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Friday, 27 March 2009 13:40 |
THANK GOD IT’S FRIDAY for 27March 2009
Headline: SEA of Troubles
YESTERDAY THE CHILDREN of Trinidad & Tobago sat the SEA (Secondary Entrance Assessment) exam and my depression set in earlier than usual. Most mornings I can keep the semblance of a good mood going up to whatever point it is some clerk behind a counter, conductor on a maxi-taxi or preacher upon a pulpit destroys it. Ordinarily, the dread of the humdrum doesn’t begin
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Curb your London grocery enthusiasm |
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Wednesday, 25 March 2009 21:54 |
 This TGIF appeared on 16 January 2004.
THE CASHIER GLARED past the three people ahead of me in the ‘Baskets only’ line. She was unfortunate-looking to start and could hardly afford the indulgence of a single severe look; nevertheless, she shot me several. Momentarily, I considered joining another line, to avoid a sour flunkie taking out her frustrations on the only person lower than her in the corporate pecking order: the customer. But the three people ahead were together and left that way and I was at her till
She folded her arms. “Only one basket,” she said. “You have to join another line.” “I always use two baskets,” I said. “One basket!” she declared. “Read the sign.” Aha. Surer ground. “The sign reads, “Baskets only”,” I said, “not “Single baskets only” or “Basket only”. “If you don’t go,” she said, “I’m going to call my supervisor.”
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Friday, 20 March 2009 01:36 |
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YET ANOTHER BEAUTIFUL day in Barbados, as nearly all of them are between Christmas and Easter. It’s appreciably cooler in the day, often even outright cold in the night and early morning. Some locals won’t even try to go swimming until Good Friday. Bajan winter. A world of difference from sweltering August to November, when you lie in bed at night in underwear
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CONTAINER YOUR ENTHUSIASM |
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Friday, 13 March 2009 00:19 |
 AS IF TO keep up with Sao Paulo’s street children and Mumbai’s slum puppies, Port of Spain over the last fortnight got some abused and neglected children of its own – except that, like everything from inflation through Carnival costumes to construction workers, Port of Spain had to import its version: we got container children. Indeed, over the last week-and-a-half, it seemed that, as was the case with Voltaire’s God, if the container children did not exist, it became necessary to invent them.
Now, if you think about it at all, the container children rumours move quickly from incredible to outright risible. Where did the children come from? Or the firetrucking container, for that matter? Why were they shipped here? Where were they going if they weren’t staying? Was there a huge forwarding address label on the side of the container reading, “If Refused by Trinbago Sex Industry, Please Send on to Bangkok”. What race were the children? What ages? What genders? What purpose did any of it serve?
As it happens, that last question is the only one we can usefully answer – and, like every other useful query in these parts, will be the only one we won’t raise.
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Friday, 06 March 2009 02:13 |
 THE JAMAICAN PARLIAMENT this week voted to keep buggery a crime in Jamaica. The decision is what you’d expect from a Parliament led by Prime Minister Bruce Golding, best known internationally for determinedly revealing himself as a bigot and homophobe on the BBC’s Hardtalk in May 2008.
Asked by host, Stephen Sackur, whether he wanted to live in a Jamaica where a gay person could be in the Cabinet, Golding (without irony, and appearing to think he was being quite clever – I wouldn’t say, “cocky”)
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