JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Sunday, April 6, 2025

It's our time to shine–Trinbago 2023!

by

Brian Lewis
611 days ago
20230804
Brian Lewis Things That Matter Logo NEW

Brian Lewis Things That Matter Logo NEW

If you want to know the end, look at the be­gin­ning–African proverb

It's one of the most dif­fi­cult, di­vi­sive and fun­da­men­tal is­sues in Caribbean and Com­mon­wealth his­to­ry. Is it that peo­ple of African de­scent are still "No­body"? We must be un­afraid, fear­less, re­lent­less and in­domitable in claim­ing the space and not on­ly claim­ing it but mak­ing it a safe space.

The de­scen­dants of the slaves must not al­low the pas­sage of time to di­min­ish the rel­e­vance of the in­hu­mane, bar­bar­ic and bru­tal his­to­ry of the told and un­told sto­ries of en­slaved peo­ple, the transat­lantic slav­ery, the plan­ta­tion econ­o­my and the busi­ness of slav­ery. To those who be­lieve it's not about the past it's on­ly about the present and fu­ture. If you want to know the end look at the be­gin­ning.

Au­gust 1, 1985, T&T be­came the first in­de­pen­dent coun­try to de­clare Eman­ci­pa­tion Day a na­tion­al hol­i­day to com­mem­o­rate the abo­li­tion of slav­ery.

Last week an im­por­tant we­bi­nar was held so as to re­main true to a promise made in the orig­i­nal Trin­ba­go 2021 bid con­cept to host the Com­mon­wealth Youth Games. It's laud­able the de­ter­mi­na­tion of Mar­tin Reynolds, the Com­mon­wealth Games Fed­er­a­tion (CGF) di­rec­tor of strat­e­gy, lega­cy and part­ner­ships to ho­n­our the vi­sion of the bid con­cept ar­tic­u­lat­ed by Kwanieze John, Rheeza Grant and Chanelle Young and the align­ment of Trin­ba­go2021 now 2023 with "Eman­ci­pa­tion".

One of the pre­sen­ta­tions en­ti­tled "Fes­ti­vals of Re­sis­tance in Trinidad and To­ba­go - Em­pow­er­ing Com­mu­ni­ties through Cul­ture" by Dara Healy- a writer, sto­ry­teller, dancer-chore­o­g­ra­ph­er and ac­tress of film and stage from Trinidad and To­ba­go (T&T). Dara found­ed the cul­tur­al or­gan­i­sa­tion, Idake­da Group Lim­it­ed in 1998 and the non-gov­ern­men­tal or­gan­i­sa­tion, the Ida Marie Guer­ra In­dige­nous Cre­ative Arts Net­work, ICAN in 2012. She is pas­sion­ate about the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of move­ment and dance and ded­i­cates her cre­ative skills to­wards the en­rich­ment of vul­ner­a­ble chil­dren and com­mu­ni­ties. Her pre­sen­ta­tion was pow­er­ful, pro­found and thought-pro­vok­ing.

En­ti­tled - The Trin­ba­go 2023 In­ter­na­tion­al Slav­ery Mu­se­um (ISM) Vir­tu­al Tour and Fes­ti­vals of Re­sis­tance - the cel­e­bra­tion and sig­nif­i­cance of T&T Car­ni­val and Eman­ci­pa­tion. The we­bi­nar al­so in­clud­ed a fa­cil­i­tat­ed vir­tu­al tour and talk by the ISM of Liv­er­pool.

The idea is to pro­vide ath­letes, in par­tic­u­lar, but al­so of­fi­cials, coach­es, ad­min­is­tra­tors and sport lead­ers com­ing to T&T with an in­sight in­to the strate­gic, cul­tur­al and his­tor­i­cal sig­nif­i­cance of host­ing a mul­ti-sport Com­mon­wealth Games in the twin-is­land Re­pub­lic.

It was an ef­fort to high­light that the Trin­ba­go 2023 open­ing cer­e­mo­ny is not just "a par­ty" but of deep sig­nif­i­cance and cathar­sis.

The in­vi­ta­tion to the we­bi­nar was cir­cu­lat­ed to the 72-mem­ber Com­mon­wealth Games As­so­ci­a­tions (CGAs). Fifty par­tic­i­pants at­ten­tive­ly lis­tened to the pre­sen­ta­tions by Dara and the ISM.

Mean­ing­ful con­ver­sa­tions about eman­ci­pa­tion, slav­ery and colo­nial­ism fight, the ma­jor­i­ty of peo­ple in the Com­mon­wealth in­clud­ing the Caribbean.

To­day, the cur­tain will raise on the his­toric first-ever mul­ti-sport event to be held in T&T.

An­oth­er im­por­tant el­e­ment of the Trin­ba­go 2021/2023 bid vi­sion is to have the steel­pan at the core of the Games' sport­ing, mu­si­cal and cul­tur­al brand iden­ti­ty. "Pan on de Podiu!" Imag­ine hear­ing the pan ver­sion of the na­tion­al an­them of all 72 Com­mon­wealth na­tions and ter­ri­to­ries.

We must be proud of the dis­tinc­tive sweet sound of our steel­pan. The steel­pan is our own in­ven­tion by "Tri­nis" of African her­itage.

The Com­mon­wealth Youth Games is here T&T. Rise up! It's our time to shine!


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored