Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian

Fam­i­lies reigned supreme at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah on Wednes­day night as two teenagers por­tray­ing cos­tumes de­signed by their par­ents were crowned this year’s Ju­nior King and Queen of Car­ni­val. An­to­nio Ram­per­sad and J’Nai Ed­wards each emerged vic­to­ri­ous over 14 for­mi­da­ble com­peti­tors to claim their sec­ond and first ti­tles, re­spec­tive­ly.

Iron­i­cal­ly, the sim­i­lar­i­ties be­tween the two mas­quer­aders were not lim­it­ed to the in­di­vid­u­als be­hind the de­sign of their im­pres­sive cos­tumes. The 14-year-olds, in cos­tumes which utilised vary­ing hues of green, did not ben­e­fit from the as­sis­tance of wheels nor­mal­ly used for larg­er cos­tumes such as theirs. 

Ram­per­sad com­fort­ably de­fend­ed his crown with a slight­ly larg­er take on his fam­i­ly’s trade­mark cos­tume de­sign that earned him a first-place fin­ish last year. 

His abil­i­ty to al­most ef­fort­less­ly dis­play his large cos­tume, “Jun­gle Fever,” while en­ter­tain­ing the judges and mod­est au­di­ence with his flu­id dance moves re­sult­ed in him re­ceiv­ing 13 points more than his near­est com­peti­tor. 

Much like her male com­pa­tri­ot, Ed­wards, with her cos­tume “Med­i­cine Woman-D Folk Heal­er,” was able to cap­ti­vate all present with a high-en­er­gy per­for­mance that saw her dance and wave freely with a broad smile as she tra­versed al­most every inch of the stage dur­ing her al­lot­ted time.

Ram­per­sad was ini­tial­ly left lost for words in a brief in­ter­view min­utes be­fore his fa­ther Mar­lon, who de­signed his cos­tume, was about to cross the stage in the Se­nior Car­ni­val King semi­fi­nal. 

“I am hon­est­ly speech­less...I am not shocked but I tru­ly worked hard to do this,” Ram­per­sad said, while flanked by his fa­ther, sis­ter, and moth­er Lau­ra, who al­so par­tic­i­pat­ed in the Se­nior Car­ni­val Queen com­pe­ti­tion.   

The AS­JA Boys’ Col­lege stu­dent was es­pe­cial­ly pleased to see his younger sis­ter An­nalee se­cure a third-place fin­ish with her heart-themed pre­sen­ta­tion “The Beau­ty of Love”, which was de­signed by his grand­moth­er Glo­ria Dalls­ingh. 

Dalls­ingh, a mul­ti­ple San Fer­nan­do Car­ni­val Queen win­ner and reg­u­lar com­peti­tor in the past, chose to sit out the na­tion­al com­pe­ti­tion this year. Last year, Dalls­ingh was not present to wit­ness her grand­son’s achieve­ment as she stayed home with her grand­daugh­ter, who nar­row­ly missed out on a place in the fi­nals. 

“Last year, she was not able to come in but this year she was and she came good for her first time in the fi­nals,” Ram­per­sad said. 

While com­peti­tors seek­ing to de­throne him spent the mo­ments be­fore their turn on stage calm­ing their nerves and putting the fin­ish­ing touch­es on their cos­tumes, Ram­per­sad took time out to help guide and en­cour­age his sis­ter from the side of the stage. He said he was ho­n­oured that his en­tire fam­i­ly shared in their fam­i­ly Car­ni­val tra­di­tion. 

“It is a plea­sure to have all the mem­bers of my fam­i­ly com­pet­ing as the gen­er­a­tions go down,” he said. 

An elat­ed Dalls­ingh proud­ly de­clared that her fam­i­ly was the first to have three gen­er­a­tions of com­peti­tors. 

She said she be­came more in­volved in Car­ni­val af­ter she sep­a­rat­ed from her hus­band when her two chil­dren were young. She sent her son to learn wire bend­ing when he was her grand­son’s age and he has been per­fect­ing his de­signs since then. 

“Now the whole fam­i­ly is in it,” she said.

Ed­wards said she was shocked by the out­come. 

“I feel very hap­py and I am proud to­day be­cause I did not think I would have gone to first place,” she said. 

“My moth­er has her own chil­dren’s band and de­signs all the cos­tumes her­self,” she said.

The Mor­vant res­i­dent, who at­tends Bish­op Anstey High School in Port-of-Spain, ad­mit­ted that she did not face the dif­fi­cul­ties she did in pre­vi­ous com­pe­ti­tions. 

“The cos­tume was easy to man­age and dance freely in on the stage,” she said.

Ju­nior King of Car­ni­val

1. An­to­nio Ram­per­sad - Jun­gle Fever - 417

2. Khayri-Jaalam Williams - Se­crets of the Sky - 404

3. Ares Barkarr - Ser­pent of Kalah - 396

4. Re­nal­do Ryan - Wings of Pu­ri­ty and Light -379

5. Kay­den Jacques - Orynn of the Twist­ing Trails - 378

6. J-Vion Moses - Spir­it of Car­ni­val - 376

7. Jarel Pe­ters - Mu­fasa King of the African Jun­gle - 365

8. Jer­im­i­ah Daniel - Out of the Abyss Bol­o­gos Un­de­feat­ed - 362

9. Xavi Har­riot - Cer­e­mo­ni­al Bus­tle Dan­ger - 354

10. Ar­mani Gas­pard - Is­land in the Sun - 351

11. Justin Har­ris - Black Shad­ow-Mid­night Rob­ber - 350

12. Ja­mani Charles - D African-Tri­ni Mu­sic War­rior, Ah Hot and Groovy - 336

13. Pe­ter Bar­row - Dako­ta Dawn - 326

14. Jay­lon Ce­de­no - As of Mid­night Tonight - 322

15. Tyrese Walk­er - Fire Works - 304

Ju­nior Queen of Car­ni­val

1. J’Nai Ed­wards - “Med­i­cine Woman”-D Folk Heal­er - 408

2. Yvonne Rose Mack - The Me­an­der­ing Man­darin of Salah It - 405

3. An­nalee Ram­per­sad - The Beau­ty of Love - 403

4. Ja­da Forde - Buc­coo Reef - 400

5. Kaleigha Stan­ley - Jew­el of the Botan­ic Gar­dens - 396

6. Makay­la Ques­tel-Fred­er­ick - Ms Caramel Pop­corn - 394

7. Japhia Joseph - Couleurs ou Jardin - 392

8. Des­tiny Williams - War­rior Queen Am­i­na - 388

9. Ko­r­rie Car­rio - Jardin Fleuri - 387

9. Jlay­na Arm­strong - Car­ni­val’s First La­dy - 387

10. McKen­zie Far­in­ha - Mys­tique Gua­ca­maya-Trib­ute to Karen Hart - 385

11. Brynell Mills - Ma­toa­ka-Princess of the Powhatan Tribe - 370

12. Azelia Mills - Un­elanuhi-God­dess of the Sun - 365

13. Shaniya Far­ri­er - A Nu­bian Queen - 364

14. Mia Subero - Aztec Sun Catch­er - 356