Elbowing poor people out of Carnival
Trinidad Carnival has become an upper middle class festival. The lower end of the middle class and the poor have, more and more, been elbowed out. Panorama (Sunday) is now an all inclusive for urban Afro and Indo twenty somethings; university grads equally gendered, where pan is a distraction from the real fete and frolic on the Greens.
And after their false appearance at a pan show, the rest of the pan shows are left to the Grand Stand die- hards that looks like a TTARP reunion. Steelbands don’t dare come out on Carnival days without mechanised pan pullers called tractors because the pan pushers are now following the decibelled DJ’s.
Tribe, Yuma and Harts are now the instant brands that all you need to do is add Pisa and enjoy. And they own the town. You have to look hard to find a steelband on the road or in a fete. And now you can’t find a live band in these new brands because it’s all about economics, decibels and non-stop flights of fantasy. No time for real musicians who have the audacity to rest. There is no room for authenticity only dj mixes, cart bars and mobile air conditioned 25 seater rest points to keep the young pros cool.
Meanwhile, Tanty gets left holding the bag for the cost of the rental of her booth around the Savannah where the brands don’t pass. She gets get left holding the wine and makes no jam.
27 July, 2011, 1:26 am
Go where the market is. . . just good business.
27 July, 2011, 4:14 am
From a country perspective where tons of taxpayers money is spent on Carnival infrastructure, it behoves the planners to get a better ROI. Part of that ROI is social. So the entrepreneurs are right to go where the market is. The tax dollars though should go to promote the things that make us different and bikinis, beads and feathers (BBF’s) don’t differentiate us from Brazil or Barbados. Sweet pan does. Wire benders do. Jourvert does. And these have to be protected and promoted, dr
27 July, 2011, 3:05 pm
Panorama (Sunday) was always a lime in the North Stand going way back in the 1970’s today Big Business take over the lime…moving with time.
My beef with PanTrinbago and Panorama Finals. They have a good products. Get the right entity (open bid) to showcase the Finals via per-per-view over the Internet, why sitting on a product the world want to see.
With my observation it is less and less people’s are coming out to see the same old Bikinis and Beads year after year. Also with the spread of carnivals all over the world less visitors will flock to Trinidad for carnival in the future…….
4 August, 2011, 5:41 am
Royce, we need to remember what’s make us different; if we lose the ethos of Carnival; Steelband, J’ourvert, traditional mas, then all we are left holding are beads and feathers and that you can buy on the internet or in any theme party any where in the world – all that glitters is not gold, dr
3 September, 2011, 8:22 pm
It’s not the fault of the people who are providing a successful product for the thousands who presumably want it that Carnival’s dynamic is changing. Carnival has an authority that runs and plans it, a government that funds large parts of it and many minds in the society who can do a lot to improve or add value but prefer to sit and snipe from the side. There are also lots of people in the ‘grassroots’ end of Carnival who by their refusal to change/improve their product have got left behind and complain when a new generation has come and left them behind.
If you examine Carnival around the world, you’ll realise that this is not germane to Trinidad but to many West Indian carnivals in varying degrees.
5 September, 2011, 1:07 am
Franka, am I considered one of the ” snipers from the side”?, dr
3 September, 2011, 9:18 pm
This is good stuff. I wrote about this after Carnival here https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150156210706934
Also, https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150154140061934 and https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150129685071934
5 September, 2011, 1:19 am
Nigel, I say let the entrepreneurs follow the market and invest and profit. And enough government $ must be directed to our authentic differentiators….pan tuners are a dying breed; what if we put 6 of them in a classroom for 5 years to duplicate their skill? That’s what will make us special and ultimately valuable and marketable. Not bikini’s from China, dr