Dear Editor,
As a Guyanese resident in Miami in need of passport renewal forms I was forced to pay a visit to our consulate in this area. I write this letter in the hope that the relevant authorities will do something to improve the image we are projecting.
As you no doubt will agree a country’s embassy or consulate represents that country to the outside world. The lady I spoke to on the phone before my visit is the same person who attended to me. She is very pleasant, helpful and professional. This is quite a contrast with the consulate’s location and the facilities it occupies.
My trip from South West Miami to the area in the North West where the Consulate is located was nothing short of adventurous as either my GPS was not co-operating with me or vice versa.
The smooth roads and expressway soon gave way to very uneven, bumpy surfaces, warehouses, and signs of depression and indigence. I soon discovered that I was in Liberty City, Miami. This was my first visit to this area, one that is so often in the news with regard to crime. Street signs (and my GPS) told me I was close to my destination. However, I missed the corner and ended up in a parallel street. As I was turning my car around I notice a bullet-ridden car on the parapet opposite a house. I quickly exited that street and found the street in which the consulate is located. “We’ll recognize the building,” I said to my daughter who was with me, “there must be a flag outside.” The GPS told us we had reached our destination but I did not see any building that was worthy of being called a consulate and there was no sign of the Golden Arrowhead. My daughter then noticed the words “Consulate of Guyana” on the door of what looked like a warehouse. Yes, we had reached our destination.
The Consulate of Guyana in Miami, Guyana’s face in this area, is a warehouse sandwiched between an empty lot with a mountain of sand and gravel and a workshop of some sort, in one of the most depressed, crime-ridden areas of South Florida. As I was admitted to the building and I waited to be helped, I could not help noticing the torn carpet on the floor.
Editor, I accept the reality that Guyana is a poor, developing country. I doubt, however, that this justifies the location of our consulate in a warehouse in Liberty City. Granted, we may not be able to pay the rents that most other consulates must pay to have their facilities in affluent areas like Coral Gables and Brickell. I am sure Guyana will argue that it is not as poor as Haiti, but the Haitian Consulate is in a much more decent location than ours.
One reality we must remember is that non-Guyanese seeking to obtain visas to travel to Guyana, visit our consulate. This is their first impression of our country. In a country in which sadly, the average person still does not know anything about Guyana, we really should be projecting a better image.
Yours faithfully,
(Name and address
provided)
