We, as a nation, are perched at the point of tipping into anarchy, but all is not yet lost. The choice is ours to make. There is no magic bullet or pill to take away our pain. Only a sense of determination, commitment, and a clear vision will drag us …
Read More »Dear Editor: Revisiting the good hair, bad hair debate and its dangerous prejudices
“[…] What the video creator is clearly signalling is that a prerequisite for good hair is solely based on texture and length… These disruptive and prejudiced attitudes and mindsets must be confronted because they inform other discriminatory practices. “[…] There are real life consequences to these dangerous prejudices…” The following …
Read More »Kangalee: Gov’t bamboozling nurses with bonus while they suffer on short-term rollover contracts
“[…] Many [health care workers] are working under short term contracts—some as short as three months—[and] have been subjected to continual rollovers of their short term contracts and who have been employed continuously for 15 years and more. “[…] Instead of abolishing the short term-rollover contract system, coming up with …
Read More »Dear Editor: Effective inclement weather policies will address inconsistent national responses and save lives
“[…] If it was unsafe for schools to stay open, why were the non-essential businesses allowed to stay open with the workers exposed to the same risk? “[…] We must consider whether these weather alerts are reaching the population—especially in rural areas—and are they being understood? […]” The following Letter …
Read More »Something sneaky with your TP: anyone else notice the dirty toilet paper trick?!
With the proposed 2022-2023 budget having been laid in Parliament, a lot of Trinbagonians have been forced to be more circumspect in how they spend their precious dollars, especially as many public sector workers are still earning at pre-2104 rates! Nevertheless, something has happened to us even before this budget …
Read More »Dear Editor: Too much negativity in media! Columnists and contributors should also inspire
“[…] I have no difficulty with the working journalists reporting the news as they find it, whether positive or negative… My concern is with the columnists and the established letter-writers. “I am suggesting that you devote at least one of your contributions per month to a positive message—something that will …
Read More »Orin: The dog ate my homework—the pros and cons of working from home
“[…] We had fun doing Zoom meetings in our boxer shorts, out of sight of the camera; but some realised that they’d mostly prefer to do work stuff from an office. In long pants, preferably. “Some missed the water cooler moments, where they could talk about what Ian Alleyne had …
Read More »Early Bird: Mango doudouce, julie and starch—but never tinned
“Pan? Pan my ass! Sat say once that UNC people have dholak and sitar and tabla and tassa; they don’t want no pan!” “Morning, breds,” I had greeted Prakash cheerily as he stepped into the street just as Bobby and I were passing his house on Friday morning. “Yuh hear bout …
Read More »Vaneisa: Foggy days of fatigue and other post-Covid symptoms
I’ve come to believe that what I had thought to be a vicious bout of both acid reflux and one of my lifelong afflictions, bronchitis, was really some form of Covid. By the time it occurred to me that it might be, it was too late for a conclusive test; …
Read More »Orin: The daily Great Trek; on T&T’s traffic woes and decentralisation of workplaces
“[…] There are no economic findings that I’m aware of, on how much the country loses by having a significant proportion of its workforce stuck in traffic every day. But there’s widespread recognition that there’s an economic cost, and that it’s probably a steep one. “For much of the past …
Read More »Vaneisa: Backward into misogyny; the problem with “old men” and a “patriarchal world”
Old men are the worst. They see the world as theirs to do whatever they please. No matter the circumstance of birth, they have been conditioned to believe in their inherent superiority. They din born so. They were taught so. By the time they are old enough to have sense, …
Read More »Vaneisa: Chicken salad to go—a sandwich adventure
When I was 16, I got a job as the receptionist at a small printery on Sellier Street in St Augustine. It was not my first job—I’d left school the year before and had worked briefly at two or three places since. One of the Seafood Enterprises outlets occupies that …
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