Janine Mendes-Franco · January, 2008

Latest posts by Janine Mendes-Franco from January, 2008

Trinidad & Tobago: Where's The ‘Mas?

  30 January 2008

Thebookmann attends Trinidadian artist Ashraph's Carnival exhibition: “The Midnight Robber, the Fancy Sailor, Bats, Red Devils and Fancy Indians, Kings and Queens and to its current transitional state of feathers and beads, all inclusive, in a brown paper bag.”

Barbados, Bermuda, USA: Standing for Change

  30 January 2008

Cheese-on-bread! notices a similarity between the new Barbados government's campaign slogan and Barack Obama's – and hopes that the “rallying cry will work for him as well as it did for PM Thompson et al…”; while Politics.bm thinks Bermuda's government “represents everything Obama rejects.”

Trinidad & Tobago: On Not Eating Meat

  29 January 2008

“I am not the preachy sort of vegetarian,” declares Trinidadian Nicholas Laughlin, as he links to an article that “summarises so succinctly the good reasons to stop eating meat–or at least reduce the amount one eats…”

Bahamas: Moving On…

  28 January 2008

Rick Lowe at WeblogBahamas.com is fed-up of the two political parties’ bickering about the election results: “It is time for the rhetoric to stop on both sides of the political divide so the country can move forward.”

Jamaica: Safe Sex?

  28 January 2008

Stunner's Afflictions blogs about the controversial issue of distributing condoms in Jamaican schools.

Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago: Lusignan Massacre

  28 January 2008

“I've never felt so utterly hopeless about Guyana as I do today, and it weighs all the heavier in this prolonged season of hopelessness about my own country, my own society”: As news spreads about the horrific massacre in the town of Lusignan, Nicholas Laughlin‘s heart bleeds for Guyana.

Trinidad & Tobago: “La Fantasie” & Reality

  28 January 2008

“For most Trinidadians, giving the name ‘La Fantasie’ to a house is a bitter joke, rousing memories of the hundreds of millions spent to construct the new prime ministerial palace…it also pokes sardonic fun at the fantasy of social and economic progress peddled by the current Trinidad and Tobago government”:...

Trinidad & Tobago: Fancy Sailors

  26 January 2008

“Every year it seems, the few individuals who have kept the traditions of Old Mas alive are becoming less visible”: Thebookmann features Trinidad and Tobago Carnival's Fancy Sailors.

Trinidad & Tobago: The Bottom Line

  26 January 2008

“Trinidad is no longer the Land of the Hummingbird but the Land of the Cash Cow…in the new Trinidad Carnival, the only thing that need be considered is not the bottom in the road but the bottom line in the road”: Nicholas Laughlin quotes Trinidad and Tobago journalist B.C. Pires.

Barbados: Impact of CSME

  26 January 2008

While Bajan Free Press believes “the future of Barbados is inextricably linked to the future of the Caribbean region of which we are a part”, Barbados Underground says: “We will probably import many of the social ills of T&T, Guyana and several of the other islands.”

Bahamas: Freedom of Information

  26 January 2008

As the Bahamian Prime Minister makes his report to the nation, Rick Lowe at WeblogBahamas.com admits to “feeling like someone was now in charge of The Bahamas”, but adds: “If there was one disappointment for me it is that Mr. Ingraham did not mention when a Freedom of Information Act...

Trinidad & Tobago: Dame Lorraine

  25 January 2008

Thebookmann attends a traditional “Old ‘Mas” performance in Trinidad and Tobago and posts video of the well-loved Carnival character of the Dame Lorraine.

Trinidad & Tobago: Stolen Generation?

  25 January 2008

A schoolyard incident in Trinidad and Tobago makes Jumbie's Watch wonder: “How and when did society ‘tief’ our children, and their innocence? And how did we let them get away with it, without even a murmur of protest?”

Jamaica, St. Lucia: Hardwick's Eulogy

  25 January 2008

“Derek Walcott's prodigious gifts, even in the face of tragedy, continue to amaze me”: Jamaican Geoffrey Philp links to the Caribbean writer's eulogy of Elizabeth Hardwick.