Tuesday, May 31, 2005

cK Goes To UCLA ReggaeFest

Hot sun, hot food.. and sizzling reggae vibes!

The annual UCLA Jazz & Reggae Festival was happening on the Memorial Day weekend. Sunday was the Jazz day, and the Monday was the Reggae Day. Since I was tied up at the other festivals on the Sunday, I missed out on the Jazz part. So, I caught the Reggae Festival. I have been planning to go to this since I read about it in a UCLA magazine in early April. The artists performing that I wanted to see were: Red Rat, Anthony B, I-Wayne and Rupee.

The event ran from 12pm to 7pm. As a west indian running on island time, you know I'm not reaching until wayyyy later. I didn't arrive there until 3:30pm -- just in time to catch the last bit of I-Wayne performing. My original friends who said they were coming along with me, sold me out, and did not come at all. So I had to attend the festival by myself.

Since I was only one person, I walked right up to the front of the stage and watched the DJ try to entertain the audience while the next act set up. This one short little guy comes out, and was introduced as a reggae artist from Belize. He came out to the crowd, and I kid you not - he chanted, "Please BELIZE Me! Please BELIZE Me!"

The DJ was playing some mixes and to me seemed like he was slipping too much. I don't know who this cat was, but he would have been asked to leave the pitching mound if he was a baseball pitcher.

Anyways... since I was at the front, I had a view of the backstage area, which was the far right of the stage. There I saw MTV's Pimp My Ride's, Xzibit there posing for pictures with some girls. I took a snap from where I was from of him.

Shortly after, calypso artist Rupee came out and started to perform. The VERY first thing he said was, "I want to send a BIG-UP to all my Guyanese Crew..." I went buck and started shouting, "Guyana Massive!" Apparently, I was only one of 3 other people in the crowd of 12,000. The people in front of me turned around and looked at me very weirdly. Oh well --- they are just jealous!

Then, Rupee sent a shout out to all the people from Belize --- the crowd went nuts. It was a very full Belize crowd. Rupee went on to do the popular songs he's known for, and the crowd loved it. But it seemed a little too mellow for me. People weren't really jumping or waving their flags when he commanded them to. Just seemed like the crowd was still new to the whole calypso mentality. I also noticed a lot of people just standing there. I guess either looking to get picked up or just look pretty. That doesn't seem fun.

After a few sets, I left the front of where the stage area was and took a walk towards the back to see if I could get some nice food. As I was walking, I felt a person tug my arm... as I looked -- it was my friend, Nichole! Nichole is my half Guyanese, half Belizian friend. She was there with her sister and her parents. Her parents were more way back away from much of the loud music. I met up with Nichole's dad and had a very interesting chat about being Guyanese, west indian cuisines and things of that sort.

All in all, it was fun. It was no Toronto Caribana, or New York Labor Day, but it was still worthy of some fun consideration. At only $15 admission, I think it was a mad bargain.

Lots of food	Lots of people	about 12,000 people
That's a pic of Xzibit	Sea of people	Crowd looking to stage
Belize Reggae Artist	Rupee comes out	Rupee performing
Crowd looks on	Nichole (right) and her sister (left)	Nichole and cK