Concrete wall, blond-hair doll and the Whiteman

Jul 04, 2016 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

The eastern concrete wall of the Botanic Gardens

It was President Granger himself, in defending the name change of Ministry of Home Affairs into Public Security, who hinted that Home Affairs was an appellation handed down by the colonials. Personally speaking, I don’t have a problem with the change from “Home Affairs” instead of “Public Security.” What I do know and what I think is intellectually defendable is that the White colonial came and destroyed many things but he left us with many positive values, some of which had we adopted we may have been more developed both morally and in terms of progress

When you look at the way many PPP leaders behaved and continue to behave, then the White colonial was a more mannerly, respectful human being. The book, “Sweetening Bitter Sugar: Jock Campbell, The Booker Reformer,” by Clem Seecharan has a saccharine piece of revisionist history. Seecharan tells his readers that the Booker chief, (who in those days would have been a powerful colonial elitist) refused to take his breakfast and lunch at the aristocratic Georgetown Club where the colonial crème de la crème hung out.

Seecharan makes the iconoclastic point that Cheddi Jagan was afraid that Campbell’s Fabian socialist style would have made him (Campbell) attractive to the sugar workers, so Jagan set out to undermine Campbell. As soon as Clement became a Minister, he held his birthday at the Georgetown Club. We are constantly reminded of what colonialism did to us but one wonders if colonialism also destroyed common sense among post-colonial leaders.

I simply do not buy the argument that colonial penetration of the psyche of the colonized has permanent effect. Colonialism did not and could not destroy common sense. Is the permanence of colonial values responsible for a blue-eyed, blond hair, white-skinned doll that was at the table of President Granger and other dignitaries at the Golden Jubilee dinner at the Arthur Chung Centre? I know hundreds of people that would have planned that event and would not have put such a doll at the tables. Where then is the efficacy of the argument that colonial penetration has destroyed the psychology of the freed subject.

Here is another example of lack of common sense that has nothing to do with the destruction of the psyche of the colonial subject but rather is a huge manifestation of lack of thinking. They are fencing the eastern perimeters of the Botanical Gardens. In fact they have put up one huge concrete wall. You should never build a wall around a public garden. You fence it. The Promenade Gardens are not walled in. The newly landscaped garden opposite Parliament Building where the Bureau of Statistics used to be on High Street is not walled it. Both of these gardens are fenced

It is lovely to see the swaying trees, the green ambience, the birds in the trees, the lush vegetation, and the flowing ponds while driving on Sheriff Street.

It is an aesthetic pleasure of immense satisfaction to be driving and gazing at the vast greenness of a large garden. People all over the world love that. My wife and I always look into the Botanical Gardens when we are driving on Sheriff Street whether going north or south. Honestly, I don’t think I have ever driven past that place without looking in. I believe the equivalent to such a sight of a garden is driving and looking at the sea or the ocean.

Whose idea was it to border the eastern perimeter of the Botanical Gardens with a massive concrete wall? Here is what I think happened. Someone suggested that if you put a concrete wall you can make money by having businesses paint the walls with their advertisements. Sorry if I sound rude but that seems to be a philistine argument. There must always be a place for music, poetry, art and aesthetics in a country. I know of no ancient society that did not think like that. The ancient Egyptians, Chinese and Greek civilizations, etc. functioned with that kind of attitude.

So I guess what you will see now as you drive along Sheriff Street and you come to the Botanical Gardens are the advertisements on the wall of smiling faces extolling the virtue of Danish Powdered Milk, New Zealand Anchor cheese, California grapes, Spanish olive oil and Trinidadian tasty snacks. I remember doing a column on a Hand-In-Hand Insurance billboard encouraging Guyanese to be insured. It was situated inside the Everest Cricket Ground. The image was that of a Caucasian man in a three piece suit smiling as he welcomed you to Hand-In-Hand. Hope they advertise common sense on the Botanical Gardens wall.

1 thoughts on “Concrete wall, blond-hair doll and the Whiteman”

Muhammad Raoof July 4, 2016 at 5:02 pm

You forgot one point Freddie, someone or possible persons, got a little “top-up” in their pocket – spend half for the wall- then the other half,,,, pocket…. isn’t that the way things go in GT???…. my heart bleeds for Guyana…..