Print from Seen-Passa Passa T-shirt.

The promoters of the weekly dancehall session, Passa Passa, have teamed up with German company Seen to launch a T-shirt range dedicated to the Tivoli Gardens, West Kingston-based dance.

The move is part of the Passa Passa promoters' strategy to increase its international presence and earn additional revenue from the event. As a street dance, the event is always likely to remain free and currently the only revenue comes from resident sound system Swatch International taking bookings elsewhere in Jamaica and abroad.

"There is no reason that there shouldn't be a Passa Passa phonecard branded by Digicel. If Macka Diamond can sell (Sangster's) Rum Cream, there's no reason that Passa shouldn't be able to provide a platform to sell or market a remittance service, or any such product," Swatch's Dylan Miles told the Observer previously of plans to market the brand.

Meanwhile, Seen is trying to take a less stereotypical spin on local culture.

Coming from "a very rural part of Bavaria, Southern Germany", Seen partners 27-year-old Tobias Huber and Gabriel Holzner, 24, are two of many foreigners attracted to Jamaica, as much as anything, by the island's stark contrast to their own roots.

"You have sound systems as big as houses playing all night long, we have old people complaining about my Walkman playing too loud on the bus," mused Huber.

Huber and Holzner have studied at the University of the West Indies (UWI) and Edna Manley Arts College respectively.

A version of this story appeared on the Jamaica Observer 'Observations' blog. For further coverage, multimedia, weblinks and more visit:www.jamaicaobserver.com/blog

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