A Carnival kingdom?

September 21, 2002
By Bukka Rennie

As things get heated on the hustings, one is amazed and shocked to hear a derogatory comment made that suggests or implies that one-half of the population here dwells in a "Carnival kingdom".

The inference therefore by logical extension is that the "other" half of the population exists in some kind of a twilight zone that is superior in moral principle.

It is typical in such situations as ours that one would attempt to assume the moral high ground for one's own "side" in the attempt to score political points with little or no regard to the "collateral damage" to the national psyche that may result.

Many years ago, in an attempt to refute this very same sickness, I wrote the following lines in a poem titled "All Stars":

"...Carnival mentality is divergent thinking/ is divergent acting/ is carrying on like you want to/ like you must/ not the sickening death of prearranged routine/ the suicides of conservative cowardice./ It is reaching for the sky/ aiming for the raging colours/ that bend to glitter/ to extend and push and stretch/ human endeavour/ despite the pain and bleeding/ onto Olympian realms..."

Those of us here who are completely theocratic in our manifestations, cocooned in our antediluvian parameters, are yet to come to terms, far less comprehend, the power of purely secular culture that is almost entirely a New World product. Nevertheless this little speck of an island has had the audacity to give the whole world a new sense of self via the Carnival arts and craft.

At the same time, there is evidence that the Carnival arts and craft industry of T&T grossed in 1995 earnings of approximately $253 million in foreign exchange, of which some 75 per cent or $180 million was directly attributed to the handmaidens of calypso, pan and Carnival (see the Henry and Nurse study).

There is virtually no tourist industry here outside of Tobago, calypso, pan and Carnival. Tourists come to these shores for the peace, tranquillity, sun and sea of Tobago throughout the year; recently yachties have begun to come for the safe haven of hurricane-free inlets, but by far the great influx that really makes the difference is between January-March each year for the festivities of calypso, pan and Carnival.

Government taxes on the tourist dollar from airport to hotel and back is yet to be quantified for these three months but it can be easily done to show the contribution of calypso, pan and Carnival to the State coffers, and if that is ever extrapolated over a ten-year period one can very well imagine the astronomical sums.

In addition, the export of Carnival, and its main ingredients mas, calypso and pan, has been extensive in the last decade. There are reputed to be almost 100 Carnivals around the world that are direct outgrowths of T&T's. The biggest events are as follows, according to the Henry/Nurse study:

Toronto/Caribana, attendance of one million people, with tourist expenditure accruing to the city of some Can$200 million; New York/Labour Day, attendance - two million, accruing some US$70 million; London/Notting Hill, attendance - two million, accruing some 20-30 million pounds.

According to our estimates in TT dollars, that is a grand total of some $3.7 billion. Add the other Carnivals in the Western Hemisphere and we may very well end up with a figure of some $4 billion annually.

All this we have said before but it is essential to restate the point that it is our being a "Carnival kingdom" that has earned us an international identity. Nothing else sets us apart! Not even political corruption! It is our "works of art and works of mas" which have created a "space" for us in this world.

No amount of puerile criticism will diminish the importance of our Carnival output. And as fate will have it, just as the statement was made on the hustings, our own Peter Minshall, as if in rebuttal, was awarded an Emmy for his projection of our art and craft on the international front.

The very poem quoted above ends this way:

"...Give me the Carnival mentality any day/ give me this strength/ to reach for the sky/ allow me to clutch/ the raging colours/ that bend to glitter/ like flies that flitter/ living only to become one/ with the neon gleam..."