Christmas Tree Lighting at Havensight
Havensight is the outdoor shopping area by the main cruise ship dock. Last Wednesday was the annual tree lighting ceremony and party and we were strongly encouraged to attend by those I work with at the courthouse. So, rather willingly at 5:30, I left work to walk over there; it's only about a mile and I see tons of tourists do this walk daily. Dave drove straight from work and met me there.
There was quite a tall Christmas tree at the main part of Havensight. (The live Christmas trees arrived on St Thomas on Tuesday last week. Apparently we get two crates full. One of which is at Home Depot now. Yes, the Christmas tree lots here are really just refrigerated backs of semi-trucks.) A large steel drum band of students was playing music and promptly at six o'clock the lights came on the tree, and I believe Santa arrived shortly thereafter. Dave and I decided to take advantage of the shops being open late and bought a few Christmas gifts while we wanted around Havensight which is made up of about 6 long rectangular buildings. There are roads between these buildings but for the party they were blocked off and filled with people like us wandering around or dancing to the band that was playing in that section of Havensight. I think there were about 6 or 7 different bands, all playing very different music. There were also dancers and mocko jumbies (traditional folk characters - brightly dressed people walking on stilts - the elevated spirits).
Of course, a big part of the celebration was food. There were tons of food booths. We recognized some of the vendors from the agricultural fair at UVI. I tried kallaloo soup for the first time. It is a traditional soup around Christmas though it can be found year round here, though not many restaurants serve it daily. It's typically fish soup with lots of greens, okra and various spices. Sometimes pork is added in as well apparently. Kallaloo usually comes with fungi too. Even though I'm not a fan of okra, I do like fungi! It's made of cornmeal and okra. I enjoyed my dinner and had a sour sop juice to drink too. Dave had pork, local potato stuffing (very tasty stuff, have we mentioned it before?....) and various other side dishes with his guava drink.
Then we hit the dessert vendors! We tasted sugar cakes - I couldn't really explain what this is like.. the sugar is crystalized but it's still soft somehow, there was an almond flavor to it as well. One recipe I just found online says it has coconut, water, sugar, cream of tartar, and almond essence. We should try making them at home... We also tried mango something. it was okay but not fabulous. Then we got some Caribbean candy canes. They are made in rectangular pieces and are quite thick - about an inch or two wide and 1/2 inch deep and the lengths vary but the ones we got were about 6 inches. plenty of sugar! Very pepperminty sugary taste.
All in all, we enjoyed our first Caribbean Christmas event and we are looking forward to Miracle on Main Street this Friday, which sounds like the same thing as the Havensight party except its near the shops in town instead. Any excuse for food and music!
There was quite a tall Christmas tree at the main part of Havensight. (The live Christmas trees arrived on St Thomas on Tuesday last week. Apparently we get two crates full. One of which is at Home Depot now. Yes, the Christmas tree lots here are really just refrigerated backs of semi-trucks.) A large steel drum band of students was playing music and promptly at six o'clock the lights came on the tree, and I believe Santa arrived shortly thereafter. Dave and I decided to take advantage of the shops being open late and bought a few Christmas gifts while we wanted around Havensight which is made up of about 6 long rectangular buildings. There are roads between these buildings but for the party they were blocked off and filled with people like us wandering around or dancing to the band that was playing in that section of Havensight. I think there were about 6 or 7 different bands, all playing very different music. There were also dancers and mocko jumbies (traditional folk characters - brightly dressed people walking on stilts - the elevated spirits).
Of course, a big part of the celebration was food. There were tons of food booths. We recognized some of the vendors from the agricultural fair at UVI. I tried kallaloo soup for the first time. It is a traditional soup around Christmas though it can be found year round here, though not many restaurants serve it daily. It's typically fish soup with lots of greens, okra and various spices. Sometimes pork is added in as well apparently. Kallaloo usually comes with fungi too. Even though I'm not a fan of okra, I do like fungi! It's made of cornmeal and okra. I enjoyed my dinner and had a sour sop juice to drink too. Dave had pork, local potato stuffing (very tasty stuff, have we mentioned it before?....) and various other side dishes with his guava drink.
Then we hit the dessert vendors! We tasted sugar cakes - I couldn't really explain what this is like.. the sugar is crystalized but it's still soft somehow, there was an almond flavor to it as well. One recipe I just found online says it has coconut, water, sugar, cream of tartar, and almond essence. We should try making them at home... We also tried mango something. it was okay but not fabulous. Then we got some Caribbean candy canes. They are made in rectangular pieces and are quite thick - about an inch or two wide and 1/2 inch deep and the lengths vary but the ones we got were about 6 inches. plenty of sugar! Very pepperminty sugary taste.
All in all, we enjoyed our first Caribbean Christmas event and we are looking forward to Miracle on Main Street this Friday, which sounds like the same thing as the Havensight party except its near the shops in town instead. Any excuse for food and music!
posted by Kendra at 11:36 AM
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