"I am Latin and I will continue being Latin in respect to some aspects of my culture. I dance, I sing and I will keep on dancing and singing," Princess Maxima said on marrying the heir to the Dutch throne. And she vowed to encourage Crown Prince Willem-Alexander to join in the fun. "I keep trying to push him. His hips are a little rigid," she joked of his efforts on the dancefloor. Well, Argentine-born Maxima had a little help in that aspect when the couple landed in the Caribbean along with her mother-in-law, Queen Beatrix.
The royal party were encouraged to let loose at a festival in Aruba, celebrating the island's multi-cultural heritage. Willem-Alexander gamely shook his hips at the insistence of locals, and even the Queen had a boogie. Earlier in the day they'd been greeted by a sea of orange – the Dutch national colour – worn by islanders to show support for their monarch.
Aruba, off the coast of Venezuela, is one of four countries in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Reflecting its rich history, Dutch, local Creole dialect Papamiento and English are spoken on the isle, which has a territory of 69 square miles. Praising their hosts in a speech, the prince said: "It is wonderful to see how a small country can sometimes be great and to realize that no dream is unattainable, if you really believe in it."
