MY wife and I decided for Easter Monday, we will have Gilbaka curry. On Easter Sunday, after exercising in the National Park, I went to the Bourda Market fish pond to buy the stuff.

The gate was closed. The folks selling outside told me on Sundays and holidays the market closes at 10:00hrs.
I looked at my phone time and it was 09:50hrs. So how could they shut off before 10:00 hrs? I still got the stuff because a gentleman outside asked me what I wanted. He then yelled out, “Beryl, Beryl, Freddie Kissoon want Gilbaka.”

Beryl handed me the stuff over the gate. I should not have been surprised because after living all my life in Guyana, I know you don’t see the eerie things in other countries that you see here. I think the US is the most extremely eerie country on Planet Earth but Guyana is an oddball. But I was indeed surprised.

Why would a market, municipal or otherwise, close at 10:00hrs on a holiday? On Sundays and holidays, it is the best opportunity for working people to shop. Billions of people work from Monday to Saturday from 08:30hrs to 16:30hrs. When they get home, they are tired plus they want to see their kids at home. Sunday is the best opportunity to shop.

Why would the authorities close the market at 10:00hrs? This is the time you go out to shop. What is the reason for 10:00hrs and not 14:00hrs? To think that is the 21st century, a market closes at 10:00hrs is incredible. I still cannot fathom why so early in the morning but of course, I know the answer – it was like this 100 years ago.

Do you know how many regulations that are absolutely irrelevant in the 21st century, we inherited from the British that we still live with here in Guyana? Do you know in a column career going on to 36 years how many times I have pointed out the abominable irrelevancies that no one wants to get rid of and that should have been eradicated since the year of Independence in 1966?

The 10am market thing has its origin in colonial times. When the man shouted Beryl, Beryl, there were about another 10 persons outside the gate waiting to buy meat and fish like I did. Commonsense should tell the people at City Hall that you do not close a market at 10:00hrs on perhaps the days when working people have to shop – Sundays and holidays.

Guyana has always been the West Indian polity that had a more progressive world outlook. Even to this day, we have still maintained that tradition. Take two examples – we have a more open mind about homosexuality and are far ahead of CARICOM countries in support of stopping genocide in Gaza. So you wonder why these ancient oddities are still with us.

Do you know there wasn’t any publicity given to something positive Trinidad did recently? Trinidad has removed all regulations that prevented men and women from entering a public building wearing sleeveless tops and other similar accoutrement? Just think of it, in a tropical climate, citizens cannot wear sleeveless tops.

That is equivalent to a café in Siberia saying, “no winter jackets allowed.”
There is a silly policy at the Guyana Revenue Authority that has to be removed. I went in October 2019 to collect my car on the wharf. The GRA office was on lunch. You have a country where vehicles are coming in on a daily basis and customs officials are kept busy yet all work ceases when it is midday.

Commonsense should tell you to have a rotation system whereby the lunch break is staggered and customers are served during the lunch period. This is commonsense man, you don’t need university training to know this.

Do you think despite 35 years of advocacy in these columns, these regulations will be a thing of the past? My answer is no. I have been doing these columns for 35 years and several times long before 2019, I mentioned the GRA work anomaly yet I encountered it in 2019.

Guyana defies commonsense and philosophy. In Guyana, for the court to grant you a divorce, you must cite one of three reasons – infidelity or malicious desertion or domestic abuse. But there must be several other reasons other than those three.

So why can’t you cite the philosophical reason of people moving on through mutual consent. In fairness to her, Minister Manickchand when she first became a minister drafted no-fault divorce legislation. It never reached the parliament. On Easter Monday, I did have my Gilbaka curry despite some ancient regulations in Guyana in the 21st century.