Tony Deyal | Chinatown blues and yellows

About 11 years ago, when I worked as the corporate secretary of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), a group of us were in Barbados looking at the cricket facilities at Cave Hill.

I am not sure how it started but the president of one of the island groups which owns the WICB commented negatively to the two Jamaican representatives on the board about “de white boy” who was on the Jamaican team at the time.

The person he was referring to was Australia-born Brendon Nash, son of Paul Nash, a Jamaican Olympic swimmer. Between October 13, 2007 and May 27, 2011, Nash scored 1,093 Test runs for the West Indies at an average of 35.25, with only Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Chris Gayle, and Ramnaresh Sarwan scoring more for the team.

But to the Jamaicans, it was not a matter of how many runs Nash had scored but the fact that Nash was Jamaican. They immediately pulled up their colleague and made it extremely clear that they and their country don’t discriminate on the basis of colour or race, and regardless of whether you’re black, blue, brown, yellow or even pink, a Jamaican is a Jamaican is a Jamaican.

It was not always like that in Jamaica. Initially, the people who suffered most from discrimination were those of Chinese descent. Their connection with the opium (ganja) trade was a major issue and anti-Chinese sentiment erupted in a riot in 1918. However, despite an exodus in the 1970s, the Chinese and ganja have become almost totally integrated into Jamaican society but for different reasons.

In Barbados, despite the joke about Chinese people of Barbadian descent being called ‘Beijings’, there is no issue with their acceptance. I truly admire the strong sense of nationalism among Barbadians.

My son Zubin confirmed that he was never discriminated against in that country and was fully accepted because he was born there. I worked, lived, wrote and fathered two children in Barbados and never had any problems based on race.

DIFFERENT IN TRINIDAD

In Trinidad, a destination for Chinese immigrants and labourers since 1806, it is a different story altogether. It is true that people who have problems with the prevailing language of a country are perceived as stupid and are the butt of jokes.

When our neighbourhood Chinese shopkeeper tried singing a hit of the time, Rest Your Head On My Shoulder and converted it into ‘Less your het on my soldier’, it was a hit which has never left us.

In his Treasury of Humour, American scientist and science-fiction author, Isaac Asimov, tells the story of Wellington Koo, a Chinese representative at a Washington Conference in 1921. He was seated next to one of Washington’s high-society ladies who was utterly unable to think of anything to say to Mr. Koo.

Finally, after the soup, she asked him, “Likee soupee?”

Mr Koo smiled and nodded. After dinner, Koo rose and delivered a speech in impeccable English. When he returned to his seat, he turned to the very embarrassed lady and asked, “Likee speechee?”

Right now there are some Trinis who makee big speechees, especially on talk radio and to the media, because they are against calling a section of a street in Port-of-Spain ‘Chinatown’, despite the fact that it is an area where Chinese businesses, especially groceries, have long been established. I remember when, as a 10-year-old, my Aunty Doris took me through the Charlotte Street area where the Chinese shops are located, and I had my first experience of the overwhelming mix of spices that still attract and fascinate me.

My first visit to a real ‘Chinatown’ was in Toronto where my Chinese friends from Trinidad, some of whom had fled during the Black Power problems of 1970, took me to lunch. I was stunned by the entire experience – the shops and the variety of products, the odours and sights, the food and the manners of the people.

GROWING IN INTENSITY

I had gone to school with children of Chinese descent and, in one case, I had such a crush on one of the girls that I even copied her name ‘Octavia’ in my book and faced several questions from my mother and jokes from my friends about it.

In high school it never mattered – we were a mix of many races and got along without racial issues or rancour. Later, when I did well in exams, I taught English to the children of two Chinese families and shared their food and sweets. It is perhaps the need, not just to enjoy the food but take in a culture I admire, that wherever I go if there is a Chinatown, I find it. In fact, when I go to a Chinatown restaurant, if the lights are too bright, I ask them to dim some.

Unfortunately, the race-based animosity that increasingly characterises Trinidad is growing in intensity instead of getting dimmer. Calling a part of a street ‘Chinatown’ in today’s world does not have the same connotations as naming an area ‘Coolie Town’ in the conurbation that is the capital city. In fact, the idea seems to be not just to celebrate the Chinese presence but to create an area where locals and tourists can enjoy an important component in the mix that makes Trinidad a rainbow country. What bothers me most about the animosity and anger is the knee-jerk response by some people to feature, as a counter-measure, the names of Chinese Trinidadians who excelled or were outstanding in their fields.

I have seen people of Indian descent do the same. This burns me up more than Tiger Balm because I see no reason why people of Asian descent have to defend or justify their presence in Trinidad or in the Caribbean, given their contributions to what this region was, is and will become.

Tony Deyal was last seen recommending that to calm the troubled waters, we get a genuine Chinese peppermint-based product named Po Som On Oil. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com