The build-up to the Caribbean’s biggest Carnival in the twin-island Republic of Trinidad and Tobago (T&T), which takes place in February or March, starts well before Christmas. Costumes are chosen, money is saved, huge steel bands practise daily, and old-time calypsonians rehearse their lines for a witty, lyrical competition. In this most rainbow of nations, blacks, Indians, whites and others pull together as one people at Carnival.
The tradition of Carnival satire goes back a long way. In the 19th century, huge bands of people masquerading as sailors paraded through the streets of the capital, Port of Spain, to ridicule the British navy and the wider colonial social fabric. At the 2009 event the title of Calypso Monarch was awarded to old-time teacher, historian and lyricist ‘Chalkdust’, whose hard-hitting satirical sketch of the fraught relationship between Prime Minister Patrick Manning and housing and trade minister Keith Rowley situated them in a hospital emergency room.
