Bank stoops low: sneaky stealing

Okay, let me explain, because while some may agree with the headline above, others may see it as inflammatory. So, for those who disagree, I leave you to arrive at your own conclusion.

On Friday, Mar 6, I received a check drawn on an out of state bank account for $300. With only $1.35 in my Chase Manhattan Bank account and knowing that my Time Warner Cable would be suspended for non-payment, I was eager for the check to clear. After depositing it, I left the teller’s window and looked at the deposit receipt, which did not indicate when the entire amount would be available. I was later informed that, even though tellers are supposed to notify customers and have it printed on the receipt when their funds would be completely available, if the deposit is $300 or more, the customers are also, according to Chase, expected to ask when the funds would be available.

The next day, in keeping with a banking regulation was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives back in 2005, $100 was available. From conversations I’ve had with “back office” Chase employees, including those who have worked at the institution for many years, when a customer deposits a check, usually, the entire amount, because of our electronic age, is available to the bank but held by them and turned over – that is, sold, loaned and “interest-ed,” earned interest for the bank. Banks claim holds and other dubious circumstances to delay making the funds available to customer who are told that their funds would not be available, especially for an out of state check, for four to five business days. For an instate check, funds could be available in two to three business days. Business days do not include Saturday, Sunday or holidays; these are working days, Monday to Friday.

Short on food, I went out the next day $100 empowered and spent $48. Then just as I expected, Time Warner suspended my service. That night, I called in a check payment for $106 to the cable company and my service was restored. Having done this type of payment before, I had an idea or a rough guess of how long the Time Warner check payment would take to clear and I figured that by that time, the out of state check, the $200 balance would also clear and keep me solvent. That didn’t happen and is still in dispute as to when – it came down to a time determination- did the balance clear and the cable check hit my account. Nonetheless, I noticed that Chase hit me with a $25 insufficient funds fee, also called an NSF fee. Still thinking I had funds in my bank account, I treated myself to a $6 McDonald’s breakfast.

That is when it all went down hill. My account was overdrawn and I was in the red for 23 cents. Hurrying to the Chase branch at the corner of Broadway and 165^th Street, I spoke with the branch manager, asking her about the $25 fee. Not wanting to have a negative balance, I scrounged up $3 for a deposit, and as I was standing in the line waiting to be restored to good standing, I asked the manager about being charged another $25 because my account was over by .23 cents. She assured me that when the charge hit, she would remove it, because she had the authority to remove NSF fee charges on negative balances less than $3. But then, accepting that I miscalculated, an automatic payment of $19.99 to Verizon also hit my account, which forced my account into a further negative balance of $17. The next day, I deposited $504 and saw my balance reduced to $486, and the next day I deposited another check for $880. This time, when I made the two latter deposits I enquired when they would be available and was told the next day. Confident in my new found wealth, I went shopping for necessities. But on Thursday, when I looked at my statement online, I noticed that there was a $64 NSF fee charged to my account. I hastened once again to the bank and enquired from the manager. She explained that the bank’s policy was that more than an initial NSF charge, $25, was charged at $32, and the $64 charge consisted of $32 for the .23cents and for the negative $17. I proceeded to remind her of the discussion and the assurance she made the previous Friday. After much wrangling and derogatory comments and saying she would have to take the loss at her branch because she made the promise to refund the NSF fee, she reluctantly reversed the charge.

But, what struck me was that without knowing, Chase had not only charged me $32 for a negative .23cents, but that the charge had been automatically increased from $25. The manager, referring me to a thick booklet containing Chase’s policies and procedures in 8-point print, stated that any amounts that go into a negative balance, regardless of how much, even if one cent is charged $25 or $32. When I pointed out that people designed the system which automatically charged customer, she found it difficult to accept that concept, which enabled Chase, under the guise of legality, to gouge its customers. Now, I wonder how many customers, who do not carefully monitor their bank balances or statements, does Chase fleece in such a flagrant manner. There are those who say that what Chase is doing is the fundamental of capitalism, that it is, a bank is in the business of making money. But, isn’t that same philosophy that has caused the financial sector to be in so low, corporate greed?

Reflections: Mr. President Obama

Could this be true? America has a Black president

There is an emotional catch in my throat as I look and listen to all the commentaries and analyses, historical comparisons to Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delanor Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, who was spot on when he said the U.S. would have an African-American president in 40 years; and Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., who suggested a Black president in about 25 years, and contemporary parallels: the economic crises with Bank of America needing money to help them stay afloat; the three automotive industry giants needing money to keep more than half a million employees and subsidiary concerns, two of them forecasting being unable to stay in business come March; the second half of the promised $750 billion appropriated as a financial bailout of the finance sector: people are asking where has the first half gone, has it evaporated?There is no evidence financial institutions have resumed inter-bank lending, that businesses have been getting the advance credit they need to operate and produce, and an average 500,000 homes per month are going into foreclosure, there has been no mortgage renegotiation.

In recent days, there has been no mention of the issue of immigration. It was touching indeed to see his paternal grandmother who traveled from Kenya sharing the dais. Obama himself knew that without the strong support of the Hispanic community, who had grown to despise the Bush administration for the draconian immigration policies and renditions, the Berlin-like wall along the border between Mexico and the U.S.; that he would not have won.

Looking at television close up shots of the faces of people who had gathered on the National Mall, many men and women whose eyes welled with tears, many women their mascara running – haven’t they heard of waterproof mascara, or for many for whom the tears brim over their eye lids, like the waters of Lake Pontchartrain cresting the banks of the levees and inundating the basin below – sliding down their cheeks? Tears which hold not just the salt from their bodies, but the expectations commingled with longing, for all those who are Black in America, who struggled and endured ignominies and humiliations of every kind, yet did not live to see this day, when a Black man is president. The tears flow as many think of those Blacks who still endure slave like conditions, whose lives are inextricably bound to their white counterparts, and who dare not murmur a word or breathe a sigh of discontent or disagreement for fear of a disengagement or termination, which would reduce them to penury.

In a commentary on the eve of the Inauguration on BBC America’s Notes to Obama, national poet Maya Angelou said that she was not presenting a poem, she was presenting ruminations or reflections of what an Obama presidency means to and for her. She said that while the nation needs him, it is he who needs us more.

“We need him, the race needs him, the banks need him, and the economy needs him. He brought to us something we cannot live without, hope. He offers us the chance to have a great president, with whom we can identify, not as a Black president, but a president who would speak for the voiceless, for the poor black, poor white and for the disadvantaged Hispanic person.

I believe he needs us more than we need him. I believe that each of us has to do something more. I believe that we Americans deserve the most we can get. I will work alongside being of use and I will look for you working alongside, being of use,” she said.

During the Inauguration, when Obama took the oat of office, was there a hint of petty vindictiveness and partisanship, even subtle racism? Could it be that because Obama opposed John Roberts’ confirmation as Chief Justice, that Roberts felt to get back at Obama, to fumbled the words of the oat of office while the world looked on, as if to remind the President that he is still subject to the White establishment? Roberts’ subsequent apologies to the President, even re-administering the oat of office, have only highlighted the shadow of incompetence of the Bush administration, but which with tiny wisps and tendrils are trying to reach out to contaminate the new administration. What a mark on an historic and memorable day. Did anyone see the television close up of Obama’s expression during the fumbling? No doubt if it hadn’t been re-administered, constitutional lawyers would have had a field day on the legitimacy of the President.

As he promised, Obama has issued executive orders closing Guantanamo Bay within a year, which while keeping a campaign promise to the American people and assuaging the Islamic world, opens up other problems: reports suggest that some of the detainees would be brought at imprisoned at Levanworth prisons, which is on U.S. soil and places the detainees under the dictates of the Constitution: is there justification to holding them, how are the rules of evidence applied and exercised, what proof is there of involvement or collusion, except for some of the 250 detainees, who were held on hearsay or suspicion, and what about the Patriot’s Act? He has also ordered troops home within 16 months, and outlawed torture.

Reflections: Obama, a President

Interregnum: the between time

Obama, should remember only too well the Roman observation: how fickle the populace of Rome – who briefly rejoiced in the victories of Pompeii and before the last sound of praise could be heard in his honor, turned against and reviled him. If he cannot deliver on the promises, like every politician before him, he has made, he would be hounded out of office in infamy. He is a lawyer and like all of his profession, he has over the last several weeks, since the elections, when the campaigning was over and he became starkly aware that his rhetoric had now to become practical, began to cover himself with a disclaimer. Not wanting to seem as though he has stepped away from his promises of change, he has begun to temper the expectations he created in the people of what HE would do. In the later days of the interregnum, he has changed his tune, repeatedly he has cautioned that in the first 100 days of his administration, he may not be able to meet all the expectations people have of him, not that he has created in a people thirsty and desperate for a new American direction, and more importantly, being able to fulfill the promises he made to win; admitting to the possibility of making mistakes and missteps. His electoral victory was a demonstration of who could fool all of the people better; everyone saw through Sen. John McCain’s weak political strategies and rejected his posturing as a continuation of a Republican party steeped in the corrupt machinery born and developed since the Regan presidential era.

Many Black leaders, after the euphoria of the electoral victory and the prospect of a Black president in the White House had worn off, have admitted that he cannot achieve and accomplish all he promised. They recognized that they were fooled, but preferred to abandon their righteous anger of being deceived by one of their own, to celebrating the accomplishment of one of their kind; as opposed to the anger if John McCain would have won. Can anyone imagine what would have been the national reaction if McCain had won, the abject apathy of many Black people – many of whom would have said, “see I could’ve told you the White man would never allow a Black man to get higher,” “Did that Black man, Obama, think he is better than the Whites,” or the disgust and increased disrespect of the wider international community, who laughed at and mocked Americans for reelecting George Bush for a second term, what would they say should McCain have won the elections?

With the vapors of his electoral victory’s honeymoon quickly dissipating under the heat and starkness of the light of people looking for satisfaction, Obama has acknowledged that closing Guantanamo Bay may not be as immediate as he first thought, it would take the better part of the year. Why, this new administration has to find a way to either bring the inmates to a fair trial – grounds which so far are dubious – or to export them to other countries, many of whom the outgoing administration was looking for help, and as recent reports revealed, many stalled on committing to the Bush administration, but have now agreed to accept prisoners; he won’t be able to bring the troops home from Iraq as soon as he had originally planned, because now the Iraqi government has locked the Americans in a contract binding their presence up into 2011, yet some battalions may be withdrawn; there is doubt in Congress, where once he felt he was confident in bipartisan support, about passing his proposed $850 billion economic stimulus package, which has raised fears of at least a $2 trillion budget deficit, which would be visited on the next two generations; but held true to his word he would make torture illegal for the armed services.

Experiencing a Food Pantry, is it for me?

I stood on the uptown platform on Christmas Eve afternoon with two food-laden blue plastic bags waiting for the #1 train to arrive. Two women I recognized as being where I had just left, came toward me, heads bent and with bags hanging from each of their hands, their blue bags encased in upscale shopping bags, hiding the fact that they had just come from one of the city’s food pantries on the Upper West Side, where they were able to get raw packaged and canned food supplies to take home to their families. A thought flashed through my mind, in these days, what is it to be ashamed of if a person has to go to a food pantry for assistance and to augment their food stocks? It is necessary to get food where ever one can, with out too much hassle or cost.

This experience may seem mundane or ordinary to some, and to others, unusual, as it undoubtedly was for me. But when I considered the recent announcement by New York Governor David Patterson that he would make available $1 million to assist food pantries in the state, then the idea of going to a food pantry didn’t seem all together too much of a issue, except it would if I put pride before my stomach.

With economic constraints around the city hitting non-profit organizations, the governor’s announcement may be welcome news to those non-profit organizations with food pantries who have seen a significant drop in donations from individuals, other organizations and corporations; some may complain it’s not enough to provide for the burgeoning number of unemployed or under paid people seeking help with basic food, and some may not be able to accept it, because they no longer have pantries. But I wonder, with hundreds of food pantries in existence and many more organizations starting them as a social response, akin to the era of soup kitchens, but with less overhead and operational commitment; how much out of the $1million would any food pantry statewide receive to effectively stave off people clamoring for help and facing empty shelves? In this experience, I realized, that whether or not a person was employed, accessing the services of a food pantry is not restricted to the unemployed, but is equally available to those whose income makes it necessary for them to find other means of supplementing their food; putting pride or social status aside in the interest of obtaining food, especially if its free.

Rewinding to about an hour and a half before I stood on the uptown subway platform, at about 12:30 pm, I had followed a suggestion from one of my friends and headed downtown to the food pantry to see if I could get help with food. Taking the #1 train from my stop at 168^th Street, I disembarked from the downtown #1 train at the 86^th Street and Broadway stop, walked west to the corner of West End Avenue to the church of St. Paul and St. Andrew.

I walked resolutely through the misty rain, tiny drops of water falling from an overcast sky, remnants of ice and snow littered the sidewalk. I approached the wrought iron green-painted box like enclosure with steel steps leading down to a basement under the massive concrete structure of the church where a young Latina woman was closing the gate after escorting another woman out. When I enquired about the food pantry, she replied that the pantry was closed for lunch, from noon to 1:00pm and suggested that if I wanted pantry services, I could wait inside the church. A sign connected to the wire meshing detailed the pantry’s hours of operation, Monday to Friday, 8:30 am to 12:00, and 1:00pm to 3:00pm.

As I had no umbrella, and my only protection against the December cold and rain was a wool hat and a pea coat, I took the young lady’s advice and sought shelter in the church. When I entered the building through a side door, I felt as if I was suddenly transported to another place: inside the shadows seemed darker and deeper, and the silence noticeable. Where was anyone, I asked myself? Wandering around unhindered, I found myself in the church, proper; I had in fact entered into a vestibule cum office or reception area. The church seemed cavernous, its pews were aligned at a slight angle, not the traditional straight forward looking to the front set-up, but a semblance of a semi-circle, as if embracing the vacant sanctuary ahead. Above in the darker gloom of the church’s barrel vaulted ceiling, the occasional patches of white revealed where the darkened, sooth stained paint had peeled, and over the sanctuary was a large gray banner with black letters speaking to harmony existing between brothers and sisters. The yellow or gold stained glass windows that lined the walls, in three rows at differing heights, all bore similar generic patterns at each level, but which in themselves were devoid of character, except one, which showed a man kneeling before another who was seated throne like, and carried a plate below crediting the family who donated it to the church.

When the time arrived, I ventured out of the church’s warmth and protective gloom into the rain, and walked to the green painted steel steps, descended and through a door, entered into a vast hall. Pausing mid stride, I looked around, oriented myself, my senses attuned, observing, analyzing and processing this new experience. At a table in front of an opening which led to an office, a woman stood there as if guarding the objects on the table, which were a sheet that clients sign and a stack of clip boards with application forms with bank styled chain-attached pens affixed to the metallic clasp. I asked the woman, who struggled to speak and be understood in English, what to do as a first timer to the pantry. She pointed to a sheet of paper, said I had to sign in and then handed me an application on a clip board. The application itself asked questions which included, race, social security number, date of birth, income, employment status, and so on. I thought, the only thing missing from this application is a box to tick off that I was willing to provide a specimen for DNA and that with the social security number and date of birth, as well as name, address and phone number, I may as well be giving away my identity for the sake of food.

After I’d completed the application, writing on the social security line a bold N/A, not applicable, I waited for a short moment and was invited by another Latina woman to sit in a chair in front of a desk, where she proceeded to conduct an interview. Before she began, I was asked to sign my name on another sheet of paper, which she explained was to log the clients seen by a counselor. I never knew what was the purpose of signing my name on the first sheet of paper, perhaps that was also a log to count the number of people who had entered the pantry, and perhaps the two log signings was to see if there were any discrepancies, between the clients who had come to the pantry and those who had actually entered the pantry.

The counselor mentioned that the information on the application was not shared with anyone, but was used by the organization for statistical purposes, to determine the number of clients, and to assist with coordinating the food supply. What became apparent by the end of the interview, was that the counselor simply wanted to verify that the person sitting before her was the same person who filled out the application for assistance. Not once during the interview did she look at the form, but asked questions that were already asked and answered on the form, boxes ticked off and lines written on, such as what was my apartment number, my date of birth and if I had completed college and possessed a four-year degree. Then she asked if I had medical insurance and if not, would I be interested in a hospital offering low rates, at which suggestion I added that I didn’t want another bill. But thought to myself, who was she kidding? A low cost hospital in New York City? I wondered what this organization was getting in return for the hospital referrals.

When she was finished with the interview, she reached over to a side of her desk and selected a plastic badge holder with a blue sheet of paper on which was printed a shopping list, of sorts, where instead of prices, there were points alongside the items. As briefly as possible, the Latina counselor explained what little she knew of the pantry’s food points system, as in what form are the vegetables, canned or loose, and what quantity constitutes how many points, questions she couldn’t answer, but referred me to one of the attendants in the pantry, and told me that I was only able access the pantry’s services once a month. It also occurred to me that there were different color lists for families of different sizes; one woman had a yellow paper list, which allowed her to collect food for her and her family of three, and another had a green papered badge, which allowed her different food allotments.

The actual pantry was a study in independence. This was a pantry unlike others with which I was familiar, where you are handed a plastic shopping bag with food the distributing organization thinks you should have. Here, clients entered a large room containing metallic shelves laden with packaged and canned food, a loose vegetable area, and two large upright glass sliding door cooler, one containing dairy products and the other with various types of meat. On one side of the pantry were glass panels, where anyone in the pantry area could clearly be seen and monitored by the staff from the outside. Based on the plastic badge colored paper shopping list, a client selected what he or she wanted from the shelves.

Being a novice to this experience, one of the pantry’s attendants accompanied and assisted me in choosing items from the list that were on the shelves. When he saw I had understood the system, he left me to continue selecting, but hovered behind me to ensure I had really got the hang of the pantry. Because I was a single man, my shopping list was blue, only allowing food for one person. According to the list, I could only get three cans or three pounds vegetables worth three points; two one pint bags of rice and a box or oats, worth three points; dairy, meat, and fruit, one point each. I was allowed to have pasta, but on a shelf was a single box of spaghetti, which I reached for, but quickly retracted my hand. The box had been opened. The attendant assured me that it was okay, but when he saw my hesitation, he said I didn’t have to take it and that the staff would put the box of opened spaghetti in a plastic bag, tie the top, and place it back on the shelf where someone else would take it. I looked at him in horror, thanked him for his help and turned away.

While I was selecting food items from the shelves, I checked the ingredients of many of the canned foods for mono sodium glutamate, MSG, or other types of preservatives. I was determined to scrutinize each can to ensure that, not because I was getting free food, I had to have unhealthy food. I looked at one can of tomato sauce and noticed that there was a supermarket price label on it. It occurred to me that for many food pantries around the city, when they have reached below their established threshold level of food, donated, they actually go out and buy food from supermarkets to augment their stocks.

When I had completed my selections, I arrived at a long aluminum covered table where two women, dressed in aprons, performed a simulated supermarket check-out, except there was no cash register, moving conveyer belt or card scanner. The older woman who had given me the application at the beginning was there to check me out, looking through my blue bag to ensure that I had taken my blue shopping list allotment, nothing more or less. Noticing that I was new and unfamiliar to the pantry and since it was Christmas Eve, she offered me two additional cans of Campbell’s Tomato Soup and a box of assorted herbal teas. My foray into the world of food pantries and donated food complete, I left the pantry, climbed the green metal stairs to the street and headed across Broadway to the subway entrance and to wait for the train on the uptown platform.

Thanksgiving night, Dinner and Subway ride home thoughts

(New York, NY) My sister, who was visiting from Maryland, and my nephew, who lives in New York City, had invited me to accompany them to see the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Hall, on the eve of Thanksgiving and after to his house in Rockaway Park, Queens, to cook Thanksgiving dinner.

Though hastily contrived, sometime betwixt the hours of late Thanksgiving eve’s mad and panicked dash to the supermarket, and early the next morning, my sister-in-law, my brother, my younger nephew and his most recent girlfriend, my sister and my older nephew came together to cook for a Thanksgiving dinner far exceeded any of our expectations. From the turkey, which was baked to a golden brown color, stuffing that was so rich my sister complained it was had a trifle too much salt and was too peppery, to the collard greens with ham hocks, candied yams, carrot and ginger soup, good ole Uncle Ben’s wild rice and my nephew’s indomitable mashed Idaho potatoes, the boiled corn, the warm spiced clove and cinnamon stick apple cider, and the apple pie with sugarless, but Splenda sweetened ice cream, all washed down with glasses of red or white, heavy in sulphites, Napa Valley wines, lots of conversation and a television stuck on CNN International where there were constant flashes and reminders of the carnage in Mumbai, a world away, all juxtaposed against a backdrop of reggae music, pulsating through speakers at my older nephew’s house.

At the end of this gastronomic gourmandizing, more food than any of us had had occasion to be near in the most recent past, we departed for our respective houses: my brother, sister-in-law, younger nephew and most recent girlfriend to their apartment, my sister staying with my older nephew to head to her house the next morning, my older nephew remaining in his house and retiring to bed, to sleep off the turkey, and I to my apartment.

I was dropped off at the subway station and after a short, but seemingly interminable wait on the platform, which was surprisingly populated, I boarded a local train to make a connection to an express train at the juncture of Utica and Fulton Streets in Brooklyn. When the A train arrived, Manhattan bound, odd assortments of people embarked and disembarked as the train made its express stops through neighborhoods, yet any given time, there were no more than 16 people sharing the car I occupied.

While sitting on one of the side facing seats, two young men came into the train, one at one of the lower stops in Brooklyn, just before heading through the tunnel under the East River to Manhattan, and the other at another station, also in the riverain bordering stations. Trying to read the latest issue of the New Yorker, I glanced up took notice of them both. One sat opposite me and the other, in one of the forward facing seats across from me. As the train barreled along its tracks the young man sitting facing me reached across to ask a question of the one in the forward facing seat. Not understanding what he was saying, the forward facing passenger looked in my direction and seeing that I was interrupted from my reading by this sudden and unusual activity: speaking to a stranger on the subway, he asked me in Spanish if I understood and spoke the language and to translate what the other young man was saying. Turning to him, I asked him of his problem and he explained that he had just been evicted from the apartment where he was staying and was asking the other young man if he could spare him a dollar to help him get to someplace. Translating the request, the Spanish-only speaking young man replied that he was “broke” and didn’t have money, the begging young man looking crestfallen and disappointed, leaned his head against the glass panel separating him from the doorway and closed his eyes.

Immediately, the thought occurred to me: I’ve written recently about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) homeless youth, and shelters like the Ali Forney Center and the planned True Colors Residence to provide permanent housing, but what to tell a homeless LGBT young person if one encounters one who is in need of shelter. Conscious of the falling temperature outside, the coldness in the air, the realization that this was Thanksgiving night, I was stumped. I racked my mind for what and where to tell this young man of a place he could go that would at least provide him with shelter, perhaps a warm place, if only for the night.

The Spanish-only speaking young man asked me where he could get a connection to the Bronx, and as I told him where he could get trains, the D or No. 4, the other young man expressed that he too was heading to the Bronx. He said that he had just moved from Philadelphia to the city to take a job which didn’t work out, his girlfriend had just thrown him out of the apartment, and he was heading to the Bronx, to a family member, with whom he hoped he could stay, at least, for the night.

My mind racing while he told his tale, I could only come up with a suggestion that if his family were unable to accommodate him, he could try calling the city’s help line, 311, and to ask about temporary shelter. The question, however, haunted me: where and what does someone who is either lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender do or go if they suddenly found themselves without a place to live?

At Broadway/Nassau Street station, both young men disembarked the train and headed for the No. 4 train. Yet, throughout these dramas, I still was able to read my magazine, until the train arrived at my station stop much further uptown.

When I arrived home, I immediately called my older nephew and my brother, answered by my sister-in-law, to tell them I had arrived safely home. Briefly, with each, we marveled at how we were able to put together a full three-course Thanksgiving meal in a less then 24 hours, reminisced and acknowledged the feeling of family we experienced and shared, how special and reinforcing it was to all of us. As a true journalist, I found the hint of a story and plan on following it, not only to see where it leads, but to provide information for the wider community.

Jonestown 30years later – what about Guyanese people?

Last evening, at 9pm EST, CNN showed a documentary that was hosted and presented by Soledad O’Brien, who did Black in America, on the 30th anniversary of the Jonestown massacre. Many of us would recall the effect and impact of this event on the Guyanese national consciousness.
Prior to Jonestown, Guyana’s impact on the world’s stage was restricted to vague references such as the Dryfus Affair, the 1963-64 race riots, and a few notable personages, such as Sir Shridat Ramphal, who was Secretary General of the Commonwealth and one of Guyana’s best scholars and representatives, and the semi-autobiographical novel of E.R. Braithwaite’s To Sir With Love.
Guyana, as we who lived through the Prime Minister-ship, Presidential turned dictatorship of L. Forbes S. Burnham era know only too well, was a country by northern hemispherical classification standards a third world underdeveloped country, that was provincial and rural, but to its Caribbean counterparts, because of the fertile land, was considered the bread basket, rated one of the highest in literacy and a steady ship of state. It was anything but bucolic. Rather Guyana was a country caught up and living in a post-colonial ideological confusion: couldn’t quite decide how to define its republic self whether as socialist or just simply anti-American and by extension to the British, anti-imperialist.
We who have lived through the evolutions of Guyana’s history, despite our present allegiances, are still proud of our heritage – our parents, close friends, the unique amalgams of African, Indian, and Amerindian foods – holding fast to gastronomic maxims such as a person who ate labba and drank creek water was bound to return, our particular lilting sing-song Creolese speech, our conversations that sound like full-scale disagreements as each of us tries to out speak the other, to make our point, and our intelligence, general knowledge and education, which placed many of us at odds against those with whom we work or attend schools; made us undeniably and identifiably Guyanese. It is a history and heritage we share to the extent that we still shudder at the memory of the 1963-64 race riots, telling ourselves that we would not ever and warning our children, against a repeat; where we cringe at the shame the recent allegations of two of our fellow Guyanese accused of plotting to blow up the John F Kennedy Airport in New York; and we shake our heads in horror at “Fineman’s” rampage through the country. We who live afar but still retain contact with our family, friends, or business associates in Guyana shake our heads uncomprehendingly at the economic state of affairs, asking ourselves: how could this be, why are prices so high, how are people making it and surviving, isn’t there a government committed to serving the people instead of their own interests, how is it that there is such a bloom and narcotic pervasiveness, which has seemed to become and support a sub-economy? These are some of the questions we ask each other and ourselves.
But have we asked what was behind the deal that Burnham made with the “Reverend” Jim Jones to lease 3,800 acres of virgin land, a turn off from the railroad that plied between Port Kaituma and Arakaka in the Kaituma region, for a commune. As rumors go, which undeniably contains a modicum of truth, Burnham received coveted U.S. dollars for allowing Jim Jones into Guyana. What really was the arrangement that not only gave Jones land in the Northwest region, but a house and land in Prashad Nagar, at the time an affluent section of northeastern Campbelville? Was there an enquiry into why did Guyana have the shame and stain of 918 deaths on its national pride? How was Guyana perceived then and how is it seen now? Guyana’s attraction to Jones was, as Burham was reported to have said after the tragedy, “he wanted to use cooperatives as the basis for the establishment of socialism, and maybe his idea of setting up a commune meshed with that,” and that coming to Guyana “would afford black members of the Temple a peaceful place to live.”
Every year, there has been some mention of Jonestown, but this year marks 30 years since the murder-suicide happened. We who live in the U.S. have witnessed the holding on to and dredging up of the memories of the past: Pearl Harbor, Jonestown, and September 11; incidentally, only those which were caused by others, and which rekindle memories and make healing and forgetting that much harder. How do we as Guyanese feel about this re-hashing of an event we would rather forget? Isn’t healing supposed to involve forgetting and allowing the past to remain in the past? While many of us know that Guyanese, in the main, had no active part in this blot on our country’s pride, are we somehow culpable by our passivity?
I could feel the bile rise in me when I listen to O’Brien recount, in a behind the scenes interview of the making of the documentary, the experience of Traci Parks, a survivor of Jonestown, who was 12 years old at the time and who returned to the area for the documentary. Parks, according to O’Brien said that as it was then, so it is now, she is still trying to wash off the oppressive heat, the sweat and the smell of Guyana from her skin. Parks speaks of the darkness and fear she experienced as she fled for her life in the jungle bordering the airstrip. Earlier this week, MSNBC carried a two-hour long presentation of Jim Jones and the Jonestown massacre.
While Guyana has come a long way since the events of Nov 18, 1978 on that turn off from the stretch of railroad between Port Kaituma and Arakaka, questions still linger. Just as in the U.S. there were investigations into what happened and who caused September 11, was there ever an enquiry by Guyanese into all that was Jonestown?

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonestown

Excerpt from Slavery of Faith by Leslie Wagner-Wilson: http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/11/12/jonestown.wilson.excerpt/index.html?eref=rss_latest

Raven: The Untold Story of the Rev. Jim Jones and His People

Seductive Poison: A Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life and Death in the People’s Temple

Dear People: Remembering Jonestown

Jonestown – The Life & Death of Peoples Temple