Eid-ul-Fitr: the end of the fast
Celebrating the end of the Ramadan fast, Muslim women prepare to pray in the Onafhankelijksplein, the park at the heart of Paramaribo’s...
Sapto Sopawiro: man of shadows
A wayang performance starts with a number of banana-tree stems (the Earth) and a large screen of white cloth (the Universe), behind which...
Earthy delights
Andromeda Gardens Bathsheba, Barbados Near a steep cliff overlooking the island’s east coast, Barbados’s best-known garden began as the...
Paramaribo: rolling in the deep
The muscles in my upper arms were screaming, protesting at the workout they were being made to undergo, the likes of which they hadn’t...
Suriname’s rainforest: journey to the back of beyond
It is a typical afternoon in Raleighvallen, a remote area of Suriname’s rainforest, perhaps not unlike a day a thousand years ago. The...
Suriname: kingdom of the silk cotton tree
Stand on a bustling Paramaribo street corner for five minutes and you’ll see the multicultural history of Suriname walking past. The...
A Sip of Suriname
It’s one o’clock in the morning in Paramaribo. I’m in the back of a taxi piloted by a Guyanese man, flying through the puddles in...
Welcome to Suriname
Judging from the faces and the food, you might be in Africa, Asia or Indonesia. Looking at the architecture in the capital no one would...
