The Trinida­di­an lyric so­pra­no will re­turn to the stage on Sat­ur­day for Sacrae: An Evening of Sa­cred and Spir­i­tu­al Mu­sic, a recital shaped by re­mem­brance, faith and a deeply per­son­al jour­ney back to mu­sic.

Long be­fore she was crowned the in­au­gur­al Miss Afro Trinidad and To­ba­go, Delece Ra­bathaly was a lit­tle girl stand­ing be­side her fa­ther at a po­lit­i­cal ral­ly with one sim­ple re­quest.

He may be known for his mu­sic, but An­dre Al­long, pro­fes­sion­al­ly known as Andy Ven­ture (VEN­CHA), has tak­en on an art form that he be­lieves has el­e­vat­ed him in­to a whole oth­er di­men­sion and stratos­phere that is ‘over your head’.

Jineal Chich­ester was halfway across the At­lantic, stand­ing aboard an air­craft car­ri­er bound for Africa as a young naval of­fi­cer in the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard, when a sin­gle ques­tion changed the course of her life.

For more than 40 years, the fa­mil­iar sight of a man ped­alling an age­ing Raleigh bi­cy­cle through the streets of Dow Vil­lage, Cal­i­for­nia, has sig­nalled one thing to hun­gry cus­tomers - Tony “Je­di” Sanowar and his dou­bles have ar­rived.

At 6.30 am, Jor­dan Lamy is al­ready up and prepar­ing for an­oth­er day of bak­ing while tack­ling cus­tom or­ders.

Along Trinidad’s north-east­ern coast­line, where the At­lantic Ocean meets the vil­lages of Ba­lan­dra, To­co and Matelot, lies Ram­panal­gas, a com­mu­ni­ty whose sto­ry has been writ­ten by the hands of co­conut work­ers, fish­er­men, farm­ers and gen­er­a­tions of fam­i­lies who built their lives around the land and the sea.

The phrase is re­peat­ed with a smile, but be­neath the hu­mour lies the frus­tra­tion of liv­ing in one of Trinidad's most iso­lat­ed com­mu­ni­ties, where breath­tak­ing nat­ur­al beau­ty ex­ists along­side chron­ic un­em­ploy­ment, lim­it­ed op­por­tu­ni­ties and a grow­ing sense that the penin­su­la has been left be­hind.

Men will dis­cuss chest pain, blood in the urine and con­sti­pa­tion with sur­pris­ing courage. Erec­tile dys­func­tion of­ten ar­rives in a whis­per. Some­times the pa­tient waits un­til the con­sul­ta­tion is al­most over.

The price of suc­cess is high, and for Za­meena Marisa Khan, it has meant ac­cept­ing the harsh re­al­i­ties that come with chas­ing ex­cel­lence: em­brac­ing crit­i­cism, re­main­ing per­sis­tent and ig­nor­ing those who seek to un­der­mine her jour­ney.

Mi­nor in­juries are an in­evitable part of child­hood, whether from run­ning bare­foot in the yard, play­ing out­doors or sim­ply be­ing cu­ri­ous.

For years, the 31-year-old has been do­nat­ing his hair to the T&T Can­cer So­ci­ety’s (TTCS) Show You Care, Do­nate Some Hair ini­tia­tive, giv­ing peo­ple he has nev­er met the op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­ceive a hu­man-hair wig.