Carisa Lee

Re­porter

carisa.lee@cnc3.co.tt

The most fre­quent­ly asked ques­tion by se­cu­ri­ty, pa­trons and ven­dors at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah stage on Car­ni­val Mon­day was, “Where are the mas bands?”

One Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) of­fi­cial, who asked not to be named, said she has been work­ing the Sa­van­nah stage for years and de­scribed this year as the most un­event­ful she has ever seen.

“This is the first I’ve seen, giv­en the his­to­ry of the fes­ti­val, that bands are tak­ing hours to come to the stage, not tak­ing hours to cross the stage as in pre­vi­ous years,” she said.

As of 4.30 pm, the on­ly large band to cross the main stage was Pa­parazzi Car­ni­val, while K2K Al­liance and Part­ners, along with Ex­ou­sia, were the on­ly medi­um bands to cross the stage.

“They should put things in place so that the bands must cross the stage. I think they should im­ple­ment that as a rule, be­cause every­body looks for­ward to this big stage; that’s the main idea of play­ing mas,” the NCC of­fi­cial added.

The Hott Stuff Pro­mo­tion with the Colours of Gems and Jew­els and PM Petle­Mas, Whis­per­ing Wings, al­so crossed the stage.

Guardian Me­dia spoke with Pa­tri­cia and Gem­ma as they wait­ed on the drag for a band to pass. They said they have been do­ing this for decades, and while they had time to wait, they ad­mit­ted it was the first time they had seen the stage and its sur­round­ings so qui­et.

“Maybe they en­joy J’Ou­vert too much ... when­ev­er they come, I’m wait­ing to see All Stars; I’m not go­ing no where til I see all of them,” Pa­tri­cia ex­claimed.

“I’m on va­ca­tion; it doesn’t mat­ter to me. I’ll wait for­ev­er,” Gem­ma added.

In the North Stand, which the Min­is­ter of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment, Michelle Ben­jamin, on Fri­day an­nounced was free to the pub­lic, the same ques­tion was be­ing asked, though peo­ple there were a bit more pa­tient.

One pa­tron, who brought her moth­er to ob­serve the Pa­rade of the Bands, said they usu­al­ly sit on the drag but took ad­van­tage of the free North Stand, which gave them an op­por­tu­ni­ty to be clos­er to the main stage.

Dayle Jo­gie, from San Juan, brought his daugh­ter for the Car­ni­val Mon­day ex­pe­ri­ence.

“This was ex­pect­ed, wasn’t it, be­cause it is Car­ni­val Mon­day,” he ex­claimed.

“They go come out a lit­tle lat­er,” an­oth­er pa­tron added just af­ter 3.30 pm.

Egypt­ian tourist Hamid, who came specif­i­cal­ly to ex­pe­ri­ence Car­ni­val, de­scribed the mu­sic and cos­tumes as beau­ti­ful.

“The peo­ple are friend­ly, and the food is de­li­cious; it’s a nice coun­try and very good peo­ple,” he said.

The song of choice by the few bands that crossed the Sa­van­nah stage was En­core by Machel Mon­tano, al­though many on the drag who spoke to Guardian Me­dia hoped it would be Aaron “Voice” St Louis’ Cyah Be­have, as that is ex­act­ly the con­duct they planned to have on the road.