This is built by the Amerindians – the original people in this country

You might have seen from one of my earlier posts, a picture of Georgetown from my hotel. In that, you would have seen the lighthouse close to the hotel that you see here.

On our bike ride, we eventually went past our Marriott hotel. I finally got my curiosity question out… “Cherry-Ann, why is there that lighthouse looking structure on my hotel?”

I am glad I asked! Found out the full story behind it.

When the hotel was built, the beacon was built there since the building was going to obstruct the view of the original lighthouse!

Found a street named after the famous cricketer Shivnaraine Chanderpaul. And on that street was the stadium where India played West Indies in the World T20 series a few months back!

In Bengal, we used to call this “jhnyata”. In Guyana, it is referred to as a pointed broom.

In Bengal, it used to be pointed all right. Often used as a threatening device for corporal punishment, many a Bengali expletives would be bereft of its core essence and emotion without a liberal use of this word. Why its cousin “baa-ron” never earned the same status, I will never know.

Seems like this might have some other significance too in Guyana. As you will see in the picture, one of carvings of the first president of the country had the pointed broom also carved in. I have no idea why.

Cherry-Ann and I went to the Bourda market on our bikes. Reminded me much about the Indian markets. It was crowded enough that we could not ride. We got off the bike and started weaving thru the melee of people. In between, a car would inch along. Funnily enough, somebody would get down from the car and start shopping. And all this time the car would be sitting there with all traffic behind would be stuck. Nobody honked!! They knew what they were bargaining for when they drove into that street.

There were shops of all kinds there – mostly focusing on vegetables and fruits and such. We stopped at a spot to grab a drink and snacks. I had the sugarcane juice!

Horse drawn carriage merrily plodding along in front of a large Coca Cola hoarding

It is a structure of 3 arches built on 6 pillars at the bottom. The 3 arches stand for the three original counties that made up Guyana – Demerara, Essequibo and Berbice (now the country is divided into 10 regions) and the six pillars stand for the six races in the country – Amerindians, East Indians, Africans, Europeans, Portuguese and Chinese.

Apparently, he had led a slave rebellion successfully. And then infighting and renewed reinforcements from Dutch soldiers defeated the movement.

He and his wife Carolyn love cycling. When they go out on vacation, they try to do bicycle tours. Given that my 5K race attempt did not pan out, tried the bicycling route myself. Found out a cycle tour company (the only one, in fact) and rented a bike. I was the only guest – so, the tour guide and I did a 10K ride all over the city by ourselves. Learnt a lot about Guyanese history and culture.