As the year draws to a close, I find my­self think­ing about how I want to feel when the new one be­gins. Rest­ed. Ground­ed. Clear about where I am head­ing.

It was sup­posed to be rou­tine. A Pap smear, a sim­ple health screen­ing that Kim­ber­ly Moone­sar had no rea­son to be­lieve would change the course of her life.

Dr Tonya Abra­ham is set­ting her­self a tall task—to ac­tive­ly tack­le men­tal health in young peo­ple.

For 55 years, Pan Trin­ba­go has stood at the heart of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s steel­band move­ment, help­ing to pre­serve, pro­mote and ad­vance the na­tion­al mu­si­cal in­stru­ment. As the or­gan­i­sa­tion cel­e­brates its 55th an­niver­sary in 2026, it is re­flect­ing on a lega­cy built on re­silience, cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty and the work of those who laid the foun­da­tions for gen­er­a­tions to come.

And the an­gel of the Lord ap­peared un­to him, and said, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of val­our.  And Gideon said un­to him, Oh my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this be­fall­en us? And where are all his mir­a­cles which our fa­thers told us of, say­ing, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has for­sak­en us and de­liv­ered us in­to the hands of the Mid­i­an­ites.  And the Lord looked up­on him and said, ‘Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Is­rael from the hand of the Mid­i­an­ites: have not I sent thee?’  And he said un­to him, Oh my Lord, where­with shall I save Is­rael? Be­hold, my fam­i­ly is poor in Man­asseh, and I am the least in my fa­ther’s house.” (Judges 6:12 to 15).

The use of the “home name” has been a nor­mal part of every­day life for Trin­bag­o­ni­ans for decades. Most of us are prob­a­bly more close­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with our home names, of­ten link­ing our “gov­ern­ment name” to se­ri­ous sit­u­a­tions or “get­ting in trou­ble”. But did you know that the home name was steeped in West African prac­tice and be­lief? Our African an­ces­tors be­lieved that a per­son’s true name holds deep spir­i­tu­al pow­er and con­nects di­rect­ly to their soul, so a “fake iden­ti­ty” was a way to pro­tect chil­dren from the evil eye, neg­a­tiv­i­ty, jumbies and for­est spir­its.

Thou­sands of young women in Trinidad and To­ba­go face the month­ly chal­lenge of pe­ri­od pover­ty, with a lack of ac­cess to es­sen­tial men­stru­al care prod­ucts po­ten­tial­ly af­fect­ing their ed­u­ca­tion, con­fi­dence and dig­ni­ty.

Pork ribs plat­ed like a starfish, topped with lo­cal kim­chi. A de­served chef’s kiss not on­ly for its pre­sen­ta­tion, but al­so for what could be eas­i­ly de­fined by the lat­est pop­u­lar food term “ten­dernism”, as the meat came off the bone with gen­tle per­sua­sion of the fork.

Some­times we can de­vel­op anx­i­ety be­cause a build-up of in­flam­ma­tion in the body can lead to detri­men­tal health out­comes. It makes us won­der when we eat a meal or snack, “Is this caus­ing in­flam­ma­tion in my body?”

For many par­ents, bed­time read­ing is a qui­et rou­tine de­signed to lull chil­dren to sleep. For lo­cal au­thor Al­isa Gomez, how­ev­er, it be­came the un­ex­pect­ed launch­pad for a self-pub­lish­ing jour­ney aimed at re­shap­ing lo­cal chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture.

Janay Bernard, Miss Barataria, was crowned Lit­tle Miss Pleas­antville Queen 2026 at the Pleas­antville Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre on Sat­ur­day, Oc­to­ber 17, fol­low­ing an evening show­cas­ing tal­ent, con­fi­dence, poise and el­e­gance.

Shar­lan Bai­ley’s re­sem­blance to his fa­ther, Win­ston Bai­ley, is so strik­ing that peo­ple of­ten do a dou­ble take when­ev­er he takes the stage. As Ca­lyp­so His­to­ry Month comes to a close, the late Mighty Shad­ow re­turns to the spot­light through the eyes and mem­o­ry of his son.