It’s the one place and one time of year that offer the best of many worlds.  A sidewalk bar or café within metres of swirling waves conjures up images of Venice, Italy. Vignettes of the people’s African roots are highlighted in the numerous displays of culture in music and dance.  The traveller easily recalls the energy and dynamism of Louisiana’s Mardi Gras, and the masquerade shares the colour and splendour of carnival in neighbouring Trinidad and Tobago.

Grenada’s carnival or – to use the more appropriate official title “Spice Mas’’ – is definitely world class.  But it’s also uniquely local and distinctly Caribbean. In fact, it’s genuinely summer’s last Caribbean jump up; the “last lap’’ of carnivals in the region.

Modern Grenada carnival started its indigenization after Africans were freed from the bondage of plantation slavery in 1834. Their carnival, unlike the 18th Century pageantry of upper class French settlers, was a commemoration of emancipation, which was first dominated by stick fighting and Canboulay, a processional cane harvest celebration held on the night of August 1.

Many, including Guyana-born Kimani S.K. Nehusi of the University of East London’s Afrika Studies Centre, trace the origin of carnival to harvest festivals in Ancient Egypt. The African nexus of carnival is supported by Olaogun Adeyinka, a Trinidadian with family ties in Grenada. He was a contributing writer for Ah Come Back Home, a book on carnival that was published about ten years ago.

“I would never deny that other people have contributed to this festival, but we must not allow its African origins to be submerged,’’ demands Adeyinka.  “The myth of carnival having come from the French settlers is widely spread today.  We must protect its African-ness, stand fast, and draw the line in the sand.’’

In the one hundred and seventy-five years since the enslaved Africans were emancipated, carnival has evolved and it's continuing to do so.  What has not changed, though, are the African elements of drumming, masking, high-spirited merriment, and parodying in song and dance.

The Africans creolized the French word for the evil Satan, diable, and created a devil masquerade that is now popularly known as "Jab Jab.''  While other carnivals, such as in Trinidad and at Labor Day in Brooklyn, have their Jab Jabs, nothing compares to the jovial, villainous Jab Jab masqueraders who playfully haunt the streets of Grenada at J'Ouvert.