What’s up world? Just finished up week 1 here in Port of Spain, Trinidad, and I’ve got one more week to go, so it’s been about three lifetimes in the last 7-8 days. Packed up in Brooklyn last week and headed out to DC to do a spoken word poetry arts and activism workshop with the good folks over at Bloombars (an AWESOME collective-run political performance and gallery space in Columbia Heights, check ‘em out here) which was co-sponsored by Organization for Chinese Americans – One of my favorite kind of spaces: intimate, cozy, and full of energy. (THANK YOU DIANA & GOWRI!)

Then hustled to sound check for Sulu DC Presents Miss Fortune: A Celebration of AAPI women in hip hop at U Street Music Hall. Did all my kisses hello while chomping on sushi and trying to get everybody’s bios to prep for hosting – and then bam! the show, which was seriously on fire. Everybody brought their best (Kick Rocks Crew, Misnomer(s), Rocky Rivera, DJ The Pinstriped Rebel) and left it all on the stage. What I loved about that night too was the range of expressions of hip hop from new school commercial hip hop to experimental moody political hip hop to cali-hyphy-infused hip hop to spinning throwbacks like Queen Latifah and Monie Love. It was an eclectic and passionate evening, and thankfully, nobody was in a bikini, lol. (THANK YOU SIMONE, JENNY, ALEX, REGIE & THE WHOLE SULU STAR SYSTEM

After the party was the afterparty. After the afterparty was….a veggie arugula sandwich at Busboys & Poets, one of my fave poetry spots in DC Next morning, was crazy enough to finish and record a new poem (with the help of Ill-Literacy‘s Adriel Luis for a forthcoming literary magazine issue, try to find a friend for brunch (unsuccessfully), and then hustle to the airport for my two weeks in Trinidad!

Lightning storms all around Miami, so I didn’t get in until 4 AM, but since then it’s been a non-stop succession of amazing dance classes (Contemporary Caribbean Dance, Dunham Technique, Choreography, Repertory – I’m here for Makeda Thomas’ 2011 New Waves Dance & Performance Institute), connecting with new friends, and experiencing the culture here in Trinidad. Ah, so much to say, where to start?

Tuesday, I was lucky enough to go spit for a packed house at One Mic-Culture Eh Dead out in San Fernando, which is on the south side of the island. The organizer, Skeeto, told me that this poetry set has been going on for the last 5 years, and that he used to rush home walking 35 minutes every Friday night after he finished his shift at TGI Friday’s (there are a lot of TGI Friday’s here, plus KFC, Subway, & Papa John’s) at midnight, just to catch Def Poetry on TV. It blows my mind how global spoken word poetry culture is, and I feel so blessed to see it and feel what these words – and the simple act of folks getting together with mic – can do. (THANK YOU SKEETO!)

Also got to watch, Skeeto and his crew The Undaground perform in Port of Spain on Thursday, and they were SUPER-DOPE. Their band played everything from hip hop to R & B to Soca, and Richard “Pan” Bereaux threw down on the steelpan, doing covers of everything from Alicia Key’s Unthinkable to Jay-Z’s Death of Autotune but putting the bands own spin on it with the musical arrangement and the verses. It was really refreshing to see these kinds of remix/mash-up/chopped versions with heartfelt lyricism and overall skill. Something that’s all too rare across the board and expressing the heart of local culture with culture from abroad. Check ‘em out here:

More next week!

Kells