I
have always been home for Christmas, no matter how far away I roam.
The
pieces represented here tell those tales, beginning with the genesis of my journalism morphed into
literary endeavours, mapping as much the evolution of the society over the
period as they do personal development and evolution as a writer. The selection here are all close to my heart.
In
a year that began and ended in sighs and for many a sense of despair – over not
just public-induced personal traumas as
well as unfolding tragedies as the gruesome murders of the Japanese masquerader
Asami Nagakiya and Shannon Banfield and all in between, reading and reviewing
and reflecting on these are helping to position for the challenges that may
come in the New Year that are sure to test one’s faith in the future of home.
Sometimes it takes a long view to put things in perspective and position for
the New Year, and hence these selections.
Genesis
and Discovery: Christmas 1986-87
In
the spirit of colonial Discoverie, the Discover Trinidad & Tobago columns of 1986-1988 – one of my
first series and one of which one a BWIA Media Award for Excellence in
Journalism/Social and Political Commentary - became the forerunner to the
writings & explorations that fed writings for AVM Television Series as Cross Country, Booktalk, Survival, &
the AVM Special Report; other
newspaper columns as Environment
Friendly, In Gabilan, I Beg to Move, Between the Lines, the C Monologues, The
Week That Was etc, all of which
partly fed the impulse of my thesis and book, Finding a Place; the introduction,
A Clash of Political Cultures/Cultural Diversity and Minority Politics in
Trinidad and Tobago in Through the
Political Glass Ceiling and LiTTscapes
– Landscapes of Fiction from Trinidad & Tobago published in
commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of Independence.
Trini
Christmas – Reconstructing Nationhood from the ashes of the 1990 Coup-attempt
The
article Trini Christmas written in 1990, the year of the attempted coup, when
we were still shaken – and some of us have never really recovered from being on
the frontline reporting the unfolding events – takes a close look the nation and its evolving traditions …. The
humour and comedic perspective is tolerant of the fickleness with which we treat
cultural traditions in a society daily adjusting, adapting and growing new
traditions. While the word tradition itself becomes paradoxical and oxymoronic in
these contexts, the musings here provide insights into the vivacity of our
living heritage. Symbols and
representations of heartwarming Christmas traditions are as elusive to define
as the spirit of the season itself in a young evolving nation in the grip of
globalization and is a good source of warm and rib-tickling comic relief too
for those of us still-in-recovery from the traumas of the 1990-attempted coup.
C Monologues
Creole
Christmas and CrisCringle List, are two pieces from the C Monologues
series, one of the longest running of my columns that appeared on the editorial
leader page of the Sunday Guardian. Though
hinged on actual and specific occurrences of the day, they epitomise the collection
in that they suggest either a society in statis, or the particularly timeless
character of the pieces. The pieces evoked wagging fingers from Prime Ministers
Patrick Manning and Basdeo Panday, to the Chief Justice, Ministers, Ambassadors
and Diplomats, many of whom also privately called in their consternation as
well as their commendations. It also inspired did wagging tongues from readers
who looked forward to its weekly issuance. A former Ambassador of the US said
on more than one occasion he felt torn between admiration for the pieces which
offered him unique insights into the society and, of course, unease when it
delved into some of the actions of the country he represented, the USA which at
the time of the War on Afghanistan offered much to C Monologue about. All are
treated with the perspicacity, picong and pepper humour of the calypso arena,
chutney stage or the private gatherings of Trinis’ elemental sharp tongue and
wit.
The
companion piece, CrisCringle’s List is my Naughty and Nice list sent to Santa
in 2002. Based on events and occurrences of the day much of it still applies
today, and to the same figures – give or take a few if you substitute the names
for any of the ensuring years – the more things change …. though not sure one
can find as many C’s as on that year – the year of the political deadlock with
the third general election in as many years, reflective of the internal statis.
Creole
Christmas is personally dear to me, as triggered from a childhood memory and
inspired by my father’s daily honest toil to provide for this family as a
farmer and market vender from which resonate cringing at callous authority
figures perpetuating ongoing mistreatment and disrespect to vendors and other
honest hardworking citizens struggling to beat the odds of challenging
circumstances. That it is a situation as real today as it was written as it was
of yesteryear and the reality of successive generations again poke reflection
on the state of the nation.
Deadlocks between stasis and suicide
To me one of the most poignant piece among this
selection is from my
The Week That Was. The Week That Was, a satirical summation of weekly
national and international news and occurrences that I prepared, appeared
weekly on Page 2 of the Sunday Guardian,
a print version similar in style to now commentaries of Jon Stewart, Stephen
Colbert’s or John Oliver in American satirical sitcom. But this form of satire
is a tradition all our own, rooted in what we call Trini picong and mamaguy,
the edge of fiction, hinged on the week’s happenings, on facts and on truth.
It’s Christmas …. In A Small Place of December
23, 2001. The Christmas
of 2001 was one shrouded at sadness over the suicide of a friend in the arts.
It inspired dedication of the column, The
Week That Was to him,.Playwright and actor Devindra Dookie took his life
following a period of intense and growing depression and institutionalization. Having
had my own taste of the isolationism that public endeavor can provoke,
Devindra’s end resonates like the season’s tolling bells as a constant reminder
of the kind of madness that this place can plunge one into.
It’s Christmas …. In A Small Place is inspired by the tone of the week and a
Santa Claus styled hat given to me as an early Christmas present by my friends
at our celebration of Eid which stimulated replays of the melody of the refrain
of Mel Blanc's 1957 The Hat I Got for Christmas then making a comeback through the soca/parang rendition of by Anthony Tone Salloum. So it was not fiction. Indeed
I got a hat (see photo) that was too big for me and covered my eyes. The silver
dust sprinkled on it also released into my eyes, making it virtually
unwearable. We three friends referenced in the article, and something of a play on the three wise (wo)men of Christmas, are real, too. From three different
faiths, nothing prevents us from sharing religious observances and celebrating
the festivals of each other, as Divali that preceded Eid that year and the
forthcoming Christmas. Such is the national character. The national political
character was, however, then, as now, somewhat altogether different and tinged
with the ugliest elements our society can churn up.
It is symbolized in the
farcical ‘limited agreement’ referenced
in the piece which speaks to the political deadlock arising from the General
Election of December 10, 2001. The incumbent United National Congress (UNC) and
the opposition People's National Movement (PNM) each won 18 seats after the
general election, posing a constitutional debate about which party should form
the government. Prime Minister Basdeo Panday offered to share power in a
government of national unity to break the deadlock, which the Opposition leader
Patrick Manning rejected. Both met with President Arthur Robinson, and agreed,
as provided under the Constitution, to authorise him to appoint a new Prime
Minister.
On the Week of this column,
on December 19, 2001, the two political parties had a ‘limited agreement’ on
appointment of a new Speaker of the House and that the sitting President choose
the next government.
It might be a prophetic
allusion but the day following the column, it became evident that the ‘limited
agreement’ would be stillborn and PM Panday's allusions of National Unity, suicidal, as on 24 December 2001, President Robinson chose
and swore in the Opposition, Mr Manning as Prime Minister. It meant suicide for
the political pact that had resolved the elections tie, and threatened the
convening of the 7th Parliament and by extension Parliament’s ability to pass
any legislation resulting in the call for new elections.
The deadlock characterized
the politics of the year 2002 and a larger national stasis; the wastage of public time, energies and
resources was reflected in the left unattended to real issues of the day, like
the floods that swept through the Central Plains and dampened the spirit of
Christmas.
The stasis, the choking
frustrations and the dead end for one’s art that Devindra’s act of suicide
represent frame the column as much as the dead air deadlock of the nation
drawing out the irony and pathos of the House of Parliament hailing his suicide
as an act of self-will – when his suicide was so glaringly a statement on the
lack of will, lack of political will, and his own lack of will to live.
The quotation excerpted in
the image is from his suicide note, a mike drop if ever there was one.
I was first exposed to the
art of Devindra Dookie at high school in the 1980s, when the touring Theatre in
Education group came to students of Princes Town, including St Stephen’s College. Devindra led the cast that
included Errol Sitahal, Dennis ‘Sprangalang’ Hall, Errol Jones and Pearl Eintou
Springer. With a passion for literature, their depiction of excerpts of the
school’s literature syllabus remains embedded on my mind, especially the
presentation of local author Samuel Selvon’s A Brighter Sun and UK’s George Orwell’s satirical novel, 1984. Eintou, who have been a close
mentor since the start of my journalism and literary endeavours was always enthused
by my avid regular appearance to research my pieces at the West India library
she curated. She recalls that her group toured and performed with Devindra in
schools across the country and after performances, would find the drinking-spot
in the village to discuss issues of the
day, books, the arts, politics and personal issues. He leaned more and more on
the bottle that Eintou described began as socio-cultural drinking. It had
evolved into taste for the strongest of them all - Puncheon Rum which is iconic of Trinidad and Tobago as the royally patented Angostura Bitters - because other
alcohol couldn’t dull the pain, it seems.
Devindra led the
Alternative Theatre movement, generating work through his own writing,
directing and producing plays or what his circle of friends might engage him
in. For much of his career he was an invisible voice on a government
information programme, sitting behind a microphone in the uninspiring drab
unlit, unaired space of the Division of Information. His acting/directing and
stage career included, Men of Gray II and Flight of the Ibis.
His passion for his work,
which he would at times invite me to sneak preview in stages of development,
masked his internal turmoil and torment. Devindra, who’s art I had covered over
the years – as actor, director, playwright, inspired me, and I never suspected
until the later years, when he too, like so many artists sought a shoulder, an
ear, a sympathetic heart, against systems that seem heartless to the arts –
like the last moments of Pat Bishop who rolled off her chair from a heart
attack at a meeting to plan directions for the arts and culture a decade later;
like so many other stymied and stifled talents in the arts, little knowing that
I too may one day be so close to the brink on which he stood.
One night, a few years
prior to his suicide Devindra came pounding on my door, inebriated, singing
loudly. I gently talked him away through the door. He left, singing.
But he was already on a
downward swing. I was soon in and out of the country, on studies, first in the
UK, and then India. The next I would hear from Devindra would be in a note sent
to my office while I was away. In the note he was raving neurotically that they
were coming to kill him. I tried to track him down but some said that he was
unreachable, mentally. A few months later, he would take his life: an act of
the kind of futility that so many of us in the arts here seem to be always
trying to ward off, and the understanding that it is to live that requires
courage, not to die as that Week That Was recap of December 23 2001 chronicles. The years since have brought me closer and
closer to understanding and living with death and the death-thoughts of others
that would mock the first Newsday headline,
5000 Lives Saved - an article
I wrote in the days of hope and optimism and before Newsday’s suicide of its
good news intent that was like a premonition of the death knolls that have
continuously rung out since. My friend, Irma Ramabaran, too comes to mind,
gone this year. How the callousness of
this country can stampede on endeavor and achievements, put one on the edge, on
the brink of suicide, heart attack, death.
Breathless & Pantin for Hope
Among the
pieces, I also found hope. The lighter
pieces represented are in an era when a few people in journalism took the brave
step to challenge the existing media status quo and attempt change, which
efforts in themselves were stopped in their tracks by blinkered commercial
interests.
It
is not unlike the current environment where, since the 2016 Local Government
Election and end of year spurt of murders, a number of individuals have been
coagulating in various configurations to try and define agendas for change. But
without the long view and perspective, such endeavor for change may themselves be
as stillborn as the Newsday Good
News endeavour.
Founded on
the principles of Good News with its first lead story 5000 Lives Saved (by the
suicide hotline), Newsday - before
it became the Town Crier for Crime, Murder & Mayhem - once believed in the
power of the press to shape the social conscience with glad tidings, few would
believe from its current mutation.
It's Christmas Time In The City: The early
days of our founding of this newspaper, and our focus and efforts to lighten
the heart and creating the tone for a society more solidly resting on its imagination
and creative strengths are what emerges from the pieces of 1994 – when Newsday’s
was but an idealistic infant as we all were of its good intentions.
Deck the Halls: Making
one’s own decorations brought family and friends together creatively but has
become one of the fading traditions of Christmas that with readily available
plastic & Made in China alternatives.
An Excellent Store: The
Commercial imperative found savoury contexts of social, cultural, historical
& heritage value, beyond materialistic greed; based on principles of Good
News, celebrating diversity, social inclusion, community building, social
development - the power of the press to
shape socio-cultural conscience with glad tidings …
Peace: Among
these pieces, too, is the voice of the now deceased Archbishop Anthony Pantin. Faced
with social and religious leaders who recoil and are timid to standup to the
atrocities of those who hold positions of authority, there is a sense of
nostalgia as one could have
always counted on : Archbishop Pantin to give the society & his flock the
right dose of conscience-stirring appraisal, soul stirring guidance, &
sense of security without thought to status, class, position, power or
relationship to his Church.
His
message in this piece rings through and true with its message for our times, in
the single word which formed the headline and the word on which I wish will
rest the ensuing days of this Yuletide season and the coming year for all:
Peace.
Lagniappe: LiTTscapes: Christmas Traditions in Fact & Fiction
A lagniappe is a Christmas tradition. Standard dictionaries define it is an act to give something extra when one has made a purchase. This sneak preview of 30 Christmases also offers a lagniappe, some of the representations in fiction of Christmas as detailed in LiTTscapes which compresses the preseitnations of Christmas as viewed through the eyes of writers, poets and novelists as Derek Walcott, VS Naipaul, Earl Lovelace, Michael Anthony, Lakshmi Persaud Seepersad and Ramabai Espinet.
If this has whet your appetite like their telling of the making and partaking of gingerbeer, ponche-a-crème, sorrel, blackcake, rum and a host of other Christmas traditions as parang you can send in requests to purchase LiTTscapes or pre-purchase the complete edition of 30 Christmases.
Auld Lng Syne - one from the series I started called Between The Lines virtually sums it all up - the character of timelessness, the sentiments expressed in all of the pieces, the pathos and the prophesy as the song Auld Lang Syne is itself and is indeed a fitting way to close the year and open as 2016 promises to be, in every sense of newness.
Thank you all for being part of it and seeing me through this year.
Season’s Best and bests for a Joyeaux New Year.
R
Related
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Dr Shadow’s Snakes’ Symphony Tribute to
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Oct 20, 2013 Choosing the Emperor's New Troops. The dilemma
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Jul 30, 2013 Wherever these breezes have passed, they have
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peoples demanding a ...http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Oct 14, 2013 They are announcing some political meeting or
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sceptic so help me decide. http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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T&T Constitution the culprit | The Trinidad Guardian
Jun 15, 2010 T&T Constitution the culprit | The
Trinidad Guardian · T&T Constitution the culprit | The Trinidad Guardian.
Posted by Kris Rampersad at 8:20 AM · Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare
to Facebook ...http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Oct 14, 2013 They are announcing some political meeting or
the other; and begging for my vote, and meh road still aint fix though I hear
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sceptic so help me decide. http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Trinidad and Tobago. http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
Demokrissy: DEADLOCK: Sign of
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Oct 29, 2013 An indication that unless we devise innovative
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tug of war albeit with not just ...http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Oct 16, 2013 Sheilah was clearly and sharply articulating
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wrinkled, deeply over with concerns about political and institutional
stagnation but brimming over with ... http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Oct 21, 2013 Ain't Trini politics d BEST! Nobody fighting
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That's what make we Carnival d best street party in the world. Everyone are
winners because we all like ...http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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and Politics in a New Age - Demokrissy
Jan 09, 2012 New Media, New Civil Society, and Politics in
a New Age | The Communication Initiative Network. New Media, New Civil Society,
and Politics in a New Age | The Communication Initiative Network. Posted by
Kris Rampersad ...http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
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Apr 22, 2014
It is placing
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gender, cultures and other sectoral interests, and in utilising the tools
placed at our disposal to access our accumulate knowledge and technologies
towards eroding these superficial barriers. In this context, we believe that
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the institution best positioned to consolidate the ..... The Emperor's New
Tools ...
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/
Demokrissy: Cutting edge journalism
Jun 15, 2010
The Emperor's New
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@BJP4India #BJP @Priyankachopra #PriyankaChopra#merkel
@EmmanuelMacron #EmmanuelMcrona #JohnTrudeau @travelchannel @usatoday
@BBCWorld @BBCWorldHaveYourSay @TEDtalks @TEDNews +britishcouncil@engageats.co.uk @britishmuseum, @britishcouncil,
@britishlibrary, @Royal_Gov_UK, @justintrudeau, @helenclarkeUNDP, +Google for Nonprofits @googleartsandculture,
@econculture, @commonculture, @writersdigest, @nytimes, +PBS NewsHour +Breaking News +BBC News +news@news.ideastap.com +info@takingitglobal.org +Open Society Foundations @richardbranson,
@billgates, @melaniegates, @gatesfoundation, +G Singh, @clintonfdn, @WJClibrary,
@clintonglobal, @librarycongress @google, @googleresearch @yahoo,
@yahoonews, @yahoomovies, @ABC, @CNN, @REUTERS, @ABC, +Kamla Persad-Bissessar , +Prakash Ramadhar, +John van Tiggelen,
@FoxNews, @UKinCaribbean,
@WBCaribbean, @TheEconomist, @wef, @economictimes, @business, @businessinsider,
@wsjbusiness, @wsj womenshealth, @wsjmag, @people,
@fortunemagazine, @ellemagazine, @oprah, @O_magazine,
@OWNTV, @oprahbooklist, @voguemagazine, @twitterwomen,
@womenintheworld, @UN_Women, @womenatforbes, @womensmediacentre
@womensenews,
x
@krisramp @justintrudeau
+Kamla Persad-Bissessar +Sonja Wong +POTUS @POTUS @realDonaldTrump @FLOTUS @ForestWhitaker
Through Sigh and song
Better beware, be
canny and careful
Reviewing the posts of this year: the loss of close friends, and some, not so close and the celebration of new inscriptions, music, song dance, between the steupsing at the chupidty, 2017 is poised to be a year of awakening for not only teenage nations as ours which nevertheless still have the soundest lessons on addressing the thrills, trials and traumas of diversity and multiculturalism, as articulated here and elsewhere that older societies are only now rediscovering, as articulated in this post MultiKulti is Dead Long Live MultiKulti.
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/12/30-christmases-caroling-and-paranging.html
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/11/have-some-more-roti-kurry-and-chicken.html
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/11/american-winter-follows-autumn-in-paris.html
July 27
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/07/caribbean-wins-one-more-from-unesco_20.html
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/04/disconnecting-to-buy-local-for.html
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/02/death-of-knowledge-and-social.html
http://kris-rampersad.blogspot.com/2016/02/turning-our-dreams-to-shame-rip-asami.html
