Yvonne Webb

Once you ven­ture up La Pique Hill, it's hard to miss the tamarind tree, stand­ing ma­jes­ti­cal­ly at the foot of the Na­pari­ma Girls' High School, where it was plant­ed in 1917 by Amelia Doon-Adol­phus, five years af­ter the school was built.Un­der its shady branch­es, the lives of many stu­dents, past and present, have been shaped and char­ac­terised.

It is no won­der then, that when Na­pari­ma Girls de­cid­ed to pub­lish a col­lec­tion of po­ems, writ­ings and art pieces in com­mem­o­ra­tion of its cen­te­nary cel­e­bra­tions, that the Tamarind Tree Blos­soms was the name cho­sen to en­cap­su­late the many achieve­ments of its stu­dents.The Blos­soms, in the ti­tle, refers to mem­bers of the Alum­nae As­so­ci­a­tion, who can be found across the globe in all spheres of life.

The book was launched on Oc­to­ber 8 on the school's com­pound, and the event was at­tend­ed by past stu­dents, Her Ex­cel­len­cy Dr Jean Ramjohn-Richards, Za­lay­har Has­sanali, min­is­ter of Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion Car­olyn Seep­er­sad-Bachan, Dr Jen­nifer Yamin-Ali, Jus­tice Gladys Gafoor and for­mer San Fer­nan­do West MP Di­ane Seuk­er­an. The col­lec­tion, which is on sale, re­flects the mem­o­ries of past stu­dents, among them An­gela Crop­per of the Crop­per Foun­da­tion, at­tor­ney Gillian Lucky, au­thor Ram­bai Es­pinet, Dr Clara Foueault, Lara Quen­trall-Thomas, Shakun­ta­la Har­racks­ingh and Dr Pa­tri­cia Mo­hammed.

Seep­er­sad-Bachan re­called her mem­o­ries of the tree, where some stu­dents were sent as a form of dis­ci­pline, where class­es were held when the class­rooms be­came too warm, where stu­dents be­came friends and most im­por­tant­ly, where they en­joyed cool and re­lax­ing lunch breaks when catch­ing up with gos­sip and old talk."This tree grew over the years, al­most in tan­dem with the way in which the school grew, and ex­pand­ed and built a rich his­to­ry filled with stu­dents from all walks of life who learned and grew and achieved to­geth­er. That my friends, is a very pow­er­ful sym­bol, in­deed, and it is what makes it an icon­ic his­tor­i­cal sym­bol," Seep­er­sad-Bachan com­ment­ed.

Chair­man of the book com­mit­tee and pres­i­dent of the alum­nae, Mintee Ish­mael, said the book was the brain­child of the first lo­cal prin­ci­pal of Na­pari­ma Girls' High School, the late Beu­lah Meghu, to whom trib­ute was paid."Miss Meghu had in­ti­mat­ed to me that the Alum­nae should com­pile a book of past stu­dents' writ­ings in or­der to high­light their achieve­ments."As we em­barked on cel­e­brat­ing the cen­te­nary of the school, the ex­ec­u­tive of the NGHS Alum­nae As­so­ci­a­tion de­cid­ed that it would be most ap­pro­pri­ate to pro­duce the book and make Miss Meghu's dream a re­al­i­ty," Ish­mael enun­ci­at­ed.

She said the name was ar­rived at dur­ing their de­lib­er­a­tions on how mean­ing­ful the tamarind tree was to stu­dents, many of whom now hold pres­ti­gious and in­flu­en­tial po­si­tions in var­i­ous dis­ci­plines all over the world."Right here in Trinidad, we can boast of hav­ing pro­duced two first ladies of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go, one of whom, Za­lay­har Has­sanali, to­geth­er with an­oth­er past stu­dent, Jus­tice Gladys Gafoor, have re­cent­ly re­ceived the na­tion's high­est award, the Or­der of Trinidad and To­ba­go. They have made us in­deed ex­treme­ly proud," she added.

Dr Ramjohn Richards, in her re­marks, said while the spo­ken word was pow­er­ful and be­yond doubt, very im­por­tant, "sad­ly, it can be for­got­ten, lost to the hear­er who re­ceived it with glad­ness, but who, over time, does not re­tain what was heard."The writ­ten word, how­ev­er, stands as a liv­ing mon­u­ment, a tan­gi­ble point of ref­er­ence to which one may re­turn, from time to time, as the need aris­es," she ex­pressed.She said the Tamarind Tree will serve to some ex­tent, "as a his­to­ry of this great in­sti­tu­tion of learn­ing and as a com­pass to cur­rent and fu­ture stu­dents. In ad­di­tion, as we bring this pub­li­ca­tion to the no­tice out­side the Naps soror­i­ty, it will speak to the na­tion and even per­sons be­yond, of the lega­cy of ex­cel­lence that this school has adopt­ed from its in­cep­tion."

Seep­er­sad-Bachan agreed that the Tamarind Tree Blos­soms must serve as more than just a re­flec­tion of the past, but must stand as a mod­el for the be­gin­nings of the fu­ture."Re­mem­ber, we stand here to­day rep­re­sent­ing the fu­ture that stu­dents of the past dreamed about. We must ac­cept the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for en­sur­ing that we con­tin­ue giv­ing life to the fu­ture that NGHS has pre­pared all of us for."It is there­fore for us to do our school proud, our city proud and our na­tion proud. In fact, I hope that this might even mo­ti­vate us in San Fer­nan­do to re­turn to some of the old val­ues that we trea­sured in the years past."