Walking and eating plantain chips on the road after the Independence Carnival...

Saturday afternoon , Independence afternoon and Camp Street is quiet down to Regent Street. The place has a grey blue tinge after the rain earlier, sun is about to set. Place is so dead that my neck hairs raise as I start looking to see if anyone would come to rob me. I wonder where all the Carnival people gone.

Minibus to Gardens
"I only going to the gardens.. can't go further.. if you want you gotta go to the market and then get a bus which going all round... but gas too expensive.."
I curse the Carnival and the people who think the roads should be blocked because people want to sport.

Regent Street kind of dead. Nobody walking. No cars either. I wonder what the driver talking about.

Reach the gardens... gardens still  open. Buses waiting for passengers. Barricades up. Police liming by the Barricades. No music as such,people moving.
I hold in my belly and say, arite.. walk home time now.
I look around for plantain chips... but nothing around. People selling plastic things for children to play with. Some drinks and nuff sno cone carts.
I don't usually see sno cone carts at sunset.
I see a man I know and I wonder if the man mussee wonder if I come to watch Carnival.

Nuff people got bottle or cup in hand.  I am walking slowly, some motor bike and thing passing so I Not sure if road open and I wonder if I get knock down on the road on Carnival if that would make a good facebook post.

A woman holding a pram talking to an older woman about something, and all of sudden she starts twerking.. I watch in envy.. I should probably ask her to show me how , it might help with the lower back pain which might go away with the walk home.

Walking almost in the middle of the road. Scared to jam anyone because I aint sure what would happen. STart to hear the music and so. I aint see no skimpy costume. People like they going home.
KFC full. I wondered if people were selling food on the street.  Popeyes full.

Fry chicken after carnival. I want plantain chips.. the crunch would help to calm my nerves down.
 Some people with paint on their faces pass. I hear some coolie music not sure though if is from one of the bars set up. A taxi driver had told me is a black people thing,the carnival.  

Some children close to the speakers. I pray for their ears.   No plantain chips.

The side streets look quiet. I thought I would see the action move off of Vlissengen to the side streets.

Some people drinking,, sitting on chairs. I remember walking in New York and on the pavements how people sat around tables and played games and talked and drink and so. 

Some adults walking with children. I follow two guys who look like they on a kind of meetup date thing. Walking kind of slowly, like they not in a hurry to reach anywhere. I pass them without looking back. 

Two transgender persons walk past.  I had to look twice. I heard one person mutter something..but it sounded like nobody was bothering. Maybe the carnival and Independence inspired some social cohesion and nobody bothering with transgender citizens walking down the road.

Last time I was on this road like this was 1987. Raising funds for graduation from Sixth Form and we had a food sale outside a friends' house on Mash Day. I see the house and remember.
Was nice to stand up and sell at the time, people you know walking past and so.

I don't see anyone else I recognise, or who recognises me. I wonder about that.. as I get older, fewer and fewer people I seem to know walking the streets.

Plantain chips
 Find a plantain chips lady. 120 she tells me.  She look kind of surprised when I said 'no sour'.

Then I see a man pushing a cart with chips and chicken foot and so. Nobody seems to be buying though. I thought of buying another one but my teeth can only handle one pack of chips at a time


Station Street looks dead.  Plantain chips finish and I look for a bin.  No bins on the carnival route it seems.

I turn in Barr Street and it is like leaving one Universe and entering another.

Something .. the place is silent,, dead. No traffic. No people walking down from the road. I remember when walking home from Emancipation in the park and things like that.. people would be walking or catching a bus and so.  The light is going and I see a sign near to a rum shop.. Lunch was pot roast chicken and fry rice for $600.  The shop usually has people in it,but it seems only the women working.
The fish shop is open, four people there.
Didn't the carnival spill over from Vlissengen Road into kitty?

I see a bin and throw in the plastic bag from the chips. Thanks to the residents who leave their bins on the bridge and to the people who don't steal them.

Bananas
A young woman is selling at the fruit and veg stall near Kitty Market. I pass and think of getting some bananas. It is almost dark. I see a man I had not seen for a long time doing his shopping. He had survived violence and his smile was large as we chatted. Two people who recognised me then..

Some men with accents in a car are buying tomatoes. She is pleasant and smiling. The stall has a battery light. Independence carnival night and she is managing her business.

A young man is keeping her company. The bananas are hanging on a string. She gives me a knife, smiles and says "cut them down". There is something trusting about it. I mean.. I could take the knife and run, or take the bananas and run or something.

I hear another man on a motorbike, Indian accent,asking for cucumbers. I think about asking him what he going home to cook.. only cucumbers he wants.

The street livens up near another bar. People drinking on the road opposite the bar too.
Then the street goes dead again. I turn another corner. No one on the road.  I think of robbers.
A bike passes me, and my heart jumps a bit , I have been robbed by men on bikes who passed me and turned back.

I smell marijuana.  A man sitting on a bench on his bridge is smoking.  Place dark now.  Quieter than Sunday because on Sunday evening people would be moving to church and so.

But it wasn't Sunday, just a holiday on a Saturday.