KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter/Pro­duc­er

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

BEI­JING, CHI­NA - In the heart of Bei­jing’s harsh win­ter, Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­als found a fa­mil­iar warmth, as the Caribbean com­mu­ni­ty in Chi­na came to­geth­er to cel­e­brate the Christ­mas sea­son.

On De­cem­ber 6, nine Caribbean em­bassies in Bei­jing, along with the Com­mer­cial Of­fice of Haiti, host­ed their an­nu­al Christ­mas par­ty.

In at­ten­dance were diplo­mats, stu­dents, pro­fes­sion­als and vis­i­tors from across the re­gion, in­clud­ing T&T, Guyana, Ja­maica, Grena­da, Bar­ba­dos, An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, Do­mini­ca, Ba­hamas, Suri­name and Haiti.

For Tri­nis liv­ing thou­sands of miles from home, the evening pro­vid­ed a rare but wel­come taste of what many de­scribed as “a Tri­ni Christ­mas.”

So­ca parang and the scents of Tri­ni home­made dish­es filled the air to recre­ate the fes­tive at­mos­phere some na­tion­als told Guardian Me­dia they miss so much this time of year.

But, for many na­tion­als, the event was more than a cel­e­bra­tion.

It was a re­minder of to­geth­er­ness at a time when ques­tions about re­gion­al uni­ty have resur­faced.

Two na­tion­als who left Trinidad to be­come teach­ers in Chi­na said they miss their fam­i­lies dur­ing the Christ­mas sea­son, but they’ve gained new ones over­seas.

One Ch­agua­nas res­i­dent, 30-year-old Ibiza McLeod, said, “I have been here in Chi­na for five years, three years in Bei­jing, and every year, Christ­mas, it hasn’t been the same since I’ve been most­ly by my­self, but the Caribbean coun­tries, we all have a spe­cial cel­e­bra­tion. We cel­e­brate our Christ­mas very dif­fer­ent here, and I miss be­ing home a lot. I miss my fam­i­ly. I miss my friends. I miss the ham. I miss the drinks Ponche de Crème, sor­rel, ham, turkey. I just miss be­ing at home with my fam­i­ly and loved ones.”

Ivan Pierre, who hails from Diego Mar­tin, said, “One thing that I miss is re­al­ly just fam­i­ly, but I feel like I have a fam­i­ly away from home here with my Caribbean com­mu­ni­ty.”

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­cent­ly crit­i­cised Cari­com, say­ing she does not con­sid­er Cari­com a re­li­able part­ner.

But in Bei­jing, scenes of Cari­com ca­ma­raderie told a dif­fer­ent sto­ry.

At the event, Guardian Me­dia ob­served T&T na­tion­als laugh­ing, danc­ing, shar­ing food and drinks with their Cari­com coun­ter­parts as they all cel­e­brat­ed in peace.

For many, the gath­er­ing stood as a qui­et re­but­tal and a re­minder that Caribbean peo­ple, wher­ev­er they are in the world, con­tin­ue to val­ue con­nec­tion and sol­i­dar­i­ty.

New­ly ap­point­ed Am­bas­sador Ex­tra­or­di­nary and Plenipo­ten­tiary of T&T to Cari­com, Ralph Maraj, al­so praised the show of uni­ty and to­geth­er­ness.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia via tele­phone yes­ter­day, he said, “That’s ex­cel­lent. Cari­com get­ting to­geth­er in a for­eign coun­try and Cari­com sol­i­dar­i­ty and Cari­com uni­ty. That’s very good.”

How­ev­er, he de­clined to com­ment on Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s crit­i­cism of Cari­com.