Kwanzaa at Kente's

with

Legacy of Weyanoke

On the last Friday evening of December 2000, Legacy of Weyanoke sponsored a Kwanzaa celebration at Kente's Restaurant in Hampton, Virginia. Songs and stories illustrated the seven principles of Kwanzaa as set forth by Dr. Maulana Karenga, who designed and was the first to celebrate the observance in 1966. The festival is based on traditional African celebrations of the harvest, because history is, after all, a harvest of the deeds of the past. Dr. Karenga used the Swahili language for the terms related to his holiday. Swahili is an African trade language with roots in many other languages, and was used because it crosses many national boundaries, and has no tribal or colonial history.

Kwanzaa is flexible, & can be celebrated in many different ways. The original celebration ran for seven nights, one for each principle. Legacy of Weyanoke's observance was only one night and included all the Seven Principles, the Nguzo Saba:

 Dr. Karenga felt these to be, as he said, "the minimum set of principles by which Black people must live to begin to rescue and reconstruct our history and lives." The same could be said for any oppressed peoples.

 After the program by Legacy of Weyanoke, Kente's owner Zeeta Nyabinghi served a magnificent karamu, or feast, in honor of the occasion. Kente's Restaurant is at 301 North Back River Road in Hampton. Their phone number is 757/722-1471.