THE Ministry of Natural Resources is “ready fuh di road” come February 23, when the Mashramani float parade takes centre stage down the streets of Georgetown.The Ministry on Wednesday launched its Mash Band in the compound of the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC).
No one seems more excited about the float than Junior Minister within the Ministry, Simona Broomes. Broomes was present at the event on behalf of the subject Minister, Raphael Trotman.
Decked out with the Guyana flag painted on her face, a jovial Broomes led yesterday’s mini-fete, as the Ministry showcased a few pieces from its Mash Band, set to sounds of blaring soca music.
“The Ministry of Natural Resources wants to say to all Guyana: look forward for it, we coming down the road,” proclaimed Broomes.
The Ministry will be entering in the medium full costume, and semi-costume categories. Broomes boasted that the band will be looking to cater for 160 patrons, and encouraged employees to take part and grab their costumes early.
Members of the public desirous of doing so can also be a part of the Ministry’s procession, and it is all absolutely free of cost. Persons need only go in and register to get one of the costumes; they’ll be several to choose from.
The band being designed by award winning costume designer, Neilson Nurse, is conceptualised under the Ministry’s own Mashramani sub-theme, “Maintaining and promoting rehabilitation of our forest resources towards a green economy.”
Nurse also gave a tour of the Mash Camp, where he is designing all of these exciting costumes.
The main female costume will be the “Queen” costume, while the main male costume will feature the “Cock of the Rock”.
“With the queen, we’re playing with the whole idea of the story of ‘in the heart of a seed’, so she actually bursts open and you get a new plant within. Along the route her costume continues to expand because we’re using the concept of pollination, with the butterfly and wind, which assists with that. With the “Cock of the Rock” we wanted to use something unique to Guyana, most people would prefer the Canje Pheasant but in my mind that is overdone, so we wanted to bring out another majestic bird and the Cock of the Rock is one of those birds,” Nurse explained, as he showed sketches of some of the other costumes.
Not done yet, there is also the float. For the design of this, Neilson combined several of the industries covered under the Ministry’s purview.
“For the float we’re looking at the whole forest and reforestation. It’s a float with revelers, you will see them mining and if you follow the storyline, the water from the mines flows into the river which introduces the offshore mining and so on. It’s showing the current industry leading into the future industry,” Nurse said.
