Anansi and the Spirit of the Drum (Lufien Garawoun)
May 17, 2025|Anansi Stories
Anansi and the Spirit of the Drum (Lufien Garawoun)
A Garifuna Epic from Dangriga, Belize
By Be Belize Company
For Cyril Antonio, with love from Shaka, Stephanie, and Tigemeri
📯 CHAPTER 1: THE CALL OF WAHIMA
In the seaside soul of Dangriga, Belize, where the rhythms of the Caribbean meet the thunder of ancestral spirits, the town of Wahima was preparing for the biggest celebration since Garifuna Settlement Day. The air buzzed with excitement, the scent of cassava bread and hudut mixed with coconut oil, and the drums of Gumagarugu Street beat like the pulse of the earth itself.
Cyril Antonio, the Master Master Drummer, stood at the edge of the open-air festival grounds, a proud glint in his eyes. Around his neck swung a massive 18kt Belizean gold Garifuna Drum pendant, carved with black, white, and yellow diamonds — a sacred piece forged by his grandson Shaka and his wife Stephanie. On its crown was engraved the phrase “Lufien Garawoun” — “The Spirit of the Drum.”
This wasn’t just jewelry.
It was a beating heart of Garifuna legacy, blessed in the temple of BackaTown by the high priestess Ebu Sarah, with young Tigemeri — granddaughter of Cyril — dancing and chanting at her side, helping infuse the pendant with the power of the ancestors.
It was this pendant, this radiant symbol of Garifuna rhythm and bloodline, that called out to a trickster spirit watching from above.
In a mango tree near the cemetery sat Anansi, the ancient spider of stories, disguised as a wiry drummer with a wide-brimmed hat and eyes full of mischief.
His eight invisible legs twitched.
“That pendant…” he hissed to himself. “It came from the gold I found beneath Xunantunich, in the heart of the Maya temple. I gave it to Tataduhende for safekeeping. How did that old drummer get it? And why is it shining like the sun?!”
Anansi’s smile twisted.
“I want it back.”
🕷️ CHAPTER 2: THE TRICKSTER’S TEMPTATION
Long ago, Anansi had stumbled into the underworld beneath the great Maya city of Xunantunich, chasing whispers of Tataduhende, the dwarf guardian of buried treasure. He had stolen a golden nugget the size of a coconut, barely escaping the angry spirit.
But in a twist of fate, Be Belize Company — known for their legendary jewelry forged from cultural fire — had reclaimed it and transformed it into a drum-shaped pendant, honoring the greatest living Garifuna drummer: Cyril Antonio.
Now it shone not just with gold, but with stories. And stories were Anansi’s domain.
He disguised himself as Obadiah Spiderfoot, a wandering drummer from Jamaica. Wearing patched pants and a conch-shell belt, he signed up for the Drumming Competition of the Spirits — a battle of rhythm so intense, it was whispered the dead could hear it through the soil.
The prize? The pendant itself.
Because Anansi, with his silver tongue, had made a bet with Cyril:
“If I out-drum you, old man, the pendant is mine.”
Cyril, smiling beneath his salt-and-pepper beard, only said,
“Then let the ancestors decide.”
🌙 CHAPTER 3: BACKATOWN BLESSINGS
In the heart of BackaTown, where the moonlight spilled over tin roofs and the sea whispered in Garifuna, Ebu Sarah, the Buyei, lit sacred copal incense. Tigemeri, in her white festival dress, held a clay bowl of flower water and cassava ash.
Together, they stood before the altar where the pendant had been anointed.
“You must help your grandfather,” Ebu Sarah said gently. “This pendant carries more than gold — it carries the soul of every drum that has ever spoken in Dangriga.”
Tigemeri, five years old and full of fierce joy, touched the pendant’s engraving and saw a vision:
— Anansi with his eight legs dancing invisible tricks in the shadows
— The drums of the dead rising
— The crowd cheering blindly as the spirit of the drum flickered
She gasped.
“He’s going to cheat,” she said.
Ebu Sarah nodded.
“He is Anansi. But this is not a fight of flesh — it is a rhythm of the spirit.”
🥁 CHAPTER 4: THE DRUM WAR ON GUMAGARUGU STREET
10,000 people flooded the narrow streets near Gumagarugu, the cemetery glowing with candlelight and ancestral drums. Vendors sold cassava pudding, fish tea, and roasted breadfruit. Children ran with sparkler sticks, and dancers painted in white ash performed the Wanaragua in the moonlight.
This was the Festival of the Spirit Drum — second only to Garifuna Settlement Day — a cosmic meeting of rhythm, memory, and defiance.
The lineup read like prophecy:
- Isabel Flores opened with a funeral rhythm that made the wind pause
- Joe Tump echoed the sea, his palms moving like lightning
- Maria Melba unleashed a war rhythm that made dogs howl
- Junie Aranda played a lullaby from dreams
- Telemaco “Teli” Garcia, Paul Nabor, Gabaga, and Sebastian Cayetano Sr followed, each one building the beat higher, fiercer, deeper
And then came Obadiah Spiderfoot — Anansi in disguise.
He stepped forward with a goat-skin drum wrapped in silk, his fingers moving too fast to see. As he played, spirits whispered from the graveyard behind the stage. Women fainted. Men wept. Children clutched their mother’s skirts.
His rhythm was alive with jungle heat and mischief.
Invisible spiders danced across the drums.
⚡ CHAPTER 5: THE SHOWDOWN
Last to perform: Cyril Antonio.
He stepped into the ring, barefoot, regal. His hands were calloused, sacred. Around his neck, the Lufien Garawoun glowed — and Tigemeri stood beside him, holding a conch shell.
Cyril lifted his arms.
Thunder clapped.
He began slow — the heartbeat of the ancestors. Then faster, like rain falling in rhythm. Then faster still, calling to the Caribbean Sea, to the drowned and the dreaming.
The pendant pulsed with golden light.
Suddenly — lightning cracked. The skies opened.
Rain fell.
But the drums did not stop.
The crowd didn’t move.
Cyril and Anansi stood face to face, their drums battling like dueling volcanoes. One beat for the living. One beat for the trickster. One beat for the spirit of the land.
Anansi cheated — splitting into two forms, then four — each with drums of shadow. He summoned rhythms no one had ever heard.
Cyril answered with the Rásien-rahú — the Rhythm of the Spirit, passed to him in a dream by his own grandfather.
The dead danced.
The living held their breath.
The pendant on Cyril’s chest blazed like a sunrise through storm clouds.
🔥 CHAPTER 6: THE SPIRIT OF THE DRUM
Anansi struck one final blow — a rhythm that shook mangoes from trees and cracked the concrete beneath their feet.
And then… silence.
His drum split in half.
The spirits he summoned faded into mist.
He collapsed onto the stage, panting, drenched, humbled.
Cyril walked over and extended his hand.
“You played well, trickster,” he said. “But the drum don’t lie.”
Anansi looked up, chuckled weakly.
“Then let the story be told… that I tried.”
He bowed low, and the crowd erupted in cheers — not just for Cyril, but for the rhythm itself.
Tigemeri walked into the center of the ring, lifted the Lufien Garawoun, and danced — a dance of future and flame, joy and memory.
Above them, the clouds parted.
A golden light fell across Dangriga, and the drums — the true drums — played on.
🇧🇿 EPILOGUE: BELIZE REMEMBERS
The Be Belize Company pendant was returned to its place of honor, now a national treasure. Tourists from across the world came to Dangriga to hear the rhythms of Cyril Antonio, to buy Garifuna-inspired Belizean gold jewelry, to walk the festival roads of Gumagarugu Street, and to whisper stories of Anansi, the spider who tried to steal the soul of a drum — and left with a rhythm in his heart.
And every year, on the night of the Drumming Festival, if you listen closely under the mango tree near the cemetery, you might still hear a chuckling voice say:
“Next time… I bring eight drums.”
Lufien Garawoun.
The Spirit of the Drum lives on.
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