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Costly Mistakes

Jun 01, 2012 Letters

 

 

Dear Editor,
Let us marvel for a while at expensive mistakes and try to see the comical side. I read your news item about the problem with the two Chinese-made vessels meant to ply the Essequibo route between Parika and Supenaam.
The vessel pictured looks more like a mini ocean cruiser than a ferry boat, and perhaps it should come as no surprise that the stellings have to be modified to be fit for purpose, and this may take a few months more.
This reminded me of the fiasco in the 1950s with the present Post Office building, which, at the time, caused exasperation, disappointment and embarrassment in some quarters, sniggers in others.  The building was constructed to house the new (automatic) telephone exchange, and employees were looking forward with excitement to the move from the McInroy Building in Stabroek, near to the fire station.
It was then discovered that the ceiling of the new building at the corner of Robb and Savage Streets (which may be regarded as the corner with the most ‘vicious’ name in Georgetown) was too low to accommodate the new equipment  and therefore the telephone exchange could not be housed there.  The building was then allocated to the Post Office for general use.
One wonders how many of the people who now work in that building are aware of its history. Some years later, I witnessed something along the same lines.  A class of day students at the technical institute, under the supervision of an American woodworking instructor on temporary assignment in Guyana, completed a beautiful conference table and could not get it through the door of the room it was meant for.
The table was turned “every which way but loose”, yet no joy – the instructor had apparently overlooked the width of the door!  The highly polished table ended up in a classroom. The antics in trying to get the table through the door caused the entire institute to cheer and laugh out loud.  Funny, how these incidents all have an oversea link.
Incidentally, I saw a strange expression in a recent letter complaining about the unsatisfactory conditions at a public hospital.  Among the gripes was one which said that the patient “was placed on a bed while the sun was caressing him brutally”.   Can anything be caressed brutally? The dictionary defines ‘caress’ as “to touch gently and affectionately”. I remember a colleague once describing the rape of a young girl as being “wooed violently”. How flexible the English language.
Geralda Dennison

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