Henry in Guyana

Once again it's been a while since my last post, and now with just over 7 weeks left in the country I suppose there won't be that many more. Anyway, the past couple of weeks have seen a lot of activity - a trip to a beautiful house across the Essequibo, Mashramani and plenty of partying inbetween. There's a bar in Georgetown called Jerries which is open pretty much all of the time - visits at 4 or 5 in the morning are always entertaining as it is the "wash-down" place to be, so I've been spending a bit of time there recently.

Last weekend a group of 15 hired a bus and headed West, across the Demerara (my first crossing of the harbour bridge) to Parika which is a major crossing point over the Essequibo. The Essequibo is in parts a massive river, and I am told is 26 miles wide at its mouth. Anyway we boarded a boat and took about an hour-long trip up and across the river to Bartica, a mining town a little inland. The boat then took us 1 minute further up the river to Bidarabu, a big wooden house with five big bedrooms, big verandas, a swimming pool and a private beach. Well I say private, when I went down there in the morning a local woman was having a wash so I had to make myself scarce pretty quickly but essentially it is a secluded spot - perfect for a party!



It felt like something from a Hollywood film; a pool party with seemingly endless food, rum, party games and splashing around in a swimming pool. I know one of the biggest things I will miss about Guyana will be sitting outside in the warm weather. The group was great fun too - a significant number are development workers, who are much more glamorous than volunteers. I get the impression that there's an ex-pat hierarchy, from volunteer types (like me) at the very bottom, living in basic housing and counting cash, right through development workers with housing allowances and all the way up to diplomats with swimming pools and guards. Anyway this crowd is particularly good fun and our weekend was a non-stop party although some people balked when I cracked out the rum again the following morning. Hair of the dog I suppose...

The following Tuesday was Mashramani - Guyana's carnival. I went on the road at about midday and it seemed that every square meter lining the road had someone with a cooler or a stand selling beer and food. There were barbeques everywhere and floats from different groups, organisations and political parties. It was very jolly, although it seemed to take a long time (sometimes an hour and a half) between floats. The first part of the day was quite overcast but when the sun came out in the afternoon it got seriously hot. In the evening a small group of us went to sit by the sea wall and watch the sun set which was nice, and very busy. There were cars and speakers playing loud music everywhere which meant there were people bouncing and dancing everywhere - in Guyana, if there's music everyone bounces.


That evening we went to a Machel Montano concert, who is apparently a leading Soca star from Trinidad. It was great fun - although the support act didn't start until past midnight and he didn't come on until 2am, and he was only on for about 90 minutes. Still, armed with some brown rum we had a good group and it was a great show.

So after all this partying it's time to calm down a little - although it's Paguah on Monday so another day off and a party at someone's house. I'm also organising a final trip down to the Rupununi for Rodeo which is at Easter weekend. Still, I have also spent some time at Mercy Wings school recently and their computers are now in good condition and next I hope to help another VSO set up some literacy software on there. Saints is doing well too - I'm moving towards wrapping things up and leaving it to improve without me.


Until next time...

Well, it's been a while since my last post, mainly due to a large number of things going on at once. The last week has been very busy as my Mum came out to Guyana to visit me. Her last visit to the country was in 1985 so things will have changed a bit. Apparently the main differences are more cars, traffic lights and imported goods, but otherwise the feel is the same. I think she had a good time and got to meet up with some people she hadn't seen for a very long time. I took her to have a look around Saints and Mercy Wings, and also took her along to Woodside choir to see what that was like! During her visit I got plenty of free meals which is always a bonus.

For the weekend we went to a resort called Arrowpoint for an overnight trip. It was nice there - although a little odd as we were the only two people so we rattled around a bit. Nevertheless we did a few walks in the forest, kayaked and went on a few boat trips where we saw some small Cayman. Most people have recommended it to me but I think it would be best with a decent sized group - I think our trip only ran because two guys came out with us to fix the wireless internet.. I have now packed her off on a plane to Carnival in Trinidad where I imagine she will have a great time.

It's coming up to Mashramani - Guyana's own carnival and there are a number of events going on in the lead up to it. One was a Steel pan competition held at the National sports hall in Georgetown which I went to last night. It was a really great evening with a good atmosphere. There were soloists and duets which got a bit drowned out by the ambient noise (people selling stuff and shouting "Pringles", "Nuts" from time to time, as well as general chatter and shuffling) but the best shows were from the bands. The police band ended up winning but there were a number of very good acts. Everyone played the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah (which comes off surprisingly well on the steel pan) and a piece of their own choice, which in all cases involved a lot of jumping around, swapping of pans and so on. By the end everyone was bouncing around and for the police band encore the centre of the hall was filled with bopping persons.


An entertaining aspect which to me didn't actually detract from the event was that it started (naturally) very late. With a start time of 5pm I dutifully took my seat at 4:58pm at which point a couple of the bands were still arranging their instruments and unpacking. Music finally started at 6:30pm "a few minutes late" which apparently was to "allow for efficiency later on". I didn't see much of the efficiency and it didn't finish till 10pm but nevertheless it was good fun. Other funny things included a chap selling nuts wearing a blue Cellink (mobile phone operator) cape and chef's hat, and the fact that there was one slow person serving at the food table with no change and 100 hungry customers not exactly queuing during the interval.

As for everything else, well with just over 2 months left it's time to get on with things. This week I'm going to be spending some time at Mercy Wings so I imagine there will be more on that shortly.

Until next time...

In my time here my perception has varied in terms of the famous Caribbean laid-back stereotype. On the one hand, people in the street walk pretty slowly, sometimes to the extent of not really moving, but on the other hand the minibuses tear around town trying to get more fares. The bus park by Stabroek Market is also full of hustle and bustle - I have yet to walk past and not see a loud argument between a number of conductors over who stole who's customer. Unassertive individuals looking for a bus will be herded all over the place by men shouting and pointing at their respective buses.

In general though, things run slowly, and in my opinion a bit too slowly. I received a parcel the other day, and had to go to the post office to pick it up. It turned up pretty quickly, but then it had to be opened, looked at, shuffled around, looked at some more, taped up, put in a pile, then put in another pile before being given to me which took almost an hour. I appreciate that it had to be checked by a customs officer and handled correctly, but it seemed to me that the staff were wondering around aimlessly just picking up whatever parcel looked like it needed doing.

To be fair it was compounded a bit by a couple of Project Trust lads I bumped into in the queue (one of whom I knew already) who had about 10 parcels coming in between them. Their time sounds pretty adventurous - another village only accessible by boat with no power and contactable only by post that can take months to arrive.

Customer service is often a little shabby, with aloof or entirely uninterested shop assistants who volunteer one word answers when you try and buy things. Of course this is an extreme, and I've had my fair share of friendly shop assistants but this kind of thing makes you less likely to buy stuff! As always however, the bad things jump out at you whilst the good things are quietly ignored. There is something quite interesting about a place of small shops and businesses that largely hasn't been touched by the capitalist machine. Perhaps it doesn't dare.

The next adventure is a trip to Lethem and the Rupununi on the Brazilian border. I'm going down on Friday to stay over Christmas, which will include, I gather, a stay on a cattle ranch which will involve riding horses and herding cattle. I have been on two pony rides in my life so that will be interesting. I am also told we might try to kill and eat a deer. I have managed to get on a cheap flight down which will be my first trip on a small plane (I think a six-seater) as well as my first proper trip into the interior. The journey back will be a 15-hour bus trip which will be equally exciting I think. Hopefully lots of pictures etc. on my return...

I still find it a little odd hearing Christmas music all the time whilst wandering around in the blaring heat outside. Still, I'm getting more of a feel for it as the landlady provided us with some decorations which have certainly enhanced the bachelor pad.



Last night I went to the Scotia Bank Christmas carol trip around Georgetown delivering hampersto six homes for children and the elderly. We were led by a truck with a small band singing soca Christmas carols (occasionally sneaking other words in, like "We wish you a Scotia Christmas" and "Sco-o-o-o-o-otiabank" replacing gloria in Ding Dong Merilly on high). Everyone else followed on a number of donkey (read horse) carts, some were part of a competition and were dressed as various Christmassy things which was an entertaining sight.


 The less adventurous followed in cars, and perhaps this was not a bad idea as I gather someone was hospitalised after catching their foot in a wheel and there have been other accidents in previous years. Anyway it was good fun and as you can see I got into the Christmas spirit...

I've been here for five weeks now and continue to get a better feel for the country, so here's a few things I've noticed. In terms of vehicles, a favourite seems to be the Nissan Titan which is a (probably unnecessarily) huge car. I have yet to see any Hum-vees but I am told there are a few. There isn't a huge amount of space on some roads so I imagine having an oversized vehicle might be a bit of a challenge.

There's a reasonable amount of wildlife in Georgetown; most roads have trenches running along either side - deep gutters (maybe 2 feet) which once I imagine provided drainage but are now stagnant and have quite a bit of rubbish in them. There are little things swimming around in there, I'm not sure if they are fish or lizard things but there is life. Some parts are covered, with boards or concrete, and sometimes there are just big holes in the pavement, and I don't imagine it would be very nice to fall in. The other night I was walking home from volunteer frisbee and felt my foot come against something followed by a splash in the trench. It turned out I had inadvertently booted a rat into the water - it quickly scrambled out and ran into some bushes. Rats are not generally visible so this was a bit of a surprise, although there are plenty of dogs roaming around looking for food. Fortunately, there's enough around as there are used polystyrene food cartons all around. Many areas are quite messy, and in most areas there aren't any bins. Main Street is an exception - there is a central walkway where local craftsmen sell quite impressive wooden carvings, and there are bins all along and it makes for a nice place to walk in my opinion.

I haven't seen as many insects as I expected, just the occasional tiny lizard thing in the shower and they keep themselves to themselves. Cockroaches are rarely in sight but I'm sure they're here having a good time on bits of food and so on. Fears of a tarantula wandering over the back of the sofa were misplaced however, and at least in Georgetown there isn't any more insect life than anywhere else I have been. I have plans to venture into the bush in the new year where things will be a bit different I imagine, but more on that some other time. The flying insects like to bite, and they haven't given up, I've taken to staying in my work clothes to cover up my skin in the evening as it is a bit of a pain and you can feel them having a meal. In the morning I usually wake up to see four or five mosquitoes sitting above my head on the mosquito net licking their lips, just waiting for the chance...

It's been a busy few days again, I have just returned from playing the piano at a rehearsal for the St. Stanislaus College choir, made up of 11-13 year olds mainly. I am not really an experienced accompanist so it will take a little work, but tomorrow we are rehearsing in the Cathedral which should be fun. I have yet to come across any pianos in really good condition, most are fairly tired uprights that don't quite hold their tuning and it goes down from there. Both the Catholic and Anglican Cathedrals have magnificent-looking organs, but I haven't heard either of them; I hope they are in good condition but I think organs cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to refurbish so they may also be a little tired.

On Friday I attended sports day which was quite a jolly affair. It is run by the school governors and as a result was quite a slick operation. There was a varying level of support from the teachers, but there was a good number who really threw themselves into it which was appreciated by the students.

The atmosphere was very strong - much more than the sports days I have attended. It was held at the former national cricket ground, where in its prime a number of cricket stars played. The event began with a very impressive march past, where each of the four houses had a team of dressed-up marchers who had to march in time and parade in front of some judges (complete with drummers who may have been from the army). Have a look at this video which captures a bit of the atmosphere. I'd actually seen some rehearsing at school but not really understood why a small girl was bossing a load of others around in the assembly forum.

Once this was over the main competition began which contained all the usual events. There were some hotly contested teachers races too (which got the crowd roaring), as well as some more fun ones including tug-of-war, sack races and my favourite - late for school. This race involved perhaps some of the less athletic students starting in just their shorts and a vest. At the starting pistol they had to get dressed from a pile of clothes with shirts, ties, shoelaces etc all sorted and make it to the finish line.

All in all it was really a good day out and most importantly the students seemed to enjoy themselves and have a great competitive spirit. Hopefully in the future it can be as successful as an entirely staff-run event.

Today I went with a friend of mine to a Catholic church on the outskirts of Georgetown to collect some food to take to feed the homeless. I am not a religious person myself but I thought I'd go along and help out.

Anyway, today we packaged the food (rice, pasta and fish mainly) into polystyrene boxes and put them all in the back of a taxi to take into Georgetown. There are a reasonable number of homeless in Georgetown. Not everywhere, but around the place. Some are just plain homeless, but there are plenty with serious health problems, disabilities and so on who have nowhere to go. Guyana does not appear to have much of a welfare system - having said that I have yet to notice any children on the streets which I believe is common in other developing countries. Various churches and organisations seem to make an effort to at least provide a meal when they can.

Anyway, we drove around and made a few stops dropping off food. Usually once we started serving more would appear; it was strictly one per person but plenty tried the "I'm taking one for my friend" approach which I suppose is understandable. They were all shabbily dressed as you can imagine and many were missing teeth - the chap in the photo below only had one leg and hopped around. Apparently crutches were provided but he sold them - here you can see him offering some of his food to a dog. There are a lot of stray dogs in Georgetown who are all very skinny and spend their time scavenging.

In a way what we did was a drop in the ocean, but the hope is to build momentum and demonstrate that there can be a charitable society in a country with a great disparity in wealth. It was an enlightening experience, and on reflection, one that I didn't need to be in Guyana to take part in.

Having been in Georgetown for nearly two weeks now, I have a few more observations to make. Firstly, transport around the city is quite good. Taxis are cheap at less than £1 for most journeys, and there are buses at around 30p. Tourists are generally advised against buses as they are dangerous - and I agree. I assume that by going faster they pick up more passengers and get more fares, but they are very aggressive, zoom around and are always overtaking. Buses are small minivan things (resembling a VW camper) and have the usual sliding door at the back. Every bus has a conductor, who has the role of hanging out of the window shouting at passers by, shuffling passengers and collecting money. It seems that like any half-decent single sculler, conductors have to have a definite style (dreadlocks, big sunglasses, jewelery etc.) presumably to attract attention.

Junctions in Georgetown are mainly hectic - there appears to be some unwritten rule about when to wait and when to go, but it requires care all round. There are some, apparently recently introduced, quite fancy traffic lights which count down until the next change which are interesting. A lot of private cars have big sound systems, and as such they tend to set of nearby car alarms. It also seems that all car alarms use the same sound chip as those toy laser gun things that change sound every 5 seconds.

There are food sellers everywhere - today I had another shark puri which cost me 90p and was more than enough. Apparently the way to make money here is to work for yourself, and the food carts stop by outside all the schools. It is likely that they make far more than the teachers do.

On a more sombre note, Georgetown has been going through a little trouble recently with a lot in the news - Brickdam police station just one block down from me was fired upon by a number of men with AK-47s as well as another police outpost. Don't worry mum - I'll try not to go for a stroll through any crossfire at 3am. There have also been other incidents including arson at a school, a kidnapping and one other which I won't link to here and involves a torture case. For a closer look at the current news see Kaiteur and Stabroek News.

Posted once the blackout was over...

This morning, my first day at St. Stanislaus, began with a power blackout and so for the first half of the day we couldn't use the computers. This evening I was just enjoying my dinner when another blackout hit. Some fresh mangoes had fallen off a tree overlooking the yard so the landlady gave them to us - in the picture you can see me chopping them up (rather badly) as me and the other two chaps in the apartment sit in the candlelight. The others have gone to bed now and I am sitting here at 9pm (it's pitch back outside) running off my laptop battery with one candle having burnt out and only the stub of another left. I'm feeding bits of wax to it to keep it going. Need to not drop my torch in when I go to the bathroom...

Earlier I took a walk down Regent Street which is the major shopping street in Georgetown. I popped into a little supermarket style shop and picked up a few Western delights - milk, cereal, squash and a pack of sweets. In particular I picked up this "Tropical Punch" which isn't quite squash but you wouldn't have it neat either. It's very red, and really sells itself with the slogan (which you can see if you click to enlarge) "Irresistible" followed by the slogan "Less than 1% Juice". Hmmm. Anyway I also picked up these cubic jelly sweets called Jubes which are quite tasty. It was perhaps not as authentic as venturing to the market but it was a little taste of home to walk around a shop with aisles and fridge compartments.

The food so far in general has been very good - the landlady is a caterer and provides us with plenty of food for a good price money. In fact food in Georgetown is very cheap compared to London - you can get a big meal in a cafe for around 650GYD which is just under £2. Travel around town is ok too - walking in daylight in crowded areas is fine (although muggings do occur) but everyone I've met takes cabs once it gets really dark (about 7pm). Cabs are everywhere and inexpensive - a short drop is 300GYD, just under £1.

The heat is a slightly different story; I'm still enjoying it but long walks are not really on and our apartment is very sheltered and thus doesn't have a breeze. Fans and cool drinks make it perfectly ok, although you need a fan right on you to sleep. I hope the power comes on at some point tonight as without fans it can be quite stifling and bed time will probably harken back again to the days of the lightweight dream. I'm not a bad sleeper however the landlady owns a couple of dogs which seem to be permanently chained up in the yard (they're not big on animal welfare here) and they like to bark aggressively at each other every couple of hours during the night. One is outside my window so it can be a bit of a shock sometimes but all of these things only add to the adventure - whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

The last candle just went out.

Early on Saturday morning I headed off to the airport to leave Barbados and head for Guyana. The plane was a small 50-seater Dash-8 turboprop aircraft. It was my first time on such a small aircraft - it felt more like a bus than a plane. The engines were pretty noisy and at points it was a little like having your head inside a tractor engine. After an hour or so of flight I caught a glimpse of the South American coastline. The Caribbean blue sea abruptly stopped and was replaced by muddy brown, caused I think by the huge rivers that flow into the sea there. We flew past the Essequibo river which is very wide and has some huge islands in it.

The feature that struck me the most however was the jungle. Guyana has huge amounts of jungle, and as we flew in apart from a few roads and rivers there was green as far as the eye could see. Once the plane landed landed I collected my bag and was picked up by a British ex-pat who drove me into Georgetown. The feel was very different to Barbados - it was very exciting to have finally made it to Guyana.

On the way in we stopped off, changed some money and I purchased a Guyanese sim card for my phone. There are about 330 dollars to the pound here, and they tend to circulate in 1000 dollar notes. Given that this is about £3, to carry any amount of money involves quite a big wad. Georgetown is very different to Barbados in a number of ways. Firstly, Barbados is a primarily black population, and someone of my complexion immediately stands out as a tourist. Guyana is far more mixed, and whilst most are Indian or African in descent, there are a number of Portuguese, Chinese and any number of combinations. As a result, I don't really stand out. Secondly, the atmosphere is very different - this is not a tourist place, and so there aren't many people out spying for tourists to get their attention. This all makes for a quite friendly feel. I dropped my stuff off at the place I am staying - with a retired teacher who has worked at my link school, St. Stanislaus. Almost immediately we went to a small cafe place where I was laughed at for having chicken curry and noodles but it was quite tasty. Another chap had what they call souse - this can be made with a number of things but one of the favourites is cow face. That's right, cow face. It's a slow cooked stewy broth kind of with bits of meat in - I'll have to try it.

We spent the afternoon going to bars, drinking vodka with water and lime which is not bad at all. We met up with a few more people including a chap who owned a club where we went later on and had some food. The atmostphere is quite unique here - some of the bars are houses on normal residential streets with most people sitting outside. We had a driver who took us from place to place which is a bit different to doing a bar crawl in Durham. Having said that, it gets dark early and you probably want a driver just to be safe.

The accent is strong here and will take a bit of getting used to. I don't stand out until I open my mouth - there have been a few jokes at my expense; I imagine I am a very stereotypical English boy. Since I have only been here a few hours so I haven't really got my bearings at all. I am quite central though as it's just two minutes down the road to St. Georges Cathedral, until recently the tallest wooden structure in the world. This afternoon we are driving off to a place along the coast for some duck curry. On Monday I hope to visit St. Stanislaus College where I will be based. The reaction of some people to my project has been interesting, apparently I'm in for a shock. Watch this space....

A short tour of the apartment, introduced by the landlady's dog...