AT­TIL­LAH SPRINGER

Peo­ple say Canal too po­lit­i­cal

We want some­thing com­i­cal

I could be a re­al jack­ass

And make peo­ple laugh

Hear this:

Politi­cians now giv­ing back kick­backs

Po­lice men no longer own de blocks

Crime gone ou­ta sea­son

And the hos­pi­tal...

–Hap­py Song, 3 Canal

If you don't laugh, you will cry. And cry­ing is not a good look on an is­land so caught up with ap­pear­ances.So laugh. Laugh deep. From in­side your bel­ly. The same place where the fear re­sides. So deep it take root in­side you. The fear and the laugh­ter come from the same place.Elec­tion time is like an is­land wide com­e­dy fes­ti­val and if I was a co­me­di­an I would be look­ing for a next work be­cause these politi­cians could give you a run for your mon­ey, oui.

I mean how else you could ex­plain why tele­vi­sion sta­tions in­vest so much in the news and not in pro­duc­ing some lo­cal shows?Be­cause for an hour every night we get a glimpse of re­al en­ter­tain­ment and the truth of Trinidad's po­lit­i­cal com­e­dy is stranger than any fic­tion we could come up with.From the slap­stick to the slap­dash to the racist to the bawdy. There are stale jokes too.And ones that you've heard over and over again. But you still laugh be­cause you feel oblig­ed to.

Our politi­cians cov­er a range of tastes and per­sua­sions. You re­al­ly can't fault them for be­ing so var­ied in the ways they make us laugh.And you know what is the best thing? That they could keep their faces so se­ri­ous. That they could act as if they are un­aware that they are mak­ing the coun­try a punch­line in a fifty year joke.

You won­der some­times if they plan these things. If the Op­po­si­tion and the Gov­ern­ment sit down like the writ­ers and pro­duc­ers of Sat­ur­day Night Live and dis­cuss and plan how they're go­ing to dis­tract us with jokes this week.If they study which of our but­tons to press to keep us laugh­ing so that we don't get se­ri­ous enough to ac­tu­al­ly de­mand good gov­er­nance.In one seat five peo­ple run­ning. One seat.

And the relics. Oh the relics who saunter out of the po­lit­i­cal La Basse smug and smil­ing as if the stench of their past rub­bish doesn't fol­low them around.They are the ones with the best com­ic tim­ing. Catch­ing you un­awares like Spran­galang in drag. By now you laugh­ing so hard you hold­ing your bel­ly.You laugh un­til you hold­ing your bel­ly from the cramp­ing pain. The ter­ror of not tak­ing your­self se­ri­ous­ly enough to de­mand bet­ter for your coun­try.

It is a fa­mil­iar and un­pleas­ant pain. You have been here be­fore. You have seen this be­fore. And every­time in your past that you came to this point of dou­bling over with the sheer agony of laugh­ing so much, the joke was at your ex­pense.Still you can't re­al­ly re­mem­ber the joke that has brought you to tears. Some­times it's not the joke it­self but the way it is de­liv­ered.Some­times it is not the joke it­self but the im­pli­ca­tions of it that make you laugh.

They know us so well. What kicks to make for us to laugh. Elec­toral process is the biggest joke of all.I was laugh­ing at the news. I was laugh­ing hard. And ste­ups­ing long and wa­tery.At the same time I fol­lowed the progress of a friend from Zim­bab­we as she stood in lines for nine hours over two days just to reg­is­ter for the op­por­tu­ni­ty to vote in their elec­tions at the end of this month.I stopped laugh­ing then.

What sweet in goat mouth does al­ways sour in he bam bam. So they say.But hu­man be­ings like to make the same mis­take over and over again un­til it be­comes a ha­bit­u­al way of be­ing and you can't re­mem­ber a time when you weren't like this.When pol­i­tics was a se­ri­ous pro­fes­sion. When you thought that you could make a dif­fer­ence by putting your­self up for a lead­er­ship po­si­tion.

Were those days ever here? I can on­ly make a his­to­ry book guess that there were a few years when it was so. I don't know that re­al­i­ty from my time on this rock.It seems like the politi­cians were al­ways jokey or duncey. It seems like a ship was al­ways about to sink and we faith­ful pa­tri­ots con­tin­ue to choose to stay and per­ish slow.I don't know. I don't have enough of a sense of hu­mour to find this even re­mote­ly fun­ny.

It's like my fun­ny bone break with the last elec­tion. I have no laughs left.I want some­thing else but don't know what it is, far less how to get it.It's hard to laugh so hard when you come to the stun­ning and dread­ful re­al­i­sa­tion that the joke is you.An­oth­er world is not on­ly pos­si­ble, she's on the way and, on a qui­et day, if you lis­ten very care­ful­ly you can hear her breathe.

–Arund­hati Roy