A swift boot to the...

I've been so busy this week that I have not really had chance to blog. I try to store observations in my brain somewhere so I can come back and write about it, but in all the hustle, I think the observations fall out and get crushed. But there is one observation that repeated itself all this week and it bothers me so much I need to address it.

I live in a tropical country. Granted, the weather lately has been atrocious but it is hurricane/rainy season after all. But I am assaulted daily by women walking through the city like this -

Women's boots

What on earth? Why are women wearing boots here? In the middle of the day, in the heat? One girl came in for coffee yesterday in jeans and knee highs and I did not attempt to NOT stare. I stared and let her know I was staring cause I thought she looked stupid.  I saw yet another in Uggs. Really?? Tourists come from the US and Europe to the Caribbean to wear flip flops and run on the beach barefoot. They walk through the malls in cute sandals - loving the freedom of just waking up and knowing it's warm enough to be foot carefree. And yet...

I love boots. Love. But I won't be wearing boots in Trinidad unless hell freezes over.

I have a busy day today. I won't be looking for boots but instead will be looking for a cocktail dress for the staff Christmas party. It's actually not something I am looking forward to, only cause I am exhausted. Who woulda thunk it? Me - not looking forward to shopping or parties! Scary.

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Trini Fabulousity Hits Project Runway

Trini girl, Anya Ayoung Chee
Photo credit: Project Runway/Lifetime

One of the shows I would not miss when I was back home, was Project Runway. Loved the show. It was fashion, but without being annoying (can someone say America's Next Top Model and Tyra Banks? Wow...that Tyra was really in love with herself).

So to learn recently that this season, there would be a Trini among the 20 new designers - totally fabulish.

Look out for Anya Ayoung-Chee on Season 9. Anya represented Trinidad and Tobago at the Miss Universe competition in 2008, and then really focused on her passion for fashion, making a name for herself in Trinidad and Tobago with her own line, Pilar by Anya.

I am excited to see how she will translate her very unique fashion style and love for bold prints to this season. Very excited. Best of luck to her!

 The new season starts on July 28 at 9pm, on Lifetime.

• To see more of Anya's Pilar line you can visit here
• Check out her page on the Project Runway site, with photos and video.
• Follow her progress on the official Anya Ayoung Chee - Project Runway Facebook page
• And I raved about her collabo with Meiling on the awesome Carnival Friday night look for Fay Ann Lyons here. I still love that look immensely.

And I am just totally in love with the maxi dress she is wearing in her promotional photo. Oh...stop stop!

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Confessions of a Trini Food-Loving Shopaholic

Photo courtesy: Bang Bang
I was eyeing this little bumble bee number
but I would be a fat bumble bee

Shopping. One of my favourite activities. Student life does not really augur well for shopping but today, I shopped. Like a real person. I just did not care that the money could have gone towards food or a flash drive (a flash drive? really??? lol) In my estimation, a new blouse and my hot new maxi dress and the rest of my awesome haul are investments in my happiness. One of my favourite local stores is Bang Bang and they really banged a dent into my student wallet. But oh, how could I leave the dress and the cute blouse and the hot belt to suffer on the rack? Swiping my card at the checkout was both exhilirating and frightening but it's done now!!! No turning back.

My time at home is coming to a close. By Thursday morning, after 10 hrs in the air, I would be back in London - back to academic torment, back to ready meals, back to student life.

Speaking of ready meals, being home has been great for my tastebuds (but not my waistline). While London is a gastronomic mecca, there is nothing quite like a home cooked meal of red beans, rice, stewed pork and macaroni pie or a nice hot chicken roti with plenty kuchela. It's even better when you can share such delights with friends. Friday night, after a long battle with public transportation, I met up with the girls for a small lime. I left with stomach pains, not from the food, but from the laughter and good times. Ever laughed so hard that your stomach hurt and you had to get up and try to walk off the laugh? That is the type of thing I am talking about. It was great. Our waitress provided much of the entertainment (sweet girl but wow...special!), but dining outdoors on a cool Caribbean night, with the natives out in their numbers also was a bonus.

What I love about Trinidad, is that it is so far removed from the stereotype of a Caribbean island, especially in terms of its fashion. Tobago being more laid back and more touristy is vulnerable to more casual getups, but Trinidad is the fashion rockstar! I remarked during the evening, as we scoped out the patrons on our virtual runway, that women get dressed up to go almost anywhere - even to come out and eat chicken wings. Whether some of the women were dressed according to their body structure is a whole different entry but the myriad of maxi and mini dresses, sexy blouses and especially the wide variety of high heels that passed by was enough to be described as entertaining.

What was left of my French Vanilla ice cream with
oodles and oodles of waffle pieces - my regular order

And is it just me or is there anyone else who eats stuff like, say, oh, ice cream, really slowly, with the fake assumption that eating it slowly somehow reduces one's calorie intake? I will definitely miss my Cold Stone Creamery primetime sessions.

It has been awesome being home but I need to finish this degree once and for all. So I am putting my heels and platforms back in storage and heading back to a flat shoe kinda life. It's back to long nights and rolling off the bed, tired and bitchy. Back to Tesco and Sainsbury's ready meals and no lazy tv nights in bed. Oh, I will miss the lazy tv nights - me, the remote and my ice cream! Still, I go back to London with great expectations for a great term - despite the obvious and harrowing trials of my Master's dissertation at every turn. I already have dinner and drinks lined up for the weekend, so yaaay me.

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Colour Me Beautiful, Colour Me Fashion

Spring outside my front door this morning

Beautiful day today. I am inside again, with the books. My room is a disaster, with books literally, EVERYWHERE, but it has to be done, right? This dissertation is not going to do itself. Sigh. Bummer.

The SITSgirls are also have a spring photo challenge for the next couple of weeks and I signed up to be part of it. Now I am no photo-take-outer, but I love photos, and I think this may be the only way to force me to walk with my camera and take some photos of London. I have been here more than 6 months and I have taken very few photos. Granted, this is not my first time here and I have loads of London photos I have taken before, but it would be a great aside from the books and Daddy Disso anyway. Good luck to me.

So yesterday I was talking to a friend of mine, who was going to a Caribbean themed party hosted by non-Caribbean people. He said to me "I have nothing Caribbean to wear". I immediately rolled my eyes, shook my head, and told him if he had a nice shirt in anything but grey, black or brown, and some nice casual trousers, he would be fine. I begged him not to wear any loud printed shirts - with coconut trees or sunsets. I told him if he took my advice, he would be the best dressed man in the place because my next words to him, in my best British slang were:

I will bet you that there will be someone in a naff tropical shirt and a straw hat looking like a complete knob!

He emailed me after 9pm, and it simply said "I just walked in to the party. You would laugh".

I should have bet him money. The photo he sent from his BB was worse than I thought - bright, hideous tropical shirts, straw hats, hideous tie dyed sarongs, coconut earrings. Hideous. The typical, scary stereotype of Caribbean fashion that Europeans typically seem to have. It's not funny. It's downright wrong!

If you have ever been to the Caribbean, you would be surprised that we dress pretty much like everyone else. We love style. Love. Style. We do love colour though - I love colour. I know what colours suit me and which don't. Black close to my face does not suit me so I never wear very dark shirts or jackets, without something in my key colours - I would look like a walking shadow. But I look good in reds and yellows especially, though my favourite colours are blues and purples.

Photo credit: Fashion Week of Trinidad and Tobago. Caribbean fashion is modern, fun and vibrant! No tropical shirts!

I am trying to get another Brit, who I shall call, the Nutty Scientist, to abandon his myopic love for brown jumpers, and invest in maybe a blue shirt. He claims he hates blue - blue is for the sky, he says. He also does not wear jeans. At all. I am aiming to get him into a pair of  grown-up jeans, as opposed to ratty, torn, jeans or skinny jeans. A Brad Pitt finish perhaps. If Brad Pitt, a man just a couple years shy of 50 (can you believe it?), can wear some jeans, then a young, 30-something, good looking, albeit nutty scientist can wear a pair. Can't he?

Brad Pitt - just awesome looking in general!

I can see Nutty shaking his head at me, but if not the jeans, then God - a non-brown shirt; a shirt that speaks more spring and less winter. There is nothing wrong with a bit of colour. I am not saying spray paint your entire wardrobe in neon pink, but a touch of it can really liven up your look. Do you hear me England? The browns and greys get old. I can wear a bright yellow sweater without blinking an eye and not care what anyone here thinks about it. It is who I am. Bright, sunny, warm.

With spring here and more sunshine, and thus no need for the ridiculous huge jacket I have been forced to wear since November, I can exercise my love for colour more often hopefully. And show off my ass.

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