From music to food and from faces to festivals, Trinidad exhibits a multi-ethnic culture. With ancestors from Africa, India, Europe, China, and the Middle East, speaking dozens of languages and professing dozens of faiths, a local common culture that is vibrant, colourful and tolerant of the eccentric but still able to hold on to important elements of traditions has grown up after centuries of mixing and merging. And nowhere is the freeness of this spirit and the power of this multiethnic society better demonstrated than in the Carnival, the island's most famous cultural phenomenon. The full-scale abandon on the streets, with creative essence of the street masquerade with its thousands of costumes, hundreds of calypsos and awe-inspiring steelband performances is as honest a reflection of local character as possible. Trinidad is also the island for the cricket fan and there is no better place to take in an annual Test series than with a playful crowd, singing and chanting at the Queen's Park Oval.