AS TOLD TO BC PIRES

My major memories are more of the East-West Corridor. Anywhere between Tunapuna and Port of Spain could be home.

I say I’m from Trinidad but I should say I’m from Trinidad and Tobago. Because, although Mum was Trini, she was raised in Tobago, Calder Hall, so we’re really Tobagonians that migrated to Trinidad.

So my dad was Bajan and my mum Trinbagonian.

I went to school in Barbados but I grew up in Cinnamon Hill, Tobago. We spent all of our Easter, Christmas and summer holidays at my aunt’s home.

Back then we could catch a LIAT plane straight to Tobago. We would go across to Trinidad for a little two-three days to shop.

I tell people I was born in a BeeWee plane between Trinidad and Barbados but I was really born in Barbados.

And I really feel in-between Trinidad and Barbados.

When I’m in Barbados, I talk about Brian Lara being the greatest thing in West Indies cricket. And, when I’m in Trinidad, I (say the same thing) about Garry Sobers!

I’m a natural contrarian and agree with BC Pires that makes me more Trini than Bajan.

Because the instinct in Barbados is to conform, and in Trinidad, to ask, “Why I have to do that?”

We think things are bad in Barbados.

But when you go to Trinidad, you see people living in a mud hut. The poverty in Barbados isn’t the same. There is no place in Barbados that is ghetto.

My mom was a big Pentecost in Trinidad, had us at church every Sunday and Wednesday.

I lost my dad early, age 11. I lost my mum six months after I came back from UWI.

It put a kind of question. Seriously, God? They got so many people out there doing foolishness and you take my mother?

That was a little hurdle (in my faith).

You need to believe in something greater. Whether you believe in Chelsea, Allah, God, whatever, you need to have something that you figure, “This is!” And you just put your focus on that.

We’re all here for a purpose. We won’t know if our thoughts are right until we close our eyes and the curtains come down.

West Indies used to (dominate) world cricket when the Bajans were in control. But then they gave the power to the Trinidadians…

If BC Pires says to me that West Indies benefited from the imagination of Trini players, I say it was more like the mamaguy-ance.

[caption id="attachment_893918" align="alignnone" width="768"] I didn’t have a clue what civil engineering was when I started my degree, and three years later, I came out of UWI and still didn’t have a clue, says Joel Payne. Photo by BC Pires[/caption]

I started supporting Manchester United when Dwight Yorke played for them. Seeing Yorke’s poster plastered all over Piarco Airport, a little Trinbago boy, one of the lead United players…

And the Tobago connection, ah-wee boy, Shurwayne Winchester.

I’ve stuck with United, even though times have been more hard than good recently. But City is still a joke!

If you don’t stand up for something, you end up accepting anything.

I work as a contractor/consultant. The consultant side seems to be trumping the contractor side at th