SHE is a remarkable woman. Mrs. Ruby Rebecca Moses is recorded as being the longest surviving resident of Supply Mahaica on the East Coast of Demerara, but she spends most of her time with her daughter, Ramona Pellew, in Canada. She will be celebrating her 95th birth anniversary on Saturday (May 16th).She has returned to Canada to celebrate this auspicious occasion in fine style with her daughter and family.

Aunt Ruby, or Grannie, as she is fondly called, had spent the last several months holidaying with her son, Randolph Moses, and other siblings in Guyana; and had she the last say, she would definitely not be getting onto that aircraft to travel to Canada (last week), but would be spending her birthday in the warm sunshine of Guyana.

A rather emotional Aunt Ruby admitted: “I like Canada, but during the winter especially, it is so cold that it poses problems for me, especially with my arthritis. Then when I look around my home in Guyana, there are so many fruit trees from which I get plenty of fresh fruits: mangoes, sour-sop, cherries, guavas, tamarinds, sapodillas, star-apples; we can pick at any time. When I am tired of watching TV, my children and I can sit out on the verandah and enjoy the nice fresh breeze. It is so good to be at home,” she said softly, but so convincingly.

Like so many others, Grannie, at her age, is defiant about permanently living anywhere else but in her homeland, Guyana.

MY NATIVE LAND
Grannie’s demurring immediately brought back nostalgic memories of the patriotic songs we sang so proudly and lustily at school; for example, ‘My Native Land’: “I care not though their wealth be great, their scenery be grand; For none’s so fair as can compare with my own native land.”

Ruby Rebecca Moses, nee Browne, was born at Good Hope, Mahaica on May 16, 1919 to parents Richard and Nellie Browne – a farmer and housewife respectively. She is the last surviving of six siblings – 4 girls and two boys. She recalls her father was a mixture of Amerindian and European and her mother was of African descent, with long curly hair.

LOOKING TO 105?
Proud to be 95, and happier still at the prospect of one day attaining centenarian status, Granny beamed with an inevitable sense of pride when this question was popped by the Sunday Chronicle. “Oh yes, I’d be happy to reach 100; and there should be a possibility, because there was another in the family,” she said.

Grannie proudly shared with the Chronicle that her paternal grandmother, who had also lived at Mahaica, had attained the ripe old age of 105 years before succumbing.

As a child, Aunt Ruby attended the Mahaica Scotts Primary School at Mahaica, along with her sisters and brothers, and was part of a very pious household. As a teenager, she has memories of attending only Sunday School, apart from church services, and was never at a party. Her life was bereft of social activities, so much so that when she met her ‘suitor’, Harold Egbert Moses, and eventually had her first dance with him at a wedding reception, she made a mess of it.

BEAUTIFUL TENNESSEE WALTZ
“I was nervous, unsure of what to do, how and when to turn; and now and then I ended up stepping on his shoes. I was so ashamed,” she admitted. “And so I had to practise to dance, and he was my dance instructor,” she smilingly reminisced.

And a few years down the line she was waltzing; yes, gracefully dancing, gliding and turning to melody of the famous “Tennesee Waltz”, the signature song of the marvellous Patti Page. Reflecting on the good old days, she immediately began singing a melodious rendition of the global favourite, “Tennessee Waltz.

At 95, she possesses a charming and absolutely melodious voice, a talent that will remain with her for the rest of her days.

After marrying Moses, a farmer who reared cows and cultivated ground provisions, including bitter cassava, the couple continued to live at Mahaica. Their union produced ten wonderful children, seven of whom are alive today; but pathetically, after 54 years of hard work and a robust marriage life nevertheless, her husband passed away in 1994.

At 95, her health is average. She is reserved, but nonetheless jovial, and has a sense of humour. Her speech is remarkable, and she speaks with clarity and seems quite up to date with current affairs. And with the television as her chief companion when her son is out of the home, she is a reservoir of knowledge and therefore stands in a good position to compare costs today with ‘the good old days,’ marvelling at just how much a shilling was able to buy back in the day.

Grannie is, however, hearing impaired and suffers from gouty arthritis in the knees. And though seeing clearly out of her right eye, she has a problem with the left. She recalls having had surgery done to correct cataract and glaucoma in her eye some years back. However, as far as her knowledge goes, she claims, “Like it was not properly done,” and so the surgery had to be repeated, but she was never again able to see clearly out of the eye.

Asked what went wrong, she curtly replied, “I think that the doctor had domestic problems, so like he wasn’t too focused.”

HERBAL CURE FOR DIABETES
The nonagenarian has dentures, which allow her to eat just about anything palatable and good for her health. “Even though they give me a lot of soup, I like a little rice. My favourite is cook-up rice with nice chicken stew,” she said with a sparkle in her eyes whilst almost licking her lips. Grannie insists that she does not like curry.

And even though she has never been diabetic or hypertensive, she lays claim to having the remedy for those two chronic diseases. “For sugar (diabetes), boil green bananas or dasheen and eat it. Or you can grate the green banana and make porridge with cows’ milk – strictly no sugar,” she warned.

For high blood pressure, Grannie advises that you boil papaw leaves or sourie leaves.

In Ruby’s time, access to cows’ milk was easy for her, since her husband sold cows’ milk and bitter cassava to customers around the village.

“My husband had cows and a donkey cart, and so he would carry milk and bitter cassava as far as Nabaclis and Victoria to sell,” she recalled. The cassava was used for making cassava bread, and the juice extracted from it, for making casareep. That is how, down through the years, Mahaica, Nabaclis and Victoria have had a reputation for producing the best casareep around the coastland, she reasoned.

“But today, our farmers (are) hardly planting bitter cassava, and so that is why you mostly finding coconut casareep on the market these days.”
In those days, ownership of a donkey cart in a village like Mahaica was a big deal, and could be likened unto a motor car these days.

By Shirley Thomas