A JAMAICAN CHILDHOOD - PT.4

In this part of the story about his childhood in Jamaica, as Shaka and his brothers make their way towards the hills overlooking their village, Shaka recalls some of the events and feelings which might have helped to shape him into becoming the person he is today.

Still benefiting from the coolness of preceding dawn, Shaka and his brothers, N and G, travelled along the main road,  bypassing the local Infant school, and continued up the gradually inclined road and bearing right as they bypassed the communal stand pipe to their left, which some people would use when they could not get clean water from the two rivers, and the first (bottom shop) of the 4 main grocery shops which, at one time or another, served the district, before heading towards the mid-point of the road, where they passed Mas Asie’s house on the right, and Mas Joe’s on the left, but not observable from the road, and  Miss May’s shop on the right, and another little shop on the left, which their mother would later rent and he would have the responsibility of serving in, on his own.

Shaka remembered well the first conversation he had about wars. It was a conversation he had with Mas Joe, who was a tall man who, by the time Shaka came to know him, seemed an old man who walked with a bent gait and used a stick. Shaka remembered Mas Joe telling him about the war he had been in Europe, and how you have to fight against your brother, if necessary; something which worried Shaka at the time and for a long time after that, as he could not imagined himself fight against his brothers. Shaka’s other memory of Mas Joe was about him helping to make the coffin for his paternal grandmother, the vanishing of the coffin later, for Shaka, becoming almost indelibly associated with coffins and, ipso fact, death, thereafter.

Badly eroded land

Miss May, as Shaka knew her, a shortish and stout but beautiful woman, whom Shaka liked and would always look forward to seeing whenever he had the opportunity to visit the shop. Miss May was probably the person who was most responsible for promoting Shaka’s interest in international, social and political affairs, as it was her copy of The Jamaica Daily Gleaner which he would borrow as often as he could, to read and find out what was happening in Jamaica and abroad. 

On occasions Shaka had observed Miss May and her boyfriend being affectionate towards each other, and has imagined and aspired to emulate then, when he became a man. For now, however, he was still just a young boy approaching puberty. All the same, Shaka would continue to ‘have a crush’ on Miss May for years to come

On they went up the road, passing  the local primary/secondary school on their left, just next to Cecil’s home, and behind which lived the Knights. Mr Knight was the local Justice of the Peace, and therefore probably the highest government official residing in the village. He was a known supporter of the People’s National Party, whereas Shaka favoured Bustamante, who was the leader of the Jamaican Labour Party.

 Notwithstanding Mr Knight’s political affiliation, he was well liked and helpful to the villagers. He  had two sons, one of whom was called Kelvin. Kelvin was older than Shaka and very bright and forward looking in his outlook. Shaka still remembers vividly, how one of the school’s headmasters mercilessly beat Kelvin and called him “conceited.” All because, if Shaka’s memory does not betrays him, Kelvin disputed the existence of God. 

Kelvin refused to change his view, which accounted for the teacher, in effect, brutalising him. This event, and despite the fact that he would not have agreed with Kelvin’s views about God, since, like probably the majority of people in the village, God was to be feared, led to Shaka having a lot of respect for Kelvin, and with the term ‘conceited’, in Shaka’s mind, becoming associated with Kelvin.

Bauxite being minded in Jamaica