Author Archives: donalddeanchambers

Briana Williams, the youngest member of Jamaica’s gold medal 4 x 100 metres women’s relay team at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics posted this on her Instagram: “Just got home and found out that my dear grandmother, who lived with us, passed away soon after I left for the Olympics.”   Loop News reported that sheContinue reading “Communion of Saints”

Last night I watched a French film on Netflix called Street Flow (Banlieusards). It’s a drama that addresses issues of race, poverty, family values and the struggles of a single parent through the lens of a black Muslim family living in the suburbs of Paris.  Soulaymaan, the middle brother, is a scholar working on hisContinue reading “Street Flow”

Hansle Parchment, the 110-meter Jamaican gold medallist at the Tokyo Olympics, posted an incredible and awesome story on Instagram that testifies to a Christ-like figure. Hansle narrates.  On the day of the semi-finals of the 110 meters hurdles, he accidentally boarded the wrong bus. Why?  He was focused on his mobile music. Understandable!  Isn’t it?Continue reading “Hansle Parchment”

In my blog on Renewal and Retreat, I described a dugout area, whose surface was lined with stones in the form of a cross at the edge of the cliff on a property at which I was retreating. Its vertical section is about 24 feet and the horizontal portion is about six feet. One canContinue reading “The Cross and the Environment”

Arising to the dawn today, I remember it’s August 6, Jamaica’s Independence Day!  To be honest, I prefer to celebrate Interdependence Day! Independence from the colonial legacy of Independence and Individualism influenced by a Eurocentric thinking, “I think therefore I am” (Descartes).  Let’s divorce this thinking and remarry the African philosophy of Ubuntu that says,Continue reading “Happy Interdependence Day!”

I am sitting precariously on the six-inch concrete block in a dilapidated shed at the edge of a cliff. At the base of the cliff are crashing waves, hitting the coastline like an angry boxer. Protruding from the side of the cliff is an orchestra of coconut trees dancing to the instructions of the wind.Continue reading “Clouds and Feelings”

Today, I woke up with one thing on my lazy Saturday morning mind: Watching the finals of the Tokyo Olympics women’s 100 metres finals.  As the finalists lined up, I felt anxious and nervous. My heart pounded like a vibrant and energetic Tassa drummer “beating the daylight” out of the drum.  The wait seemed eternal.Continue reading “100 Meters: Emancipation Day Gift”

I was alone watching the evening news. Suddenly, I screamed. I yelled.  I gasped. Feelings of sadness and of being distraught blanketed me. I felt a mother’s and a father’s pain in my belly bottom.  Three children in the Burke’s family in Maraval, Trinidad perished in a house fire. They were trapped like prisoners byContinue reading “Children”

Retreats – spiritual, business or leisure – are necessary and beneficial.  I received this healing opportunity for three days. It was incredibly refreshing, renewing, and rejuvenating. The coastal town of Blanchisseuse, Trinidad, was the therapeutic hospital for my renewal. Three days of sleep, old talk, board games, eating, reading, writing, reflecting, with a mix ofContinue reading “Retreats and Renewals”