Bo­cas Lit Fest sup­port­ed The Shel­ter-A Safe House for Sur­vivors of Do­mes­tic Vi­o­lence through its year-end Books that Build Hope do­na­tion dri­ve, in part­ner­ship with Pa­per Based Book­shop.

Two years ago, Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies stu­dent Chloe Ram­nar­ine learned her can­cer had re­turned. What could have been a mo­ment de­fined by fear in­stead be­came the start of a jour­ney that would open new path­ways for can­cer treat­ment for pa­tients across the re­gion.

For Mar­sha Joseph, a 52-year-old teacher at Tacarigua Pres­by­ter­ian Pri­ma­ry School, can­cer was nev­er out of her or­bit, as she had fam­i­ly and friends af­fect­ed by the ill­ness and close­ly fol­lowed the work of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Can­cer So­ci­ety. How­ev­er, in 2024, it loomed large in her life. As she was on the brink of a new sea­son, in the year that she was turn­ing 50, she and her hus­band were cel­e­brat­ing their 25th wed­ding an­niver­sary, and her chil­dren were grow­ing in­to young adults, she nev­er imag­ined that she would al­so be nav­i­gat­ing a breast can­cer jour­ney.

Looks can be de­ceiv­ing. You might ap­pear healthy, ca­pa­ble and in con­trol, yet heart dis­ease can de­vel­op qui­et­ly. Many women jug­gle ca­reers, fam­i­ly re­spon­si­bil­i­ties and the men­tal load of keep­ing life on track. Over time, this con­stant pres­sure drains en­er­gy and places the heart un­der strain.

Can­cer touch­es al­most every fam­i­ly in Trinidad and To­ba­go, of­ten qui­et­ly, some­times sud­den­ly, but al­ways pro­found­ly. Be­hind the sta­tis­tics, screen­ing cam­paigns and fundrais­ing dri­ves are in­di­vid­u­als who have car­ried the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of steer­ing in­sti­tu­tions through grief, hope, lim­it­ed re­sources and grow­ing pub­lic ex­pec­ta­tion. One such in­di­vid­ual is Robert Du­mas, for­mer chair­man of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Can­cer So­ci­ety, whose tenure co­in­cid­ed with an ex­pand­ing na­tion­al con­ver­sa­tion about can­cer pre­ven­tion, pa­tient sup­port and the role of civ­il so­ci­ety in pub­lic health.

One year ago, Kristo­pher Mo­hamed’s life changed in a way no teenag­er ex­pects. The for­mer Na­pari­ma Col­lege stu­dent, on the cusp of med­ical school and adult­hood, was di­ag­nosed with Stage IV Hodgkin’s Lym­phoma, a di­ag­no­sis that forced him to con­front the fear of mor­tal­i­ty far ear­li­er than most of his peers.

So­ca and steel­pan came to­geth­er to en­ter­tain and en­gage thou­sands gath­ered at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah on Sun­day Feb­ru­ary 1, as BH En­ter­tain­ment host­ed the an­nu­al “Pan On The Greens” ex­pe­ri­ence.

Af­ter dom­i­nat­ing Spice­mas in 2025, sev­er­al Grena­di­an so­ca hits are tak­ing over Trinidad and To­ba­go’s Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions. So it’s no sur­prise the artistes flew over to give au­di­ences a di­rect taste of their coun­try’s Jab en­er­gy.

There’s a huge chance your favourite pow­er so­ca tunes for 2026 were pro­duced by the same per­son. In fact, many be­lieve he has per­fect­ed the “for­mu­la.” From Bun­ji Gar­lin’s Still A Road Man and Machel Mon­tano’s En­core, to Mi­cal Te­ja and Patrice Roberts’ Cap­i­tal, Xplic­it­Mevon (Mevon Sood­een) is pow­er­ing through the 2026 Car­ni­val sea­son.

Car­ni­val Is Fash­ion 2 de­liv­ered an elec­tri­fy­ing show­case of cre­ativ­i­ty, at­tract­ing a larg­er au­di­ence than last year and trans­form­ing the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah Grand Stage in­to a vi­brant cel­e­bra­tion of fash­ion, mu­sic and mas­quer­ade.

Be­fore the book­ings, the ra­dio play and the in­ter­na­tion­al calls, San­dra Em­manuel, pop­u­lar­ly known as Queen Steam, said there were nights filled with tears, hunger and prayer.

These are un­doubt­ed­ly two of the most pop­u­lar lines for the 2026 Car­ni­val sea­son, cour­tesy of Full Blown’s hit song Re­spect­ful­ly Yours.