– An era and its characters

THE Camp Street chapter is a reference captured over two decades ago that occurred at 228 Camp street by participants, where resided an unofficial bachelors’ hub of souls headed by my elder brother and revolved around a peculiar era of our modern times. My brother passed recently and since there is no culture of the social chronology of periods passed in Guyana, I think that it is pertinent to record the Camp Street Chapter and its characters, to capture a specific era, the 1970s, which is and was a tremendous modern era in human consciousness if you paid even the slightest attention. The house was occupied by my late Aunt Anita after she left with my cousins for the US of A; thus, my brother John Braithwaite, who passed recently as Ibrahim Nazar Lawrence (mom’s maiden title was Mac Arthur Lawrence) moved up as the helm’s man. I moved there from West Ruimveldt around 1976 and slowly grooved around ( observing rather than jumping in) what was going on there. The mood was one of seekers, dabblers, past performers, egos and survivors. The list of characters unveiled a roll call as follows: Jeff, who like my brother, worked at Telecoms; Tony Caesar aka Zaar, whose folks I knew from Laing Avenue; formally the drummer of ‘GT Boom band’ that was an impressive Guyanese group of musicians; Eldon the seeker (who passed away in Brazil- Salvador some months ago); Roydon Heinzen, who I dubbed quietly ‘The Occultist’ – I was a skeptic, because I drew characters for a crew from a book they had that they guarded well, named ‘The book of Demons’ the art was done to be indented on a bottom paper. My suspicions came alive when one of the crew turned up in “West” and told me what the game was about, there had been a falling out. Apparently, the seemingly clean invisible bottom paper was the key, when put in a calabash of water the monster artwork came alive, visibly. I immediately demanded a raise of pay when the other three came around, and reluctantly got it. So, I was a skeptic. Then there was Whitney, also from West Ruimveldt. He too passed away some years ago, after coming back home from America, Whitney had left before 110th street, as the corner of Wellington and Robb Streets was called, disappeared. The common edifices that made that part of Robb Street popular and Rootsie were all gone; Tang’s bakery, Metroplole cinema, Oasis, King Boys Club and Chokit were all gone. Vance, Vibert Stephen, my brother-in-Law was another visitor, and Mike, who said that he was a seaman.

The mood and the drive were rooted in the search for spirituality, clarifications of Black History an interpretation of the times of the 70s, lets put it this way, vibrations (feel the vibe) from Vietnam, new literature on Black History, the music of the civil rights, ‘What’s going on’ from Marvin Gaye, Jimmy Cliffs’ ‘Vietnam’ Swamp dog’s definitions and Stevie Wonder’s greatest Christmas Album, without doubt, the 70s musically is not yet surpassed as a decade of poetic and creative hair raising rhythms and lyrics that emerged across the Americas, and there was no shortage of local string bands, talent and a living arts movement, thus, we were inspired. The Camp Street chapter had both inspiration and disillusionment. I was the artist in school, though abandoned for years. At Camp Street I returned to my craft. Jeff gave me some of his brother’s Black History literature, mainly from the J.A Rogers collection and with sparked creativity, I was going to put the stories that were active in my mind into illustrations and scripts.

The study of the abstract and complex worlds of history as a cosmic tapestry and placing its transcendental interpretations into common events require a reconstructed intellect, lifestyle and balanced way of life grounded on principles to justify the silent personal triumphant breathing of the ego in knowing, and to share what was not common, according to the ancients, one such book of many that was available in the Bachie was ‘The Oahspe’ that had a term that “ The lesser light dwells with the masses, the greater light with the seekers” or something to that effect. The smarter of the Chapter’s crew agreed to everything but continued with their usual state of mind from before entering the Chapter, my younger brother Lenny also joined the chapter. The musician was a tireless lecherous soul and was banished from the ‘crib’ for introducing a pornography novel to the younger sisters of a member, he went on selling Icicles under a roots name of ‘Papalacks’ I heard of his passing long after the event, though I did see him selling on some occasions.

I came into conflict with my brother when he fell in love with a young upper Charlotte Street lady and wanted a courier to take some flowers- a card of poetry he wrote and a gift to the lady’s home. I told him that’s not the modern way, you take the lady out to dinner or the Disco, get to know each other then really get to know each other after a reasonable agreeable time. He said that I was ‘too carnal’ and Royden took the gift.

There was some experimentation with marijuana based on Ravenscroft Book on the mystical side of WWII, my witnessing of ganja casualties in the scheme excluded me from that. Then when I faced Vivian, British and another two in the yard in Camp Street over a pump that my brother acquired from a colleague in politics that these guys proposed were theirs, from a failed Rasta agricultural community in North Fork (unsure of the spelling, this was in the Mabaruma district) the only visible pashwa contender was Vivian. So it was between us and we were both armed. It seemed telepathically that we concluded that “we got fuh reason pon dis” it wasn’t worth it and he took his spectators out of the yard and I went upstairs to mine, peeping through windows. This article is a mere brief reflection of the Camp Street Chapter.

All in all, the Camp Street Chapter was a microcosm of Georgetown – Guyana in the 70s and it gave such a perspective of what to expect from organisations, political parties and even families, “yuh ent gon win dem all, yuh might even loose yuh self, but yuh got fuh give it a shot”