Tag: Guyana Fiction

 

 

         < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

        Locket #12  

 

       At some point during conversation the question gets asked: how did you
       two come together? what brought you here?  We've told this story several
       times. If you were a butterfly on that lampshade you might protest it's never
       the same story. "That's not because we like to embellish things. As the wine
       disperses, little details overlooked in earlier tellings pop up in the head and
       want to be included."

       We grew up in Georgetown. My Dad used to bike me round the city as a child.
       I'll never forget those growing up years. I used to take music lessons.

       Most of my friends from secondary school got married. "They married up,
       they married down." Married light, dark. A few still keep in touch. They 
       talk about their kids, the homes, their routines. How life is increasingly a
       haze of worries; a séance night and day with the future, Stan says. "And
       they're aging faster than they think."

       We go back to Georgetown often. Say what you like about the state of
       the capital, it is near impossible to bike ride now. Once we tried renting
       ("actually they wanted to sell us") the bikes. Spent the entire vacation 
       cycling around the city.

       Nothing beats waking up early, wheeling the bikes out, before the morning
       traffic swarms and starts swerving to avoid collision with the cows. "Our
       pointy bike helmets always turn heads." 

       We grew up in Queenstown. It's a quieter part of the city. Narrow streets.
       Though now cars and minibuses come ploughing through with no regard for
       life or limb.

       Towns of the old days are being abandoned. "People are leaving for new
       residence, to find some measure of dignity and quiet." Paved front yards,
       grilled windows. Far from the bicycle-to-work old days. "From cane fields
       bent over and over, everyone deserves a fresh start. To straighten up; find
       a way to live past daily bread and tea."

       So we moved away. Came to Toronto "There was one big moment of fear." 
        ̶  not now, Stan, do we need to bring that up now?  ̶  "We decided to leave
       Dark Leader and his regime of hazards and lizards. The lords of our land
       resent architects of beauty. To be mature" O, this man and his words! "is
       to risk giving insult to somebody." 

          I was warned by my father against wildness. Wildness in thinking. You might
       accidentally set on fire everything you now know. You're too young to handle
       the excitement of strangers. Outside our community, he meant.

       We're doing okay. We go biking. On weekends, weather permitting. We love
       Guru, our dog. He has a dog life of his own. No, no plans for kids.

       Why no plans? Stanislaus had this idea once we got married, we'd put off
       conceiving for two years. Determine our capacities as life partners, he said.
       "I just wanted to test how long we could put up with each other given our 
       different back streams."

       When the two years were up, we decided to uphold our pledge to each other.
       We like things the way they are. "Children would upset the equilibrium, is
       what she means."

       Say what you like, we love our dog like he was our only child. We pay
       someone to handle him when we're at work. 

       How did we meet?  A foreign Head of State was visiting. Wasn't it Prince
       Charles of England? "I don't think it was." Anyway, he was standing on the
       steps of our Public library, I mean Stanislaus, not the Head of State, on the
       steps. And I was on the pavement waiting to cross the street. "Which she
       couldn't at that point due to the barriers and the people. Her body, I
       sensed, was trembling with ambivalence. About her next step forward."

          I noticed how perfectly still he stood, and I thought, There! is where I want
       to be. Next to him. Not craning his head, all excited. Anyway, the motorcade
       went by, people were drifting away. I think we stood there for another
       minute. I felt blood rushing to my head. My eyes were on his eyes.

       Eventually we moved. He said to me, as we passed, I know what you're
       thinking. He couldn't possibly have known, but in that moment I felt
       connected to his brain. I stopped. I was surprised how easily we talked.
       Surprised he thought me worthy of attention.

       I went home. All night I twitched and turned in bed. I wondered why the
       insect noise outside my window sounded louder. I woke up from dreaming;
       I stepped back in my dream. This! all this is reality, I thought. Eventually
       after a hundred more passes, a thousand more words, I said Check! "Our
       mates were found."

       Just last week I was telling Stanislaus I thought we were born to live out a
       fairy tale. Like we were meant to follow a chosen path; without knowing
       why; and guided every step.

       "Pay no attention to her. We're making it up as we go along. Every time we
        talk about what we're doing here another piece of the puzzle slips into
        place. We'll be happy when it's finally complete."

          We're quite happy now. Lucky, too. "And always looking down the tracks.
       Light head, short breath, cardiac stutter  ̶  the carriages of decline pass our
       station every day." You hear him? And to think Mr. Gloom-and-Doom here
       was once my knight in smart shiny armour. Not a wish bone in his body.

                                                  ~  *  ~

       Selfish?  or Self-absorbed! Yes, we hear that a lot. With the no-offence giggles.
       No, we don't mind. It is our way through the world.

       A psychologist friend  ̶  from Ukraine, of all places  ̶  is intrigued by the way
       we seemed wrapped up in each other. In a bubble of rapture, isn't that what
       he said? With traces of the jungle. "He was referring to your house plants,
       Nadira."

       I'm the one who keeps us anchored. Purchases, due dates. I'm good with
       numbers. "Nadira is the probably fastest divider by twelve in the Americas."
       I keep it simple: what we need, minus what we could do without, plus
       essentials. "Plus clean, ready-to-tango bed sheets." Stan!

       I'm trying to make him change his bath towel more often. He says he prefers
       the rough rub on his skin of old towel fibres. "In clean sheets we make and
       hope to wrap our lives."

       We know who our friends are. Our true friends. "They're far and few."  The
       family next door is from back home, but we try to avoid them. He's a bank
       embezzler. Fled the country hoping no one would notice or track him down.
       "He could have stolen and stayed home. Like the squirrelly actors who hold
        office or sort revenue. Who has the time of day for detail?"  

       He smiles a lot, leaning on his snow shovel, watching your face; wanting to
       be more than a neighbour.  His wife came over; told me what he did. Then
       she packed up quietly and left.

       "She left him? You know, I never once heard raised voices over there. Not
       once someone shouting, Yes! Yes!"

       Took her child and her tits, and moved away. She told me she had enough
       of the whole stay-at-home, mind-the-baby and the kitchen business. Now he
       carries on as if nothing has changed. "Give him time. He'll go after her." I
       could punch him in the face. The scamp.

       With the people at our jobs we get along. Sort of. They're a little British in 
       their correctness and Howyoudo. The key is how close you come to know
       them, and them you. "They don't say 'fucking' a lot like the Americans."
       They're fanatics about ultra-clean surfaces in the home. "The scrubbing 
       toothbrush is the last line in defence of the castle."

       Stanislaus, please! enough with the drama. "Come here, Guru!  Nobody
       paying attention to you? Here, boy."

          
       S & N. Snijders,
       Georgetown, Guyana
       Toronto, Canada

 

 

 

      
      < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

       Locket #11  

       It took me over two weeks to piece together the mysterious connection
       between this English woman, and my uncle Toolsie. I am beginning to think
       I could make a good investigator. Maybe I could join the police force. Become
       a detective. Joke. There are no women detectives in this country, far as I
       know. I had to "interview" this Georgetown taxi driver, and other people,
       to get the full picture.

       This Englishwoman comes to Georgetown, checks in at a hotel in Alberttown.
       Traveling alone, her first visit to Guyana, but she seems familiar with names
       and places.

       The very next day she enquires at the front desk about transportation to
       Canal District. Dressed in pantsuit and sunshades, she spoke softly but
       intensely. She was told about our minibuses. She wanted something more
       private and direct. A taximan outside agreed to take her. According to him
       she directed every turn of the way.

       They had barely taken off when she told him to stop at a house number along
       Lamaha street. Her mother, she says, came out to join her first husband who
       worked for the British Administration in the 1960s, during the last years
       before our Independence.   

       She pulls out a photo from a brown envelope. "This is the building, see? This
       is where she lived.  Are we on the right street?"  She snaps a photo with her
       camera. "And where's the train line? Isn't there a train service?"   

       They move on; they get to the Berbice River. She's mumbling, reading from
       a notebook in her lap, looking up through the window.

       Same thing happens. "Where's the ferry? Are we taking the ferry". No more
       ferry, the driver tells her, we're crossing the bridge. She asks to be taken to
       the old ferry docking point. Takes a picture, looking around, her hand on her
       hat as if ready for an uninvited gust of wind.

       They cross and the taximan is told to find a village in Canal Poulder. They
       drive past roadside shacks, cars hurtling the other way. He's in relatively
       unfamiliar territory, grew up in Demerara. But she is determined to locate
       "Mr. Toolsie", my uncle. She evidently assumed that just showing up in a
       village, and asking for someone would bring results.

       Her driver grows impatient now with the frequent stopping and moving. He's
       starting to think this is one confused tourist lady. And though he's confident
       he will be paid for his services, he's never had a passenger acting so weird.
       She's really anxious, though, to locate my uncle.

       They make several enquiries, "I am looking for a Mr. Toolsie," she says, in her
       clear, chirpy accent. "I think he lives in this village". Toolsie is a familiar first
       name; the "Mr." throws everybody off at first.

       Finally she finds her man; or rather finds where he hangs out; at a rum shop,
       now a "beer garden", that also sells lunchtime snacks. He isn't there at the
       moment, but at this point the driver hints he's had enough. It's after midday.
       Sun still raging. He needs to gas up his vehicle, get some fluids and food; he
       wants to get back to Georgetown.

       The lady starting to wilt, too, under her hot weather hat. It's been a long
       morning, running around the coast of this country. Nodding her head, as if
       she too had had enough, she was ready to abandon her mission as abruptly
       it started.

       So now she's gone; and the regulars at the beer garden swat at the mosquitoes
       and wonder: what is the connection between Uncle Toolsie and all these
       white women coming to the District? There has to be some connection. 

       Some nights Uncle Toolsie starts up rambling about the days before
       Independence. He talks about the house in Lamaha Street where he worked
       as a handyman. Fridays and Mondays. Occupied by British people. Very nice
       people.

       He claims an arrangement was made with "the mistress". After the Friday
       yard work, she'd indicate she will visit the Canal District. He should meet
       her at the steamer stelling. Which he did faithfully.

       They'd take a hire car to his village, turn off the main road, walk along a 
       worn foot path, turn off into the fields. There, according to Uncle Toolsie
       in full flow after six or seven drinks, outlandish behavior followed.

       She takes the cutlass from him and starts one wild slashing at the cane stalks.
       Slash slash.  Slashing and screaming, "So this is what it feels like. This he
       cannot do himself." Slash slash. Stopping to catch her breath, wipe her brow.
       Slash slash. I could see her, clothes damp with sweat, face and arms livid,
       hair coming loose. Did she say anything when she got back to Georgetown,
       disheveled but glowing?

       At some point, all worked up, the slashing stops. She turns to my uncle: "Alright
       then, let's see what the big tool can do today."

       Out of the blue Uncle Toolsie would slap the table with a cutlass. Who brings
       a cutlass into a beer garden? Who sings and carries on, telling people now he
       wants to be called "big tool"? If you were there you'd have to laugh, or tell
       him to stop his nonsense.

       Rum can make you a sad, delirious man, deserving of sympathy. Uncle goes
       home to his wife in that wretched state. I could get to the bottom of all this
       by talking to my Aunt. She complains about his drinking, and how a man who
       knows to wield a cutlass should know how to open a sardine can without
       cutting his finger. I could ask questions, but I would have to draw the line at
       tales of sweet joy in the cane fields. 

       So let's see now. English woman comes to Guyana with a notebook (we can
       assume it's her mother's old Georgetown journal) retracing steps. What was
       her purpose? Just verifying certain pages in her family history?

       About O my God! her mother who had "meetings" with a man named Toolsie, 
       who just happens to be my uncle! who drinks on weekends in a beer garden
       like a laid off worker; the object of coarse jokes; his only friend a cane field
       cutlass. 

       Weird! like from some other dimension; like from the plantation days  ̶ 
       stories of whispered arrangements, voice commands, gratitude paid.

       I really not born to play detective. You need curiosity and patience. You
       have to be sniffing round the baggage people carry. I am only twenty four, 
       slender, burning. Besides, in this country there are so many real issues
       needing investigation. Many unsolved cases that in all likelihood will stay
       forever unsolved.

       Some things  ̶  like fever, temper, blinds  ̶  you better off not touching. Look
       around. The grass growing, serpents oil and stretch sun bathing. Everywhere
       people going about their business. At the slightest slight they cut and pouting.
       Why dwell? Best leave alone.

       Melissa Madramootoo
       Canal District, Guyana

 

 

 

      < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

       Locket #10 

 
          Since we moved to this (mostly "white" family) neighborhood in Toronto
      my wife has discovered the "dinner party". She invites the neighbors over.
      People we know from back home come over, like on national holidays,
      for food from back home, buffet style, outside on the patio. The dinner
      evenings involve food from back home, too, but it's more focussed,
      you know.

      A life lived for dinner preparation and chitchat is really not for me.
      I decided to draw the line. "What do you mean?" she asked. I said, too,
      that as a couple we were definitely "incompatible".

      The last dinner party was the point breaker. "He went back home to
      Guyana. His father was in hospital. He had a stroke," she told our guests,
      the Merridews, from across the road, like us early in their fifties. He
      has a full combed brown beard and, after a recent vacation in China,
      holds court like Marco Polo back from a big trip. 

      "Sharing" is a social tool my wife picked up after we moved here. The
       people at her job "share" from the moment they arrive and take off
       their coats. She gets home, takes off her coat, and sharing begins.
       Doesn't stop even in the bedroom. (Starts up quickly after sex, back
       from the valley! in lacy sleep wear; not a moment spared for catching
       breath.) 

       She assumes my unwillingness to "co-share" is a signal to pour forward.
       On her own. "You think too much," she  told me once. The incompatibility
       gap opened up between us after our two girls were born. It widened as
       they grew older and became impatient with our parenting.

       "He was all set to come back here," she said to the Merridews. "Suddenly
        one evening he decides to go for a walk in the city. And there he saw an
        old man getting mugged. Right in the middle of Georgetown."

        Her head and shoulders follows the traffic of every word spoken at the
        table, leaning in with opinion from as far as the kitchen area. Usually
        I withdraw, into what my face suggests is careful processing, before
        I chip in.          

        "Mugging", whatever the word means elsewhere, wasn't what happened
         that night in Georgetown.

         There's this walk path down the middle of the city's Main Street. It's a
         tree-lined path that seemed designed for strolling. I was cautioned by
         family and friends not to "stroll" after dark. The city I once knew was
         now a den for "deceivers and heartless bandits", my uncle said. He
         advised I walk like an overseas resident  ̶  stepping with straight
         ahead purpose, from place A to place B.

         I took the stroll anyway, toward a shopping area where stores were
         shutting down for the night; with pavements that seemed also designed
         for strolling, though now street vendors have taken over, cutting off
         the stroll space with precarious stuffed stalls.

         "Georgetown used to be nice," my wife had earlier set the scene. "Now
         with all the politics, it's more like a 3rd world country." (Authority on
         3rd world countries now, you notice.)

         The "mugging" victim, before he became a victim, was standing in front
         of a store window, gripping a bag, and studying the merchandise on
         display; electronic devices, phones, computers.

         I must have been half a block from him when I heard shouting. I looked
         back. He was on the ground, trying to shield off two men who cursed,
         leaned over him, punched him in the face; kicked him hard, stepped
         back, kicked him hard again, again. I shouted in alarm. One of them
         went through his pockets. They searched his bag, then they took off.

         I rushed back. The man seemed in considerable pain, breathing with
         difficulty. He tried to stand up. He seemed concerned about the state
         of his clothes. "Are you alright?" He said he was. He tried to stand up
         again, but he crumpled.

         "And while all this was going on, nobody even stopped to help," my wife
          went ahead. "Two days later he reads in the newspaper that the man
          had died. The same man. Died in the Georgetown Hospital. They
          kicked him so hard it must have caused internal bleeding or something."

          Again he tried to stand up, tried to walk. He gripped my hand. He
          wanted to know if I thought the computers in the show window were
          worth the investment. He'd buy one, but electricity in his village was
          unreliable. "Are you alright?" I shouted.

          He asked me to retrieve his bag. It contained spare parts for his tractor.
          He didn't seem to mind his money gone. He'd been waiting a long time
          for the tractor part to come in.

          Still gripping my hand he told me his wife had left him. All he had was
          a little piece of land, his house, and the tractor. He'd had an accident
          with the tractor; and  right after that his wife moved away. Back to
          her parents. Then one day off to Canada with his son.

          He hadn't heard from them in many years. Then he learnt his son was
          now Dr. Sunesh Deodatt. Working somewhere in Canada. He had no idea
          how all this happened. Her family wanted nothing to do with him. He
          was thinking maybe if he bought the computer he could use it to locate
          his son, the doctor.

          A vehicle pulled up near us. Men in uniform, with dangerously idle rifles.
          Wanting to know what was going on. The man sagged to the ground,
          but the grip on my arm was fierce.

          I told the officers he'd been kicked violently by two young men. He was
          in bad shape. He needed help.

          Out of nowhere another man approached. He swore he had seen "the
          whole  thing" happen. So someone in the shadows had watched the
          attack from a distance, and stepped forward only when it seemed
          a crowd was gathering!

          "So my goodly husband comes back to Toronto. And now all he does is
           spend hours on the computer. Up late in the night. Trying to locate
           this man's son. Mind you, the man dead and bury already."

 
                                                            ~~~

                
           In my mind one thought kept flashing: he must have been in great
           pain slumped on the pavement, going on about his tractor and his
           son. Why did he ignore the pain?

           "But why would you want to contact him?" Mrs. Merridew's forehead
           wrinkled. I found myself studying the table cloth pattern, the wine 
           bottle labels. "That's what I asked him?" my wife jumped in, alert to
           her goodly husband's apparent drop in temperature. "I mean, what
           would be the point?" "Unless he wanted to explain he was the last
           person to see the father alive."

           "And shake the hand of the son." "Now that would be something."  
           "You mean, with the same hand that gripped the dying father's hand?"
           "That would really be something?" "Was he planning to somehow say,
           Hello, I met your Dad in Georgetown?"  Faces swiveled my way.

           My wife has brought our two grown girls into this world, and my life
           to a moment of clarity at the dinner table. What has my education
           led me into?

           "And where would you begin the search? The son could be anywhere
           in Canada?" "That's exactly what I told him" "Well, the name is 
           unusual."                                              

           "Sunesh Deodatt!" Sun….
           "Sun-nesh" SUN-neesh
           "Dee-o-datt." DEE-o-datt.

           "If he is a surgeon, a name like that is bound to pop up on a hospital
           staff registry somewhere." "Or maybe he's on Facebook"  "It makes no
           sense. He could be anywhere?" It was all very sad. A little scary, too,
           the way it happened. Very sad.

           I sensed my wife preparing to announce with a winner's smile that
           the hour of dessert had arrived. At which point I got up and excused
           myself. Stepping outside for a smoke.

           That night as the electric toothbrush with the mint green handle 
           whirred away at her gums, I released the word. Incompatible. There
           was a pause. Spitting in the sink. The bathroom light off. "What do
           you mean, you think we're incompatible." "Just that. We're incom- 
           patible." "So wait, what you trying to say?"

           My abrupt manner had rattled her. From her side of the bed, a voice
           probed. "After all these years, now all of a sudden."  I didn't twitch a
           muscle. "You've been acting real strange since you come back from
           Georgetown?" And at that first arming for argument, my eyes closed.

          My abrupt manner had rattled her. From her side of the bed, a voice
          probed. "After all these years, now all of a sudden…" I didn't twitch a
          muscle. "You've been acting real strange since you come back from
          Georgetown?" And at that first arming for argument, my eyes closed.

          I was hoping it would be my last word for the night, like a pillow her
          head could toss and turn on. "Look," I said, "I'm very tired right now."
          She had much more to say, of course, but this was where I closed off.
          Incompatible. A tree-lined detour, under construction.  So that
          tomorrow and in the winter months ahead we'll see which way things
          go.

          M. Muniram,
          Georgetown, Guyana
          Toronto, Canada

 

 

 

         < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

        Locket #9 

       Whenever I visit my uncle the first thing I always notice is the Grundig
       radiogram sitting in his living room. If you don't know what that is, it's
       a radio receiver, with  a section for playing old-time records, with a
       turntable and a handle and needle. A boxy cabinet on four legs which my
       uncle dusts with a rag to keep the surface shiny.

       I try to keep his mind diverted, otherwise he would start telling me
       again about his father who preserved it over the years.

       His father was a radio man, from back in the 1950s. The Grundig
       radiogram had a special place in their family house furniture. His
       father could never imagine the day things like cell phones would be
       invented. He wanted this radiogram passed down from generation to
       generation.

       Since my mother showed no interest, Uncle was trying to get me to
       take it. One afternoon he showed me how it worked. The radio part
       had a knob you turn to find  a station. It spins through static and babble,
       picking up then losing signals.

       "German technology. Best in the world. No other radio does produce bass
       like this," he said, the first time he switched it on. "You hear that? You
       hear that deep, rich bass." I really couldn't tell the difference even
       when he turned up the volume.

       I told him I would think about taking it. In the meantime he should keep
       it at his place until I got older, and he was getting ready to pass on. I
       meant it as a sincere promise. "I intend to stay alive till I dead," he
       shouted at me.

       His father might have been a Grundig radio man, but in fact Uncle was
       a Sony radio man. He has a Sony transistor, a portable, looking real
       grubby from years of handling. It was his main source of listening
       pleasure. His father must have been really disappointed when he
       switched to Sony.

       He liked the sound of the treble. "You hear how clear the voice sound?
       Clear as bird tweet. You don't get that sound from the things you young
       people carry about. With the earpiece screeching in your ears."

       He would sit out on his verandah, his spectacles a little twisted, the
       flimsy antenna pulled right up, listening to people talk  ̶  cricket people,
       BBC news, people arguing about life in this country. His days arranged
       to rise and rest in order. That is how he is.

       Since his wife died, he thinks the bank is the best place for his money. 
       Refuses to spend it on "foolishness". Wears the  same  clothes washed
       and pressed; and always happy when I showed up at his  gate (he calls
       me 'beautiful dreamer'). He gifts me a book on my birthday and at
       Christmas.

       "Tell your mother to come round and visit next time. She always sending
       you instead,"  he'd say. I told him he could always jump on his bicycle
       and come visit her.

                                               ^  ^

 

          My mother started showing interest the day Uncle announced he was
       going to New York. Spending two weeks there with some old school
       friend. "You know what?" she said,  "You could bring things for me when
       you coming back. Travel up with the suitcase half-empty, and bring back
       things. I'm making a list."

       I started thinking: maybe he could bring something back for me, like
       the latest Samsung phone. I promised to read the last book he gave me.

       I showed him my old phone and explained how it worked. He didn't even
       own a phone. As far as he was concerned people on the road with
       phones didn't know how precious life was. "Walking and talking like
       phone conversation is some new energy food." (I laughed, that was
       really funny.)

       Still, I suggested he take my phone with him. He could call his friend
       from the NY airport. Speak to him from inside the plane.

       He said he liked the text messaging part. "It's like writing short letters,"
       I  explained. "And you could stay in touch with us on your way to the
       airport. In case of emergency? Like if you miss the flight and need
       to contact Georgetown."

       We tested sending messages to my mother's phone. That really
       impressed him. All of a sudden he was a modern man, about to step out
       in the world with the latest technology. Some old people might sneer at
       modern stuff, but gift them something like the phone, see how fast
       they get addicted.

                                                                          ^          ^

 

          Uncle's addiction was clear on the morning of his flight. My mother's
       phone start receiving messages as early as five o'clock. She couldn't
       understand what was happening. I explained our arrangement. "This
       is no emergency message he sending." She told me to delete everything
       when he was finished.

       The messages streamed in one after the other. I could hardly recognize
       Uncle as the sender. I took the phone and went to my room.

       Message #1:  Arrived safely [he meant at our airport]. Four hours  before
       the flight. Sun not even up yet. Giving myself time to get through, then
       sit back and rest. Standing and waiting now in a short line. Nobody at
       Check In counter.

       Message #2:  Mass confusion in the lobby area. Two buses arrive with
       passengers from a flight cancelled last night. Bags like crapaud all over
       the place. More than one line heading now to the Check-In counter.

       Message #3: Ah moving up, ah moving up. I nearly drop the phone.

       Message #4: No progress to report. Man with a jacket on his arm asking
       to take my confirmed seat. This flight-cancel thing always happening.
       He was a last night cancelled passenger, went back home to the Corentyne,
       got no sleep, came back to airport. Says he MUST board this morning flight,
       otherwise he will lose his job in New York. I told him, Sorry, buddy.
       Yesterday was yesterday, Today is today.

       Message #5: Time 6.30 a.m. Confusion and coarse language. That squirmy
       fellow with the jacket on his arm now making a bumsee of himself. Lady
       juggling a nice little baby that wouldn't stop crying. She say is somebody
       else baby she holding, and that is why he crying. He want his real
       mother. Everybody holding and crying now.

       Message #6:  Still waiting. I freezing into a statue from the legs coming
       up. Drop the phone again, look like the screen crack. This phone does
       feel uncomfortable in my pants pocket.

       Message #7:  Passenger in front of me told by surly officer to pay
       Departure Tax. The man start one shouting: "This is ridiculous. Just 
       five more years, I done with this place." I didn't say a word. I tell you,
       at any desk or counter in this country people does act real stupid. Two
       comrades pointing guns at each other's face. Stupercilious and stupid.

       Message #8:  Time 8.30.  Ah reach the waiting to board area. The one
       plane outside the glass look like it shut down since last night. Don't see
       any mechanics doing maintenance. They just announce a plane scheduled
       to arrive from Trinidad now delayed. Hell of a situation. Good thing I
       bring two boil eggs. 

       Message #9:  Sad to say, still not on my way. Some people definitely
       getting left back here today. I settling down with the good book. King
       James, Psalms 11.  If it wasn't for Psalms 11, I would still be in hospital.
       [I asked my mother if Uncle had an operation recently, or some serious
       health problem. She said she didn't know, and reminded me to delete
       all his messages.]

       At this point the messages stop. Either Uncle dropped the phone again,
       or maybe this time he lost it.

       Anyway, I had more important things on my mind. Like this boy who
       thinks my buttocks in tight pants is the beginning and end of his world.
       This "Janie gyal" still not ready to "go backdam" with him. Connection
       incomplete. Later for his world.

       Byrdee Klautky
       Georgetown, Guyana

 

 

       < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

        Locket #8 

       When I come home for August vacation it is to see my closest friends in
       Canal District. And to visit our English teacher, Miss Hempell.

       I stopped by Miss Hempell because she taught us everything a girl
       needed to know about managing her life. We liked listening to her talk
       about love, about things that could happen in our lives. We were her
       girls, the Hempell girls.

       After we graduated she discouraged contact. She urged us to "move
       away". She spoke to us about why she moved away in her days. There
       was this married man.  He left the country. She pursued him to England.
       She lived there for several years, then she returned to our school.
       Single, disengaged. Didn't tell us what really happened out there. She
       said she regretted not one day, not one night.

       She has the kind of body people used to describe as "buxom". It's old now,
       but not frail. It has stayed loyal to her, protecting what she knows. In her
       day she managed somehow to be "active", knowing that just one slip,
       leading to pregnancy, could have got her fired, in disgrace the rest of
       her life.

       She warned us: be wary of the transitions from "girl" to "young adult" to
       "adulthood". Nobody ever talked to us that way, about "transitions". She
       talked about these stages, and about ways to cross over the trench, slow-
       moving rivers; and chart a course into the world. 

       My parents had invested too much in my goodness for me to slip and fail
       in school. One day I felt so down, people at home and in school were
       finding fault with me; and Miss Hempell called me aside and said, "There
       is nothing, absolutely nothing, the matter with you, girl. Look around, 
       our habits and hardships, the loyal cows and royal catchers grazing."
       I will never forget that day. Those words.

       Miss Hempell's girls were known by others  ̶  I mean by girls not so
       ambitious, and uncouth, ignorant boys  ̶  as the slut, the virgin and the
       bitch. Most girls stopped using our last names. They labeled us like that
       out of pure envy. They spread stories Miss Hempell was a 'bad influence',
       and that we stayed back with her to smoke marijuana. 

       We felt sorry for them. Sorry for those home bodies that would soon
       enter arrangements of bruising or beating; or random child-bearing;
       with no rest, skirts draped over knees, no place to go. We heard the
       stories of suicide attempts.

       The young men in the district spent most of their time with alcohol and 
       gold trimmings. Shoulders too weak for responsibility. The way they
       drove cars, the stupid grins, stupid stabs at conversation, we couldn't
       possibly take them seriously.

       I am not ashamed to say I'm still a virgin. I have chosen to be "inactive".
       The slut on the other hand (call her S.) was  active, though not as much
       as people think. She acts "friendly" with everyone, so people assume.

       In our final year she announced she had already done it. With a pilot
       and someone else. And without getting undressed. Sounds ridiculous,
       right?  And a little depraved. Though when she talked about it, it was
       like something she was growing proficient at. She's vowed not to let her
       life be kept like a pup in a pen.

       The bitch (call her B.) was the pretty girl among us. Five foot five,
        bright and dreamy. Always patting her short afro. She too was "inactive".   

        She was determined to move away. To a country where carpets and
        lawns mattered, and fine restaurants. Nothing wrong with wanting all
        that. Roads paved with opportunity weren't coming to the cane fields
        of Canal District. After graduating she became a flight attendant.
        Moving down the aisle, asking passengers to buckle up before takeoff,
        was her first big step away.

        I started business studies at a college abroad. Good Hindu girl, willing
        to please her parents. S. got a job in a lawyer's office, not at a place
        with glass panels and surly faces. You should see her, dressed up, at
        a desk playing the 'personal secretary' part, answering client questions
        on the phone.

        When I came home we met almost every day, updating "developments" 
        so to speak. I told them about how my mother had found another
        person of interest I might consider going with. I reminded her, I had to
        focus on my studies? all the money invested in my goodness?

        I was managing my transitions. We Hempell girls were managing our
        transitions. Far or near, the Hempell girls would stay connected.

                                              ~ ~

      On my second vacation trip home I got such a shock. B. had left the
       airline job. She'd become involved with a Govt. Minister of an island.
       She had moved away and was living with the Minister on the island.
       The man was twice her age.

        So what did that make B.  ̶  his girlfriend? his assistant? his soon to be
        wife? I could never have imagined this happening. Had B. stopped
        even for a moment to consider?
 
        S. seemed not in the least disturbed. She had only recently heard about
        this development, after the deed was done. And she had lost contact
        with B. She didn't think there was much we could do at this stage. Also
        she didn't think it was a good idea to visit B.'s parents. They had always
        considered us a 'bad influence'. 

        By chance we saw B's sister emerging from a supermarket. We stopped
        her and enquired. She seemed reluctant at first, but her voice warmed
        up to the task of delivering wonderful news about her sister.

        She had visited her sister. They went shopping together. Her sister bought
        the earrings she was wearing. They were chauffeured and accompanied
        everywhere by "Security".  B. sometimes attended "functions" with the
        Minister. The Minister was often out of the country. Busy schedules. B.
        was alone in this big house. No, she wasn't "working". 

        It know how it might sound. Young girl, enjoying moments of island
        indulgence. Something is wrong with the picture. Attending "functions"? 
        gatherings of old men at some high wall residence? local officials sipping
        and friendsing with diplomats? I just couldn't see it. 

        I mean, what conversation could B. possibly have with these men? How
        could she let herself be swept away like that? The man was twice her
        age!

        Her sister went on and on, so excited, you'd think she was delivering
        news of school exam passes. S. looked at her phone and said, Oh my
        goodness, I have to go! It meant she had lost interest.

        "I am worried about her," I said, as we walked away.

         So have you taken the plunge yet? S. asked, completely out of nowhere.
         It was a running joke between us. Find the right plunger, finally take
         the plunge. But for the first time, in her quick change of subject, I
         heard an edge in the sarcasm that made me wince. It was not the
         sarcasm the Hempell girls reserved for others.

         S. is the only one who hasn't moved away. I refuse to believe she
         doesn't know what really happened to B. I think she knows, but for
         some reason she wouldn't say.

         I am starting to think S. is now desperate to find her path out. I can
         hear those tiny search wheels deep inside her furiously turning. Slow
         first, then bursts of turning. Couldn't help noticing she has tattoos
         now, peaking out her lower  back window?

         I went home that day to household chores and complaints that irritated
         me; a recent home invasion, long waiting lines, this and that. I didn't
         go outside much.

         My mother asked, "What's wrong with you now? Why you spending so
         much time in bed?"  I wanted the vacation to end quickly. I wanted to
         get away, to leave behind our odorous city, the loyal cows and catchers
         grazing.

         I lay on my back, staring at the walls, thinking: things are speeding up
         around me; things are threatening to pick us off one by one. All the
         'good news' about B.  ̶  hangers on the floor! security escort! sipping
         white wine!  ̶  means she has separated from us.

         Where would this move take her?  She could wake up one morning, and
         realize her situation didn't feel right; and start shaking the bars.

         Then I thought: maybe it's time I change course. I'm not sure I want to 
         continue business studies. Maybe B. knows what she's doing. And S.
         doesn't know what taking the real plunge means. Or maybe she does 
         and she thinks she can control everything "active" coming her way.

         I'm waiting for my moment of clarity.  Miss Hempell told us we should
         expect "moments of clarity". Maybe tomorrow, the next day, when I
         wake up, I will see and know, with absolutely certainty, what to do.

         V. Laidoo
         Canal District, Guyana

 

  

       < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

        Locket #7

        My best day driving hire car was just last week. The airport run. Usually
        I wait outside our Marriot to take passengers to the airport (I own a Range
        Rover; second-hand; it still look new). I don't normally hang around at
        Arrivals to catch a fare back to the city. Jostling for visitors and grabbing
        suitcase is not my style.

        This afternoon, after dropping off two departures, I get lucky. This
        American guy  ̶  he looked sixtyish, movements brisk and neat; name
        on the baggage tag hard to pronounce  ̶  seeing two white ladies getting
        out my car, and maybe thinking my ride was reliable, promptly hired me.
        Maybe he was waiting for a friend to pick him up; waiting, waiting, not
        seeing the friend.

        Anyway, we set off and lo, and behold, he was heading to the Marriot. I just
        come from there with departing passengers, I told him. "Oh really," he
        said. "Tell you what: you'll be my driver for my stay here."

        Things worked out very well for me. But I have to tell you, this fellow 
        was one strange customer.

        Quiet all the way from the airport that first day, until we passing Diamond
        Village. "What is that smell?" he asked. Sugar. This area used to be a sugar
        estate. Quiet again, studying the view. "Do you know where Agricola
        Village is?" We coming up to it soon, right off this main road. "Good, 
        I want to go there?" No problem, boss.

        Actually there was a problem. Agricola is known as an area not safe for
        outsiders. I pass it on the main road, but never took anybody in there.
        Fellows there hard face, pants always sagging. We have lots of nice 
        places to see, captain, I said, trying to discourage him.

        Next morning, promptly at 9 o'clock I picked him up. His destination
        was still Agricola.

        "Do you know a place called The House of Flowers," he asked as we turned
        off the main road. I start getting worried. Looking for a place with a funny
        name and no street address was looking for trouble. Driving slowly through
        the village, stopping people to ask about a place called the House of
        Flowers was asking for more trouble. 

        We stopped, enquired, drove a little further in. By which time I swear
        the whole village know already 'bout an Indian hire car driver cruising
        round with a white man in the back seat.

        One last stop, a lady with a child. The American got out to talk to her.
        "Maybe it's a flower shop," he said, shouting back at me. "Is there a flower
         shop around here?" We were told the only "shop" on that street belonged
         to Mr. Massiah. We should go there, talk to him, he know everybody.

         I stayed outside, engine running; looking out at houses nearby, so much
         overgrown grass both sides of the road; and wondering what I would do 
         if some fellows  ̶  men in singlets, bony boys on bikes  ̶  approached the
         car, cuss words waiting to fly out their mouth if I only sneeze.

         When he came back, he had an address. "We're going to McDoom Village.
         Number 12 Mc Doom Village." Which was on the main road. I was so
         relieved to get going. "We're going to visit the oldest lady in Guyana.
         A Miss B. B for Bailey. Or Bally. She's 102 years old."

                                                     ** 

        Now follow this: the American was a New York doctor, a "gerontologist",
        studying old people, he said. He'd heard from another doctor about a
        patient in an NY nursing home, a Guyanese woman. Left there by her
        family. 100 years old. In good health under the circumstances, but
        kind of random in the head. She would wake up ranting she didn't want
        to be treated by no one except Mr. La Fleur from the House of Flowers
        in Guyana.

        This Mr. La Fleur, it turn out, used to live in Agricola village; used to
        work with a Dr Giglioli, an Italian man who lived here back in the days,
        helping people survive malaria.

        This Mr. La Fleur had established his own business; he was the "Chemist
        and Druggist" of the village. People came from far and wide for his
        herbs and medicine; especially people who couldn't afford to travel to
        Georgetown for medical attention.

           He grew plants; he crushed and mixed leaves, flowers, shavings from plant
        roots. His powders and liquids cured all kinda problems from heart to
        liver. They say people in that area does live longer than people anywhere
        else.                                            

                                                           **

        All this I piece together from the old lady in Mc Doom Village. I went
        inside this time (I had to see who this oldest lady in Guyana was). I stood
        like his 'Assistant' and listened with humble interest as the American 
        explained his sudden presence, talking like he getting ready to perform
        major surgery right there in the house.

        She confirm that, yes, there was a House of Flowers (it was just the
        village name for where Mr. La Fleur lived). Mr. La Fleur's father came
        from Haiti. No, she didn't know the Guyanese lady in New York, but she
        knew Mr. La Fleur.

        He used to dispense his medicine in tiny packets and bottles, with no
        labels as such. He used names for them from plants and flowers. You
        had to mix it in the foods. Especially soup. Mix it in soup and drink it. 

        Now here's the important part: Mr. La Fleur kept a book with all his
        prescriptions written down with pen knib and ink; kept it in his "office"
        and consulted it while the patient talked. This book was what the
        American was really looking for. The old lady had no idea who would
        have such a book, but she knew there was a book.

        And the prescriptions worked because when Mr. La Fleur died, people
        couldn't get their regular medicine, and their health problems got worse.
        They had to travel to Georgetown. The hospital doctors kept them there,
        running tests, prescribing this, prescribing that; but nothing worked.
        Some patients refused the hospital treatment, and went home to
        Agricola to die. Hell of a thing, I know.

                                                   **

        At some point I lost interest; I had enough. I left everybody with their
        memories and medications and waited outside in the car.

        The next day I took him to the Georgetown Hospital; then to one of the
        Government Ministries. It was raining that day. He came back to the car
        irritated, complaining not about his damp clothes; he was told to sit and
        wait. He said he was amazed anything got done in this country. I told
        him I could write a book about pain from waiting in this country.

        "You're a good man," he smiled at me,"the only functioning institution in
         I have seen so far." The only functioning institution. I thought I
         deserved a compliment like that. It sounded sincere, so I thanked him. 

         The morning I took him back to the airport he sat erect and quiet again,
         looking out like now he studying our road busyness, the drivers and
         walkers and the laws. We slowed down passing through McDoom Village.
         You want to stop in and say goodbye to the old lady? I was only playing.
         "She knows about the book," he said, "She didn't tell me, but I know she 
         knows where it is." He didn't sound angry; just disappointed he was going
         home empty-handed.

         I don't know how he know she know anything. The old lady was nice,
         but to me she sounded a little far gone in the verandah chair, her granny
         jaws working up and down.

         She was looked after by a firm-breast lady who seemed related to the
         house; who disappeared inside (we heard a child cry; told not to make
         noise); then appeared again, offering us "something to drink"; the
         American declined.

         You come all this way from America just to ask me about Mr. La Fleur?
         Miss B. laughed. She spoke like an old school teacher, in sections you
         had to wait then put together. The American helped her words along
         in his cheery booming voice. "Looks like I made your day, right? Did I
         make you happy today?" Her bones shook with laughing. I swear she
         could have choked and died and gone to heaven from just one fit of
         laughing.

         In gratitude for the help he received the American distributed (US)
         20 dollar gifts. I was paid very well for my patience and service.

         Just like that you wake up one morning not knowing what will happen.
         A man come from America looking for an old lady and an old book, and
         you just lucky to be there. You so used to heat, the stink everywhere
         of wasted years, days like this come like escape to treasure island.

         So the man didn't find what he hoped to find in this forgotten corner of
         the world. But he swore he would come back to Agricola. "With a team
         of doctors".  I gave him a card with my cell number. And I will meet you
         at the airport. With a fleet of transport. At which point we shook hands
         and laughed a real good laugh.

         M. Ajodha
         Georgetown, Guyana

 

          

      < Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >

       Locket # 4 

       Bipti stepped out the car and I couldn't believe my eyes. I know this girl
       from the village; as a pretty young lady, straight back, very fussy about 
       her clothes; inviting but paying no attention to other people; and
       carrying a umbrella, rain or shine.

       The only girl I know who took her real shoes wrap up in a bag till she get
       to the public road or her job; then she change over from the road shoes.
       A start life of pure focus, pure endeavour.

       And smarter than me, I have to say. All these years I only driving minivan,
       keeping people on the move. Cash in hand help make ends meet, which 
       is not a bad thing under the circumstances. Last does graze paragrass
       in this land of wait long.

       But Bipti! moved away from the village; she was appointed Loan Officer
       in a Georgetown bank  ̶  must have had a flair for finance. Next I hear
       she get married to an Insurance Company man known around town as an
       "eligible bachelor". You could assume she was already working her way
       up the ladder, if you know what I mean.

       Next, she left the country with the Company man, and they living in
       Barbados. Divorce the husband there! after bearing two children. Married
       a Barbadian doctor and went with him to live in "upstate New York", USA.

       This was going on over years. I was getting the news piece piece from
       people in the village who knew her mother.

       She kept in touch with the mother through barrels and Christmas cards
       with photographs tucked inside. In all this time she never come home to
       visit, even when the mother take sick, dead and bury. Which is to say,
       once she left this village that was it; is gone to the Falls she gone.

       I was heading out in the van for the city runs when she step out on the
       road, in company with a plump white lady. Face a little wrinkle up, but
       despite all these years I knew was Bipti.

       Something tell me stop; say, Hello, remember me?

       I hold back. Call me dray cart dumb; was the way she was standing,
       holding head and shoulders with an air of foreign highness; pointing
       at this house, that house; like she showing the white lady the backlands
       of ordinary she start from.

       There was heavy rain the night before; the grass was shiny green, and the
        road had muddy pools of water. I was praying she wouldn't turn suddenly 
        and aim a phone or point at me; as if to say some lives like certain habits
        will never change; and some folks with lower ambition will live and die
        on the same patch of land they born and settle; forest, village, hard 
        ship  ̶  no place else.

        So even though I recognize her, I pretend I didn't know her.

        Showing up like that, alongside this white lady; both wearing white slacks,
        which wasn't really smart considering how easy clean clothes does pick up
        dirt in this place. And braided straw hat, cat-eye sun glasses, shoulder bag,
        also not smart considering how people does mark you quick as you step out
        the airport.

        When I drive back home for lunch time break, I find out she left the village
        already.

        My neighbor Ganpat wife [who I have to say is more intelligent than her 
        belly swell husband; he trying  ̶  is one whole year now he trying  ̶  with
        contractors to convert his bottom house into a beer parlour; clay brick 
        growing weeds near the paling waiting for the workers to come back.

        The man always sound agitated; talks then walks away, then turns back
        with the same warning: "Hell to pay in this world, hell to pay! This
        country heading straight to Haiti!"

        Telling me the other day, "I hear they inventing driverless cars; you and
        your hustling minibus soon going out of business." You see the son of 
        aggravation I living next door to?]

        Anyway, his wife said Bipti didn't stay long; like she was just passing
        through; came in their house for refreshment; stayed ten minutes, that
        was all.

        Apparently, the white lady (whose name she didn't fully get) was Bipti's
        supervisor at a bank in upstate New York where Bipti worked. The doctor
        husband from Barbados died (highway car crash); leaving her and (is now)
        three children; all grown up and "in college" and "doing well".

        And Bipti herself was doing very well; she had her own home in upstate
        New York (take-off-your shoes carpet, four-poster bed, Mexican workers
        doing the lawn). And, hear this, now she is "alone and available".

        Her exact words, Alone and available! which neighbor Ganpat wife repeated,
        raising her voice in a little school-girl, giggly way; half-turned on her front
        verandah as if somehow I was keeping her back from chores inside; always 
        hungry for scraps of information.

        Not that those words would mean anything to a man like me. If Bipti came
        back to advertise or tease anybody in this district, she make a wrong
        calculation.

        Running the minivan I does study people at the side of the road. You can tell
        who waiting for transport, who standing there, face blank like traffic lights
        not working; who just wish a limousine would glide over to the grass verge,
        not sardine van service every day.

        I had to learn when to slow, when to risk fast overtake; how to swerve from
        old men and stray cow; horn and flush quick business out the bush.

        I thinking now: Bipti was a real expert at love life and ladder moves  ̶ 
        forward, sideways; bypass, off the back foot moves. Left a lot of memory and
        sadness behind her, but that girl know how to measure steps; showing
        motion you barely notice as night slips out to day.

        If you ask me, most people born and bred in Canal District (except maybe my
        vest and pants neighbour Ganpat) know how to stake and hold a way in the
        world. People born and bred elsewhere does suffer  ̶  too much name match
        set, where wind blows.

        Take that girl from Wakenaam, Babsie. Start out moving to the city; take up
        with a city man (common law marriage, one child). The man catch she looking
        at another man, and warn her. He come home one night and plunge a bread
        knife in her neck. Just like that. Stab up her chest thirty times. It was in the
        papers, all over the news.

        R. Dookie
        Canal District, Guyana