"I saw it more as a new experience than a limitation," Jason Clarke says of his life-changing fall from a Julie mango tree at the age of six."I wasn't really into life yet."Had he been older, the sudden loss of the use of his legs would have been traumatic, but at that young age, the sudden need for a wheelchair was an adventure.His concerned father wanted to keep him indoors, safe from possible ridicule, but his mother urged him to go out into the world and gain his independence.
"The culture in Tobago is pride," Jason explains, referring to general society."Old time thinking was that disability is the result of something bad a family did–and it is a curse. 'God punished you for your sins.' 'Your mother used to throw away babies.' But that is fading."There was a time when people would stare at him as if he were "an alien," but that too is changing, especially as he has made himself so visible through public appearances and victories."Visibility is important," he continues.
"Not to hide the child.""The Plight of the Real Chairman," the calypso with which Jason won Tobago's Scouting for Talent in 2003, sends an important message: