If I seem to be cantering down the road of health issues these past few weeks, it is because I have been talking to several sufferers who don’t seem to know what’s going on with them. Of course I have no medical training, but I have had such a diverse …
Read More »Vaneisa: Leading horses to water—do public education campaigns work?
“She have the flu,” he said, when I asked about his daughter, who sounded weak and listless on the phone. Her symptoms? Fever, body aches and headache. I told him it sounded like dengue, and he should probably get her tested. It baffled me that no one in the household …
Read More »Vaneisa: Are we rubbishing our own chances of dealing with dengue?
When people’s homes are flooded, when farmers lose livestock and crops, when roads become impassable during the rainy season, it’s impossible not to feel sympathy. The shell-shocked look is common as people try to assimilate what has happened, and what they have to do next. Apart from the horror of …
Read More »Vaneisa: Down the dengue road—that sudden explosion of excruciating pain
Something tells me that I already mentioned that I had dengue four times; once, dengue haemorrhagic fever, another at the same time as chikungunya. The first time, around the year 2000, was an ordeal itself, worsened by the fact that I had no idea what was happening when the pains …
Read More »Vaneisa: Menarche to menopause—lifting curtain on “hormonal interventions”
A friend of mine was worried about her increasing forgetfulness. It didn’t seem any more acute than that of most of the people I know (myself included) over 50. But it was so disturbing to her that she was contemplating getting tested for possible ADHD. She is 51, and now …
Read More »Vaneisa: T20WC24 thrills, revived WI interests—but Big Three concerns linger
Both of the semi-final matches in this T20 World Cup were demolitions. The match between Afghanistan and South Africa was actually painful to watch. Even if you supported the SA team, from a sporting perspective, it is unpleasant to look at that kind of devastation—like schoolchildren being trounced by adults. …
Read More »Vaneisa: Why resurgent West Indies should still be mindful of USA Cricket’s rise
We lost the first 2024 ICC T20 World Cup Super Eight match against England in a clinical encounter that brought a harsh dose of reality. A match report here is not relevant. Suffice it to say that while the batters are more willing to take singles, there are still far …
Read More »Vaneisa: Feeling the feeling—why I’m optimistic about West Indies
The rains have come. The poui blossoms have gone. Burnt browns have given way to verdant green. What is the colour of the rainy season? This time round it is maroon. The mercurial maroon that has been bringing us to the edge—as it has so often done—and now rewarding us …
Read More »Vaneisa: The People in Print—the problem with T&T’s media
One of the panel discussions at the recent Bocas Lit Fest focused on the fate of newspaper columnists in today’s environment. Themed “They Don’t Write Them Like They Used to: A Discussion on the Present and Future of the Newspaper Column,” it ended up with a rather bleak prognosis. Among …
Read More »Vaneisa: Green till you blue; T&T must choose sustainable development
It has been about 30 years since Vicki-Ann Assevero put down her bucket in the land of her father’s birth. She didn’t come back because of some ancestral pull to Victor’s homeland—it was because she had met and fallen in love with another Trinidadian, the then-minister of finance, Wendell Mottley, …
Read More »Vaneisa: Inside the Labyrinth; how art can help save lives in T&T
On 16 May, the Central Bank Museum launched an exhibition of the late Glen Roopchand’s art. Roopchand, whose work is perhaps most publicly visible in his rendition of Carlisle Chang’s The Inherent Nobility of Man, which is on display at the Piarco International Airport, died in July 2022. The collection …
Read More »Vaneisa: Clutter of the mind—why I’m not a hoarder
Life has a way of setting you adrift; sometimes on a rough sea, sometimes with such gentle currents that you barely notice how far you have travelled. Knowing that during my period of research and writing, I had sunk even deeper into my naturally reclusive state, I felt that the …
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