Grace under pressure
By Marlon Miller
SEVEN weeks into the State of Emergency and most people have got accustomed to the regulated hours of the curfew. Limers who used to leave the pavement on Ariapita Avenue at minutes to 11 are now setting out for home at 10.15. But you know they're still stopping at the last open watering hole on the Avenue for a night cap.
Others who are getting on in age and soon to hit 50 years old say they don't mind the restrictions.
"You get to bed early and wake up fresh in the morning."
Another who has had his share of run-ins with the law over the years and now seems to be a respectable citizen says they should leave the State of Emergency for a year to make sure it really serves its purpose.
What, you mad?! You don't know that other people are already thinking about Carnival and getting a bit worried. In the meantime, the poor PNM had its request to hold a public meeting turned down. And for the first time in a while people will listen to what Keith Rowley has to say and not study Colm Imbert's school- boy behaviour in the Parliament on Budget Day.
But back to things of more importance, like Carnival. You think if Kamla Persad-Bissessar wants to win another general election she is going to leave the SoE until next February, far less Christmas. One guy said that election would be in 2012 instead of 2015 if the People's Partnership fools around with the people's party.
That fella has already planned that when the curfew is finally lifted, he will leave home just before 11 o'clock to go to a fete and not head back until 4 a.m.
"And I'll be taking my time driving home."
It goes without saying that for the first few nights of the 9 p.m. curfew in the week after August 21, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway had nothing on the Mucurapo Foreshore, or the Churchill-Roosevelt Highway, or any other open stretch of road with a house at the end of it.
And, sadly, there have been unnecessary fatalities since that day when Kamla, John Sandy and Anand Ramlogan put their feet down and said "Enough is enough" with rampant crime. And even sadder is that innocent lives have been lost in the mad dash to beat the curfew.
What about those who had to spend a few weeks inside the state prisons in detention—which is what House Speaker Wade Mark should have given Imbert—when the only thing some of these detainees did wrong was reside in a certain area, like the young footballer from Beetham Gardens.
An inspiration to the youth in the neighbourhood, Keon Quow is thankfully still smiling and, hopefully, not too scarred by the whole scary experience of being arrested and detained at Golden Grove.
And, now, the entire State of Emergency exercise is mostly reduced to destroying marijuana plantations.
As another friend exclaimed: "I never see a weed plant shoot anybody!"
But that's another story.
And you think about the major consignment from Jamaica discovered in a container at Point Lisas. As another acquaintance—who likes to keep the Letters Editor busy—enquired, how come our law-enforcement officers didn't let the shipment of "chicken" be delivered and see what transpired.
Who knows, they might have hooked a big fish to throw among all the sardines scattered in jails throughout Trinidad and Tobago.
But not enough to stop all murders, rapes and other capital crimes, committed now even under curfew.
Sure, there has been a reduction in all of the above, but how many of T&T's small percentage of hardened criminals are still out there, waiting to pounce, undetected and slink back into the night.
In the interim, everyone who claims to be law-abiding has to manoeuvre around the hours under lockdown and keep himself or herself entertained.
Near the end of last month, one young wife looked out her window and saw a few vanloads of her husband's friends arriving at her house just before 11 p.m., so you know they had nowhere to go for the next five hours at least.
"And they were all drunk...and hungry," she recalled, not sounding too upset by the whole scenario.
Another bunch who likes to play cards planned to have a poker game at someone's house between the curfew hours, but then the host and hostess thought about what would happen if they were losing and had nowhere to go but listen to the loud mouth of one rather boisterous player who usually strikes it lucky.
So they changed it to an afternoon session and fried a turkey and, there were so many cooks giving advice, they under-cooked the rather large bird and the designated chefs had to wire it together with the skill of old Carnival costume-makers like Cito Velazquez or Harold Saldenha to put it back into the fryer. And someone joked that they might get the turkey in time for Thanksgiving.
It finally was ready for serving just before 10 p.m. and a lovely meal was had by all, capping off a rather enjoyable evening of old talk, picong and plenty laughter. As it is in most every part of Trinidad and Tobago where adaptable Trinbagonians have displayed grace under pressure, all in the hope of finding a better T&T at the end of the State of Emergency.
Those in charge had better get it done before Christmas, though.
http://www.trinidadexpress.com/commentaries/Grace_under_pressure-131905443.html