Determined to make a living amidst trials.

The 58-year-old is the wife of a farmer whose daily life includes spending waking hours tending to crops in their spacious yard in Nottinghamshire Village, Linden is no other than Kamlawattie Harpaul.

She is the mother of one with two grandchildren and is from Wakenaam Island, Essequibo River and relocated to Nottinghamshire Village 15 years ago when she wanted a better life.

Harpaul has crops of tomatoes bora, pak choi, and citrus, most of which were recently destroyed by flood waters.

She recalled when they first came to the place, it was like a jungle with thick wild eddoes plants and they had to cut it down to have it cleared before they could build a small house to dwell in.

Harpaul stated that the place was littered by garbage and they had to clean up the place before they were comfortable and spent a lot of years preparing the land for farming.

She added that the place was swampy and had to be filled with dirt and they managed to fix it up to the standard it is today but despite that, within recent times, they have been inauduated with water.

“We bought five truckloads of hard stuff from the bauxite company at $5,000 per load and filled the yard because the bottom house was a pond,” she said.

She stated that they depend heavily on their crops to sell to bring in money to the home but they haven’t been able to do so lately due to the rains and the loss of crops.

Meanwhile, her husband, Narine Jadoo told the Pepperpot Magazine that he is a cash crop farmer and also has a plot of farmland in the backdam which is an hour walking to get there from the village.

The 57-year-old added that presently he cannot harvest his crops because they are infested with pests that have destroyed the leaves and are no good to sell.

To get to the farmland is a challenge since floodwaters caused it to be waist-deep with water and it is difficult to access presently,” he said.

He explained that the village was nice when the train used to pass through and they had a lot of activities where the 100-carriage train transported the locals and their supplies to and from their farm to the plant in Two Friends village.

Jadoo added that he is trying to save his citrus and other crops, but there is little he can do as is.

The farmer is waiting to see if the weather gets better and will have to start over his planting when the sun is out and the land is dried up of flood waters.

“It is not like I am not trying, but I cannot earn right now, so getting a capital to buy chemicals to spray the plants is out of the question and I will have to start all over again if I want to continue farming,” he said.

Jadoo reported that he is out of options because farming is his ‘daily bread’ and he will to continue doing it regardless of the challenges.

He pointed out that he is originally from Essequibo Coast and he comes from a long line of farmers; using his hands was instilled in him as a boy and he is doing what he knows to earn honestly.

“I never feel afraid to live here despite the bushes. It is a good place to be just needs a bit of development and job opportunities to live comfortably,” he said.

Jadoo does what they can to earn within the village and even if they have to trek through rough terrain and floodwaters to get to their farms, they do it for a living.

He is one of many small scale farmers of Nottinghamshire Village who are determined to make a living amidst trials.

Jadoo reported that they have cooperation and they would support each other in whatever they are doing to keep going because they need each other to survive.