An extraordinary crossroads

Monday, July 27th, 2009

I’ve been in Guyana for a week now and, as I come to terms with my surroundings, the extra is being knocked off the extraordinary. A friend recently suggested that while long experience can provide a useful guide to an area, descriptions are often best when they come from newcomers – newbies are more likely to remark on the remarkable.

It’s true and I can see that I’m starting to adapt. The humidity and mosquitos bother me less than they did a week ago and the constant noises are sinking into the background. I’ve just travelled the road from the airport to Georgetown again and was less gob-smacked by everything this time.

I’m a long way from being jaded though. The manatees in the national park still catch my eye when I walk past their pond, I still gawp at some of the garishly painted houses and I still don’t quite know my way around.

Friday night provided a fantastic shock to the senses too.

My first big night out took in G/town (I saw that on the back of a bus) started with a leaving do for 30 Peace Corps volunteers at a Brazillian restaurant and took in a trendy but sterile bar, a lock-in at a hotel bar (I think) and finally the lively Club Latino.

Georgetown doesn’t really bustle like many capital cities. There doesn’t seem to be a focal point that everyone is attracted to and the traffic is pretty light. Most of the time.

At 2.30am, the crossroads near Club Latino had become the meeting place for people hanging out with friends; some coming and going from the club, others content with the night air. Standing proudly among them was a man declaring his allegiance to the State and singing the national anthem. A food seller dodged around him with boxes of rice and noodles looking for hungry passers-by. The crossroads was jammed with cars, bikes and minibuses all trying to navigate around each other by sonar (I assume that’s what the constant horn beeping was about).

I imagine I looked like someone trying not to look like a tourist. I don’t care. I’m often fascinated by the dynamics of meeting places and here was one that was too busy and too alien for me to comprehend. It was slightly overwhelming and very wonderful.

It was a shame when a taxi managed to fight its way through the melee and take us home.

(Pic of Sheriff Street, Georgetown – Street That Never Sleeps by ProfessorMC)

tagged under: club latino.crossroads.digitalguyana.georgetown.guyana.meeting