Dear Editor,

I enjoyed the cultural extravaganza staged at the National Culture Centre to welcome our eminent visitors to the Rio Summit. However, three things continue to puzzle me.

(1) Why weren’t the empty seats filled with secondary school students?

(2) Were the roses authentic, couldn’t we have chosen our own homegrown beautiful and exotic heliconias or ginger lilies?

(3) Finally, the voices of the boy’s choir were refreshing, but who dressed them in that ill-fitting inappropriate garb? Do we have to continue aping other cultures in terms of what we see as being “appropriately dressed” for the occasion in hot tropical Guyana? School uniform is so unique.

Yours faithfully,

Clare Smartt