By Lakhram Bhagirat
At 72, Charles Gilkes now he spends his days reminiscing on the golden days of his youth and keeping up with the current affairs of the country. He explains that he is particularly interested in the developmental boom that is on Guyana’s horizon.
“We have so much oil and is a good thing I can listen to the news. I am very happy about how the country will develop from all the oil money. I am following it very closely and it will be nice when we start getting that money,” the Archer’s Home resident said.
Gilkes is the third, of four, children to Ruby and Hubert Gilkes of Uitvlugt, West Coast Demerara. He remembers his mother working as a cook for the workers at the Uitvlugt Estate while his father worked at the Atkinson Air Force Base-now the Cheddie Jagan International Airport.
He said that his childhood was quite a memorable one and to this day some of his experiences are etched in his memory. He remembers the long afternoons of swimming in the trench and the games of cricket with the boys. He also remembers the hard work and helping around the home.
Education also played an integral role in Gilkes’ life but due to circumstances, he could not further his education. He always had a knack for engineering and remembers making and breaking things while a young student at the Uitvlugt Government School. When he finished school, at the age of 16 he then joined the workforce at the Versailles Estate.
“I was a Fill and Press Chute Operator,” he said. I probed deeper to understand the role he played in the operations of the estate.
“Well you know when they grind the cane and all the muck settle at the bottom, well part of my job was to make sure that the much did not become part sugar making process.”
After the estate closed its operations, Gilkes went into the interior to work as a miner. He said at that time he was a diver and had some issues adjusting as a miner at first.
“After a little time, I get accustomed to diving for gold and so. Looking back now it is something that I enjoyed doing and I would do it again if I was younger,” Gilkes noted.
Moving over to the personal side of his life, with a smile on his face, Gilkes said that he is the father of five beautiful children. He got married in the early 1970s to Norma Gilkes and their union bore two girls.
“Norma was a beautiful woman and very nice. We lived together for a long time and but then we grew apart. I don’t know how but sometimes people just grow apart and that is what happened to us. Around 1991 we separated but we remained cordial because of our children.”
Over the years he would father three additional children but never remarried. He notes that one marriage is more than enough for him.
In 1992, in search of better employment Gilkes moved to the island of Barbados where he stayed for 16 years. During that time he worked several jobs and speaks of the level of indifference he experienced during his time on the island.
He worked for a construction company and did some amount of landscaping as well. Like every Guyanese in a foreign country Gilkes “hustled hard” and saved most of the money he earned. He would work three to four jobs at once to support his children back home as well as live a comfortable life.
“Sometimes I would be working three work at the same time. I was a construction worker and did everything in the trade. I also used to do landscaping and paint in my spare time too. It was more hard because the people there always used to feel that Guyanese come to take away all them work and money…it was hard to get work sometime but not all the people was bad. I made some very good friends too.”
When he moved back to Guyana, Gilkes spent some time adjusting and getting back into a routine. For the past 7 years, he has been a resident at the Archer’s Home.
“Now is all about living a comfortable life. The days of hard work are over and I now relax. Life is about making yourself happy and I am doing that.”(Times Sunday Magazine)
