“I like helping others. I do my own thing as it relates to helping on my own because of my love and passion for it. I’ve never had anyone say let me help this girl do what she is doing better or let me help give her a platform where she can inspire others. The Miss/Mrs/Teen India Guyana Worldwide Organisation has given me the platform that I’d like to use in giving young women the opportunity to have a voice,” recently crowned Mrs India Guyana Krystal Inshan said.
Krystal’s life was filled with turmoil and it propelled her to do better. Unable to make it to the hospital in time, her mother gave birth to her outside of the hospital compound in a bus. Her earliest years were spent with her family in the squatting area of Herstelling, East Bank Demerara.
“Growing up was very hard for me and because of the situation life dealt my mother,” she said. “It was heartbreaking. My [late] dad was very abusive. He was an alcoholic and a drug addict. He was a terrible husband but a great father. It was hard to see how he ill-treated my mother but at the same time I couldn’t not love my father, because that’s my father and he was an amazing dad. We did everything together. He was the one that actually gave me a voice as a woman. He always encouraged me to never settle for less … and to never pay attention to what society has to say and in doing so I would be a very strong woman and a very happy woman. Ironically, he also told me later when he had gotten sick to never allow a man to hit me. I’d never been beaten by my dad or another man ever, and that wasn’t because of what he told me but because of the way I saw him treat my mother. I was determined from a young age that I would never allow it.”
There were days when they had little to eat and on some days nothing at all. Though she deemed her father a hardworking man, Krystal shared that he worked mainly to feed his addictions. When there was nothing to eat, she didn’t attend school; at the time it was Providence Primary. Getting school supplies posed another issue and often whatever she received were hand-me-downs from the son of a family her father worked for. Krystal said that she would pull on her Power Ranger boots and boy-themed backpack and set out to school. Her peers gave her a hard time especially when she started grade six. Though an average pupil all through school she had somehow managed to secure above average marks securing her a spot in the grade six class with the most brilliant children. The taunting and teasing got worse then and many days she cried. One day she was bullied so much, she even urinated herself which of course led to more taunting. The teachers never cared for complaints and so she told no one.
While her dad’s addiction made their home a sad place to be, he was her hero. “My dad being the abusive man he was, there were times when my mom would pick up and leave for her safety and I would be left with him,” Krystal said. “It was overwhelming… for a five-year-old. I couldn’t understand it then, but I understand now her reason for leaving. Sometimes she would try to take me, and he would not let her take me. Many of the times she left she waited for him to be away at work so she could escape. I could never have put myself in her shoes…. I could remember little things like my dad making me chota (pancakes) or taking me to work with him during the night shifts. I was too little for him to leave me with anybody… I have the strangest memories of him, but they mean the world to me.”
At school, Krystal was part of the girls’ cricket team and athletics. She said sports was never her choosing as she could not run to save her life if she wanted to, but year after year the teachers would have her participate in the activities.
Her mother was a Christian and her father a Muslim. She attended both the mosque and the church. Her parents saw them as avenues of providing for her in ways they couldn’t. She was brought up with the teaching and values of these religions and on some days, she got snacks and food. At Sunday school, there were always little gifts she could look forward to. During the month of Ramadan, she could look forward to hot meals at the breaking of the fast. She recalled praying at the mosque on Friday and clapping her hands at Sunday School on Sunday.
Whenever she gathered with friends, they were mostly little boys in the village and she would join them for cricket, marbles and climbing trees.
The young woman shared that she never had the convenience of a television in her home until she was 12 years old. The television, she said, was what taught her to speak English fluently. The two programmes she often tuned into were Oprah and CNN.
When she took the secondary school entrance examination, she secured a place at Charlestown Secondary. However, her mother chose to send her to a private school called Sharome Academy run by her pastor. By then her father was working abroad and sending home money for the family; she also had a younger sister. Sharome Academy, Krystal said, was one of the best things that happened to her. She made wonderful new friends and had a principal who along with his wife was always there for the children attending the school, encouraging them and there to listen.
However, she didn’t complete her schooling there as her father had returned to Guyana very sick. Her parents separated and she moved to live with him at relatives on the West Coast Demerara to better care for him.
“… I began attending an Islamic school there. Most of my father’s savings were used up when he got sick and I had to leave the school. I used to feed him and dress him, take him to the hospital over the years… everything. After he was hospitalized and was in the Intensive Care Unit, I would visit him. I remember getting a car or bus to the Vreed-en-Hoop Stelling then crossing over with the boat. Once I got to town I walked to the hospital and back. He stayed in the hospital for two weeks. I would sit with him and talk with him… he had stopped talking by then. His kidneys were failing, and he had given up on living.
“Before the last time he was hospitalized I remember him asking ‘Krystal rub my foot or Krystal mash my back’ and I’d do it,” she said, crying again. During the last few months of his life, he had said to her that he wished he had been a better husband to her mother.
“He encouraged me to be independent and happy and not live by boundaries. He said the more I can do for myself and push myself, the happier I will be.”
When she was old enough to choose, Krystal became a Muslim. However, when asked what her favourite holiday was, she said Phagwah. She recalled spending Phagwah walking around Herstelling with father; he carried a bucket of water and she had a bottle of baby powder.
Her father died when she was 16 and she was no longer welcome at the relative’s house. She went to live with a friend, as her mother had remarried by then. Feeling like the world was against her Krystal turned to alcohol and was on the verge of becoming an alcoholic herself, but with the help of good friends and family she was able to move past this. She then took up modelling and also became a promotional girl. Through this, she was able to take care of herself and assist her mother in sending her younger sister to school.
Her biggest inspiration, Krystal said, is her mother. She saw what she endured, escaped and managed to survive. Today her mother is happy, she said. Krystal said she admires any woman who is still fighting to make it happen.
She wishes her father was still alive today so that her six-year-old son could have met him.
Now a designer, Krystal outlines her preferred pieces and has a seamstress sew them. “I would buy dresses and because of my height they would fall by my ankle and I wanted something longer, so I started designing. I also import LA Fashion pieces to resell. I am planning on launching my custom-made collection. I will provide a website with my designs and you can choose whichever design you want and send your measurements and I’ll have that made to fit clients.” Currently she’s on the search for a seamstress to work closely with her.
Krystal was chosen to represent Guyana after careful consideration from National Director Hashim Alli, who noticed the charity work she has done over the years and her passion for giving back. She has on many occasions taken hot meals to vagrants, knowing that not so long ago she too did not have a meal or a place to call home.
“I plan to do a lot of outreach programmes at schools. I hate waking up and hearing stories like ‘husband kill wife’, ‘husband stab wife’ or ‘husband run over wife with a car’. Is this a trend? Is this a sport in Guyana? I would see articles where neighbours would say, ‘Oh we know he did beating she but we didn’t do nothing, or we don’t get involved in man and wife story’. I read something the other day that said to teach your daughter it’s better to walk out of a marriage than leave in a tomb. I want girls and women to know that there’s always an option, there’s always a plan B. So, we will be targeting girls in secondary schools and women in abusive households. I would also advise women to take up going to the gym. That has helped me lots throughout my life. I remember having bad days and bench pressing and crying and saying to myself ‘Krystal it’s going to be alright’ and it gets better, maybe not right away but eventually it does.”
On a lighter note, Krystal also loves reading audio books, travelling and being a mother to her son. She hopes to take up real estate in the years to come.
A Leo, she enjoys eating cook-up rice with stripped chicken and beef.
“For now, I have to prepare for the pageant in September. I have to get in tip-top shape. I will be working with trainer Alicia Bess. Alicia is a darling,” the queen said.
She had always wanted to take up pageantry, and the Miss/Mrs/Teen India Guyana Worldwide has afforded her such and she plans on taking full advantage of it and spreading the word on women empowerment.
