SALISES – Active Voice

Sometimes I don’t write about the things that are closest to me…the preceding post is by Emma Caroline Lewis and is about a work project that i’m very involved in…spread the word and come out and attend! you’ve been give plenty of notice…also check the 5050 Project blogspot.

Petchary's Blog

Jamaica’s fiftieth anniversary (Jamaica 50) celebration has not been a smooth, gentle glide to the August 6 finish line. In fact, it has been fraught with political niggling, confusing press statements and slick marketing jargon, (with the local media trying to make sense of it all) and apparently rising levels of frustration and irritation on the part of the Jamaican populace. Amidst the confusion, it seems we are all searching for meaning. Surely, we cry, Jamaica 50 is not just about signature songs and parties and Jamaica 50 sunglasses, cute as they may be. Recriminations have been heaped on the head of an overburdened Culture Minister who is valiantly seeking to create something coherent. According to a Gleaner article this week, the youth of Jamaica – those who will take over for the next half-century – believe that “the true essence of Jamaica 50 is lost on the masses.”…

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I was reading Janine Mendes-Franco’s blog on Global Voices online earlier today; she did a round-up of blogs in the region about Gustav and you get a sudden sense of being part of a community–the Caribbean. I suddenly realized for instance that if we had been paying attention to what was going on in Haiti and the DR during Gustav’s onslaught there we really should have been better prepared and known what to expect when he changed course and came here.

But no, in the first place we were lulled into thinking that like the PNP last year Gustav would definitely “nah change no course” and then when he did we still thought oh its just a storm, not even a hurricane and so on. For instance i first thought he was a pussycat rather than a roaring lion and if i had been paying any attention at all to what went down in Haiti, if i’d read their blogs for instance, i should have known better.

We suffer from insularity at the best of times, but to continue to be insular in the worst of times is asking for trouble. I for one am going to think regionally in addition to locally and globally from now on…

ok now for something completely different: Check out these videos of my co-workers at the University of the West Indies watching the Olympic 4x100m final on that glorious day, was it just last week? Just call us the SALISES screamers…it was the second best thing to being in Half Way Tree…