Roslyn Car­ring­ton

"I've played In­di­vid­ual since the age of two," says Charisse Bovell, "but it was al­ways my dream to be­come Queen of the big bands." The dream had to be put on hold for a few years, as Bovell com­plet­ed her doc­tor­ate in Med­i­cine at UWI, and her in­tern­ship at Port of Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

With the Spir­it of Car­ni­val flow­ing through her, hand­ed down by both par­ents and with two aunts be­ing well-known dancers, her yearn­ing for the big stage was al­most pre­des­tined. "My moth­er and fa­ther loved Trinidad cul­ture and Car­ni­val, and I come from a danc­ing fam­i­ly. I al­ways loved mu­sic, and my par­ents re­alised that I had an in­ter­est in it."

For Car­ni­val 2012, Bovell was hand-se­lect­ed by Mac Far­lane him­self to por­tray his stun­ning and enig­mat­ic Queen, The Weep­ing Madon­na. "I wasn't even plan­ning to play Mas last year, but then I got a call. It hap­pened very fast." She ad­mits that at first she had some mis­giv­ings, giv­en Mac Far­lane's rep­u­ta­tion as a stick­ler for per­fec­tion. "It was an ho­n­our to play for him. Ini­tial­ly I was very ner­vous, and I ques­tioned if I could por­tray one of his cos­tumes well enough."

A quick in­ter­view with the great band­leader clinched the deal, and in two weeks' time she was stand­ing in the dusty Sa­van­nah, await­ing her turn on­stage at the Pre­lims.

See­ing her bear­ing her pris­tine white cos­tume en­tire­ly up­on her shoul­ders and mov­ing with state­ly grace, one can't doubt that those years of dance train­ing–tap, bal­let, mod­ern and Latin–stood her in good stead.

The high­ly pop­u­lar por­tray­al won not on­ly the ac­claim of the peo­ple, but the ap­proval of the judges. By the end of the sea­son, she hadn't just re­alised her dream of be­ing Queen of a band, but was crowned Queen of Car­ni­val as well. The mem­o­ry still gives her goose bumps.

"I was just pray­ing to God to make the Semis. I won the Pre­lims, and then placed ninth in the Semis...and then to come back and win.... It was ex­cit­ing. It was un­be­liev­able. Def­i­nite­ly a con­fi­dence boost­er. I don't think any­thing could top it."

The Madon­na wasn't the first Queen cos­tume Bovell has donned, how­ev­er. In 2011, she shrugged off the heat­ed blast of pub­lic opin­ion that "The Catholic Band" sets off each time it takes to the streets, when she made her first adult ap­pear­ance as Queen, por­tray­ing Eve, the Eter­nal Light of the Uni­verse. For her, par­tic­i­pat­ing in the band of­fered a nexus be­tween her deeply held Catholic be­liefs and her love of Mas.

And in spite of her re­li­gious be­liefs, she has noth­ing to apol­o­gise for. "I asked my­self what it meant to me. The Catholic Band shows there is noth­ing wrong with Car­ni­val; you can do things the right way. There is no need for ex­cess and vul­gar­i­ty."

She has a lot to say about the way in which women con­duct them­selves on the streets at Car­ni­val time. "As women, a big part of us is our in­tegri­ty. That should be up­held at all times, no mat­ter where you are, or what you're do­ing. We wear many hats: moth­er, pro­fes­sion­al, wife. I don't think we can rest down one and take up an­oth­er one; we're al­ways jug­gling. We should al­ways be mind­ful that we're on the stage. I don't be­lieve that in or­der to have a good time you need to lose all our in­hi­bi­tions. There are al­ways lim­its."

That said, though, she doesn't be­lieve in stand­ing in judg­ment of oth­ers. "But there's val­ue in self-judg­ment, al­ways mak­ing sure you are in check, no mat­ter where you are. You have to say, 'Is this be­com­ing of me?' "

Bovell ex­press­es sad­ness at the prospect of Mac Far­lane's high­ly pub­li­cised ex­it from the Car­ni­val are­na af­ter this year. "I guess every artist knows when they need to stop, so you can't ques­tion it. But it will be a loss to the coun­try. He's one of the few bands that stand out in my im­pres­sion of 're­al Mas'. If he is not on the road next year, Car­ni­val will be miss­ing a big piece."

When Car­ni­val is over, she plans on re­turn­ing her fo­cus to her fam­i­ly, friends, and most im­por­tant­ly, her plans to mar­ry her fi­anc� lat­er this year. She sees her tri­umphs to date as Di­vine in­ter­ven­tion, and op­ti­mistic that the fu­ture holds more joy. "There are dif­fer­ent achieve­ments and mile­stones in your life. Be­sides work, there is just fam­i­ly, friends, and loved ones."