Dominica

It takes place every June 29 with Masses, folk dancing, fireworks, games, street rummage sales and regional whimsical games. Many people observe this religious celebration that cheer people up. Houses are festooned with blue and white see-through paper ribbons. Bells begin to toll since daybreak, people crack fireworks all day long and the Patron Saint is taken out in procession. As we all know, the traditional and classical icon for this holy celebration stands for the two apostles hugging and kissing each other. Many people construe this apostolic kiss in many ways. For some, it means the encounter of the East (personified by Paul) and the West (personified by Peter). For others, it simply stands for the shared end of both apostles as Rome martyrs, where one of them was beheaded and the other one crucified as his Master was.

On this day, people observe the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, the Redeemer of the World, the Son of the Virgin Mary, born in Bethlehem, giving out peace and love as His most coveted gifts. During Christmas' Eve, a dinner among family members or friends takes place, where everybody hopefully waits for the December 25 Holiday. This is an ideal date to remember the teachings of this sublime Teacher of Love and Compassion, and compare this all with our way of living. Thus, we will be able to set up a standard to follow in our daily lives, in harmony with the lessons learned this way, and so make a contribution for the strengthening of human values in our society.

It's equally celebrated in all Latin American and Caribbean nations. Some of these countries, aware of the importance of their respective people’s actions for achieving a common goal, have inserted in their own cultures the tradition of the new goals to be attained during the New Year. By and large, this usually happens in a casual meeting linked to this particular celebration (New Year's Eve dinner, or the first meeting of family members and friends on the New Year’s very first day. Tradition goes that people in that family reunion must tell one another their wishes for the New Year as a way of sharing opinions.When the clock ticks by closer and closer to midnight, some people like eating grapes over each and every toll of the bells, just for the sake of good luck. Then, right at that moment, people hug one another; lovers wait for the occasion to kiss each other the Old Year away; drivers honks their cars and fireworks light up the night everywhere. A few minutes later, some begin to dine their traditional dishes saved for that special occasion; other toast; some others dance or hit the streets to party the night away.

It's already been 111 years since this date was first observed worldwide in due tribute to the longstanding battle of the working people for their demands.The commemoration was first held in Paris to honor the memory of the Chicago Martyrs, a bunch of workers that was dragged to the gallows, charged with demanding an 8-hour working day.In the mid 19th Century, retellers of that moment say, both in Europe and in America, in the emerging industrial factories, workers were forced to accept 12-to-14-hour working days, six days a week, even for children and women in toilsome jobs amid a poisoning and unhealthy environment. European immigrants coming to America in search of a better life, only managed to shake the dregs of the old feudal system off their backs in return for the ferocious appetite of a fledgling Capitalism that was dramatically profiting from the increase of the day’s working hours. Poor British immigrants were the first ever to spread social unrest among their brethren, and they brought to America the struggle they had started back in England for the 8-hour working day.

As in almost all of the Americas, Columbus Day is observed in the region every October 12. The Bahamas archipelago was one of the Caribbean's few areas where the Arawacks were not displaced by the Caribe people. These American indians were probably the very first ever to “discover” the European sailors on October 12, 1492. In fact, it was maybe on the former island of Watling –now the Bahamas- where Christopher Columbus first set foot on American land, though he thought he'd come to Asia.

Barbados became a self-ruled country in 1961 and its independence was proclaimed on November 30, 1966 within the British Commonwealth. Errol W. Barrow, known as the Father of Political Independence, was elected as the island's first governor. Unlike the rest of the West Indies, Barbados never broke away from its metropolis.

West Indies associates negotiated independence from Great Britain by all by themselves. In the case of Dominique, the bargaining process was led by Labor Party Prime Minister Patrick R. John. In 1978, the island nation's new status won passage in the British Parliament. On November 3 that same year, 485 years after the landing of Christopher Columbus, Dominique became an independent State.

During his voyage around the Caribbean Basin, on November 3, 1493, Christopher Columbus landed on a small island he named Dominique. On that soil he nailed a cross as a symbol of the Spanish Crown's new possession.