Three Gardens in Trinidad

Radio 3 transports listeners to Trinidad, just off the coast of Venezuela, immersing them in the sounds of the Caribbean island, with writer and actor Elisha Efua Bartels as a guide. Through the sounds of three Port-of Spain gardens - her home by the river in Diego Martin, a garden in the lush valleys of St Ann’s, to a house up in the hills, Elisha reflects on the rich tropical sounds of the island. Frogs, hummingbirds, parrots and occasional rainfall form a slowly shifting, vivid soundscape. We pass through cycles of warm sunshine, then heavy tropical rain, each change reflected in the types of calls we hear from the birdlife and frogs. These aren’t rarefied idylls though - on a warm evening parrots noisily flock through, disturbing the peace. Sometimes a radio or the sound of a party drifts up from the valley below; dogs bark, cockerels crow. Elisha describes the extent to which she’s both sustained by, and living at the mercy of, the wildlife around her – the parrots so loud she can’t hear the TV, the frogs soothing her to sleep at night - and how the sounds evoke a strong sense of 'home' for her.