By Michel Outridge 

SWAN Village is home to one of the best home-made jamoon wines. Just ask Barbara Debideen, who told the Pepperpot Magazine that every year she would make jamoon wine to sell at the heritage celebration in the village and this year it is no different.

She had buckets of the brew preserved for the occasion and explained that the longer it ferments and more sugar is added, the stronger it gets, making it a very strong wine for only adult consumption and in moderation.

“Jamoon wine is home-made and it is very strong wine and one must use it in moderation and to their limit or the effect can be damning,” she said.

Jamoon is sourced from within the village to make the brew and used bottles are recycled to store the wine. “Jamoon wine is a serious drink, it will have you ‘wine’ out of your clothes and that’s how some people end up the morning after heritage,” Debideen said.

Apart from jamoon wine, Debideen made portions of apple wine, fly and piwari to go along with some creole foods such as fried rice, cook-up rice and meats.

The shop owner, who also rears chickens told the Pepperpot Magazine that she looks forward to the heritage celebration because she earns funds to assist her in her daily life since lots of people are usually there.

Debideen noted that she has been living in Swan Village for the past six years and she is originally from Mabaruma, Region One (Barima-Waini), but moved to Berbice as a young girl.

She added that by next weekend she will have 200 chickens which have to be sold so she can continue rearing as her livelihood.

Another villager, Fenton Ragonauth, a labourer who works on a farm at Long Creek, also on the Soesdyke-Linden Highway told the Pepperpot Magazine that life for him in Swan is very challenging; this is because the roads are bad and taxis take $1,000 to go into the village.

He reported too that a short drop from Swan to the junction is $200 and with the children going to school outside the village, it is not easy and highlighted the need for a school bus to transport children to and from school.

“Our water system is terrible, it is dry often and we rely on rainfall for drinking and cooking water, because we get water from our standpipes every four hours per day,” Ragonauth said.

In the dry spell, they have to walk about half a mile to get to the nearest creek to bathe and wash and would like to benefit from a reliable water supply within the village.

A plus for the village though is that they will soon get electricity and for that they are pleased and genuinely welcome this development.

For the heritage celebration, Ragoonauth will sell wild-meat Pepperpot with other traditional Indigenous foods.

He stated that Swan Village is a peaceful place where folks are simple and their way of life is even simpler.