Guyana Blog 2

Saturday evening January 26, 2008

We have had a good first week here in Georgetown. It was somewhat frustrating getting here. We had to fly into Trinidad where we stood in line over an hour and a half to get through immigration and customs. Although we had booked a room for the night (I just couldn’t face 10 ½ hours in the airport before our flight out Tuesday morning) we only got about two hours sleep. It don’t know whether it was the very uncomfortable bed, the noisy neighbors or just being on edge, knowing that we had to get up at 4:00 a.m. to be able to leave for the airport by 4:30. Our flight out was uneventful, taking just about an hour, followed once again by lengthy immigration and customs lines. It was wonderful to get settled into our nice hotel room. We have a TV which has a couple of U.S. stations, a microwave and a refrigerator, as well as a chair and desk to work on. Watching TV is very interesting because they override the U.S. commercials and put in their own (which are very poor quality and seem to represent just a handful of sponsors). Their timing is usually a bit off so you usually see a bit of the U.S. commercial before the local ones begin and then sometimes the program has obviously started without you while the local commercials finish playing. While channel surfing we discovered one station that is just devoted to obituaries. They will play Christian-, Hindu- or Moslem-style music depending on the deceased’s affiliation and there will be a picture of the deceased along with written messages from various family members in memory of their loved one. The names of the surviving family members are then listed along with their relationship to the deceased and where they are presently living, often in other places in the Caribbean or the U.S.

After dropping off our luggage at our hotel, we headed for the Bible school to begin our work there. There is so very much work to do in the library and we realized early on that it would be impossible to actually get the details on all of the books entered into the library management system with only two weeks and five workers. Fortunately, Al has devised a way to capture just enough data to identify the books and get them entered into the system in a minimally-useable format. The details will have to be added at a later time by others. We had been told that there would be three locals for us to train, but so far only one lady showed up for a few hours. After working for three full days and two half-days we have probably documented about half the books in the library. We are finding that they are not shelved in proper order and some of our time may have to be spent getting the books shelved properly.

Dorothy, Al, Don and I have fallen into a routine that begins with a nice continental breakfast in our hotel at 7:15 each morning. They serve pineapple, papaya, watermelon and banana, along with toast, cold cereal, a tasty cheese and juice, tea and coffee. Then we wait for our driver who is supposed to pick us up at 8:00, but is nearly always late. We arrive at the library to work by 8:30 and find “Dr. Jeannie” already hard at work. We work until 10:30 when we are called into the lunch room for a snack. It’s great to have a little break before going back to work until 12:30 when they serve us a hot lunch. It generally consists of some kind of a rice dish with a small piece of chicken or fish and either a vegetable salad or cooked vegetables. They also provide some kind of juice with that meal. We usually take a short coffee break in the middle of the afternoon and have been quitting sometime between 5:00 and 6:00 depending on when the driver is available to pick us up. The Bible school is arranging for our transportation, for which we are grateful, but we can never depend on when we will be picked up, even though they give us a time each day to be ready to go. The problem is that it takes us so long to shut down, and we are so weary by quitting time, that it’s not practical just to work until the driver arrives. On Wednesday evening we sat around in the lobby waiting for over an hour,, during which time the mosquitoes decided to feast on my legs. I have about a dozen miserable bites, but I was able to buy some anti-itch cream today which is a great help. I made sure I got some repellent as well and will be using it liberally.

I think one of the reasons for the mosquito problem here is that there are drainage ditches filled with water throughout the city, one of which runs just outside the Bible school doors. This land was once under water, but was reclaimed by the Dutch who built a sea wall and a drainage system to hold back the Atlantic. The reclaimed land was originally used to raise sugar cane and that is how there came to be so many of African descent here. They came as slaves, but revolted in 1763 and gained their freedom. We saw a monument when we went sightseeing today which is a reminder of the slave revolt. There is also a very large Indian population (much like we found in Fiji). Most of the native peoples live in villages in the interior. They tell us that the entire population of Guyana is only 750,000 with about 400,000 living in the Georgetown area. There is also a significant Asian population and it seems they all run Chinese restaurants. There are probably 15 of them between our hotel and the Bible school. We decided that a change was in order from the hotel restaurant where we have been having our evening meals (it’s kind of expensive and not that good) so we asked our driver to recommend one of the Chinese restaurants and then we invited him to join us for dinner last night. It was a wonderful meal, and we enjoyed talking to him and learning more about him and his country. He actually worked in the gold fields on a claim owned by his brother-in-law for 12 years. Apparently he made a good living, but was home so little that his wife left him and went back to England (her homeland) with the children. Now he is working for the local pastor and the Bible school as a driver. He made a great tour guide when he drove us around the city this afternoon. We saw lots of beautiful government buildings, passed a couple of large outdoor markets, and I even got to have my picture taken sitting on one of the horse-drawn wagons which are not uncommon on the streets of the city. As part of our “tour” we were able to go into the largest wooden cathedral in the world. St. George’s Anglican Cathedral was completed in 1892 and had barrel ceilings, lovely stained glass and a very old pipe organ.

Because of the lengthy British colonization (replacing the Dutch), everyone speaks English, although we often have a great deal of difficulty understanding them because of their heavy accent which is similar to what you hear in the Caribbean. We have found them to be warm and friendly people, but are struggling a bit with their concept of time. For example, we found out that the driver had made arrangements to take three of the missionaries who are here temporarily teaching classes out on a sightseeing trip at 10:00 this morning. He was to return at 1:00 to take the five of us who are working in the library. At 2:30 he still had not showed up to take the first group and when he did arrive shortly thereafter he only had a 5-passenger vehicle. Then we had to wait for him to call a cab so that the two vehicles could accommodate all of the sightseers. Apparently this is a universal problem here. We understand that when our former pastor from San Diego, Dr. Richard Dresselhaus, was here teaching for a few weeks that the local pastor kept him waiting for more than two hours for an appointment one day. Those of you who know Pastor D and his concern for punctuality will understand that he was “not a happy camper”!

Tomorrow will definitely be a needed “day of rest” and we will be ready to get back to some very long work days in order to accomplish what needs to be done in the library. It is tedious work, but it will be rewarding if we can leave it in a useable state with the hope that there will be those who will complete the work and maintain it. They have installed air conditioning for us, which is a huge blessing, but we struggle with having adequate work space and dealing with very old and dusty books. Now that they can keep the windows closed (because the room is air conditioned), they may be able to remove the plastic sheeting which protects each book shelf, but makes it very hard to access the books as we are working with them. We are all definitely finding that “patience is a virtue” and it is definitely a much-needed one.