Understanding

Funny enough, the name is a pun. A rum lover is a Rumantic. The word itself recants notions of excess, inebriation, and alcoholism, all widespread stigmas associated with rum in the region. As an adjective though, Rumantic qualifies individuals who share a common appreciation and knowledge about the spirit, its countries and terroirs.

One isn’t born a rumantic however, but can be raised to be such a connoisseur thanks to individual curiosity, enough sharing and gratitude. Rumance is not  a state of being as much as it is a path , like a map or timeline of love itself, traveled out of pleasure and with respect for the inspiration and wonders met along the way.

The idea of Rumance opens up a world  of suggestions that can be freely interpreted. But the word remained because it simply makes sense. It articulates an intention and a desire rooted in both pleasure and expertise. The text below, despite its unknown source, speaks to these roots.

No self respecting Caribbean person holds allegiance to any other spirit. It’s the first thing you learn to drink. After all it is in your blood. Rum flows in the veins like rebellion. It is strong and bitter like cane burnt in anger.  It is what is left after the sweetness is taken out.

Rum stems from a long human and technical history.

But hold on. Before you take a sip. Before you burn the tip of your tongue and feel your whole inside go golden from the heat of liquor coursing through you.
Before the feeling goes to your head and your tongue gets loose and your waist begins a barely perceptible oscillation.

Remember that Rum is first an foremost a feeling, an experience to be had.

Open the bottle of rum and pour a libation. Spill three drops on the ground.  You do this for those who are not here to part take of the drink themselves.  For those who have gone before. For ancestors whose names we don’t remember. For Gods whose names we were forced to forget. For blood spilt, lives lost and the riches that were created 

Rum is associated with diverse rituals.

Rum is the drink of forgetfulness for some. I believe that it started as a drink of remembrance.

Rum is creativity and remembrance. Innovation and tradition.

Only a concept could encompass the broadness of the spirit. As such, Rumantics answers the need to infuse the rum world with a perception of excellence and highlight its heritage be it cultural and culinary, or natural and agricultural. The concept allows for a genuine expression from the caribbean to the world.

Because sugar cane and rum are at the root of the Caribbean, they have today to capacity to create linkages where history set them to be factors of divide. This is my chore belief. With Rumantics, I choose to use love to speak of us, to foster another representation of who we are individually and collectively.

Rumantics focuses on landscapes inhabited by the men and women who make rum and the land what it is. It sets out to name the habits and sensations so familiar, we all to often forget how meaningful they can be. It collects and reflects upon daily inspiration.

And because rum isn’t fixated either in its production or its consumption, I want to explore through the concept the many intersections between rum and culture as it stands today in our islands and the world.

This is what the blog aims to achieve.