The future is now

Writing takes courage. The kind of courage you don't think you need when you first sit down to write, but it is so real. In my experience I find all the dreams of being the next Naipaul evaporate and procrastination (the nemesis of courage) gets the better of me. If I lost you at the Naipaul reference, then you probably haven't read a true West Indian story, these days we call the region "the Caribbean" but I like that Columbus bumble better, and I consider myself a true West Indian...an island girl from the Caribbean with a global life. My roots reach much deeper than sun kissed shores, however. This blog is really a space where I could show how that perspective has come to shape my experience of the world. Many moons ago, I was encouraged to write more and while I think the title of writer is hardly one I'd bestow on myself, I do one day hope this blog shapes me into the type of writer I have dreamed of becoming. Present: I'm sitting here in the hub of Asia, a cultural metropolis and a place I'd like to call my second home. It seems like the best place to right the wrongs of my procrastination and write myself a new chapter in my life story. In 2010 I first came to Japan on the JET Programme, and it changed my life...as it has done for many people I know. My good friend Jazz had given me a diary to record my "Japan years" as a parting gift. The contents of that diary has many stories of those years, experiences of fearlessness and of feelings of loneliness too. Travel is like a double edged sword and the expat life has in it the best of times, and the worst. To be fair, I packed up with me a lot of baggage from Trinidad (and not just the kind that has a 20kg limit) so the first episodes of "Japan years" aren't the kind I'd want to share on a blog. As the name of the blog says rambling, those were ramblings of a different sort. But now, now is beyond the present, it's the future. It's six years later and I am here in Japan again...to pick up this dusty old story and continue to the next chapter. Japan is already showing signs of getting ready for Olympics in 2020, even as the Rio Olympics have only just begun. An Israeli guy I met yesterday in Ginza said his first impressions of Japan were that it felt like he had come to the future, of the sort you see in movies. It was nice hearing what that feels like for someone for the first time, even as I'm on my fourth trip to Tokyo. This thing we call time is not as it seems, and even as I am here in the future, 13 hours ahead of the time zone I was born into, I know change sometimes can be slow in the land of the rising sun. So I look forward to sharing what's new and exciting happening in my area of the globe. I'm hoping it will be the time of my life, and so much more. I hope you will stay with me.

The loneliness I love

She's like a tiresome lover. I fight with her, hate what she does to me sometimes so much that I dream of when I'll leave. Then I actually consider doing the deed and realize that dammit I'll miss her. So I decide to take the heartache she brings, the separation from so many other things I love and I hope that one day she'll be what I dreamed of, or maybe that I'll eventually change to suit her. My love affair with Japan has definitely moved from a one-year 'stand' into a full on commitment. And like many a man caught in the tangles of a bewitching woman, I'm baffled how I'm still here when each year I promise it'll be the 'last'. Is it her quiet, unassuming manner? Is it the moment when I'm so high on self-indulgence that I forget my pains and say, ok, just one more time?

Aroma of home

It usually goes like this... I get home, sometimes undress, most times not, and head to my kitchen. It's a decent size kitchen and usually I've got stuff in my fridge to cook. Lately cooking is becoming a sort of therapy and a way to cure any lingering culture shock. Today I tried, for the second time, making sada roti in a shallow frying pan. It was okay-ish. The loyah was good, if I do say so myself. Put just the right amount of baking powder and kneaded it just the way mom showed me...most times I didn't care to follow her instructions but now, i feel it's more than feeding myself if I don't get this. Rehersing memories. I think about the way the food from different cultures ended up in Trinidad as I get my hands dirty in the kitchen tonight. Perhaps it was similar therapy for those immigrants, indentureds and slaves. It's a worthwhile supposition. Now I'm an expatriate in Japan and my journey home is with my tastebuds. One night I dreamt I flew all the way back home, only to insist I get shadon beni, enough that I could bring back to Japan with me. So I guess I'm gonna be here a little longer than a year...my mind and subconscious seem ready, once I am satisfied with a few home comforts I'll be doing this kitchen ritual until 2012. And if I spoil my dinner, it'll be another homesick night in Japan. Bon appetit.

Politics or poli-tricks

'It's politics time again!'to take the refrain from a Buju Banton song.

After just half of its political term, the People's National Movement in Trinidad and Tobago has announced a 'snap' election. So in a matter of months, citizens will be going to the polls to decide if we'll have an extended stay by Mr Manning and his balisier waving sycophants or whether we'll set into a new phase of governance with the rising sun. Word is that they've managed to form the alliance they claim will give them the victory, and yet I am unsure they'll convince the population that change with the same old people is even possible.

Election time in Trinidad is very entertaining, if nothing else. The first major political 'coming out' party took place yesterday and I wait in anticipation for the cleverness to actually begin. If there's one time there's a battle of wits, or rather to wits end, is when a politician speaks on a platform.

It's also a time when cliches and catchy lyrics from popular tunes will be played at deafening volumes making you wish the day would come when you'd be able to turn off your hearing aid like Dr Williams. Who knows?

All I know is that it's all in a day's dealing when we enter the 'silly season'in T&T.

Shaggaramus

I just think some our Trinidad's orators are ingenious.

Recently I had the chance to view the new video of a song done by Rapso artiste Ozzy Magic and I thought, 'Now what a clever man!'. What I meant is, why didn't I see the association between the word 'shag' which is British slang for casual sex and one of the popular lovers cove on the south-western coast of Trinidad, Chaguaramas? Chaguaramas was once used as an American army base in the second World War and I have heard many stories, and songs, of the island girls and military men who exchanged passion on its beaches, and who have left a legacy of light coloured babies and the lure of sweet sex within its woody valleys.

Ozzy's song reminds me of the many reasons language is colourful and rich here in the Caribbean.

Making good on a promise

I can't believe the last time I wrote here was in January. It seems like such a long time ago and yet, I didn't see the time go by.

Perhaps journaling has gotten me thus far without wanting to combust from pent up thoughts and frustrations.

Since that time, I've continued a hard lesson in life so much so that now I consider myself only a fresher in the school of life. But it's not all bruised knees, I have found that writing keeps me going, puts things in perspective.

So hopefully this will be the first installment of many to come.

Politics of Distraction

Today Trinidad and Tobago woke up to the reality that maybe, just maybe, our small but thriving economy may be in for some turbulence amidst the global financial crisis. The Central Bank, together with Government, announced its move to intervene in the operations of CL Financial Group, particularly its financial services companies, as a preemptive measure protecting deposit holders and citizens at large from what appears to be trouble in the company’s financial system.

A few years back the Group branded itself as a financial “superpower”. Now with the world witnessing superpowers like the United States and the European Union bending their knees from the pressures of an economic meltdown, it seems like dramatic irony that the region’s own superpower is buckling under the weight of similar pressures.

What worries me most is not the fact that Trinis continue to bury their heads deeper in the proverbial sand with Carnival-mania, neither the fact that one of the strongest economies in the Caribbean region attributes close to one quarter of its GDP to the commercial activities of a single corporate group. What I see that worries me is the workings and the mechanics of something far more serious threatening our young democracy. I see beyond the glare of our dailies’ headlines and those in the coming days that spell a natural proliferation of a worldwide phenomenon. In the coming days, little will be heard of the two-day-old headlines about blatant impropriety in the tendering process at a local company under the stewardship of a government ministry or of its CEO Calder Hart.

It is interesting that only days after “robust” questioning from a member of the Commission of Inquiry into the construction sector, and calls for that member to recuse himself, that a new ‘bacchanal’ has found itself on the radar. It is clear that this new news item has hastily put to bed public discussion on the UDECOTT issue given its wider implication on the national agenda, one in which the public is more widely vested. I can’t help but consider how, after weeks of discussions between Central Bank, the Government and CL Financial, they should choose the end of such a week to disclose such a major move.

The nine day wonder in Trinidad is over. Gone are those days. Today the life span of the vox populi was cut short by the politics of distraction. To put it in Carnival terms, it is like getting into a real good groove at a soca fete only to be interrupted when the DJ suddenly changes the pace with one of those ‘jump and wave’ numbers. Talk about distraction!