The Trinidad Carnival season
The ritual of Trinidad Carnival involves more than buying a costume and jumping in the streets for two days. Let us initiate you into the customs of Carnival. It's a season — a lifestyle!
View ArticleTrinidad Carnival in a nutshell
Love it or hate it, it is a uniquely Trinidadian experience you are unlikely ever to forget
View ArticleTrinidad: a flow of festivals
This festival island constantly celebrates life, creativity, and diversity – Archbishop Desmond Tutu called T&T a “rainbow nation”. These are some of our most distinctive annual celebrations
View ArticleTrinidad Carnival: the birth & evolution
Central to understanding much of the Trinidadian psyche is to understand the festival culture of the island. And no festival is greater than the Trinidad Carnival. The dynamism of the festival has...
View ArticleEndless Wuk — a Trinidad Carnival Guide
A brief history of Carnival The history of Carnival in Trinidad and Tobago can be read as a history of banned things. When the French arrived in the1780s, they brought a tradition of pre-Lenten...
View ArticleTrinidad & Tobago celebrations & festivals
Few things speak more eloquently to Trinidad and Tobago’s reputation as a place where people like to party, and as a multi-cultural melange, than the quantity and variety of festivals on the national...
View ArticleOur time — Trinidad Carnival in the new millennium
This is the mother of all West Indian style carnivals around the world. The intoxicating mix of high-energy music and street performed by masqueraders, some in costumes 50ft tall, make the massive...
View ArticleTrinidad Carnival — what you need to know
A large part of Trinidad Carnival is about abandon and confrontation, an anti-authoritarian movement subverting all that inhibits and represses. So what you’ll find is a strange, testy negotiation...
View ArticleTrinidad Carnival: the who, what, where, when, why
The Carnival season is like one large buffet. You can sample all of it over multiple courses; just some of it, by confining yourself to a few things which appeal to you; or none at all (which means...
View ArticleA Trinidad festivals calendar
In alphabetical order, here are some of the island’s most treasured festivals. For a full calendar of events, click here. Bocas Lit Fest The five-day Trinidad & Tobago Literary Festival brings...
View ArticleThe Miracle Mother — La Divina Pastora, Siparee/Supari Mai, the Black Madonna
In what was once a Capuchin pilgrimage church of the same name in Siparia — a town settled by the first Spanish colonists — stands a dark-skinned statue of the Virgin Mary as La Divina Pastora (the...
View ArticleA Trinidad festival guide for 2018
Here are some of Trinidad's most treasured festivals, in alphabetical order...starting with the big one: the Carnival season.
View ArticleSpiritual (Shouter) Baptist Liberation Day
Celebrated on 30 March, Spiritual (Shouter) Baptist Liberation Day commemorates the abolition of the colonial-era British-instituted Shouters Prohibition Ordinance. In 1917, the Ordinance was enacted...
View ArticleIndian Arrival Day
This national public holiday (30 May) commemorates the arrival of the first indentured labourers from India on the Fatel Rozack in 1845, following the Emancipation of African slaves in 1838. Waves of...
View ArticleEid-ul-Fitr
Eid-ul-Fitr, often shortened locally to just “Eid” (and sometimes spelt Eid al-Fitr internationally), marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan — the ninth month of the Muslim year, according to the...
View ArticleEmancipation Day
Celebrated on 1 August to commemorate the end of slavery in the British colonies (1838), Emancipation Day — a public holiday — is marked with street processions (a morning procession, including...
View ArticleIndependence Day
Trinidad & Tobago Independence Day in a nutshell Independence Day — a public holiday — marks the occasion on 31 August, 1962 when Trinidad & Tobago’s became independent from Great Britain. The...
View ArticleDivali: the festival of lights
Divali is one of the most beautiful, unifying, and anticipated holidays of the year, celebrated by the Hindu faithful — and the nation as a whole
View ArticleTrinidad’s most cherished festivals | Roundtable
In addition to helping our readers find the perfect Carnival itinerary, we talked to our roundtable — Nigel Campbell, Maria Nunes, Penelope Spencer, Franka Philip, Ardene Sirjoo, and Laura...
View ArticleTrinidad Carnival — the perfect itinerary | Roundtable
The depth and breadth of Trinidad's Carnival activities can overwhelm anyone wanting to immerse themselves in the culture and the festivities. Our roundtable discussion with Maria Nunes, Nigel...
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