Barbados, Summer 2014 – Notes: July 15 – 18

(Cross posted on PeterMarina.com)

From New Orleans, the plane headed straight to the rolling hills of Barbados where Pastor Michael Alleng picked me up near the capital Bridgetown. Alleng heads Evening Light Pentecostal Church in Arch Hall, Barbados. He is a tall, lanky man standing at about six feet two inches and drives a green car. He travels frequently to other churches in Barbados, the Caribbean, and the United States, guest preaching at the churches of several leaders he knows through PAWI (Pentecostal Assemblies of the West Indies). For example, Continue reading

St. Lucia – June 11-13

(Cross posted at Peter Marina’s blog)

Travel back to Antigua was brief, only a day. Stephen Andrews used his charismatic networking to link me with pastors and religious leaders in St. Lucia, Barbados, and Dominica (pronounced dah-meh-NEE-ka). A LIAT airline travel agent that works closely with Andrews’s SJPA House of Restoration Church helped me purchase the tickets at a discount rate, setting up a direct itinerary to all the islands. LIAT, however, will change flight plans at the last minute to maximize profit. Continue reading

Port of Spain, Trinidad June 4th – 9th, 2014

(Cross posted at Peter Marina’s blog)

The plane hopped and hopped from Antigua to St. Lucia, Barbados, and St. Vincent & the Grenadine Islands all the way down to Trinidad — the last island in the Leeward Islands so far south that it kisses Venezuela. Port of Spain, Trinidad’s capital, bursts with colors of every kind. The colors of the visualscapes coalesce with the soundscapes of the bustling city, a stone’s throw away from Venezuela. Walking down Charlotte Street between Park Street and Independence Square just East of Woodford Square where political subversives shout their speeches, one immediately notices the vibrant colors – skin colors from charcoal black to pasty white, hair textures ranging from straight, dead hair to radically alive afros, vegetables and fruits of every variety and color including bright reds, greens, blacks, purples, and yellows.

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Antigua – June 1-3, 2014

(Cross posted at petermarina.com)

A dazzling aqua-blue sea surrounds the oddly shaped two-island country of Antigua and Barbuda, which sits in the middle of the Leeward Islands. Aside from the August Carnival, every five years in June, political elections disrupt the otherwise normally tranquil nation.

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