I remember everyone was busy cleaning their homes one week before. Christmas Eve, the smell of cakes in the oven wafting through the air. Christmas Day, everyone busy cooking up meats, chowmein, eggplant fritters, etc.
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Former Member
Hard times under PNC version 1.
Former Member
Same here. It was getting worse and worse every year under the PNC.
Former Member
Stockings with lil race cars, guns and sackett, lining up for Santa, lots of cooking, lots of eating...plenty fun as a lil bai
SOme yall obviously were into politics from a very young age
Former Member
remember going to the cinema to see an Abbot and Costello double on Christmas morning
Former Member
Going to the cinema, especially at this time, was special as all will be "dressed up" and the boys would generally be admiring the girls going to dress circle and balcony. 
Former Member
Christmas Eve, carolers came by. They sounded like angels from heaven.
One Christmas Eve, Dad snuck out of bed to steal cake Mom baked all day. He forgot she polished the floor, fell, and Mom chided him why he couldn't wait Christmas Day.
We set cups on the dining table with our names underneath. Christmas morning, we ran out of bed to find the goodies in our cups: sweets, balloons, dolls; the boys got toy soldiers and cars. A 10-year-old boy next door drank rum and called my Dad out to fight. Dad gave him two slaps and put him in our hammock to sleep till he sobered up.
Former Member
Ray posted:Stockings with lil race cars, guns and sackett, lining up for Santa, lots of cooking, lots of eating...plenty fun as a lil bai
SOme yall obviously were into politics from a very young age
I second that, guns and sockets and the sound and smell of bussing caps.
Other times, screaming toy cars and toy fire engines and the smell on oil.
My mom making black cake, and pepperpot....the smell. Could not touch till Christmas morn.
Small days is still on my mind, small days was a good good time.
Former Member
Leonora posted:Christmas Eve, carolers came by. They sounded like angels from heaven.
One Christmas Eve, Dad snuck out of bed to steal cake Mom baked all day. He forgot she polished the floor, fell, and Mom chided him why he couldn't wait Christmas Day.
We set cups on the dining table with our names underneath. Christmas morning, we ran out of bed to find the goodies in our cups: sweets, balloons, dolls; the boys got toy soldiers and cars. A 10-year-old boy next door drank rum and called my Dad out to fight. Dad gave him two slaps and put him in our hammock to sleep till he sobered up.
He probably had a crush on you!
Bgurd. Regardless how tough things were, guyanese always had a good Xmas. People made do with what little they had. I cant speak for anyone one else, but i love Xmas in guyana. Something about that place.
Rass man we go through these stories every year rass.
Change it to the best toy you got at Christmas
Former Member
Gilbakka posted:Gilly's memories include most things already mentioned above. Here are more from the 1950s-'60s: White lime to whitewash palings. Carbon rocks to make "bombs" in Ovaltine or Milo cans with spit added. Masquerade band. Long Lady aka Mother Sally. Ginger beer.
Homemade artificial flowers made from crÊpe paper & wire. Squibs. Balloons aka bladda.
Former Member
Amral posted:Rass man we go through these stories every year rass.
Well, true deh, but Christmas dozz come every year rass!
Former Member
Sheik101 posted:Bgurd. Regardless how tough things were, guyanese always had a good Xmas. People made do with what little they had. I cant speak for anyone one else, but i love Xmas in guyana. Something about that place.
Christmas was always the time parents made you forget the problems around. Does not matter how bad things got, few toys, special Christmas food, fairy lights, music, midnight mass, and for that short time, thatâs all that mattered. âTwas an innocent time!
Former Member
Amral posted:Change it to the best toy you got at Christmas
We talking more than toys bai. Read nuh!
Baseman posted:Sheik101 posted:Bgurd. Regardless how tough things were, guyanese always had a good Xmas. People made do with what little they had. I cant speak for anyone one else, but i love Xmas in guyana. Something about that place.
Christmas was always the time parents made you forget the problems around. Does not matter how bad things got, few toys, special Christmas food, fairy lights, music, midnight mass, and for that short time, thatâs all that mattered. âTwas an innocent time!
I agree. Good times in the homeland. I dont know if its only me, but i just dont enjoy Xmas in the States. Every blasted thing christmas at my disposal and i just dont feel it. If its not the weather, is something else. Talking bout weather, i wonder how dem cyanadians does mek out round dis time a year. I hear dat place real cold. Never been.
Former Member
- Maybe in bbice things was good due to the underground economy via smuggling. But in GT pnc banned toys, sweets, dhall, fruits imports, even down to the lowly plastic christmas tree and fairy lights. Yall rass deh pun stupidness if you don't remember the bannings.
Drugb posted:
- Maybe in bbice things was good due to the underground economy via smuggling. But in GT pnc banned toys, sweets, dhall, fruits imports, even down to the lowly plastic christmas tree and fairy lights. Yall rass deh pun stupidness if you don't remember the bannings.
Banna res yuhself eh, regardless what geh ban. Ting use to still flow down in GT. Like u been under a rock or something.. Starting to sound like the guyana Grinch.
Sheik101 posted:Baseman posted:Sheik101 posted:Bgurd. Regardless how tough things were, guyanese always had a good Xmas. People made do with what little they had. I cant speak for anyone one else, but i love Xmas in guyana. Something about that place.
Christmas was always the time parents made you forget the problems around. Does not matter how bad things got, few toys, special Christmas food, fairy lights, music, midnight mass, and for that short time, thatâs all that mattered. âTwas an innocent time!
I agree. Good times in the homeland. I dont know if its only me, but i just dont enjoy Xmas in the States. Every blasted thing christmas at my disposal and i just dont feel it. If its not the weather, is something else. Talking bout weather, i wonder how dem cyanadians does mek out round dis time a year. I hear dat place real cold. Never been.
Well we Canadians live in Igloo burning fire wood to keep warm, if you pee it turn iscicles and when you spit it turn ice before it hit the ground.Presently the streets are empty, everybody hibernate till Spring the place totally covered with that White stuff, Americans call Snow.
Most schools close at this time, shelves in the grocery stores are empty, people stock up for the long freeze. If you can count nine months from now, thousands of Babies are born cause we Canadians love to screw with you Americans.All said and done we have the Best Christmas.
The story of your Christmas Pepperpot
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By Francis Quamina Farrier
ONE of Guyanaâs popular National Dishes is Pepperpot, which has its origins in the heart of the hinterlands where many of Guyanaâs Indigenous Peoples reside. For many Guyanese, Pepperpot is prepared and consumed mainly at Christmas time, while for others it is enjoyed all year round. For example, in most hinterland communities and also at the Banks DIH Camp Street, Quik Serv, located on the same block with Citizens Bank, Pepperpot is prepared among other dishes every Sunday morning and the sessions are usually well patronised.
Many of the customers turn up after attending their Sunday Morning service.
While garlic pork and black cake among others are also popular at Christmas time in Guyana, Pepperpot reigns supreme among them and, for many, the making of the dish results in an enthusiastic, âHooray!â.
Back in the day of Christmas in colonial British Guiana, which is before the invention of the electric stove, folks on the coastlands of the British colony, prepared their Pepperpot somewhat like the Indigenous Peoples in the hinterland from whom the dish was learnt. It was cooked over wood fires or in coal pots fired with coals supplying the fuel. But that was a long time ago, and even though the method of preparing Pepperpot has been modernised using electric stoves and pressure pots, the basics elements remain the same.
In Guyanaâs North West District (now officially Region One), and other hinterland regions such as the Cuyuni, the Mazaruni and the Rupununi, the Cassava plant is wildly cultivated. The cassava is used to make cassareep which is one of the principal ingredients for making Pepperpot. First, letâs pause for a moment and consider the hard-working cassava farmers who toil daily in sun and rain to tend their cassava farms. And as a quick aside, I have to mention the healthy-looking cassava plants which I saw at a farm at East Dangme in Ghana, while on a recent visit to that West African country. One needs to be reminded that although there is an impressive production of cassava in our sister Commonwealth country Ghana, there is no Pepperpot available over there.
As we continue to think of those who make significant contributions to our Christmas Pepperpot, letâs now consider the women in Guyana who fetch the cassava for long distances from the farms after the reaping, then grate and process the root crop into the dark, molasses-like cassareep. All that is just the beginning of the process of making our Christmas Pepperpot, the cassareep being one of the principal ingredients. Once the cassareep is acquired, then you have the other ingredients which include beef, veal, pork and other meats such as âwile meatâ. Those will have been acquired as a result of other hard-working farmers and hunters; mainly the men.
If the cooking process is done over a primitive fire or fireside, then one has to consider whose job it was to collect the firewood or coconut husks. If the Pepperpot is cooked on a modern electric stove, the manufacturer must be acknowledged. So, too, should those who work in electricity companies, toiling day and night to ensure that the electric stove is functioning to produce the fire which keeps the pot with the Pepperpot, boiling, boiling, boiling.
And of course we must not forget those who manufactured the pot; be it a regular pot, or a pressure pot. Even the manufacturer of the big spoon which is used to stir the pot should not be ignored. Finally, the bowl or plate and cutlery into which the finished Pepperpot is placed and which is lifted and placed into our watering mouths was the product of a manufacturer, who like all others who contributed to our Christmas Pepperpot, must also be acknowledged.
If you are not a vegetarian, consider the many people who have contributed to that special Indigenous Guyanese dish you delve into at Christmas time, and especially when you request or have yourself a second serving. There is a calypso song entitled, âSanta Looking for a Wifeâ, in which Santa Claus is advised to come to the Caribbean where he will find the best wife possible.
The suspicion is that the wife Santa will find most loving and rewarding, is one who knows how to prepare a good Pepperpot and teach him, too, how to do so, as well and together they will share out the toys to the good girls and boys and Pepperpot to the good Ladies and Gentlemen. And as Santa goes from home to home here in Guyana and with his jolly belly full of Christmas Pepperpot, heâll be saying, not just, âho, ho, ho!â, but rather, HO, HO, HO!â, while on the Radio we hear the classic Guyanese Christmas song by the Four Lords, âSanta Claus on his way, Happy Christmas to you Dear, Happy Holidayâ.
Former Member
Sheik101 posted:Drugb posted:
- Maybe in bbice things was good due to the underground economy via smuggling. But in GT pnc banned toys, sweets, dhall, fruits imports, even down to the lowly plastic christmas tree and fairy lights. Yall rass deh pun stupidness if you don't remember the bannings.
Banna res yuhself eh, regardless what geh ban. Ting use to still flow down in GT. Like u been under a rock or something.. Starting to sound like the guyana Grinch.
Dude you are free romanticize about the past, time passed tends to soften the memory of evils of the yesteryear. I have my own memories of a shythole country under PNC version 1 and you have your own.
Leonora posted:eggplant fritters, etc.
You mean baigani?
Former Member
antabanta posted:Leonora posted:eggplant fritters, etc.
You mean baigani?
Yes, I wanted to see who would be the first to figure it out. My Mom was the best Bigani maker.
Former Member
I remember a couple of kids with their shiny toy guns and holsters running in the streets shooting at each other. Of course, we were watching.
Leonora posted:antabanta posted:Leonora posted:eggplant fritters, etc.
You mean baigani?
Yes, I wanted to see who would be the first to figure it out. My Mom was the best Bigani maker.
I thought you playing hinglish duck.
Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
Former Member
Nehru posted:Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
I spent a Christmas with my aunt in Enmore and saw the Masqueraders. It was exciting to a 10-year-old Berbician.
Former Member
Leonora posted:Nehru posted:Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
I spent a Christmas with my aunt in Enmore and saw the Masqueraders. It was exciting to a 10-year-old Berbician.
All this while some unfortunate folks seemed to have had traumatic, loveless, bitter childhood where even Christmas was nothing to celebrate.
Some abie lucky rass. Burnham couldnât tek way we pepperpot and black cake rass!
Baseman posted:Leonora posted:Nehru posted:Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
I spent a Christmas with my aunt in Enmore and saw the Masqueraders. It was exciting to a 10-year-old Berbician.
All this while some unfortunate folks seemed to have had traumatic, loveless, bitter childhood where even Christmas was nothing to celebrate.
Some abie lucky rass. Burnham couldnât tek way we pepperpot and black cake rass!
When dem po' people grow up dem does become good swimmers, dem doan care even if councie deh in the water. Unfortunately they does end up with SFB.
Former Member
fust time I hear some Guyanese had miserable childhoods
Ray posted:fust time I hear some Guyanese had miserable childhoods
Only some ,not all Guyanese. Consider you self fortunate.
I remember small silver balls on the white icing of the Christmas rum cake.
Former Member
Put carbon in small tin can with some saliva, it gets warm as you shake the can. You light the small pin hole on the bottom for the kaboom. Dogs seek cover during this time lol.
Dave posted:Put carbon in small tin can with some saliva, it gets warm as you shake the can. You light the small pin hole on the bottom for the kaboom. Dogs seek cover during this time lol.
If you want a louder boom I used to use fat bamboo, put a hole at one end with the knot remaining put the carbon way to the end with the hole then spit in the hole onto the carbon place your bare foot over the hole,once you feel the heat place a lighted match over the hole, then BOOM
Former Member
kp posted:Dave posted:Put carbon in small tin can with some saliva, it gets warm as you shake the can. You light the small pin hole on the bottom for the kaboom. Dogs seek cover during this time lol.
If you want a louder boom I used to use fat bamboo, put a hole at one end with the knot remaining put the carbon way to the end with the hole then spit in the hole onto the carbon place your bare foot over the hole,once you feel the heat place a lighted match over the hole, then BOOM
I remember one of the guys went for a loud boom and the bamboo split open!
kp posted:Sheik101 posted:Baseman posted:Sheik101 posted:Bgurd. Regardless how tough things were, guyanese always had a good Xmas. People made do with what little they had. I cant speak for anyone one else, but i love Xmas in guyana. Something about that place.
Christmas was always the time parents made you forget the problems around. Does not matter how bad things got, few toys, special Christmas food, fairy lights, music, midnight mass, and for that short time, thatâs all that mattered. âTwas an innocent time!
I agree. Good times in the homeland. I dont know if its only me, but i just dont enjoy Xmas in the States. Every blasted thing christmas at my disposal and i just dont feel it. If its not the weather, is something else. Talking bout weather, i wonder how dem cyanadians does mek out round dis time a year. I hear dat place real cold. Never been.
Well we Canadians live in Igloo burning fire wood to keep warm, if you pee it turn iscicles and when you spit it turn ice before it hit the ground.Presently the streets are empty, everybody hibernate till Spring the place totally covered with that White stuff, Americans call Snow.
Most schools close at this time, shelves in the grocery stores are empty, people stock up for the long freeze. If you can count nine months from now, thousands of Babies are born cause we Canadians love to screw with you Americans.All said and done we have the Best Christmas.
lol
Nehru posted:Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
You? Masquerade dancing? What u gon seh next that u dress up as mother Sally or de bull cow. war break, bai. That was de thing. how things have change.
Former Member
Sheik101 posted:Nehru posted:Going Masquerade dancing to get money to buy Guns and Caps.
You? Masquerade dancing? What u gon seh next that u dress up as mother Sally or de bull cow. war break, bai. That was de thing. how things have change.
Today, the masquerade crew are now extortionists. They hang out at the stop light and intimidate your to payup, like the epidemic some years back with the squeegie men in NY until Guilanni put a stop to this eyepass.
Former Member
Radio Needy Children's Fund (RNCF), started when I was a child by broadcaster Olga Lopes-Seale. At Christmas time she made stirring appeals on the air for donations. When she emigrated to Barbados in the early 1960s, broadcaster Pat Cameron became the voice of RNCF. Thousands of poor kids got free toys, clothes and meals.
I am happy to learn that the Fund is still going strong:
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