The an­nu­al Or­isha Olokun Fes­ti­val will be held at Dhein's Bay, Care­nage, on Oc­to­ber 24. Ac­tiv­i­ties on the wa­ter­front will be­gin at 10 am. The Olokun Fes­ti­val is the Or­isha Fes­ti­val of the Ocean in which man's in­dis­pens­able link and con­nec­tiv­i­ty to the force of the ocean is cel­e­brat­ed.

Olokun is the de­ity of the deep ocean, marsh­es and wet­lands, and is pro­tec­tor of the African di­as­po­ra. The theme for this year's Fes­ti­val is "Re­ju­ve­nat­ing the old and build­ing new African In­sti­tu­tions." As is­land peo­ple, Olokun is es­pe­cial­ly im­por­tant to Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean. As usu­al the fes­ti­val will be host­ed by Egbe On­isin Ele­du­mare.

Earth is the blue plan­et. It is our ocean and its wa­ter sys­tem that sus­tains and has made pos­si­ble all life on Plan­et Earth. The plan­et's oceans and seas ab­sorb and neu­tralise the agents of pol­lu­tion, pro­vide food, raw ma­te­ri­als, med­i­cine, recre­ation, trans­port and com­mu­ni­ca­tions for bil­lions of the plan­et's in­hab­i­tants. Mankind pol­lutes the ocean at his per­il.

Many Old World so­ci­eties recog­nise the crit­i­cal sa­cred sig­nif­i­cance of the seas and oceans, and spe­cial pro­pi­tia­to­ry rites are per­formed each year to en­cour­age the co-op­er­a­tion of the liv­ing force called sea or ocean.

To­day in the West­ern world, many are scep­ti­cal that the sea/ocean is home to sa­cred in­tel­li­gences that com­mu­ni­cate and co-op­er­ate with us in sus­tain­ing bal­ance and equi­lib­ri­um.The Or­isha com­mu­ni­ty con­tin­ues to be­lieve that com­mu­nion with the ocean is nec­es­sary for our sur­vival. The Olokun Fes­ti­val is one of the ma­jor fes­ti­vals on the lo­cal Or­isha cal­en­dar for this rea­son.

The At­lantic Ocean is al­so the an­ces­tral grave­yard of tens of thou­sands of de­ceased Africans who lost their lives in the bru­tal cross­ing of the Mid­dle Pas­sage on the ter­ri­fy­ing voy­age from Africa to be forced in­to slav­ery in the New World. Olokun is the guardian of these de­part­ed spir­its and is al­so guardian of all African de­scen­dents in the New World.

Each year, in T&T, the Olokun Fes­ti­val is cel­e­brat­ed at a dif­fer­ent beach, riv­er mouth or man­grove at a spe­cial­ly div­inat­ed site. This year it re­turns to Dhein's Bay in Care­nage.

Olokun's colour is white, but devo­tees and vis­i­tors can wear colours rep­re­sent­ing their shrines or Or­isha. Items of of­fer­ing in­clude fruits, peas, corn, yam and coins.

MORE IN­FO

For book­ings and fur­ther in­for­ma­tion: Olu­dari San­gode (727-3712);

Oloye Orawale Oranfe (380-9382);

or Rubadiri

(797-0949).

Al­so one can vis­it: http://yorubasa­cred­science­cen­tre.word­press.com