listen
Please note, Yohance was still at his school when recording this, so you will hear school-sounds in the background, including what I can only describe as someone kicking a steel drum.
timestamped notes
5:43 ~ multiculturalism. Trinidadians trace their heritage rather evenly to Indian and African roots (about 35% each); the rest being smaller, more recent influxes or mixed heritages. I have to wonder what the emancipated population thought when they saw the first Indian slave traders sail into dock on the Fatel Rozack. The anthropologist Dylan Kerrigan wrote on why laws on multiculturalism didn’t make their way into the legal system until only recently.
7:28 ~ Identity as a Caribbean. Ian McDonald (writer of the Caribbean classic The Hummingbird Tree (affiliate link)) described himself as:
Antiguan by ancestry, Trinidadian by birth, Guyanese by adoption, and West Indian [Caribbean] by conviction.
Ian McDonald, Author
Guyana, while on the South America mainland, is part of the Caribbean and offers players and loyalty to the West Indies Cricket team. This article, by a Guyanese journalist, poses the issue of a combined identity.
8:11 ~ Party Central! Among the SFW images I could find for Carival, Mudmas is part of the opening day’s activities.
And alternatively, the beautiful natural beauty: beaches of Tobago, Pitch Lake, and bird watching.
10:43 ~ The West Indies cricket team.
12:52 ~ doubles. These look amazing and definitely will be trying to make some myself.
thoughts
This was one of the first interviews I did and was worried a lot about getting information. I knew a little about the Caribbean nations having known many from the DR and Haiti but would not have been able to place Trinidad and Tobago (nor apparently not pronounce it correctly) on a map.
Yohance was extremely gracious in his sharing and, like a good teacher, eager to break things down historically for an outsider. I can testify to his being a good dad, since our interview was postponed a couple times due to his daughter’s health.
