The Easter season got off to a fun start for children of Albouystown, Georgetown, when Guyanese from the diaspora volunteered their skills during a kite-making workshop to keep the cultural tradition alive.
Rotarian Janice Hall, who traveled from New Jersey, made a donation towards the purchase of kite-making material and snacks, while putting a smile on the faces of the children, many who never had the opportunity to participate in the pastime.
Hall said kite making is a wonderful tradition that is dying because there are imported options. Some of the kids, who took part, would not have had a kite to fly otherwise.
“By teaching kids the art of kite making, I am hoping they also learn self reliance. Besides, it was wonderful to see them get excited as their kites take shape from frame, to paper and glue.”
“As their kites soar about the ground, I hope they too can rise above their current situations and reach great heights in their lives,” said Hall, who was part of the initial kite making session one year ago, in the same village where she was born.
The kite-making workshop is one of many other initiatives, the newly elected Georgetown City Counsellor, Malcolm Ferriera, has planned to give back to the village where he too was born, and grew up.
A broadcaster, mentor, and politician, Ferriera, who seem to be loved and respected by the children, said the pleasure has always been his to help the community, while keeping certain cultures alive.
“We could have asked for financing to purchase kits but that was not our tradition and custom as children. We cannot make the art and joy of learning to make a kite, and raising a kite in the air to just go away. We chose to do this a second year, to also bring the community together,” he added.
One hundred kids were taught to enhance wooden frames donated by joiners in the community. They added paper, and personalized the kites in color and designed, said the dread-locked Ferriera, who dedicates his time to ensure kids in the underprivileged community thrive.
In addition, he heads the “Ambitious Future Leaders” group, that benefit from academics, vocational skills, as well as life skills, proper nutrition, anti-bullying, drug and alcohol abuse, and teenage pregnancy education.
Ferriera, with the help of influential communications professional, Margaret Lawrence, will start an audio engineering program to give youth more options for the future.
He looks forward to expanding future projects, with the help of the community and the Guyanese diaspora, through his WhatsApp platform (011-592-628-8245). Sponsorship of kite making workshops, mentoring program, or financial donations, will be accepted through this medium.
Despite the inclement weather on Easter Monday, April 2, thousands of kids and parents alike littered the busy oceanfront Seawall, and other wide open spaces around the Georgetown environs, where colorful kits were hoisted.
Kite flying is one of the most exciting and cherished festival, celebrated nationwide by families. Kites of all color, size and shape, uniquely designed were seen flying in the sky.
The celebration starts weeks before Easter Monday, a symbolic occasion for kite lovers, many who choose plastic imported bird kite, a cheaper version to the traditional wood frame design.
