Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@cnc3.co.tt

For years, Rox­anne Oma­lo was best known for her com­mand­ing pres­ence on the Car­ni­val stage—a four-time Car­ni­val Queen (2018, 2020, 2024, 2025) whose poise, con­fi­dence, and sto­ry­telling cap­tured au­di­ences and cel­e­brat­ed cul­ture.

To­day, that same in­flu­ence has found a new pur­pose, one that reach­es be­yond feath­ers and fab­ric and in­to class­rooms, liv­ing rooms, and the for­ma­tive years of Caribbean child­hood.

Hail­ing from the east coast of Trinidad, Ma­yaro to be spe­cif­ic, Oma­lo has qui­et­ly stepped in­to en­tre­pre­neur­ship, launch­ing a line of chil­dren’s learn­ing games root­ed in Caribbean cul­ture, val­ues, and iden­ti­ty.

It is a tran­si­tion she de­scribes not as a de­par­ture from Car­ni­val, but as an evo­lu­tion of its pur­pose.

“Car­ni­val taught me dis­ci­pline, con­fi­dence, pre­sen­ta­tion, and the pow­er of sto­ry­telling,” Oma­lo said. “On stage, you’re not just wear­ing a cos­tume — you’re rep­re­sent­ing cul­ture, val­ues, and pride. To­day, in­stead of rep­re­sent­ing a band, I rep­re­sent chil­dren, fam­i­lies, and pos­i­tive de­vel­op­ment.”

Raised in Ma­yaro, Oma­lo said her up­bring­ing and cul­tur­al ground­ing have shaped both her world­view and her busi­ness di­rec­tion. While prepar­ing for pageants re­quired re­silience, team­work, and men­tal strength, she said those same qual­i­ties are now es­sen­tial in en­tre­pre­neur­ship — es­pe­cial­ly in the ed­u­ca­tion sec­tor.

Her in­spi­ra­tion to cre­ate chil­dren’s learn­ing games be­gan close to home, with her daugh­ter. As a par­ent, Oma­lo no­ticed a re­cur­ring gap in the tools avail­able to Caribbean fam­i­lies: while ed­u­ca­tion­al, many were im­port­ed and cul­tur­al­ly dis­con­nect­ed.

“Our chil­dren were learn­ing — but they were not see­ing them­selves,” she ex­plained.

She ob­served that most learn­ing games re­flect­ed for­eign re­al­i­ties—snow-cov­ered scenes, ap­ple or­chards, Amer­i­can coins, and land­marks—while Caribbean chil­dren grow up sur­round­ed by man­go trees, Car­ni­val, steel­pan, fish­ing vil­lages, and lay­ered cul­tur­al tra­di­tions. That ab­sence, she said, has deep­er im­pli­ca­tions than most peo­ple re­alise.

“The biggest gap was cul­tur­al rep­re­sen­ta­tion,” Oma­lo said. “There was al­so a lack of val­ue-based learn­ing root­ed in Caribbean morals, af­ford­able lo­cal­ly pro­duced re­sources, and games that build both aca­d­e­mics and self-es­teem.”

Her ed­u­ca­tion­al prod­ucts are de­signed to do ex­act­ly that — blend­ing lit­er­a­cy, nu­mer­a­cy, crit­i­cal think­ing, and val­ues through play that feels fa­mil­iar and af­firm­ing. From Caribbean-themed char­ac­ters and foods to folk­lore, fes­ti­vals, and every­day is­land life, Oma­lo’s games are in­ten­tion­al­ly de­signed to help chil­dren recog­nise their world as wor­thy of learn­ing from.

“When chil­dren see them­selves rep­re­sent­ed, self-es­teem grows nat­u­ral­ly,” she said. “They feel proud of be­ing Trin­bag­on­ian and Caribbean. They recog­nise their ac­cents, say­ings, and tra­di­tions as valu­able.”

For Oma­lo, Car­ni­val and ed­u­ca­tion are in­sep­a­ra­ble. She sees both as tools of sto­ry­telling and na­tion-build­ing.

“Car­ni­val tells sto­ries of re­sis­tance, free­dom, African her­itage, In­di­an in­flu­ence, vil­lage life, folk­lore, and faith,” she said. “In my ed­u­ca­tion­al prod­ucts, I do the same.”

She de­scribes her games as giv­ing chil­dren the same emo­tion­al ex­pe­ri­ence a mas­quer­ad­er feels when step­ping in­to cos­tume—pride, pow­er, and vis­i­bil­i­ty.

“I want every child to feel like they are wear­ing their own cos­tume while play­ing with my ed­u­ca­tion­al prod­ucts — proud, pow­er­ful, and seen.”

But the tran­si­tion from pub­lic fig­ure to busi­ness leader has not been with­out its chal­lenges. Oma­lo said that vis­i­bil­i­ty comes with scruti­ny, par­tic­u­lar­ly for women.

“When you’re recog­nised in your com­mu­ni­ty, every move is mag­ni­fied,” she said. “Suc­cess is cel­e­brat­ed, but mis­takes, lies, and ru­mours are dis­cussed loud­ly.”

She al­so spoke can­did­ly about the ex­pec­ta­tions placed on women in lead­er­ship.

“Women are of­ten ex­pect­ed to be nur­tur­ing and agree­able, but lead­er­ship re­quires de­ci­sive­ness, bound­aries, and some­times say­ing ‘no’ with­out apol­o­gy,” she said. “Learn­ing to lead with­out shrink­ing my­self was a ma­jor growth process.”

Her ad­vice to oth­er Caribbean cre­atives hop­ing to turn pas­sion in­to en­ter­prise is both prac­ti­cal and point­ed.

“You don’t need ap­proval to start. You need ex­e­cu­tion,” Oma­lo said. “Not every op­por­tu­ni­ty is aligned. Not every col­lab­o­ra­tion is healthy. Peace is a busi­ness strat­e­gy.”

As she con­tin­ues to ex­pand her ed­u­ca­tion­al of­fer­ings, Oma­lo re­mains clear about her long-term vi­sion. This ven­ture, she in­sist­ed, is not sim­ply about pro­duc­ing games.

“It’s about iden­ti­ty, em­pow­er­ment, and giv­ing our chil­dren tools that re­flect their world,” she said. “Pas­sion opens the door. Dis­ci­pline keeps it open. Vi­sion builds lega­cy.”

But Oma­lo has not giv­en up on her first love. She is de­fend­ing her Queen of Car­ni­val crown at the Di­manche Gras lat­er to­day. She has been de­scribed as the fore­run­ner of the com­pe­ti­tion and placed first in the se­mi-fi­nal round.