Edward “Firstman” Wray welcomes me at the Rastafari Indigenous Village he co-founded, located in Montego Bay, Jamaica. The Rasta hand gesture Edward displays in this picture is a downward-facing triangle symbolising balance. The Rastafari believe in a balanced lifestyle, in which one lives in harmony with nature. They are often seen dressing in the colours red, green, gold, and black, which symbolise the life force of blood, herbs, royalty, and Africanness.
As people who seek to live and thrive directly from the land, and who keep an “I-tal diet” which is a natural, plant-based, non pollutant diet, the Rastafarians have a lot to teach us today about caring for the environment. Yet, today, the same consumerist systems they denounce are threatening them and their future on the island.
