By Raffique Shah February 21, 2010 CARNIVAL Friday night and I am driving to Port of Spain, my mind working like a Pentium computer chip. Which route do I choose to reach St James, my regular liming spot? Over the years I have learned that bumper-to-bumper traffic, not to add a virtual sea of early-bird … Continue reading Carnival: one foot in the grave
By Raffique Shah February 01, 2009 POLITICIANS are wont to making the damnedest statements. This ugly trait is not confined to Trinidad and Tobago’s special breed that litters the political landscape. The recently booed-out-of-office US president George W Bush carved an unmatched record of making the stupidest remarks, maybe of all times. But among the … Continue reading Tourism down, Carnival dying
At Brazil Carnival, Racial Unity a Mask “Nowhere is the vision of Brazil as a racial democracy more apparent than during carnival, when millions of people black and white, rich and poor, press up against one another in an annual party that began Friday in most of the country. But the celebrations mask tensions that … Continue reading At Brazil Carnival, Racial Unity a Mask
By Raffique Shah February 25, 2007 It was not the “best Carnival ever”, as some Government ministers and security officials boasted last week. If they meant that it was the best in recent years, with that I agree. There were more than a handful of good calypsoes. There were a few mas bands that were … Continue reading A Carnival we can be proud of
By Raffique Shah February 18, 2007 It’s the columnist’s perennial dilemma: what topic to address on a Carnival Sunday? Who reads newspapers around this time anyway? Pan “peongs” in their thousands will be bleary-eyed and either celebrating the sound of steel or fuming over the judges’ decisions from last night’s Panorama finals. Many more who … Continue reading Crime will not stop the Carnival
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe February 20, 2024 “A Quest for Truth” was delivered on Monday Night February 19, 2024, at the UNC’s forum on crime. The Hon. Kamla Persad-Bissessar, leader of the UNC, other members of the panel, distinguished members of the UNC, ladies and gentlemen and those who are present at the Chaguanas … Continue reading A Quest for Truth
By Raffique Shah February 19, 2024 It took Machel Montano 40 of his 49 years to creatively and graphically make an emphatic statement on this senseless commess that surrounds calypso and soca. I am still not sure however that his contention—that soca is the soul of calypso—is correct, but he laid down the gauntlet for … Continue reading Machel resurrects the old
By Raffique Shah February 13, 2024 I can see it clearly today as I did back then 70-odd years ago. My brain at eight years young focused on the sweet melody that came from the one steelband that passed through Freeport Junction. By 6 a.m. when the junction came alive with about 800 people of … Continue reading When music ignites passion
By Raffique Shah January 23, 2024 Eleven years ago, when I first reported that I was diagnosed by several doctors with Parkinson’s disease, I thought I knew then much about this neurodegenerative condition for which there was no cure. Back then, the only persons I knew who had PD were actor Michael J Fox, my … Continue reading Parkinson’s patients mission
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe October 23, 2023 The following is a lecture delivered at the Pa Gya! A Literary Festival in Accra, Ghana. First of all, I wish to thank the hosts of this marvelous festival for inviting me to participate in it and for allowing me to share my ideas of how literature, … Continue reading Art and culture in West Africa and the Caribbean