Here and Blogging

So, we have now been in Guyana for two weeks.  I figured it was about time I started blogging - especially since the title of the blog is literally true now.  There were a few internet issues like they couldn't find the modem they knew they had, and a few other housekeeping issues like a fridge that broke soon after we arrived and had to be taken away to fix.  Driving on the other side of the road from the other side of the car is, as many said, not that hard.  Knowing where to buy the things we needed when we got here, some of which we didn't know we needed, was a greater challenge, but we have managed as we always do when moving to a new place.

It is too easy with this sort of blog to spend most of the time talking about the differences in culture, social standing, economic levels.  But as my son pointed out to me it is important to see the similarities rather than the differences first.  Of course that will not stop the occasional cultural reference such as how to make a good Guyanese 'cook up.'

This blog is the reflections of a Lutheran in Guyana, not a Canadian or North American in Guyana, so while it is true that some of my musings will be thoughts I might have anywhere, they will often be about the Lutheran Church in Guyana - its worship, its mission, its heritage, and what our place in that might be.

For this first post in our new home, let me end with the National Anthem of Guyana.  I find it moving [as my wife pointed out I mention frequently] because it is not about bombs or banner or standing on guard, but rather about the struggle to create a nation out of divergent groups most of whom were brought here by the British to work the sugar cane fields.  That is an ongoing struggle in a country the size of Colorado with a population slightly smaller than Calgary, Alberta.  We join with them for the next two years.

Dear land of Guyana, of rivers and plains

Made rich by the sunshine, and lush by the rains,

Set gem-like and fair, between mountains and seas,

Your children salute you, dear land of the free.

Green land of Guyana, our heroes of yore,

Both bondsmen and free, laid their bones on your shore.

This soil so they hallowed, and from them are we,

All sons of one Mother, Guyana the free.

Great land of Guyana, diverse though our strains,

We're born of their sacrifice, heirs of their pains,

And ours is the glory their eyes did not see,

One land of six peoples, united and free.

Dear land of Guyana, to you will we give,

Our homage, our service, each day that we live;

God guard you, great Mother, and make us to be

More worthy our heritage, land of the free.