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The 'Sound'. I was determined to get it and achieved perfection! It's done by getting the Soapy water and Clothes between your fingertips and knuckles. Then you rub together vigorously and listen keenly, then adjust accordingly
I adored those days, the washing at the river, dying and polishing the floor..then shining with the coconut brush, making our own coffee,coconut oil,planting our own rice 🍚, bathe in metal pan,using enamel pail and chimney.. etc
Our knees are crying now with arthritis. lol. It was rewarding because you had a sense of completion and accomplishment. We received a reward every Saturday after scrubbing the floor and polishing with bismark
I remember as a child that my mom washed by hand in the bath she came to the UK in the 60’s from Jamaica. I was born in the 70’s and when she would wash by hand she would make that sound with the clothes 😄😄
That washing sound is what got me to start washing. Lol Sir Kareem, I love your energy and your zest. If I have one critique for you, sir, is. Let your quest finish their thoughts before you interject with your follow-up questions. Trust you are me so excited to hear this out . Love it, but it derail the thought of the person before they are finished
I’ve washed in the bath pan with the scrub board. Used a kattah on my head to carry water; done the bleaching as she just described; scripted the water, etc. Followed the soaking process, but never in the river! In the zinc bath pan or a huge Mahogany bowl for washing and bathing. Yes, done two soapy water and one rinse. Walked barefoot to school, aaawwwh. Scrubbed the floor kneeling on my knees, yaks! Did chores before and after school. Grate coconut make coconut oil. Used that similar “bucket”. To make ice cream at home - special treat that was! Trifle cake - made on Sundays - poor man’s pound cake. Had grated fresh coconut. Yummy. Not only done in Jamaica. Yes,ma’am - did the kerosene lamp too and the hurricane lantern for outside. Mercy!Belize!! Memories. Yea, did the kerosene stove too. Thought that was great, not using the firehearth burning dry wood! Baked on the hearth bread, Johnny cakes and Christmas fruit and pound cakes. Not to mention starched clothes. Yes, cleaned shoes and tennis shoes…sneakers. Had two uniforms to last one or two or more years…until they wore out. Used the coal stove iron, and the gasoline iron. Mercy!! Those were the days. And white clothes were White. Yes, I used a crinoline skirt. Had only one that I sewed on the hand Singer’s sewing machine. Thank you for sharing
One of my greatest delights was to discover Kareem's Quest. These discussions are making me so nostalgic. When I started high school in the early 1960s, I had to use the flat irons on the coal stove to iron my clothes including school uniforms and gym tunics made out of white drill. Since the iron was directly on the coals I had to use an old rag to clean the iron surface before putting it on the item being ironed. The bigger iron with the live coals inside was called a self-heater. Tailors and seamstresses used these to iron their finished products. Self-heaters were used to iron big items like bed linen and curtains. Thank God, we no longer starch and iron bed linen. Then came the electric iron! Quick easy ironing but larger electricity bills. Do you know, even now, people still grate coconuts and other items with a grater. For me, thank God for the inventor of the Magic Bullet. When we had to shine floors with the coconut brush, we would use an old towel or old bedspread to kneel on to protect the knees. Imagine my delight when I went home one holiday to find my aunt had bought a Hoover.
They use to have some lamps made from tins we used those in the kitchen and torchbottle made with paper and kerosene oil to use outdoor or going to the pit toilet in the night. 😅
I remember the coal oil lamp with “Home Sweet Home” on it. When I came home from living and teaching in Jamaica, I brought with me, one of those lamps, and I still have it to this day. It is a significant reminder of the many times we lit lamps when the electricity was off and we needed to have school work to mark.
In my house now I have a coal stove, a coal stove iron, an ice shaver that they used to make snow-cone, and a kerosene lamp ( now I use lamp oil). My brother came to visit from Maui recently and he was asking me where I find these things!? A blast from the past!!
Instilled discipline and responsibility..... I had goats and had to tie them out in the wee hours of the morning before going to school. I remember the helper using the coconut brush. It was not just for wood floor. We had concrete I believe. And it was a red polish. Also remember when hoover came in. I remember the sound when washing by hand. I could never produce that sound but it really had nothing to do with the cleaning. Lol. This is soooo awesome... Keep up the good work.
Washing with the scrip-scrip sound was a must throughout the Caribbean I think . It was a way big monitoring the young person doing the washing I suspect- without having to look !
The screw thing for the lamp was called 'The Burner' we used to sell them in our shops both in Time and Patience (Linstead) and Oxford, St. Mary. I love watching the show.
We used ashes and cho cho leaves to wash the chimmy.Also we went to bush to get leaves from the salindine tree that was used as a stain for the wood floors
" Catta/ Katta" was , in my district of Pike, near Coleyville in Manchester...made from pulling off dried leaves from a Banana Plant and coiling & twisting it to make a "😊head rest" for the Duna Pan or Water Keg...if it slips off, the water keg/ "Duna" would burn your " pate" ( head top) and hurt yr neck. Some of this banana leaves would be torn apart and put on top of the water to minimize sloshing out if no cover was there to do so. 😊
Yes, cleaning is one of hardest jobs. However, my favorite parts of washing is the scrips scrips, scrab board, shinning wooden and tile floor, karosine oil lamp, gratering coconuts and potatoes to make pudding, coal irons, wearing cottas on my head to bring crocus bags of Primento Seeds to sell. However, my absoulte favorite is the Fuggie and Ice Cream. Over, these traditional living brought back so much memories. Yes, before Usain Bolt became the Fastest Man on Earth. He said, when he first started Tracks and Field the first he wanted to buy his mother was a Washing Machine.
I grown up in the seventy in Grenada and that was my life watching in the river growing down on my knees to scrub the floor first I had to scrape the floor with a knife fist then whip it also the greating of coconut to make oil the ice cream I really enjoyed that with my grandma every thing she was saying is so true
Such beautiful memories, growing up in ST. Thomas I had the great experience of many of these. The greatest was a day at the PLantain Garden River. Wonderful memories. Kareem the environment was cleaner then than now. Those hardships allow us to strive and make us who we are today. Excellent program especially for those of us overseas.
Keep recording this lady and many others before they pass over because we have lostso much heritage I remember some of the songs MissLou and many others usec to sing and didn't realize they all had allegoric meanings Would love to delve into some of those treasures from the past
OMG, I just remembered that we also used to make our own ice-cream back when I was a boy in the 80's! I grew up in Kingston and can remember Saturdays or Sundays after church that we used to make ice-cream in one of those contraptions shown in the video - ours was not made out of wood however, but from a sturdy plastic. I remember we used to pack the tub was lots of ice and pour all the ingredients in the middle. We would then use our own fruits picked from our own trees in the backyard to make ice-cream. I distinctly remember us making sour-sop ice-cream, which was never really my favorite. These are memories I'd COMPLETELY forgotten until I watched this video! True story: growing up my parents INSISTED that my sister and I learn to do household chores since the age of 9 or 10. We had to learn how to wash our clothes BY HAND (even though we had a washing machine), how to cook, how to vacuum the carpet, how to sweep and mop the tile floor, how to rake the leaves in the yard, how to clean the dirt off the walls, how to make our beds, etc. I used to hate Saturdays since that was work day which meant we had to start early and finish all our chores before we were allowed to watch Saturday morning cartoons. I thought I had the cruelest parents on planet earth! My mother would justify this by saying "one day your wife will get sick, so you have to learn how to help yourself"! Fast forward 15 years and by this time we were living in New York. I had just graduated from college, living alone in a small apartment in Upstate NY and couldn't find a job. I was so broke that I couldn't even afford to put gas in my car, which was parked on the street for weeks on end since I couldn't afford to drive it. One day I applied for a job at a big insurance corporation and to my surprise they hired me on the spot! I can't explain how happy I was to finally have an income after months of poverty! The problem however, is that for this job you had to wear a suit and tie to work every day, which of course I did not have. So with the last $10 to my name I went to the Salvation Army second hand store and bought a white shirt for $2, a tie for $1 and a suit jacket for $5. And so bright and early Monday morning I went to my first day of work with my new (used) suit. As this was a very hot summer I would sweat all day and so by the end of the day my white shirt was sweaty and dirty. Since I didn't have a washing machine and no money to go to the laundromat and my first paycheck was in two weeks, I had no choice but to fill the bathtub with warm water and HAND WASH the white shirt by myself. I didn't even have to think twice, since I'd learned as a child how to do these things. Then I hung up the shirt to dry and got up early the next morning and ironed it. I did this every day for the first few weeks until I got my first pay check and could finally afford to buy a couple of white dress shirts. One day one of the secretaries came up to me and said "everybody's so impressed with you, especially since you're always wearing those designer suits!" I said to her, "WHAT are you talking about??" She replied, "you know, you're always so well dressed in those nice suits, everybody's wondering how a recent college graduate can afford such expensive clothes! Do you have rich parents or something?" I then just had to burst out laughing! I told her that those "expensive suits" she's talking about came from the Salvation Army second-hand shop, and that everyday after work I had to wash my only white shirt in the bathtub and iron it the next morning. She also burst out laughing, saying that my clothes were so nicely washed and ironed that everyone thought they were expensive designer clothes. When I got home that evening I IMMEDIATELY called my mother and THANKED HER for insisting that I learned how to cook, clean and wash! I FINALLY understood that all this time she was preparing me for the hard realities of life in America, just that I was too young to understand it at that time. If I ever have children YOU BET they're going to learn how to wash, clean and cook! And there'll be NO cell phone, computer or TV until their household chores are completed to my full satisfaction! 😆
I used to get two old shirts or old clothes and kneel on and use the coconut brush and I am only 50 so it was not so long ago. Blue and brown soap for washing clothes. It was hard but life was good back then. LOVE DEM DAYS.❤
Kareem I am Costa Rican with Jamaican heritage. Most of what is said in this video was part of my experience growing up. For example the shining ah the floor wid the coconut brush . We had wash pans you call wash board and doh talk about greater in the coconut wid the grater was my job to prepare for the rice and beans. And the washing and the sound like interviewer as a child I wanted my little wash my mother would allow me to wash to sound chups chups We also had home made ice cream a man used to pass around on sundays selling wid the same icecream bucket in your video Jamaicans in Costa Rica and the roots still strong💪🏾
Just a thought what about making one of your videos about Jamaican heritage in Port Limon Costa Rica? I am also a Historian so that is one of the reason I enjoy your channel it makes me nostalgic of that Limon of my youth I am now 63 years old.
This vlog is really a treat of old time Jamaica. As a child I remember seeing women washing at the rivers. I experienced the kerosene lamps when I lived in rural Manchester for a short while. It was my job to clean them. Please tell us what it was like to go to Denbeigh back in the 1950's and 1960's. Thank you so much for reminding us what life in Jamaica was like back then.
Jamaican life is the best I remember those days washing on scrubber board cleaning the floor knocking Johnny cooper lantern with the brush all that lady is saying is true
The 'Sound'. I was determined to get it and achieved perfection! It's done by getting the Soapy water and Clothes between your fingertips and knuckles. Then you rub together vigorously and listen keenly, then adjust accordingly
Those were the good old days I remember when I used to clean my grandmother's house with the brush girl you have to sweep wipe and then polish and then and Shine the floor
I remember the katta , we used to make it from dried banana leaf and then put our bucket of water on your head and walk up the hill without holding it and not spill even a bit . The good old days
The washing is not only Jamaica a lot of this was the same in many of the other Caribbean countries. This was the same in Guyana 🇬🇾 , St Lucia 🇱🇨 and Barbados 🇧🇧. The ice cream can was the same we know of this as well.
We had a kerosene fridge, Earlier there was kerosene stove until it blew up and my father bought a gas stove, All through high school it was the flat iron to iron my uniform for school.
I do not come from Jamaica, but my parents is from Jamaica. In London I use to wash clothes in the bath wow great video I love traditional methods of doing things
I was taught to have a lamp with Kerosene oil, lit, beside me as Manchester was COLD , so I had to hold the brush about 6 inches away from lamp flame to warm bristles THEN put one inch of Genie Floor Polish onto brush THEN SHINE THE TARRIS ( paved red concrete ) or the DEAL BOARD and make it SHINE!
Kareem's Quest and company. That was an amazing conversation with your guest. Taking us back down memory lane. I enjoyed every minute of the interview. Thanks to you and your guest. 😊👏🌻 Love and blessings to all. ❤🙏🙏🌻🌻
I remember the refrigerators with locks. The iron solid metal was the more modern ones but the hollow ones were first that you’d have to put the hots coal inside the iron. I remember the coconut brushes and genie floor polish, red. I remember the enamel cups. The worst thing to be washing at the river is don’t let your wash pan float away or turn over. I used to be so jealous of my friends that could go to the river and wash in Saturday morning
U would have to use d washing soda along with d bar soap to rub on d clothes and boilthe clothes this pro. Ismainly for white clothes when rinsing those cloths u have to use clothe blue.
When you shine the floor with the coconut brush and lick jonnycooper, you also use Cardinal red floor polish, salindine bush and straw dye,you never get that out a the finger nail😂😂😂😂 😂😂😂
I know people in the hills in St. Catherine use big bamboo joints to carry water. In my area it was against law to wash or bathe in the river. i grew up in the fifties. When we as boys go to the river to swim first we hide our clothes far away from where we are swimming. My brother in law use to sell ice cream in the Linstead Market.On Saturdays we make three buckets of ice cream and put in a big container to sell for the day. Sometime they make crenolin with flour bag sometime they find a small tree and put the crenolin over it to dry.
We would use the brown soap and put out in the sun also the white clothes would be boil in zinic pan to make it white and free from germs. I am fron the sixties in Clarendon The pale was also used for female steaming for female problems.
I had a washer woman, Monday Tuesday Thursday and Friday ironing ladies, although I left Jamaica at about eighteen i knew most of those things but I was lucky to have people doing most of the work, especially those china cabinet, the bucket and drawstring toilet. and a very big tank on the property where the truck would come three times a week to fill up and we would sell them water: I took bus to school but if it leaves I would have to run the over five miles and be late,
My mom prefer corn stick she came from St Elizabeth. I love when she tells us stories she ran away to Kingston at 12 years old. She said too much hard work and she was the eldest work from morning till night we cried. She came to Kingston and worked as a helper up on the hill. People still use grater see it on TH-cam.
Everything this lady said is true but we weren't use to polishing the floors. The way we washed in the river was not in a basin but on a pile of stones above the water level. Yes the sun was used for bleaching. You had to sort out the clothes. All whites had to be bleached as well as clothes with stains. The river was a good distance from your destination. There were rivers that were nearer home but not popular and it was not possible to hitch rides from passing vehicles to return home. These were happy days which allowed you to meet with friends and some family members. "Home Sweet Home" was the chimmey for the lamp. The river episodes were St. Lucia experiences.
We used to scrub clothes on flat stones. Every one who is washing had their own very flat stone on which they scrub their clothes. We used to wash with soap, lather with fab as we use to call it and then rinse.
They also use this dye for the floor name red oak its a powder and its red they mixed it with water and put onthe floor then .et dry and then use the coconut brush to shine the floor and its beautiful
Hello Jamaicans you are not alone. I am from Guyana and when I was a child the elders had the same culture. They used scrubbing board, beater, which was used to beat the clothes to get them clean as well as graters to grate coconuts. Stained clothes were put in the sun which removed the stains and made them white. Salt was sometimes applied too. Ice-cream was churned at weekends in a wooden churner.. Irons called 'flat irons' were placed on a coal pot. When they were hot they were held with a cloth by the handle and clothes were pressed. Sometimes discarded electrical irons were used in the same way. However, in my young working days Jamaicans were always so very innovative. Guyana imported hand cream and body lotion, skin powder with wide puffs in fancy powder bowls, perfumes and many other items from Jamaica
My mum said she had to walk from BeckfordKraal to Clarendon College. Her one pair of shoes had to last, so she would walk barefoot halfway, then put her shoes on the rest of the way....
My grandfather used to plan corn and when the con fit, I will roast the corn and eat Then we have to put the can stick to dry we use it wash scrub the clothes I am from Saint Catherine. you still live close beside barrel Lodge sugar factory used to have some big pump that water the canes Our grandparents used to send us to wash the clothes. It was three of us
I wish those days come back only river I wash and I go down on my knees and clean my floor you .when i finish clean you could see your face in the floor is like a looking glass. I did love it ❤❤❤❤😅
I was born in the mid 70s, i am a man and i went through all of that growing up. I am living in the United States and i am missing this lifestyle. I really want to go back home and relive this lifestyle. I cleaned house every Saturday, grandma had the Hoover, but we hardly ever used it. Collect firewood, fetch water by the river every morning, sweep yard every day. Tie out goats and cows, feed hogs and chickens. We plant our own food, rice, corn, sugar cane. we made ice cream, cooliz, gizadas, gratercakes, pudding, pepper shrimp, parch corn acham. Grandma sell these things by school gate. We wash clothes by the river too, and i could do the scrip, scrip sound too. I stopped doing these things in 1990 when i was 15, but i keep washing my clothes by hand until 2006. I hated every moment of this growing up, but now i missed it all, i wanted to relive some of it.
Not only in Jamaica. I am from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. 💙💛💚 We made the sound while washing as well. My mom taught us how to wash in the river at Stoney Grounds. Kingstown. St. Vincent.
When i grew up in those days every thing you are talking about it was a must to do these daily activities ‘ it was hard work and most of up kids were made to do the work and we get a lot of beatings if we did not get the job done every day so we would invent playful ways so as not to feel so depressed while doing what is expected of us to do.
Read more about Jamaican Household items: kareemsquest.com/items-you-would-find-in-every-jamaican-household/
U can also soap up d clothes and spread it out in d night dew for couple night well or u could soap up d clothes and boil it in d oil kersine pan .
The 'Sound'. I was determined to get it and achieved perfection! It's done by getting the Soapy water and Clothes between your fingertips and knuckles. Then you rub together vigorously and listen keenly, then adjust accordingly
three foot black cooking pot
Kareem, if possible do a part 2 with your current guest. She is a wealth of knowledge. Respect 🙏 👍
For sure. I have some more interviews with her, on the channel
God bless 🙏 this queen 👑 o Lord in a beautiful bless way 💕...
Lady u tell such lovely memories of stories....
I have passed on your message to her
Still goes on….river too!!🇯🇲🌴
I am Ghanaian and we still wash with the scrip scrip sound 😂. You need to pass that test before you get to washing machines 😂
Nice to know
I was thought by the age of 4 yrs how to wash my dirty clothes with hands by my mum 😀
Yes i have experienced everything she's saying in 🇯🇲. I just subscribed
I adored those days, the washing at the river, dying and polishing the floor..then shining with the coconut brush, making our own coffee,coconut oil,planting our own rice 🍚, bathe in metal pan,using enamel pail and chimney.. etc
Our knees are crying now with arthritis. lol. It was rewarding because you had a sense of completion and accomplishment. We received a reward every Saturday after scrubbing the floor and polishing with bismark
I remember as a child that my mom washed by hand in the bath she came to the UK in the 60’s from Jamaica. I was born in the 70’s and when she would wash by hand she would make that sound with the clothes 😄😄
That washing sound is what got me to start washing. Lol
Sir Kareem, I love your energy and your zest.
If I have one critique for you, sir, is. Let your quest finish their thoughts before you interject with your follow-up questions.
Trust you are me so excited to hear this out . Love it, but it derail the thought of the person before they are finished
We used dried corn stick instead of a washing brush to rub the clothes back then😊
I’ve washed in the bath pan with the scrub board. Used a kattah on my head to carry water; done the bleaching as she just described; scripted the water, etc. Followed the soaking process, but never in the river! In the zinc bath pan or a huge Mahogany bowl for washing and bathing. Yes, done two soapy water and one rinse. Walked barefoot to school, aaawwwh. Scrubbed the floor kneeling on my knees, yaks! Did chores before and after school. Grate coconut make coconut oil. Used that similar “bucket”. To make ice cream at home - special treat that was! Trifle cake - made on Sundays - poor man’s pound cake. Had grated fresh coconut. Yummy. Not only done in Jamaica. Yes,ma’am - did the kerosene lamp too and the hurricane lantern for outside. Mercy!Belize!! Memories. Yea, did the kerosene stove too. Thought that was great, not using the firehearth burning dry wood! Baked on the hearth bread, Johnny cakes and Christmas fruit and pound cakes. Not to mention starched clothes. Yes, cleaned shoes and tennis shoes…sneakers. Had two uniforms to last one or two or more years…until they wore out. Used the coal stove iron, and the gasoline iron. Mercy!! Those were the days. And white clothes were White. Yes, I used a crinoline skirt. Had only one that I sewed on the hand Singer’s sewing machine. Thank you for sharing
One of my greatest delights was to discover Kareem's Quest. These discussions are making me so nostalgic.
When I started high school in the early 1960s, I had to use the flat irons on the coal stove to iron my clothes including school uniforms and gym tunics made out of white drill. Since the iron was directly on the coals I had to use an old rag to clean the iron surface before putting it on the item being ironed. The bigger iron with the live coals inside was called a self-heater. Tailors and seamstresses used these to iron their finished products. Self-heaters were used to iron big items like bed linen and curtains. Thank God, we no longer starch and iron bed linen. Then came the electric iron! Quick easy ironing but larger electricity bills. Do you know, even now, people still grate coconuts and other items with a grater. For me, thank God for the inventor of the Magic Bullet. When we had to shine floors with the coconut brush, we would use an old towel or old bedspread to kneel on to protect the knees. Imagine my delight when I went home one holiday to find my aunt had bought a Hoover.
I love the sound when I was wasing the clothes. Made me feel efficient 😆 😂
They use to have some lamps made from tins we used those in the kitchen and torchbottle made with paper and kerosene oil to use outdoor or going to the pit toilet in the night. 😅
Thank for sharing 😂😂the good old days in Jamaica
Very interesting love your show. Good Job Kareem old time days.
That back then that was the appliance that we had
I remember cleaning the pots with the ashes from the wood fire that was in the outside kitchen..those were the days
I remember the coal oil lamp with “Home Sweet Home” on it. When I came home from living and teaching in Jamaica, I brought with me, one of those lamps, and I still have it to this day. It is a significant reminder of the many times we lit lamps when the electricity was off and we needed to have school work to mark.
In my house now I have a coal stove, a coal stove iron, an ice shaver that they used to make snow-cone, and a kerosene lamp ( now I use lamp oil). My brother came to visit from Maui recently and he was asking me where I find these things!? A blast from the past!!
Instilled discipline and responsibility..... I had goats and had to tie them out in the wee hours of the morning before going to school. I remember the helper using the coconut brush. It was not just for wood floor. We had concrete I believe. And it was a red polish. Also remember when hoover came in. I remember the sound when washing by hand. I could never produce that sound but it really had nothing to do with the cleaning. Lol. This is soooo awesome... Keep up the good work.
Genie floor polish smelled so good...red floors...we used to have a dry mop to sweep, a wet mop to wipe the floor.
Thanks for sharing the good old days in Jamaica. Its just killing now wish those days would returned with love as usual❤❤🙏🙏
So true
Manuel Road was one of cleaning songs in St Ann's Bay
Washing with the scrip-scrip sound was a must throughout the Caribbean I think . It was a way big monitoring the young person doing the washing I suspect- without having to look !
The screw thing for the lamp was called 'The Burner' we used to sell them in our shops both in Time and Patience (Linstead) and Oxford, St. Mary. I love watching the show.
We used ashes and cho cho leaves to wash the chimmy.Also we went to bush to get leaves from the salindine tree that was used as a stain for the wood floors
" Catta/ Katta" was , in my district of Pike, near Coleyville in Manchester...made from pulling off dried leaves from a Banana Plant and coiling & twisting it to make a "😊head rest" for the Duna Pan or Water Keg...if it slips off, the water keg/ "Duna" would burn your " pate" ( head top) and hurt yr neck. Some of this banana leaves would be torn apart and put on top of the water to minimize sloshing out if no cover was there to do so. 😊
Yes, cleaning is one of hardest jobs. However, my favorite parts of washing is the scrips scrips, scrab board, shinning wooden and tile floor, karosine oil lamp, gratering coconuts and potatoes to make pudding, coal irons, wearing cottas on my head to bring crocus bags of Primento Seeds to sell. However, my absoulte favorite is the Fuggie and Ice Cream. Over, these traditional living brought back so much memories. Yes, before Usain Bolt became the Fastest Man on Earth. He said, when he first started Tracks and Field the first he wanted to buy his mother was a Washing Machine.
Thanks for sharing!!
I remember delco,I am 67 born in Siloah St,Elizabeth.Thats where i frist saw the delco.Good old days.
I grown up in the seventy in Grenada and that was my life watching in the river growing down on my knees to scrub the floor first I had to scrape the floor with a knife fist then whip it also the greating of coconut to make oil the ice cream I really enjoyed that with my grandma every thing she was saying is so true
Such beautiful memories, growing up in ST. Thomas I had the great experience of many of these. The greatest was a day at the PLantain Garden River. Wonderful memories. Kareem the environment was cleaner then than now. Those hardships allow us to strive and make us who we are today. Excellent program especially for those of us overseas.
Keep recording this lady and many others before they pass over because we have lostso much heritage
I remember some of the songs MissLou and many others usec to sing and didn't realize they all had allegoric meanings
Would love to delve into some of those treasures from the past
Thanks for the comment
So true we made the katta from dry banana leaves .I enjoy those days.thanks much
OMG, I just remembered that we also used to make our own ice-cream back when I was a boy in the 80's! I grew up in Kingston and can remember Saturdays or Sundays after church that we used to make ice-cream in one of those contraptions shown in the video - ours was not made out of wood however, but from a sturdy plastic. I remember we used to pack the tub was lots of ice and pour all the ingredients in the middle. We would then use our own fruits picked from our own trees in the backyard to make ice-cream. I distinctly remember us making sour-sop ice-cream, which was never really my favorite. These are memories I'd COMPLETELY forgotten until I watched this video!
True story: growing up my parents INSISTED that my sister and I learn to do household chores since the age of 9 or 10. We had to learn how to wash our clothes BY HAND (even though we had a washing machine), how to cook, how to vacuum the carpet, how to sweep and mop the tile floor, how to rake the leaves in the yard, how to clean the dirt off the walls, how to make our beds, etc. I used to hate Saturdays since that was work day which meant we had to start early and finish all our chores before we were allowed to watch Saturday morning cartoons. I thought I had the cruelest parents on planet earth! My mother would justify this by saying "one day your wife will get sick, so you have to learn how to help yourself"! Fast forward 15 years and by this time we were living in New York. I had just graduated from college, living alone in a small apartment in Upstate NY and couldn't find a job. I was so broke that I couldn't even afford to put gas in my car, which was parked on the street for weeks on end since I couldn't afford to drive it. One day I applied for a job at a big insurance corporation and to my surprise they hired me on the spot! I can't explain how happy I was to finally have an income after months of poverty! The problem however, is that for this job you had to wear a suit and tie to work every day, which of course I did not have. So with the last $10 to my name I went to the Salvation Army second hand store and bought a white shirt for $2, a tie for $1 and a suit jacket for $5. And so bright and early Monday morning I went to my first day of work with my new (used) suit. As this was a very hot summer I would sweat all day and so by the end of the day my white shirt was sweaty and dirty. Since I didn't have a washing machine and no money to go to the laundromat and my first paycheck was in two weeks, I had no choice but to fill the bathtub with warm water and HAND WASH the white shirt by myself. I didn't even have to think twice, since I'd learned as a child how to do these things. Then I hung up the shirt to dry and got up early the next morning and ironed it. I did this every day for the first few weeks until I got my first pay check and could finally afford to buy a couple of white dress shirts. One day one of the secretaries came up to me and said "everybody's so impressed with you, especially since you're always wearing those designer suits!" I said to her, "WHAT are you talking about??" She replied, "you know, you're always so well dressed in those nice suits, everybody's wondering how a recent college graduate can afford such expensive clothes! Do you have rich parents or something?" I then just had to burst out laughing! I told her that those "expensive suits" she's talking about came from the Salvation Army second-hand shop, and that everyday after work I had to wash my only white shirt in the bathtub and iron it the next morning. She also burst out laughing, saying that my clothes were so nicely washed and ironed that everyone thought they were expensive designer clothes. When I got home that evening I IMMEDIATELY called my mother and THANKED HER for insisting that I learned how to cook, clean and wash! I FINALLY understood that all this time she was preparing me for the hard realities of life in America, just that I was too young to understand it at that time. If I ever have children YOU BET they're going to learn how to wash, clean and cook! And there'll be NO cell phone, computer or TV until their household chores are completed to my full satisfaction! 😆
Nice story.
@@Junjo11Yes, I enjoyed reading this article. I had some similar experiences.
What a beautiful story, I feel as though I know you! May God continue to bless you! ❤️🇺🇸❤️
❤
Please cover if you can . Cooking throughout the years.
School lunches. Like bolo slush
Explain what is bolo slush
@kareemsquest Bolo Slush was what we use to call the food that was provided by the school that I attended in the 70s. Rousseau Primary in Kingston
@wint4516 okay thanks for the clarity
I used to get two old shirts or old clothes and kneel on and use the coconut brush and I am only 50 so it was not so long ago. Blue and brown soap for washing clothes. It was hard but life was good back then. LOVE DEM DAYS.❤
We use Cardinal polish on the floor I remember a bucket muma gone a pond game wast duty close or use banana leafs to make catter
Kareem I am Costa Rican with Jamaican heritage. Most of what is said in this video was part of my experience growing up. For example the shining ah the floor wid the coconut brush . We had wash pans you call wash board and doh talk about greater in the coconut wid the grater was my job to prepare for the rice and beans. And the washing and the sound like interviewer as a child I wanted my little wash my mother would allow me to wash to sound chups chups
We also had home made ice cream a man used to pass around on sundays selling wid the same icecream bucket in your video
Jamaicans in Costa Rica and the roots still strong💪🏾
Wow thank you for sharing your story as well
Just a thought what about making one of your videos about Jamaican heritage in Port Limon Costa Rica? I am also a Historian so that is one of the reason I enjoy your channel it makes me nostalgic of that Limon of my youth I am now 63 years old.
My wife says they make the kind of sounds when washing clothes in St. Lucia back in the day.
Our scrubing brush was a corn cob roasted and scraped then we use it to scrub the clothes
This vlog is really a treat of old time Jamaica. As a child I remember seeing women washing at the rivers.
I experienced the kerosene lamps when I lived in rural Manchester for a short while. It was my job to clean them.
Please tell us what it was like to go to Denbeigh back in the 1950's and 1960's. Thank you so much for reminding us what life in Jamaica was like back then.
Okay I will look into that topic
@@kareemsquest thanks
St.Lucia 🇱🇨 too
I remember kerosene stove, 2 burners first then 4 burners. What I remember most was the circular wicks that lights the stove.
Jamaican life is the best I remember those days washing on scrubber board cleaning the floor knocking Johnny cooper lantern with the brush all that lady is saying is true
I enjoyed washing clothes and pots at the river. It was fun with our country friends!!!
The 'Sound'. I was determined to get it and achieved perfection! It's done by getting the Soapy water and Clothes between your fingertips and knuckles. Then you rub together vigorously and listen keenly, then adjust accordingly
It was a roasted corn stick was the brush to scrub the clothes on the board.
Board and sink and saw dust
Interesting! Also people who have stones or could find stones would make Stone-heaps for bleaching clothes.
Those were the good old days I remember when I used to clean my grandmother's house with the brush girl you have to sweep wipe and then polish and then and Shine the floor
We use to have one when I was small. We used to use dry ice on the outside of the cylinder.
I remember the katta , we used to make it from dried banana leaf and then put our bucket of water on your head and walk up the hill without holding it and not spill even a bit . The good old days
Yes, it’s an African cultural thing. Also done to carry wood and other things.🇺🇸🇯🇲
@@chrisper7527 so true ! The good old days
The washing is not only Jamaica a lot of this was the same in many of the other Caribbean countries. This was the same in Guyana 🇬🇾 , St Lucia 🇱🇨 and Barbados 🇧🇧.
The ice cream can was the same we know of this as well.
We had a kerosene fridge, Earlier there was kerosene stove until it blew up and my father bought a gas stove, All through high school it was the flat iron to iron my uniform for school.
My grandmother would put the white clothes in a zinc pan on the fire and boil them,especially the white sheets and pillowcases
I do not come from Jamaica, but my parents is from Jamaica. In London I use to wash clothes in the bath wow great video I love traditional methods of doing things
I was taught to have a lamp with Kerosene oil, lit, beside me as Manchester was COLD , so I had to hold the brush about 6 inches away from lamp flame to warm bristles THEN put one inch of Genie Floor Polish onto brush THEN SHINE THE TARRIS ( paved red concrete ) or the DEAL BOARD and make it SHINE!
Kareem's Quest and company.
That was an amazing conversation with your guest.
Taking us back down memory lane.
I enjoyed every minute of the interview.
Thanks to you and your guest. 😊👏🌻
Love and blessings to all. ❤🙏🙏🌻🌻
Thanks for your kind words
I can still make the scrup scrup sound with my hand when I wash the kitchrn cloth
I still scrlp scrip until to this day, and I living out of Jamaica.
I used to watch mama until I learn how to do that. I loved it.
My brother in law used to carry water on his head using a cotta back in the late 70s
I remember the refrigerators with locks.
The iron solid metal was the more modern ones but the hollow ones were first that you’d have to put the hots coal inside the iron.
I remember the coconut brushes and genie floor polish, red.
I remember the enamel cups.
The worst thing to be washing at the river is don’t let your wash pan float away or turn over.
I used to be so jealous of my friends that could go to the river and wash in Saturday morning
That ice cream was the best teast great❤❤
I remember seeing my grandmother using those iron❤❤❤
U would have to use d washing soda along with d bar soap to rub on d clothes and boilthe clothes this pro. Ismainly for white clothes when rinsing those cloths u have to use clothe blue.
Jamaican culture nurtures body and mind, what dont kill you only make you stronger. Thats why Jamaica produces world class athletes.
When you shine the floor with the coconut brush and lick jonnycooper, you also use Cardinal red floor polish, salindine bush and straw dye,you never get that out a the finger nail😂😂😂😂 😂😂😂
I know people in the hills in St. Catherine use big bamboo joints to carry water. In my area it was against law to wash or bathe in the river. i grew up in the fifties. When we as boys go to the river to swim first we hide our clothes far away from where we are swimming. My brother in law use to sell ice cream in the Linstead Market.On Saturdays we make three buckets of ice cream and put in a big container to sell for the day. Sometime they make crenolin with flour bag sometime they find a small tree and put the crenolin over it to dry.
Thanks Kareem so much for these "authentic " videos! Love them had to subscribe...
You're welcome
We would use the brown soap and put out in the sun also the white clothes would be boil in zinic pan to make it white and free from germs. I am fron the sixties in Clarendon
The pale was also used for female steaming for female problems.
I had a washer woman, Monday Tuesday Thursday and Friday ironing ladies, although I left Jamaica at about eighteen i knew most of those things but I was lucky to have people doing most of the work, especially those china cabinet, the bucket and drawstring toilet. and a very big tank on the property where the truck would come three times a week to fill up and we would sell them water: I took bus to school but if it leaves I would have to run the over five miles and be late,
In London (1950-60s) our hot water heater was also a 'gyster"
My mom prefer corn stick she came from St Elizabeth. I love when she tells us stories she ran away to Kingston at 12 years old. She said too much hard work and she was the eldest work from morning till night we cried. She came to Kingston and worked as a helper up on the hill. People still use grater see it on TH-cam.
My chore was washing a washpan full of clothes on saturdays. I used a washboard.
Everything this lady said is true but we weren't use to polishing the floors. The way we washed in the river was not in a basin but on a pile of stones above the water level. Yes the sun was used for bleaching. You had to sort out the clothes. All whites had to be bleached as well as clothes with stains. The river was a good distance from your destination. There were rivers that were nearer home but not popular and it was not possible to hitch rides from passing vehicles to return home.
These were happy days which allowed you to meet with friends and some family members.
"Home Sweet Home" was the chimmey for the lamp.
The river episodes were St. Lucia experiences.
We used to scrub clothes on flat stones. Every one who is washing had their own very flat stone on which they scrub their clothes. We used to wash with soap, lather with fab as we use to call it and then rinse.
I am a born Jamaican the lady is telling the truth that's the way I was grown up.
They also use this dye for the floor name red oak its a powder and its red they mixed it with water and put onthe floor then .et dry and then use the coconut brush to shine the floor and its beautiful
Hello Jamaicans you are not alone. I am from Guyana and when I was a child the elders had the same culture. They used scrubbing board, beater, which was used to beat the clothes to get them clean as well as graters to grate coconuts. Stained clothes were put in the sun which removed the stains and made them white. Salt was sometimes applied too. Ice-cream was churned at weekends in a wooden churner.. Irons called 'flat irons' were placed on a coal pot. When they were hot they were held with a cloth by the handle and clothes were pressed. Sometimes discarded electrical irons were used in the same way. However, in my young working days Jamaicans were always so very innovative. Guyana imported hand cream and body lotion, skin powder with wide puffs in fancy powder bowls, perfumes and many other items from Jamaica
Thanks for sharing all this information
Born in the fifties bee wax was used on coconut brush so it runs freely and give better shiny good old days work was fun 😂😂
I was in that era and one of the cleaning song was knock pupa lantan bam bam bam
I remember using guinea gold and magic soap to wash with corn stick brush
My mum said she had to walk from BeckfordKraal to Clarendon College. Her one pair of shoes had to last, so she would walk barefoot halfway, then put her shoes on the rest of the way....
My grandfather used to plan corn and when the con fit, I will roast the corn and eat Then we have to put the can stick to dry we use it wash scrub the clothes I am from Saint Catherine. you still live close beside barrel Lodge sugar factory used to have some big pump that water the canes Our grandparents used to send us to wash the clothes. It was three of us
We use to use ashes to make l lye to remove stains from lion brand flour bag to make sheets for beds
I wish those days come back only river I wash and I go down on my knees and clean my floor you .when i finish clean you could see your face in the floor is like a looking glass. I did love it ❤❤❤❤😅
I dont know but my pleated uniform for September morning would be well pleated with that coal iron.
We lived in town. So we went the zinc route. That would make white clothes BRIGHT WHITE!
True that
yes i use to have one when i carry water
I was born in the mid 70s, i am a man and i went through all of that growing up.
I am living in the United States and i am missing this lifestyle. I really want to go back home and relive this lifestyle.
I cleaned house every Saturday, grandma had the Hoover, but we hardly ever used it. Collect firewood, fetch water by the river every morning, sweep yard every day.
Tie out goats and cows, feed hogs and chickens.
We plant our own food, rice, corn, sugar cane. we made ice cream, cooliz, gizadas, gratercakes, pudding, pepper shrimp, parch corn acham. Grandma sell these things by school gate.
We wash clothes by the river too, and i could do the scrip, scrip sound too.
I stopped doing these things in 1990 when i was 15, but i keep washing my clothes by hand until 2006.
I hated every moment of this growing up, but now i missed it all, i wanted to relive some of it.
Jamaica uncut was talking about drying school uniform, on the back of the fridge 😂
Bruces Patties un Cross Rds was the place for patties.
Beautiful memories of my past. I am just smiling. Love your culture programme. What about using the zinc pan as oven?
That is a topic I might have to look into
The burnt corn stick after we eat the corn was the clothe brush
Oh yes!😂
I iron my iniform to school my bigger sister never used to iron them good
Not only in Jamaica. I am from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. 💙💛💚
We made the sound while washing as well. My mom taught us how to wash in the river at Stoney Grounds. Kingstown. St. Vincent.
Here watching from Barbados🇧🇧
In my days we had to wash and second wash, and rinse twice.
When i grew up in those days every thing you are talking about it was a must to do these daily activities ‘ it was hard work and most of up kids were made to do the work and we get a lot of beatings if we did not get the job done every day so we would invent playful ways so as not to feel so depressed while doing what is expected of us to do.