Jesse Ramdeo

Car­ni­val Tues­day told the tale of two cities, one where the na­tion’s cap­i­tal brimmed with peo­ple, colours, rev­el­ry and splen­dour, while San Fer­nan­do paled in com­par­i­son.

Short­ly af­ter mid­day, while sev­er­al ma­jor mas bands had al­ready crossed var­i­ous judg­ing points in Port-of-Spain, mas­quer­aders in the south­ern city be­gan chip­ping in­to their as­sem­bly po­si­tion while mu­sic trucks blast­ed Road March con­tenders Bun­ji Gar­lin’s Hard Fete, Nailah Black­man and Skin­ny Fab­u­lous’ Come Home and Shake the Place from Machel Mon­tano and De­stra Gar­cia.

As the blaz­ing sun warmed up mas­quer­aders, band lead­ers told Guardian Me­dia Car­ni­val in San Fer­nan­do was in ur­gent need of at­ten­tion from the au­thor­i­ties, as its fu­ture seemed to be fad­ing.

Kalicha­ran Mas band­leader Ayana Kalicha­ran said it was time Gov­ern­ment place fo­cus on San Fer­nan­do too.

“They have to do a lot to pump and boost San Fer­nan­do Car­ni­val,” Kalicha­ran said.

“We are try­ing as band­lead­ers but the Gov­ern­ment needs to fo­cus on San Fer­nan­do Car­ni­val, all the en­er­gy, every­thing is pushed in­to Port-of-Spain Car­ni­val. There is no ac­tiv­i­ty, you are dri­ving through the streets, there are no ban­ners, no fly­ers, there is no feel of the at­ten­tion on San Fer­nan­do.”

Kalicha­ran said while her fam­i­ly’s band was thrilled to be back on the road fol­low­ing two years of in­ac­tiv­i­ty due to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, there were chal­lenges.

“A ma­jor chal­lenge was with peo­ple and their salaries, be­cause re­mem­ber they have not yet re­ceived their Feb­ru­ary salary so they asked us to do pay­ment plans and we did. An­oth­er ma­jor chal­lenge was the ad­min­is­tra­tive process to get things on the road, per­mits, pass­es for the trucks, as you know we had a prob­lem with the li­cens­ing of trucks so that de­layed us a lot.”

She said a ma­jor take away from this year’s cel­e­bra­tions was the need to plan ear­li­er, adding work for Car­ni­val 2024 will be­gin from as ear­ly as next week.

Jages­sar mas band­leader Rose­marie Ku­ru Jages­sar mean­while said she no longer knew what it would took to bring back mas in San Fer­nan­do.

“You can see for your­self who is on the road to look at us? But we love mas so we here. I don’t know what to do again, we try all kind of thing, we try every­thing we could, we change the cos­tume, we made them skimpy for the young ones, we did all we could have done but yet it hasn’t changed, I mean af­ter 45 years I don’t know what to do again,” she said.

The band por­trays icon­ic In­di­an mas cos­tumes, a sta­ple of her late hus­band, leg­endary mas­man Li­onel Jages­sar, who passed away last year.

David Ti­boo, a spec­ta­tor along Cipero Street, said it was heart-break­ing to wit­ness the de­cline of San Fer­nan­do Car­ni­val.

“See­ing how every­thing was be­ing hyped as the Moth­er of all Car­ni­vals, I came home think­ing every­thing would have changed, ex­pect­ing to see a steady flow of mas and noth­ing has changed and I think it’s get­ting pro­gres­sive­ly worse, as every year I come home for Car­ni­val and it’s like I’m see­ing less mas and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty.”

How­ev­er, San Fer­nan­do May­or Ju­nia Re­grel­lo and Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion chair­man Win­ston “Gyp­sy” Pe­ters con­tend­ed that Car­ni­val was far from fin­ished in the south­ern city and that the num­bers did not nec­es­sar­i­ly re­flect a cause for con­cern.

“How can it be dead and your band is 3,000-4,000 strong and your band sold out. I don’t know where that in­for­ma­tion is com­ing from, it may just be pro­pa­gan­da to raise con­tro­ver­sy,” Pe­ters told Guardian Me­dia.

“I just see a set of liv­ing peo­ple pass, I ent see Bel­grove be­hind them or Dass fu­ner­al home...I see­ing peo­ple, lots of them.”

Pe­ters al­so ac­knowl­edged the ben­e­fits to a south­ern Car­ni­val.

“I want to tell you how for­tu­nate you all are to have this kind of hub to have al­most a free­way with big wide streets to have Car­ni­val in San Fer­nan­do, oth­er than what it used to be be­fore. I grew up in San Fer­nan­do, I am a south boy and you know I pre­fer this and you have a planned place where you can have all your mas. I wish this was in Port-of-Spain.”