First Person Singular

Taken into high orbit on a Soyuz rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, the watching satellite captured in astounding detail, the historic rupture from Guyana’s rare earthquake of magnitude 5.6 on January 31 last.

The crying crowds have gone, even as the candle-lit vigils continue across the country and  overseas.

A frenzy of sudden activity in the green and white building that Junior Emmanuel was watching, made him freeze, realising he had been spotted.

The dry earth was still booming and vibrating in remote southern Guyana on a blazing Sunday afternoon, but across the Atlantic, it was just after 8 p.m.

Dismayed by the brightness, the colony of dangling bats fled the starch mango tree which is still bearing a few plump fruits, out of season.

Early Wednesday, as the sun shone through the open window, I received a short text from my American-born long-time friend writing from her chilly New York apartment, “Today is not a holiday.

On January 6, 2021 the California Congresswoman, Jackie Speier thought back to a traumatic November day, as she and her colleagues in the United States (U.S.)

A group of visiting foreign journalists, we stood that cold morning to one side, struck into silence by the sheer size and splendour of the Capitol’s Rotunda, as we stared at the ornately decorated dome with its neo-classical motifs, in soaring symmetry above us.

Across schools in the region, students have long been taught that millions of indigenous Taino people died out following the catastrophic arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, but recent revolutionary genetic studies are suddenly rewriting our history.

It may very well be the oldest and tastiest surviving savoury sauce in this part of the world, but Guyana is the only country where the rich, dark, intensely flavoured indigenous concoction is so seamlessly integrated into our cuisine, consciousness, and Christmas culture.

Fragrant with warm notes of Ceylon cinnamon, pungent cloves, lacy fronds of mace, and glossy green bay leaves pulled from the potted tree that bears twinkling lights, the first sweet scent of Christmas dominated the evening air.

I have a precious but dwindling jar of dried Guyanese salted seabob that I save to use sparingly in my cooking.

In this record year of a raging and deadly viral pandemic, the Belgian authorities were on secret alert, awaiting for weeks, the Guyana scrap metal shipments that came in five separate containers aboard a loaded transoceanic vessel.

A record $100M was publicly spent by the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) and a rising New York-based group of diaspora allies, on lobbying critical American support in the lead up to the March 2, 2020 high-stakes elections and during the five-month democracy crisis that ensued.

Just weeks before the abrupt conclusion of Guyana’s prolonged election crisis, the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) quietly ended its contract with the American lobbying firm, Mercury Public Affairs having spent over $63M against its main rival’s $10M.

Almost exclusively of East Indian descent, the mostly older Guyanese men, on a popular site, openly bragged about voting, with their families, for incumbent United States (US) President Donald Trump.

Some of my favourite memories are of magical moon-lit nights with no electricity, when the white rocky orb would slowly rise in the east, above the multiple rows of triangular rooflines silhouetted against the shaded sky.

Six days ago, the plain-spoken environmental activist Gary Aboud, 60, slapped on his cap and denim jacket, secretly boarded a small Trinidadian boat and did the unthinkable.

As the region’s oil-rich newcomer Guyana looks to steadily soar production, neighbouring Trinidad and Tobago (TT) is struggling with decreased resources, declining output and Covid-19 related-contractions in its troubled energy sector.

With Guyana’s proven oil reserves rising to over eight billion barrels from the latest finds by the American multinational ExxonMobil, we can well imagine what famous warning would come from the late Jamaican Prime Minister, Michael Manley.