Dear BP,
I recently had a conversation with someone who proclaimed to all that, as far as he was concerned, nothing that happened before he was born in 1966 was of interest to him. In other words, he was historically ignorant and a fool. What happened to him recently proved that I was unfortunately correct. The forces that he and, indeed, many Bahamians thought were dead and buried still controlled his field of employment and limited him.
My point is that we Bahamians have done all we can to eradicate or debase those things that made us uniquely Bahamian and replaced them with trivial, self-serving nonsense. I am old enough to remember the pristine condition of government buildings. Indeed, taxi drivers used them as a guide for their fares who wanted to walk around. They would direct them to the beautiful pink government house or building because these were well-maintained and painted the correct colour.
Which leads to the question, has anyone in Antiques and Monuments noticed that Government House is the wrong colour? Or that Nassau Public Library, the Ranfurly Out Island Library, and many other historic Bahamian buildings are in an advanced state of disrepair? How about the Performing Arts building on the Shirley Street Theatre site? Do they even care?
Do these Philistines even know that the beautiful bricks in Rawson Square were a gift from the British Government upon our Independence?
My point is this: Historically ignorant people are charged with preserving our national patrimony, and they suck at this. Their solution is not historical preservation but demolition. What happened to the Rodney Bain Building is a case in point, and whether or not the proper procedure was followed, i.e., proving that no alternative use was possible, is a secret.
At this point, you may well ask, “ Ole Geezer, ” what has caused this attack of angst? The answer is that I got caught up in traffic, which was totally still. Eventually, when I moved, I found that three motorcycle policemen had traffic held up to facilitate a student float parade on a Thursday, no less. And here I was thinking that they only used our motorcycles to escort funerals for a fee; silly me!
That standard has declined, as goes without saying in our Bahamas, but what really troubled me during my drive around was a danger to Bahamians that I thought had been resolved years ago. Specifically, there is a limestone wall running parallel to the Government House wall near Gregory Arch on Market Street, and a narrow road connecting East Street to Market Street.
I remember that many years ago, the wall was dislodged by a wide, heavy truck trying to use it to enter Market Street, and here I am talking about at least twenty-five years ago. As a temporary solution, MoW staff used a heavy canvas strap anchored by heavy cement blocks to stabilise it. So, imagine my surprise to recently see that, although the canvas straps were gone, the heavy blocks were still there, and the wall was probably more unstable and dangerous than before.
This is the beauty of having historical, institutional and organisational memory. I know this wall is dangerous, and I know nothing was done to stabilise it over the years because I remember the incident.
So, a warning to pedestrians and drivers using the Gregory Arch portion of Market Street in any direction. Always look up at that wall. It may save your life.
Your Truly,
Some “Ole Geezer”
