Rain on the parade

“We need to make a check of all baggage on board. Please bear with us. We are sorry for the inconvenience.” These were not the exact words.

I’m sure they sounded a lot more trained, but that’s your gist.

My friend Nyla looks at me, and laughs. It’s dry laughter.

‘Did you hear that?’ she asked.

“Nope.” I continue surfing through Turkish Airline’s movie list.

‘A man came on board with his luggage and has refused to fly.

Now they have to check all the luggage on board.’ “Oh,” I continue poking the touch screen.

‘Well at least I know I’m not going to die alone,’ she remarked.

“Uh huh,” I mumble.

I’m not too sure whether my reaction had to do with ‘I expected this’ given that there had been several spates of bombings in Istanbul right before we had embarked on our journey, or whether it was my characteristic emotional shut down when something that has the potential to be tragic begins to happen. Or perhaps it’s just that Trinidadian laid-back attitude that allows the Carnival to go on. I figured it was a combination of everything.

Passengers were co-operative and didn’t seem too perturbed.

Perhaps the security check was a relief in a place where an explosion is generally the order of the day.

Half an hour later we were happily on to our destination.

I returned to Trinidad the week before Carnival where, despite the ‘few’ incidents of loss of life (now a part of daily living here), the show was in full swing. During my stay away from the island, much had happened. I lost two friends to sudden deaths, there was news of a surge in crime and basically, from the air, there didn’t seem to be anything positive happening here. Time abroad allows one to look in and see things that we don’t see when we are in the thick of things. When you aren’t chipping along with the band on the road, your rhythm is different.

And India was definitely a different sort of carnival.

But, I missed the rains at home.

In India, the seasons felt too organized.

Organized is a good word in the context of a place where walking the roads is a test of one’s physical and mental reflexes. It’s a case of dodge the vehicles and people — stop — run — stop — reach other side safely. Needless to say, Trinidad seemed pretty organized. Yet I loved the chaos in India. And the weather simply did not facilitate full chaos. It was winter. And that meant no rains.

In Trinidad, it was the sporadic rains that I missed. I figured it had to do with the cathartic nature of rain and in the spirit of the Carnival, I wished to enjoy the surprise of grey skies that wrap us in feelings of cosy happiness so that, even if we have to work, it’s okay to be lazy that day. The island is bound in the camaraderie of laziness that makes it fine to be slow on a rainy day. Not on Carnival though. No, no.

Despite the debates about women’s bodies, owning sexuality and victim blaming, the latter of which had prompted a friend to message me to ask if I had heard the latest bacchanal about Rowley’s comment in Maloney — life goes on. I was away from it all and I simply asked ‘he gone mad?’ But then I didn’t have the full story so it was the only question I could ask. Even if he had gone mad, he wasn’t alone. It was the entire country. So, despite the raining crime — the slitting of throats, the human trafficking and the drug trades — nothing stops the Carnival. We might postpone it perhaps but we can’t stop it.

As I write this, Carnival is in progress. It’s raining and I’m happily sipping a cup of green tea thinking about entertainment and art. As divergent as that thought might seem in the context of this piece there is a thread.

It is that entertainment thrives in situations of oppression. It’s a testament to the fact that the world isn’t binary. There are just contradictions and conflicts. And we put odds and ends together to create our lives.

So, even while we denounce the crime, few will boycott the Carnival.

It’s a cathartic event. And we need catharsis.

For moments of catharsis restore some semblance of balance within the chaos of life.