Bridge over lost terrain

Sep 22, 2017 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

As I wrote last Monday, you will get comments from people with each column, some of which are eye-catching. People would point out things you should have included. I got one such call, and it came too early in the morning. My column yesterday was in the same vein as what I have done the past thirty years – the lack of modern life in Guyana.
Just a tiny reminder of those who may not have read it. My daughter was about to shower and she asked me to go over to the pharmacy in Giftland Mall to but a specific type of medicated shampoo. I live one minute drive to the mall. It was my wife who suggested that they may not have it so call first. I didn’t have a recent phone book. I called the directory assistance line. I held for ten minutes but the operator did not come on. I changed, and drove to the pharmacy only to find out they were out of it.
The early morning caller suggested that I left out a precious line in the article. He thought I would have mentioned that if anything terrible, like an accident had happened to me it was all because a simple piece of information the directory operator in this day and age should have given me. Before he came off the line, these were his exact words; “But Freddie I know this is Guyana.”
And it was Guyana alright that I discovered once more time on Wednesday evening. After Wednesday night, I think I will stop writing about blackouts. What more could the average man and woman do? We had blackouts twice where I live at Turkeyen on Wednesday. I came home Wednesday night only to find there was electricity interruption again. After I came out of the car, my dog was jumping all around me but I could not see where she was because it was pitch black. Then I heard her scream. I had stepped on her toes.
I remember yelling out, “These damned blackouts.” I don’t think I want to comment on this aspect of Guyana’s woes any longer. But Wednesday night’s aggravation caused me to reflect on that evergreen cynicism; “This is Guyana.”
My mind went immediately to the cost of the proposed new Demerara Harbour bridge as I walked up my stairs that night. Here is a country where a citizen in his sixties is still getting electricity disruptions which he got when he was a UG graduate in 1978. That meant my marriage life saw blackouts, professional working life saw blackouts, daughter’s life saw blackouts and now as I move to old age, I am still seeing blackouts.
And in the midst of this permanent angst, I am seeing that my government will be spending about US$180 million to build a new crossing over the river.
I am a complete layman when it comes to engineering so I will ask a layman’s question- why can’t they take that US$180 million and pump it into the electricity system. So in a few years’ time, I will go to West Coast Demerara via a brand new bridge only to return home in darkness and when my dog lovingly greets me, I may step on her belly and pulverize her.
As we are on the bridge, let me continue my layman’s questions. I know that in the 21st century if you are building a bridge, you can go on the net and see the different styles in different countries. President Burnham’s engineers in the mid seventies gave us a beautiful bridge at that time. There must be more aesthetically attractive ones since then. The sketch of the new bridge I saw does not have a walkway as the original one we have at Peter’s Hall. Why not?
Young lovers from the West Bank and West Coast used that walkway from the time it was built to come across to Peter’s Hall. Joggers used it from day one. I used to jog on that walkway with former Minister Winston Murray in the afternoons. It was a time in my activism that I got to know Murray well and I will always remember some of the things he told me about the post-Hoyte PNC leadership.
If ever there was a PNC leader that loved the PNC as much as Burnham, Ptolemy Reid and Hamilton Green, it was Winston Murray. My wife and I spent many years walking on that bridge in the afternoons after I picked her up from work. Am I surprised the new one will not have a walkway? This is Guyana, maan!

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