SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

Se­nior Re­porter

shal­iza.has­sanali@guardian.co.tt

En­core, Cyah Be­have and Road Man were the mas­quer­aders’ and spec­ta­tors’ three top choic­es for the 2026 Road March ti­tle at yes­ter­day’s Car­ni­val Mon­day cel­e­bra­tions in down­town Port-of-Spain.

The songs by Machel Mon­tano, Aaron “Voice” St Louis and Ian “Bun­ji Gar­lin” Al­varez were played re­peat­ed­ly as mas­quer­aders from the bands Pa­parazzi, Blush, Ex­ou­sia, and Danc­ing War­riors pa­rad­ed be­fore the judges on South Quay, un­der the blis­ter­ing sun.

Cross­ing the judg­ing point first at 11 am with their pre­sen­ta­tion “Elope: Des­ti­na­tion I do,” Pa­parazzi mas­quer­aders in their colour­ful cos­tumes could not con­tain their ex­cite­ment when they be­gan chant­i­ng the in­fec­tious line of Bun­ji’s Road Man song “stage, stage, stage,” to an emp­ty stand on South Quay.

Bun­ji en­tered the Road March race at the eleventh hour.

He’s one of 18 artistes com­pet­ing for this pres­ti­gious ti­tle this year.

Mas­quer­ad­er Ger­ald Moore said he was dis­ap­point­ed that Bun­ji threw his hat in­to the race at the last minute be­cause Road Man is such a pow­er­ful song.

“It came in late, but it has the po­ten­tial to win the ti­tle. That song is grip­ping. Bun­ji is a boss. He will get my sup­port any day.”

Shak­ing her hips from side to side, Nicole Grace said Voice’s Cyah Be­have was her favourite.

“I telling you, Voice will mash up the Car­ni­val with his song. Peo­ple re­al­ly cyah be­have them­selves when they hear the lyrics. They be­hav­ing bad ... and that is what Car­ni­val is all about.”

James Har­ris pre­ferred En­core, stat­ing that Mon­tano was de­serv­ing of the crown.

“The man is a per­former. He does give his fans and the crowd to­tal per­for­mance. Machel is in a class of his own. No­body could touch him,” Moore said.

Spec­ta­tors tak­ing in the pa­rade al­so picked these three songs as the top con­tenders for the ti­tle.

Re­tired Cana­di­an col­lege pro­fes­sor and first-time vis­i­tor to Trinidad’s Car­ni­val, Kevin Sul­li­van, said Mon­tano’s En­core keeps play­ing in his mind.

“There’s some­thing in­fec­tious in Mon­tano’s song, I just love. I can’t stop singing it,” Sul­li­van said.

Sul­li­van’s friend Lau­rie Heyen­dal al­so favoured En­core.

“It’s to­tal­ly elec­tri­fy­ing,” she said.

New York­er and trav­el­ling doc­tor Joanne James wants Voice to cap­ture the ti­tle.

“His song has mean­ing and is full of tem­po and vibes. That is what mas­quer­aders do on Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day. They mis­be­have.”

Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies law stu­dent Michelleina Charles’ pick was Voice.

“His song is at the heart of Car­ni­val. It’s a true re­flec­tion of our Car­ni­val,” Charles said.

While mas­quer­aders en­joyed the rev­el­ry, food ven­dors and bar op­er­a­tors down­town com­plained of poor sales.

Shon­ell Adam­son, own­er of D’ Home Made Food Store on South Quay, said she in­ject­ed close to $3,500 in gro­ceries to pre­pare meals for spec­ta­tors and mas­quer­aders, but there were few buy­ers.

Adam­son said no J’Ou­vert bands passed in South Quay this Car­ni­val, which she de­scribed as un­usu­al.

“This nev­er hap­pened in years. All my pan­cakes, fried bake and fried chick­en sand­wich­es that I pre­pared for break­fast re­mained in my glass case. I was ex­pect­ing these break­fast meals to be pur­chased by mas­quer­aders play­ing in the J’Ou­vert bands. But the street was like a ghost town. Sales were re­al­ly bad com­pared to last year.”

All Adam­son raked in was $520 in sales. By lunch time, Adam­son be­gan giv­ing away the meals and had stopped cook­ing.

“I am not com­ing to sell on Car­ni­val Tues­day. All my mon­ey gone down the drain. I am re­al­ly dis­ap­point­ed.”

Adam­son said this was one of the worst Car­ni­vals she had ex­pe­ri­enced. The slow pace at which the Car­ni­val bands flowed al­so ham­pered sales.

“The place is dead. Af­ter Pa­parazzi passed the judg­ing point ... we didn’t see an­oth­er band for more than an hour lat­er.”

Next to Adam­son, Mon­i­ca Wynne said she had on­ly sold six drinks for the day.

Like Adam­son, she too was frus­trat­ed.

An em­ploy­ee sell­ing be­hind the counter of Avi’s Bar said that they had not sold one case of drinks for the day.

“We stocked up ex­pect­ing peo­ple to buy an ar­ray of drinks, but to tell you the truth, it’s dis­ap­point­ing that all our drinks have re­mained on our hands. Last year was far bet­ter,” the em­ploy­ee said.