The rains came like a long-lost friend this week—un­in­vit­ed, over­whelm­ing, but fa­mil­iar. For three straight days, grey skies blan­ket­ed Trinidad. Not a hint of sun­shine peeked through the thick, sullen clouds. Tor­rents of rain poured down from above, drench­ing rooftops, streets, and moun­tain­sides. As the wa­ter came, so too came the mem­o­ries—clear, vi­brant, and soaked in sen­ti­ment.

In days gone by, a trop­i­cal wave like this was not seen as a threat, but an in­vi­ta­tion. Chil­dren would run bare­foot in­to the open, arms flung wide, faces turned sky­ward. That was what we called “bathing in the rain.”

It was joy in its purest form. I could still hear the echo of our laugh­ter bounc­ing off gal­vanised roofs, see our small feet stomp­ing through pud­dles with reck­less aban­don, and feel the cold wet­ness that had noth­ing to do with dis­com­fort, and every­thing to do with free­dom.

Back then, home­made bam­boo gut­ter­ing lined the sides of our hous­es, ex­pert­ly carved by un­cles and grand­fa­thers. They’d set them up to guide the rain­wa­ter in­to con­crete drums or large blue plas­tic bar­rels, mak­ing sure every drop was saved. Some of us still have those to­day. Oth­ers had wa­ter tanks, the good kind that meant your fam­i­ly was do­ing okay. But most de­pend­ed on those drums, es­pe­cial­ly dur­ing dry sea­son. Rain­wa­ter was a bless­ing. A re­source. A gift.

And then, there were the rain flies—those del­i­cate-winged, short-lived crea­tures that on­ly made their pres­ence known when the rains were re­al. You didn’t see them with light driz­zle. No, rain flies meant the heav­ens had opened up and were tru­ly weep­ing. They’d hov­er around the light­bulbs in swarms, their trans­par­ent wings shim­mer­ing. To many, they were a nui­sance. But to us, they were a sign: “This is re­al rain.”

It’s been a long time since we saw rain­flies. Years, per­haps. That’s how you know this week’s weath­er was se­ri­ous.

But those same rains that brought back the sweet­ness of youth al­so re­vealed a bit­ter re­al­i­ty. Flood­wa­ters swal­lowed roads and com­mu­ni­ties with equal force. Com­muters were left ma­rooned in maxi taxis and cars, star­ing at brown, churn­ing wa­ter that rose with alarm­ing speed.

Farm­ers in cen­tral and south lost their crops in a mat­ter of hours—months of toil buried in the mud. Rivers, swollen and an­gry, broke their banks and barged in­to homes, drag­ging along ap­pli­ances, fur­ni­ture, school­books, and mem­o­ries in their path. Bridges col­lapsed, homes shift­ed from their foun­da­tions, and en­tire com­mu­ni­ties were plunged in­to dark­ness—with­out elec­tric­i­ty, with­out ac­cess, and with­out help.

I watched as moth­ers held their chil­dren above their heads to cross waist-high wa­ter in the streets. I saw el­der­ly peo­ple sit­ting on chairs on table­tops, wait­ing for the wa­ter to re­cede. These were not news clips from far­away places. These were our neigh­bours. Our fam­i­lies. Our peo­ple. So here we were—caught be­tween nos­tal­gia and dis­as­ter.

Caught be­tween re­mem­ber­ing how rain once unit­ed us in joy and fac­ing the harsh truth of how it now tears com­mu­ni­ties apart. This is the du­al­i­ty of life in Trinidad. A land of beau­ty and boun­ty, yet al­so of ne­glect and mis­man­age­ment.

Flood­ing is not new. It didn’t start with this trop­i­cal wave. We’ve had years—decades—of warn­ings. Each rainy sea­son brings a flood of head­lines and promis­es. Yet, the root caus­es re­main: clogged wa­ter­cours­es, poor drainage in­fra­struc­ture, il­le­gal dump­ing, un­reg­u­lat­ed con­struc­tion, and an ever-ex­pand­ing ur­ban foot­print that leaves no space for wa­ter to flow nat­u­ral­ly.

The truth is, we can no longer af­ford to treat flood­ing as an act of God. This is not di­vine pun­ish­ment—it’s hu­man neg­li­gence. And it’s time we called it that. Gov­ern­ment af­ter gov­ern­ment has made state­ments, com­mis­sioned stud­ies, and al­lo­cat­ed bud­gets. Yet here we are again—dis­as­ter af­ter dis­as­ter, while or­di­nary peo­ple pay the price in washed-away be­long­ings and ru­ined lives. We need more than tem­po­rary re­lief ef­forts and sand­bags. We need a na­tion­al flood mit­i­ga­tion strat­e­gy. We need re­al drainage plan­ning, prop­er main­te­nance of rivers and wa­ter­ways, and en­force­ment of build­ing codes. We need smart ur­ban de­vel­op­ment, not just con­crete and high-rise am­bi­tion.

The rains will come again. That’s a cer­tain­ty. The cli­mate is chang­ing, and with it comes more in­tense storms, more un­pre­dictable rain­fall, and more threats to our peo­ple. But if we act now—de­ci­sive­ly and bold­ly—we can pro­tect our com­mu­ni­ties. We can make sure the next gen­er­a­tion re­mem­bers rain not for what it de­stroyed, but for what it in­spired.

I want my grand­chil­dren to bathe in the rain, not wade through it in fear. I want them to know the joy of jump­ing in pud­dles with­out wor­ry­ing that the wa­ter car­ries sewage or dis­ease. I want them to see rain­flies and mar­vel, not mis­take them for the be­gin­ning of a storm that brings de­struc­tion. I want them to col­lect rain­wa­ter with pride, not with pan­ic.

But that will on­ly hap­pen if those in au­thor­i­ty act with ur­gency, not with in­dif­fer­ence. If they treat flood­ing as the na­tion­al emer­gency that it is—not just in the mo­ment, but all year round.

So, as we dry out and mop up and re­place the things we’ve lost, let us re­mem­ber what the rains once meant to us. Let us hold on to the mem­o­ry of in­no­cence and free­dom, but not at the ex­pense of re­al­i­ty. Let us de­mand bet­ter.

For though the rains may fall from the sky, the re­sponse must rise from the ground—where peo­ple live, work, and dream. It’s time.