The Woman and The Jaguar
There was this woman who took care of us when we were younger and our mother went to work. My father had died and we were too young to be left alone. This lady was a close family friend but had lived alone in a forested area and came to help my mother until my sister was older. Our mother had to walk miles to go to work and would stay the night where she was whenever she finish too late. So this lady would come and stay with us. One night I had to use the toilet which was situated about quarter a mile from the house. When I came to the house’s door it was open but I thought someone had forgotten it that way. While in the toilet I heard the sound of a jaguar. I was very afraid though I knew that we did live in region one. I peeped through the crease at the back of the latrine and saw what appeared to be a jaguar in the bright moonlight. The strange thing about the jaguar was it looked different from pictures I saw, it was like I knew it was a jaguar but it also look a bit different. It walked around the latrine but the crease didn’t go all the way around so I lost my visual. When I peeped through the crease at the door I saw the woman walking toward the house. Without thinking anything, I ran out to meet the woman because I was afraid to walk to the house alone. When I told her about the animal and how we needed to hurry she said it’s gone because she chased it away.
Last week, it was established that although the annual mini-festival in Georgetown to start off the month of Amerindian Heritage in September could not be held this year, the power and importance of this heritage persists. This festival offers a brief glimpse of indigenous culture, both popular and traditional, each year. But the great strength of Amerindian civilisation may be accessed through the oral literature which still exists and does not depend on the annual mini-festival to be exhibited.
