Celebrating Indian Arrival Day.

Uploaded by PepeCris15
ACROSS THE DARK WATERS
Performed by Kobo Town
Lead singer/songwriter Drew Gonsalves

Across the dark waters we came
With despair in our eyes,
to rest beneath these foreign skies
And so began the endless wait
For an end to misery, for an end to history
In this new land we came to learn
About greed’s capacity to incite our cruelty
But over time we came to yearn
For the precious liberty that always stood beyond our reach.

But the wheels of history grind slowly
Circumstance never smiles on the lowly
Everywhere we see contradictory signs
Perhaps tomorrow will being a brighter time…

Tumblin’ off the Grandstand on the Savannah
Bubblin’ out the speakers on every corner
Breakin’ over the mountains like a mighty thunder
Our hope is a restless song
Rising up from the sands like a defiant flower
Holding and consoling us in our darkest hour
Sweeping over the country like a dry-season shower
Our hope is a restless song
Our hope is a restless song.

Across the dark waters we passed
To arrive where we now stand in this divided land
Few believed that we could last
To build a nation on these shores but look how we endured
In this former colony things are never what they seem
Beneath every place we see is a tortured history
The past could trample us
It could not rub out our dreams
And though we reached the present time
We have not left them behind.

But the wheels of history grind slowly, ever so slowly
Circumstance never smiles on the lowly
Everywhere we see contradictory signs
Perhaps tomorrow will being a brighter time…

Tumblin’ off the Grandstand on the Savannah
Bubblin’ out the speakers on every corner
Breakin’ over the mountains like a mighty thunder
Our hope is a restless song
Rising up from the sands like a defiant flower
Holding and consoling us in our darkest hour
Sweeping over the country like a dry-season shower
Our hope is a restless song
Our hope is a restless song.

You are my land, you are the land of my birth
For better or for worse, you are the land I put first
In sickness and in health and in good times and bad
I bow to you oh Trinidad
Though I have lived out my life far across the sea
In a foreign country, in a frozen city
But I know I would be back again
You are the land running though my veins
You are my land, the land of my life
Your joy is my light and your sorrow my night
Your vision my sight, your soil my birthright
You are the land of my struggle
And your plight is my fight
The land of my struggle
And your plight is my fight.

Tumblin’ off the Grandstand on the Savannah
Bubblin’ out the speakers on every corner
Breakin’ over the mountains like a mighty thunder
Our hope is a restless song
Rising up from the sands like a defiant flower
Holding and consoling us in our darkest hour
Sweeping over the country like a dry-season shower
Our hope is a restless song
Our hope is a restless song
Our hope is a restless song.

© Copyright – Kobo Town.
Posted with the kind permission of Kobo Town.
....................................................................................................


A Note From The Gull

Thank you, Kobo Town.

Today, Trinidad and Tobago celebrates Indian Arrival Day. Each arrival comes like one of the Magi bearing precious gifts to enrich and honour our nation. Each arrival sends us on a renewed quest to accommodate, to include, to transform, to grow. Thank you for coming. Thank you for refreshing and flavouring the pot, for rocking the boat and requiring those already here to make room while finding a new balance. Thank you for reminding us that our journey is never over, that we must continually depart from the status quo to evolve. Thank you for teaching us that in order to survive, we have to face kala pani and the fear of sagarollanghana, of losing ourselves, or how others have defined us in order that through blood, sweat and tears we can eventually discover that we are so much more. Thank you for the diversity that your presence has brought. Thank you for your cultures, your beautiful music and languages and food and crafts. Thank you for your optimism and patience and courage. 

Close ranks Trinidad and Tobago and protect what you have created. Close ranks and protect your own. 

"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