After attending Easter Sunday Mass at St Jerome's Catholic Church in Ft Lauderdale, Carol and I headed across to the Hyatt for their signature champagne Sunday Brunch in the revolving rooftop restaurant which gives spectacular views of the intra-coastal waterways, the Las Olas stretch and the stately homes on the water's edge, with their expensive floating toys parked out front.
While enjoying the extensive brunch menu, which included bruschetta, lobster, eel, quail, scallops, cured salmon, caviar and duck confit, among myriad others, we met another couple from Trinidad and got to chatting with them.They explained that they had migrated from Trinidad about five years ago and were explaining their reasons for leaving and it got me to thinking of why people would want to migrate and move away from sweet T&T. Now I enjoy travelling and meeting people from all over the world but it is still always a great feeling when you come back to your homeland, the place of your birth, where the essence of your Trinbagonian spirit is rooted and planted firmly on the ground. But coming back this time, I realised that one of the issues we are facing is that there are no more Trinidadians.
People are people
Scanning the news and blogs when I returned I saw that there had been a lot of race talk and conferences and discussions on the state of race relations in T&T. There was talk of Africans, Indians, Chinese, Syrians, Lebanese, Portuguese, French Creoles, Caribs, Coco Panyol, Dougla and Mixed races and I remarked that we seem to have everybody and every group present and represented in this country except Trinidadians! Interesting-so there really are no more Trinidadians.
I always find it intriguing the way we as a tiny nation on a little rock in the sea are ever so consumed with a passion and fascination about race and ethnic and social groupings and sectors and sub-divisions. If there is anything I have discovered from travelling and encountering people all over the world of all races, cultures, backgrounds and persuasions, it is that people are people wherever you go. It may sound simplistic and platitudinal, but sometimes the truest things in life are the simple ordinary, everyday truths which we fail to recognise-people are people.
The good, the bad and the ugly
I have found that there are good people, bad people, nice people, mean, vindictive, brilliant people, stupid people, productive people and lazy people to be found within each and every and any and all ethnic groups, classes, strata and sub-sections of societies, communities and nations the world over. Anyway you cut it, slice it or dice it, chop it, mince it or grind it, you will find the good the bad and the ugly among all races, faces and places wherever you go. So what is our fascination with being everything else but Trinidadian? You go to Jamaica and you meet what we would refer to as a Syrian, an Indian or a Chinese and they will put you in your place if you try to refer to them as any of the above. They will correct you in true Jamaican style and let you know that you're speaking to a Jamaican, full stop. They see themselves as Jamaican first and foremost and above everything else while we on the other hand see ourselves as being everything but Trinidadians.
Trinis by convenience
You go to Barbados and encounter someone whom we would refer to as a French Creole and he would set you straight and tell you, "Skipper, I don't know what you talking about, I'm a born and bred Barbadian." They also see themselves as Barbadian first and they understand the importance of having, appreciating, loving and embracing that national identity and national consciousness. We tend to be Trinis of convenience, so when we travel abroad and we hear a steelpan somewhere, we of course have to declare to the world as Benjai says "I is ah Trini", and we want everyone to know that pan was invented in T&T, but when we come back home, we become everything else but Trinidadians.
This does not mean that we abandon, ignore or subvert our ethnic and cultural heritage or lineage, but it must not be the only way in which we see or define ourselves when we are in fact born and bred Trinbagonians. Look at the Greek, the Polish, Portuguese and the Italian communities in the USA, they do not ever lose or ignore or deny their cultural, historical or ethnic lineage but they are Americans, first and foremost and that is the major problem with us as Trinidadians.
Now I keep harping on Trinidadians because while it may have changed by now, I can say that growing up during primary school days in Tobago, things were very different and we were just all Tobagonians, and we were just all friends and "pardners". For all my years of primary School, I did not know that Roger, Paula, Jerry and so many others of my school friends were "Indians", and the amazing thing is that they did not know it either. We were all just Tobagonians, friends and schoolmates. I did not know I was an "African", and my schoolmates did not know that either, we just saw people as people and accepted one another unquestioningly as such. You put young children to play together and they will all play with one another regardless of obvious differences between them of race, class and heritage so it appears that young children possess a wisdom, maturity and foresight, which, from the recent race debates, it appears that many of our adults are yet to understand, appreciate or fathom.
Can't find a Trini
It was only upon entering St Mary's College in Form One, that I discovered Trinidad to be filled with a myriad of peoples from here, there and everywhere but I could not find a single Trinidadian-quite amazing! So I have been able to develop and refine a perspective, which allows me to honour, respect and appreciate the wondrous diversity that makes up this country and which makes us all uniquely Trinbagonian, except that in this mix, the situation has not changed from when I entered St Mary's College years ago, in that I still can find, no more Trinidadians.