RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

The hills of Na­pari­ma Girls’ High School are gleam­ing with the mag­i­cal en­chant­ment of their an­nu­al Christ­mas Light­fest, draw­ing scores of vis­i­tors for a dri­ve-through ex­pe­ri­ence that some say is sim­ply un­par­al­leled.

Be­neath the ma­jes­tic Na­pari­ma hills, the fresh, crisp air car­ried with it the essence of Christ­mas, a spir­it that had seemed elu­sive to many fam­i­lies since the on­set of the pan­dem­ic.

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Prin­ci­pal Karen Bal­ly said the pan­dem­ic was the cat­a­lyst be­hind the breath­tak­ing Light­fest, a spec­ta­cle that has flour­ished with sup­port from the school’s stake­hold­ers.

“This idea came about last year as we were scep­ti­cal about hav­ing the usu­al fundrais­ing bazaar and walkathon. Na­pari­ma Girls’ High School is a gov­ern­ment-as­sist­ed school and the funds raised will be go­ing for school main­te­nance and im­prove­ment,” she ex­plained.

En­try to the Christ­mas dri­ve-through costs $100 per car­load and the event’s pro­ceeds con­tribute to main­tain­ing the school, a cher­ished sym­bol of San Fer­nan­do’s pride.

Prepa­ra­tions for the Light­fest start­ed two weeks be­fore the end of the school term with stu­dents and teach­ers com­ing to­geth­er to cre­ate the spec­ta­cle, Bal­ly re­vealed.

“What is spe­cial about this is the lights are synced to mu­sic so it gives you a whole dif­fer­ent ex­pe­ri­ence. You tune in to 88.5 as you en­ter and gives you that feel­ing of joy, more than any oth­er light show,” the prin­ci­pal ex­plained.

Say­ing the show has been a great suc­cess, Bal­ly said it was al­so im­por­tant to keep chil­dren hap­py and loved.

“We hope to of­fer some lev­el of hope and joy which will help peo­ple to deal with the var­i­ous prob­lems they are go­ing through. The whole rea­son for Christ­mas is hope that this is what the birth of Je­sus Christ has brought us,” she added.

Sev­er­al spec­ta­tors ex­pressed ex­cite­ment over the Light­fest.

Randy Ma­haraj said, “It’s very cre­ative and colour­ful.

“It was well put to­geth­er and the school should be com­mend­ed.”

Be­lin­da Bridge added, “I think it’s an ex­cel­lent in­cen­tive which high­lights the cre­ativ­i­ty of this school. It is def­i­nite­ly worth the dri­ve.”

Pepee­ta Ama­r­ali who came with her son said she too was im­pressed.

“Here they have so many dif­fer­ent types of light shows. They have big Christ­mas trees, the arch­es, there are char­ac­ters, and the crèche. The school has done a fan­tas­tic job,” she added. 

The show will runs un­til De­cem­ber 23, with the last car be­ing ad­mit­ted at 9.30 pm.