Day 1 in Trinidad

May 24, 2011

We are at our first port – Port of Spain, Trinidad and after a whole day’s worth of work, I finally got to get out of the ship at 1700. Once we (Ros, Kaya, me) got out of the port area, we went left and then saw that we had to cross a very major street with five lanes during high traffic time. I forgot to say that we didn’t have any lights in front of us to help us cross or remind cars to stop. After some nervous laughter and what seemed like a lifetime of waiting out cars speeding at minimum 45 mph or just completely stopped waiting to go, we were able to cross with me in the front waving my hands up and down like a bird. We walked through the city and saw numerous historical buildings – Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, the Old Fire Station Tower, the very cool and modern national library, Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, the Red House which is under construction or rather repair, the Old Public Library, the Cabildo, the Treasury Building, and the Old Police Headquarters. What was my favorite buiding was the last one on the list – the Old Police Headquarters had some of the same arches and look of what can be found in the Alhambra in Spain. It is described as Gothic and while I am not an architecture expert, I can’t help but think of something that was made by the Arabs or Moors in Spain. this building was built in 1876 from limestone and was the site of the old West India regiment barracks.

Several blocks from this building, I saw the education ministry’s building. Compared to the rather noble and majestic looking Police Headquarters building, the Education Ministry’s building looked worn, non-descript, and frankly, may be called a “dump.” It makes one think of how society may value one type of “service” over another. What I enjoyed the most besides walking and getting to know my colleagues (we ended up picking up another faculty member – Dean), was talking with the police officer outside of the headquarters. He was so friendly and was fascinated with the multi-racial make-up of our group. He was shocked that I was considered American by my colleagues because according to him, I was not. We all assumed that he thought it was because I was Asian. We had a fun conversation telling him about the diversity in the United States even though he may not see that in the tv and movies he watches from the west.

We ended the evening after walking through the city at the Hyatt overlooking the water, the ship, and the lovely sunset. So peaceful, so calm with gentle breezes, a perfect way to end a very busy day.