Pover­ty, the loss of both par­ents in La­gos, mi­gra­tion to Lon­don, an abu­sive mar­riage, and years of sin­gle moth­er­hood and low-paid work formed the con­di­tions out of which Buchi Emecheta wrote. Writ­ing stead­ied her, saved her, and moved her out of the mar­gins she had oc­cu­pied in Britain. Over her ca­reer, Emecheta pub­lished more than twen­ty books—nov­els, es­says, chil­dren’s sto­ries and an au­to­bi­og­ra­phy—mak­ing her one of the most wide­ly read African writ­ers of her gen­er­a­tion. In 2005, she was ap­point­ed OBE for ser­vices to lit­er­a­ture.

When Trinidad-born vo­cal­ist Ger­ard Placide stepped on­to the ice at the UBS Are­na in Long Is­land, New York, on No­vem­ber 7, his pow­er­ful ren­di­tion of the Unit­ed States Na­tion­al An­them si­lenced a crowd of 17,000.

Is the COP process re­al­ly work­ing? Does it meet the needs of the in­ter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty in 2025? And why, af­ter ten years, has the world moved fur­ther and faster away from the Paris Agree­ment? The Unit­ed Na­tions has some an­swer­ing to do.

Ther­mome­ters hit 31 de­grees Cel­sius in south Trinidad on Wednes­day, but ear­ly Car­ni­val ac­tion at Kairi Peo­ple’s Run­away all-in­clu­sive event made the at­mos­phere at South­ern Ranch in Debe feel even hot­ter.

The Trin­i­ty Dance The­atre of Trinidad and To­ba­go cap­ti­vat­ed au­di­ences at Queen’s Hall with its lat­est pro­duc­tion, Seeds.

Akua Lei­th has come to un­der­stand that good health is a form of wealth—and that poor health can drain both life and re­sources. The high­ly dec­o­rat­ed mu­si­cian and steel­pan in­no­va­tor has nav­i­gat­ed dan­ger­ous twists and turns through­out his life, but al­ways en­vi­sioned great­ness wait­ing on the oth­er side. He at­tend­ed St Ann’s Pri­ma­ry and South East Port-of-Spain Sec­ondary be­fore even­tu­al­ly pro­gress­ing to ter­tiary stud­ies lo­cal­ly and abroad. But the path was any­thing but smooth.

When Bri­an Wick­ham be­came a teacher at the new­ly opened Bish­op Anstey Trin­i­ty Col­lege East (BATCE), his fo­cus was al­ways on de­vel­op­ing the whole child—not just the aca­d­e­mics. Al­most 25 years lat­er, as act­ing head of ad­min­is­tra­tion, his vi­sion re­mains the same.

Kwame Em­manuel Boatswain was di­ag­nosed with bipo­lar dis­or­der at the age of 24, but that didn’t stop him from pur­su­ing a BA in Film Stud­ies and Film Pro­duc­tion at The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI), St Au­gus­tine cam­pus.

Kar­tik Snaan was ob­served re­cent­ly at Man­zanil­la Beach. Kar­tik is the eighth lu­nar month of the Hin­du cal­en­dar, and Kar­tik Snaan takes place on the full moon day of this sa­cred month.

Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) CEO Kei­ba Ja­cob Mot­t­ley says last Fri­day’s of­fi­cial launch of Trinidad and To­ba­go Car­ni­val 2026, dubbed “Car­ni­val in the City,” was a re­sound­ing suc­cess. She de­scribed the day-long event, staged in the heart of Port-of-Spain, as one that “sur­passed all ex­pec­ta­tions.”

“Each of you should use what­ev­er gift you have re­ceived to serve oth­ers, as faith­ful stew­ards of God’s grace in its var­i­ous forms.”

On No­vem­ber 1, the Rapid­fire Kidz Foun­da­tion held its An­nu­al Gala Din­ner at Achie­vor’s Ban­quet Hall in San Fer­nan­do.