The next decade....what's in store?
Musings of a yamfooted traveller still trying to shake off those last 20 pounds as she treks across the Caribbean
That's why I am single!
Just went on to eHarmony.com, an online dating service. Bloody long questionnaire but I felt I was very honest. So they run the report and look for matches and it came back plain and simple....
THERE ARE NO MATCHES FOR YOU AT THIS TIME.
So see? I am not meant to be with anybody. (Or maybe I just too darn picky!)
I have to get used to calling my former boss in Grenada this. On Wednesday he was knighted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace. So it's now Sir Royston O Hopkin, KCMG.
Here is the picture....
J$100,000,000 went to one person in the lotto yesterday. As Shaggy sings..."it wasn't me". But I did get 3 numbers out of 6. 50% not bad huh.
Next jackpot is a paltry J$7 million. You won't find many people playing.
Not Cash Pot...which was a given (I played yesterday all three draws and didn't win a thing!)
But more importantly, is that I have misplaced my tape recorder. This is an important part of my life. I bought this little Panasonic thing in either September or October 2003 when I was going up in the country in Grenada to interview Devon Smith. It has been my trusty side kick since then, taping the voices of
Allan Rae,
Jackie Hendriks,
Easton McMorris,
Jerome Taylor,
Fidel Edwards,
Devon Smith,
Dwayne Bravo,
Courtney Browne,
Roger Harper,
Ridley Jacobs,
Ronald Rogers,
Andrew Simpson,
Robert Haynes,
David Bernard Jr,
Donovon Pagon,
Nikita Miller,
Runako Morton,
Junior Murray,
Carlton Baugh Jr,
Xavier Marshall and his mother, coach and manager,
Derrick Parry,
Chris Gayle,
Wavell Hinds,
Tony Cozier,
Rudi Webster,
Steve Bucknor,
Tino Best,
Tony Howard,
Michael Hall,
Tamar Lambert,
Jermaine Lawson,
Ricardo Powell,
Andrew Richardson,
Simon Crosskill,
the fans,
the pundits like Tony Becca, and a whole lot more.
Oh, did I say Brian Lara and Lawrence Rowe too? Yeah, them too.
So it means a lot. Now do I have a clue where I put it? I thought it was in my top drawer along with the mini cassettes I use in them. It was on the table here in the office all this time, then I decided that since I wouldn't need them until around 5th May, I could put it away.
Went to look in the drawer on Monday and to my surprise it was not there. I am feeling like a fish out of water. Is not that I can't get another because my father and brother have one each. It's that that one is mine, bought with my money earned from the 'Aliens' hotel.
I wish I were psychic. The powers would lead me to it. Of course, some day long after cricket is over, it will turn up. No, I don't think anybody has stolen it.
I was buying these numbers for a few days, then two of them played yesterday or whenever was the last time it was played. The two numbers, 6 and 35 played!
I guess if I had actually bought them on Saturday, it would have been useful!
So, ok, you get it. I didn't really win. But I could have!
Not lucky with the Lotto though. It's now at J$100 million. You know how that would help me out man? If only I could dream a number.
Today, round about now, family and friends of Keith are saying good bye in a service of thanksgiving for his life, which, based on my short time knowing him, and all the tributes posted on the other blog entry, was a full full one. Much like his laughter.
I like to think that what happens to us in death, is just how it was portrayed in the movie 'Ghost', where your spirit leaves your body, in all of its pain, and finds a resting place more glorious than you would have ever seen on Earth.
So I will think that Keith is in such a place, linking up with all the people he knows who have gone on before him.
Through this incident, I have discovered that blogging, and the internet, is a very powerful tool to allow people from all over the world to connect and share. Even though I am not at the funeral, my thoughts are with Dawn, their daughter and the siblings, friends, and relatives of Keith, as they sing, give praise and magnify the life of their dearly departed.
Keith, may your soul and your spirit rest in peace.
PS. Regular posting will resume here as of Monday.
This is until we hear word about Keith Hammond.
To many of you who pass by here, that name doesn't mean a thing to you. To those of you who have been reading the Jamaican news, when you saw it first, it didn't mean anything to you.
That's the name of the student pilot whose plane crashed on Monday 4 April somewhere near St Mary.
He is also someone I know.
The meeting took place in July 2002 on the campus of the University of Surrey, where Safari (a visitor to this blog) and I were students. I used to write stories and send them by email to friends and family. Click below to read the excerpt from that story that mentions our encounter with Keith and some other Jamaicanss who had come up to participate in the Commonwealth Games.
He has a great sense of humour and can tell a good joke. Kept us in stiches. Although we always exchanged emails, and spoke on the telephone when I was in Jamaica, we never did meet up after that. He had promised to take us to the Rifle Club on a Wednesday, when they used to have a little lime, but I couldn't go the night he suggested and it just never got off the ground.
You hear the news, you hear the name and you say 'please God, don't let it be him'. But it is. It seems that it's not a question of if he's gone.
YAMFOOT'S NOTE*****
When I first made this entry, the last sentence would have read 'it seems it's a foregone conclusion' (that he did not survive), but according to this Observer report at least one person is holding out hope. Sometimes, that's all you need....just one person.
Sadly, a week later, there is still no more news.
But instead of referring to him in the past tense here, I've referred to him in the present. Now there will be another person holding out hope.
From an excerpt of the Guildford Chronicles dated 1 August 2002 entitled 'Emancipation Week'
On Saturday before this, 'Safari' (other Jamaican girl here) and I were talking near the Laundry. We say we wonder if there are any Jamaicans staying on campus for the Commonwealth Games. The shooting competition was being held in Bisley which apparently is not far from here (we don
.....who knows what has happened to Keith's.
As each day passes and there is no news item about the search and recovery efforts, it's easy to forget that there may be someone in the deep beyond whose family and friends need to see him, just one last time.
So, until such a day comes, this blog will not post anything except it has to do with Keith. You may go to my other blog here, where I will post anything that I feel I must, that doesn't have to do with Keith.
On the first blog entry about Keith's disappearance, there are a couple of comments from other persons who knew him who visited the blog for the first time, so you can read what they have to say. One comment is from Keith's cousin.
Another is from his wife.
I couldn't tell you when is Keith's birthday, what size shoes he wears or what makes him laugh or cry, so in that sense, he's not a close friend. But as I have alluded to in other blog entries, his personality was so engaging that you would want to be associated with him.
I was trying to find online, the article in today (Saturday's) Gleaner, where his sister talks about him, and how he was always into trying new things, and also one of his employees in the dental practice talks about how he treated everybody like family. She had been with him for about 16 years I think it was, if I can recall correctly.
So you see the kind of person I'm talking about.
Somehow he struck me as a kind of pragmatic guy, so he would have known the risks associated with going up in airplanes, whether he was the pilot or not. Hopefully, that would have made him prepare differently on Monday morning.
He seemed to have had a reach into many parts of society through Catholicsm (I'm sure that's spelt wrong), Freemasonry, Army Reserves, Rifle Association (he is President), Dentistry (he studied in Cuba), and I'm sure a whole lotta things that I wouldn't know about.
So when you hear that he was large, it's both in outlook on life, and in size (strongly built man).
And always smiling and laughing.
ttitilayo had mentioned on her blog one time (this, that, whatever) that she wondered if anything happened to her, how people would know.
I felt compelled to send an email to Keith's address, and this I did on Tuesday. I'm assuming that eventually his wife or sister will get the ISP to go into Keith's account and retrieve all the emails that would have been sent by people who wouldn't have known that anything happened to him. As a past member of Jamaica's rifle team, he would no doubt have travelled all over and met many people.
Anyway, the text is below...
Hello, I dont know if anybody from Keith's family is going to read this, but I just wanted to say how sorry I was to learn of the accident. I havent heard any news this morning, so like the colleague in the Jamaica Observer who said he was optimistic, so too am I.
Keith crossed my path quite accidentally, while I was a student at the University of Surrey in 2002. The Rifle Team had come to stay there for the Commonwealth Games and a Jamaican friend of mine and I saw them on campus and went and introduced ourselves to him, David and Jose. We met up for drinks, and another day we cooked for them because they complained that the British food was awful (it is!).
As you would know, Keith was the jokester among the bunch. He had us all in stiches. Unfortunately, after talking on the phone a couple of times when I would come back to Jamaica, I never did see Keith after that time on campus 3 years ago.
It didn't surprise me that he was taking flying lessons because he seemed very gregarious and wanted to make sure his life was fully occupied.
May God give you the strength and your family to lean on, in this difficult time.
I found these sayings in a book at the Princess' Kingdom in Bimshire during my last visit. I had to write some of them down. Make them your mantra.
Everybody should strive to be happy in life, because you don't know how long or short yours will be.
I wrote this story sometime after I moved out of my parents' house. It was either written in 1997 or 1998, as the beginnings to my novel.
But then I showed my brother and he laughed at me.
So you are entitled to laugh as well!
This police officer to the left in the picture below, is definitely front page material, as he was in today's Gleaner. Mighty fine!
