Romance Dance of the Plume
If you ever found yourself on the party streets of New Orleans during Mardi Gras, you might be lucky enough to spot a Big Chief Indian in full glorious spate. This wondrous apparition, clad from head to toe in sequins, beads, rhinestones, velvet and constantly wavy ostrich plumes, would be accompanied by his Spyboy, his Flagboy, a bunch of drummers, a street-walking jazz band and a few hundred dancing followers.
Down south in Rio de Janeiro, the annual carnival would also be in progress, with thousands of lovely Samba Girls of the Copacabana dressed in a couple of sequins and very little else besides their beloved ostrich feathers.
Across the sea in Belgium, the small coal-mining town of Binche has its traditional Gilles characters parading on Shrove Tuesday. During what some call ‘the world’s weirdest Mardi Gras’, the Gille is restricted to wearing his elaborate costume, wooden clogs and fancy ostrich-feather headdress within the confines of Binche, and only on this day.
On most nights not too far from here,
