Penticton author responds to tragedy

Students of journalism learn the value of a short bus wreck story that provides filler copy for whatever media device they’re preparing. When one of my Cuso International colleagues from our Guyana days sent a link to an article about a tragedy in the country, I immediately thought the equivalent of a bus wreck was being announced.

So often we hear of devastation from local to global level that we gloss over details. In this case, nineteen children died in a fire at Mahadia Secondary School’s female dormitory. I didn’t recognize the name of the village, but when the article mentioned the Pakaraima Mountains, I knew this was Indigenous territory near the western border.

I’d visited this area of dry savannahs when on birding explorations in one of the most biodiverse regions of the planet. I wrote of those trips and accompanied Indigenous youth to the area. It was an initial exposure to what they could expect in training sessions for ecotourism development.

The beauty of Guyana and the vibrancy of its people enthralled me and inspired my recently published book — “Gripped by Guyana: A Memoir of Purpose and Adventure.”

Suddenly, I was thrust back into Guyana where I’d lived and worked over the span of two years. I remembered school buildings in the Indigenous villages in the interior. I visualized a fire “maliciously set [in] a concrete and wooden structure with five doors and grill windows”. The doors had been padlocked for the night.

I’d worked with Indigenous girls and knew of concerns for their safety. However, those overseeing the facility failed to protect them from fire. I could hear the screams, feel the heat of the flames, and smell the results of the conflagration.

Guyana’s newspapers were filled with condolences from all sectors—governmental, social, personal.

All rang hollow to my ear. Village primary schools had nurtured these girls through their early years.

They’d left their remote villages and were entrusted to the care of residential secondary schools. In the country’s struggles with post-colonial development, each of those lives was precious, especially in remote and challenged Indigenous areas. Now those lives were lost to their families, their villages, and their country.

I thumbed through my memoir and stopped at the photographs of young people in markets, in boats on the country’s myriad waterways, and in training sessions. My throat constricted.

Merle Kindred Penticton