PM Hinds contemplates the possibility of major oil discovery in Guyana (Part two)

By Prime Minister Samuel Hinds –

The Emiratis seem persuaded that fossil fuels for energy can only get costlier as negative impacts on the environment are sanctioned.  They recognise that while petroleum products could, for a long time, be exported as the energy source of choice in many situations, and as a chemical feedstock, they could reduce their own consumption significantly.  They are working to be among the leaders in the new green-technology world.  Their oil could be too costly for them!   A “Future City”, “Masdar”, a zero-carbon city, was being built, learning as one goes, on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi city.  An initial 10 mega watt photo-voltaic farm was already in place.  In principle, there will be a network of driver-less train units underground and the streets aboveground will be pedestrian.

In seeking to learn about the country while we were there, we encountered some uncertainty about the population of the Emirates today – with estimates ranging from six to 10 million souls on the ground, of which, perhaps, 20 per cent to 25 per cent were native Emiratis.  The others, 75 per cent to 80 per cent,  were “guests” characterised in  broad groupings as “Other Arabs”;   “Expats” – the investors and high level managers,  mostly from the developed countries; and “South Asian workers” from India and Pakistan,  largely, but also from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar (Burma), Philippines,  and Indonesia, and black Africans south of the Sahara.  There seemed to be in this group, also, some Chinese, Middle and East Europeans, including Russians.  I got the impression that there were a sprinkling of young people even from developed countries, probably bent on seeing the world, working their way as they did.
In conversations,  in Abu Dhabi, with  persons  who happened to be Other Arabs, I mentioned that from the magazines I was reading  in the  late 1970s, I thought the UK  contractors  led the way  in constructing infrastructure.  The answer was, “Yes, initially, however, they made a number of mistakes which we, the Other Arabs,   corrected, and then led the way.”  Sentiments not unlike those I encountered in Kamarang, when the local people complained about the roof of the school built by contractors and workers from the coast; and similar sentiments expressed in Georgetown about contractors from abroad!
Guided tour
A good four hours was spent on a specially-guided tour around, and through, the Burg Kalifa in Dubai, the tallest building in the world – a perk of being a prime minister.  There is a wall of pictures dedicated to all who worked in creating that building – a wall of pictures of people from all over the world!  Pride of place was given to the person who was the overall manager, an Emirati, who had been educated and worked in the U.S., and who was given the job to the astonishment of many.  But the job could not have been done better,   only six months lost to the interruption of the great financial and economic crises of 2007!
There is a huge mall on the lower floors of the Burg Kalifa.  All the high-end brands are there – so too many staple brands.  The month of January is a month of sales during which, I was told, all prices are required to be greatly reduced – a month of shopping tourism!  There were crowds, peoples from all over the world, from Europe, North America, Asia and Africa north and south of the Sahara.  There was a good feeling of the peoples shopping and relaxing.  Only a few seemed very rich – you couldn’t plan large malls if the goods were to be in the reach of only the very rich.  No doubt, many of the shoppers were from the millions of “South Asian” workers present in the Emirates.   We settled for lunch in a Philippine restaurant, one of the many offerings of fast food cuisine from Asian, and other countries from around the world.
Guyanese in UAE
There are some Guyanese out there in the UAE!  One family of an airplane pilot met us at our hotel.   They spoke of some other Guyanese in maintenance, in the airline industry there.  I learnt later of the daughter of a friend who was out there with her husband, a banker from the UK.  A survey may find a few tens, not more than a hundred, of us Guyanese, in the Emirates.
A bellhop, with a name plate “Pradeep” on his chest, came for our bags when we were leaving.  Entering the elevator, I said, “We have many ‘Pradeeps’ where I come from”.  He returned, “I am from Sri Lanka.  On my last job, on cruise ships off Alaska, I met a dozen, or so Guyanans – (Guyanese).”  I wondered whether, among them, was a Guyanese whom I know who was heading that way.  A sense of contacting, connecting, in a web of one world, one human race!
There is literature out there about migrant workers being the slaves and indentured labourers of the 21st century.  No doubt,  there are regrettable instances,  many too many: but a US$500 to US$1000 per month  job, instead of the US$50  to  US$100 that one might  manage at home, is improvement worth going after.  And those I encountered from Mumbai, Kolkata, Pakistan and elsewhere, didn’t seem sorry for themselves, didn’t seem weighed down with a sense of service and servitude.  Rather, they seemed lively and enthusiastic, seeing life getting better with glorious possibilities.  My butler from Chennai found that workers from the world over, living together, was a great experience: being helpful to each other, learning of each other’s dishes, and words for common items and actions.
My memory went back to one evening at our National Park, at the end of a Jehovah’s Witness’ Convention I attended:  a Guyanese woman, Afro with some Portuguese, in animated discussions in Chinese with some Chinese women. I enquired and learned from the Guyanese woman that she had been working in a restaurant in Barbados alongside some Chinese women co-workers.  They had made a deal – she teaching them English and they teaching her Chinese.  I have steadily been heartened by such instances – demonstrating what could be accomplished when people get together!
Lakes and marinas
Looking  once again – out of the  glass-walled elevator,  at the vista below as we descended,  the desert sands being re-worked with lakes and marinas; the gardens with trees,  each of which is said to cost  more to maintain than a person; the huge palace being constructed over there; the ultra-modern buildings, many reaching for the skies; buildings getting smarter  with not just fixed-shutters,  like ours  in Demerara,  but shutters that would orient themselves like leaves on a tree, sensing and responding to ambient conditions; so much to me appearing unnatural, unreal, but harbingers of the future – peoples from all over the world working and living together in such a  place – was I having a preview of  mankind on the moon in 2113, or on Mars in 2213?
If we do find lots and lots of oil off-shore Guyana, I hope that we do not go the way of those who, on winning a lotto, set out for a life of only ease, of only feasting, of only making merry; a life that soon loses its satisfaction and becoming boring without challenge – but that we set out to be the best person each of us Guyanese can be.