Eddie Doyle, 9 Jul 2010 16:18 hours
Lethem, Guyana Cabora flies and Brazilian blues I know this is meant to be a blog about Guyana, but living on the border with Brazil it is difficult to ignore the fact that the World Cup is on at the moment. The Brazilian colours/flags have flown from cars, windows and on people as shirts. For myself I don’t usually watch opening events and managed to avoid most of the fanfare in South Africa, getting to the TV just in time for the opener of S.A. v. Mexico. Well there, I was met with the picture of Sepp Blatter (President of FIFA) and Jacob Zuma (President of S. Africa) as the honorary guests!!! What a horrible way to start one of the world’s finest events…..by allowing two of the worlds most corrupt morons to deface such an event….how does the old saying go; ”Money talks”. Once the football got going I tried to get rid of the bad taste but their ugly mugs have plagued me through many matches.
Having lived in Ghana 2 years both myself and Behi were rooting for the “Black Stars”, unfortunately their inexperience and nerves got to them in the penalty shoot-out with Uruguay….a real shame. The game between Germany and England was a personal dilemma for me. For the first time in my life I cheered for the English team, not because I wanted them to win but the thought of the Germans winning was even worse. Considering the result, maybe I should cheer for the English more often!!!!
National mourn is the only way to describe the reaction of people and media alike across the border when the Dutch put out the Brazilians. Every cloud has a silver lining though as the cheering testified when we got off the bus in Boa Vista the following day,……the Germans had just scored a third goal on the Argentineans. National pride was restored: Just who the hell is that Maradona fool to compare himself to Pele as the greatest player ever (and I completely agree with the Brazilian sentiments). Just Sunday’s match left and it is a hard call, I guess the Dutch!! But I will be pleased either way as long as it is not because of a ball being 32cm inside the goal and doomed as a no goal (not that the English were very good, but fair is fair and that was not)
The trip down to Boa Vista was to take a few days free and experience Brazil and Brazilian culture along with doing a bit of shopping. After riding the bike to Bonfim, the border town on the Brazil side and parking at the Jesuit Mission (I work with the Jesuits in St. Ignatius), we took an AIR-CON bus to Boa Vista on TARMAC roads… total bliss!! My two words of Spanish were very similar in Portuguese, so I was like a local at ordering beer…..at bit worse when it came to everything else… but we managed to get by. All in all a nice few days of R and R. but for the next trip we need to do more study in the Portuguese lessons we were given by a returning volunteer Richard.
I mentioned in the last letter that the rains had begun. Thankfully it has been a good season so far with if anything too much rain, causing at one stage, the little creek more than 10 meters under the bridge to St. Ignatius to cover the road….On a positive note, the kids were able to jump from the bridge into the temporary swimming pool. Along with the rains, comes an increase in mosquitoes and a horrible little fly (no more than a couple of mm’s in size) called the Cabora. Locals say the Cabora licks off the insect repellent before taking a bite out of you. Because of the itchiness and scratching, the bites develop to measles like spots. I have only had a few but Behi has been covered in them, including under her feet.
On the work front things have started to fall into place. I will be 4 weeks in St. Ignatius followed by a week in the Amerindian community of Surama, an absolutely stunning place where the savannah meets the jungle. I will write a bit more about the work in a few weeks as I have babbled on about more important things this time. While this time it will be either The Netherlands or Spain, watch out for the Irish in the 2014 World Cup. Which makes me think of a bumper sticker I saw in California years ago; “God invented whiskey to prevent the Irish from ruling the world”
|
01:35 
). But it's fascinating to read about it virtually.