CHOICE
by Maia Chung
It is not for me or you to determine how a man plays out his destiny. This is between him and his God, his line of reasoning, his conscience…you get the picture?
The incidents surrounding the execution of an arrest warrant for Christopher Coke, by a joint police and military operation in Jamaica… which resulted in the lock down of the capital city of Jamaica: Kingston made me overwrought with rage. I am still enraged.
Schools at all levels closed, supermarkets closed, shops closed, gas stations closed, businesses halted: lost money, were looted, lost employees some were fired and some were killed.
A limited state of emergency was called – extending through Kingston and St. Andrew, to last for thirty days, as I write this it is still on …all because of one man’s choice of a lifestyle Christopher Coke’s.
Dudus’s choices for his profession became my problem it became me, my family’s, my friend’s, my enemies…everyone who lives in this country’s choice without any consultation, but what am I saying that would mean we had a choice.
Some one hundred are dead now because of events linked to his choice of a lifestyle, some persons holding visas to foreign countries were the beneficiaries of the life path that he chose, to take their right to visit some lands, have now been revoked.
During the week when the limited state of emergency first took hold, I couldn’t get food for my family.
My sons lost valuable academic time.
People came back to their work places when they could due to violence all over Kingston and were told, “no jobs here for you…we had to carry on business and so we had to fill your space”.
People lost their lives, their sense of security, because one man chose to live his life his way.
I t doesn’t matter who facilitated his choices, what matters is that his choice became mine, when I never benefited from any of the “nice” parts of his destiny, when I am pretty certain I never ticked yes on the checklist “slice of Dudus life please” – I never chose his choice .
Now when you talk about the unfairness of life, you can see that this illustration is a textbook case of almshouse.
From the affected in Western Kingston communities, to the children set to do their CSEC examinations, one of the most pivotal set of tests for the Caribbean child - who lost their choice to be just ‘ordinarily nervous’ for a really big life exam – you had Jamaican’s of all ages and types having their choices being cut off.
Instead the mere butterflies of a big exam, transformed in to valkyries not by their choice, but by the terrors of the bullets being shot sporadically outside the exam centres.
Kids wondering would the bullets penetrate the building?
Armed security stalking a round the classrooms, ostensibly to protect the children – but call me nuts -men with guns policing the facilities where the tests are being held – seem sort of scary and nausea inducing, maybe it’s just me?
Jeez! A poor kid is just trying to catch a break with some good exam results.
One fact confirmed by the Ministry of Education is that four students from the war torn Western Kingston did not show up for scheduled tests – on at least one afternoon of the week beginning May 24 -2010 – when several CSEC exams were scheduled.
Subsequently it was announced that the Ministry of Education was in the process of making arrangements to have the kids who missed or were so traumatized by the issue, to resit next year (and not just the four I am referencing who are really a subset example to make my point).
Not their choice, but the choice of the one man – to whom the nation paid homage to by sinking in chaos, like fly into a hot bowl of porridge, penalizing citizenry all across the country by limiting movement not by our choice, even laying us bear to police scrutiny and detention in many cases unwarranted - even as we chose and still choose to live as law abiding citizens, how queer eh?
Going back to the children - those four missing their exams, even the people who paid the ultimate price by dying – as callous as I may seem, the dead have done gone – the children are still here.
These young ones, to me are the representatives that indicate in a tangible way the major price we all paid and are paying and will ever more pay – why?!
This has become whether we chose it or not a part of JAMAICAN HISTORY!
The children who missed their exams, their futures’ outcome certainly is now up in the air.
You see …a kid can chose to sit on a corner or go to school, no amount of parental scare tactics can make someone who God made be good or bad.
So I thought that at least in some limited realms, we did have choices. I thought this was one you know, you come from poorness but instead a turn bad man you can choose to educate your way out?
Apparently these four and their families thought so too -as they were signed up and expected to take their CXC/CSEC subjects.
But they couldn’t and didn’t.
Yeh Andrew Holness will pay for them to resit next year allegedly and how we know say the same ting nah go happen again?
It’s not like we have a choice or anything.
A lot can happen in a year – just like a lot can happen in a week (May 24- May 30-2010 to be exact).
These four children may become unfocused, cynical, overridden by bitterness, lose places in colleges universities - that may have been waiting on their results this year – that cannot be undone.
They are still here, alive and having to make some sort of life. And like groundhogs day they get to live over a year of their life, because one man chose be what he wanted to be.
They may “wise” up and see that choosing your destiny is only a Mortal Kombat PS3 game construct.
After all if nothing else, hasn’t this experience shown them they’re choices are irrelevancies.
Their choices to not go on the bad road but stay on the good road and study for their CXC’s/CSECs meant nothing after all.
My conclusion is that if I was even holding out to see this land evolve into a great developed nation, we are not even a democracy, we are still slaves.
Great gaps of the population still pay homage to one force …homage-payers, boot-lickers kowtowers, isn’t that slavery?
We have no choice. We have no voice.
You see none of us anywhere in this country ever had choices. Accept your doom…fate…part…role its already a done deal.
Choice is a myth, perpetrated by those who are a part of an establishment, to keep us in check.
While this is a fact that apparently has been known to many, the attempt to execute a warrant of arrest against Christopher Dudus Coke was a timely reminder and a wake up call to the new generation and me, that the real deal is your life is not your own...
There are actually people in the world who don’t choose to be don’s they chose to be blue collar workers or working class stiffs… coz frankly maybe they/we can’t handle the stresses and high consequences of being kings, stars, dons etc. Nothing is wrong with that to me I thought that was my choice.
It takes an entire structure to make the world go round – some dons, some kings, some queens, some stars et al.
The fact that I accepted journalism or chose it, meant I know I won’t have Bill Gates type money in the near future, but I made that choice - when there were and are others I can make… that could catapult me into the realm of the Bill Gates(s) of this world - if not into his bracket certainly into his realm.
But since these options are not tenable with my soul I avoid them. I thought I had chosen.
I thought I could choose how to live in a democratic society, even if I couldn’t choose how to die.
And even in death it would be cool if I can’t choose the death method to say that I chose to be cremated or buried entombed, whatever.
That post life choice again taken!
They say some bodies were eaten by dogs, due to the fact that the bodies were left where they dropped, it being too dangerous due to gun fire for authorities to remove them.
You know until I heard that, that never even occurred to me as a possibility in this country.
What dream was I living in?
Ludicrous! So I cannot even chose whether or not my dead body will be: a) cremated b) buried or c) eaten by dogs while it rots in the street, after a meeting a brutal undignified end because of one man’s choice.
One man’s choice left me with no choice but to give my children crackers for a week, as it was not only in Tivoli Gardens that people had no food.
Food stores all over the corporate area closed in fear that the incidents surrounding the war would prove a cover for other types of criminal types of activity. They were right google the back newspapers and you will see.
The limited state of emergency status effectively ensured enough panic in the capital and its environs to shut churches, food stores, bakeries …one of my reporters said “bwoy this come in like the rapture” (lol).
I even looked at the issue of death and thought, so even though we know not whence death comes or how, I felt that if I had been killed violently or any of my journalist colleagues had been killed as a result of the warring in the place, what a waste – it would be due to a man’s choice.
Not because we sought to inform on issues related to noble causes like the abolition of slavery, freeing the wrongly imprisoned, stopping abuse, it would be a death with no honor or relevance …
I am by no means a wall flower cosseted and unexposed, but I really see how naive I am now.
I thought because I, who do not dwell, in a war torn, underdeveloped country (Maia you certainly have your head in the sand!), had made choices that I would take the consequences for good, bad or ugly.
So maybe I am not the richest or the most popular but that’s me… I can live with myself… in my crazy world that is worth more than gold to me!
So imagine my immense surprise and dismay - at the discovery when they went for Dudus in the Tivoli Gardens community in West Kingston Jamaica, and the large and fantastic fantasy I had immersed my mind in that I was actually living a life I chose was shot to hell.
I have no guarantee that because I choose to get up every day at a reasonable hour, motivate my children to become Prime Ministers, get an education, work nine to five, see the occasional movie that I can live within reasonable expectations of what my life should look like.
In Jamaica 2010 I could very well get eaten by a dog, my remains that is - after being killed in the streets - over something that I couldn’t fathom if you sent me Harvard!
I am no judge or jury, so give onto Dudus what is due to Dudus but give unto Maia what is due to her.
I am sure if I ever meet the gentleman he could not be able to tell me that because my son had Autism and I started a Foundation to look at the issue; his children missed their CXC exams. I dare him lol.
Neither could he say that because I chose to become a journalist he almost got shot and killed.
Or his corpse was desecrated by animalsI mean come on.
I have had my disappointments with Jamaica, but this situation, and its Act of God similarity and impact on the lives of a nation is just a little too hard to stomach.
I have never really had the feeling that I hate my country until now.
I feel disoriented, I feel disenfranchised and I do not want any platitudes or “pseudo-hushes”.
“Oh Mary, Jane and Jim have it worse”.
I don’t give a damn! I am well thinking hard working deserving person, I am not innocent but I certainly ain’t guilty.
I am doing my best for God My family and my country and by God I deserve to have a choice about the way my life plays out!
I am woman enough to accept the fall out or blessings that comes from my choices with what God gave me – that’s what I been doing!
We are living in a laughable state; this ain’t no flipping Gaza, Afghan, Iraq, and Baghdad.
So just a tip to my fellow Jamaicans, if you never copped to it after this you have no choice, you have no options, you have nothing but to wait until you die.
Maia Chung is the News Manager of Newstalk 93 Fm Jamaica and the Founder and Managing Director of The Maia Chung Autism and Disabilities Foundation feedback maiachung@yahoo.com.
