Beyond the beaches

The Bahamas has changed a lot in its 50 years of independence, but there are still places where life is much the same and history and traditions run deep Words & photographs

- Lyn Hughes 

"When I was four years old, I was in bed on Christmas night and heard people dancing in the street outside. I wanted to join them, so my mother put a costume on me and I went out and danced. I've been doing it every Christmas since!"

Now in her 70s, but exuding a crackling energy, Arlene Nash Ferguson's eyes shone as she showed me around her Educulture Junkanoo Museum, based in her former family home in Nassau on New Providence Island. "This was where I was born; where I grew up."

Junkanoo, a street parade of music, costumes and dance, was first documented in the Bahamas in 1801 but probably started much earlier than that. Under British law, enslaved people had to have time off at Christmas, so they used to recreate the festivals they had celebrated back home. Boxing Day and New Year's Day are still the main dates for the major Junkanoo parades; others occur on special occasions and events, but all are held in the small hours - "We wait until nighttime. It starts just after midnight," explained Arlene.

Costumes have always been made out of whatever is available. There was a time when sponge diving was important to the islands, so the designs back then were all crafted from sponges; however, for some time now they have been fashioned from paper or card.

"I find it ironic that paper became the material used for the costumes. Slaves were not allowed to read or write," Arlene told me.