There is a lovely Rupununi hammock in our house; one which has given me much relaxation and sound sleep recently. Stretched out in it this morning, noticing the interlocking patterns of the weave, with the brown and the white and the green strands wound tightly together, it suddenly occurred to me how much what I was looking at was, in fact, a reflection of the society I live in, where, of late, different strands in the population have become a subject for the political and racial discords around us. The irony is that the various strands of mankind that constitute Guyana, often seen as proof of discord or division, should be seen in fact as the opposite – in that they constitute the strength of the nation with each strand bringing some benefit or unique contribution to the whole. Living away in sprawling metropolitan areas in North America, Europe, etc., with a mix of immigrants from around the world, it had gradually dawned on me in the late 1960s that the very efficient combination of skills from various lands that thrive and contribute to those places was exactly the same mix we had grown up with in Guyana; in other words, our diversity, the contributions from various individual races making up our whole culture, was in fact the single most powerful thing about us; and, in the same moment one could see that when we, as adult Guyanese, moved to those “white people” metropolitan societies in North America, Europe, Australia, etc., we arrived ideally equipped to succeed because we were creatures of that diverse crucible; we may not have seen it all personally but we knew people or had people in our family who had, so that almost any job that was open in Toronto or Orlando or New York was one that a Guyanese could fill. In Toronto, for example, we had a Portuguese migrant, a Gonsalves, operating a Guyanese produce store just as he had done at home; as migrants we brought auto mechanics to Toronto, and bakers and dress makers and painters and carpenters and farmers – we were all those things and more, even musicians and dancers and painters, as we had been at home. The fabric of many strands, formed in the Third World land of Guyana, three thousand miles away, was now able to become a strong contributor to a First World Economy like Toronto or London or Miami and to even represent those metropolitan centres in sport around the world and function as teachers or medical personnel – we had come from the crucible ready, we were a complex fabric of many strands. We had come as a varied group, yes, but my hammock held the lesson that our history had made us a multi-faceted group able to plug into a range of occupations – we had the panoply to choose from – that’s how our upbringing of many strands had left us.
It is a realisation that should be sitting front and centre for us as we struggle with voting along racial lines whenever an election looms. Guyana is a fabric of many strands. The Indian one displaying that colourful culture, with its captivating cuisine and music and dress, so that mutton curry and dhall and the sari and the kurtah are ours; as the African dashiki and metemgee and roasted breadfruit are ours; and, similarly, we have Amerindian strands with pepperpot and tasso, and Chinese ones, not to forget some Portuguese touches (garlic pork and Shrove Tuesday pancakes) and even some colonial ones in bow-ties and English beer.
It may emerge in different forms, and is not necessarily immediately visible, but in many ways Guyanese end up selling ourselves short. Many of us are too busy noticing the different “looks” of our various races to recognise that that very “difference” is potentially our strength; we are a people of all-rounders. Notice that while we see some tendencies in certain careers – Indians and Amerindians in farming; blacks in construction; Chinese in restaurants or laundries; et cetera, that in fact there is considerable racial mingling in all these careers. To be concise, we are a nation of all-rounders, able as a group to put our hand to area B when no vacancies exist in area A, and in difficult economic times that is a condition with considerable value. I was to notice in my first marriage that my two children, Luana and Tony, would often remark on some particular skill or ability I had (repair a broken chair or lawn umbrella, or prune a tree, for instance) that I simply took for granted because of my upbringing; without even thinking about it I had picked up those skills growing up in Guyana, and there were hundreds of migrants like me all over North America impressing their young children in the same way.
Our leaders in various areas, not just in politics, should be pushing and prodding us to see ourselves that way and thereby fostering acceptance of diverse cultural strains – Portuguese and Chinese entrepreneurship; English respect for tradition and manners and integrity in public figures; African music and arts, and respect for their success in debilitating labour (punts; roadwork; porkknockers; sailors; timber workers) and for champion athletes in soccer, cricket, boxing, track and field, cycling; Indians coping with rice-field conditions, water up to the waist, or showing dexterity as gold smiths and farmers; Indian dress and jewellery; cricketers like Kallicharan and Kanhai and Shiv; Indian films and music and paintings from James Boodhoo, and Bernadette Persaud. In our mix, we have Amerindian dress and culinary achievements (pepperpot; cassava bread; dried meat tasso; cassareep) and leaders like Stephen Campbell; Chinese decorations and dragon figures in Mash, as well as fried rice; egg rolls; chow mein; spare ribs; etc., Portuguese garlic pork, Shrove Tuesday pancakes; Madeira wine; it is a huge and varied list, ultimately forming an impressive rainbow which, on closer examination, is seen to be not a monolith but a magical combination.
Granted, the primordial, the fears of “the other” going back to the caves, is at play denying the picture of a fabric to be recognised and flaunted, but until we embrace this condition as ours to treasure, our oft-mention “racial divisions” will continue to cripple us. It is no longer enough to parrot the words of the slogan “One people, one nation, one destiny.” We have to demonstrate by our actions that we believe them. Metaphorically, we have to look at the hammock and see the various strands. Granted, also, there some examples of some of us having reached that state, but they are too few and too occasional. They must become a flood. Without that cultural tsunami, the slogan will remain a dream.
