Dear Editor,
On Wednesday morning an incident occurred in Wortmanville just outside my mother-in-law’s house. This occurrence holds tremendous lessons for race relations in Guyana and I would urge all Guyanese to reflect on it and all sociologists and political analysts to think hard about it.
I come from Wortmanville, in south Georgetown, and apart from studies abroad lived my entire life there, moving out only in 2007. South Georgetown people are always stereotyped but here is a huge example of their nature. Here is what happened. A car driven by an African Guyanese male with two African Guyanese females, drove into a parked vehicle owned by a Chinese family who are my mother-in-law’s neighbours.
The Chinese family came out and began remonstrating with the driver. The accident had no grey areas. He just drove into a parked car positioned off the road and stationed on the parapet. The young African man began to argue with the Chinese family. Four African neighbours from different houses began to challenge him. Heated arguments ensued. At one time I sandwiched myself between an irate neighbour and the driver. Another neigbour brought out spray paint to mark the lines where the vehicles were.
All the defenders of the Chinese family were African Guyanese. Race never came into it. A Wortmanville resident was being bullied by an outsider and the neigbours stood up for justice. I have seen this incident so many times in my life played out in different shapes that I can safely say that the times are literally countless. I have witnessed the inflexible protection of East Indian people by African Guyanese in a situation where persons were trying to be unfairly violent to East Indians. When you grow up and live among an ethnic community that is other than your own, you see dimensions of their character that outsiders would not understand. Life in south Georgetown has taught me two lessons. One is that I am not Indian or African but Guyanese. Secondly, human beings are fundamentally humane, selfless, honest people.
Yours faithfully,
Frederick Kissoon
