A Note From The Gull
Chévere! I had never heard about El Callao in Venezuela and so I was very interested to learn that Trinbagonians and other Caribbean peoples have made a home there. It gave me the greatest pleasure to see that they had not gone there empty-handed but had brought with them rich cultural gifts. Among these were the calypso and carnivals of their homelands. As I looked at and listened to the videos, I was filled with gratitude.
Some time ago, I wrote a post about emigration as a tentative exploration of what it means to be "expelled/pulled" from Trinidad and Tobago. Expulsion, whether voluntary or imposed creates a global scattering or "diaspora".
Recently, while trawling the Internet for Trinbagonian and more specifically calypso's influences abroad, I began once again to think about diaspora but this time from the perspective of the recipients/host countries of these scattered Trinbagonians. How have the places where they eventually put down roots benefited from the "items" which Trinbagonians carry in the jahaji bundles of their hearts and minds and bodies.
I've also been thinking recently about Diaspora as Ark. It allows us to carry our culture to the four corners of the earth but sometimes there are those instances where generations later the descendants continue to preserve bits of the culture which have long disappeared from the country of origin. This is why I look also at Diaspora not only as movement but as Ark.
"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.
Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.
Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare
