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Published: March 3rd 2009
Post-fete Coconut Water
This was some good stuff, especially after a night on the street.February 21, 2009
The other day I went up the mountain to make some reservations at the PAX guest house with another student for her grandparents. The owner is good friends with one of the professors at the UW – Madison. They’re both big ornithologists. Before we knew what was going on, he had invited us in for tea and cake and we were sitting on the back veranda. There are tons of birds, not quite hundreds, but a lot. Off in the distance various birds of prey are soaring the thermals. A little bit closer to us we saw a variety of humming birds, one of them the smallest in Trinidad, the Tufted Coquette. Brittany and I also saw a pregnant Black-throated Mango hummingbird. But the most amazing thing we did up there was feed a hummingbird out of a wine glass. No joke, check out my pics. Gerard, the owner, said it took him 8 years to train them. He has two huge feeders and when they empty one (about 3 hours to down 2 litres) a hummingbird will fly into the dinning room, which is inside the house, stop by all of the tables and then go
Rain at UWI Splash
Who'da thunk, rain at a party called splash. Akilah and I didn't notice till we were soaked. hover outside the kitchen until someone goes to grab the feeder. Pretty cool. We’ve now been invited for a second time to come clear trails, apparently some rather large trees have fallen across the trails a ways out up another mountainside.
I’ve had two tests in my forest ecology class so far. An insane multiple choice test on rainforests and then a plant identification test that wasn’t quite as bad. Beyond the fact that it took near 3 hours, we had 1 species guide to share with our whole lab group. The things that are starting to irk me here are lack of investment in what I see as more necessary resources, like basic tools for teaching, and the endless levels of bureaucracy and paperwork. To turn in a lab assignment, I had to go to a department head office on a specific day, get a stamp and endorsement and then sign out that I had turned the lab in personally. It’s irksome that many people assume we should know how to do all these things and often questions are simply answered with a blank stare, but I suppose things could be much worse. The locals are just as
Destra Garcia
She usually had her bumpa to the audiance, so much that I don't have pictures of her face. fed up with the university system here, I guess it makes me appreciate the UW that much more. And if these are the worst problems I’ve had thus far, I should be thankful.
Onto more fun stuff. Thursday night, we went to UWI (pronounced you-we) Splash. We headed out around 10 o’clock to Chaguaramas, a town in the northwest, for an outdoor concert. Another night of winin’ from around 11 till 5:30 in the morning. Everybody had an awesome time, sometime after 2 it started raining, then some of us made our way to the front of the stage. Carlos, a cool dude from Miami, ended up on stage dancing with a major Soca star, Destra Garcia. He still freaks out whenever it gets brought up. He’s now viewed as a hero on hall and has been declared a Trini.
My roommate, Isaiah, is back from the bush. Opened my door one day and there he was, thanks for the call, punk. Well, we went to Tunapuna to get a few things for him. He’s been working on at the Port-a-Pierre Wildlife Trust doing a lot of manual labor and being eaten by mosquitoes. Everything was closing in
Carlos and Destra
This is kind of the ultimate wine, so it was a big deal for Destra to get on Carlos...kudos, dude. town by the time we finished lunch, that tends to happen here. Would have been on time, but whenever you go somewhere it seems like at least a handful end up inviting themselves along as well. Oh well, we stopped in a little strip mall on the way back, nothing we wanted, but they were giving out free drinks and blasting Soca, nice surprise. Walked home in the rain, not a nice surprise. I’m still waiting for this dry season to kick in…apparently it wont come, say my professors.
Date: February 22, 2009
So I just got back from my first round of Carnival, it was the best party of my life. Everything is downhill from here, damn. I haven’t slept for about 27 hours but I feel wide awake, must be the red bull. To start out with, we left for Dimache Gras last night around 5 o’clock. It’s like Mardi Gras, but on Sunday instead of Tuesday. The main attraction of the event was the showing of the king and queens of Carnival. Both wear enormous and elaborate costumes, often so heavy they cannot carry them, so they get pulled around on wheels. Many of the
One of the DImache Gras Queens
It was near impossible to take pictures of these costumes, they were amazng. costumes were over 20 feet tall, wide and deep with some being around 30 feet in various directions. There was also a big Calypso show, which is somewhat like Soca. Only it is much slower and carries with it much more meaning, whether it be political, socio-economic or what have you. There were some pretty good performers, quite a few songs about Obama. Not to mention the Obama paraphernalia, wow! Some intense crazy shirts…sorry no pictures.
Afterwards, we, six white girls and myself, took off to meet up with our band for J’ouvert (pronounced joo-vay, remember French Creole). Actually, J’ourvert is short for jour ouvert, which means day open and is usually the biggest party in most Caribbean Islands, so say some of my sources and it most likely originated in Trinidad as a way to remember the uprising of slaves. Rioters use to paint themselves to cover up their appearance, thus the paints and mud. It was a bit of a long and sketchy walk but there was enough traffic that everything was cool. Unfortunately, it was raining but seeing how I was going to be covered in mud and paint within the next few hours, I figured
Another Queens
I'd have to say this was my favorite costume, wish the pic had turned out a little better. it didn’t matter all that much. I played with the Red Jokers, reasonably sane group of people…for J’ouvert standards. J’ouvert is a huge street party that circles the Savannah, a very large open park space in Port of Spain, T&T capitol. ‘Bands’ form and wine down the streets till the sun comes up. Every band I saw had a semi truck with walls of speakers on the front, both sides and the back and a DJ in the middle running the show. The semi is followed by drink cars, which by joining a band you get free drinks…or I should say unlimited drinks, it costs money to join a band. Not all that much though, I certainly didn’t think enough to warrant the selection we had; multiple rums, Johnny Walker, Heineken, Red Bull, juice, lots of water, paint and a bunch of sweet stuff like Smirnoff and Shandy, it’s like Boone’s Farm, 0.5%, but sweeter. Obviously my favorite. By midmorning I was covered in red paint and mud, the sun was up before I even realized it and the party just kept on truckin’ till 10ish. They served us breakfast too, fry bakes with some kind of a cheese salad
Pregaming for J'ouvert
Alisha and I getting pumped for the party, probably about 2:00am right there. or fish salad. I found the biggest bone in my sandwich I’ve ever pulled out of a fillet, perfect for a toothpick. Trini people always seemed ecstatic to see how much fun I was having, great people down here.
Our walk home was interesting, quite long…no idea how long it was, but much farther than any class I’ve had to walk to at the UW. Everyone was still in good spirts, we were winin the all the way back to the bus stop…I was surprised at the lack of dirtyness of the other people on the street. If a group of white people walking down the street doesn’t already get enough attention, being covered in red paint and dancing to the nearest source of music really drew attention, but all the stares came with great big smiles. Actually, we got free beer from one of the vendors. Covered in red paint and up that early in the morning drinking beer reminded everybody of UW football.
Some unmentionable uncle on my mom’s side of the family said enough about food, how are the ladies down here. If you can’t tell from all these pictures, then I will just say
Sweet Dog
This actually was someones dog in my band, 'The Red Jokers' and he was having just as much fun as everybody else. Running up and down the street parking and waging his tail. that they are all very nice in many ways. And they can all dance, really well, like really really well.
Monday, during the day…as in a few hours after J’ouvert, there is first lap of the bands around Port of Spain. People usually aren’t decked out in full costume, but it’s a big party all the same. I sat this one out, got some rest. Tuesday, Isaiah and I went to town and met up with a couple girls for what’s called ‘Second Lap.’ Everybody is in full costume and the streets are swinging. People from all over the world were there, to see what is considered one of the biggest and best Carnivals in the world. Check out the pics.
I just got back from Tobago today, more on that later...
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