Tag Archives: British Guiana (Guyana)/South America

The Writer’s Life: Challenge of re-creating an unrecorded life

24 Sunday Mar 2024

Posted by in The Writer's Life, Women Issues

≈ 51 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

Kowsilla (1920-1964) – Leonora Village – British Guiana

Since I had already featured Kowsilla of Leonora on International Women’s Day in 2013, I had decided not to share her expanded portrait in Chapter Nine of my work in progress. I changed my mind the day that our former president and current presidential candidate called the black- and brown-skinned migrants/refugees at our southern border “animals.” “[They’re] poisoning the blood of our country,” he said on another occasion. His remarks hurt. It matters not that the blood of these people has fueled and continues to fuel our giant corporations worldwide. Kowsilla (1920-1964) was such a person.

Kowsilla’s abruptly shortened life was so inconsequential to the powerful British sugar producers that her ultimate sacrifice at Plantation Leonora only merited a brief description in our local newspapers. In recalling those early days of growing up in then British Guiana, I regard her as a worthy and memorable representative of the rural working-class women of her generation. With little information about her life, I took on the challenge of re-creating her story.

To tell her story, I turned to Kowsilla’s ancestral history as a descendant of Indian indentured laborers. I found Coolie Woman: The Odyssey of Indenture by Gaiutra Bahadur (The University of Chicago Press, 2014) an excellent resource. What strong and courageous women! I also considered the cultural norms of the rural East Indian population during Kowsilla’s early years.

I hope that I have done justice in re-creating her unrecorded life.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Looking at “the outsider” with an open mind

25 Sunday Feb 2024

Posted by in The Writer's Life

≈ 58 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

Janet Jagan nee Rosenberg – President of Guyana (1997-1999)

Since I’ve already posted Chapter Eight of my work in progress, featuring “Winifred Gaskin: A Political Woman,” I’m moving on to Chapter Nine that portrays another political woman and the first female president of Guyana (1997-1999): Janet Jagan nee Rosenberg. The white American-born wife of Cheddi Jagan—co-founder of the left-leaning People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Guyana’s first political party to garner massive support—was regarded as an “outsider” among the ruling British and local elite at the time.

When I started this book project, I did not plan on including Janet Jagan among the influential women in the formation of my social and political consciousness. As a young devout Christian, I viewed her not only as an outsider but also as a threat to religious education in our parochial schools. Though I did not share her communist ideology, I would be remiss in not acknowledging her influence in empowering Guyanese women to speak out against oppression and injustice by those holding power or authority within the home, workplace, and public spaces. In retrospect, she may well be the driving force for my rebellious attitude towards those in authority: A criticism I received from my religious superiors as a young Catholic nun.

As Cheddi’s wife and political partner, Janet’s remarkable journey is also an interesting case of what can be achieved when the male and female work together as equal partners. Here in the United States, we are still plagued by the patriarchal dominator model of organizing our society. As the world’s greatest democratic nation, we lag behind other countries, advanced and developing, in electing a woman for the top position as president. Since the 1872 elections, several American women have tried and failed. Isn’t it ironic that the first American woman to hold the position did so in a foreign country? Hillary Clinton came close in the 2016 elections. Does Nikki Haley stand a chance in 2024? We have no shortage of remarkable American-born women capable of leading our nation.

We left Guyana for Brazil in 1987 before the PPP returned to power in 1992, after spending 28 years in Parliament as the major opposition party. With her husband as Executive President, the 72-year-old Janet became First Lady of the Republic of Guyana. She was 77 years old when she was elected as Executive President, following Cheddi’s death.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: How the Church and State shaped my young identity

28 Sunday Jan 2024

Posted by in Guyana, Religion, The Writer's Life

≈ 58 Comments

Tags

, , , , ,

Second Vatican Council (1962-1965)
Photo Credit: Vatican Archives

In Chapter Seven of my work in progress, I tell two stories that played vital roles in shaping my young identity. These involved critical turning points within the Roman Catholic Church and the end days of European colonialism. What an interesting time to witness history in the making!

Beginning on October 11, 1962—after ninety-three years since the convocation of the First Vatican Council on December 8, 1869—between 2,000 and 2,500 Catholic cardinals, patriarchs, and bishops from all over the world, assisted by 460 theological experts, convened in Rome for the Second Vatican Council. For the first time, Protestants, Orthodox, and other non-Catholic observers were invited to assist. In attendance as observers were forty-two lay and religious men and women.

Meanwhile, in what was then British Guiana, our parents and grandparents were embroiled in the struggle for independence from Britain. Our country’s independence in May 1966 went way beyond constitutional change and self-governance. No longer socially inferior subjects of the former Mother Country, we the people also had to undergo the psychological process of “mental emancipation.” As I observed during my adolescence, the Church and State often disagreed on the means to achieve such profound changes of being and doing.

When I first drafted this chapter in 2017—yes, this project is years in the making—the MAGA administration of our 45th president held power in the White House. As I understood then, this rallying cry to “Make America Great Again” meant a return to the 1950s when the white male held power over non-white bodies and the female stayed at home to raise the family and serve her husband. I had visions of a return to life in colonial British Guiana. It meant a return, too, to my mother’s unhappy life as a stay-at-home working mother of five children and an abusive husband.

What a turn of events in the world’s richest and most powerful nation!

I imagine that this is not an easy time to be a young person in the United States. In addition to laws and regulations dictated by the Church and State, they must also contend with bullying and conspiracy theories on ubiquitous Social Media platforms. Added to that is gun violence in schools, colleges, and the public spaces where they socialize. For girls and young women, rights won by their mothers and grandmothers, through years of political activism, are being dismantled.

During my adolescent years, my steadfast faith in the teachings of the Catholic Church grounded me during those transformative years from a colonial country to a cooperative socialist republic. Moreover, as a young woman, I witnessed strong and courageous women lead the way forward. I feature three of these women in Chapters Eight to Ten.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Looking at oneself through the hourglass

03 Sunday Dec 2023

Posted by in Religion & Spirituality, The Writer's Life, Women Issues

≈ 54 Comments

Tags

, , ,

Closest resemblance to my handsome seminarian

In the last three chapters, I’ve shared the stories of three women who played important roles in shaping the person I would become: Mother, Auntie Katie, and Auntie Baby. In Chapter Six of my work in progress, I tell the story about the handsome, young seminarian who entered my life and changed its course: Michael (fictitious name), my first love. At thirteen years old when we first met, I had already developed a close relationship with Jesus, but it was Michael who set me on the path to the religious life.

My deepening relationship with Jesus was a well-guarded secret. To speak of my love for Jesus was out of the question. As I’ve mentioned in an earlier chapter, we were not a family of huggers and kissers. What’s more, those three little words “I love you” were not uttered among us.

For right or wrong, good or evil, truth or deception, I was shaped by the society that sustained me. During those early days of youthful innocence, our country was undergoing political, economic, and social upheavals that would later remold my self-identity.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: A Story of Dogged Persistence

28 Saturday Oct 2023

Posted by in The Writer's Life, Women Issues

≈ 54 Comments

Tags

, , , , ,

The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders March Past at Parade Ground in Georgetown – British Guiana – 1954

Chapter Five of my work in progress presents the third portrait of a woman in my life. Auntie Baby, Mother’s baby sister, played an important role during my formative years. Nine years younger than Mother, she was just four years old when her parents and nine older siblings left British Guiana in 1946 for the United States. With the end of World War II in September 1945, my maternal grandparents must’ve seen better prospects for their future under America’s President Harry Truman. For reasons unknown to me, they failed to fulfill their promise to return for the three girls left behind.

Auntie Baby lived with us on and off from the late-1950s to mid-1960s. She brought lots of fun into our lives as kids. I must’ve been around eight to nine years old when I became aware of her dream to marry a white man and move to the Mother Country. Perhaps, the arrival of British soldiers in the colony incited her imagination.

On October 8, 1953, the Royal Welsh Fusiliers were the first battalion to arrive in the colony to suppress an alleged communist takeover. Two weeks later, they handed over to the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. Auntie Baby was twelve-going-on-thirteen years old when they left in October 1954, taking twenty-five Guianese-born wives with them back home to Scotland. When she began dating at eighteen years old, the Worcestershire Regiment was on their one-year tour of duty. Her time had finally come to catch her dream husband. She soon learned how elusive dreams can be. Yet, she persisted.

Auntie Baby was the inspiration for the minor character, Joanna de Freitas, niece of protagonist Richard Cheong’s mother-in-law, in my debut novel Under the Tamarind Tree. Joanna first appears in Chapter Seven (p. 32) when she arrives with her Scottish soldier boyfriend at a family Christmas party (December 1953).

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Memorializing a Simple Woman

24 Sunday Sep 2023

Posted by in The Writer's Life, Women Issues

≈ 71 Comments

Tags

, , , ,

Market Greetings – Painting Oil on Canvas by Guyana-born Artist Joy Richardson
Photo Credit: Joy Richardson (Market Series)

Chapter Four of my work in progress presents the second portrait of a woman in my life. Auntie Katie was an inextricable part of my childhood. She lived in the adjacent flat in the tenement yard, where we shared the same toilet and bathroom. Unlike other neighbors in the yard, she did not complain if we were too noisy. Perhaps, she considered that we already had our fair share of corporal punishment.

For some reason, she tolerated my curiosity and treated me with kindness. I liked and respected her. In her simple and quiet manner, she taught me that the color of our skin did not matter. What was in our heart mattered. How we treated others, even the little ones, mattered. Though she has been long gone from the world of the living, she remains close to my heart.

In Chapter One of my debut novel, Under the Tamarind Tree, she makes a small appearance as herself. More importantly, she became the inspiration for my most beloved character, Mama Chips, the protagonist’s surrogate mother following his mother’s death when he was thirteen years old.

The period described in Chapter Four is the 1950s and 1960s in then British Guiana.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Difficulty in Telling True Stories of Women Close to My Heart

27 Sunday Aug 2023

Posted by in The Writer's Life, Women Issues

≈ 64 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

Cactus Plant – A Gift from Mother
Photo taken in Rosaliene’s Garden

Chapter Three of my work in progress presents the first portrait of a woman in my life: my mother. As the most influential person in shaping my self-identity and vision of the world, I could not neglect to tell her story. Moreover, given the current reality of our lives as women in 21st century America, where conservative legislators and the women who support them have forced us back into the 1950s and 1960s, my mother’s story becomes even more relevant.

The first draft of this chapter was written in February 2017, shortly after my mother disowned me as her daughter. In revising this chapter six years later during a period of grief, following her death a year ago on August 22nd, I’ve come to realize how much of my mother’s own pain and loss I’m still carrying.

Given my closeness to the subject, I found it difficult to tell her story without bias or judgement. My objective stance faltered during the narration of intense interactions cited in the portrait. Though I know very little of her life over the thirty years of our separation, my siblings have all shared stories of the terror they had endured. Despite my questions, none of them have been forthcoming about the incident or event that unleashed her rage against them and their spouses. My turn came later, following our reunion in 2003.

The story’s time frame is not linear. Prompted by Mother’s tendency to uproot the past during our conversations, the narrative moves back and forth between our time together in Guyana and in Los Angeles, Southern California. Do let me know if you find this confusing.

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Writing About Uncomfortable Subjects

30 Sunday Jul 2023

Posted by in Guyana, The Writer's Life

≈ 82 Comments

Tags

, , , ,

Natasha Houston and her mother at home in Zeelgult. In 2013, Houston’s husband killed their two children, slashed her arm and hand, then died, apparently by suicide.
Photo Credit: KPBS (Williams Rawlins for NPR)

As I shared in my May 23rd post on getting my creative mojo back, I have resumed work on my writing project about women of agency. Revision of the completed draft of Part One, set in Guyana, is steadily moving forward. I struggled with Chapter Two: The Violence of Men.

When I first presented this chapter to my writers’ critique group in August 2019, I discovered that it was an uncomfortable subject for the male members of our group. I could see the rage in the eyes of my writing friend seated directly across from me on the other side of the table.

“I’m not a violent man,” he told me, struggling to restrain his anger. “I defended my mother against our psychotic father… I protected her.”

Taken aback, I said: “I’m speaking in general terms.”

Another male member of our group was more measured with his response: “Rough content, but so is life.”

Guyana’s First National Survey on Gender-Based Violence, launched in November 2019, revealed that more than half (55%) of all women experienced at least one form of violence. More than one in ten had experienced physical and/or sexual violence from a male partner in the previous 12 months. One in every two women in Guyana has or will experience Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) in their lifetime. Moreover, one in five (20%) women has experienced non-partner sexual abuse in their lifetime; thirteen percent (13%) experienced this abuse before the age of 18.

We live in a world still dominated by the heterosexual male. All men are not violent. All women are not nurturers. I’m considering changing the Chapter heading to “Violence as Humanity’s Default System.” What do you think?

Continue reading →

The Writer’s Life: Is my creative writing mojo back?

28 Sunday May 2023

Posted by in The Writer's Life

≈ 64 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,

Auction of African Slaves on Arrival in the Dutch Colony of Novo Zeelandia, later known as Essequibo – Undated
Photo Credit: Images Guyana Blogspot

On Monday, May 22nd, I revisited Chapter One of my two-year-long neglected work in progress. As I revised the chapter, the familiar thrill of creating images with words surprised me. Once again, I was eager to engage with the creative process. I woke up in the mornings with ideas for improving or adding to the text. What a joy!

Since last working on this chapter in January 2020, I found it easier to “kill [my] darlings”—words, phrases, sentences, and even entire paragraphs. While maintaining the purpose of setting the stage of the world in which the featured women fought for agency in their lives, I found it challenging to cut and tighten critical historical information. Although the players in our own time have changed somewhat, women and minority groups are still fighting the same battles.

To establish the author as a participant-observer in the lives of these women, the narrative also contains autobiographical information. The author, like all the players on the stage, shares their legacy of severed ancestral roots.

Regardless of the efforts of some among us to rewrite or erase America’s brutal history, the legacies of slavery and colonialism continue to impact our lives at home and worldwide.

Continue reading →