Demented indeed

Just got in from Christmas Eve drinks at a fairly quiet bar and was a bit astonished to see downtown Georgetown heaving with shoppers along Regent St. - to such an extent that the police blocked off traffic heading east.
A Facebook friend has been writing derisive comments all week about the mad consumer rush for non-required junk and the fact that the average Guyanese has turned into a mindless consumer-- I rather liked his plea: 'Stop shopping mutton'.
The bar itself was fairly interesting -- mainly a younger 'cool' crowd; a quarter of whom were compulsively texting on their cell phones, the guys  looked  a bit 'posey' and the some of the girls a bit over-dressed while others in smart 'afternoon' casual clothes. The amount of vehicles was pretty impressive-- both in the car park for the bar and on the main shopping streets close to midnight. It's a whole different life once I take my nose out of a book!

The Way Guyanese Men view Women

In spite of the fact that like the rest of the Caribbean and the developed world, the numbers of women continuing in tertiary education are outnumbering men; Guyanese men seem to be stuck in some sort of Time Warp where women are there to provide cooking cleaning and sex.

Sadly, 'big men', those in positions of power wield their economic power and frequently cross the line of decency, telling themselves the women deserve to be treated like that.  I was appalled that a 21yr old accepted a lift from a much older man to drop her child off to day-care. She reported that she was surprised that he waited back for her and offered her another lift... this time it was ominous, he locked the doors automatically, drove her to a remote location and raped her, made her perform acts seen on pornography, had her say she enjoyed it so she could get a lift back, then tossed her out of the car with a $5000 bill (US $25). She stopped a mobile police patrol who arrested then released the man without investigation and apparently advised her to seek medical advice without telling her to not wash herself until evidence was taken

This sort of behaviour starts all the way from the top-- pathetic men who tell themselves young, poor women are whores and should be flattered by their attention... the main attraction being the cash and other emoluments. Particularly stomach-churning are the instances of Government Ministers indulging in this behaviour... not limited to one particular Party as the previous regime did that also. So I was suitable disgusted to read the transcript of the Anil-gate taped conversation between the relatively 'green' Attorney-General and a reporter of one of the more trashy dailies. The conversation opens with the AG badgering the reporter for the name of the woman reporter because his uncle would like to f**K her/bang her ... Sadly this attitude appears to represent the majority of Guyanese males, judging from the book In The Sly Company of People Who Care.http://gtobserver.blogspot.com/2011/12/sly-company-of-people-who-care-rahul.html

Being from fairly conservative family, it is an attitude totally alien to me and when I engaged in voluntary work in 1995, I was thinking that the men must be 'backwards' to refuse to let their intelligent young daughters go out to work; now that I have been around for a while-- I understand that that is about the most a poor man can do to protect a beloved daughter, as there are so many wolves in sheep's clothing about.

How Do You Go About Fixing Things....2

Quote from a response to a disgruntled letter (http://www.stabroeknews.com/2014/opinion/letters/10/07/please-stay-dont-go/ in the local newspaper: 'the hidden defects of colonization is the silent culprit that will forever influence the leadership psyche of those who aspire to govern.'
One wonders when exactly will we be able to shrug off the mental shackles when even those countries guilty of manipulating the Global system are up Shit Creek themselves?  The letter-writer himself says that 'there is the near total lack of standards and ethics in the national character. It is where many are on the take, and others long to be taken.' and his warning for those on the outside contemplating returning:  'They will run into the steel wall of the local mindset that is ensconced intractably in mediocrity and fear. It is the fear of unskilled, untutored, and unexposed natives who feel threatened and apprehensive that their game might be up, and that they could be sidelined or overwhelmed, or revealed for who they really are; of how much they lack and how prehistoric they just might be.'

So with the happy thoughts above, I note that four students from one of the top high schools were posted on Facebook quite unashamedly engaging in oral sex seemingly at school (turns out in a private home but they were in school uniform) -- of course the girls giving the boys--- still a sex imbalance in the field. No doubt the ready availability of pornography via cell phones has contributed to the desensitizing of the act and as someone noted-- they WANT to be caught. There seemed to be a free exchange among adults before FB pulled the video. One suggestion was to expel them...then what? This was the same school where a teacher or two were caught on camera exposing their backsides and underwear during a post-election upheaval incident. It strikes me that we simply are overwhelmed - bad parenting notwithstanding, it is difficult to police people shrieking Human Rights while breaking whatever rules-- unwritten moral ones and written ones referring to a bygone era.
The so-called leaders just out to get the glory of leadership while being clueless about what to do-- I left our little (un)friendly society when the members started belly-aching about poorly qualified people coming out from the local university while making plans to employ them?
The mindset of no tomorrow has sadly extended to the more accessible interior - overhunting and fishing is beginning to make its presence felt and I feel a bit sorry for the locals who might have been dependent on supplementing their subsistence farming, but I am reliably informed the young are now all drifting to the cities to engage in the local hustle of money by any means.

Unsurprising really

The news reported that a 40-something yr old Liberian decided in early September to join his family in the US as the Ebola epidemic is poised to explode further. He had no strong ties to Liberia, living in a rented room. He assisted his landlord's family to carry their 19yr old 7-months pregnant daughter to several hospitals but she could not be admitted as there were no beds. She died of the disease a few days later, apparently having caught it from a cousin who came to visit her at home-- now with all the information going around ... why the need for touch?? Dying of ignorance! I believe the man knew he was at risk and I was reading the outraged comments of Americans who are furious that he was admitted into the US to sponge off their health system. To which I say-- the world is interconnected-- you can't manipulate the system to be top-dog and think that it would not find a way to bite you in the backside at a later date!  Extreme poverty is responsible for the unwarranted spread of this disease... the variables that could lessen the terrible outcomes all have this as their root cause- from simple communication of health promotion messages and alternatives to dangerous practices, to lack of beds to isolate the infected from transmitting the disease.
I read of the UK Foreign Secretary -Philip Hammond considering the alternative to last-minute efforts - that of letting the disease run its course--- sounds cruel but what else can you do with such large numbers of people? If that would be the case, the world can expect hordes of the educated ones with the means to 'visit' friends and relatives in 'safe' countries by any means - I would certainly be considering that possibility if I were in their shoes!  In fact, I half-expected something of that sort when Sierra Leone announced their shut-down for three days! Truly interesting times we live in.

PS -- most amusing to see the Americans getting their knickers tied up in a twist... one faux-pas after another: from totally missing the possibility to an Ebola case in Texas -- the man's nephew having to contact the CDC in Atlanta  to forcing the man's family to stay in the apartment where he had shed bodily fluids, confusion about getting a 'specialist crew' to decontaminate the place (shouldn't they be moving the humans out??!) then the crew not being given permission to transport the linen he used. What will they do if there are more then 10 cases?

Bad Governance

The newspaper today has a Reuters' article about the President of The Gambia in West Africa voicing concern about pirates ramming boats just off Europe and being responsible for the deaths of many illegal immigrants to Europe. I heard a BBC report earlier this week and the gruesome details albeit on radio left a graphic picture in my head that I just cannot shake: A Palestinian man recounted that a (pirate's) boat rammed their boat carrying illegal immigrants to Europe (at  U$4000 per person), in the ensuing confusion, he and his brother clung to a piece of wood and between them tried to save a baby when died of hypothermia; he further stated that he saw a desperate survivor clinging to the (pirate's) boat and the men leaning over and hacking the hands off the body!  Such appalling inhumanity but in the next breath the Palestinian said he wanted to go to Sweden where he had family and find a job. Gaza is pretty much totaled. How many people can Europe hold, even with the best intentions? And what about the swelling numbers of their unemployed--- currently seeding better educated and tech savvy disgruntled young people who feel no empathy and strong cultural ties with their country of birth/residence ?
I replied back to the President of The Gambia... what was he doing to keep his people safely in his country? Small bands of elites in Africa mimicking their counterparts in the developed world are leading to increasingly desperate peoples. Sierre Leone has just instituted quarantine measures without seemingly giving thought to how people would get basic supplies to live, including food-- even if people started a kitchen garden, it would be at least a few months before they can reap anything-- which led to the problem in the first place-- the possible zoonotic transmission of the Ebola virus from a different species into humans-- eating bushmeat.  Sadly this can be repeated in Latin America and pretty much elsewhere.

29/9/14 Yep:  http://blogs.cfr.org/patrick/2014/09/10/ebola-reveals-gaps-in-global-epidemic-response/   'Though far from over, the crisis has demonstrated how ill-equipped the multilateral system is to cope with global public health emergencies, particularly in the world’s weak and failing states. In an increasingly globalized world, it is illusory and hazardous to imagine that fragile states can cope with such emergencies on their own, cordoned off from the rest of the world.'

Voluneetering-- how does this work in practice?

So it seems to me surprising that the most important and exhausting tasks are left on the shoulders of those a bit more community-minded than most.  I read about UNICEF looking for (qualified) volunteers in Nutrition, Risk Communication and Water + Sanitation for the West African countries currently affected by the Ebola outbreak.  While I understand the urgency of the situation and the need for a quick-fix solution and maybe a sane system might develop from an ad-hoc one ( but I pessimistically don't think so!) - surely focusing on building local capacity using their volunteers might be a better long-term solution?

I have been compulsively following whatever Ebola news has been grudgingly picked by Google-- Fox News (???) and the established networks and cussing lack of news to disseminate the important things without a 'spin'- couldn't any network find a local person with a mobile telephone to call in daily reports?   I think the Washington Post or the NT Times had a video about the 'burial boys' of Sierra Leone -- 20-something yr olds, some who used to be  taxi-drivers and who volunteered to do the unenviable task for burying the dead victims, facing - being infected, outrage from the communities not being allowed to honour their  dead and ostracism from their family and immediate community from running the possible risk of infection.  They were initially not paid and are now on a princely sum of U$6 per day -- really-- we grudge them THAT paltry sum for risking their lives??

The question of finance is a tricky one -- medivac-ing ain't cheap as presumably there are not many specialised units. I read reports that to evacuate the first American doctor was U$ 2 million then U$1 million per person -- whatever it is: plenty money and yes-- brave of them to volunteer (when they did the outbreak wasn't 'on') and also wise of their agency to have back-up insurance but I mourn the loss of the local healthcare workers -- we are told that when they realised that they had contracted the disease-- no-one was digging into their pockets to medi-vac them to Germany which one assumes had agreed to treat them--- well people-- how does THAT work-- the nightmare (and cost!) of getting a local person to the level that you can communicate with on an intellectual level and you leave them without (financial) support?  On what basis does the world decide to spend billions and then ignore local capacity?  PAY/MAKE AVAILABLE MONEY FOR THE DAMM PEOPLE!

Globalisation - is it a good thing?

So, with the tragedy in West Africa (Ebola infections) being made worse by governments without a risk management strategy of any sort-- all three initial countries barely struggling to keep peace between different factions--  the exacerbation caused by effects of globalisation can be seen.
Attempts to cordon off reputed affected areas are being met with resistance as fears about regular food supplies in urban areas and other goods and services in the more rural areas are quite rightly being raised-- official responses seem very ad hoc and would not inspire confidence in the populations that the people in charge have their well-being at heart.  Add the declining international transportation services to those areas to the  mix with dwindling non-local supplies and no wonder the people are inclined to riot!  Rather reminiscent of Italian city states during the plague.
So where are the smart asses who devised the grand plan that countries should not be self-sufficient and instead  join the global rat race? And what suggestions do they have for desperate people without even means of basic protective barriers? Even more worrisome is that the majority of population in the worse hit country (Liberia) are illiterate and the most effective communication means is by radio and as knowledgeable people in the front-line decline there are not many others to take up the slack. Typical - destroy the local capability to create a band of elites to tie into the global system then stand back and wash your hands of the situation when it all gets out of control!

29.9.14: 'Though far from over, the crisis has demonstrated how ill-equipped the multilateral system is to cope with global public health emergencies, particularly in the world’s weak and failing states. In an increasingly globalized world, it is illusory and hazardous to imagine that fragile states can cope with such emergencies on their own, cordoned off from the rest of the world.' http://blogs.cfr.org/patrick/2014/09/10/ebola-reveals-gaps-in-global-epidemic-response/