Countryman – Stories about life, in and out of Guyana, from a Guyanese perspective

Mar 01, 2015 Countryman, Features / Columnists

---

ET in GT – The paradox of perception

By Dennis Nichols

 

Sometime in the not-too-distant future, visits to Earth by extraterrestrial life forms may become reality. Some believe they already have. Popular science imagines an archetypal ET as being a wise but mostly unemotional ‘Star Trek’ humanoid, able to understand and use human language, steeped in logic, and imbued with the ability to teleport itself, yet without true knowledge of how things work on our planet.

Now let your imagination place one such ET right here in 2015 pre-election Georgetown, Guyana. Near our colourful ‘bizarre bazaar’ Stabroek Market. And for convenience sake let’s give our guest human gender. Male. He looks like one of us and blends well with the market throng.

So here he is, on a drizzly day, looking around, scratching his alien head in bemusement. Super wise but confused, because he is in Guyana and his telepathic mind is picking up strange, conflicting thoughts and vibrations from people around him, even when he chooses to focus on an individual or one group. So he switches to standard verbal communication.

He approaches Guyanese A, a female market vendor, a seller of fruits, and asks her to tell him something about herself and her country. She starts with a few courtesies and platitudes but soon, realizing this isn’t a typical condescending tourist, launches into a litany of miseries about politics, crime, the cost of living, and the ‘stupidness’ happening at City Hall.

ET senses her distress, and immediately picks up similar vibes from others. The output he is receiving from them includes an alarming number of fears, insecurities, anxieties, and imminent threats to each other. Yet nothing happens. Words, (whispers, snarls; bellows) curious emotions and disorganized thoughts overwhelm, and produce in him alarming new nervous impulses.

His logical mind tells him this is not a nice place to be in. His super intelligence apprises him of possible imminent danger. Then suddenly he picks up a different vibe. He isn’t sure where it is coming from but recognizes it. A composite of calm smugness, self-assurance, optimism, and an ego the size of the big market across the way. Then he senses who it is coming from. A small soft-bellied man, Guyanese B.

The alien asks him the same thing he asked of the vendor. He knows this man’s response will be different. It is. Guyanese B gushes about democracy, a growing economy, foreign investment, a construction boom, fancy buildings, and lots of food. ET thinks maybe he misheard the question. The man asks if ET is a tourist, and wishes him a fantastic time in Guyana.

Around him ET observes piles of garbage and flies everywhere. Parts of the roadway near where they are standing, are covered with squishy dirt, littered with wrappers and soda cans. He walks away from the small, pot-bellied man and immediately becomes aware of fresh input. Signals of apathy and laziness slide across and bounce off his radar. He moves toward three older persons, a man and two women. However, he doesn’t speak to them; he already knows.

Later, he turns to the newspapers, television and internet for information, and discovers – Dualities. Almost every subject, every issue, has at least two sides to it, opposing, clashing facades. ET is more confused than ever but tries to evaluate the input. Not much luck!

He comes up with ‘Guyana is a beautiful country, rich in minerals, timber and precious stones; Guyana is a poverty-ridden cesspool of corruption and crumbling infrastructure. Georgetown is the Garden City; it is simultaneously the Garbage City of the Caribbean. A political party is the country’s saviour. The same party has made the country a failed, cursed state. Guyana’s citizens are intelligent, hospitable and tolerant. They are also dumb, ill-mannered and insensitive.’

Now he begins to make sense of the vibes from the people near the market. He tries to sort fact from propaganda, commendation from flattery. He sees glimpses of beauty and joy, and something like truth. But they are submerged under a tide of disharmony, disorder and discontent. Stupidity, deception, crime, decadence and death reign over common sense.

Okay, my little ‘futuristic’ fantasy act may sound far-fetched and improbable. But, being still characteristically naïve, I am struck dizzy by the way people, including leaders in society, look at a person, an issue, a project and see two or more vastly different pictures. Each can be a blessing and a bane simultaneously, depending on which side of any shaky fence you sit.

In America, for example, is President Obama, an inspiring leader, and his Affordable Health Care a revolutionary and progressive undertaking or is the clichéd leader of the free world a witless neophyte and his signature achievement a huge blunder? (Intriguingly a number of historians already recognize ‘Obama Care’ as a historic triumph, according to New York News & Politics.)

Guyana’s politics, economics and leadership should hardly be compared with America’s, or any other nation’s for that matter. But the kind of human perception which informs statements made by individuals or groups is the same. I can ‘bet my bottom dollar’ that many such views and expressions are little more than cunning agenda ploys rather than sincere convictions.

They say ‘the devil is in the details’ to show how a superficial statement or an alluring advertisement becomes much more complicated, even untruthful, when the fine print is read, or the details analyzed. Statistics, polls and campaign promises are notorious examples.

Apparent fact – A TV announcer states, “Citizens have rejected the offer.” In actuality, a small supposedly disinterested cross-section of maybe a dozen persons may have vented their opposition to whatever offer was being made. In such an instance the announcer’s statement is both ‘factual’ and, to use a relatively new buzzword, disingenuous. The devil chuckles.

So is our country a failed state as some believe or a flourishing democracy as others declare? I look around, listen, read, and cautiously suggest neither or both, or take refuge in the less intelligent but more truthful, ‘I don’t know’. It’s that ‘best of times; worst of times’ retreat.

A nation is made up of many components – institutions, laws, demographics etc… But people are individuals and groups who think, speak, and act based on any number of variables including beliefs, personalities, and experiences; it is a wonder than any two persons can agree fully and wholeheartedly on anything. And why the world is so confusing.

Now scientists, particularly those involved in the field of quantum physics are theorizing about the very nature of reality, and some suggestions are, to say the least, mind-blowing. Statements like ‘nothing is real’, ‘consciousness creates reality’, ‘the observer creates reality’ and ‘the universe is a mental construction’ seem to be gaining popularity and traction. ET came to Guyana and rediscovered a concept he’d all but forgotten – the reality paradox.

Me? I’m thinking cricket, recalling a recent ODI between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and thinking that I really don’t know the first thing about bowling action. Why doesn’t anyone seem to find fault with Lasith Malinga’s weird and lethal sling (not ‘chucking’ they say) action, but want to take the mystery out of West Indies ‘Mystery’ bowler Sunil Narine’s cool spinning fingers?

I don’t know! Ask ET.

---

---