Discover Trinidad & Tobago 2017 (#28)

carnival
courtesy k2k alliance & partners
A masquerader from K2K Alliance &
Partners’ “Searching for Shangri La”, the
2016 band of the year (medium)
The Carnival season is like one
large buffet. You can sample all
of it over multiple courses; just
some of it, by confining yourself
to a few things which appeal to you;
or none at all (which means leaving the
restaurant altogether, to keep the analogy
going). But the point is, there’s no right
way to do Carnival. The very impulse and
origins of the festival defy the idea of any
established order or authority, anything
which forces you to conform. Here we’ll
introduce you to how the season unfolds.
Once you get a sense of what’s on offer,
decide what you want to indulge in, and —
as we say here — “play yuhself”!
Party. Party hard. Party
soft. Party some more …
Though the powers that be seem to have decided
that Carnival band launches won’t happen
earlier than July (for now), this means a long
fete (party) season that kicks into high gear
after Christmas. The fetes are something of a
buffet too: there are more affordable, low-key
“cooler fetes” (where you can bring or buy your
own food and drink), and more upscale, exclusive,
food and drink all-inclusives for which people
fork out big money for entry (and wardrobe).
The most popular fetes usually feature the biggest
soca stars as headliners.
64 discovertnt.com