Tag Archives: Dominica

Entertainment, Interviews

King of Caribbean Comedy: The Rise of Majah Hype & the One Thing He Wants Caribbean People to Do

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It’s almost 10 p.m. on a cool fall night in Charlotte. The best old-school reggae music is playing, the venue is almost packed to capacity and if this was a dancehall or party – they place would have been turned up already. But the crowd isn’t here to dance. Everyone is anticipating the start of this show to see Caribbean comedy sensation Majah Hype in his debut North Carolina performance. When he touches the stage, he lives up to all the hype and more. People pull out their cell phones to record the authentic, raw and hilarious performance that only Majah Hype can deliver.

“I don’t do jokes on Haitians no more,” Majah Hype begins his set, taking the crowd into his hilarious explanation. His stand-up comedy is different from the sketch comedy that catapulted him into the hearts of fans everywhere, but it remains the same in many ways – it is authentic, presented with passion and totally funny.

Majah Hype began his comedy career around 2012 after being laid off from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority of New York, where he was a licensed electrician. His sketches started simple enough. He would say, “Jamaicans be like….,” “Haitians be like…,” “Trinidadians be like…,” then go into full antics of someone from that particular country and post it to social media. His accents, dialects and mannerisms were so real for each impersonation, everyone wondered which Caribbean country Majah Hype was from and what was his background.

Majah Hype was born in the Caribbean and grew up in New York. We know that his first name is Nigel, but that’s about all he’ll reveal. Keeping his nationality private forces his sketches to remain original and allows him to connect with people throughout the Caribbean and the diaspora because he’s not pigeon-holed as one nationality, so everyone can identify with him.

His videos garner thousands of views and hundreds of shares within minutes of posting on social media. On those pages, people from all over the world connect through humor and culture. Many commenters remark of his ability to lift their moods. Some say they check his pages daily waiting for his videos.

In an interview after his Charlotte performance, Majah Hype said his goal is to unite Caribbean people throughout the world.

“We need to really support each other because strength is in numbers,” Majah Hype said of Caribbean people. With millions of people in the Caribbean and millions more of Caribbean people throughout the world, the levels that can be attained through mutual support is unlimited, he said.

“There is no Caribbean celebrity that has a million followers that we created. We didn’t create Rihanna. We didn’t create Nicki Minaj. We didn’t create Foxy Brown. There’s no entertainer that has a million followers. I see a big problem with that because there’s more than a million Caribbean people in the states alone. We need to support each other more. We need to help each other rise as a people,” he said. “We need to big up each other. We need to big up every nationality. And that’s why I started this movement, because strength is in numbers.”

Majah Hype has evolved greatly, creating dozens of characters from all over the Caribbean – starting with the likes of Grandpa James and De Ras, to everyone’s favorite Mitzy with a Z and Petty-Ann. His sketches are full scenes with him starring as each character.  Majah Hype’s character development and story lines are so deep, you would think that he has writers on his team. On the contrary, everything comes from the mind of Nigel.

“Everything you see on social media is me,” Majah Hype said. There are no screen tests and nor rehearsals. “I don’t write any skits. I never pre-record any skits. I wake up in the morning and I just do what I do.”

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And if you thought that Majah Hype could only impersonate West Indians, you are wrong. He has created characters like Charlie and Mable, Bobby Bunz, and most recently Shawn and Tanya aka “Are You Dumb.” Majah Hype wants to keep his fans entertained. “I always think of reinventing myself. People nowadays, their attention span is real short, so we always have to bring something new to them,” he said.

Now selling out shows across the United States, United Kingdom, Caribbean and aboard specialty cruises, Majah Hype is a household name in the Caribbean and the diaspora. His first movie “Foreign Minds Think Alike,” was based on his characters. He has also starred in the web series, “Money and Violence.” He has gotten endorsement deals, most recently for Patti LaBelle’s sweet potato pie. Majah Hype said he’ll continue growing his brand and expanding his acting career. He didn’t know what to expect when he began in 2012, but he’s putting in the work to become successful.

“Whatever is for you is for you,” Majah Hype said. “God gave me a talent and I shared it with the world and we are where we are today.”

Tips for the ladies: when attending a Majah Hype show, be sure to wear waterproof makeup. You will laugh until you cry!

For more information on Majah Hype and his shows visit the website www.majahhype.com.

 

Island Life

Living the Sweet Life…

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Ah… the joys of sitting on a low step, feet spread far apart, leaning forward slight, ravenously peeling the skin off of a mango, then sinking my teeth into its juicy flesh – the yellow nectar of this wonderful fruit spilling around the sides of my mouth and running down my hands, sometimes to my elbow. It’s mango season! Time to eat my belly full of one my favorite fruits. Mangoes for breakfast. Mangoes for snack after lunch. Mangoes for appetizer before dinner. Can anyone ever get enough of mangoes? Growing up we had several mango trees in our yard on St. Thomas. The Julie mango tree was right at my door step. I could never get enough of that one. And as plentiful as that tree was, we always watched the fruit waiting for just the right time to pick them. We hardly allowed the fruit of this particular tree to fall to the ground – they were too precious. Every year during mango season, family from near and far would come for their pick off the tree.  Strangers, even, would come to our yard to get their pick when we weren’t there.

On the other hand at my grandparents home in St. Croix there were so many mangoes that I didn’t know what to do. The sheer size of their property allowed them to grow more trees, and their trees seemed to grow much taller and wider than those at our home on St. Thomas, producing so much of the treasured fruit. A tree that produced a purple mango with thick skin was near the entrance of their yard. That tree produced an enormous amount of mangoes! No matter how many people came by for their share, the supply never seemed to dwindle.  But those purple mangoes were not my favorite. I liked the small round ones at the tree further up. I also liked the ones from the tree all the way on to the back of the property. But even having so many mangoes at my disposal, I still looked forward to the days when we would drive to other parts of the island picking different types of mangoes that didn’t grown on my grandparents’ property. Not only did we get to eat our heart’s desire of any type of mango we wanted, there were so many that I could be picky. Yep, I only ate the ripe-but-firm ones, the ones that had little or no bruises on the skin. Anything else wasn’t good enough. But I would eat a mango until there was no yellow left. My Grandma Madge would say to me in her heavy Antiguan accent, “yuh gyal, nuh badder eat deh sudden dung to the seed bare so… me hab one pail ah mango here fuh yuh.”

But if you really want to know what mango heaven looks like, you must go to Dominica during the summer. I remember the countryside of LaPlaine, where my mother was born, being loaded with tropical fruits – every tropical fruit you could think of. We would wake up to a bucket of varieties of mangoes freshly picked mostly by our cousin Handel. And the coconuts, another of my favorite fruits, were also picked and lined up waiting for us to choose which ones we wanted to consume first. Handel treated us like royalty! (Sadly we lost Handel on a New Years day many years ago – a casualty of a drunken driver. The family has never gotten justice for his death.)

As a child I never remember anyone having to pay for mangoes. Maybe that was because children don’t have to pay for anything anyway. For the most part mangoes were shared freely. They were in such abundance! What else would people do with all those mangoes? Has anyone noticed that mangoes are not as abundant as they used to be? Not only mangoes. I’m observing a decline in other local fruits. I’m can’t name a single place on St. Thomas where someone can find a cherry (gooseberry) tree.  A couple of years ago when I was pregnant and couldn’t wait for my usual supply of mangoes, I decided to buy some mangoes from a fruit stand. I asked the lady where the mangoes were from. I looked at her in disbelief when she told me Puerto Rico. What! It was bad enough that I had to actually BUY mangoes, and the mangoes were not even locally grown! It’s not that I have anything against fruits from Puerto Rico. It just seemed strange to me that before, mangoes were so plentiful that someone could make a good hustle from selling the mangoes that they collected for free out of their or someone else’s yard. Now we had to import them.

 For me, because mangoes are seasonal I try to eat as many as I can when locally grown ones are available. Luckily for me, my daughter’s grandmother also shares a love for mangoes and supplies us with bags full at a time. But still, this delectable fruit doesn’t seem to be as plentiful as it once was. So if you happen to catch me eating one, or see me admiring your tree, or see me stop my car to pick up a freshly fallen fruit – bear with me. It’s mango season!