More than 20 years ago, she watched her moth­er, Anne Boodoo, lose her bat­tle with ovar­i­an can­cer. Anne was 47.

Though he has been paint­ing for years, peo­ple still stop for­mer na­tion­al cy­clist Michael Phillips at events or on the road and ex­press com­plete shock when they learn that he is al­so an artist—and a pret­ty good one, too.

Oc­to­ber is Ca­lyp­so His­to­ry Month in Trinidad and To­ba­go, a time to cel­e­brate, re­flect up­on and pre­serve one of our na­tion’s great­est cul­tur­al gifts to the world. Yet, this Oc­to­ber 2026, as we come to its end, car­ries a par­tic­u­lar­ly poignant sig­nif­i­cance, com­ing as it does in the wake of the pass­ing of the leg­endary Slinger “Mighty Spar­row” Fran­cis­co, uni­ver­sal­ly ac­claimed as the Ca­lyp­so King of the World and, more re­cent­ly, An­tho­ny Em­rold “Broth­er Valenti­no” Phillip.

Pow­er­ful dy­nas­ties from across the world will con­verge on San Fer­nan­do as Fyr­na­tion pre­pares to trans­form the streets in­to a spec­tac­u­lar show­case of colour, cre­ativ­i­ty and re­gal splen­dour for Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day 2027.

The Lost Tribe has com­plet­ed the sec­ond edi­tion of Car­ni­val Cam­pus, an in­ten­sive train­ing pro­gramme aimed at equip­ping emerg­ing de­sign­ers, ar­ti­sans and pro­duc­tion spe­cial­ists with the skills need­ed to build ca­reers in Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cre­ative in­dus­tries.

When Melanie Par­ris was di­ag­nosed with stage three breast can­cer at the age of 28, she strug­gled to rec­on­cile the news with the world around her. Near­ly three decades lat­er, at 57, she is liv­ing proof that a can­cer di­ag­no­sis does not have to mark the end of one’s sto­ry.

Den­im, di­a­monds and daz­zling style took cen­tre stage as in­sur­ance and fi­nan­cial pro­fes­sion­als trad­ed their work at­tire for fash­ion­able en­sem­bles at the Den­im and Di­a­monds par­ty, host­ed by the South Chap­ter of the Trinidad and To­ba­go As­so­ci­a­tion of In­sur­ance and Fi­nan­cial Ad­vi­sors (TTAIFA) at Car­ni­val City, Gulf City, on Sat­ur­day Oc­to­ber 17.

For renowned artist Jack­ie Hink­son, cre­at­ing a piece of work is a qui­et, con­tin­u­ous con­ver­sa­tion be­tween nar­ra­tive and form. Ahead of his up­com­ing ex­hi­bi­tion this No­vem­ber, Hink­son shares a rare look in­to the cre­ative phi­los­o­phy that un­der­pins his decades-span­ning ca­reer and guides his lat­est col­lec­tion.

Trinidad and To­ba­go-born steel­pan mu­si­cian, com­pos­er and arranger Savion Nicholls is set to show­case his ver­sa­til­i­ty in a two-night pro­duc­tion com­bin­ing steel­pan, clas­si­cal voice, pi­ano and in­spi­ra­tional mu­sic at the Cen­tral Bank Au­di­to­ri­um.

The aro­ma of fire-roast­ed veg­eta­bles, fresh­ly pre­pared cho­ka and hot sa­da roti filled the Cou­va South Au­di­to­ri­um on Fri­day, Oc­to­ber 23, as em­ploy­ees of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Elec­tric­i­ty Com­mis­sion (T&TEC) put their culi­nary skills to the test in the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s first-ever cho­ka cook-out com­pe­ti­tion.

Af­ter a sev­en-year hia­tus, the Na­tion­al Coun­cil of In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) is bring­ing back its pop­u­lar Dance and Youth Champ com­pe­ti­tions as part of this year’s Di­vali Na­gar cel­e­bra­tions.

When To­bag­on­ian Oni­ka Thomp­son-Toney was di­ag­nosed with breast can­cer in 2017, her first thought was that she was go­ing to die.