Do! You! Know!!! Who I am??

“You know Annie, I really wish I know a Person of Influence. I would go around grabbin’ people by they shirt front and hollering in they face, do you know who I am, Do You Know Who I Am??” I did have a particular bad morning at the post office one day last week, trying to mail a package Abroad. Annie, friend, confidante, I thought, would lend me kind, caring, compassionate ears over the phone.

Annie snicker. “You know G, my brother friend say he can’t believe that people still go around saying that in this day and age. My brother friend had some altercation with a man two days ago and the man ask he, do you know who I am, do you KNOW who I am?”

Truth to tell, not all Persons of Influence (Pifle, pronounced “piffle”) does prance around stuff-up in tiny egos as delicate as tutus; some Persons of Influence can be truly lacking in arrogance and bullyism. In a small town like this where law don’t seem to work sometimes, ordinary citizens does want to know Very Big Pifle.

Plenty, plenty times, when ordinary citizen apply for land and they ain’t getting the title; when they feel the law working unfairly against them; or when they can’t get they decent, quiet child into a good school, ordinary citizen does say, “What me can do? Me can’t do nothing, me ain’t know Nobody.”

“Nobody” is another name, colloquial one, for Very Big Person of Influence.

Well, like most ordinary citizens, I ain’t know Nobody either. But I refuse to lose heart; one day I gon know a Really, Very Big Pifle. In the meantime, I practicing.

“Do you know who I am? Do You KNOW Who I Am?” I ask Annie on the phone.

Annie snicker. “What happen, you got amnesia?"

“Do you know who I am? Do You KNOW Who I Am?” I ask my mother who been brushing she hair.

My mother continue brushing she hair. Then she notice me standing there waiting. She stop for a brief moment to answer.

“Queen of Sheba?”

The pure white line

I read somewhere, a butterfly flutter he wings in one country and earthquake happen in another part of the world.

Reality, me dear, ain't pretty like a butterfly.

Somewhere out there, right now as I type, a young Wall Street hotshot is in he razzle-dazzle apartment snorting a pure white line up he nose-hole.

That line connect he to my country, tie he to sellers here, twist and knot them together along a violent razor edge.

Boom, a father get threatened…if you don’t back off we case, we gon kidnap your li’l daughter and cut off she fingers and send them to you.

Clang, innocent gyal travelling to Abroad for the first time get throw in jail, she carry a bottle o’ rum for she boyfriend (she love, she life); she didn’t know he put stuff in it for she to deliver to somebody Abroad.

Later, Wall Street hotshot gon phone he grandma. I need more money, Grannie, my rent is so high, I don’t know how my salary goes so fast. You think he care how that pure white line tie he innocent grannie to sellers here? If he ain’t care about that, why then he should care about we who he ain’t know? Third world faces without names, a brown mass in a country that is transshipment for the stuff that give he bliss. If we tell he about the anxiety we go through because of that stuff, he might just laugh. Here, snort this, he gon say.

The anxiety ain’t obvious; is like your shadow in daylight, you don’t notice it because it always there and you take it for granted. But every now and then when darkness break loose, when you get a power cut and you light a candle, the glow cast your shadow huge up on the wall and you can’t help but see it. In that same way you become aware of this lurking uneasiness.

Like the time I been going back to university, and a mother ask me to carry a fruit cake for she daughter who didn’t come home for the holidays. The mother is a good woman, from strong Catholic background, wealthy Portuguese family; the daughter was me high-school friend, a kind, caring gyal, so of course, I didn’t think twice to say yes.

I collect the cake, keep it on we dining table, I would fetch it in me hand luggage. The evening before I travel, Auntie Babba [who been living in Guyana then] peer at the cake. Give me a knife, she say. No, no, you can’t cut it, I protest. I am not cutting it, she say, just give me a knife. I give she the knife and she poke and jook and examine. Mm-hm, it’s okay, she say. Why you do that, I ask, still puzzled.

“You never know who to trust these days and what they can put inside that cake,” me dearest, dearest auntie say.

We didn’t have a blackout that night but a shadow rear up big and frightening, then it hit me, the truth. About what me auntie been saying.

The truth. In miniscule ways law abiding citizens must pay because of it.

Like everybody else, I just go about me business but sometimes that truth make me angry because of the hours, no, days we waste trying to do a simple thing like mail a package overseas. Ain’t so easy no more since the curry powder fiasco.

About a year ago somebody hide the white stuff in a tin o’ curry powder and post it to overseas through the customs section in the general post office. As the story go, them customs people in the post office didn’t examine the curry powder properly, they only stir the top. The tin of curry powder reach all the way to the airport before the machine there discover the white stuff. But the sender didn’t get ketch because he or she did write a wrong mailing address on the package.

Immediately after that, a new rule burst on the scene. Senders of packages must provide proof of address. No problem. Except nobody ain’t tell we what is a proper “proof of address”. So back and forth, from home to post office, the people go, including me, with various proofs. Driver license one day. Stamped, addressed envelope that had snail mail another day. One girl in the line say this is she fourth attempt to send some DVD’s to she sister in Canada.

One day, there I been in the line again, still trying to mail a birthday gift to me li’l nephew. Suddenly, a gyal with a wrong proof of address burst into rage at the customs officer. “Look lady, move from here,” the custom officer shout. I could see the frustration on he face too.

Wow, I think, suppose, just suppose he is a spiteful man, and he note down she name and address and ID card number, and the next time she post a package, he tell he friends at the airport, look, put some white stuff in this package to get back at she for me. Or suppose she travel, and he tell he airport friends, plant some stuff in she suitcase, suppose, just suppose.

Crazy, crazy thought about one incident as slight as a butterfly shaking he wings, and it ain’t gon cause no earthquake in no other damn place. Crazy, anxious thought that, because they crave that white stuff over there, one li’l dispute here can change a gyal whole life.

Clang, just so.

Blog dream

…trying to blog…read blog posts…can't connect to links...got to touch them with pointing finger, but still ain’t connecting.

Eh? The computer don’t look like a computer…it is a glossy Aussie calendar, birds, flowers, bright, beautiful photographs. Dust, dust…dust cover the calendar, thick, brown dust curling and clumping, I need to clean, I got a Swiffer cloth…wipe, wipe.

Ah, I get on to one blog, Cream blog. What the…?!? Cream got a new name, new style, he is now holier than thou and self-righteous and…oh my gosh…75 comments!! Since when people so interested in religious rantings? And Zoe pretending to be a man, writing as if she is a man. And Dan is a mad, wild cat.

Oh, look, mosquito net all around me, thank goodness, I wake up, I can't bear to know what everybody else morph into…

ESP.

Dear Friends, Family, Fellow Bloggers, Freaders [Readers, but I goin’ so good with the F, I might as well continue],

I feelin’ too shame.

I got a pile of emails that I ain’t reply to as yet, some months old.

When you see me taking so long to reply, please, please, I begging you, don’t think that I snubbing you. I ain’t the snobby type. I might be mischievous like schoolboy, vulgah like market-vendor, prim like Ms. Prissy, impatient like mini-bus driver [well, almost, as nooooobaddy can be impatient like them]...but I ain’t the snobby type, no way Hozay. People matter too much to me. As Cousin Lis say, she does get high on people. Same with me.

I take a year and a day to reply because I got so many beads on me platter to string, purses to sew, wall hangings to embroider, house to clean, junk to throw out [yesterday I throw away ten bags of t’ings]; market to go to, sometimes lunch to cook, salad to make and wares to wash; mother to try and boss but she does ignore me because she think she is the Boss, Annie to share ideas with over the phone, and Val too, oh shucks, I ain’t call Val in a good while; I got a very slow dial-up connection to the net plus I got manuscript to print on a printer that got willing spirit but weak body, I think I can, I think I can the po’ thing go.

Truth to tell, I try really hard to contact you all via ESP but everybody ignoring me.

Channel 2 and the blue tennis ball

I don’t know the origin of the story, who tell somebody who tell my first big brother who thoroughly aggravate me with it. But two nights ago I experience a modern, literal twist to the tale of the blue tennis ball.

Me and ma been watching a’ African movie, On Bended Knees. Man love he wife ‘til the day he believe that she was unfaithful. He ill-treat she and kick she out. Then years later the man discover that the wife never cheat on he.

Five minutes or so left for the movie to end.

Braps. The movie cut.

“The movie will continue after News Break,” a notice say.

“This is just like the blasted blue tennis ball,” I quarrel.

“Whaz that?” ma ask.

“A boy had to write Common Entrance exams. He daddy promise he, son, if you pass you exams I gon buy you a nice, nice gift. The son think, aaah, I gon get a Bullohvah or Ohmeegah watch. Thoughts of the watch full up he head, that alone make he pass he exams.

He father say, son, now is time for your gift. The son tear open paper, pull open box, heart-racing. Then he heart nearly stop. No expensive watch been in the box. Only a blue tennis ball.

The son ask, daddy, why you buy me a blue tennis ball? The father say, son, one day you gon find out.

The son write ‘O’ Levels. The father promise he a wonderful gift. The son think, aaah, now I gon get me Bullohvah or Ohmeegah watch.

The son pass he exams. And the father buy he a blue tennis ball. When the son ask why, the father say, son, one day you gon know.

The son write ‘A’ Levels. The father say, son, I gon buy you a fabulous gift. The son think, I know I ain’t gon get the Bullohvah watch or the Ohmeegah watch. But you never know, I might get a car this time…

He pass he exams. The father buy he a blue tennis ball. The son ask why, the father say, son, one day you gon know.

And so the son story go - he move on to university, write exams, graduate, find a great job, marry, get children. And every time he achieve, the father does give he a blue tennis ball.

Old age take over the father, he get sick, gone in hospital. The son visit he.

The son ask, daddy, tell me nah…why you always buy me a blue tennis ball? Why daddy, why?

The father look at he son, well son, y’see…is like this…aaahhh… And the father dead.”

While I tell ma this story them bleddy news break and repair, mud road turn to pitch-road and cow give birth to kyat and…

…Channel 2 switch off…a blue screen appear.

3 links

that mean plenty to me:

All about blogging and writing.(T’ank you, Mike.)

String literature of Brasil.

Britain backs Guyana's rainforest plan.

...and no, no, you ain't got to make a comment, just storing them here...

A (euphemistic) tale from the abattoir.

Annie visit we the other night. After she drink homemade ginger beer, gyaff (chat) li’l bit and gone I remember the time, about a month ago, when she been to the bloody-stink and filthy abattoir. ‘Abattoir’, by the way, is Guyanese-euphemism for ‘slaughter house’. Now what a nice gyal like Annie been doing in a place like that ain’t the point. The point is the conversation she overhear there.

A woman at the abattoir been telling another woman about one o’ them herbal doctors night show on local tee vee.

A man phone Herbal Doctor on the tee vee show. The man complain that he pencil does break too soon when a woman sharpen it. But when he masticate the pencil it don't break too soon.

“Is your pencil too short?” Herbal Doctor ask.

Of course, the man deny this with great belligerence. "No! No! My pencil is not too short! It is not short at all!!!"

When the woman in the abattoir done relay this tee vee show to she friend, the friend say, "He does masticate he pencil? He gon go blind. I read it in a book."

I ain’t know the point to this tale at all…

A fulfilling 2008 to one and all…

2007 end with me belly so chack-full, up to now them cupboards in me tummy pack-up. From Christmas day to yesterday, I eat eat eat. All kinda food been on different tables in various places, here and there. Grilled salmon. Baked sweet potatoes. Bhagee. Roti. Ginger beer. Curry beef and roast beef for meat-eaters. Milkshakes. Fruit cakes. Chocolate cake. Tea. Don’t ever fo’get the tea. Salad with lemon juice, dill and chop-up shallots. Baked chicken. Rice. Carrots and green things. More veggies. Baked tomatoes stuff-up with cheese. The days following Christmas we hang out with long-awaited family from Seattle who bring gifts from sister, cousins, auntie.

I am sure y’all eat plenty too, wherever you been…so…let us retire to the library, dear folks, puff away at rotund cigars and drink port or brandy or whatever them men of high society used to imbibe in olde English literature, I hope you don’t think badly of me for drinking the humble l’eau though…

I want to make a li’l wish for everybody. Salut. Sante. Good health to all for 2008. Prosperity. Happiness. Love. Warm hugs on cold days. Nice cool drinks when your life-pot get too hot.

Ahhh…now let we recline, rest we hands on we pretend paunches, burp in ungentlemanly and unladylike ways and gyaff…chat…what plans you got for this new year?