Overseas-based Guyanese writer wants to contribute to evolving change

May 31, 2015 News

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Change has come to Guyana and there are many people, even some residing overseas, who are ready to embrace this with open arms.
Although she hasn’t resided in Guyana for many years, Sharon Westmaas, the daughter of well known Consumer Activist, Eileen Cox, who passed away last year, is among those who are ready to return home to help ensure that a desirable change is sustained.
Westmaas said that she was long hoping for things to change in Guyana.
“I really had this belief that Guyana can be great, and I really think that people should believe this too and work hard for it. You should put every effort into it even if you don’t see results right away…just keep working towards that goal,” said an enthused Westmaas.
She currently lives in Germany and recalled during an interview with this publication how she visited her mother almost annually prior to her death, and would be appalled at the garbage-infested state of some sections of the capital city. She grew up in Georgetown with her mother and remembered all too well that the capital then lived up to the title of “the Garden City.”
That title over time had changed, with good reason, to “the Garbage City.”
Westmaas is convinced that the elections of a new Government has brought with it a wave of much needed change, which has even seen a clean-up frenzy that is likely to extend to every facet of the society.
“Even sitting in Germany I could really feel an enthusiasm, a hunger for change, and I was delighted to see it happen…this is a really good beginning,” said Westmaas who arrived in Guyana just in time for the May 26, 2015, inauguration of President David Granger at the National Stadium.
The auspicious occasion was one that coincided with the celebration of Guyana’s 49th Independence Anniversary.
Already she has had talks with Minister of Education, Dr Rupert Roopnaraine – who also has responsibility for the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport – about the possibility of her lending some form of support to the development of culture here in Guyana.
WHO IS SHARON WESTMAAS?
Some might easily recognise her from her pen name Sharon Maas, author of a few phenomenal novels including: ‘Of Marriageable Age’, ‘Peacocks Dancing’, ‘The Speech of Angels’, ‘The Small Fortune of Dorothea Q’ and ‘Sons of Gods’.
She was born to Eileen Cox and David Westmaas in 1951. While her mother was always a very liberal soul, her father worked as an Assistant to the late President, Cheddi Jagan, at Freedom House. Westmaas recalled that her parents divorced while she was still very young. In fact she is convinced that her mother was one of the first women in Guyana to embrace such recourse.
Moreover, Westmaas was raised in the home of a single working mother while her father remarried and moved on with his life.
Westmaas remembers well living on Lamaha Street and then in Subryanville in Georgetown with her mother, and according to her, “for me it was a bit embarrassing, because nobody else had one, everybody had two parents. I was a little bit shy about that…I didn’t like the situation, especially when she called herself Miss Cox and I had a different name.”
JOURNALISM AS A CAREER
But life went on. Westmaas attended St Margaret’s Primary and then Boarding School in England before returning to attend The Bishops’ High School. She completed her ‘A’ Levels and was quite ready for the world of work.
Choosing a career was no difficult task. As a child she was always reading or writing and her best grades were understandably in the subject area of English. Moreover, she always knew writing was something that she could easily delve into.
At the age of 18, she started contemplating being a print journalist. Her options were the Guyana Chronicle, The Evening Post and the Graphic. She immediately applied when she saw an advertisement for trainee journalists at the latter mentioned newspaper entity. It was quite a competition, but the young Westmaas was the only girl among the three trainees accepted.
“It was an enjoyable experience,” she said of her time at the Graphic, as she recounted going out on a little motorcycle to track down stories. She was tasked with doing a wide range of stories, but she eventually found her true passion. She described it as a breakthrough, as she disclosed how after writing a story about the St Ann’s Orphanage, she realised that she had a preference for writing articles that focused more on the human side of stories.
“I went into this Orphanage for children with Polio and they all came rushing up to me with their braces on and they were all happy and smiling. I was so moved to see these children with this horrible disease and how they could laugh, smile and be so friendly and so loving,” disclosed Westmaas.
This was the beginning of her focus on human interest articles. Her writings, complete with by-line, were by far the best produced among the trainees.
But she was not allowed to stay on at the Graphic as a journalist. She revealed that a most distasteful situation resulted in her being fired. Westmaas hadn’t even shared with her mother what led to her abrupt dismissal from the Graphic, but she did relate to this publication how a senior male editor made sexual advances to her and her refusal to consent meant she couldn’t secure a place there.
“He said ‘you know you are pretty’ come and sit on my lap’ and I said no and I walked out, and the next thing I knew is that he said that he was not renewing my contract,” said Westmaas who noted that while she told a number of persons at the entity, there wasn’t much that could have been done, since she was not yet appointed as a journalist.
DETERMINED TO EXCEL
She soon after applied at the Chronicle and was able to truly make a name for herself there. With the training that she had already secured, she was soon granted space for a weekly human interest article.
“I was determined to show that I could be a good journalist and that I should not have been fired,” said Westmaas.
She remained there as a fulltime journalist for about one year after which she decided that she would take a break to travel. Her travels took her throughout South America, during which she took copious notes, of course with the aim of eventually sharing them with the readers of the Chronicle. An entire series of her travels were published by the Chronicle.
But she was determined to learn more about the world. This saw her heading to India where she lived for a while. There she met a young man who she eventually married and travelled with to Germany. Their union did not last, but she remained in Germany and decided to study Social Work, eventually securing a job along this line.
Westmaas, sometime after, remarried and that union yielded two children. And it was when she gave up her work to mother her children that her passion for writing was rekindled. It was during this time that her first novel – Of Marriageable Age – was published.
Drawing from her experiences over the years, the fictional novel is one that is set in Guyana, India and England. “It is three stories woven into one. Three different characters from very different backgrounds and it all becomes one story in the end,” said Westmaas of her first publication which she said is still available at Austin’s Book Store.
She reflected that all of her writings have a deliberate focus on her Guyanese upbringing since most of the books she read as a little girl had details of things she was unfamiliar with.
“I would read about children eating strawberries and cream, about tulips and daisies, so I really wanted to write books that had backgrounds, people and things that I knew about…I wanted to be different,” Westmaas intimated as she noted if given a chance, she would be willing to contribute to helping to advance culture in Guyana.

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