The question of fate is one of life’s great mysteries and not something I have an answer to. I’m humbled though at times to witness its impact on our planet and to ponder the fairness of application. Last weekend the stark contrast of the different kind of lives children here in Guyana may have came to light in a most poignant moment.
I accompanied my VSO friend Selina to the races. She had been asked to go by one of her neighbours and basically I was along a chaperone, so that the outing would clearly not be a “date”. We were picked up by the neighbour and his friend in a 4x4 outfitted with a tent, a food cooler, an ice cooler, a beer cooler, plates, a few different machetes, cutlery, chairs, fresh coconuts on the vine...it was like jungle camping! A bumpy hour or so later and a 4X4’ drive up a large sand hill we arrived at our destination and prime viewing spot reserved by another guy who had arrived at the crack of dawn to secure it...so we were now front row at the races and the men set up camp central. Very exciting indeed!
The day progressed with very loud and intermittently thrilling car and motorcycle races in the extreme heat and much showing off of us two “white gayls” to the crowd of almost entirely men at the races. We were served hand and foot by our hosts....(humorously this is not what would happen if we were say married to these guys, then we would be doing the serving as is custom here). We decided to enjoy it for what it was and so we were served salad and fried chicken, then later curried chicken with puri, fresh fruit, iced drinks of fresh coconut juice and vodka ...and beer and then more beer...all before noon on a Sunday!!!.......The owner of all the camping gear had also brought along his 10 year old son for a day of manly fun, and as all the vendors walked by he was bought a sun hat, then chips, then another hat, this one with a solar panel operated fan built in (way cool), a pack of bubbles and well basically anything he wanted he was able to purchase from the passing vendors. He was a cool kid, not spoiled, funny, sweet, smart and thrilled to be out at such an event with the guys, he was clearly not taking any of it for granted. We enjoyed spending the day with him. We were also thankful for his presence as he was apparently the reason the driver kept his drinking down. (Whew!)
Shortly after lunch we were sitting in the chairs (brought just for us gayls) with the boy between us playing with his bubbles when two other boys about the same ago walked up to us. These boys were without shoes or hats in the hot sun and were wearing ill fitting and dusty clothes, they looked tired, hot and well kind of desperate...they were vending you see. They both had cigar style boxes around their necks with their scarce wares for sale on display out in front of them. They had so little for sale it was quite sad, an open pack of cigarettes and gum cut out of the packet so you could buy it one piece at a time, some very pathetic looking packets of biscuits, a few sun bleached peeling packs of mini-pringles, and a couple of bags of cheese stix (a Jamaican cheezie that I am actually quite fond of). The other boys father immediately tried to shoe them away, but something made me want to purchase from them, and I tried to but I only had a thousand dollar bill ($5 CAD)...a “BIG” bill here. They had no change of course. As they were being shoed away for the second time I asked them to come back when they passed again. Sure enough about an hour later they were back, dustier than ever and if it was possible even more desperate looking, they really wanted to make the cheezie sale. We had bought something else to get change. They sold me the cheezies and no words needed to be said... a look passed between Selina and I, and later we discussed we had been thinking the same thing.... of the huge and stark contrast of these two children’s lives to the boy here happily playing right beside us with his bubbles and solar hat, as ten years old should.
The vending boys took their money and walked off without shoes in the hot sand to make another round, maybe they would sell another bag of cheezies or a few cigarettes before the day was out. What was their story, did they have a home to go back to?...how much money could you even earn selling singles of cigarettes and gum?.... why did they have so little for sale?..were they made to work by their family and if so how long do they vend for on a hot day like this?....do they even have a family?..or maybe optimistically they were simply young entrepreneurs trying to make some money at the races with high hopes of a future expanded vending empire? I will never likely know their story yet the question of their fate sat soundly with me and I have thought of those two boys all week.
I have occasionally heard people in the 1st world talk of the poor and of poverty and a few times have heard some place blame on those that are poor themselves, that they should get a job, and that they can and should be able to change their circumstance, but it’s seldom true, if ever that those who find themselves in such circumstances truly have the power to change things around them. Sometimes maybe you are just a little kid forced into an adult dog eat dog vending world and you can barely acquire enough things to re-sell on a hot day...and if fate was kind - all kid’s would be playing with bubbles at the races instead of selling cigarettes.
The heaviness of my privilege is at times here almost unbearable.
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