Yvonne Webb

Ca­lyp­son­ian Michael Os­una, bet­ter known as Sug­ar Aloes, says he may have sac­ri­ficed his ca­reer for the art form he loves, but af­firmed, yes­ter­day,"I could live with that." His state­ment fol­lowed his per­for­mance at the Ca­lyp­so Fi­es­ta held at Skin­ner Park, where an un­for­giv­ing crowd turned ta­bles on their one-time favourite ca­lyp­son­ian, as they pelt­ed him with toi­let pa­per and a piece of roti.

For­mer fans al­so greet­ed him with plac­ards, la­belling him among oth­er things, "dis loy­al," in ref­er­ence to his per­for­mance at the UNC sec­ond an­niver­sary, where he sang "She's Roy­al" for Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar. He, how­ev­er, was not the on­ly one on the re­ceiv­ing end of the toi­let pa­per posse. The Orig­i­nal De Fos­to Him­self, who al­so aligned him­self with the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment, was not spared ei­ther.

As the mas­ter of cer­e­monies, Shirlane Hen­drick­son an­nounced Aloes, the boos start­ed from among the Skin­ner Park au­di­ence. Up went the toi­let pa­per and plac­ards with mes­sages rang­ing from, "Aloo force we hand," "Don't go 4 crown with that song," to "Sug­ar Aloo-es is wuk ah wuk­ing fuh cur­ry dol­lars."

With con­fi­dence, a smil­ing Aloes, dressed in white and pink, walked on the stage telling his one time fans, "I still love you." In an im­me­di­ate re­sponse, as he ex­it­ed the stage, Aloes said the re­ac­tion was not un­ex­pect­ed. He said he was ex­pect­ing the Skin­ner Park acid test, "so I built up my courage. I stood my ground. They can't move me. I is a spir­i­tu­al hu­man be­ing. They did not dis­tract me. I sang, I eh make a mis­take.

For­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick, who has been on sick leave for the past year, af­ter suf­fer­ing a stroke, at­tend­ed the Fi­es­ta.