Imagine 20.000 smiles, 40.000 dancing feet and 40.000 waving armes, loud music, singing, costumes and masks.
Last weekend the PULSE team went to the Gauteng Carnival and got an experience they never will forget.
Carnival has been traditionally known as a festive season. Carnival typically involves a public celebration or parade combining some elements of a circus, mask and public street party. People often dress up or masquerade during the celebrations, which mark an overturning of daily life.
Gauteng Carnival is an expression of telling the story of Gauteng region and South Africa. The hight of the process is the street procession or parade that showcases months long preparations and trainings. The Gauteng Carnival procession was officially launched 2005 as part of the Heritage Month festivities.
The Heritage Day is a South African public holiday celebrated on 24th of September. On this day, South Africans across the spectrum are encouraged to celebrate their culture and the diversity of their beliefs and traditions, in the wider context of a nation that belongs to all its people. A colorful, variated and lively nation and people that we in the PULSE team just has started to get to know! We look forward to celebrate the Heritage Day in our new home country and will of course blog about it. But before that we look forward to all the exiting work tasks we will be doing the weeks to come.
- The two Johannesburg teams outside the Field Band Foundation head office. From the left: Siri, Hanne, Vemund and Lisa
We have settled well in here in Rivonia in Johannesburg, Gauteng and in Parys, Free State. The three different teams have used to first weeks to make a lot of plans and goals to achieve during the next year – workshop, health and music tour, movie, surveys, interviews, guidance sessions etc. all linked up to the PULSE project main objectives: to create a greater understanding and practical knowledge shared about how musical activities can be a tool for health promotion, gender equalitiy and social inclusion in different societies, and in all parts of the Field Band Foundation. The Parys team also focus a lot on how to best integrate children and youth with special needs into the Field bands.
We are all very excited to be a part of the second round of the PULSE project. The last year group have achieved a lot, and we feel very privilaged to get to follow up and develop the project further! You can read more about our tasks and objectives and about us all here, and follow our activities at our Facebook page.
Written by Hanne Johansen and Siri Thorson.
Pictures Siri Thorson
PULSE Music Matters 