Senior Reporter
jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt
It was a family affair at the Eighth Street, Barataria home of centenarian Norma Puckerin yesterday, when her cousin, reigning National Calypso Monarch Machel Montano, visited her.
Montano sought out the elderly woman after she posted a video on social media asking him to have a party with her. When he went online asking for assistance to identify her, however, he discovered that she shared his mother’s maiden name.
“The first message I got was from Brian Williams, who’s a footballer. He tell me she have an athlete son and this and that and she’s a Puckerin. I say she can’t be a Puckerin because my mother is a Puckerin. How come I can be looking for granny, and granny is my granny!” he said after meeting her.
“We want to do all about the family this year. In school at UTT, I had to do a family tree and I had to find the Puckerins. I wouldn’t believe that now I find my only grandmother. You like my Granny because you are a Puckerin.”
As he serenaded her, Puckerin said she would be able to rest easier as she had met the soca star.
She began to cry when she reflected on her daughter Janet, one of two children, who died recently.
“I made 10 children, eight alive, one recently died, but oh Lord, she would have been happy here,” Puckerin said.
Her tears ended when Montano interjected that she had gained a grandson.
He promised to return for her 101st birthday on April 15.
The family affair continued when one of Puckerin’s sons remarked that Montano’s wife, Renée, grew up a few houses away.
Montano and clothing brand Janoura’s donated an automatic wheelchair to Puckerin, who has more than 20 grandchildren, is a great-grandmother of ten and great-great-grandmother of seven.
