“Let us dance! Let us celebrate life!” This was the message of this year’s Celebrate Dance; Celebrate Life performance held at the Frank Collymore Hall Saturday night.
The HIV & AIDS awareness initiative in its seventh year under the direction of the Ministry of Tourism in collaboration with Dancin’ Africa who, as part of their own 20th anniversary celebrations undertook the task of raising awareness through the power of dance.
There were seven performances, six of which were done by Dancin’ Africa, which hit emotional resonance with the audience through the underlying messages expressed in the dances.
The first performance entitled The Issue; Three Little Words, depicted how the words Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) wreaks just as much havoc on an individual’s psyche as on their body.
The next performance, Everybody’s Business; And So The Streets Turn Red, depicted a promiscuous male having very public displays of affection with multiple partners, which soon lead to the deterioration of his health but also to spiritual salvation.
The two performances following this, Choices And Consequences; Parabellum 1 and Living with HIV AIDS; Parabellum 2, portrayed all but one of three couples protecting their sexual health, and a woman living with AIDS recounting her life struggles with emotional fervor, respectively.
The former performance showed the creativity of Dancin’ Africa, where their costumes and dance routine depicted both fertilization and contamination of the young mother.
The final three performances, Stigma and Discrimination; Third Phase, Be Kind – Embrace; Red River Embrace, and Celebrate Life With Hope; We Praise You Lord all accomplished their objective of further raising awareness and moving the audience, with their respective depictions of the misinformation and discrimination that plague HIV/AIDS victims, the quilt that is the human race and the love that should be shown to all, equally, and the last with the powerful message that in spite of having a “death sentence”, victims should praise God and life should be celebrated.
The performances of Dancin’ Africa stirred the emotions and cranked the mental gears of the audience, but most importantly showed that in the end, love conquers all afflictions.