Latinos extend “Children’s Day” Celebration to Guyana

Jul 18, 2022 News

Linero taking a group photo with some of the children who showed up to celebrate their day

By Shervin Belgrave

Kaieteur News – Scores of Venezuelans, Cubans and a few Guyanese on Sunday turned-up at the Critchlow Labour College on Wolford Avenue, Georgetown, to celebrate “Children’s Day”, an annual tradition that is very popular in Latin countries but totally new to Guyana and the rest of the Caribbean.

“Children’s Day” is similar to the traditional Mother’s Day and Father’s Day celebration observed globally. In Latin American Countries, especially Venezuela and Cuba, “Children’s Day” is celebrated on the third Sunday of July every year.

Children would wait in anticipation for this special day, because their parents would buy them gifts, prepare their favourite meals, buy them sweets and take them for outings at fun parks, watch a movie, play games or even take them for a picnic and a trip to the zoo.

This year “Children’s Day” fell on Sunday July 17 and the Cuban and Venezuelan migrant community living in Guyana decided to unite and celebrate it here. In fact they wanted to share this culture with Guyanese.

Speaking with Kaieteur News at the celebration was one of the organisers of the event Miguel Linero. According to Linero this is the second time that he and his team have organised a “Children’s Day” event in Guyana and they are hoping that it can become an annual celebration in the country.

One of the organizers of the event, Miguel Linero posing for a photo with his wife

The first was held last year on the lawns of the YMCA building located on the corner of Camp Road and Carifesta Avenue, but the majority of attendees were people from the migrant community. This year, however, it could be noted that Guyanese are also getting involved in the celebrations and Linero said, that this is the intention of the Migrant community living in Guyana, “to share its culture with Guyanese and also to learn of the Guyanese culture”.

“Y esta es una muestra de lo que es la intencion que tenemos los latinos, que es lo que queremos lograr con los Guyaneses. No solomente hemos venido a trabajar sino tambien hemos venido a intercambiar culturalmente, compartir nuestros costumbres y nuestros tradiciones”, Linero said.

(This is one example of what we Latinos want to achieve with Guyanese. We have not only come here to work but also to exchange our cultures, share our customs and traditions)
Children’s Day, related Linero, is just the beginning and hopes that sometime in the near future, the migrant community can find more ways to share their culture with Guyanese by organising bigger traditional festivals. To make the Children’s Day celebration possible, local Cuban and Venezuelan businesses partnered with Guyanese businesses in pooling their resources together.

Scores of families showed up and their children participated in many fun activities such as, face painting and games. There were treats for all and they played together in the bouncy castle and trampoline that were set on the lawns of the Critchlow Labour College.