"Far from Over"

Arriving to Boston on Wednesday afternoon was bitter sweet. Bitter, because not only did I have a fever and a headache the entire plane ride, but also the airline lost one of my bags and on the way to Boston I must have been stopped at every random search checkpoint! Sweet, well of course because I got to be reunited with my beautiful family and friends again (who have been taking great care of me by the way). Today is Saturday and I am feeling a lot better (minus the stomach pains and sore muscles) and I’m finally begging to recap on my journey in Trinidad and Tobago and put what I’ve learned to good use. One of the main underlying messages relayed to us was figuring out “who we are” and “what is our purpose” and there is a lot packed into those phrases. I’ve been battling with who I am for quite a while now, simply because I am at the age where I “should” know these things. I’m going on to my fourth year in college, my second internship and in the midst of my 21^st year of life, so I “should” know where I’m headed, right? WRONG! Sunity Best taught us that life is a lesson and instead of trying to figure it out we shouldn’t get caught up with where we “should” be and spend time thinking about where we want to be. Sunity, and all of the other scholars in Trinidad that gave us their time reminded me that my life, is my own and only I can control my destiny. Arriving to Boston and waking up with a semi-clear brain this morning, all of my experiences in Trinidad began to rush into my memory. Christo, LeRoy, Sunity, Ella, Efuwapwe, Rawale, Tony (both of them), Ivan, Rohler, Muhammed, Michael Phillips, Naarie, and Moose have all been detrimental players in my journey in Trinidad. Separately, they may be Mas players, journalists, professors and artists but together they represent one thing, Trinidad. They represent a growing culture birthed by these intellectuals and elders and nurtured by the community. Living in Boston I’ve lost that togetherness and sense of community that is so prevalent in Trinidad, and being there helped me to recapture it. I’ve also learned that life isn’t all about the choices you make but, how you make them and where they will lead you. Taking this dialogue and traveling to Trinidad was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I’ve met people who we (Americans) would consider celebrities to be so grounded approachable and eager to meet me. I’ve hiked through the forest and swam under a waterfall, I picked a mango right off of a tree, I sang with Ella Andall, and I painted on a LeRoy Clark original. Through this experience I have become a stronger person and am now on the journey to finding my true self and the rest of my life.

Yellowgirl can only quote Drake at this moment and say "It's far from over"!

Final projects... then TOBAGO!

My group which was the Mas group presented and did extremely well! For our final presentations we created a mini documentary and played traditional Mas for our audience. The experience was great and it brought me back to my old theater days. Once the presentations and the papers were done we headed to Tobago for our last few days in the country for some RxR and it was wonderful.......

(The beautiful beach in Tobago)

(Tobago sunset)

(Small plane back from Tobago to Trinidad)

Yellowgirl can't believe how beautiful Tobago is!!

Meeting the Elders.

(LeRoy Clarke original painting from Legacy House)

Aside from the stress of our group projects we only had a few days left in Trinidad. On one of those nights the group chose to go back to the Legacy house for Dr.B and Dr.P to bless the house with their music. We listened to great music, met great people and even got to paint on LeRoy Clark's paintings. After the fun and music, LeRoy sat us all down and sat Ms. Sunity Best and Mr. Earl Lovelace down next to him. He spoke to us about the importance of his life experiences two great friends sitting next to him who were there through his journey, and they spoke both good and bad about their old friend. Looking at these three accomplished elders and all that they have established in all of their years of existence gave me hope and confidence. The confidence that one day acquire the knowledge and life experiences to be an elder. And the hope that I will be able to pass on my knowledge to others who are as well deserving as we were that night.

(LeRoy Clarke and myself)

(Our musical talent for the evening)

(Me and established author and writer Earl Lovelace)

I left the Legacy house once again liberated, but this time it was musically, spiritually, and all of the above. I truly think the Legacy house is a place where knowledge and spirituality are painted on every wall and stamped on every tile and floor board. Visiting the Legacy house was and will always be an experience.

Yellowgirl is inspired by these great people here in Trinidad and hopes that one day I can be telling my story to young people.

"Music is the gift after life itself"- Ella Andall

Today, we met Ms. Ella Andall (above left) who is both a singer (a very good one) and an Orisha priest. Not to mention the mother of Efuwapwe, who we've met a few days prior. She talked about the rhythm of life and finding your own rhythm. When she was talking about this I once again, began to think about how I can apply this lesson to my own life. Instead of always listening to what others say and tell me to do with my life I must find my own way, my own rhythm. Intertwined with this lesson she gave each person in the room a sound to make and we created music, with only our voices and bodies, which are essential instruments in Orisha music. We then, got real close and sang with Ms. Ella, any song that came to our minds. This was very exciting because not only were we all getting the opportunity to sing with Ella Andall but through her presence a lot of people broke out of their shells and sang "I Remember" with gusto. At the end of her time with us she asked us if we had any questions about finding our own beat/rhythm to follow, however everyone asked her questions about herself. I could sense her want to get to know us and learn from us and her dismay that we had only inquired to know about herself. However, she welcomed and answered all of our questions happily. Ella, very much like all of the other wonderful people we have met here in Trinidad was open and giving. Once again I am blessed I got the opportunity to meet her and listen to her sing, this trip just keeps getting better and better.

Yellowgirl is wondering what can possibly be next!

Final 3 days of Steel pan lessons.

(Carrie, Me and Will being creative with our sticks)

Day 3

Today was the third day of steel pan lessons and we learned a new song and practiced “the waltz”. Mr. Headley helped me to better understand how to count and stay on beat with the pan. I think I had it a lot easier today, in reference to the ascending and descending of the chromatic scale because I had the notes written on my pan (a little bit of a cheat). We also learned the G major scale (I think that’s what it is called). Today was better than yesterday because it didn’t rain the entire session, which was kind of bitter sweet because it was very hot! All in all, it was a very good day and I think I’m getting the hang of playing the steel pan.

Day 4

Today was the fourth day of our steel pan lessons with Mr. Headley and we learned another new song. The song is called “love me tender” by the late, the great Elvis Priestley. He played the song for us before he taught it and assumed that we would all know the tune but me, not being an Elvis fan was clueless to what he was playing. Learning this song was different than the others; it required a little bit more skill, and being able to not get caught up in the other sounds in the band. Tomorrow we are going to continue and perfect “love me tender” and hopefully get a few smooth runs without messing up or confusing one another. I would say that playing the steel pan isn’t as much technique, as it is feeling. I’m interested to see what tomorrows steel pan lesson brings.

Day 5

Today was the last day of steel pan lessons with Mr. Headley, which was bitter sweet for me because I no longer had to wake up at 7am to rain. But on the other hand I really liked learning how to play the steel pan and learning new tunes as well. So, today we simply went over the songs we had already learned which are “the waltz”, “Cuando, Cuando” and “Love me Tender”. Mr. Headley brought his son and his nephew to rehearsal today, which was really cool because his son was our drummer (who was really good by the way). Him bringing them also gave me a sense of the importance of music in his family and the Trinidadian culture. I was still a little rusty on “Love me tender” but I would have to say “The Waltz” is my favorite tune. I think that today and the first day we began learning how to play the steel pan are the most significant days out of the five of our lessons. Looking back on the first day, I barely knew what a steel pan was and how on earth one would play such an odd instrument. But from this entire week I’ve learned all of the notes on my tenor pan, 3 songs, and chord progressions and also that the steel pan has a significant history behind it. All in all the lessons were extremely helpful and I’m thankful that I had the opportunity to learn to play the steel pan from an amazing man, Mr. Headley.

*Learning how to play the steel pan was definately something new and exciting for me. I got to learn a new instrument and it only took me 5 days to learn the basics, which is pretty amazing! All in all (as I've stated in my reflection above) this experience opened me up to one more aspect of myself that I never knew I even had! I love this!*

Steel pan, Day 2

Today was day 2 of learning how to play steel pan with Mr. Headley. The morning didn’t start off too well for me because it was raining cats and dogs! Personally, I just think the rain puts a damper on the rest of the day. Although the rain got me down, my spirits were lifted once we got out of the Maxi Taxi and arrived into the pan yard. During this session we continued to learn the rest of the tune “The Waltz”, which seemed complicated at first, but once you get the hang of it, it’s really simple. I was having trouble with the note progression that he also taught us; I just couldn’t remember which note goes directly after the other. After playing for majority of the morning, Mr. Headley gave us a little more history on the steel pan and its correlation to calypsos. He sang and played on the steel pan the U.S national anthem as well as the Trinidadian national anthem. It was interesting to hear him play the national anthem on the steel pan because I had never heard it with that instrument and, I haven’t recited the national anthem since the 8^th grade. The other calypsos he played were fun and all had an underlying message. Listening to Mr. Headley talk about the history of the steel pan I realized that all of our project topics, Mas, Kaiso, and Orisha are all interlocking in Trinidadian history. It’s almost like you can’t mention one topic without using the others as reference points and vice versa. All in all, today’s lesson gave me a better feel for the pan and also helped me to see that spirituality, music, and performing in Trinidadian culture are all dependant upon each other. The pan is very vital not only to Trinidadian history but to everyone’s history it represents freedom, power and many other things. I’m happy that we are learning how to play this instrument and happy that we are learning its roots. Lastly, we are supposed to be learning a new song on the pans tomorrow and I’m really excited, I can’t get the tunes out of my head!

Learning Steel pan, Day 1

Today was the first Steel Pan lesson at the Bird Song steel pan yard, right down the street from Rawle Gibbons’ bookstore. I initially went into this experience excited and not really knowing what to expect. Before arriving in Trinidad I was briefly introduced to the steel pan at Carnival held in both Cambridge and Boston. Also, one of my high-school classmates used to play and I always thought of it as such a weird instrument. Our steel pan instructors name was Harold Headley, which I expected to be very stern and down to business because of what we’ve heard from Dr. B however, Mr. Headley was in fact very nice. We started off listening to a short lecture of the history of the steel pan by Mr. Headley. The information was interesting and a lot of what we had already learned in previous lessons about the history of Trinidad. But I missed most of it because Mr. Headley was soft spoken during his lecture, I could barely hear what he had to say and the outdoor noise was adding to the faintness of his voice. Either the loud cars, or the rain hitting against the tin roofs drowned him out. He wrote letters, and notes on the board, which meant absolutely nothing to me because I couldn’t hear any of the explanation behind it. Finally, after struggling to hear Mr. Headley speak, he introduced us to the steel drums that we going to learn how to play. There were 4 different kinds of pans that we were assigned to, and I chose to play the Tener pan (which little did I know carried the most notes in the band). He taught us all of the notes on the pan, which was what he was writing on the board, and then everything made so much more sense to me. The pans, are all really cool too because each section of the pan makes a different sound which ultimately creates an entire song. By the end of the session we (the whole group) played the tune “The Waltz” and it sounded really good! I was so proud that all of us, we were so good and played well together. I’m excited to see what tomorrow brings! I’m also excited to be able to get some of our own pan sticks and take them home as souvenirs.