Mama make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming!

Boy, this Alzheimer’s thing, well, well, well

By Mutryce A Williams:

“Morning, morning and how are you this morning? Morning, morning this is Christmas morning! Mama make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming! Mama, make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming! Christmas coming and New Year’s morning,” he jolted forward and bellowed at the top of his lungs.

Bewildered to say the least, I asked, “Are you okay?” We were sitting in his ‘drawing room’ discussing the predictions of the McDonald’s Farmer’s Almanac. The outburst seemed to come from out of thin air and, trust me, it didn’t help any that it was mid May and Christmas was months and months away. He said, “Pusa dear, draw the curtain for me. Open up de big trunk and hand me the things you see in it one by one.”

He burst into song once again. This time he had the pair of shack-shacks in hand. Shaking them fiercely, tapping his foot, voice as strong as ever he continued, “Mama make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming. Mama make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming!” He passed the shack-shacks to me and said, “You got the beat right! Now pass me the banjo. One, two, three let we go. Mama make the Johnnie Cake, Christmas coming! Sing louder man. Sing. Sing a tell you, sing!” Fully immersed in the Christmas spirit, I was now strumming away at the banjo totally transformed I tell you, as if I had gone to the school of that St Paul’s banjo maestro they called Lil Tom.

At that moment Papa and I had what I call an alternating string bang. We switched from shack-shack, to banjo, baha, to the big drum, guitar, to cow bell, triangle, to mouth organ and indulged in the sweet ‘feeleeleet’ of the fife. Out of breath, I plopped down on the chair, ‘Well, that was fun!’

When I thought that the excitement was all finished still humming he said, “Child, take the back way and go over the road by you Aunty Mae. Tell she a say hurry up come up here for the pork before I sell it off or give it way and tell she don’t forget to send up me black cake, cassava bread and two bottle a sorrel.

I know you mother in there making hers, but is Christmas you see and you could never have too much black cake, sorrel, cassava bread and rum…and rum…and ruuummmm…ha, ha, ha is Christmas girl and me belly ain’t got no end. I going eat and eat and eat till me belly burst…aaaah.

Wait, who that there out there out there over the doving pot helping she with the Johnny cake, roast pork and turning the cassava bread? Oh is she! I hope she don’t think she going go with more than wha she bring you know.

Every year she do it. Who is that there calling me? I say who is that there calling me? Oh is you, Uncle Joe. Tell he I tuning the banjo and when I done I going meet he down the road and we going go round the village serenading.”

Smile on my face but with a heavy heart I knew that he thought that I was my mother. His brain has been going ‘addle’ as we like to call it, senile or now they have a word for it. It is called Alzheimer’s.

Instead of trying to will him back to the present, I held his hands and allowed him to take me back there. He looked in the direction of the kitchen and shouted to my grandmother, “Woman you ain’t done cook yet? How the roast pork and Johnny Cake coming? Maude I know that woman does come say a help but no let she go with more than what she bring I tell you, mind you hear, mind.”

He looked at me and seeing me as me now but still thinking it was Christmas, he said, “Girl where you going to this Carnival thing,” He continued, “Don’t get me wrong you know is a good thing it have its place but that there itself ain’t Christmas. Yes, Christmas is for Christ and all that but it is a time of real merriment, family, sports and when I tell you sports I mean Clowns, Mummies, David and Goliath and lord them Japanese girls with they umbrella and short, short skirt.

Girl you ain’t want see plenty, plenty sports, I mean Actor, Neagre Business, Indian and Cowboy, Masquerade, Bull and Them Thing. You member if I did tell you about the time I used to play Bull. Well, well, well them there was some sweet, sweet days, is so I catch she in there you know but no tell she I say so cause she would set up she face like ten rat trap and stop talk to me and I can’t deal with this this time of year here, man… any other time but not Christmas time I tell you… cause this is food, more food and belly burst down time.”

He continued, “Christmas is the time when me and boys go round serenading. Maude and she church people them do go caroling.

Is the time that Maude love to fuss, paint, clean and put up she lovely, lovely curtain them. Wait there who that coming there.

I sure is one she sisters them from Englandt. She don’t even tell me that they a come home. One by one they show up and the thing is you know for a whole six weeks me have to sleep a ground. We have to give up we good warm bed and be hospicable… that woman there just want turn the place into a hotel you see… in she mind I guess that is what Christmas is all about. Oh, John, me boy is you that.”

He shouted to Granny, “Hey Maude, bring me shoes there let me shine them now and don’t forget to patch the li’l hole in me jacket and starch my shirt. I have to look like a sharp boy going to church this Christmas Sunday.”

He took down his tie off the ledge and showed it to John, he said, “You see this tie here is me first son George send this for me from inna America. He say is how they make them now.

Tell me something John, you have anything go so? Tell me something there, you people them in a away just member you a Christmas time?

Peep out there in the kitchen you see something is whole three barrel we family send from overseas. If you want a tin of sardine or two don’t ‘fraid to ask. You know we is giving people. We ain’t going eat down the whole thing we self and know you in want and ain’t give you any.” John just smiled.

Granny shook her head, sat down beside him and rubbed his hands. He was zoning in and out.

He looked in my direction and shouted, “Hey wait there, Pusa you done praptice you recitation? I hope so you know ‘cause you have to say it good in Church this Sunday at the Christmas concert. Say it hard and clear you know. Make me proud.

You know as soon as you done is me first going stand up and clap the hardest and say hey that is mine there… mine… You know wha’, stand up and say it now let me hear you. Stand up straight and watch the people in they face no bend you head.” At this point there were tears in Granny’s eyes. She shook her head and said, “Boy, this Alzheimer’s thing, well, well, well.”

Alzheimers is a horrible disease. It was eating away at him however it allowed me to see Christmas through his eyes. I envied the Christmases that he had. The look on his face said it all.

One can tell that it was his favourite time of year. It wasn’t about Santa. It wasn’t about decking the halls with holly. It wasn’t commercial. It wasn’t about Carnival. It wasn’t about how much money you had or how many gifts you got.

It seemed like a time of merriment and joy that he shared with his family and friends. It was a time of butchering pigs and sharing what you had in your cupboard or barrel. It was a time of roast pork and Johnny Cake, black cake, sorrel, cassava, lovely curtains, sports/folklore, serenading, caroling, string band and church going.

It’s now Christmas. What does this Christmas mean to you? How would you compare your Christmas now to the ones you had then? Were they better? What’s missing and if anything how do you intend to fix it? Do you have that Christmas spirit? Are you in a zone of merriment strumming your banjo, shaking your shack-shack and singing, “Mama make the Johnny Cake, Christmas coming!”

December 23, 2009

caribbeannetnews

Happy Festivus!

By Anthony L Hall:

Even long before William Shakespeare patented this literary device, jesters had been used in plays and other forms of entertainment to highlight the folly in prevailing thoughts and customs of the day.

Therefore, it seems entirely fitting that it took jesters on the comedy show Seinfeld to highlight the blithe spirit with which we have made Christmas a celebration more of crass commercialism than of the birth of Christ. For it was on this show that most Christians worldwide were first introduced to the celebration of “Festivus for the rest of us.”

Festivus, which is celebrated on December 23, began in 1965 as a family ritual in the home of writer Dan O’Keefe. And, interestingly enough, it was his son Daniel, a writer for Seinfeld, who wove the entire history and meaning of Festivus into the December 18, 1997 episode of the show.

I saw this episode; and I can attest to the fact that the uproarious laughter all references to Festivus elicited was surpassed only by the cunning messages about the real meaning of Christmas that I felt compelled to ponder long after the end of this episode.

Ironically, Festivus is a wholly secular attempt to remind us that Jesus is the reason for the season. Accordingly, it encourages us to utterly shun not only the indulgent ritual of shopping but all of the other hedonistic activities Christians engage in this time of year.

The O’Keefes reportedly do this by engaging in the antic practices of having an “Airing of Grievances” meal, at which each person tells other family members all the ways they disappointed him or her over the past year. This meal is then followed by a “Feats of Strength” performance, during which family members must wrestle and pin the head of household to the floor to bring the celebration of Festivus to a close...

Of course, since there’s no religious dogma associated with this holiday, you do not have to follow the O’Keefe’s fashion when celebrating this holiday. Instead, you can choose whatever non-commercial activities you wish to engage in to celebrate Festivus. For example, I think the most spiritual way of doing this would be to take a family walk on the beach and commune with nature.

In any event, I urge you to think – “What would Jesus do?” – before joining the madding crowd of those rushing out in a last-minute dash to spend money in a patently perverse effort to celebrate His birth.

Happy Festivus ... and Merry Christmas!

December 23, 2009

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Say a prayer for Jamaica this Christmas

One of the ways in which the global recession is beginning to impact disposable incomes of people in the Caribbean is the fact that governments throughout the region have sought, or will seek, to raise taxes. With three days to go before the last Christmas of the first decade of the 21st century, it may have been a little unusual to see parliamentarians in Port-of-Spain debating legislation as fundamental as the major reform to the country’s system of property taxation. One of the points about the proposed property tax is that it seeks to provide the Government with a substantial new revenue plank at a time when the country’s revenue base has been challenged by the sharp decline in earnings from the country’s energy sector. The fact is that the Government forecasts that it will earn $37.9 billion in revenue from all sources in the fiscal year October 2008 to September 2009. This is a 39 per cent decline in tax revenue from the year before.

Based on an assumption of an oil price of US$55 per barrel and a natural gas price of US$2.75 per million cubic feet, the Government predicts that total revenue for the current fiscal year will amount to $36.6 billion. But while the decision by the Government to proceed with the new property tax has led to a great deal of heat, T&T nationals should consider the situation in which our neighbours to the north find themselves. In Jamaica, the Minister of Finance last week tabled in their Parliament the third set of revenue-raising measures for their fiscal year which ends in April. The Jamaican economy has been devastated by the sharp decline in its three main sources of foreign earnings: taxes on its alumina and bauxite resources, revenue collected from tourists who visit the island, and money sent to Jamaicans by friends and family members living in the US, Canada and the UK.

Jamaica has also been impacted by years of living beyond its means—by spending significantly more than it collects—with budgets over the years being balanced only because the country has been able to borrow from international and local banks at ever-increasing interest rates. But with three credit rating agencies downgrading Jamaica’s foreign debt to levels that indicate that there is an expectation that the country will not be able to service its debts, there are few commercial banks that would be brave enough to lend Jamaica money—even if banks the world over did not face liquidity concerns. As a result of global downturn and its own lack of fiscal prudence over the last three decades, the country has been forced back into the arms of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)—with which Jamaica has had a fractious relationship.

In preparation for the new stand-by agreement with the IMF, the Jamaican Government has been placed in the invidious position of having to announce a punitive package of new and increased taxes a little more than a week before that country celebrates Christmas. Among the measures that were announced in the Jamaican Parliament to be implemented on January 1 were an increase in the general consumption tax (GCT) from 16.5 per cent to 17.5 per cent and an expansion in the tax base of the GCT to include many food items such as fresh fruit and vegetables, ground provisions, sugar, salt, flour and cooking oil. Jamaica’s Minister of Finance also announced increases in the taxes on electricity and gasoline. Prime Minister Bruce Golding, who made an unannounced visit to Port-of-Spain last Wednesday as the country seeks to divest its national air carrier, made it clear in a statement on Sunday that he has no choice but to raise taxes.

“I urge the Jamaican people to understand that our choices are extremely limited and there is no easy way out. Our current revenues cannot meet our required expenditures and we cannot continue to borrow our way into an even worse crisis,” said Mr Golding. While we say a prayer for our brothers and sisters in Jamaica, we also need to learn from them the dangers of living beyond our means.

22 Dec 2009

caribdaily

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Climate Summit deal 'falls short of what's required to avoid catastrophe'

By ALISON LOWE
Tribune Staff Reporter
alowe@tribunemedia.net:


THE critical two-week long UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen ended on Friday without a legally-binding deal being reached on efforts to curb global carbon emissions and no set future date by which attempts would be made to achieve such an agreement.

Chairman of CARICOM, President of Guyana, Bharrat Jagdeo, told The Tribune yesterday that the deal reached between a number of countries at the summit "has some positive elements but falls short of what is required to avoid catastrophic climate change".

The so-called Copenhagen Accord brokered between the US, China, Brazil, South Africa and India involves "significant departures from CARICOM's position" on what the Summit needed to achieve for the benefit of its members and the world in the fight against global climate change, added the President.

Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham was one of three CARICOM leaders including Mr Jagdeo who, along with dozens of world leaders, decided to personally attended the UN Climate Summit last week in the hope of helping to ensure a meaningful outcome would be reached.

While at the Summit, Mr Ingraham made a speech in which he reiterated his warning that the Bahamas "will suffer catastrophic results if emissions are not stabilized and reduced".

"A temperature rise of two degrees Celsius will result in sea level rise of two metres and will submerge 80 per cent of our territory," stated Mr Ingraham.

Yesterday Mr Jagdeo noted that the Accord announced late Friday night by US President Barack Obama "seeks to limit temperature increases to 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels (but) the commitments listed (by individual countries on cutting carbon emissions) in its appendices would lead to an increase of over 3 degrees".

CARICOM and the Alliance of Small Island States, of which The Bahamas is a part, had both called for countries to commit at Copenhagen to doing what is necessary to limit temperature increases to 1.5 celsius above pre-industrial levels if its members and other countries are "to stay alive".

Speaking at the close of the Summit, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon called the deal "an essential beginning" but cautioned that serious work lies ahead to turn it into a legally binding treaty.

Nonetheless he praised the fact that "all countries have agreed to work towards a common long-term goal to limit the global temperature rise to below 2 degrees Celsius; many governments have made important commitments to reduce or limit emissions; countries have achieved significant progress on preserving forests; and countries have agreed to provide comprehensive support to the most vulnerable to cope with climate change".

President Obama called the Accord an "important breakthrough that lays the foundation for international action in the years to come" but also admitted that it leaves the world with "much further to go" to get the legally binding agreement that is agreed to be necessary to avert the most devastating potential impacts of climate change.

And besides the question of turning the Accord into an agreement with legal teeth, the criticism remains that while it "recognises" the scientific case for keeping global temperature rises to no more than two degrees celsius in total it does not contain the kind of commitments by countries to reductions in emissions that would achieve that goal.

Meanwhile, it is not yet known whether all 192 countries outside of the small group who ultimately negotiated the Accord will adopt it.

Yesterday Mr Jagdeo, who has been a strong advocate for action on climate change, said that based on what transpired at Copenhagen, he does not think the type of agreement which climate experts say is necessary to save small island and low lying states like The Bahamas and Guyana can now be reached by the end of 2010.

December 21, 2009

tribune242

Political Bahamas Blog

Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the rest

By David Roberts:



First the good news. Support for democracy in Latin America is at its highest level since the late 1990s, according to the latest version of the highly respected Latinobarómetro survey, published a few days ago. And that's despite the quasi coup in Honduras and the financial crisis-cum-economic slump.

Overall explicit support for democracy - those believing it is preferable to any other system of government - stands at 59%, according to the survey of some 18,000 people in all Latin American countries except Cuba. Last year the figure came in at 57% and the year before 54%.

"Implicit" approval, meaning accepting democracy has its shortcomings but it's still better than other systems - what Latinobarómetro calls Churchillian democracy based on his famous quote paraphrased in the headline of this column - stands at 76% in the 2009 survey.

"In summary… Latin America is more democratic after the 2009 crisis, it is more tolerant, is happier," the survey's authors conclude, as reforms in the region are starting to bear fruit. It seems we've never had it so good, to paraphrase another former British prime minister.

Interestingly, support is strongest in Venezuela, a country where many regard democracy as being under threat at present, at 85% in the explicit category and 90% in the implicit one, the 2009 version of the survey concludes. Perhaps if Cuba had been included it would have scored even higher. Next, in the explicit category, come Uruguay, Costa Rica and Bolivia.

A little disturbingly, however, at the other end of the scale support is a mere 42% in Mexico (explicit) and 62% implicit. It's also worryingly low in Colombia, Paraguay, Ecuador and Guatemala, at least according to the 115 page survey produced by the Santiago-based NGO.

It's easy to pick holes in a survey of this type, but one thing is for sure: Latin America is in much better shape now than it was two or three decades ago, at least in terms of democracy and stability.

In the 1970s and 80s, military regimes ruled large parts of South America (Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay) while Paraguay was under the iron fist of Alfredo Stroessner. Bolivia's "palace coups" were all too frequent, and Mexico was effectively a one-party state.

In the 1980s, civil wars were raging in Central America, Cuba was seen as a real military threat to much of the region and Peru was rocked by terrorist violence, while Colombia was being torn apart by guerrillas, drug barons and paramilitaries. Then there was the US invasion of Panama, and in the 1990s came the Zapatista "uprising" in Mexico's Chiapas.

And while the recent crisis has hit the region hard, especially Mexico and those countries more dependent on manufacturing and US markets, things need to be put into perspective. In the 1980s, we had hyperinflation in many countries in the region, the infamous debt crisis and banking meltdown after meltdown, and that's not to mention the Tequila and Asian crises that followed.

Today, with the one obvious exception of Cuba and the less obvious one of Honduras given the recent elections and the prospect that the "civil coup" will simply peter out after Porfirio Lobo takes office, democracy in some form or another prevails universally throughout the region, as witnessed most recently by Sunday's elections in Chile. In the meantime, there are plenty of signs that the region and the world are emerging from the recent economic crisis.

So, reasons to be cheerful there are indeed, although as Latinobarómetro says, the positive results of this year's survey provide no motive to celebrate just yet given the problems in the region and the potential to return to instability.


bnamericas

Bahamas Blog International

Caribbean Region needs to focus more on environmental leadership

There must be more emphasis on environmental leadership and regional co-ordination in the Caribbean.

This was the message of Dr. Mark Griffith, as his organisation CaribInvest
honoured seven regional luminaries that have made an outstanding contribution to environmental sustainability. The event took place on Wednesday evening as part of the two-day Second Caribbean Dialogue on Caribbean Economic Expansion, Investment and Opportunities Arising from the Economic Partnership Agreement at the PomMarine Hotel.

Griffith noted that the environment had not been one of the key issues taken on by CARICOM, but noted that there had been a lot of work on the issue in past decades which was not necessarily being recognised. To this end, the recipients have also been honoured in a book entitled “Nuts and Bolts” by Griffith and Derrick Oderson that is dedicated to issues relating to Caribbean Community law and regional environmental co-ordination.

“Essentially, the publication seeks to put into perspective what has taken place in the region since the late 1980s,” Griffith said during the presentation. This, he said, was derived from the lack of historical perspective on what our negotiators have achieved in terms of the evolution of environmental and sustainable development co-ordination in the Caribbean.

Griffith said the book was dedicated to several people who have made a significant contribution to the area of environmental sustainability, explaining, “The period late 1980s–mid-1990s is described in the book as the golden period of regional co-ordination.”

The honourees included Dr. Ted Aldridge, a Jamaican, who worked tirelessly to promote regional environmental co-ordination and Charles Leeward, a former Ambassador from Guyana to the United Nations Environment Programme, for his strong role in environmental co-ordination; both are deceased. In addition, Professor B. Persaud, former Director of Economic Affairs Division of the Commonwealth Secretariat and Minister Lincoln Myers of Trinidad and Tobago, who Griffith described as one of the most outstanding Ministers of Environment in the region, were both noted for their roles in the 1994 Small Island Developing States (SIDS) conference in Barbados. Furthermore, Myers was noted for his role in spearheading the creation of the Alliance of Small Island States, which was launched in 1989 and helped direct more focus on small island developing states.

Former Guyanese Foreign Minister Rashleigh Jackson was also honoured for the important guidance he provided for the designation of SIDS. Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Teresa Marshall, was recognised for her role in ensuring the success of the First Global Conference on the Sustainable Development of SIDS, which was held in Barbados in 1994. Griffith said Marshall played a significant role in bringing together the developing states to partner, without which the conference would not have been a success. Finally, former Prime Minister of Barbados, Sir Lloyd Sandiford, was lauded for the support he showed for the conference being hosted in Barbados despite the economic difficulties being faced. (NC)

12/18/2009

caribdaily

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Extradited Jamaican has case dismissed

Mark Beckford, Staff Reporter:


Another Jamaican has had his court case dismissed by a United States judge because of lack of evidence, after being extradited to that country on charges of trafficking of cocaine and money laundering.

Adrian Armstrong's case was dismissed on September 23 after being extradited to the US in 2006.   This was after spending two years in custody in Jamaica.

Armstrong's ordeal began when he was arrested on July 11, 2004 on a narcotics charge.

On July 13, 2006, he decided to discontinue his fight against the charges in the US after reportedly "losing faith" in the local justice system.

Armstrong's charges were based on evidence offered by a co-operating witness known as Duffis Alexander, who presented himself as a witness.

The witness purported to have taped and recorded telephone conversations between himself and Armstrong regarding cocaine trafficking and money laundering.   Neither the tape nor a transcript of the tape was supplied with the extradition request.

Applications to the resident magistrate and to the Supreme Court, as well as requests to the requesting state's representative for the tape, were unsuccessful.

In the US, these tapes were presented in court and subsequently examined by an expert on behalf of Armstrong, and two experts, on behalf of the government.

Examination of these tapes revealed there were several discrepancies.

These included stop-start features on the recording, a possibility that there was over-recording, anomalies which question its moral integrity and the possibility of tampering.

Evidence

Based on evidence, on December 30, 2008, the US judge ordered the suppression of the tape, but denied the motion to dismiss on the basis of outrageous government conduct.

The prosecution then offered Armstrong a plea to a lesser offence, which he refused.

Armstrong's lawyer persisted with the motion to dismiss, which was finally granted on the government's application on September 23.

Armstrong has not yet returned to the island, his lawyer Jacqueline Samuels-Brown told The Gleaner.

She said she was in contact with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as her client had no passport for travel.   She said he was in the process of gathering these documents to return home.

Picking up the pieces will not be so easy, Samuels-Brown said, as Armstrong has reportedly expressed disappointment at how he was treated.

"The way I would characterise him is that he is a patient person, a fighter, and his spirits remain strong.   He has reiterated his love and commitment to his country, but he is disappointed that his country did not afford him the facilities and the protection of the law," said Samuels-Brown.

December 16, 2009

mark.beckford@gleanerjm.com

caribdaily