devils in trinidad

{Charlotte}

I have been here for about 4 weeks and have gradually got used to the accent and culture here. During the first week I could hardly understand the local people’s English, but now the situation is much better. I have tasted the delicious roti, bake and shark, double and coconut water. I have watched local sexy and passionate dance. However, as Sheena said, people here have a racism against Chinese,  so Asians are insulted verbally sometimes. It is hard to accept, but we have to face it as a part of the DukeEngage experience, and there is little we can do about that.

The problem of illegal vendor is another issue that we are working on. There are many illegal vendors outside the market and around Arima. Since they have a more accessible location and sell goods at a relatively low price, some customers prefer to buy goods from them, which seriously affects the business of the legal vendors inside the market. For this reason, this week, Adam and I went down the street and started our illegal vendor assessment.  First, we counted the number of the illegal vendors and then interviewed some of them. Most of them reports that they have been selling in the street for years and prefer to continue selling in the street even if a larger market is built. Half of them state that they have never been fined or arrested while the others have been fined for once or twice. Furthermore, we learned that, compared to the vendors inside the market, they have relatively higher daily revenues and much longer operation hours. By doing this assessment, we found that the illegal vendor problem has lasted for a long time. This problem cannot be easily solved unless the enforcement is enhanced and a larger market is built to accommodate the illegal vendors.