In the spirit of togetherness

Where I come from Christmas is not the most popular holiday (although it’s definitely my favourite! Hello! Christmas trees and hot cocoa and presents??). We don’t really celebrate Thanksgiving. Our ethnicity is predominately Hindus, Muslims and Christians, in that order. And that being said, Divali and Eid does not begin to compare to the holiday being celebrated today.

This week we celebrate CARNIVAL!!!

In Trinidad, Carnival is what we live for; it’s what most people go through the entire year waiting for. We live from Carnival to Carnival. Whoever does not know about Trinidad Carnival should stop reading this post right now and go look it up! Festivities start immediately after Christmas and continue for the months leading up to Carnival. There are fetes every weekend and the buildup to Monday and Tuesday. And trust me, we Trinis love a good fete.

After the Carnival season, we go through Carnival tabanca until the next year, playing soca and reminiscing. For those of you who don’t know, today is Carnival Monday and tomorrow is Carnival Tuesday, which are the highlights of the season. The road is what we wait for. We need to hit the road on this glorious Monday! The picture above is what today’s all about. And let me put this out right now! My vote for Road March is Kes!

The thing with Trinidad is that even though we are a multi-ethnic society with a rich culture, the racism is ridiculous. It’s beyond my understanding why we are so ready to spread hate to our fellow Trini brothers and sisters because they do not share the same skin colour as us, they do not share the same views as us or the other non-excuse excuses we come up with. However, this all changes during Carnival. During Carnival, all issues are forgotten, the only issue being which band do we play mas with and which fete do we go to. Who we take a drink with or a dance with is inconsequential. As long as there is bumper there will be wine! We party as one and we feel what unity is.

From Ash Wednesday its back to life as usual.

Small Island Girl With Big Dreams

“She was like a drowning person, flailing, reaching for anything that might save her. Her life was an urgent, desperate struggle to justify her life.”

― Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated

Growing up on a small Caribbean island can be hard, especially with the mass broadcast of pop culture available on the media today. Having this exposure could be both a blessing and curse for the impressionable youth in such a society. Needless to say, I felt like I had been one of those impressionable youths. This is my story…