Typical Weekend - Part 1

I am often asked what life is really like in Jamaica as a returning resident. Let me relive the last week-end with you.

Friday, March 13, 2009

My wife picks me up from work (HICFoundation, where I am the President) at noon today to transport me to play in a golf tournament that will benefit the “Heart Foundation of Jamaica”. Due to the drought, the course is not in good shape because unlike Caymanas, where I am a member, Constant Springs does not have a sprinkler system. Notwithstanding the greens, the men in my foursome are good golfers and good company. I actually played well but hit one ball out of bounds and lost one in the woods that took me out of the winning circle.

After golf, Stephanie joins me at the reception and we mingle with friends and enjoy the food and spirits. In addition to the group I played with, I am particularly happy to spend some time with my favorite cousin, Errol McKenexie (Executive Vice President at Sagicor)and his son Stephen. Errol is definitely a mover and in Jamaica. He was very instrumental in introducing me to Jamaican society on my return a year ago.

We meet another couple for dinner at 7:30 pm. The “Market Place” is a wonderful development where one can choose Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Spanish, Indian or French restaurants. We chose “Habibi Latino” and enjoy the paella, although the paella is not as tasty as the one our daughter Melanie makes! The conversation is lively mostly centered on whether the inequities based on skin color in Jamaica are due to racism, classism or both. The conversation got over heated when Stephanie took great exception when some said that her "helper" was content to be a housekeeper because "she" was a good boss. No amount of reasoning could convince this person that this attitude of one of both classism and racism. I went on to explain that Stephanie is very sensitive to this issue particulary because when we were visiting Mauritius two years ago and having dinner with four Indian cardiologists, I asked why there were no Black physicians in Mauritius even though Blacks made up twenty five percent of the population? One of the Indian cardiologists had the audacity to say that Black people neither had the ambition nor are thy willing to sacrifice to become doctors. My dear wife had to be restrained. She pointed out that there were over a dozen Black cardiologists (our group) at the conference who obviously did not meet that criterion and Mauritians needed to re-evaluate their presumptions.

After dinner, we went to the home of our dear friend Sonja Allen to celebrte her birthday. We bring her a bottle of Logwood honey (indigenous to Jamaica) and enjoyed dessert. The party was particularly entertaining because another friend, Loy Robinson played the piano and we sang old time favorites together. We even recited poems that we learned as children attending school in Jamaica in the “old days”. Sonja has the most amazing friends including my Aunt Madge, and it was non-stop laughter. Stephanie and I got home at 12:30 am and she remarked that she now understood why I was always comfortable lapsing into song and dance in a crowd. It’s the culture. We very happily yielded to sleep after a long and exciting day.