One of my Favorite lines of poetry begins: The days run away like the wild horses over the hills…
I often find myself shaking my head and smiling while, in amazed exhale, I breathe out this line at the end of a stretch of time, which has stampeded past with so much intensity and chance that I am barely able to catch it at all. The expression allows me not to worry that everything has past me bye, but simply to release the rare sights and sounds I have glimpsed to mix with the light in my minds eye and let the dust settle where it will. Something will come of it; change has already happened.
The whirlwind of days continued here in Guyana this last weekend. The sky has kept its moisture to itself and people seem both emboldened, enlivened by the constant sunshine, yet also slightly distrustful, as if afraid of bad portents to come. It may storm at any minute, but then it never does; the clouds pass over, the sun keeps shining; it’s pre-occupying, or at least it is for me. I have always been slightly unhinged waiting for a storm to come. Have always been sensitive to the change in atmospheric pressure perhaps. Or, perhaps I have been on too many mountain tops while the storms gather and close with their nearing lightning strikes. If indeed “It will be rain tonight.” Then “Let it come down.”

By Friday afternoon I had really gotten my stride in the middle of the third repetition of my introduction to Shakespeare/Macbeth. I left the school with a great sense of accomplishment like I had actually taught something to teenagers and they hadn’t completely shunned me. It being Friday I made my way to the neighborhood where I play football as the heat of the day drained off into the tranquility that is the hour before dusk.
The neighborhood is called Stand Pipe, though it is pronounced more like Stan pie. It is not written anywhere, not on any of the municipal street signs that demarcate neighborhood borders. In fact the area has a few different names written up on signs as you enter from opposite sides: Nursetown, Haverford. But I have learned that Stand Pipe is a well-recognized name in New Amsterdam. Earlier in the week a few students in my younger class shyly asked me in their formal way: “Excuse me sir. Sir, Do you play football at Stand Pipe Field?” I replied that I did and they though it very funny. I have gathered in a different context that the name refers to the pipe that comes directly up from a septic tank to a toilet. Another town is called Sheet Anchor- again pronounced more like Chitonka.
The entrance to the neighborhood is at a crossroad where I had attended a block party a few weeks back. The crossroad is a broken section of pavement leading slightly uphill as you enter. Every Car has to slow down to a crawl to make it over the impediments. On a bike there is a little path in the dirt, which winds through the asphalt and gets you up or down in single file. Straight in is the main road with houses lining both sides, yards fenced full of life: animals, children, flowering plants. A left takes you into side streets and eventually with a few twists and turns to the football pitch hidden in the back. The right turn becomes a single-track dirt path through a green road-less section, with houses on one side but not the other. Often there are a lot of children and dogs cavorting around, while older residents sit out in the cool afternoon on a large downed log or on one of the porches. Eventually this area takes you back out to a main road. While it is more direct, I biked it once and, even without the mother dog which attacked me for almost running over her less than week old pup, I wouldn’t recommend anything but walking as you cross several streams half-forded by boards and uneven terrain all around.
In the middle of this cross road, slightly off to the side in the green area, is a large U shaped set of benches. Each bench holds up to 7 people or so, and they are high enough up that there is a lower rail for your feet. There are posts, which can accommodate a tarp above the benches, but during the dry season, at least, the canopy is left off. Every time I have gone to Stand Pipe, there have been people on these benches, sometimes only a few, sometimes they are packed solid. You have to go past this parade grounds to get into the neighborhood. I sat at it during the block party for a little while and, especially at that moment, it felt like an exalted place. Usually I kind of nod and wave as I pass on the way to football, for mostly the faces are only slightly recognizable to me.
On this Friday the benches are full and a number of other people, including Roland, are standing around in the street. So I pulled to a stop. No football today I quickly gathered, and then a lot of other less clear talk. This is how it normally is when I am in a group of Guyanese who are speaking amongst themselves and even when they speak to me. I make out bits and pieces of the dialogue, but not much at first because I really don’t speak Guyanese at all fluently. The only thing I really understood was that there was no football and that they at some point were going to set up for a big yearly festival at the main New Amsterdam public grounds called the Esplanade. I almost left and went back home, but since I was there and since Miriam was out till later that night, I realized I didn’t really have anything in particular to do. So I asked if I could help in anyway and Roland replied with the universal- “more hands, less work.” Now all I had to do was wait around until something happened. I moved over to the side and said hello to the one or two people that I knew on the benches, and then kind of leaned against the post, not quiet able to make the bold move of sitting down. I leaned for a while, maybe half an hour, kind of easing myself into the group, trying to become like the post and thus normalize my presence to everyone. In New Orleans penal code I believe it’s called “leaning against a post with intent to fall”. Except I wasn’t drunk, just nervous. Eventually someone got up and left, Roland had taken off some time ago, but I got the sense he would return sooner or later. Before I could let myself decide to just go home and read, I sat down. Of course nobody paid the slightest attention. It’s just hard not to feel like a complete unwanted freak sometimes when you are: the only person who looks like yourself, obviously have not grown up in the neighborhood like everyone else, and you can’t really understand what everyone is saying.
Once I was seated I started to relax and eventually almost was able to follow most of the conversation, at least if I picked one conversation to follow. The group is entirely male, ranging from early twenties to mid- forties and at least three quarter are heavily dreadlocked Rastafarians. Among other things you can tell their age based on the complexity of their dreads. The twenty year olds have either short or medium length dreads, the thirty-year olds -the beautiful long strands that stack up under pillowed caps, and the older guys- huge piles of hair which cannot be contained except by wrapping it stacked high in the air like an enlarged turban. Of course this is just generalization, like everybody some are more conscious about how they look and style themselves more. But I think that since it is still against school rules for boys to have long hair that the Rastafarians only start growing their dreads after they are out of school. I’m sure there are many other factors of which I am completely unaware, not the least of which is their individual adherence to the Biblical passage, which is one of the bases for the dreads in the first place. Suffice it to say that I am in a group made up primarily of Rastafarians. The others go almost completely clean shaven, head and face, though cornrows seem like they are a growing trend.
There are a few great things about the arrangement of sitting on these benches at the entrance to the neighborhood. For one thing everyone sees everyone, and there is a communal aspect that only repetitive greeting and acknowledgement can accomplish. There are also long stretches where nobody says anything and nobody walks by and a large group of men simply sit in silence while the sun gets lower in the sky. It is also a perfect place for telling stories: very little distraction and a captive audience. There are also some awful things about the arrangement. It is entirely male and when ever a woman walks by who is not know to be attached to someone, the woman gets all sorts of talk and noises in her direction. This is prevalent in Guyana, especially a kissing or sucking sound. It is very embarrassing for me to sit near, as it is like the noise I make to greet unknown dogs. Miriam gets it all the time. The Rastafarians don’t seem to make the noises, but the eyes often say just as much. Unequivocally I can say that it is demeaning and wrong and societies have to figure out how to make it unacceptable. I go out of my way to avoid anything but a smile and greeting of the day and then avert my eyes entirely from just about every woman I see on the streets. This of course is ridiculous as well, but unfortunately there is little happy medium. Occasionally I ask men I am sitting with, wherever I have been in the world, if they actually think the women will respond to the noises. I don’t get much, but laughs and shrugs and usually I just don’t have the place to say anything at all. Women either learn to ignore it, or develop an ability to give just as good as they get. Which in the end is really still problematic due to the societal normalization of this as a starting point for conversation between men and women. Secondly the arrangement of men sitting around idle at any time of day is a fairly accurate sign of how much unemployment there is, especially in the Afro-Guyanese community. And of course unfortunately often the loudest guy, with the most obscene stories, gets to hold court.
But, as the sun faded completely and the number of the group dwindled down, at one point, right near dusk, I felt that I was in the closest thing to my peer group as I have been in Guyana. Only five people remained and they were all roughly my age. Roland and I sat next to each other for a while and spoke of the happenings of our week. Another guy named James told me about his musical career and how he has traveled around the world playing and singing his love. It is almost like I have friends. And in those two hours I have learned much about the weekend to come, by not rushing away I have found my self a part of something about to happen- even as I am unsure about what exactly it will be.
It turns out that there is a field nearby where someone will be setting up lights for tonight to have a bunch of friendly matches in preparation for a tournament on Sat. night. After it has been dark for a while we head over. The field is at the Prison Officer’s Sporting Club, which I gather is the place where the Prison Officers perhaps are housed but at least gather in off work time and perhaps on. It is located across from the New Amsterdam Prison. The Prison itself is an all-wooden structure, which doesn’t look much bigger than the average secondary school. A large wooden wall with barbed wire surrounds it so it’s hard to see much. The street, which runs between the Prison and the Club, has three large tree trunks, which are sometimes pulled into the road at staggered intervals to slow down traffic. We enter through a gate and what appears to be the patio of a Rum shop, then through another gate and onto the field. There are about forty people grouped around a small football pitch. Men are putting up lights, one is already working and half the field is lit in those strange stadium shadows. I sit with Roland and a few others off to one side. A few boys kick around a ball, eventually James joins up with some younger kids and they play a little 3 on 3 keep away. Nothing seems like it is happening anytime soon and I consider getting up to kick the ball around. Gradually it becomes apparent that two teams are warming up. They have uniforms and do organized calisthenics. I settle in the grass ready to watch some five on five football, kind of relieved that my time at playing organized sports has long past- time for others to be displayed under the lights. Two games are played, with half times and switching sides, even a referee. The field is starting to fill with people, men and women, spectators. I realize that I am now sitting with a distinct group of people; I feel the little white boy in a sea of Rastafarians on one side of the field and the crowd has grown to over four hundred. Through overhearing conversation and talking to Roland I gather that the Stand Pipe team will play the last game of the night.
It is getting late and Miriam and I have a standing worry time set at Nine O’clock, three hours after dark, if nothing is heard from either of us. There is no way the game will even start by then, so I decide to go home ostensibly to get my cleats. I pedal across town quickly, excitedly grab my stuff, kiss Miriam, and pedal back. I’m not even sure if I will play or if I can or if anyone wants me to or if I even want to. But buy the ticket take the ride.
The prison officers club that I return to is a strange mix of stereotypically organized clean shaven disciplinarian men who are running the football matches and a crowd of men and women at the front rum shop on the second floor. As I return and make my way to the field, a man hails me and asks in excited eager tones wither I am looking for Bam-Bam, which after a bit of confusion turns out to be sex. I smile politely and tell him I am just there for the football. Entering the field, the second match is almost over and again the crowd has grown. As I make my way over to the side where Stand Pipe is sitting a young man hails me with “Sir Arthur”, which means I most likely taught him Shakespeare that afternoon. I am getting nervous as time drags on during the third game. I have laced up my boot and suddenly I realize that I might not be wanted by Roland to play at all. I am embarrassed by the thought and desperate to cover myself, as well as unable to sit still, I go around the field to where an old woman is selling bottles of beer and I buy two thinking to have them on hand if I am not to play. A sort of insurance policy, which says well, see I have a beer, didn’t expect to play at all. But she opens them before I can stop her so now I walk back through the people with two open bottles. Someone hails me and it is my next-door neighbor. I get an uneasy feeling, like everyone in New Amsterdam is watching this match. When I get back I offer Roland one of the beers to which he of course says he’ll have one after the game. Which was why I got the second one in the first place, but I tell him that it got opened accidentally and he takes it, passing it on to someone else and he says that it’s ok he will get one back later. So it is kind of the gesture that I meant it to be, although it is a little off; everything is becoming a little off. I take a sip of my beer and then spill the rest.
Suddenly it is the last game and Roland leans back and asks if I’m ready. Out I go into the lights, onto the pitch with more people standing around watching me than I’ve had in almost twenty years. As Roland and I enter the pitch and a few others start to come on, half of the crowd it seems is yelling out to Roland “Captain, Captain, pick me , pick me.” It is a jest as the team is already established but it is a startling echo of the esteem that people hold in him. Now the Stand Pipe team, unlike everyone else, has no uniform (they in fact will not play in the organized tournament because it costs money to enter). But it gets decided that we shall wear white. I have on green. Someone in the crowd literally takes the white shirt off of his back and hands it to me. The game starts. We don’t get a chance to kick around a ball or anything.
I would like to say that I played excellently, even scored a goal perhaps, or even that I played adequately. Unfortunately this is no the case. It was now 10:30 and I had been up all day, teaching Shakespeare for christ’s sake, there were a lot of people watching, the lights made me unable to see clearly, the football pitch was even and fast and actually had grass and boundary lines, unlike anything I had played on recently. Everybody, even Roland, was a bit nervous. But those are just excuses, the truth is I was terrible. Running around like a chicken with it’s head cut off; frantic like a baby burro who has lost it’s mother. Too excitable for my own good and the other team was well organized. Had in fact actually played as a team before. I got subbed out in the first half. But not until after one horrendous moment when the ball came towards me and for some unknown reason I stuck out my foot and missed it entirely- a lame little failed poke, tentative and extremely un-coordinated. Stumbling and stupid under the lights while a town looked on.
I was sure I was done, had failed. I even took off my cleats. Half-time came and nobody said anything. Second half came and somebody told me to get ready: I came in as a sub, played ok, ran around a lot, pressured the ball, got tired fast and took myself out. Again kind of dejected. Mumbling to myself and to the men and women of Stand Pipe who were watching, who I had let down- “didn’t have much to give today. Kind of terrible.” Sorry, Sorry. Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa. As I came off one of the men who had been sitting on the benches around dusk, Brian, exclaimed loudly something repetitively, of which I only caught a little. “White man is working out there. Don’t care what you say, the white man was working.” The game got over quickly and everyone dispersed just as fast. Roland, who was dejected and down, barely lifted his eyes as he came off the field, but made sure to say goodbye to me a few minutes later with the same grace and joy in his eyes with which her always said hello and goodbye.
Right before I left, some guys walked by smiling and said something to which I vaguely responded that I played poorly. One of them turned to me and said “yeah you caused them to lose, Mr. CIA. That’s right, we know you CIA.” And walked away with a hard cold stare. Even the woman who I bought the beer from, and who had made me promise to return the bottles, was gone. It was a long ride home through town in a strange foreign land.
I didn’t sleep well that night. Kept replaying that stumbling attempt at a kick- haven’t felt so uncoordinated in a long time. And the jeering faces were all I saw of the crowd.
The next morning, after going to the market, I headed over to the Esplanade where I thought I had heard Roland would be starting to set up for the festival around 10 AM. He was there and so were most of the players and much of the bench sitters. I was a little afraid they would be ashamed to be seen with me, but I got the warmest greeting I had ever gotten from James and Brian and then Roland when I found him on the other side of the fair grounds. The Rastafarians sometimes greet each other by meeting hands together palm up, fingers interlaced and, though they had never done this towards me before, they all came to me like this now. We all laughed about how bad we had played, how the lights were hard to see under, how everything had not gone our way. I was immensely relieved to say the least.
They were starting to do the days cooking for the festival. They had four or five fires and oil drum grills started. Huge woks were crackling with oil and food was being prepped all over the place. I said that I could cook and how could I help, which they thought kind of funny, but after they gave me a knife to humor me, they realized that I could actually use it. I was a prep cook for two hours, and then had to leave. I promised that I’d come back with Miriam to see the beginning of the festival, but that we would have to leave early because Miriam was preaching three times in the morning.
Miriam and I returned to the Esplanade around 5:30. The group was at the gate doing some last minute breaking and sawing of a lock to let some cars in and out. I introduced Miriam to Roland. With a solemnity that surprised me, he spoke to her about how good it was to spread the Word. I cannot say enough how much of an impression it made on me that this leader of the Rastafarian neighborhood in this foreign country of Guyana thought that what Miriam does when she preaches in church on Sunday is a good, important thing. I was as proud as I had been humbled the night before.
We toured the area. They had set up a little county fair, with booths of food, and carnival games, a bar, and a huge concert size sound system. A dance would start after 9, which would go until after 3 AM with live music. I introduced Miriam to some of the people. The place was full of kids running around, men and women enjoying the evening together. The football tournament had been called off due to the festival, another mysterious sign of the organizational clout of Roland and his group. Somehow or other I am acceptable to this group, to this neighborhood called Stand Pipe.

But that was just half of the weekend.

Don’t worry this part won’t be as long.

On Sunday morning we awoke at our early hour and were at the corner to be picked up by 6:15 AM (no mean feat for me in and of itself). Miriam preached well, each time shaping her sermon differently and delivering it with controlled passion and grace. During her sermon I heard that we cannot carry our burdens alone, that we are a part of a wider community which helps us life our troubles, and whose troubles we ease by our helping hand. And that we can do this thankfully by the grace of god sharing our brokenness. Amen to all that. At one point during each service I chanted aloud with the congregation part of Psalm 116- My eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling- and though I had not felt delivered from those afflictions on this weekend, saying the words made me realize that not alone did my feet stumble and not alone did the tears well up when I heard but many years ago someone else’s did as well.
By noon I was exhausted and I didn’t even preach. We slept in the hammock after a quick lunch then headed back out to Canje for Miriam’s teaching confirmation class and a women’s group meeting where my presence was requested because they were going to make a local type of food Euphemistically called Chicken’s Feet. By 4:30 I was in the small back room of Transfiguration church with 7 or 8 women and one teenage boy rolling out a dough made of chickpea flour, flour, peppers, and garlic- the exact proportions of which I could never get them to tell me. The ladies were impressed with my ability with the rolling pin and when Miriam arrived I had detailed notes with diagrams that they all found hilarious.
With very little warning, right during the middle of cooking in fact, we were whisked outside into the dark of the country and taken down the dirt road to a congregation member's home, all the while competing with a herd of cattle for the use of the road. Turned out that this woman’s neighbor was having a wedding celebration and she wanted to take us over to see something of a Hindu celebration. Her mother, who is Hindu, asked us if we would eat the food, as she had a son who had turned Christian and would not now eat Hindu wedding food considering it not sanctified. We assured her that we would most definitely eat the food.
So we crashed the Hindu wedding, where we were welcomed like next-door neighbors even when they thought that we had just come in off the streets alone. They piled up huge quantities of delicious curries onto large plates made out of giant lily pads and we stuffed ourselves trying our best to be somewhat civilized eating rice and curry with our fingers. They are of course remarkably neat about the whole thing. After a while I got the technique down, but still we got a lot of hot pepper juice on our lips as the blistering and swelling attested to the next morning. To me, being the man and all, they gave an especially massive portion. When do you decide that you have eaten enough not to be offensive? Is it offensive to throw any of it away in the first place? Well best to just eat it all to be safe. It was also really fabulously good, so pay the consequences in the morning and keep eating. A few minutes after we finished eating and had washed up the elder brother of the groom took us aside and led us into a back room where he introduced his wife and proceeded to explain that they had been married 3 years and as he said “still didn’t have any children. Her face was on the floor. Somewhere in there he asked for a blessing.
Luckily Miriam is the Pastor, so I can just stand there dumbfounded while she tries to figure out something to say to this shy woman and her husband. Or maybe I was supposed to say something as well- what could I say in this extremely complex multi-cultural situation. I wished them blessings. How woefully inadequate words can be, yet it is so important that we try to give them to each other. The downtrodden eyes of the woman stay with me. How we fail one another. How I failed her.
Not that I had much time to reflect as ten seconds later everyone wanted us to dance. We all twisted our hands to the Hindu music and then I jumped around doing a jig, finally going so far as to twirl Miriam around. Two songs, shake hands all around, get handed huge bags of food to take away, then out the door and back to the church.
We labored into bed a few hours later.
Monday we lay around in a stupor as the curry got itself out of me as fast as it could. Oh and I went with pastor Roy and picked up some chickens from a congregation member who lived in the country. We have three hens and a rooster now in the back yard.
The days run away like the wild horses over the hills…
Indeed.

Luckily I got to teach an improptu session on similes to 11 year olds on Tuesday.

When I mention to a long time resident of New Amsterdam how it seems to me that the sky threatens constantly, but then does not deliver on the promise; I am told that it will rain in November.