CHILDREN on Fort Island and other riverain communities, located at the mouth of the Essequibo River, were treated to a Mashramani spectacle on the once Dutch capital, at the first-ever ‘Mash’ celebration held there on Sunday.

“I decided to plan the event because children in the riverain areas don’t really have the opportunity to go to Georgetown to see the floats [at the Mashramani float parade],” organiser of the event, Pretti Debedin said.

At Fort Island, there are about 26 children, while there are varying numbers of children living at Leguan, Bonasika, Parika and the other nearby communities. As part of the historic celebrations, there was a small parade along the walkway where Fort Zeelandia is located, not far from the health centre. It was there that three small floats and the crowd revelled in their own way.
Following the parade, there was a small cultural programme at the health centre.
“The youths on the island don’t have a playground to really enjoy themselves, so I took advantage of the holiday so that they could celebrate Mashramani,” Debedin told the Guyana Chronicle.

Debedin has been living on the island for the past 15 years, and she is the nurse-in-charge at the health centre there. She used her position to invite persons to the event and more importantly, garner their support to celebrate the occasion.

She planned with Old Fort Tours, a tour company based at Parika that would frequent the island, and in three weeks she was able to string together the historic event.
“This is just the beginning, and we want to make it bigger and bigger each year, so that the children can see a lot of floats right here,” Debedin said.

The event which was entirely community-organised, was lauded by Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan, who was in attendance.
“This was an exceptionally well-done activity, and it reveals that the local communities can do the organisation and the arrangements to make things happen within the community,’ he said.
According to him, the event might have been small in comparison to the Mashramani events held in other parts of Guyana, but stressed that it could blossom into a

sophisticated celebration.
“These are but the seeds for which better things can come,” he said, while adding: “We need more kinds of initiatives like this, so that we can build our own cultural things in and around the islands, and in and around the communities of the Essequibo.”
He acknowledged that the community might be one that has its own problems, but at the end of the day, it has demonstrated a “cooperative effort” in combining contributions to make the event a success.

“Sometimes when you have that independence of financing activities, it helps [because] not everything must come from the government,” he said. Cognisant that the community is hoping to enhance the celebrations next year, he expressed his personal support and that of the government in helping to make that a reality.