New Grounds wins National Nine Mornings lighting competition

The results are in. The best lit community overall for 2009 in the National Nine Mornings lighting competition is New Grounds.{{more}}

For the third year in a row, the central Windward community was crowned champs, beating out two of their rivals. The announcement of the winners came on Thursday, December 24, at the closing of the Nine Mornings festivities held at Heritage Square in Kingstown.

Coming in second was the north Leeward community of Rose Bank while Sunny Gutter in Bequia had to settle for the third spot.

In best lit garden competition, Richmond Hill Gardens copped the number one spot, Arnos Vale roundabout came in second place and The Adams Garden rounded off the top three.

Best-lit house went to Jimmy Samuel of Rillan Hill and Olivia DaSilva of Cane End was second.

The south Windward community of Stubbs took the award for the best Nine Morning community. Carierre came in second place and Layou slid into third place.

Communities throughout the nation were also judged in five zones. The winners from zones one through five were: Rose Bank, The Sion Hill intersection, New Grounds, Park Hill and Sunny Gutter, Bequia.

Kenneth Ash, the man whose house is adorned with over 68,000 lights this year, was also honoured for his contribution to the Nine Morning festivities.

Minister of Culture, Rene Baptiste presented the retired Electrician with a bag of presents.

Baptiste noted that Ash is the pioneer of lighting of houses in St Vincent and the Grenadines, a practice which has grown to become such a huge part of the Christmas activities.

Ash, in turn, thanked Baptiste and the Chairman of the Nine Mornings Committee Michael Peters for doing a great job in keeping the tradition alive. He urged persons to continue supporting the Nine Mornings since it is the only festival of its kind in the world.