Alissa Trotz is Director of Caribbean Studies at the University of Toronto, and editor of the In the Diaspora column.
By Alissa Trotz
On a wintry afternoon two days ago, hundreds of mourners gathered at the Weston Pentecostal church in Toronto to pay their last respects to Basmattee Dharamlall, known to us all by her calling name, Desiree, who died at the age of 54 after a prolonged battle with cancer. Born and raised in West Coast Berbice, one of five children, she was a single parent who worked inside and outside the home, sometimes at more than one job, to raise her three children, Tony, Tracy and Aubrey. When I met her in September 2001, she had just arrived in Toronto through a charitable organization that had sponsored an urgent medical visit for her youngest son, then 15 years old. His procedure went well, but a few months later Desiree would be diagnosed with advanced cancer, and remained in Canada for treatment. She was active in all sorts of ways, from the Guyanese community to church groups to the walks for cancer she participated in each year.
At home and in the diaspora, Desiree was also known as W3327 Dharamlall, or ‘Big Souse,’ a nickname she had earned since her days in police training school in the mid-1970s. Even if you are no longer in the force, you seem to continue to wear your number, like some sort of affectionate shorthand. And so 349 Gibson and 319 Boodhoo, two of her female squadmates, came to pay their respects last weekend, and they brought condolence messages for the family, reeling off from the tops of their heads the badge numbers of other police officers in Guyana, New York, Boston, Liberia, Pakistan, her instructor 6738 Williams.
Each year the group holds a reunion in New York, but they had committed to holding the 2009 event in Toronto so that Desiree could be with them. During the open microphone session, someone came forward from Desiree’s natal village, No. 7 West Coast Berbice, and recounted how proud the villagers were of her when she became the first Indian woman from the community to join the police force. The eulogy was given by a couple from New Amsterdam, a Black family whom she had lived with when she first began working as a police officer. By her example, Desiree showed us a Guyana that could be, because her life is such a rich reminder of how workable relationships are the foundation upon which all sorts of imposed and useless boundaries can be overcome.
A few months ago, and seven years after her initial diagnosis, Desiree was admitted to hospital for the final time. A devoted mother, she wanted more than anything to see her son and daughter in Guyana, but she was in no position to travel and in Guyana she would not have had access to the kind of medical attention that she required at this stage. Her condition prevented her from returning. Efforts were made by her family to request Canadian visas for her children. Each was unsuccessful. Up to the very end, when the doctors issued a ‘do not resuscitate’ order, even the local Member of Parliament sent a final plea to Immigration Canada for her children to travel to be by their mother’s bedside, as Desiree had explicitly requested, time and time again. But by then it was too late.
We live in a world where unfair rules and legal niceties can trump the simple urgency of a family’s anguish. We live in a society that is defined by borders that split families apart, and that derive their meaning and their purpose from the people that they are designed to keep out. Desiree’s life is a rebuke to the inhumanity of these restrictions, because her journeys never respected such cruel divisions. Instead, she lived in the world completely, in ways that can only be described as a perpetual bridge to others, and a testimony to the joys to be had from such varied experiences of crossing. Despite the tremendous pain she was experiencing, she refused to dwell on her own situation (when told finally that there was nothing more that the doctors could do, she told us “Ah wha’ yuh a cry for, yuh ain’t know I gone get up and walk out of here?” Against the doctors’ orders, she would entreat family and friends to bring her saltfish or her favourite sandwich from a franchise called Subway, even if she was too ill to do more than take a smell or a quick taste.
Her hospital room was visited by Guyanese from all walks of life, neighbours, members of her own as well as neighbouring congregations, the Canadian doctors who had provided such excellent care for her over the years and were inspired by her courage, numerous friends from countries like India, Algeria, Germany, Iran, Barbados, children whom she had helped care for during her stay in Canada. All were stitched together by Desiree’s care and generosity. Up to the end, her smile and wit and unshakeable faith made us all feel better, and I believe she understood just how much she was loved by so many. We need a world that respects such care, and that recognizes and properly rewards carers like Desiree for their work against the odds.
After the church service, we headed downtown, into a slowly setting sun. In the distance I saw an airplane coming safely into Toronto, and imagined the families and friends waiting excitedly at the airport for its passengers to disembark. And I thought of Desiree, unable to say goodbye in person to her daughter and son, returning to them in Guyana today. Her life will be celebrated at the Berbice Resurrection Lutheran, the church where she was baptized, before her earthly remains are reunited with her mother and brother in family land. She is on her final journey. And this time, there is no border to stop her. She has crossed the threshold, and she is home.
(This is one of a series of fortnightly columns from Guy-anese in the diaspora and others with an interest in issues related to Guyana and the Caribbean)
