LORD HAVE MERCY! The two Barbadoses concept has gone crazy.
If Bizzy builds us a few more islands, we’re soon gonna have a whole Barbados Archiepelligro!
I mean, the Barbados Ralph Thorne, Peter Wickham, Tennyson Joseph and them were talking about on Sunday, and Corey Lane on Monday, bears not the slightest semblance to the one I live in.
It started with the Wickham poll. I’m no fan of polls, especially since they undoubtedly encourage vote-buying in marginal constituencies.
But apparently Peter lives in a Barbados where supermarket shoppers sidle up to bend his ear with their distress. My wife packs shelves in different supermarkets every day and reports shopping carts overflowing. One lady was telling her recently how she bought goat’s milk but didn’t have the heart to drink it.
“So I gave some to the dog and he started to jump and prance. I gave the rest to the cat and she jumped even higher. So I’ve come to buy some for myself.”
In Q In The Community Barbados, hundreds sing and dance happily. In depressed Brass Tacks Barbados, “people live from pay cheque to pay cheque”. In my Barbados, a contractor told me last week how a Guyanese worker asked him to keep his savings for him. In three months he had saved (saved, mind you, not earned) over $10 000, which he sent home. I’ve heard similar figures quoted elsewhere.
Maybe Rickey Singh can explain the paradox of our struggling Barbadians versus our flourishing Guyanese. Hint: when asked why he didn’t put his money in the bank, the Guyanese said that if his girlfriend found out how much money he had, it would be gone in a flash.
It’s claimed that left to themselves men would walk around limber and relaxed. It’s women who make things hard. Could that be the reason?
I really can’t complain. Last week Billy Poop in the village told me to pass by for a pig liver and light, which the wife made into a stew. Anthony Nicholls sent down enough free veggies to open a stall plus bottles of exlicious cane juice. I’m living like a king.
And don’t talk about money! Email from one Rev. Sister Esther read: “You have been compensated with US$800 000 by the United Nations”. I haven’t even bothered to collect or find out what it’s for because I’m sure the new Sunday Sun is going to spring for even more than that.
Check this. Two weeks ago I made a joke involving Dennis Johnson. I did my due diligence and have in writing from Dennis he would not have sued although he would’ve preferred 70 well tried lasses to 70 virgins. The Nation cut the whole Dennis Johnson mention.
Yet in the Sunday Sun Al Gilkes has a calypso about alleged prostitutes “round the
Garrison exposing . . . bet your life is to Lowdown they selling . . . ”
Is that not a grievous calumny on my character? Associating a paradigm of virtue with whoremongering? For the record, I’ve only ever had two brushes with prostitutes. Once at age 12 while waiting by the fire station with brother Bill for a lift, a lady offered to show us a “golden rabbit” for a fee. Bill wouldn’t go. He was never into animals like me.
Then at the Miramar in Trinidad I was tempted by a light-skinned exotic dancer. After her performance, she would disappear for about 20 minutes with a client, reappear and repeat. I alas realised that if she went out with me and came back two minutes later, the other UWI fellows would never let me live it down. So I didn’t.
Nothing incenses me more nowadays than girls being forced to engage in prostitution by unscrupulous pimps. One American girl was beaten up every time she didn’t make her US$1 000 a day target. Put me down as solidly against the exotic dancer/prostitute business.
Finally, Sunday, if I live, 40 years with the wife. No easy ride. Seldom a word of praise to cheer the labouring swain. Last week I thought things were changing. She was entertaining an old school friend and I overheard her say: “Richard does it equally well in any position. And he can keep it up for hours!” I was feeling spranky until the friend replied: “Poor you! My Frank snores too, but nothing like that!”
*Richard Hoad is a farmer and social commentator.
Email [email protected].
