Let's go to Jamaica (part 1) - Dancehall Mecca
As Dancehall dancers we are encouraged to visit Jamaica at least once. This Caribbean island is the birthplace of Dancehall - the music, the dance, the culture - which managed to bring joy to people across the whole world. Next to music artists like Beenie Man, Spice, Popcaan, and Shenseea filling venues in different countries, Jamaican dancers are also sharing the Dancehall vibe through their worldwide tours, including Black Eagles, Sopreme Blazzaz, Overload Skankaz, Kimiko Versatile, and many more.
At the end of December 2023, I decided, with some encouragement from other dancers, that it was time to also make my way to Jamaica. Considering I’ve never been before, I was set on going on an organised group trip. That way I didn’t have to concern myself with things like booking hotels, transportation, excursions and so on. The only thing I had to do was book my flights. The moment I arrived, I would be picked up at the airport. Chill, right?
The group trip that I signed up with was Let’s Go To Jamaica. It’s run by Johanna Enough from Sweden, and she has been organising trips for dancers for several years now. Currently, Let’s Go To Jamaica plans two trips per year: one in January and one in July/August.
I signed up for this trip alone: I didn’t ask anyone I know if they were or would be interested in joining. As I’m not the most social when it comes to meeting new people, it was a bit of a risk to go with a group full of people I didn’t know, but, hey, they say it’s good to do things that make you uncomfortable sometimes! 😅
Trip to Ocho Rios
The start of my trip took me from my home to Brussels Airport, a layover at Frankfurt Airport, a layover-ish at Holguin Airport, and finally Montego Bay. Although I was the only person from Belgium, I did not travel alone the whole time. Before leaving I noticed in the planning we got from Johanna that I would be on the same flight from Frankfurt as three other people who would be joining the trip as well. I did something that I wouldn't normally do: I texted Sophia, Anne, and Helen (total strangers at that point!) to see if they wanted to meet up at the gate before our flight. They agreed to link up and so we got to introduce ourselves before boarding our 12-hour flight. They were very open and I felt pretty comfortable around them. Not a bad start!
The flight itself went by fairly fast. I never got too bored: I spent my time mostly watching YouTube and Netflix. Sleeping was not a part of the flight for me though. I never manage to get a lot of sleep on these long flights, mostly because I can’t get comfortable enough to fall asleep (for a long time).
We didn’t have a direct flight to Montego Bay: we first made a stop in Cuba. There we got off the plane, got handed a “transfer ticket”, and then had to wait to board the plane again, before the other passengers. This is the first time I ever had a layover like this. My previous layovers were with two tickets: one for the first plane and a second one for the second plane. For the latter, we would just queue with the other people to board the plane. There was no difference with the other passengers. But hey, if it works, it works 🤷
Once we got on the plane again, it was only an hour until we touched down in Montego Bay. Once we got through border security and collected our luggage, we met up with our driver who took us on a 1,5 to 2-hour journey to the Sandcastles Resort where we would spend the first week of our Jamaica trip.
Week 1 - Dancehall Mecca at Ocho Rios
The first week we participated in Dancehall Mecca’s 4th Summer edition. It’s a dance camp/festival filled with Dancehall activities in Ocho Rios that started in 2019. The biggest part was the dance classes: there were 15 of them including Sashi Empire, Latonya Style, and crews like Sopreme Blazzaz, Endevarous, and Active Immortals. My favourite classes were the combo class of Sashi and Dansa Bling, Sopreme Blazzaz, and Endevarous. The first one is because Sashi was teaching Skanking. The second one is because we got four flow moves and that is something that I really want to work on. The third one is because Geminai started explaining the first move by saying “You don’t stop this groove until we tell you to”. 😄
The classes took place on the tennis court of the resort. The teachers and the DJ were together on a stage. On the left, we had a view of the mountainside with all the greenery. Looking at that made me realise that “Damn, I am really taking a class in Jamaica.” This view is such a stark contrast to the “view” we have when taking a class in a room in Europe. I don’t have a picture of this view from the tennis court, but you can see it from the same direction in the picture above, which was taken when walking back from the city centre of Ocho Rios to the resort.
Besides dance classes, we also went to one of the famous parties in Kingston: Uptown Mondays. We left with two buses from Ocho Rios and headed out to Kingston, where we arrived around 1:30. It was my first Dancehall party in Jamaica and I was really curious to see how these parties are. I have heard a lot about them, especially from Jamaicans when they are teaching in Europe, and caught glimpses of them from videos online. Although the Jamaican dancers were dancing, the other partygoers didn’t dance much. Now, that could be a one-off, so I’m not saying that this is always the case of course. But I expected to see more dancing in general. The non-dancers were mostly just standing still and watching the dancers during a dancing segment. Nonetheless, it was a great experience to attend such an iconic Dancehall event.
On the third day, we went to the White River in the morning, before hitting three classes in the afternoon. It was our first nature excursion of the trip. It was the first time I went to a beach in 8 years. The last time was in Greece in 2016. So I’m clearly not a beachgoer, by any metric. That probably also explains why my back got sunburned 😬 It was the first time that we were in a (more) quiet place. There is always something going on at the resort or Mecca, so you don’t really have this type of downtime.
The next day included more beachgoing: it was a beach day at Mecca. I was definitely going out of my comfort zone here 😆 Okay, okay, I’m exaggerating now. 😉 They planned a video shoot, classes, and dinner on the beach connected to the resort. Eventually, we did two shoots: one with everybody participating in Mecca and one with only the people of Let’s Go To Jamaica, which was actually almost half of the Mecca group.
Dancing on the beach is really different from solid ground, which we had at the tennis court, when it comes to footing. The classes we did with Gabbidon and Shelly Belly did not require us to go super crazy and be super stable, so that helped. This was a bit different for the party after the dinner if we wanted to stay with the energy of the music and dance full out. 😅 It’s an experience… but let’s say I prefer concrete. ✌️
The last day of Mecca was filled with four classes including two by crews that I’ve never had a class from before: Endevarous and Too Kool Dancers. Like I said before Endevarous was one of my favourite classes, but the one by Too Kool dancers was also definitely worth it because of the flow of the steps they taught.
After having taken our final classes, how do they compare to ones in Europe? They are very similar with respect to how the Jamaicans teach. But there are more Jamaican dancers at Mecca and they will jump on stage and join the classes, including dancers from other crews than the ones that are teaching. During all the classes I took, we were only shown moves and steps, no choreographies. In general, this is how I prefer it.
On the final night, the World Championships took place, consisting of two categories: one for Jamaican dancers only and one for international dancers. I was one of the participants in the championships! Interesting to notice, as you can see on the flyer, is that the international category has 7 women and 1 man, while the Jamaican category has 2 women and 6 men. And it’s reflective of how it is in the European community: most of the non-Jamaican dancers are women and most of the Jamaican teachers are men. Male non-Jamaican dancers and female Jamaican teachers are rather an exception. However, the latter is changing, at least compared to five years ago I think. Which obviously is a great change!
The battle itself was definitely a great experience because of the fact that it’s in Jamaica! The battle followed the common knock-out format: once you lose a battle you are out. The first round was an exhibition round: we picked our own song and could dance to it for 30-40 seconds. Based on those rounds the judges - Zidan Xqlusiv, Geminai Endevarous and Cojo Hotfoot - chose the top 4. Those top 4 each chose randomly a name from the bottom 4. Those combinations would be the quarter-finals. I was in the top 4 and had my first battle against Kristina, against whom I’d never competed before. The quarter-finals were all new school rounds: the DJ played new school music and we were expected to dance new school. I won! On to the semi-finals against Sabrina Berryz.
Where the quarter-finals were focused on new school, the semi-finals focused on middle school. Well, that was the idea… When the music started I was like “Wait, this is new school, not middle school.” Regardless, I still danced and did middle school moves, as this was what we were told to do. I lost the battle. And to be honest, I believe I should have won. Although the music was new school, I followed the rules and Sabrina didn’t. She danced both middle and new school. If we didn’t get the assignment to dance middle school, then sure I would have danced new school on that specific song.
It was definitely a disappointment. Although I would have been (more) upset at another battle, here I didn’t want to let it get to me too much, because I still wanted to be able to enjoy the rest of the trip. I will leave it at what one of the Jamaican participants told me after my battle “You got robbed.”
Overall, Dancehall Mecca was awesome start to my trip! 😄 The combination of classes, trips, and being around others dancers in Jamaica made it a great experience. And I suggest to everyone to consider it when planning their trip to Jamaica. I will definitely do that if I go a second time.
Join me again next week for the second part of my trip!
Update: part 2 is available now! Read about my week in Kingston.