Deb­bie Ja­cob

What can you say about a hol­i­day in which we cel­e­brate a peo­ple's ar­rival to a new and dis­tant land-even if the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing that ar­rival were hor­rif­ic? In­di­an Ar­rival Day fas­ci­nates me be­cause it puts a pos­i­tive spin on an oth­er­wise dark chap­ter in Caribbean his­to­ry. It cel­e­brates peo­ple ar­riv­ing and mak­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go their home, rather than the hor­ri­ble cir­cum­stances in which they came or lived as in­den­tured ser­vants. I don't want to com­pare in­den­ture­ship to slav­ery, and I don't want to crit­i­cise a hol­i­day like Eman­ci­pa­tion Day.

This is not my in­ten­tion. I mere­ly want to cel­e­brate the spir­it of this hol­i­day be­cause it tru­ly is a re­mark­able com­mem­o­ra­tion of a peo­ple's spir­it of dis­cov­er­ing and find­ing a new home. His­tor­i­cal­ly speak­ing, we know and re­mem­ber how a peo­ple filled with hope and dreams of a bet­ter life in a far-off land were duped in­to servi­tude so that they could work in West In­di­an sug­ar cane fields. The abil­i­ty to put that ter­ri­ble pe­ri­od in­to per­spec­tive and cel­e­brate the fact that the East In­di­ans came and stayed and con­tributed cul­tur­al­ly speak­ing to the West In­dies says a lot about a peo­ple's pride and for­ti­tude.

And what would T&T be with­out Tri­nis who trace their roots to In­dia? The food alone-fat, juicy dalpuri with split peas spilling out like the gold that Sir Wal­ter Raleigh searched in vain for in the El Do­ra­do of his dreams is enough to make us ap­pre­ci­ate the con­tri­bu­tion of those ear­ly East In­di­an im­mi­grants.

I am here, liv­ing in Trinidad, be­cause I came to live in cen­tral with my friend Pam, who lat­er be­came my aunt through mar­riage.

I lived in a lit­tle, white board house on stilts in the mid­dle of a cane field in War­renville, sand­wiched be­tween Cunu­pia and Ca­roni, and I ate chataigne and cur­ried man­go, pump­kin and bha­ji on a ba­nana leaf when there were prayers and fu­ner­als and Di­vali, the Fes­ti­val of Lights, and every­one in the neigh­bour­hood-re­gard­less of eth­nic­i­ty-was in­vit­ed to cel­e­brate a Hin­du hol­i­day. I lived with Moi who woke up every morn­ing to spin sa­da roti on the tawa and then stuff it with pump­kin and shrimp for me to eat be­fore I went to work as a jour­nal­ist. I have heard chirp­ing crick­ets sing sto­ries of those cane fields and their place in our his­to­ry.

I lived in War­renville at a time when peo­ple still donned their black boots and car­ried their cut­lass­es to go in­to those cane fields to chop cane. I have seen and heard those rag­ing fires sweep­ing through cane fields, and I have wok­en up to the smell of brown sug­ar sim­mer­ing in those fires. What al­ways struck me the most when I lived in War­renville was the gen­eros­i­ty of spir­it that I can­not be­gin to de­scribe. Even the poor­est of peo­ple cooked and shared their food with vis­i­tors.

There was al­ways a warmth and pride that matched those sur­round­ing cane fields, and I was al­ways re­mind­ed that this vil­lage was carved out of a sug­ar cane field. Even to this day, when I want to re­new my spir­it, I go to War­renville be­cause I swear the smiles are brighter there. Many of the peo­ple I know are gone now. My aunt Pam makes roti in her own restau­rant in Seat­tle. Moi, who was like a grand­moth­er to me when I first came to Trinidad, died many years ago. I miss Moi's sis­ter, Ac­ka, who made her life as joy­ful as pos­si­ble af­ter her son was trag­i­cal­ly killed and her hus­band died.

Ac­ka, who on­ly spoke Bho­jpuri Hin­di, donned her urni over her west­ern-style dress and at­tend­ed Hin­du prayers all over Trinidad. I still re­mem­ber Ac­ka call­ing, "Oi," when she came back from prayers and then sit­ting in the ham­mock un­der the high board house to give us all the "scores." War­renville, I al­ways thought, was a mys­ti­cal, mag­i­cal place, a place I want­ed to share with every­one in Sug­ar Cane Ar­rows, the dra­ma se­ries that I wrote. This was my home when I first came to Trinidad and it is the place where I feel my sense of roots. A sug­ar cane field, I dis­cov­ered, felt a lot like the wheat fields where I grew up in Ohio.

In the evenings, when I sat on the steps of Pam's house, and watched the ibis fly home to the Ca­roni Swamp and the jum­bo jets fly low enough on their de­scent to Pi­ar­co Air­port for me to read the name of the air­line, it nev­er oc­curred to me to feel home­sick. It nev­er oc­curred to me to re­turn to Amer­i­ca be­cause I felt like I was home in that cane field. In­di­an Ar­rival Day pays homage to a peo­ple ar­riv­ing in T&T. It says we are glad we came and stayed.Yes, times were bad, life was un­speak­ably hard, but we have put that be­hind us. What is most im­por­tant is that we ar­rived. And that's ex­act­ly how I have al­ways felt. We should all be glad that we are here.