It’s time again to gather up family and friends and head out to the rolling green hills of Bordeaux for the 17th annual Bordeaux Farmers Rastafari Agricultural and Cultural Food Fair on Saturday and Sunday. You’ll have no trouble finding it; just head west on St. Thomas and follow your nose. The heady aromas of fresh food will lead you.
The fair bursts with fresh produce, herbs, vegetables, cook pots filled with pumpkin soup, kallaloo, homemade vegan and raw food, pumpkin fritters – it goes on as it has for years, the annual celebration of all that is right with the world. It runs from 10 a.m. to midnight or thereabouts each day.
The fair is the proud product of the Bordeaux Farmers Collective We Grow Food Inc., illustrating the group’s belief: "To lose agriculture is to lose our culture, integrity, self-worth and pride. Without these characteristics, we as a people fail to exist."
This is the second year the fair will be held in its spiffy new covered pavilion, featuring new plumbing, lighting, a dining pavilion and a 60,000-gallon cistern. It’s located on the island’s west end, about five miles west of the University of the Virgin Islands campus.
The farmers work all year long, with a monthly market on the last Sunday, but the annual fair is their time to shine. It brings out the pride of all their toil and provides a chance to celebrate the year’s bounty.
Instead of a Farmer of the Year, a Farm Team takes center stage this year, honoring the fair’s theme: Production and Teamwork for 2014. Representing the theme is the team of Charlie Leonard, along with daughter Britany and Jeannie "Fatie" Delsoin. Leonard has received many awards for his remarkable bounty over the years, but this is a first honoring the team.
The three are a regular fixture at the Saturday Market Square market (now held at Emancipation Garden), bustling to arrange their wonderful offerings of everything from pumpkins to avocados, eggs, chickens and homemade hot sauces and honey.
In between bites of the incredible bounty of dishes, the fair has no end of activities including arts and crafts, top Ital dub masters, live/raw dishes, an all-day family activity center for the kiddies, farm tours, bee keeping demonstrations, an agricultural demonstration, drip irrigation, mulching, and composting, and everything from terrace making to tofu making.
Stage activities begin at noon Saturday with the welcome from WIGI president Zimba and presentation of the Farm Team followed by Solar Energy presentation by the V.I. Department of Energy. The afternoon will feature drumming by the Echo People, an Afrikan Fashion Show and Konyah’s Poetry Korner.
At 5 p.m. the action changes and the Reggae in the Mountains begins featuring Judah & Princess, Miko, Bassali, Nero, Tribe, Soulji Karrado, Sekemnah, Unity Band, Dj. Dilli Fingas, Jahman, Nuby Dan, Sister Joyce and Ras Batch.
Sunday’s program features the Mungo Niles Dancers and the Queens of the Earth Princess Dancers in the afternoon.
There is plenty of free parking on the road, which is about five miles from UVI.
Admission is $3 for adults, with children admitted free, daytime. The evening Reggae in the Mountains is $10 in advance or $15 at the door.
