Christmas Sunday gets to a few heads

Christmas Sunday in the Caribbean is all about ladies in hats. Not much comment, just enjoy. The hats and their wearers are really beautiful. Have a wonderful end to 2007 and look forward to a superb 2008.

Family value

My wife's family is extraordinary, not only in a Caribbean context but even seen more broadly. It has been at the heart of many important changes in The Bahamas and stands with heads held proudly. It came from humble origins. It was instrumental in forming one of the major Anglican Churches in Nassau, where the family still worships. The family has had three generations who have studied at university, and all are still living; the next generation looks set to follow this tradition. My wife's uncle (Sir Arthur Foulkes, whose father was Jamaican) was a founding father of a major political party, which is now governing again; one of his sons and a son-in-law are both members of the current government Cabinet. Ironically, none of my wife's immediate family has successfully walked on the political stage. Her father is a lawyer and her mother was a nurse. Her brother is now the Director of Public Prosecutions, which is as close to the government and political process as they have come, if you exclude canvassing at elections. Her three sisters work variously in insurance, cancer treatment, and finance.

The family has been and still is a strong matriarchy, My wife's maternal grandmother held the family together, with the strong support of her husband, but she guided the family. My mother-in-law is now the doyenne and is a firm glue to hold the family (immediate and extended) together through all situations. My father-in-law is solid but he is not in charge. My mother-in-law's brother, Sir Arthur, is the doyen, but knows that he is the male "shoulder" supporting the family's female "head". This side of the family hails from Great Inagua (see link), which is the third largest island in The Bahamas at 596 square mile (1544 km²) and lies about 55 miles (90 km) from the eastern tip of Cuba. However, Inagua's population is only about 1000. The island's main claim to fame is its salt ponds, which have been exploited for many years by the Morton Salt Company to produce sea salt and table salt. A grand-uncle of my wife's (who died recently) was in charge of the National Park on that island and did much to develop and protect the habitat of about 80,000 West Indian, pink, flamingos, who get their colour from eating the shrimps that feed in briny lagoons on the island. Inagua's capital, Matthew Town, is understandably small and quiet.

At Christmas time, which is when I am with this family most, they spend a lot of time together. They talk a lot of social change, not so much about politics. They are very close and often spend time together, at church, eating, caring for children, eating, planning events including their role in the traditional family Christmas dinner. They believe that the strength and closeness of the family is a key link in keeping society stable and safe, and have focused recently on how the disintegration of close family ties seems to be behind a rising wave of crime and social problems in The Bahamas. Certainly, the kinds of social decay that is associated with these problems seem to have been avoided by this family: no teenage girls having children, no teenage boys being fathers, no corrupt politicians, no sex scandals. The family has had its separations but they seem to have had little destabilizing effect as the family has rarely taken antagonistic or adversarial positions for either side.

The social problems besetting The Bahamas are not unique either in the Caribbean or in the western hemisphere. So, it would not seem to make much sense to think that the solutions will be unique. Acknowledging the importance of supportive family structures is one way of avoiding the collapse of an important pillar of a stable society. Building that structure takes time and attitudes that often mean a degree of denial with which many would have little patience. Denial does not mean doing without essentials but thinking hard about luxuries. It also means resolving difficulties in a particular way through negotiation rather through force. Popular images often show force as the way to make progress, and children especially often see these images without having explained to them that this is not the best way. Other pressures on children come from their seeing so many things that have to get added to a "must have" list. Parents have to moderate these images and desires for their children. Parents too have to moderate their own desires; they too clamour for goods, especially if they are seen as signs of success--the flash car, the big house, the jewelry, careless spending.

Denial can mean resisting some (maybe many) of these temptations or moderating them, especially by waiting until such time as more important family goals have been achieved. So build the big house, but make sure that the family can live securely in the meantime; it may mean a five year wait but it's sustainable. Buy a new car, but do that for a real reason, such as the current car is having mechanical problems or has been damaged in a bad accident. Buy the children new toys but try to get them to understand that these things come at a price: they wont understand the value of money for many years but they can quickly appreciate that "money does not grow on trees" but come from hard work and not just from wishes. Women love clothes and Bahamian women love buying clothes more than any group I have ever encountered. Moderating the shopping urge could be the hardest nut to crack--especially when the society has become so rich so quickly--but has to be dealt with. I never grew up with this urge, partly because Jamaica's fortunes have risen much more slowly, but also from a certain English upbringing so can more easily be critical of it. This is not a call for a minimalist approach but that could be an extreme way to go, at least in terms of "one in, one out". If every new item bought was equalled with one item returned, exchanged, or given to a family in need that would be a salutary lesson that is worth learning.

This family has stayed strong by denying itself many things and by having a certain degree of modesty and moderation and by never being afraid to show its faith. From an early age children understand that they have to give thanks to God and never have any sense of shame associated with showing that belief. You are with the church and the church is with you. The main family home is comfortable but is now located in a very unfashionable part of Nassau, which has changed from being residential to mainly commercial. The large yard is an uncommon luxury that the home has, so is its slightly elevated location. It has no signs of great wealth oozing from it.

Every adult in this family has had a stable job for many years and all that has been gained has come from hard work, diligence and honesty. Children have had that held up to them as the way to live life. No one has used violence against someone else to get their way.These also good living examples of "denial" and "moderation"--nothing comes easily. If everyone could resolve to follow those three characteristic do you think social problems would persist? I find it hard to believe that things would not be much better.

Christmas cheer in financial markets

Trading has opened my eyes to things that I understood in part about financial markets but rarely experienced fully. I now respect the power of market forces more than any amount of text book study of economics could explain.

Holidays such as Christmas pose interesting problems in modern financial markets. When they operate such markets are open 24 hours, and function as the time zones dictate. During holidays you remember quickly that not everyone follows the same traditions. Christmas is routinely a two day holiday in many parts of the former British Empire (with most activities closed on December 25 and 26), but in most of Europe, Asia and North America, it is only Christmas Day that is a holiday. New Year's Day is routinely a holiday, but in Asia many markets close until January 4. What that all means is that conditions in the markets during such periods are really abnormal; most trading desks are barely manned and it's hard to know if movements, which tend to be exaggerated and in one direction, are really sustainable. However, if you get on the right side of deals you can do well.

A few funny things happened during this shortened holiday week, but most notably it seemed that the US dollar rally that had begun a couple of weeks ago fizzled out and the "trend" to selling US dollars resumed towards the year-end. The Euro, which I had thought several weeks ago would move to become a "safe haven" currency instead of the US dollar, seemed to develop that role this week. For me that was a little frustrating because I had anticipated such a change a few weeks ago and bought Euro against the US dollar only to see the Euro wilt against the US dollar. So, when I saw the Euro edging up from the mid 1.435 against the dollar I said to myself that 1.44 would be the limit; but up it soared after Christmas Day and ended the week well over 1.4720 (see chart). A huge move in a few days. Again, you can't look back and say "What if...?" You make a decision and stick with it.

My decisions were that pound sterling and Japanese yen would fall against the US dollar, with both the UK and Japan having separate economic woes, and apart from one period where I got caught out by a sharp reversal of sterling (following the assassination of Benazir Bhutto on Thursday which raised concerns about terrorism), I was more or less on the right side.

It is proving instructive to be in the market to see how trends develop and what affects the rates. Sometimes it's pure fundamental factors, other times it's news and rumours, and at yet other times it's just "whatever". I am developing great respect for the currency strategists, who overall get the calls right and by following some of their deep analysis I have done much better than if I were flying "blind". They are especially good and helping to figure out how far rates seem likely to move and their turning points. My one big mistake this week (with sterling: dollar) was not seeing the turning point and staying with a sell position too long before reversing to buy: in the end I was even as I recouped my losses fully over two days.

My other mistake, which is recurrent, was in not letting deals go to the target that I had set. I realise that the desire to take profits early is conditioned by the fear of loss. Yet, on balance when a target has been set and the deal does not get to "benefit" from my overlooking it, things work out well. Selling US dollar:Yen from 113.45 to 113.0 was one case; though the fall continued through 112.30. Sure, the limits could be extended to get more profit but there is also the principle of "enough already". A lot of nice deals give 20-40 point gains and they multiply into significant gains over time and are more sustainable than looking for the 60+ point gains, which often take a while to mature and may end up being 30-40 point gains.

I did learn a nice lesson in "waiting for the right opportunity" when one of my sterling:dollar deals peaked momentarily and flashed a huge profit in front of me for a milli-second and before I could close the deal receded quickly and started to register larger and larger losses. I said to myself, 'This is a test of the low point, which I will ride out and buy into near the bottom. But I will only see this go so far." I got it right, bought more near the bottom, and then was able to sell as the price rebounded to get even higher profit than I had missed initially. I reduced the position (whose size made it potentially very risky), and am still in with half of the original position running over the weekend, with additional profit already on the board.

I also traded nicely with US dollar:Japanese yen in terms of buying on dips or selling on rallies, and instead of profiting from a single position got profits from the rise and fall of the pair over several days.

Next week will again be one with tricky, illiquid markets, but I have seen enough this week to give me good ideas for a workable set of strategies. I will read my market reports over the weekend then set up my deals and look forward to heralding in a promising new year.

Happy trading!

Homosexuality: A topic of inexplicable fear

As the year winds down, and we have extended vacations, we get a lot of time to think about many interesting social and personal issues. Many prejudices exist in our lives and in the Caribbean we have many taboos and prejudices. Some of the region's harshest wrath is reserved for homosexuality. Without much discussion I will say that the prejudice and vehement opposition is about male homosexuality. The term of endearment most commonly used in the Caribbean for male homosexual is "sissy". Parents warn their sons "You don't want them to think you are a sissy." Nothing positive in those notions. I have hardly ever heard mention of issues to do with lesbians, and disparaging terms such as "dike" or "butch" don't feature much in Caribbean dialogue. A woman may occasionally be accused of being "too much of a man" but that is usually because she has followed male ways to get herself success at work. Ironically, it's often taken for granted that a woman will "boss" her man or men (sons cant escape for ever) around. We live in societies where women often rule the roost. I am not going from there to say that a certain reaction by men to this "bossiness" is in sexual preference, though some have argued this point.

Women especially--and in The Bahamas I would go as far as to say that some women are obsessed by the subject--have harsh negative views about men they believe are homosexuals. I have noticed over the past few years that a conversation amongst women about general social developments always comes to a point where one woman says, "He looks gay" or "He's a sissy. That's why his wife left him: she caught him with another man." Now these observations rarely have any facts to back them up. The story often drifts around the observation that the man concerned is also known as a womanizer, but that is taken to be a cover. Next to cancer it seems that the fear of her man being a homosexual ranges amongst the worst fears a woman can have. It is a "black mark" to scar any opponent.

If a man is indeed homosexual these harsh attitudes would drive almost anyone to remain "in the closet" as long as possible. I have not heard of stories as wild as the tales from Jamaica where homosexual men or suspected homosexual men (often transvestites) have been publicly pilloried and attacked--even set on fire-- with little respect for context, and have been attacked in churches and at a funeral service.

The Caribbean has a lot of contradictory attitudes concerning sexual activity and we are very good at seeing some very antisocial behaviour as alright while condemning other activities, even ignoring some that are common but we do not wish to deal with. Strangely, the women seem to stand by their men if they catch them "boning" another woman or if he is known to be a "sweethearter". They defend fathers who molest their own children. That I cant figure out. I used to think that Caribbean women were worried by male homosexuality because of the competition, and that another man being seen by their man as better than herself was of course the deepest insult. Can that explain having a less damning attitude when another woman is given preference by her man?

The region tends to turn a blind eye towards over forms of sexually deviant behaviour, such as child abuse, men abusing women, and even incest, often with comments that suggest that these are somehow part of a "natural order". Yet any sign that a man may not be as manly as people would deem to be correct, quickly turns into an accusation that he is homosexual. Yet this is a society where men love to preen themselves and wear jewelry: a Caribbean man will often wear more rings and chains than his female partner--he may not have the range to choose from but at any given time he will be equally weighed down.

Effeminate men exist all over the world, not least because their close family, friends, or other social contacts had no problem with this way of behaviour or speech, but this is not the same as being homosexual. The Hirjas of India (shown in the picture above) are known transvestites who are rarely homosexuals, though many have taken steps to make them physically more like women, including genital surgery.They identify themselves as "incomplete men", "incomplete women", or "in betweens", but the Indian national census counts them as women. Eunuchs are still very common in many developing regions in Asia and Africa.

To me, being homosexual is like being left handed in a world of right handed people. You are uncommon but you are not much different in most ways from those around you. Many men who are homosexual do not fit into the stereotype of being "limp wristed" or fey; they may not have any desire to dress up in women's clothes. Often when homosexual men "come out" they belie the stereotypes. They may be burly and anything but weak looking as is clearly the case with those who have been professional athletes.

I have never met a homosexual man who "looks gay", and known very few effeminate men who were actually homosexuals. The homosexual men whom I know or knew are or were as mixed as any heterosexual men that I knew. They are not all working as flight attendants for British Airways or Qantas; they are not ballet dancers, ice skaters, or theatrical. However, none of them is married. Only one homosexual man that I know (with whom my wife worked for several years) was married; he has a good relationship with his son who is not himself gay and knows and acknowledges that his father is gay. When homosexuals kiss or hug each other I see nothing overtly physical about them that would allow me to single out their sexual preferences at a glance. I played on a soccer team where one of my team mates was homosexual and he never did anything within that team to "betray" that he was gay: he never propositioned anyone or tried to do any funny business in the team bath or in the toilets. He had his preferred partners and his preferred hang outs. He was a great footballer too.

The one encounter I have ever had with a man who tried to "entice" me was when I was in my early teens in England, and was using a public toilet, and he asked me if I liked the size of his penis. I did not know much about homosexuals at the time except that we used a term "bender", "bent" or "queer" to describe such people. I don't know if this man was homosexual or a child molester. I did not bother to find out but kicked him in the crotch and with my heart pumping like fury ran like the wind!

I found a very interesting website about homosexuality, which if nothing else appears to put this subject into a wider international context. What is fascinating is how different societies tolerate male homosexuality. For example, on the Pacific Island of Papua New Guinea, all Etoro men engage in homosexual acts and most also marry and engage in heterosexual acts with their wives. However, heterosexual intercourse is prohibited for up to 260 days of the year and is forbidden in or near their houses and vegetable gardens. In contrast, homosexual relations are permitted at any time.

I know that my views are much more tolerant than those of many in the region. That may be because I have grown up in "more liberal" societies in Europe and North America. My parents never uttered a word against any social group and I think that shaped my views more than anything else. (My mother, like many people in her generation, had a negative view about Rastas and was most concerned when I first grew a beard. "You wan' turn Beard man?")

In the Caribbean we start sexual stereotyping very early with all the "blue is boys...pink is for girls" labelling from even before birth. We can often see a violent reaction to a boy showing that he may be sensitive to more than so-called "masculine" things: "Get out of the kitchen, boy. Leave that to your sister [mother]!" "What you doing smelling flower? You want people to think you is a sissy?" We are especially afraid of something that we feel homosexual men will bring to our societies. I am not clear what that fear is, and it may be nothing more than a very severe reaction to things that are not the norm. Women see their close bonding with other females as a strength, yet any sign of closeness amongst men--except if it involves drinking and sports--leads to cynical condemnation.

We are a judgmental region and our views on sexual preferences are much in that vein. We have anti sodomy laws without realizing that these laws affect heterosexual relations too. When I was teaching recently it shocked my group of mature students when we did an Internet search of sodomy laws in the region and found that most of them were regularly indulging in illegal acts, even though all of them was performing these acts with someone of the opposite sex.

In the Caribbean we are confused and hypocritical in our attitudes toward sex in general. We love women to flaunt themselves and not just in our festivals (carnivals), and we love sexual innuendo or explicitness in our music. We love to promote heterosexual vigour. We seem to abhor homosexuality, which has forced many to hide behind a heterosexual veneer just to be safe. More than a handful of the region's senior male politicians are reported to be homosexuals but I do not think that any one of them is willing to make that public for fear of a dramatic end to political power. Maybe in the coming year we will see one or a few politicians or other prominent individuals decide that enough hiding has been done and will stand up for what they are. At least this would start the necessary process of demystification. But then again I am waiting to see my first flying pig.

Thank you, readers

I write because I have ideas I want to share. For a very long time those ideas rested inside my head or escaped in conversations. Now I put down my thoughts "on cyber paper". Various people have urged me to write a book and I started that venture a few months ago, initially chronicling my life. It was much easier to start having already had several months of writing this blog. The blog was not meant to be like training wheels but it has proved useful in that way.

When I began this blog I had no targets; I still have no targets. I write because that is what I want to do. Those who read the blog do so because they like what they are reading. That is a nice meeting of interests. However, I wont pretend that writing comes without a little vanity. I was interested in whether there was a sizable audience for my writing. In the first month when I started to track readers (May 2007) the blog registered 565 visits/1024 page views in the month (about 18 readers a day). The readership rose gently through July to 812 visits/1260 page views (about 26 readers a day). From August the readership really took off to around 2300 visits/3800 page views (about 75 readers a day), and remains steady. I know that bad events in August put my blog on the radar screen of many new readers, when the hurricane season began and people from outside the region sought information about "Dean". Disasters in Barbados such as the cave-in at Brittons Hill and the spate of awful road accidents meant that I got many more "news hound" visitors. But it seems that most of them stayed. That pleases me. It suggests that I have enough relevance other than being a place to find out about bad news.

I know that a good portion of my readers are family and friends, but there are many readers whom I do not know at all except through their comments. Some of the unknowns are fellow bloggers, but most appear to be simple readers. I hope that all of you spread the word and that I can reach out to a wider audience.

Those of you who read the blog regularly will have noticed a lot of changes in the past few weeks in terms of presentation. Time is important for all things. My "vacation" time, which began in early December gave me time to tinker and I added features that pleased me but also gave the blog a more interactive feel. Readers can subscribe and get alerts of new postings by e-mail. The guest book will eventually be a wonderful trace of from where readers are coming and it's a nice way for people to just say "hello".

Blogging tends to be friendly. Some blogs have decided that being confrontational is their style and they have their place. I think content is important but so too is tone. If the only way to get myself noticed is to litter what I say or write with invective then I feel that I have nothing much to offer. If know someone well and know them to be bad then they deserve blasting. But if most of what I know of someone is what I read about them or impressions based on what I see then I think I had better watch my cyber tongue. I know too well how often I am misunderstood!

It is hard to write every day, even though ideas never stop flowing. The process of creating something readable needs a lot of positive elements. Lack of interruption is the main element; and preferably for more than an hour. For that reason I tend to write in the early morning before there is much life around, or late at night when most are sleeping. Writing during the day tends to take more hours and is rarely a smooth process.

I have tried to keep blogging in a pure sense: very little self-editing, and few corrections other than spell-checking. The blogs are a record of the moments, warts and all.

Finally, this blog may take a slight change of course in coming weeks. I have tried to tempt some friends and family to try their hand at writing for a wider audience and asked them to offer "guest blogs". I have had a few yeses but so far no text. I wont push them because I know that when the muse is ready she will move. I look forward to this wider sharing of ideas.

As we wind down the year I know that many people think of the fresh start that the new year can bring. I am no different. We live for progress. I remember two phrases attributed to Mahatma Gandhi: "You must be the change you want to see in the world." and "Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes." My blogs have tried to be faithful to the first quotation and I am surely indulging myself in having the liberty of the second.

Life is starting around me. It's 7.25am. My father-in-law is trying to make fresh coffee for himself (I deliberately am not helping him but told him what to do--teach a man to fish...). He now needs help because he put the whole beans in the machine and wonders why the water is just coming out a faint dull brown colour! He is an intellectual so I will bring him into contact with reality such as the need to grind the beans first. My little daughter has now woken and come to give me a hug. The phone has started to ring. I think that marks the end of my "free time".

Are we all ready to play Wii?

Scary food for thought. The video games industry is trying to grow the interactive games business. That is what experts in this area told me this morning on BBC radio. What this means is getting more games to appeal to a wider audience; the existing players are near their limits. Selling to kids has gone nearly as far as it can in developing games based around sports and various forms of combat. Most parents have been driven totally insane in the process by the waves of demands from children as innovations move on.

What does widening the market mean? The expert said that growth needs "building games around personal interests". "OK," said the interviewer, "I'm interested in opera. What kind of game can you build for me?" The expert was caught off guard and came up with some weak ideas: training opera singers for a concert (come on!), games that build around the stories of some operas (more interesting), or being the conductor (those interested are already wielding their batons, real of mythical).

Now, I saw the way that my wife was very excited by her young nephew's Wii, which he got as a Christmas present. Her interest was not just because it has a good tennis program but because she liked the energy the kids had to use to keep the games going. You can see in the video clip the kind of action that got her going (and that is not her playing).

Conan vs. Serena at Wii Sports tennis

She even tried it and this lady is as anti-video games as they come.

I see the potential for Wii games that would horrify many a man. One activity that has a large potential audience that never seems to falter is SHOPPING. This must be the basis of THE GAME OF GAMES. Without much imagination you can foresee games about filling shopping trolleys, either at speed or in quantities, or based around types of goods, etc. You can even make it "narcissistic" by having a game based around Internet shopping. It's almost endless because you can have whatever you want as goods on the shelf.

If the makers of Wii follow this idea of games based around shopping I will expect to get more than a pittance in royalties.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I have spoken or tried to speak (or sign) all of the languages below at some time in my life! (If you did not realize it, Breton, Cornish and Welsh are related.) Thanks to my African friends who introduced me to some of their tongues. Thanks to my Norwegian "cousins" for visiting the Caribbean and also allowing me to meet up again centuries later. Thanks for an absence of fear in trying to say at least "Hello" and "Thank you" whereever I travel. Thanks to my parents for never letting me think that the colour of my skin had anything to do with anything except the colour of my skin. Thanks to all those people I have met who had never met a black man before and now know that we are a lot like them.

The world is really small and languages are one of its barriers. Let's try to get over them little by little with seasonal greetings (see a much longer list of Christmas greetings that will help).

American Sign Language

Arawak - Aba satho niw jari da'wisida bon

Breton - Nedeleg laouen na bloav ezh mat

Cantonese - Seng Dan Fai Lok, Sang Nian Fai Lok

Carib - Sirito kypoton ra'a

Cornish - Nadelik looan na looan blethen noweth

Creole/Seychelles - Bonn e Erez Ane

Dutch - Vrolijk Kerstfeest en een Gelukkig Nieuwjaar!

Estonian - Rõõmsaid Jõulupühi ja Head uut aastat

French - Joyeux Noël et Bonne Année!

German - Fröhliche Weihnachten und ein glückliches Neues Jahr!

Greek - Kala Christougenna Ki'eftihismenos O Kenourios Chronos

Hausa - Barka da Kirsimatikuma Barka da Sabuwar Shekara!

Igbo - Ekelere m gi maka Keresimesi na ubochi izizi afo ozo

Irish - Nollaig Shona Dhuit

Italian - Buon Natale e Felice Anno Nuovo

Japanese - Shinnen omedeto. Kurisumasu Omedeto

Latin - Pax hominibus bonae voluntatis

Latvian - Prieci'gus Ziemsve'tkus un Laimi'gu Jauno Gadu!

Malagasy - Arahaba tratry ny Krismasy

Norweigan/Nynorsk - eg ynskjer hermed dykk alle ein god jul og godt nyttår

Norweigan/Bokmål - God Jul og Godt Nyttår

Polish - Wesolych Swiat i Szczesliwego Nowego Roku.

Russian - Pozdrevlyayu s prazdnikom Rozhdestva i s Novim Godom

Spanish - Feliz Navidad y Próspero Año Nuevo

Swahili - ºKrismas Njema Na Heri Za Mwaka Mpyaº

Turkish - Noeliniz Ve Yeni Yiliniz Kutlu Olsun

Welsh - Nadolig LLawen a Blwyddyn Newydd Dda

Yoruba - E ku odun, e ku iye' dun!

The once a year that is Christmas

Christmas is essentially a religious festival to celebrate the birth of Jesus, but its true meaning has been lost for many people. In the Caribbean the strong influence of Christianity has kept the religious element to the forefront of lives in this region. Whatever else happens at Christmas it really revolves around the religous celebration. It is a time for giving and receiving which takes on a some special shape where I spend Christmas, in Nassau.

Christmas Eve is the final time to prepare for Christmas Day. Last minute shopping is essential for some even with weeks of shopping already done. The food preparation starts and takes up most of the day. The house smells wonderful as the seasoned ham and turkey are roasted and fresh bread is baked. We already had a day with the kitchen filled with the smell of "benny cakes" (sesame seeds and caramelized sugar) and "peanut brittle" (peanuts in caramelized sugar).

The long Eve-day ends with a visit to church for midnight mass. Carols precede the service, which means getting to church for 11pm. The mass ends around 2.30am, and is then followed in this family with a visit to a sister of my mother-in-law for chicken souse, sheep tongue souse and Johnny [journey] cake (a kind of flour and cornmeal bread--in other Caribbean countries "Johnny cake" refers to a completely different dish but each based on flour and water). (For non-Bahamians reading, Bahamian souse is hot and is really like a broth with potatoes, celery and onions, not the cold cooked pork dish that is familiar to Bajans.) A wide array of traditions exist for Christmas in terms of events and food and it makes good reading to see how that varies [see BBC web site].)

On Christmas Day morning the young children rise earliest of anyone and make sure that their parents are awake too. Some of the little ones are awake from in the middle of the night. Cookies and milk were already placed ready for Santa's arrival: we tickle the children's imagination and ask if they can see Santa coming on his sleigh or ask if they can tell which reindeer is Donner and which is Blitzen. It takes less than ten minutes for their presents to be unwrapped. Paper flies all over the floor and the gifts get their moments of glory. "Ooh! A bike", "Dora and her own back pack", "Lipstick", "Harry Potter!", "A camera"...

Slowly those who are past their teens appear in their PJs. Grandma and Grandpa take centre stage in the rest of the proceedings, as we all gather near the Christmas tree. Like the children the grandparents' first thoughts are about their gifts. No real exchange of gifts takes place. The tradition with my in-laws is for the daughters in the family to organize a pool to buy one substantial gift for each person. The household is a true queen-dom and the few males who are present are fondly overshadowed by the women. For Christmas gifts we men will get a few items that really please: a tool kit, a radio or a camera make good gifts. But the ladies get the real big set of treats: jewelery, perfumes, earrings, other accessories. I am personally always content with any gift I get and I love to get a bottle of cologne or aftershave. There is nothing that most of us need but plenty that we want and we know that Christmas has become a time for self-indulgence.

Once all the gifts have been opened regular life resumes and we really start on the road toward Christmas dinner. In this family the tradition is to have a rotating location, with all relatives gathering at a designated home. Cooking is shared. Several turkeys and hams are cooked in different homes. My mother-in-law makes macaroni pie. One of her sisters is in charge of peas and rice and baked beans (guarding a family recipe from her father). A third sister, who bakes for a living, is in charge of the array of desserts. We all take charge of eating as much as we can.

After the meal the events are varied. When I first shared Christmas with this family nearly 10 years ago each family would try to give a brief account of what they had achieved or had to deal with over the past year. But this "tradition" seems to have lapsed and a variety of "presentations" now take place, but with no structure. The main thing is that the many branches of the family are together for one day and we are content to share time and to exchange stories.

After all the eating and drinking it's time for rest. The already long day has a long way to go. Junkanoo will start at about 2am so those who want to attend would be wise to get some rest; by the time it ends near 9am many of the spectators are ready to hit their bed.

This family has added another event in recent years: the "dine and dash". The normal meaning of this phrase is to eat a meal and run out of a restaurant without paying (sometimes called "chew and screw" or "doing a runner"). However, our version is almost the opposite and quite honorable. We rent a minibus and take a tour to a few family homes on one of the days after Christmas, taking one course at each stop: appetizers, salads, main course, desserts and coffee. It's a chance to eat something a little more exotic than the traditional Christmas dishes as each family tries to be adventurous and offer something special. The "dine and dash" takes a whole afternoon and has been the source of a few adventures. The first year the minibus got a puncture on our way to the last stop, which this time was home, and we had to be rescued by a wrecker and the busload was ferried in a shuttle of cars.

All of that is enough to wear out the best. But it is all part of a celebration, perhaps over indulgent to some. But celebrations by definition need to be excessive. Christians believe that this time of year, and remembering the birth of Christ, is when they should be excessive about their faith. They and their beliefs get refreshed.

The old year will soon be done and we are again ready to send it out on a high note, which is Christmas. On that high note we will sing our Alleluias.

Christmas: a little history and etymology

Most countries that celebrate Christmas do so on December 25; however, in many countries the main event is Christmas Eve (December 24). The word Christmas originated as a contraction of "Christ's mass". Its origin is from the Middle English word "Christemasse" and the Old English phrase "Cristes mæsse", which was first recorded in 1038 and is a compound from Old English derivatives of the Greek "christos" and the Latin "missa". In early Greek versions of the New Testament, the letter Χ (chi), is the first letter of Christ. Hence, Xmas is often used as an abbreviation for Christmas.

Christmas in the Caribbean

Christmas is special, and very much so in the Caribbean. Not only do we enjoy warm weather when most of the rest of the world is cold, but we also have a way of making the season festive. For most of the past 10 years I have spent the season with my in-laws in Nassau; my wife has never spent Christmas anywhere else. The Bahamas has its unique way of celebrating Christmas and New Year, with the annual street parade-carnival, Junkanoo (see official web site).

Junkanoo is held on the mornings of "Boxing Day (December 26) and New Year's Day (January 1). The events usually last 7 to 8 hours and the participants ("rushers") are exhausted at the end, in part because some of them need some liquid sustenance to keep going; power bars alone don't cut it. We see some of their tired bodies on our way home for breakfast. Whether shaking bells, beating drums of playing brass the body gets a full work out. I have rushed once and it took me days to recover. It's better to be on the street to watch and listen and jump to the beat of the advancing bands, as the goombay drums pound. The bands have "colourful" names (such as "One Family", "Roots", "The Valley Boys", "Saxons", "Fancy Dancers", "Barabas and the Tribe"), and rivalries are intense even within families. Costumes are hand made and only last for one event. It is always a labour of love to cut, glue and paste the costumes and part of the buzz comes from starting a costume late and working madly to get everything finished before the parade. Last year, all hands were involved getting one of my sisters-in-law ready for her first rush.

In Barbados and Jamaica pantomime is still an regular feature of Christmas and we enjoyed a show put on by school children in Barbados before leaving on holiday.

Church is an important part of celebrating the season, and Christmas week will involve many visits to church. However, with little children to deal with we can't all make the late night masses, especially if watching Junkanoo on the streets is part of the plan. We love to sing carols and parties are even better if they have carol singing as well as food, drink and music. The traditional Christmas fare is something we all anticipate greatly: turkey, ham, peas and rice, macaroni pie, etc, plus the desserts like black cakes and guava duff. In Barbados they eat jug-jug and pudding (made from sweet potatoes). You have to accept that there will be a lot of eating and think about sweating off the pounds afterwards. Drinking alcohol in great quantities is done much less these days. But if there is egg nog on offer (whether "leaded" or "unleaded") then you have to take at least one glass.

Christmas is about families getting together and the airports are jammed with returning students and other family members in time for Christmas. They come and go with heavily laden bags. Of course shopping and gift giving take on enormous proportions during the season. But generosity is not limited to family and friends. Many of us will take the time to remember those who have been helpful, even in simply doing their jobs like garbage collectors. Some have developed plans to help families who are needy and have little to enjoy at Christmas.

People who live in North America and Europe love to visit the Caribbean at Christmas time. The weather is an obvious attraction: who could resist temperatures of 28 degrees Celsius, sandy beaches and a relaxed attitude, compared to zero (freezing), snow and ice, and a lot of stiffness? The "snow birds" fill the planes from New York, Toronto, and London, England. A lot of people travel the other way too, especially to Miami and Fort Lauderdale for shopping.We have had the good fortune of being able to take a vacation of at least two weeks every Christmas, and it has been a great time for decompression; our employers have had to understand that Christmas is the most important holiday for us and just deal with it. This year I will have been "off" for a month; taking time off is much easier when you work from home. I spent two weeks in Jamaica with my family (with whom I plan to spend Christmas next year), and will now spend the rest of the time in Nassau.

Children get the most out of Christmas and often cannot wait for Christmas Eve/Christmas Day. "Is Santa here yet, Mummy" is the daily wake up call. I will feed off their excitement.

Everyone who celebrates Christmas deserves to feel that it is a time when people should be especially kind. I hope that people can take that spirit a little bit longer into the new year.

I wish everyone a wonderfully merry Christmas and hope that all will have a very happy New Year.

Maggie: an ambassador for cats

Maggie is a flat-faced Persian cat who belongs to one of my Bahamian sisters-in-law. I met this furry feline for the first time a few days ago and now know the type of car, if not breed, that inspired the cartoon character, “Garfield” created by Jim Davis in 1978 (see official web site); Garfield is a tabby.

Maggie has all the characteristics that make cats so despicable: slothful, needy, fuzzy, destructive (especially of cloth furniture and Christmas trees). She has not yet shown any anthropomorphic talents but if she does I will include some of her comments.

I don't really like cats but they seem to be attracted to me. My first daughter, Eleanor, has had a cat and dog almost all her life. My wife had one when I met her; the cat was traumatized when my wife-to-be moved home, ran away as soon as we arrived at the new place and was never seen again. Rhian will get a cat after our Christmas holidays; he has been picked out and is being weaned. So, I will have to get used to having a cat in my daily life again in 2008. I hope he and Maggie will provide good blog material.

The Christmas story: a true Jamaican tale?

I don't want anyone reading this to think that I am being irreverent. But once again when I heard the Bible readings that explain the birth of Jesus (see Matthew chapter 1, verses 18-25), I have to say to myself what really was going on in Nazareth? When I attended church this morning with my wife and her family in Nassau, The Bahamas, I saw the Christmas story in a whole new light after I had spent much of the past year in Jamaica.

Here we have a story that is all about a prevalent way of life in Jamaica and is much in discussion. Joseph is engaged to Mary and before they can get hitched, she tells him that she is pregnant. But wait. Joseph has never had sex with Mary. So who is the father of the child and how can she keep telling Joseph that she is still a virgin? What kind of nonsense she trying to lay on the man? She says that the real daddy is someone called the Holy Spirit. "O'Lee Sperrin? He from foreign?" would have been a good reaction from Jo'. "He know you having his child? He going to marry you? Wha' happen to our engagement? What about the trust? Man, I don't know if I can deal with all this. We ain't married yet and trying to make a fool of me?" These would have been a reasonable set of questions from most men when presented with this "sit-u-a-tion".

In Jamaica, that would be a classic situation of Joseph having to recognize that he was going to be the daddy of a "jacket" and that his wife-to-be had "given him bun". In Jamaican slang a "jacket" is a child raised by a man who is not his/her father, and "bun" is to get cheated on [as well as to smoke] (see Jamaican slang dictionary): for example, "She gi ‘im bun ka 'im bun whole heap a herb" [She cheated on him because he smokes a ganja all the time]. (There is another complex and separate issue about the warped thinking that would lead a woman to seek to punish her man by getting pregnant by another man.)

Now Joseph was surely a man of extraordinary understanding. He heard out his fiancee and decided that this story sounded alright to him and that he should still go ahead and marry the girl. He did not feel the need to blast her, kick her out, cut her up or shoot her. He calmly took this news and said "You know what? I can live with this." I must admit that I have always found this story so amazing. Not just the "immaculate conception" but also the reaction of the man who was possibly cuckolded. But having been brought up a Christian it has been a part of the faith that you have to take as it's written in "the good book".

The story is one that plays out occasionally in the modern Caribbean. Jesus turned out to be a good man despite his very odd arrival in the world. His parents raised him as a couple and ensured that he never felt any stigma about his daddy not being his true father. He did got through some trying times, including learning that his father was in fact called "God, the Holy Spirit". Then to confuse the boy more, he heard that God also went by the sobriquet "The Father" (he was some kind of Don?). But weirdest of all God also wanted to be called "The Son" even though everyone knew that Jesus was the son (some kind of schizophrenia going on here?). Jesus had his run-ins with the law but never had to do much time for his "crimes"; he also had lots of issues with almost everyone in authority. Sure, he embarrassed his parents on more than a few occasions. There are a lot of places that bore the mark of his anger and more than a few buildings barred their doors to him. But he managed to fall in with a good crowd and many of them realised that he was someone who could lead them to be more than the wayward bunch that they seemed headed to be. In the end he did more than enough to make all three of his parents proud.

However too few of the Caribbean's young men seem ready to carry themselves like Joseph and work to become like Jesus? I don't think that today's youths need to be Christians to get themselves off a bad path. But they need to recognize that a story from Christian teachings has characters with whom they can truly relate. It's too easy to say that the young men who are today's villains are victims of a bad start to life and a harsh environment. It takes much more than a bad start to ruin a life. It takes more than a series of bad events to ruin a life. There are enough examples of people coming from starts that are so bad that you wonder how they survived; and many have overcome devastating upsets during their lives to still make themselves good and great in terms of what they do that is positive for themselves and for others.

We love easy excuses but need to work more to reject them for what they are. You have to be prepared to work your way through problems for successes to last. You can't make your life better by making other people's lives worse. If as a child you do not get good guidance from adults you will go astray. If adults do not help young people understand the meaning of limits youths will go beyond reasonable bounds. No child can raise itself, and whatever a child becomes--good or bad--it has been with consent and support (or lack of) from adults.

Have a blessed day.

Restoring downtown Kingston

It's ironic that in this morning's Gleaner there is an article about restoring the full charm of Kingston's downtown (see article). As I drove through the area on my way to the airport last Thursday I did what I often do on this drive. I reminisced about what I remembered of my early childhood. You see, I lived downtown in the mid-1950s, in an area close to the waterfront, near the prison. The street where I used to live, Vauxhall Avenue, is now full of dilapidated properties. It looks like one of those US inner city shells that have been abandoned by the middle classes after the race riots. None of the earlier charm is there. Yet, we have not had people flee because of race, but economic interests have surely shaped the capital. Most of the older structures are still there. You can walk past store fronts that take you back to the 1950s but there is no economic activity going on inside the stores. Property owners and government have somehow conspired to blight this whole area, both its corporate and residential sides, which if restored would be one of the most visible signs that Jamaica wants to be a better country. Instead of the bland concrete and glass of New Kingston, I want to see the stone and wood of Old Kingston.

Over 40 years have passed since Jamaica got its Independence and during that time many plans and agencies have been created to revitalize downtown Kingston. But why have none of these plans borne fruit? The area's low rise buildings can easily be envisaged as a charming bloom in a capital that has few charming buildings. The exceptions are well known such as Devon House (see website). But why does no one appear to care for Kingston's old architecture?

For me, such a project is laced with the romance of my childhood memories: of stories told by my parents about going to Bray Street; walking along Orange Street; shopping in King Street; of Mr. Chin and other Chinese-owned grocery stores. The city was then literally centred around downtown and the bustling areas such as Parade. Not every old building is as beautiful as Ward Theatre,
but many houses and store spaces could be restored to give it company.

Almost any city that I have visited that has had its core revitalized has also enjoyed a resurgence. Baltimore and London are great recent examples of how the old structures of the city or parts of it have been given new life and founded a new base for boosting the city. it may be chicken and egg. Jamaica's many economic problems (especially its inability to control budget spending may be at the core of its inability to restore its capital. This continued dilapidation is also ideal cover for criminality and in sweeping it away the cobwebs that support crime would also star to give crime less of a base. I trained in urban planning but rarely worked in the field. I wonder why (if not because of government blockage) private sector ventures have not taken on this task. The organizations that are located downtown show what can be done and the beauty that remains: just look at the Grace Kennedy and Jamaica Stock Exchange buildings.

Jamaica's new prime minister is talking about "sprucing up Jamaica". I would like that to start with restoring Kingston.

Hooray for Guinea

For three years I worked to try to help the government of Guinea to get an economic stabilization program with the IMF, but as they say, things did not work out. After I left in October 2006, the socio-political situation became very tense culminating with national strikes in January during which many people were killed by the security forces. The demand of the population was for a change of government and that happened. I wont go into all the details of how that was achieved.

The new government was made up of ministers who were all new to government, and mainly techocrats, including a good friend who became Finance Minister. Growth had been slow (1-2% a year) and inflation high (30-40% a year), and the exchange rate had depreciated rapidly. The new government set about improving economic performance. Most notably inflation was nearly halved and the exchange rate appreciated and has since stabilized. A first reward for a commitment to economic reform came yesterday when the IMF's Executive Board approved a new support program for Guinea (see details from IMF web site).

The money that comes with that support is only part of the benefit. Agreement with the IMF opens the door for other donor agencies such as the European Commission and the World Bank to provide direct budget support. That additional finance should help achieve many economic and social goals.

I wont go further than that at this stage. Guinea has had a history of slipping off the rails quickly, but I hope that this time the train will stay on its tracks long enough to give a solid base and hope for this country of 9 million very poor people.

For all my friends in Guinea I hope that this "present" coming ahead of Christmas will be a welcome gift.

Friends

If you have children you will have experienced the ease with which they make friends. A friend for a child is someone with whom to play. So Mums and Dads are naturally friends. Anyone who does not offer an immediate rejection or give off bad vibes is also a potential friend. I love to watch Rhian “make friends”.

At the Norman Manley Airport last Thursday friendship making was in full force. Another little girl, aged about 6, was sitting near us with her mother. She had a Dora the Explorer roll-on bag from which she took out paper and pencils. Rhian siddled up to her and asked if she could draw too. In no time, the two girls were happily colouring on the same sheet of paper. Then Rhian started some reciprocal behaviour and took out the bright colouring pens from her back-pack, and the girls got into more colouring, this time being fascinated by the patterns coming through the back of the paper. Along walked another girl, aged about 5. “Can I do some colouring with you?” she asked. “Sure” was the natural reply, and the new entrant ran off to get permission from her mother before coming back to make a lovely threesome. And so they played for about an hour; all flights were delayed by about an hour so this was a blessing.

The friends began to break up as the flights got ready to leave. The last arrival was the first to depart—somewhat unhappily as her mother unceremoniously came to take her, and to the disgust of the other two girls never even acknowledged them or asked if their friend could leave.Really! Rhian recoiled from the mother—a bad vibes person—and had to be reassured before going back to play with her first friend. We too soon had to leave when boarding started for our flight.

As usual the parents barely got to meet each other. We did not get down on the floor and start colouring too. Adults make friends more slowly than children; I don't know at what point we lose spontaneity over friendship. As we get older we develop “agendas” so making friends is part of that; friends offer advantages that we cannot otherwise get. So friendships need more maneuvering and developing. We think about relationships, asking questions about why someone is appearing to be nice. That gets more complicated when the two genders are involved. As a father who has spent a lot of time with my children I know that I'm still an oddity because parenting is still often seen as “mothering”. A father or mother starting a conversation around their children can easily be surrounded by some sexual friction, real, or imaginary.

It's funny though that when thrown into an alien situation as we have been recently when based in another country on assignment friendships can happen more spontaneously. We now have lots of really good friends from our three years in Guinea and a smaller number from our ten months in Barbados. And we came to be good friends by just taking each other as we are. We seem to operate without agendas and enjoy casual socializing, which helps us bond better. We don't get to know each other very well in terms of full information about each others lives; we get to know some intimate snippets, enough to feel connected. This spontaneity can only work if you are open to it, so many adults and children will find themselves in new social settings and feel unable to make friends, then tending to limit contact and so end up having few friends. We can see this when children have to change schools and of course we adults experience it when we move to new places.

I like the way that children make friends most of all because they don't feel the need for personal details. No need to say, “Hello. My name is...” before you get down to play, and no problems just leaving, with no need for “See you again.” With socialization we adults feel the need to have that detail, so we are going to try to exchange addresses or phone numbers and of course we have to know names. That takes the fun out of it, and losing the sense of fun is sadly part of growing up.

Learning to love Canada again

Remember my post a few days ago saying that I would not be sent to the madhouse by the lunatic antics of the “loonie” (Canadian dollar)? Well, I put him back in his straight jacket good and proper. The more you trade the more you learn.

Well my lunatic friend helped me with its movement below parity with the US dollar, which was dramatic (see chart). I went back to the loonie as I sensed that it was indeed gaining its legs. I saw that after the US dollar rally of the past few weeks, the Canadian dollar was grinding around, almost aimlessly hovering around 1.003-1.008and then reversing toward parity with the US dollar with a certain regularity and each test lower was getting closer to the figure and the resistance less each time. So, I joined the sellers on Wednesday evening, at about US$ 1.003 to the Canadian dollar, hoping that it would fall initially to some 0.9980 and then 0.9940 and hopefully to 0.9920 before moving toward 0.9840.

The intial move worked very well and came around 6.30 on Thursday morning and my three lots netted me US$ 140, as the rate fell from 1.003 to around 0.9980. As I was due to travel for almost a whole day I decided to leave trading this pair alone. With travel completed on Thursday evening it was somewhat frustrating that the Internet connection was down at my in-laws. I was not able to review the market until Friday morning, by when I had missed the chance to get back in above 0.9975. When I was able to trade (on a somewhat slow and erratic connection) I managed to get in again when the rate was 0.9950, sold it again and made several one lot trades to net $20 several times, as the rate edged through 0.993. Better than expected Canadian economic data released today initially led to little market reaction then a reassessment suggested that future interest rate decreases would be less likely and the exchange rate continued its fall. Oil prices rose during the day, which also helped the Canadian dollar strengthen.

The rest of the day was a struggle with support around 0.992, which was stiff and is not completely broken, though the rebounds were contained to about 0.9933. Perhaps because the attack came at the end of the trading week and just ahead of the holidays, follow through was limited. For much of Friday afternoon the rate hovered between 0.9915-0.9933, and closed below 0.992, which should imply further downward movement. I hope that next week starts off well and my target rate of 0.9845 is reached. That would do nicely before Christmas.

In the market rate changes are not in straight lines, but often in waves. I have not studied wave theory but that could be something for private study soon; I will have to get academic and learn about “Elliott wave analysis”. After the initial major break below parity mentioned above the rate tried to get back up to parity and had I been smart I could have foreseen that and taken the bet on the increase. But I did not.

I have ridden waves several ways, including taking profit as an intermediate target is reached, letting the rate bounce back and getting in again. That risks missing the critical breakthrough so I tend to do it with caution, feeling that it's better to stay in at the initial position and maybe see such opportunities pass. With hindsight one can always review the wisdom. Hindsight is of course 20:20.

The other aspect that I am learning and will focus on more is a good lot size and even in a cautious trade the initial positions should always be two lots. That way one can opt to ride through waves by taking profit on one position and regaining the other position after a reverse movement; that works well if the subsequent retracement is dramatic and one could get in near the starting price.

I am still not sure if I can make a living out of trading but I have made $1000 in December. That is a return of about 40 percent, which is an impressive rate but I do not see that as sustainable; though I had targeted trying to make about 1-2 percent a day. Making $1000 a month would not be bad though.

Another lesson I have learned several times now is that online trading is very tricky when technology is not helping. Poor Internet connections or slow computers can lead to missed opportunities or at worst losses. For that reason alone setting stop-loss limits as soon as a trade is executed is really important, just in case the connection drops or computer freezes a and one is left totally exposed. I have tended to trade on two platforms simultaneously and found that this provides some protection as at least one platform tends to be running at any time. (It's sometimes astonishing to see the different speed with with each platform refreshes and if one is not paying attention, then deals can be opened or closed at the wrong rate.) But I am enjoying the challenge of trading “on the move”. Other people's computers are set up differently and I have had a devil of a time getting things set up as I would have them at home. Fortunately, all of that tweaking has not been too costly. But the essential element is the connection.

I plan to trade little over the Christmas period, hoping that the market also decides to take a break through the first week of January. It should be a time for friends and family so I will aim to respect that.

PS: I was heartened to read one of the analytical comments from Todd Gordon, Currency Strategist at Gain Capital (with whom I trade) in his “Strategy of the Day” for December 21, who analyzed averaging down, i.e. building positions when the price moves against you. I have used this technique several times to good effect, once really testing the nerves as with one of the recent repeated Canadian dollar 100+ point reversals against the US$ (see blog). Of course the practice can go sour as the rate moves further than some are prepared to risk as in the above example, or never really turns around, at which point you have to eat a large loss.

The technique worked nicely this week as I traded pound sterling/US dollar while the rate fell from 2.03 toward and then below 2, netting about $210 on two trades. He points out rightly that this technique must be part of a plan, within a correctly assessed strategy. Little by little my strategic sense is getting better; I know that the experts are not always right and twice recently when following their assessments, against my own judgement, I lost not so heavily but let's say unnecessarily. I wont pin blame on them for that, but it is important to remember that we are all fallible.

Do we know what we are doing?

Many bureaucratic procedures exist and we comply with them without much question. I am a terrible skeptic when I can see little rhyme or reason in actions. Immigration forms at airports are a good example. Take my arrival in Nassau last night. Why do I need to give the precise details (name, address, telephone number) of the persons with whom I am staying? Is it really to be able to reach me in an emergency? I get uncomfortable when I ask why the information is needed and the reply I get is "Believe me. We need it." Why should I believe? Is this some tracing mechanism about who and where get the most visitors?

What I have noticed from a lot of international travel is that these types of details seem to be demanded more by certain types of countries. Those that have poor facilities for processing and analyzing them, such as many poor African countries, and Caribbean countries (with limited human resources). Those countries that have a clear central control regime (such as in the former Soviet Union). Countries that have a certain "make work" culture, which reflects a political gesture and a relatively easy way to fool people into thinking that unemployment is low. We see this last model sometimes in the Caribbean. Whatever the motivation there is a lot of seemingly useless paper shuffling. By contrast, the information needed to travel to and through most of western Europe and North America is minimal. Even though many of us dislike the new surly posture of the US Department of Homeland Security the information demanded at immigration is minimal.

I like to know why I do something. I like transparency. In the Caribbean we have a lot of problems with being open about official activities, as if everything told to the public can really threaten national security. Why also the plethora of immigration forms across the region? One of the great benefits of Cricket World Cup was having a Caricom common visa, which temporary eliminated a lot of bureaucracy at border points within the region, as should be the case if we are moving to a true common economic space.

We need to do a lot of streamlining in the region and we have shown in some areas that the task is not too hard. But all too often we hold onto old ways of doing things, or keep doing nonsense to as an act of political payback. I would rather live in a region that excelled in all it did and was a model of modernity. It could start appropriately at the border, the first point of contact for visitors.

Why should I be insulted?

Every year I am insulted when I arrive in The Bahamas and it's because of Jamaica. I don't know who I should blame, the Bahamians or the Jamaicans. “Full search mandatory” the Customs officer told me, explaining that for most visitors checks are made randomly, but for Air Jamaica flights every passenger's bag is checked. “Oh and the belt ain't wo'kin' so you have to push the bags yourself” she adds as I hauled my Santa-like sacks onto the belt. Of course, I had no drugs or guns in my bags and I passed through with no problem. But why do I have to endure this every time I use Air Jamaica to The Bahamas? America has far more crime but American Airlines passengers don't get this treatment. Is it about tourist dollars? I don't endure this when I travel with Air Jamaica to any other Caribbean island, especially Barbados, where Air Jamaica is also Barbados' flagship carrier and provides a direct link between the two islands.

Thank you all you drug smugglers and petty criminals who have tainted the reputation to every decent law-abiding Jamaican. I wish you a very unmerry Christmas and a pox-ridden New Year. There are many decent people who readily advocate the kind of brutal punishment that is still practised in some Muslim countries for petty crimes and crimes against the person. When I feel shamed of my national heritage because of these criminals I can understand such sentiments.

The irony is that The Bahamas is no Eden. Like Jamaica, it too is scourged as a transit point by drug-running problems, and is famous for “night fishing” from Bimini or other islands close to Florida. Several major drug dealers are employing expensive lawyers to help them avoid having to face full justice.

The Bahamas is also Sodom but does not seem to know it. This is a country obsessed with people's sexual behaviour, where people openly talk about “sweet hearting” (being unfaithful to a partner), yet any sign of sexual misconduct by politicians gets blown into a major issue. Remember Shame (sorry Shane) Gibson and the late Nicole Smith being photographed with the Minister having a close constituency meeting in his office that looked remarkably like a bed? When I arrived last night I saw the sensational tabloid newspaper The Punch headline “MP caught...sexing”. The story is about opposition PLP MP Alfred Gray who had been caught by police euphemistically "in his birthday suit" with a "female companion" who was decidedly not his wife in a church car park close to his home and was outed with front page pictures by the more sedate The Tribune (see latest report). The MP was given a "harsh warning" by the police officers. That makes no sense. Ain't you all got nothing better to do? In Jamaica newspapers don't waste time reporting such rubbish: “We know unnu all a sexin' but a no fiwi bizniz. That is between you and you missus. Why you wan' put dat inna paper?” More of an issue for me would be the fact that this MP is also a deacon at a Methodist Church. What method in his madness? Where is a man like this leading his flock if he is caught under some "other woman'" frock?

Heaven help you in The Bahamas if you are a gay man. The same phobia that engulfs Jamaica is present here too, where there is no tolerance for "sissies" as gays are disparagingly called.

The other sadder side is that here is a country of only about 300,000 people, whose average income is the highest in the English speaking Caribbean, which is showing signs of sliding down a slippery slope of social degradation. It is now being plagued by one the ills that has haunted and shamed Jamaica for decades. Murders and violent crimes are on the rise. The number of murders through mid-December (74) has already exceeded the total for 2006. That translates into a rate per head of population that is half that of Jamaica's, which records 1500 murders a year for its 3 million people, which means that it is lower but still very high. And solutions? “All the politicians are talking is foolishness” my father-in-law rails; he should know as he is a keen observer of international developments and a barrister. So like Jamaica no credible solutions are being proposed to deal with violent crimes, and people continue to pay for this failure with their lives. We'll see for long that will go on.

I may be wrong but it seems to me that The Bahamas has hit a cycle of decadence. The murders is one marker. I put much of the blame on the US, or at least the ease with which Bahamians can get access to goods and services from America, and the extent to which American culture floods the islands. Car ownership in Nassau/New Providence is ridiculously high and Nassau has so few roads that congestion is just horrible every day. Conspicuous consumption is a national sport. The currency is pegged 1:1 with the US dollar so that gives immense spending power. The islands are buoyed by financial services and tourism but barely produce anything so most consumer needs are imported. Any kind of bling is available tax free and Bahamians love name brands! Gucci, Fendi, Ralph Lauren, Rolex, diamonds etc are must haves. It's a consequence of not really having had to work to get rich so there is little understanding of the sacrifices and hard work that are usually needed to get wealthy, as would be the case in Singapore, for example. With a sense of privilege running like water through the veins it's little wonder why many younger men (yes, it's a boy thing) are seeing that the best route to quick richness is through crime and now the stakes are raised because guns are easily obtained.

But look out. The same problem that makes Bahamian Customs officers humiliate Jamaicans is ready to bite them. As Jamaica has seen, once the guns get entrenched in the society it's a devil of a job to get them out again. None of the Christian pleading—and yes, there's a growth industry in that too—is making a jot of difference. In fact, some of the church leaders seem to be contributors to this malaise with their views on how being good Christians gives some rights to being flagrant in all forms of behaviour.

I am going to enjoy my next two weeks in Nassau and look forward to the conch salad and grouper and macaroni pie and turkey and ham and Christmas cake an sky juice. But I will keep my eyes and ears open to sense better how far down the slope The Bahamas has slid.

God's in his heaven but we know that all is not right with the world.

Regeneration

My father has gone through some dramatic changes over the past 14 months. First, he suffered a stroke in October 2006, then after making a good recovery he had a mild seizure. Both set him back very much physically. Although he is now 78, he has enjoyed the past 20 years with a renewed lease of life since he and my mother (who died in 2004) retired in their mid-50s and decided to return to Jamaica from England, where they had lived for nearly 30 years.

Though he was always active, he was never a sporty person; his main contact with sports was watching me perform as a sprinter and footballer, and in both instances my parents were not spectators on a frequent basis. They were often very surprised by my winning races and scoring goals: "Bway, we never know you was so good! " was often their reaction. So it was a great surprise to me that he should take on a range of regular exercises after he returned to Jamaica. He had trained in psychology and worked as a mental nurse at Belleview Mental Hospital in Kingston before he emigrated. He was always aware of the need to train the mind and exercise the brain. So, when his exercise regime started to include yoga that seemed less surprising. However, his going to seniors' aerobic classes was really out of the blue. But he loved it, especially often being the only man in a sea of women. He developed good yoga technique and his body became very lean and strong; I was awestruck watching him doing head stands. He supplemented the classes with regular morning walks from his house into town, across the golf course, to attend his classes on week days, then go to the market to buy provisions. He was well known in Mandeville for his walking and his back-pack of fruit and vegetables.

Since his stroke all of that came to an abrupt halt. His stroke paralysed his left side initially, but he has since regained use of his left leg, while his left arm and hand can barely move themselves.He has managed to walk again but with great difficulty and only with assistance from a stick or someone. His mind is really sharp, even razor like. Maybe he is compensating. He is keenly aware of sounds and though he lost the sight of one eye through glaucoma a few years ago, he seems to see the finest details especially if they seem to be obstacles as he walks.

It saddens me to see how life has changed for Daddy. But I have also started to realise something. It important to go through changes like this with your family and friends alongside. We suffer together and heal together. He has managed to make the transition very well. He is rarely low. He sits in bed or in a wheel chair on his veranda or in his dining room and receives a string of visitors during the week. Some of his neighbours visit every day and chat with him; most of them are about his age and many are also "returning residents" who had lived in England and are now enjoying being back home. He talks a lot about his youth and has an unending number of funny stories, especially from his days in St. Mary and life in Cuffy Gully. Daddy is also enjoying his latest grand daughter (though on a recent car ride he could not deal with any more rhymes). She too has managed the transition well. She is not afraid to see him less active and his "illness" does not frighten her; she is there giving him some hugs and kisses morning and night. As she is only 4, she only has a short memory of him any other way. But she asks why grand dad needs a stick, and she willingly tries to push him in his chair. When we visited his doctor in Kingston last week, she helped with all the tests, and encouraged him as he had to climb up onto the examination table: "Well done, grandpa." she urged. I'm not sure if it helps him but it touches me to see that interaction.

As Dad's memory of certain events fades and details sometimes become confusing, he has lots of things to hold onto and look forward to. He appears to see each day with a freshness that comes from seeing his friends and enjoys visits from one of his grandchildren who runs around and ask questions and does things that make him proud. He likes having his son visit so that he can just be there but also to help deal with simple or complicated issues that Dad can't resolve, like overdue tax payments. Rhian has visited him twice this year and with about six months between trips there is a lot of change Daddy can see in her and he notices a lot. I have managed to visit five times this year and with about two months between trips there's less change in me to notice each time. For my dad, I'm still a boy who may need a good knock on his head.

Though not at all the same as losing the mental control of the body that results from a stroke I suffered a major injury--torn knee ligaments--which stopped me from being active and playing various sports during most of the past five months. That injury is now almost healed and I restarted playing tennis a few weeks ago. During my rehabilitation I swam a lot; the water therapy helped a lot. When I took my father to the mineral baths at Milk River I could see how easy it was for him to move, and he could do a lot of exercises sitting in the deep bath of warm radioactive water. But getting better seemed harder for me because I was living in a new country and had few people on whom I could draw to help me through. It was easy to feel forlorn. Having passed through the painful limping and soreness, I now find that walking is something that will help my body recover without too much strain. I have taken a small leaf from Daddy's book and walk before sun rise; when I'm in Mandeville I walk the golf course at that time and think of him doing the same once upon a few months ago. I had started yoga about 18 months ago and that too has helped strengthen body and mind. These are not deliberate parallels but it is interesting how events can mirror each other.

When my daughter and I leave after this visit I will hope that next time the three of us can again walk and talk together, in our different ways and at our different paces. As three generations it is important for us to stay closely connected. There are many very good we can take from each other, young or old, weak or strong.

Me love mi Pickapeppa

Pickapeppa sauce is as much about Jamaica as reggae music and "Yea man!" This family owned business, which started in 1921, still makes what is for me the best sauce in the world (see company website). They have also the best pepper sauce. About six other products are now on the line, including three varieties of mango sauces. About 90-95 percent of the products are exported, mainly to North America, the UK and central America.

The Pickapeppa company developed after Joseph Lyn Kee Chow, whose parents were from China, bought the rights for a recipe from a friend, Norman Nash, who had been "brewing" this sauce in his kitchen. Like so many Jamaican-Chines, Mr. Chow was a good businessman and he built a wonderfully successful company around the basic sauce, which is a combination of tomatoes, onions, mangoes, raisins, garlic, thyme cloves and more, and some secret ingredients. The sauce is cooked and then stored in oak barrels for a year before being separated and bottled. The bottled sauce has a shelf life of five years.

The residue is used to make Pickapeppa's jerk seasoning; and if you smell the basic ingredients you immediately want to go get some jerk food. The pepper sauce is made from Jamaican peppers and stands for three years in barrels after being cooked. These sauces are really like great wines.

By chance I met a lady, named Shirley Ledford, who works at the factory and she arranged a tour today, who guide as a funny bio-chemist named Noel, thanks to whom I am now so knowledgeable. The children followed most of the tour well, but found the factory "stinky".

The basic packaging for the sauces has not changed since I was a boy and it's nice to see a company that makes a great product being a wonderful ambassador by its selling abroad. It means that we in Jamaica sometimes don't see the products at all (such as the mango sauces). It is also important for the work it provides in Jamaica. The 40+ employees at the factory have to be added to numerous small farmers who provide the basic ingredients. The bottles used to be made in Jamaica but the company failed and now imported bottles come from Costa Rica.

I have a few bottles of the sauce to share this Christmas and I hope that like a fine wine it will be a good accompaniment to Christmas dinner.

Planting the navel string under the coconut

It used to be a tradition in Jamaica that you would plant a new born child's navel string (umbilical cord) under a seedling so that the tree would "belong" to that child when the two were grown. I planted a mango tree for my first child, not with her "string" underneath, but Mandeville is really too cool for mangoes and the tree never flourished. I decided to plant a tree for the youngest daughter and got two dwarf coconut plants, one yellow, one green. We planted them this morning--again without the navel string--and they should start to give fruit after 2 years. She has named the yellow tree "Plenty" and the green tree "Cindy". I don't know why. But that is the joy of a child.

Most people who live in urban areas get few chances to really enjoy rural life. My father, who comes from St. Mary--a rich agricultural part of Jamaica--always impressed on me that a person should never lose contact with the soil; it's what gives sustenance and it's important to know how to exploit that. Daddy no longer lives in the hot, lush hills but in the cooler slopes of Manchester. His house is surrounded by citrus trees (mainly oranges), which do well in this cool parish. He also has yam hills, cassava, peas, bananas, etc. His driver/friend and a neighbour have extended the cultivation on a piece of land yet to be developed to grow corn and peas. At one time, my father only needed to get meat and chicken from the market and he would have all the other ingredients from his garden, mainly herbs, onions, and scallion. Other bushes (mint and cerassee--that well know reliever of colds, stomach problems and laxitive) would provide the basis for teas (see website for details of other Jamaican herbs and their uses). I did a similar thing when I lived in England, growing potatoes, carrots, lettuce, corn, berries, rhubarb, etc. In the US, whose climate and soil I did not know well, I limited myself to growing ornamental plants and maintaining a pond with goldfish. Even that form of gardening can lead to interesting encounters with nature, as we have found deer visiting to eat the plants and drink from the pond; frogs have moved in to make the pond their home; and herons visit to try to eat the goldfish and drink. Few of us urbanites will become full-time farmers but being good market gardeners, or supplying enough cut flowers for the home should be possible. For that reason it's good to follow the GoGrown Barbados blog (see link). Dirt under the nails is a good thing.

We can all watch the progress of Plenty and Cindy and I cant wait for a taste of the first coconuts. I hope that the absence of the navel string does not jinx the trees.

The conundrum of violence in Jamaica

Jamaica has a scourge of brutal personal violence. It has plagued the country for the past 40 years, and seems to have reached new levels. A lot of bright heads have been scratched to find ways to solve this problem .

The images alongside show how violence has changed lives in most parts of the country--the difference between the "sweet old days" and the "time of wicked ways". They reflect a harsh reality about the problem of violence. Wealth has done very little to protect a Jamaican from being a victim of crime. The one area where people's fear of violence is greatest is in the home, which is supposed to be a sanctuary. Access to the wider range of consumer goods available on the island or "from foreign" has given comforts but also given motives to some criminals. The motive is less the visible signs of wealth--TVs, VCRs, DVD players, fancy cars--but often the basis of those comforts, which is money.

Life behind household bars is as much about protecting oneself as about protecting one's wealth; though most wealthy Jamaicans do not keep much cash at home. Criminals, however, know that invading a home to get cash or easy to sell items is often simpler than robbing a bank or holding up a store. Most institutions now surround themselves with armed guards, alarms and electronic monitoring devices. Most homes are protected by dogs, alarms, contracts with security companies, and personal firearms. However, it is still not easy to get money from people directly and that seems to have led to use of kidnapping and ransom, hoping that people will pay highly to save loved ones. The fear is greater because it seems that whatever victims do the criminals will be brutal. The instance and fear of crime is greatest in the corporate areas of Kingston, St. Andrew, St. Catherine and St. James--the latter posing a particular economic problem because that is the parish of Montego Bay and many tourist dollars.

Many Jamaicans, however, also respond to the threat of crime in an enigmatic way. Despite the very high levels of crimes against persons and a rising level of murders, people don't impose curfews on themselves. While residents may stay behind bolted doors and grills when at home, when people go out they appear to have less visible security; and as far as I know no one is making a big market of selling bullet-proof glass for cars. At night the roads in Kingston and many other places are not empty. Of course, certain downtown areas are avoided. But in uptown areas, people will still have a heavy social calendar, and it is rare for an event like a regular house party to be protected by guards; and such events will still be held outdoors if weather and space permit. In rural areas most people seem to go along with daily life much as they want to.

It seems that citizens see less of a role for themselves and more of a role for government, and they feel that crime has never really made it onto the political agenda, in part because a significant number of politicians and the party machinery are somehow implicated in criminal activity. A recent correspondent to The Gleaner seemed to sum up well how many people feel about crime and government's inability to deal with it.

"The crime problem has been neglected for so long that people have become comfortable with [actions] that are in place - and working. This system uses violence to solve all problems. People no longer have to use the expensive and meandering maze that we call a justice system. Violence is immediately and richly rewarded and the entire society has come to realise this.

Crime cannot be managed without the help of the citizenry. The Police have lost their respect and earned their distrust. Many now see them as nothing more than an irrelevant irritant.

Minister Smith has got to level with the people and let them understand that the violence we are experiencing is the result of deep, long-standing social and psychological problems which have been ignored for so long, they are now absorbed into our culture."

People have become cynical about "crime plans", and a new one was launched in early November. Equally, many people have little sympathy for action to cut down ganja (marijuana) plantations such as was reinstated recently; many feel that by giving a livelihood to some in rural areas ganja cultivation has been a factor in minimizing crime.

Some see the government's assessment of the problem as deeply flawed because it will not accept certain "truths" about Jamaica that have a greater bearing on crime that low income and race. In an newspaper letter/article provocatively entitled "Licensing the Jamaican penis" (see link), Kevin O'Brien Chang wrote the following:

"No other country has over 85 per cent of babies born to unmarried mothers and over 50 per cent without registered fathers. No other country routinely discusses parenthood in such relationship neutral terms as 'baby father' and 'baby mother'. No other country so readily accepts absent fatherhood or brings up children so carelessly. And no other country not at war has such a high murder rate.

In "Life Without Father" David Popenoe found the relationship between family structure and crime to be so strong that it erases the relationship between race and low income and crime. Two-parent white and black and rich and poor offspring have far lower incarceration rates than their fatherless peers. But because there are so many more poor and black single-parent children, these make up the bulk of those in U.S. prisons. No doubt the dynamics are the same in Jamaica.

Most fatherless children grow up to be well-adjusted individuals, and only a small percentage become criminals. But almost anything bad that can happen to children occurs with much greater frequency to those from single-parent homes. Nor does fatherlessness affect only children. For men with no family involvement are far more prone to violence than those in settled relationships.

Any society with large concentrations of young, unattached males asks for and gets chaos - two prominent examples being the 19th century American west and the 21st century inner-city ghetto.

All of which boils down to this: If the majority of fathers supported their offspring psychologically and financially, Jamaica would have a much lower murder rate."

Jamaica appears to be an exception to many rules. That related to its attitude toward parenthood is worth considering in the context of dealing with crime. Again, taking words from Kevin O'Brien Chang, he cites the famous anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski:

"[He] considered the principle of legitimacy a universal sociological law. The crucial determinant of legitimacy in his view was the male's public commitment to his child's mother, not the widely varying concept of legality...What matters is not a piece of paper, but the father's willingness to give emotional and material support to his offspring.

The general societal rule, Malinowski found, was that no child should be brought into the world without an acknowledging father to act as the custodial male link between child and community.

But with more than half our children having no registered fathers, Jamaica appears an exception to this rule. Many of our 'fathers' are mere sperm donors who boast of the number of their children but contribute nothing to their welfare."

From this perspective, crime fighting is a much harder task because instead of blitzing crime it would need changes in social inter-relationships and introduction of laws that bind fathers and empower women and mother with regard to paternity obligations. That's has more banana skin quality for most politicians, who would rather go with the visible "attack" on crimes and criminal themselves, and would be leery of touching a deep-seated social issue of which many may be part.

However, if this parental root is indeed the main cause of the crime problem it will be very difficult to deal with because Jamaicans have lived so long with a slack attitude to child-bearing and child-rearing. It seems that people have been more prepared to protect their right to "just go mek pickney" than most other things. But if they believed that this was actually life threatening would it be enough to make that attitude change? Answering that question will be an interesting test over the next year.

No moaning at Mona

Mona Reservoir is one of Kingston's environmental treasures. Seated at the foot of the misty Blue Mountains, adjacent to the university campus, it has become a favourite walking and jogging area. Its perimeter is 1600 metres and with its constant residents of pelicans, herons, and egrets it provides a tranquil place to recreate.

The reservoir has some some points of intrigue such as the aqueduct. My wife discovered the reservoir years ago when she had to go to Jamaica for work. I have discovered it during my recent visits to Jamaica and now try to take at least one walk around the reservoir if I am in the capital for a few days. On Sunday I did the walk during the mid afternoon with my 4 year old. She is to say the least a real trooper. Her only concerns were why there were so many centipedes and snails, and couldn't they make their homes elsewhere. She managed the whole walk without being carried, and even enjoyed getting doused by a good rainfall that hit us for about half the circuit.

A parent is a guide, interpreter, and protector. I am enjoying playing those roles especially on our extended travels, such as now during the Christmas school holidays. Television is a modern necessary evil, which naturally children enjoy because of the immediacy of images it provides. But if there is the opportunity to do real things then there is no place for TV. My little one played with some other children before our walk and all they needed was a little sunshine to have great fun on swings, chasing each other around the mango and orange trees, or taking quiet time sitting on the floor with books. They needed no directions and only occasionally sustenance in form of some snacks and drinks.

My youngest child spends a lot of time with adults and it is beginning to give her an air of sophistication that disguises her age. Her eldest sister says, correctly, that the youngest one needs to spend time with her own age group and she does. But like a lot of only children, especially with older parents, Mum and Dad are often around and can be good play mates. She picks up quickly on many things and words, so during our walk she probed me about what hovering meant, and what is an observation; and she is now able to show that she knows the beginning of words. So we had a lot of "Reservoir. That begins with an R, like me." She turned the walk into a challenge: "Run, run, as fast as you can. You can't catch me. I'm the gingerbread man." That got her most of the way round. So, like the little train who thought he could, she did. I was so proud of her for that.

Why some people dislike Canada

Oh, Canada! I love all the Canadians I know. But my daughter who studies at McGill in Montreal has nothing but a healthy loathing of Canada. "What about the pleasantness of the gem of Quebec?" I ask her. "It all sucks!" she snarls back. That's how it has been for the past 2-3 years since she went to university. Now McGill has a famed reputation for being an administrative Gulag and many a student has ended up bald because they get notifications of course choices after the deadline, or their online fee payment is late even though the "system" says transactions went through and balances are clear, they still get notices of penalty fees and course continuation is threatened.

My wife studied in British Columbia and Ontario and loves Canada. Her sisters studied in Canada and they think the place and people are alright. I met lots of Canadians in Guinea and found them to be real friends, who speak with a quaint English and even quainter French accent.

I have however begun to develop a dislike for things Canadian since I started forex trading. Trading is risky business: prices go up and they come down. Sometimes the daily movements are large, say 150-200 points (that's as many US dollars per lot traded), and that volatility is what creates nice trading conditions. But you like to feel there is some rhyme or reason to the movements. The Canadian dollar is called a commodity currency because it is sensitive to the developments in the market for crude oil and gold, minerals it has in abundance. It is also very sensitive to developments in the US, its neighbour and major trading partner. But it also seems to have mind of its own.

The US dollar has had a period of prolonged weakness, and it was movements against the Canadian dollar over the past weeks that signalled the start of a US dollar rally; the Canadian dollar had reached nearly 90 US cents in early November from a position of about US$ 1.08 in August. It since rose quickly and touched US$ 1.25 on Sunday and Monday. But as they say there was no follow through, and this level was known as one of major resistance. But the "loonie", as the Canadian dollar is called (because of the duck on the dollar coin, not because of the people) seems to have gone a bit barmy (see chart and click to see full size).

The start of this trading week has been unbelievable. Admittedly conditions are strange the week before Christmas, especially after important interest rate decisions over the past two weeks; traders are winding down and closing their books for the year. But picture poor me. The US dollar was strengthening against other major currencies, but the Canadian dollar position did not respond. Gold and oil prices fell and the Canadian dollar did not decline. I was trading Canadian dollar several days ago, and bought US$ and saw little gain; I should have been suspicious then. However, I bought US$:Can.$ again on Sunday at around US$1.015 and saw the price move towards US$1.025, and I got a nice little profit. The rise faltered and I rode the down movement towards 1.018 and bought again; the price rose towards 1.022 and I made a little more dosh. Good day, I thought, and was ready to leave my trading desk. Then I saw the price fall again towards 1.016 (see the first block of blue bars going down), so I bought again and the price began to rise and I was rubbing my hands.

Now we know about going to the well too often and about that deadly sin, greed. Yikes! During the course of the next few minutes the price fell about 200 points! It rebounded and then had a slow slide for the rest of the day to settle at around 1.003. I was not fazed because I thought about the fact that over the past two weeks the US$:Can $ pair had traded in a range between 1 and 1.025; it was "consolidating" in this area so I set my stop-loss at 1.0. Market sentiment was that if it went below 1, then look out o.95. If it went above 1.025, hello heaven. But that's a wide range for sure. Let me cut to the chase. The lunatic that I am had a position that went as low as minus US$1000 as of early this morning as the North American traders pummelled on Monday, and when the loonie saw the greenback getting up, it pummelled it again with Asian traders and early European traders pushin the rate to around 1.001. You have to imagine the loss ticker flipping between minus $200 and 600, staying stable, then switching back and forth to have an idea of how the day went.

When I saw that 1.001 figure at about 2.30am this morning I said to myself, well it was a deep stop and if it gets broken then so be it. I went back to bed accepting a nasty stain on my trading book. Well blow me down. I got up at 6am and found the loonie had counter punched by the greenback and was now around US$1.01. What the @#% is going on?, I ask myself. But before I could figure it out I just accepted that at least my potential loss was now only about US$350. I gave a heavy sigh of relief. I had dreamed of how I would rationalize the $1000 loss and that I would never "double-dip" again on the trades, etc., yaddah-yaddah.

A few bits of Canadian price data were due out around 8.30am and the rate coasted up toward 1.012 ahead of that. I nibbled at some positive gains. Then the data came in a bit worse than expected and the rate shot up to 1.016. I got some more profit and reduced some losses and sat back. Maybe we will see 1.02 again today, I mused. But guess what? The loonie remains loony and the rate plummeted to test 1.006. I got through the test and is back at 1.01 as I write. I will see where the duck has landed later this afternoon.

Well my position is much reduced and I am happy to watch this mad patient try to climb out of the asylum. It is not putting me into the cookoo's nest, though. I am due to travel today and wanted to have nothing major still trading. That I have achieved. My account stands balanced for today, which is a tad better than minus US$1000. Not good trading tactics, I have to admit though. A lucky escape some may say but you have to ride some waves like this one. Had I been on the other side of the deal I would be getting more of the Tiffany earrings my wife so loves. At least I don't have to buy a set of false diamonds from a dollar store.
****
A post script to my fellow blogger at http://www.onlinefxtrading.net/. He has been chronicling how he is doing with his trades and his "strategy". His profits on his practice accounts are of the order of US1-20. That is, however, not what trading is about and if he wants to make money doing it dollar by dollar won't do it. He has to learn that very hard lesson of sitting with a deal a longer time than a move of 1-10 points. Get used to the up and down of 25-50 point moves. It's good for toughening the nerves and developing the discipline of respecting a deal. If one is nervous then a wide stop-loss will give more comfort.

I am learning to leave the dog to sleep and accept that sometimes a burglar comes in and takes all my goodies. But I am finding that most times the dog does a good job, if well positioned and the goodies stay safe. So, I trade with a bit more of a sanguine air. I am making a bit more than I am losing this month (up 30 %) and hope that it continues that way. Yes, I am miffed that I tightened a stop-loss with Euro:US$ and found myself closed out by 2 points. Leave well alone, eh! But in the big scheme of things you have to let that go. And I did.

Happy trading!

Jamaica's investment club debate

Professional economists are supposed to love empirical evidence. I admit that as a professional economist I have shied away from certain things, one of which is regression analysis and econometric forecasting. The main reason for that is a belief in a maxim I learnt at graduate school: the one thing you can be sure about with a forecast is that it will be wrong. If that is the case, I figured, then why spend laborious hours modelling and refining data sets to get something wrong? If my instincts tell me something I perhaps stand as good a chance as a modeller in getting a right answer.

I had a teaching assignment in Tortola, British Virgin Islands in September (see blog); my teaching was in the evenings and my hillside hideaway where I was living gave superb views to the sea and other islands and I had time to think. I kept on getting notions about OLINT and whether the numbers made sense. High returns often lead to immediate suspicion that something is not right. It can happen for short periods of time with speculative ventures and when you are the innovator of some idea and get huge benefits from being first. You see this easily with investments in IPOs where the price on opening is often multiples higher and those who were in the IPO make a whopping profit--hence the suspicion about who investment agencies allow into IPOs (friends, family, etc).

Most financial institutions pay meagre nominal returns, except in situations where inflation is high. You may often find that in real terms (adjusted for price increases) it is hard to get positive returns. The institution where I do most of my banking in the US pays 0.15% a year on my current account. Several years ago I looked at US market interest rates and saw that money markets were paying substantially more than that (say 4+%), and giving similar liquidity, so I took my deposits and placed them in a money market account (MMA). I found the MMA was not as easy to use for regular banking (bill paying, transfers etc.) so I looked for another option and found Internet banks but they too were a little like bricks and mortar banks (a bit bureaucratic and sluggish) but on the Internet. So I looked for another option. I discovered PayPal through selling on eBay. PayPal allows money to be placed into an Internet account and for transfers in and out to be made by e-mail; most transfers are free; and it pays rates close to money market rates. It also links to real bank accounts so permits transfers across them in a way that the actual banks still find difficult. So for the past five years or so most of my banking is done through PayPal. I can make transactions where ever I can find an Internet connection and my only minor problem is that transfer take about 3 business days. I have been earning closer to 4-5% a year on current account instead of 0.15%--a big difference over several years.

OLINT is paying something near 10% a month. How is that possible? I decided to do some research. The "investment club " is supposedly able to do that because it is based on foreign exchange (forex) trading. I say supposedly because one of the issues about such clubs is that details of their actual activities have not been disclosed; that's not a crime but it makes it hard to prove what is going on. So I started online forex trading (see earlier blogs) and wanted to see if I could replicate OLINT's results. Now I admit that I made horrible mistakes at the beginning: these are especially common to new traders, though seasoned traders are also guilty of them occasionally. I started trading with real money much too soon, but I found that I enjoyed the risk taking, and it was important to deal with the real environment--as vices go it seemed not so harmful and playing just with play money seemed like a waste of time. The real environment means nerves: when losses or gains start to show, the heart races, the palms start to sweat and calculations are being made about how far this will go.

Experienced professional traders set up deals in quite precise ways: they set the all important point of entry, which gives the maximum risk/reward potential, and set their risk ("stop-loss" point) and reward ("limit"), then make the deal and sit back. (Actually, they watch what is going on, getting new information that may change outcomes today or later, but tend not to tamper with their deals). They take the gain or loss as set up. If things dont work out they go back and analyze their assessments and try to come up with revised trading strategies.

Professional traders have a particular way of dealing with potential gains: taking half the profit when the reward is two-thirds satisfied, and setting the stop-loss to the entry point, so ensuring a decent profit and no possible further loss. They also use "trailing stops", which follow the price by a pre-set margin, say 10 points: when the deal moves in your favour the limit keeps moving to safeguard the pre-set margin, when the price moves against you the margin reduces but no more than the pre-set amount. So the most you lose is say 10 points from where the price is. If you have already set a limit for your deal but are not content to see that be met the trailing stop says take me out at my limit but don't let me lose gains because of price reversals, so you get out at the deal limit of the trailing stop limit, whichever is met first. (I have started using these more; my first experience was bad and I misunderstood how it worked; it's very important to ensure that the trail is set the right way, such as buy--not sell--when that's what you need to close . Sounds simple but believe me misstakes happen.)

I am learning all the time. I found from trading the live and practice accounts that volume is very important. US$50,000 in the practice account is huge and with the margin trading possibilities of lots of $100,000 you can see gains that make you blink but also losses that make you wince. You can also take risk with trades and not care. With live money you wince a lot whatever, but as a I said your nerves start to play on the deal and that is a major barrier. I use smaller margin trading lots there (US$10,000, meaning I put up say $100 of my money to play with the bigger amount and a 1 point movement represents US$ 1 on my actual money, so 15 point gain/loss is $15 profit/loss). I have learned over the last two months to let my nerves play less. I try not to watch deals as much and let them run. I even set deals and then go on trips, which sounds risky but is no different from keepinga position overnight and seeing how its done in the morning.

Why volume matters is that if the balance is small then deal sizes must be small and also the margins for losing are very finer. If there is an intention to make a decent amount of money one needs a balance of at least $1000: that allows deals bigger than just one lot that don't risk too much capital and can handle a few losses. Amounts such as $250-500 are really too small. about $2000 is nearer ideal for starting as a small trader. By having larger lots and letting deals run longer individual deals can net $50-100 more easily (say 2 lots gaining 25 points); of course you can lose more on each deal. (Onlinefxtrading is an interesting blog about one Jamaican's experience with online trading and highlights perfectly why small amounts wont work and are likely to end up losing.)

I also found that intervention tends to lead to worse results. I found that tampering with a deal tended to mean that actual gains were less than potential gains. A major novice mistake is to close deals too fast either to minimize a loss or because you fear losing a gain. But in doing that you miss the nature of price movements in financial markets, which have wave tendencies (ebb and flow) and reversals are normal. The experts have sophisticated ways of calculating the possible reversals and set deals up so that reversals do not damage the risk/reward set up. So, with a stop-loss of 45 points a 38 point reversal towards loss is interesting but not critical; without the analysis a 38 point reversal often leads to a panicky feeling, especially if the trading position is large. This pull-back as it is called is part of the trend and so should be left alone. So, armed with their charts, and price movement details and experience, professional traders make money more than they lose and they can make large profits. [Yesterday showed me that well: I had sold at 1.4610 and set my stop-loss for Euro:US dollar at 1.4660, the price rose to about 1.4590, then reversed and the Euro ended the day closer to 1.4430. (I did not get all of that gain as I did not believe the fall would be so dramatic--very unlike Euro/US dollar in recent weeks--and took my profit earlier.)]

I, on the other hand, am armed with few of these tools, including lots of sources and market contacts alongside that can tell me about developments in related markets (especially futures, equities and commodity prices); this is a big handicap because the markets are linked. Nevertheless, how have I done? Well, David Smith and OLINT can sleep safely for the moment. Since September I have not managed to make 10% a month; I am down overall. But since September my performance has been improving, and at mid-December I am up 25%, so if I made no more trades that would be a good point of satisfaction. On any given day, it is possible to make money whether prices rise or fall, and I have played with several "emotional" strategies, including looking for cheap deals (say 5-15 point gains, especially on a single lot), which satisfy the need to see the cash balance rise but tend to give less overall if one looks back on how a deal could have played out. So, I have tried not to be greedy and if I see that I have made between 1-5% on the day I tend to say "I'm out". Now deal making is such that new opportunities always present themselves so to avoid that temptation I often have to close my account and walk away from my "dealing room" (my basement office). Another lesson is that the return visit tends to mean losing some of the initial gain.

Experience matters. When I lose $200-500 in a day I am not fazed anymore because I now know I have the potential to gain the same amount. The tendency to think the market is against you when you lose is normal. (Believe me, you do feel this way when a lot of deals go sour.) You also need to live through volatile experiences and know your history. I was in the market during the past two weeks when the major countries (Canada, UK, European Economic Commission, and US) made interest rate decisions and also when very important data were published. Many traders take a side line ahead of such situations knowing that the price movements afterwards are hectic and conditions can be unclear; they prefer to see how things settle and then re-enter. I gained despite the increased volatility; it is hard to say where I would have been if I had been on the sidelines but I am in the middle of my own research and it's important to know the feeling of seeing your position move 60-100 points for or against you in a flash. I also learned important lessons about disorderly about trading conditions: my stop was set at 30 points but my deal was not filled until the loss had gone to 60 points--there was a market gap when it is almost impossible to fill orders because of the speed of price moments,which usually lasts no more than 30 seconds, and deals then get filled at the nearest point. Expensive lesson in that case, but it also helped me with a large gain in another deal. I also learned that it is better to stay with a group of currency pairs, and get to know their market characteristics better. It's good to know where the US dollar sits in terms of decade lows and have a notion of to which point it will initially rebound, and so on.

Bottom line? My question was whether forex trading made of over 10% a month returns possible . I have enough information to tell me that the answer is yes, though I don't know how sustasinable it is. Judicious trading can easily net 1% a day, and over 20 trading days a month even 20% is not amazing. So, I have no in principle problem with the gains that OLINT is paying out; there is no guaranteed amount and in recent months the monthly pay out has been around 7-10%. Now, David Smith is an experienced trader and reputedly very good so my next question would be how much is OLINT really making? I am not going to pursue that here except to say that if the gains are closer to 20% a month then with a lower pay out that allows space for covering other costs and a tidy profit for Mr. Smith and his corporation. I won't begrudge him that. Trading is stressful and though it may be different to play with other people's money I imagine the stress is still very high especially with sums in millions of US dollars. Big corporations give large pay outs to their CEOs if they can make the business very profitable so Mr. Smith is entitled to his slice of the cake.

Jamaica's "small man" has been thrown a welcome life belt with schemes such as OLINT and a lot of deposits have flown from banks into such schemes. I do not think all the schemes are the same so I will make no judgements about them. The government and financial regulators in Jamaica are now pursing various legal cases against such schemes and their outcomes will be very important (see article). Financial system regulation is important to give investors confidence in the institutions with which they deal, and also to determine if there is a need for insurance or some other cover to protect investors from losses. If something is not illegal then it can't be stopped on legal grounds. If it is risky and legal then investors need to know the risks they are taking on; so trading stocks or forex means living with price rises and falls and losses and gains.

If the legal cases go against the "unregulated investment schemes" and mean that some of them have to close the financial fall out could be devastating. Common talk in Jamaica is that the banks won't see many of the depositors flocking back because the widespread belief is that they are grossly underpaying depositors. The recent action of some banks (see article) to try to close the accounts of OLINT and Cash Plus, not honour their checks, and to demand that their employees disclose if they have accounts with such "clubs" or risk being firedhas angered many people unions. Again there is now a court case over this and injunctions have been issued to stop closures for the moment. It may also lead to a run on the clubs as depositors clamour for their money, which could threaten what was a viable operation (not Northern Rock, but the example is very vivid and current). A senator has asked that the issue of the investment clubs be>

The general feeling is that if you are able to invest with OLINT and Cash Plus you have been able to get a very handsome return. OLINT has been running for several years and I have seen no reports of dissatisfied customers. That is not to say that either club can continue to do as well. As far as OLINT is concerned, if its principal activity is forex dealing then this is not illegal. If it has been giving investment advice (which it denies) then in Jamaica that is an activity reserved for licensed and regulated institutions. If complying with relevant legal requirements is a problem then that will signal another problem. Forex trading seems to be a growing activity for small investors, and online companies are sprouting up like mushrooms; not surprisingly Jamaicans are apparently jumping on them (see Silicon Caribe blogs and also recent Gleaner article). They make money on the spreads (difference between buy-sell prices). David Smith is now offering such opportunities with the sweetener of a $100 bonus for Jamaicans who open with a stake of the same size (see I-trade FX website).

Sensible investors have not put at risk money they cannot lose. Some people might have taken on risk they cannot handle, but the recent sub prime mortgage crisis and other past financial crises show us vividly that this is always the case. They also show us that regulation does not prevent financial crises. Simple precautions help prevent certain kinds of losses which individuals can avoid, one of these is to test how easy it is to withdraw funds: my feeling is that if that is a problem then better not to go there. I tried an online trading company recommended by one of my commentators and doubled my initial stake and more. I then tried to withdraw the full balance. The company asked for several pieces of documentation to prove who I was and confirm my credit accounts, part of normal "know your customer" rules. My money has been returned to my credit card account so I feel that I am dealing with an institution I can trust, even though the process was cumbersome.

A bitter pill in the recent dealings with the investment clubs is the vigour with which they are being pursued and that has made the "small man" very angry as he has done well out of it. So, he is asking, "Why the government can't go catch all o' de thief and murderers who a mek we suffer?" Good question.

Domestic violence

If you have no notion of what violent crime does to a society you need to visit Jamaica. A rate of murders that leads the world and many acts of brutal violence has scarred this country and changed dramatically how people live their lives. Much of the violence is gang-related. An astonishing number of brutal killings are of women and children. That is a bizarre inter-relationship. Drive-by shootings seem to be increasing. A lot of policemen are killed, but the police also do a lot of killing.

One aspect of the escalating crime is how the police have been targeted. The police have a tough task but the force has not helped itself with its reputation for also being undisciplined and also home to many criminals (see recent report in The Gleaner of comments by Montego Bay's Police Superintendent). Police crimes involve corruption (including the traffic cops asking for "a little help"), lottery scams, missing drugs and firearms, and more. Citizens are being asked to help the police but there are many reasons why there is much reluctance. Just this week I saw how non-community minded the police are. A vehicle was broken down on a major road near Devon House. Police officers were in the area doing vehicle checks and towing. One motorist became frustrated because when it was possible to pass the broken down vehicle a policeman proceeded to saunter in the road way deaying the traffic, which was again caught by a red light. The driver honked. The policeman waved his arm angrily at the motorist and pointed for him to pull over. The driver started to drive on, but the policeman grabbed the car door, yanked it open, and made a grab for the driver. He yelled at the motorist and acted like an ordinary angry citizen with no sense that he needed to maintain order if not the law. I have seen this kind of policing often in Jamaica. (I also saw this type of loutish action many times in Guinea, even with policemen jumping into cars and trying to pry the controls for drivers!) Simple situations can escalate into major altercations with this type of behaviour; and this was over a traffic non-event.
Almost everywhere you go in Kingston you see police in bullet proof vests and battle helmets, heavily armed with sub machine guns; you often see defence force squads rolling around in armoured trucks; or neighbourhoods sport signs that they are protected by some private security force. This gives the city an eerie sense of being constanly under a state of emergency or martial law. Curfews are common in problem neighbourhoods.

Crime has also changed life at any middle and upper class homes. Most Jamaicans have lived within grilled and barricaded homes for decades now, since the upsurge in violence in the mid-1970s. But the possible random nature of crimes and their brutality is sending fear through neighbourhoods that normally would be wary but generally felt to be safe. It's rare nowadays for people to just sit outside their homes, but you could leave a door open to let breeze through. Increasingly doors are shut and locked; if opened then the grill gate is locked. Who are the prisoners now? Politicians, their families and also some prominent business people have recently become targets . The increasing sense of threat that the privileged and middle and upper classes feel is likely to be a platform for action.

The Gleaner reported on a march for peace by children in midweek and gave a vivid description of what violence is all about: "The dehumanising conditions in large pockets of these inner-city communities, the high rates of unemployment and the cynical manipulation by political hacks over many years have contributed significantly to the antagonistic and anti-social behaviour that breeds a vicious cycle of criminality. That cycle must be broken by strong, coordinated and sustained social intervention." It also comments about how informers are reluctant to come forward for fear that corrupt policemen will reveal their names. The country seems at a loss how to deal with crime. Whatever has been tried has had no effect on the rate of murders. Whatever will be tried next is likely to fail if there is no willingness on the part of the public to real support action against crime. That means that the incentives for helping remove criminals has to greatly outweigh the risk of criminal reprisal. If this is not present that all bets are off.

Relative values

I increasingly enjoy my visits to Jamaica for the chance to hear people talk about events. Their conversations rarely cover major events of the common news variety. Talk about elections, politics and world events are often about how the personalities behave themselves and usually with a jaundiced eye (with comments such as "Look how dem mek fool o' dem self." ) and distrust ("Bway, dem can lie!"). The conversations I like are about happenings in the districts and stay close to what sticks in the memory for its humour, personal significance, example of someone's character, etc. As I usually spend time in rural areas I rarely hear direct accounts about the hardships of life in the Kingston ghettos, and the escalating national murder rate and brutal violence, which is hitting the headlines every day (over 1400 murders already this year!). I get to hear more of these stories as I talk to my older relatives, but sadly not nearly as much as I would like and not as much as I would have heard had I not emigrated.

In my case I love to hear about the life I missed when I was not living in Jamaica, especially about my family. A cousin and I have separately started building family trees and these stories help to flesh out the personalities. I started the process late but better that than never. My father reminisces a lot and he does this more since his stroke last year, but he is starting to confuse the details (not a real surprise anyway for a man nearly 80) so I need to really pay attention to what he says. He often talks about his life in Cuffy Gully, St. Mary (a land rich in hills, agriculture and rivers). He has great stories about his three uncles (Levi, Consie, and Mas' Will), for whom no woman seemed off limits. For instance, one uncle went to Kingston to visit his sister (my grandmother) at the house where she was a domestic. He was left alone with the girls who were preparing gungo peas (reputed to make people feel aroused) and by the end of the afternoon this uncle had "made three babies". True or false, that is some reputation.

Life in rural Jamaica in the 1920s through 1940s sounds like it was really sweet. A river ran through the land owned by my great grandmother so the children all became swimmers, especially the boys. They also used the river to play and to catch shrimps and fish (something I vaguely remember doing also when I was a boy). My father would help to sell herb medicine (bought from the husband of an aunt for two shillings and three pence [about 15 pence in current English pounds/30 US cents] and sold for three shillings and six pence, and the profit helped pay for his secondary school education). He would also help one of his uncles make shoes, managing all the steps needed; in those days with no electricity in the rural areas machines needed real manpower. The money my father made from this work also went towards his school fees.

The uncles were typical men of the time and mainly artisans. One was a builder, who later went to Kingston and "made a fortune" through government contracts in the 1960s, but wasted it all on women. Another uncle was a shoe maker, who could do wonderful work but was a wizard when he drank: one time he had to change the two left-footed shoes he had made for a man's wedding on the day of the marriage and the wedding went off well. The third uncle was a tailor. All of them started and ran their businesses from their mother's house, which became a pathway for men needing fine clothes and shoes. I guess that as business was good the stream of men was also a source of distraction for the sisters in the household.

It is a great pity that we have no pictures of these men, and I only have pictures of my paternal grandmother and one of her sisters. Somehow, however, the family will try to keep their memories vivid.

Roads to oblivion

Jamaicans have a very rough approach to driving. On most roads they drive fast whenever possible, loving to ride close behind the vehicle in front waiting to overtake and accelerate towards the next vehicle and start the manoeuvre again. Jamaican males sees cars as extensions of themselves and use them to make statements; this macho way of affirm their maleness is cutting many lives short. Road deaths are very high for a country of some 2 1/2-3 million people, about 300-350 a year. Most accidents involve cars. For the past 15 or so years, the gender breakdown shows that 81 % killed are males and 19 % females. Most of the dead were in their productive years. Children and the elderly have accounted for approximately 30 % of all road traffic accident fatalities over the last five years. Most accidents are due to reckless driving of some sort, and about 1/3 of accidents are found to be due to faulty tyres.

Today, on an otherwise uneventful drive from Mandeville to Kingston and back I saw again why road accidents are plentiful and why deaths are high, though amazingly I saw no dead or injured. First, I saw an articulated truck, jack-knifed on an uphill corner facing into the mountains. I can't even imagine what speed the driver was doing for him to lose control going uphill. Second, a car driving in front of us drove into a parked truck, as the driver appeared unable to see well as he glared into the sun. The rear corner of the truck just pierced the windshield of the car and was inches away from the driver's head. A very lucky escape and thankfully the car had only been moving at about 50 km an hour. Next, another truck had decided to try to reshape a hill and this time it had been "de-cab-itated"; the cab and parts of the chassis were strewn across the road. There was no sign that the driver had been hurt but oil and debris were on the highway.

Road conditions are not good and there is a permanent race that Jamaicans would win if it were an Olympic sport, and that is "patch up" road. Every few months roads are scraped and another thin layer of tar and stones goes on top of marl, waiting for heavy rain and traffic to wash it away again so that the race can restart. It provides good employment opportunities so I don't foresee any government changing soon this seemingly useless band-aid practice.

Road conditions are made more difficult by idiotic road maintenance crews, who seem to have about as much intelligence as a flattened mongoose. Imagine a road jam in the middle of the day on the highway from the capital due in part to patch-up works, but then made worse because the flag person was waving one line of traffic to the right of the work and the other the left. So far alright? But the left side traffic then was headed to a parked steam roller! So the drivers were at a dead end and of course wanted to back up to then join the freer flowing right side. Jamaicans have a way of saying "idiot" that seems onomatopoeic, they say "eejyat". And when an eejyat causes you problems for no reason it's a real saint who does not "cuss them out".

Jamaica launched a "Think before you drive" campaign a short while ago to help reduce the carnage on the roads. Within it a programme for the identification and reconstruction of "collision bad spots" was to be put in place by the National Works Agency, which had identified seven such spots island wide--a very low number. I don't think this "thinking" is making much headway in terms of driving attitudes. My last example from today spells that out. Two minibuses, both filled to bursting with passengers. Each one heading along Highway 2000 (a 2 lane by 2 lane freeway) at well over 100 kms an hour. Each racing side by side trying to overtake cars. Highway 2000 looks like a raceway so why not race on it. Only pure luck saved those nearly 30 passengers from a horrible and stupid tragedy. I can't tell if they were begging the drivers to stop or if the drivers had any notion that what they were doing was verging on kamikaze behaviour. They were also "eejyats".

The need to drive with due care and attention is another area where Jamaicans better wise up fast before they hit another self-destruct button.

Grave issues

Special thanks to Ms. Janet Hayles of Knockpatrick, Manchester, Jamaica, for sharing her knowledge with me.

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In Jamaica, up until about the 1960s-70s, most families would bury their dead within two days, because many could not pay for morgue fees. Immediately after a death, the practice was to put the body at the back of the house on a tall table covered with zinc sheeting; the body would be wrapped in sheets with an iron on the stomach to stop it swelling. The two big toes would be tied together; the nose, ears and bottom would be plugged to stop flies entering the body; the two arms and hands would be placed at the side of the body. Chipped ice would be placed all around the body, which was then covered with zinc sheeting. It was important that the body be placed somewhere out of the sun. If no visitors from far away were expected the burial would often be within 24 hours of the death.

Carpenters would visit the home with their tools to make a coffin; cut board was usually kept at home in anticipation of the need to make a coffin. Local men in the area would come and start digging a grave; all they needed was drink (mainly white rum) and food (ground provisions). Women in the area would come and help prepare food, serve, clean the home and other household chores.

After the death there is period known as "nine nights". The night before the burial would be the start of "set up": visitors would come to comfort the bereaved, and help in the home. Then the body would be prepared for burial by family and "respected" persons in the community: the body was washed and dressed in the person's favourite clothes. For those who had been regular churchgoers, their coffin would be taken to their church or place of worship, and following the service the body would be buried either in the church graveyard or in the burial plot at the family home. If the dead person had not attended church or a place of worship regularly, a ceremony would be held at home, and the body then buried in the family plot. The burial plot was simply a hole in the ground, covered with earth. After the burial family and friends would continue to visit to comfort the bereaved during a period of nine nights, especially for the first three days and nights, during when it is believed that the dead person will "visit" the home again.

A year after the burial the tomb building would begin. (The belief was that beyond a year the dead would come back to complain that they were uncovered and cold.) The burial plot would be cleaned: weeds were removed and some "spirit" (white rum) was added around the plot. Tomb building was usually as big an event as the set-up; those who had not been able to make set-up would try their best to be at the tomb building. Drinking and eating, and recalling memories of the dead person's life, were important parts of tomb building.

At each major Christian festival (Christmas, Easter) or on holidays (especially August) family and friends would clean the family plot and repaint the tomb stones (usually in white).

Since the mid-1970s funeral homes have developed and they now take care of most of the arrangements for burials. "Set up" is now longer than nine nights, maybe several weeks, and burials may be held up to a month after death. During "set up" a new trend is to employ a band to play music (especially drums). Some people still use their family plots for burials, but increasingly public graveyards are used.
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Two men travelling along a lonely road met a young boy and asked him if he knew where they get some ice. The boy said he knew a place and went to get the ice. The men used the ice to chase their rum. When the ice was finished they asked for more. The boy came back without any ice. "What's wrong? No more ice?" they asked. "There's plenty of ice, but Mama said I can't take anymore from the dead!" replied the boy.

Finding places on Jamaica's south coast

Many places in a country go undiscovered by most people. One of Jamaica's best kept secrets is its south coast, especially the area between the parishes Clarendon and Manchester (which reputedly got some coastline from the parish of St. Elizabeth so that every parish had some seaside).

It is extraordinary to travel along a road for an hour by car and meet only one other vehicle. That was the case between Milk River--where there are fantastic mineral baths with reputedly the world's most radioactive water, and supposed wonderful healing powers (see link for more on its origins)--and Alligator Pond. The road from the highway to Milk River is rough after much damage by mining truck. From Milk River to Alligator Pond the road is not bad but with occasional bare and rough patches. It hugs the coastline but this is not visible most of the time; instead one sees the high rising coral and rock hills to the north with john crows (vultures circling high above) and can cave openings. It's lined with cacti and thatch palms. The housing is sparse and apparently very basic. It is a land populated by fishing people and rastas. Popular folk lore has it that it is also full of "duppies" (ghosts and spirits); as you pass what seems like acres of uninhabitated land, with occasional cave mouths on the roadside, you can sense the fear people have when passing this area at night. Then you reach Alligator Pond, which has much more going on but not that much except one rare gem. A fish and seafood restaurant called "Little Ochie" has built a reputation for simplicity and excellent cooking. You choose your fish (parrot, goat, snapper, doctor, etc) or seafood (lobster; conch, crab, etc). You decide how you want it cooked (steamed, roast, jerk, etc) and drink fish team while waiting for it to arrive with "bammy" (cassava bread)and/or roasted breadfruit. Little Ochie's cluster of thatched huts on the beach really comes alive at night and the weekends, but the food is also available during the daytime.

The chefs love their work but they also know how to play in their downtime (as you can see from the video below).

This little area of southern Jamaica defies easy description. Most tourists never get anywhere near it. The bauxite and alumina business has meant that the area has had a lot of cash flowing through it. Fishing gives a good livelihood. Agriculture has been generally very productive. The relative economic success shows up in a very high number of bars and shops on the way north from Alligator Pond back into the parish of St. Elizabeth. I may exaggerate but it seemed like one bar every 400 metres. The land once owned by my maternal grandparents (near Myersville) is now part of the Alpart alumina complex. I never visit the industrial complex, but lament every time I pass its entrance.

There is nothing remotely glitzy about this south coast area (in marked contrast to the famed north coast), and that may be its saving grace. Life is generally slow to backward and distinctly rural, but that is a plus. Few properties have been barricaded by grills, even shops and bars. Foreign visitors who get this far are intrepid. As my father says, "You na ha' no reason fi drive yah so." So if you end up in this area you are either lost or you have found its secrets. If the latter only whisper about it to your friends.

A Sunday afternoon in rural Jamaica

Men gathered at a bar hut, tucked off the roadside, with its own patch of grass for parking. Some hold hot Red Stripe or Dragon Stout in hand, others hold a glass of white rum, ice and water. Two domino tables resound with the sound of tiles being slammed; then quiet, then tiles are shuffled. Jamaican dominoes has its theatrical style (see link), and one man poses as he crashes his final tile on the table. The dialogue at the tables is fast and furious. " Me nah 'fraid fi you! A no six-blank you gwan beat me! Cho' man, you can' play wid man; you is a bway!" People eye newcomers to see if better partners are arriving: "Watch dat man deh. 'Im dangerous wid de cards dem. Mi did play wid 'im since we dey a school."

Pretty girls adorn the calendars of the wall, and one serves at the bar. That's as close to equality as the genders will get here.

A man tends a small wood fire outside the bar. He stews a pot of pork from a pig killed by the bar owner yesterday. He is also frying fish. Cornmeal and plain flour stand ready to be mixed into dough, for dumplings. "You a'right boss? You can 'ol' you pork yet? Or is fish you want?"

Meagre-looking dogs wait their turn for any scraps. While waiting they sleep; the nights are rough barking at strangers walking by. They need no pedigree for their work and the rougher their background the better.

One man, dressed all in green (JLP colours), proudly yells "Fi mi gobment gwan change dis ya country. Me is Bruce Golding. You all gwan change." He proudly shows a photo of himself and Edward Seaga taken several years ago. He adds "We mus' bless di bar. Even di rum we a drink need God blessin'. Listen to dis ya CD. Is pure upliftment." The girl at the bar quietly changes the CD playing Sean Paul and puts on 'Bruce's' selection of revivalist tunes. Everyone continues to rock to the beat, even though the lyrics have switched from night to day.

A man so drunk that he can hardly hold his glass starts to argue with another man who had been so drunk he messed up the play at a dominoes table. The two of them sway in front of each other, grasping at and missing each other. No one cares about their argument, which is about who can throw whom out of the bar. Both would be sad if the owner arrived and threw them both out.

People pass in their cars and hail the crowd at the bar. "Is wha' you a keep up?" some ask. "We gwan nyam pork an' fish. You wan' grab some?" they get in reply.

The best seats are at the bar counter. Chairs have to be brought from a nearby house. Standard seating outside is the carcass of a car long forgotten, whose bonnet also serves at a preparation table for the fish fryer.

Some more women arrive. They start to organize: beer is repositioned on the bar shelves, tins of soda are counted. Men's eyes start to drift from the dominoes. Hunger is beginning to bite and a few drift off to get some of the sweet smelling food. There are other distractions: cell phones keep ringing and men break away for more than a few minutes to deal with the calls. The games break up a little.

The bar owner arrives with several cases of beer. He also bring a few car loads more of men. Spirits revive and the afternoon looks set to stretch into night. Those of us with other responsibilities make a move to eat the pork, fish and boiled dumplings; something needs to push down that beer. We make a brief farewell visit to the sugar cane bush at the side of the bar, and leave without fanfare.

The country roads are quiet but we decide to take a shortcut across the land being mined for bauxite. The red earth and white marl make a sharp contrast to the lush fields of yam, corn, and cassava. The roads are pot-holed and we have to drive slowly but we reach the highway again quickly. The town centre is almost empty when we get there; most people are resting at home as the hustle of the week takes its toll. Sleep and rest are now the orders of the day. Sunday is indeed a day for rest.

Thoughts for the day: Inspiration, culture and tradition

Taking what has become a regular pre-dawn morning walk from my father's house across and around the golf course I get a lot of time to think. I share my thoughts with the barking dogs who run my way, or with the crowing cocks that hail the sunrise, or with the egrets overhead as they wait for cows to come out. I look across the lovely misty hills of the parish of Manchester, which are like a blend of where my parents are from: my mother from the baked savanna of St. Elizabeth and my father from the lush hills of St. Mary. I think I am a lucky guy. I have the chance to spend some time with my father and for him to spend some days with his grand-daughter. She has spent most of the past few weeks in Barbados dressing in sweaters and leggings saying how much she likes cold places. Now she is in a Caribbean place that is really quite cold and is in her element.

When I got back from my walk I had the pleasure of seeing my young daughter have her grandfather tell her some stories about his life, of when he collected mangoes as a boy. She has no real notion of where he grew up; she just knows where he lives now. I gave her a breakfast of Ovaltine and bulla bread (a staple for Jamaican kids), a first for her and she liked it; she's not yet ready for bulla and avocado pear (a traditional favourite for Jamaicans). We then spent a couple of hours dressing up Barbie dolls.

My morning thoughts began with Bob Marley's Redemption Song; it was really the first verse that got me, but the whole song is worth recalling:

Old pirates, yes, they rob I;
Sold I to the merchant ships,
Minutes after they took I
From the bottomless pit.
But my hand was made strong
By the and of the almighty.
We forward in this generation
Triumphantly.
Wont you help to sing
These songs of freedom?
-cause all I ever have:
Redemption songs;
Redemption songs.

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Have no fear for atomic energy,
cause none of them can stop the time.
How long shall they kill our prophets,
While we stand aside and look?
Ooh!

Some say its just a part of it:
Weve got to fulfil de book.
Wont you help to sing
These songs of freedom?
-cause all I ever have:
Redemption songs;Redemption songs;
Redemption songs.

I think this song came to mind after a conversation last night with one of the coaches for the Jamaican karate team who had just returned from Japan; he happens to be my father's gym instructor and had popped in to see my dad. I asked him for his impression of the land of the rising sun and he answered that he admired how they protected their culture. He then expanded on how we in the Caribbean have no culture as we are all mixed up and a patchwork of peoples all thrown together. We had an interesting discussion about how the Romans viewed Europe, which they felt had no culture.

When I had visited Japan some 20 years ago I had noticed how homogeneous a place it seemed, and how traditions and standard behaviour seemed to be at the core of the country. That tends to make us feel that there is a culture. That sameness also comes with a certain conservatism, which can lead to hostility to outside influences and foreigners. I recalled some English friends who had studied in Japan; spoke Japanese fluently; married Japanese men; had children in Japan and lived there for nearly 20 years; knew much about Japanese culture and history, but were never fully accepted into Japanese society. Much of Asia prides itself on having a very long history and a wealth of traditions.

In Jamaica, we are by definition a young society and have been building a nation since independence based on a motto of "Out of many, one people". Views will differ about how inclusive and tolerant we are or have been. Those who happen to be on the margins of Jamaican society may feel constantly locked out, that is especially evident when it comes to homosexuals. But I love it when I am here and "foreignness" does not seem to be a reason for exclusion. Jamaicans of Chinese or Indian origin speak to me and I know immediately that they are true Jamaicans. Even though they are significantly in the minority they have an important place, often in trade and business, and that is recognized.

Coming out of a colonialism that was founded on involuntarily transporting people from their homelands, we we have a long road to travel to be able to build something that is truly worthy of the term culture, but we should try to build it. Many traditions coming from Africa, India, China or the Middle East have been part of the fabric that makes this country. But it's also true that many of these traditions have not lasted and are being displaced by practices that come from another new nation, the United States. So, it's hard to say which way we will go.

I am at heart a traditionalist, meaning that I love to feel that things that were important in my childhood will still be there and important for my children. Yesterday I went in search of "Solomon G(r)undy". This is the name of a dish derived from the English food Salmagundi, which was integrated into the English language from the French in the 17th century, and is a salad of cooked meats, lettuce, anchovies and eggs, with other condiments. But in Jamaica it is a paste made of red herrings and spices (and for me the best version is made by Walkers Wood).

For me, it also recalls a children's rhyme:

Solomon Grundy,
Born on a Monday,
Christened on Tuesday,
Married on Wednesday,
Took ill on Thursday,
Grew worse on Friday,
Died on Saturday,
Buried on Sunday.
That was the end of
Solomon Grundy.

Well, my search was successful; a few months ago there was none to be found on the island--a production problem I was told. But I learnt that most of the young people in the grocery store have no idea about these piece of Jamaican tradition; the cashier who was about my age did ask me to sing the rhyme.

We need to learn how to protect our traditions if we hope to build a culture. It is hard because of our size to not be swamped by foreign cultures. But if we can get the world to accept things we do (like reggae music) then we need to find ways to defend what we do. The best way to start that protection is to have them as part of our children's lives. I know my daughter will squirm at the smell and taste of Solomon Gundy, but she will at least have that smell in her memory bank, in the same way that she now has Ovaltine and bulla or the smell of salt fish, dumplings, and scallion.

So, I am going to do my little part to build a culture and expose my children to the traditions before they disappear. That's a small commitment but a big task.

Brawta

I am back in Jamaica and within moments I am struck again by how a country that is supposedly so poor has a rich vein running through it. Jamaicans are often known to be generous in spirit, and they can be generous in kind. One of our endearing characteristics is for a seller to give something extra to a buyer, what is called "brawta". Webster's online dictionary definites it as "a gift", "above extra", or "bonus". I have played with this notion in Barbados, and found that it's viewed as alien within the business areas that I have encountered. But in Jamaica it is as common as air. Go to the market and you wont be surprised to find some small token added to the basket, whether it's noticeably more than you ordered, or some fruit added to go with the vegetables. But it happens in stores too. The discount is often the brawta, whether this is 5 percent or more. It could also be a bag of sweets for the child accompanying its parents. The point is you get something for spending your money.

Brawta is not the same as the buyer getting something extra from the seller when there is haggling, or bargaining over the price. Brawta comes without any demand being made, but is a sign of appreciating the customer. I have come across it during my time in north and west Africa and I have also seen it in Europe (most notably in rural areas, but it exists in London markets too).

I have come across some form of the notion in Barbados, at least with some workers at the house where I live, who have brought mangoes, limes or starapples and left them in the kitchen, or who have done other jobs not at all related to their real tasks. But in the tourism business in Barbados it does not seem to strike much of a welcome chord.

Whatever brawta does to the bottom line is often more than recovered by the building of customer loyalty and a willingness to recommend a seller (hotel or restaurant). Tourism offers potentially great opportunities for brawta and I am convinced that it could do wonders for business. Boutique hotels or very small restaurants that I have visited in many countries--who have to do something different than just live off volume--have often shown an understanding that a client is likely to be a return visitor because of the way he/she is treated. The little extras are always remembered, whether it is the complimentary drink on arrival, a vase of fresh flowers each day, a bowl of fruit, the turndown service, free coffee, or being greeted by name. But larger hotel chains (eg some of the Marriott chain) have seen that occupancy rates can be kept high by not gouging visitors to pay for every item and offering something for free--breakfast and internet access are two common examples. So far my experiences in Barbados have not shown me that this is a part of the model being promoted.

If everyone likes a little something extra then you would think that it would not be hard to offer that. Maybe I am missing something.

Reaping the harvest of crime

Most countries in the Caribbean region have had a long experience of peace with other nations; few have actually been directly at war with other nations. However, we find that we are increasing "at war" amongst ourselves. With the stark contrast of Jamaica and to an increasing extent Trinidad most countries have also been free from high levels of crime, but this is changing fast. The development and impact of crime has been well analyzed in a recent World Bank/United Nations report, which points out how the region suffers from being an ideal transit location almost midway between a major supply of drugs (south America) and a enormous demand for drugs (United States). That position of transit has facilitated the entrance into Caribbean societies of a level and kind of violence that is truly alien to our cultures. More and more crimes are against persons and targeting locations that offer quick cash such as conveniene stores or gas stations. In some cases such as Barbados there has been a dramatic fall in commercial and residential burglaries during 2007, of some 15 percent compared to 2006.



The region is often discussing ways of implicating the Diaspora in its development. Now we are reaping a strange reward for migration with the return of criminals from the Europe (mainly UK) and USA, and most (some 50-70 percent) of these deported persons have been shown to be closely linked with illegal drugs and have higher rates of repeat offences. Data also show a close correlation between increased deportations and the rise in the murder rate in Jamaica and Trinidad.


The impact of crime on ordinary people, especially violent crime against persons, is devastating. Those who are victims and live are naturally traumatized forever. Those who die leave behind an increasing string of bewildered grievers. The sense of insecurity about their lives causes people to make decisions that would have shocked them several years ago. Take for instance a Jamaican friend with whom I had lunch yesterday. He has worked almost all his life for organizations in or for the region, and has spent time in Washington DC (dubbed "the murder capital of America"). He is a cancer survivor, who retired and restarted work in a regional organization here in Barbados. He is pondering his options when he really retires. Having felt strongly about going back to Jamaica he bought land there. Now the decision time is nearing he is plagued with worries as he hears more and more stories of what appear to be gratuitous violence. He retold a story of a couple in Montego Bay who were recently raped murdered by a group of men who faked an accident with the couple; this in the area known to be the region's tourist capital. So what is he contemplating? DC seems a better option, he feels. But so is Las Vegas. In short, a choice other than Jamaica.


In the 1950s and 1960s thousands of Caribbean residents were tempted abroad by work and prospects of a better life in Europe and North America. Now that the Caribbean countries have had time to mature in their independence and could use all the skills that were exported, we find that many are driven away from the region or are very reluctant to return.


My personal view is that governments have been extremely timid when it comes to addressing rising crime. And too little will soon end up with too late. Citizens have largely been limited in their direct actions against rising crime, beyond trying to do the natural thing and move away from areas where crime is rising; but the crime follows relentlessly and as it spreads then the chances of being in the wrong place increases. Politicians know their motives and their constituents and it's clear that in a good number of cases important constituents are criminals. I am not tarnishing politicians with this observation, but it needs to be considered when thinking about solutions. The region has one of the best democratic records in the world and rarely has a change of government that needs violence. Therefore we know that our votes count. I find it peculiar that the fight against crime has rarely featured on manifestos of recent elections in the region. If crime really worries us then maybe it's time to look at and think carefully about those for whom we vote.

Small is truly beautiful

With great apologies to Schumpeter, I take his axim for this blog. I like functional and appropriate technology. That is why things related to sustainable development rank high on my interests. As an aside on that it's pure folly for governments in countries that have free resources like sunlight, wind, and wave power to move slowly to encourage the use of these as alternative to dependence on fossil fuels. So, with my position stated, I go to the fun.

I had to travel recently and as many know taking a laptop on a plane is one of life's new banes. "Out of the bag, please, sir." or "Put it in a separate tray, sir, not with the shoes and belt." are phrases that sweeten my air from Grantley Adams, where "please" is always omitted, to Paris, London, or New York. I have become used to this process but what began to tell on me was the weight, as I hauled a relatively heavy 3-4 kilos/7-8 pounds around on my shoulder or in roll-on bag. Sure, this is a much lighter load than in the days of luggable laptops at the beginning of the portable era: I remember walking with what seemed like a 20 pound laptop back in the 1980s. Then I got a bad/good break. My employer insisted that as I was on extended leave I needed to send my laptop back to Washington--bad break as I just got a consulting assignment. But during the trip back from the assignment I got my good break. I read one of those PC magazines, and in it I saw my saviour. A laptop that is only 2 pounds/1 kilo, and that almost all I needed ready loaded: e-mail connections, Skype, video and audio, etc. It also did not operate on Windows, but on the more esoteric Linux platform, with programs coming from open sources. And for less than US$400. So, I became the owner of an Asus Eee PC (see link). Sure, it takes getting used to, especially the very small keyboard and small screen (7 inches). But when I can carry something this light I know there have to be compromises.

But look. There is no real difference in functionality. I prepared this blog with no major problems because of the size of my cutie. So, I know have something new to bounce on my knee when I am spending those long hours in airports. The final plus: the Eee comes with a lot of new games loaded such as electronic versions of Soduku. I will be good. I will work. I will not waste time. Nah! And of course my 4 year old has just seen the new machine: "Hey! That's just the right size for me, Daddy!" My problems are now starting.

Human Development

Bajans are cock-a-hoop this week with the news that the Human Development Index puts Barbados in 1st place amongst developing countries (see link for country details), putting meat on the bones of high school enrollment (89%), high life expectancy (nearly 77 years) and very good levels of average income (US$ 17,300). Of the 177 countries covered, the nearest island countries in the region are The Bahamas (49th), Cuba (51st), St. Kitts & Nevis (54th), Antigua & Barbuda (57th), and Trinidad (59th), with Jamaica very low (101st). Singapore with which Barbados is often compared comes in a few places higher at 25th; Mauritius is down at 65th.

So how does it feel to be nearly developed? Barbados is a whisker ahead of the Czech Republic (32nd). Germany is a puff away at 22nd. If you have travelled you will know that there is a world of difference between most of the acknowledged developed countries and Barbados. But this little country deserves a lot of applause for making the most of what little it has. If there is an area where Barbados' position belies reality it's how life is lived. I may not express it well but the notion I have is that Barbados is still like a village or at best a small town when compared to how life is lived in a major developed country. Somehow, Barbados has retained a lot of the gentility that comes with much less developed countries where people have not become so rich and satisfied that they have forgotten that people are more important than things. So, in Barbados buses will just stop and let off or pick up passengers; similarly people will stop their cars to let others cross or just have a quick chat. I know that I have flagged before that some of this is changing, but for the moment it is still much in evidence.

There is no doubt in my mind that the absolute and relative smallness of Caribbean countries has been a great benefit. In a sense, if you cant get it to work on these little islands then you really cant do anything. Where I have doubts about the state of Barbados' development is in its ability to deliver public services, though I would admit that my experience is limited and largely anecdotal, and distinguishing between superficial and real progress. Size is not a help when delivering some services: having one of something is not much use. If Queen Elizabeth Hospital were to be damaged by fire I suspect that the country would face a health care crisis very quickly. Having a fleet of new swish police cars is not convincing evidence of control over crime. When the system is pushed it creaks--and one should see that this is a feature of the private sector too: the inability of the phone network to deal with the call volumes that arose after the earthquake should prompt a quick review of voice-carrying capacity. (My experience during that period was that internet services were fine but there would have been far fewer people near a computer at the time.) A visit to the airport any afternoon will tell you that the system cannot cope with the volume of international flight arrivals that appear to be clustered into a tight time period: I have been there many times in the last few months and the average time to get luggage is running at around an hour. Road congestion and traffic accidents have increased dramatically, worsened by modern day pressures to do everything by car, by what seems like interminable road expansion works and some very bizarre road designs that are literal bottlenecks which generate congestion.

So part of Barbados' push to be really nearer to Germany in lifestyle rather than in some statistical measure is to have good capacity and high quality over a wider range of services. That will be a huge challenge for a small island economy, and the reality may be that such capacity only makes economic sense if provided for a larger population as would be represented by several countries in the subregion.

Bajans may tend to be complacent or arrogant about what they have achieved after some 40 years of independence, but they need to retain some modesty. They may want to puff up their chests and claim that the rest of the region needs to bend and praise them. Attitudes need to change: some would say that a sense of excellence needs to be recaptured. It is only a short step from mediocrity to failure. An economy based on a fragile and somewhat fickle demand, as is the case with tourism, is no guarantee of long-term success. Factors outside the country's control can easily derail progress, whether it is the weakness of the US dollar, or rapidly rising oil prices, or natural disasters.

I will wish Barbados success, and smile as it celebrates its 41st anniversary of independence and realizes that life begins at 40.