GRENADA – The St. Andrew’s Anglican Secondary school (SAASS) located in Telescope, St. Andrew yesterday concluded its build-up to this year’s Independence celebrations with their annual Independence Treat. As part of the build-up, which commenced last month, students were given the words of patriotic songs and were allowed to sing them during morning assemblies. Also, there was an Independence quiz during the weekly Monday morning assemblies and the winning students were given ‘tokens’. During the past week, the build-up intensified with the annual Independence concert on Wednesday. Speeches from the Governor General, Prime Minister and Opposition Leader were read out and there were presentations from the school’s choir, the top three students in the Independence Poetry Competition, the school’s steel pan group, the school’s band and the school staff. Students also competed among themselves in the Independence Calypso competition and the Independence dress competition. The ‘Black Wizard’, who is a past pupil of SAASS, was one of the special invited judges and he made a guest appearance, singing his song, ‘Oh Grenada, Land of my Birth’. On Thursday February 03, the school staged its Inter Form competitions in the categories of Traditional Food and Drinks, Traditional Clothing, Traditional Music & Dance, Traditional Games and Folklore & Artifacts. On Friday February 04, the students were allowed to come to school with their national colors and they had their Independence treat. Since students were only given EC $2 per child, teachers improvised by asking students to bring in various agricultural products like bread-fruit, bananas, oranges, callaloo, gospo, lime, lemon among other items and used them to cook ‘oil-down’ – the national dish - and made juice out of the citrus that were brought by the students. In the all instances, the form masters and mistresses were the chief chefs, while some of the students worked along with them. This provided students and teachers with the opportunity to socialize, have fun and strengthen the bonds of friendship. The winners of the different events were: Inter-Group Folk/Drama Competition 1st Choir - 'Day O' 2nd Guides - 'Wake Up Johnny' Independence Calypso Competition 1st Michael Alexander - "Grenada Sweet Grenada" 2nd Raynard Thomas - "True" 3rd Jasmine Murray - "Eyes on Me" National Wear Competiton 1st - Cady Jeffrey - 5C 2nd - Reisa Modoo - 4N 3rd - Shadina Felix - 5D Inter-Form Cultural Competition Category Clothing 1st - Form 1U 2nd - Form 1N 3rd – Form 1J Category Food and Drinks 1st - Form 2U 2nd – Form 2N 3rd – Form 2J Category Music and Dance 1st – Form 3J 2nd – Form 2N 3rd – Form 3E Category Games 1st - Forms 4N and 4E 2nd – Form 4J 3rd - Forms 4C and 4U Category Folklore and Artifacts 1st - Form 5D 2nd - Form 5C 3rd - Form 5J To view photos of the Independence concert, visit the Photo Gallery under INSIDE GRENADA By Wallace JA Inside Grenada News