Today's installment of the Blogger of the Week series takes us to the beautiful island of Trinidad and Tobago, home to Global Voices regional editor for the Caribbean Janine Mendes-Franco. I had the opportunity to meet her for the first time at the Citizen Media Summit in Budapest last June, where she left a very good impression on many fellow bloggers. Recently I had the opportunity to get to know her a little better and to catch up with her on how she became hooked on GV, Caribbean identity issues and her gardening talents, among other things. - How did you first hear about Global Voices and when did you start writing there? Global Voices showed up on my radar towards the end of 2005, which was when Georgia Popplewell (GAP) first began covering the Caribbean for GV. I started following her posts and soon became hooked on the site. I was recruited by GAP to cover for her while she attended the 2006 GV Summit in India and the rest, as they say, is history! I was officially a GV-er from then on… - What was your main motivation in getting involved with Global Voices? It sounds really magnanimous to say I was helping out a friend – and while I was genuinely happy to do that and eager to keep up the standard that Georgia had set, the truth is that I really enjoyed the work! I would look forward to going through my blogroll every morning to see what Caribbean voices were saying. I really wanted to be part of the conversation. - Now about your personal blog: When did you start blogging and what was your main motivation to start a blog? (Bows head in shame). My personal blog has been like what Trinidadians call an “outside child” ever since GV came on the scene, honestly. I started it in April 2005 after much coercing by Georgia (do you see a theme emerging here?) because she kept going on about how it was such a great outlet with which to hone your writing skills (writing is a key part of what I do in my job as a TV producer). But looking back now, I think she had a dastardly plan all along – I was just a helpless pawn in the whole scheme! Joking aside though, she was right. Blogging has done so much more for me than simply providing an outlet for exercising my writing muscles – it’s opened up the entire world! That said, my blog should be undergoing a major overhaul very soon. It started as an eclectic “here’s what I have to say about anything that strikes my fancy” kind of forum and now it needs to determine what it wants to be. It also wouldn’t hurt if I posted more regularly… -What do you blog about? How would you describe it to someone that has never read it? I called the blog Francomenz to play off both the pronunciation of my surname and a colloquial term called “franko-men”, which basically means “to be frank; to tell it like it is.” Because I haven’t blogged regularly in so long, I’ve been able to take a step back and assess what the site’s challenges are. I’ve written posts about everything from art to politics, and I haven’t always kept a regional focus, which I think is one of the issues. It’s like a smorgasbord of opinion; me weighing in on whatever gets me passionate or riled up or amused. But I’ve realised this isn’t the best approach for encouraging site traffic, because, to quote Forrest Gump, “you never know what you’re gonna get.” - What is your most memorable blogging experience? Devastating effects of natural disasters aside, I really enjoyed blogging about the earthquake that hit the Caribbean region last November. There’s something invigorating about blogging breaking news, especially when the entire region has something to say about it. The Caribbean is generally viewed as a monolith by the international community, but anyone who has been here knows that there are tangible differences from territory to territory. This was one event that made me understand how interconnected we actually are. - How many languages do you speak? In what language do you blog and why? (Bows head in shame once again) My mother tongue is English. I used to be able to speak both French and Spanish quite fluently; even studied French up to university level in Canada. And then, sadly, through lack of practice, I’m tremendously out of touch. It’s not like riding a bike. If you don’t keep speaking the language, you forget vocabulary, grammar, etc. So while I’m usually able to pick up the gist of what someone is saying when they speak either of those languages, I seriously need some refresher courses – podcasts, here I come! Hey, it worked for Hungarian! - What do you do for a living – when you're not blogging or writing at GV? I have my own communications firm called The New Cheeze. - Describe the blogging scene in your country.