by Colin Hyde
There were quite a few negative comments from Bel Ams about the way our press crowded the airport on the return of over 20 of them by charter flight from the US last week. Really, illegal entry is a misdemeanor, and usually it’s no big deal—immigrants being sent back to the land of their birth. There was one man on the flight who the police believe attempted to kill someone. Apart from him, the returnees were mostly Belizeans whose only offense was to enter the US illegally, or overstay their time. All countries have laws to control the movement of people. Most people who cross our border illegally are looking for betterment for themselves and their families, which is similar to what Belizeans are about when they go to the US.
Bully for the police for blocking the cameras. We didn’t need to see the pics of the Bel Ams. Ouch, there are way too many cameras in Belize. I hope it’s a lie that we are getting a thousand more. Already we are under scrutiny whenever we’re in a public space. I have heard people discuss how big business and special interests da foreign invade our space whenever we go online on a cell phone or laptop, but that’s not 1/10th as bad as big local business invading/observing every step you take, every move you make when you enter their shops, where we have to go to buy things.
I don’t know that our media handled the matter badly. It’s news because the new US administration blames illegal immigrants for everything that isn’t right with America. From the onset of the Trump administration, Bel Am Ms. Aria Lightfoot said we shouldn’t panic about deportation because the American court system isn’t an overnight process, and the logistics of carrying out mass deportation were daunting. So far, her observation has held up. But we’re barely 4 months into the new agenda. Many things the US has done since January 20 are near unprecedented. The sense I have is that people over there illegally are frightened more than they have ever been before, that the courts over there are challenged more than they have ever been before, and that some of the methods being used to get us out of there have never been pushed before as they are now. I saw this story where a woman faced major fines for living in the US illegally. That’s serious pressure to get people to leave.
Another story from the Bel Ams is that our arms should be opened wide to receive returnees. I am not aware of any hostility toward them. But let’s not be naïve. Some returnees are now strangers, and we all know how it is when people at home meet strangers. Years ago, a cousin-in-law of mine who made real good in legal dealings in New York told another cousin-in-law of mine who had done okay for himself in New York in less savory things, and had gotten himself deported, to try and make it back to New York because, because he wouldn’t be able to adjust to living in Belize. I know wise counsel when I hear it. The popular song says, if you can make it in NY you can make it anywhere, but that anywhere is only another concrete jungle.
Know that some of the Belizeans who left us, whether successful, unsuccessful, or in between, are not the persons we knew. Environments change people. With some, it will seem like they never went away, but some will have to acclimatize, and all might not be able to. Among the Bel Ams who are sent back there might be one or two who we absolutely hope will try and find their way back to that land across the Rio Grande. Ah, there’ll be some, hopefully most, who we will want to do our best to keep with us.
Whatever is our feeling about the charter plane, dehn deh home. Bienvenidos a todos!
Trump is truthful about his vision for the US …
… an hihn noh shame fu outright lai to push that agenda. During the first Trump presidency he abandoned the pretense of his predecessors, made us know that everything, everything the US does is about US interests. It’s kind of basic for most people, and most countries to look out for themselves first. We have heard the saying, charity begins at home. But selflessness isn’t alien to all individuals, ditto countries. Raatid, some of the things the US did/does for USA, USA, if they were an individual they would go to hell, no stops along the way. But then they produce a Jimmy Carter who gave the world hope that we are all in this, that the US didn’t mind curtailing its appetite sometimes so the rest of us could get more crumbs. Ah, Jimmy Carter, he was the exception, not the rule.
In this second administration, Mr. Trump and his folk have doubled down on America first, first, first. Trump wrote a book called The Art of the Deal. There must be a chapter in it that says telling untruths is good if it improves the deal. The story about the Panama Canal is just wild. Over and over Trump tells the world about the thousands of American Americans who died to make the Panama Canal. The thousands of people who died during the construction of the Panama Canal were from the Caribbean and Central America. And the technology to build the canal wasn’t all American. The first blueprint was from France, and that failed because they hadn’t done a proper study of the terrain, and both workers and managers were decimated by Yellow Fever and Malaria. But while working on the project that failed, other ideas about getting the job done were born. Yes, the Americans had great input in the successful crossing of the isthmus. But why not give the French their due, and tell the truth about whose blood dried there? (In this paragraph I drew from research done by a guy named Matthew Parker.)
You know the art of the lie began with the Europeans discovering the Americas. Nowhere on the planet are black people committing genocide against white people. There is not one country run by black people where they have the military capacity to touch white people. Now Trump trots it out there that that is what is happening in South Africa. Someone said that Elon Musk was the “eyewitness” who sold Trump that story, but I am thinking the concoction is straight from Netanyahu, the supporter of apartheid whom South Africa is pushing to bring before the world court to answer for the terrible genocide in Gaza.
The 3 worst fish for the table in Belize
No suspense, those hard to eat bohgaz are bone fish, tarpon, and machaca, and the reason why they’re at the bottom of the list is because you have to have the nimble mouth of a cat to get by the bones. As far as I know, if you’re talking sabor, there is no panades like a bone fish panades. So why did shark get all of the fame? It’s for the same reason fish een a tin beat out bone fish. When we were young and our mom promised us a treat with panades, we caught a few soaja, robbed them of their roly-poly (their fat tail), and waded into the sea at low tide to catch boanifish. It was our job to make the first pass at picking the bones from the flesh after our mom cooked them. She always gave a second pass, because a single bone in a “panades” is as bad as or worse than a singing mosquito at night.
The Bone fish is a great fighter, and so is the tarpon. I’ve never eaten tarpon, never caught one, but my dad told me about them. That’s another fish that has bone fu days, and that’s what makes it one of the legendary fighters.
The machaca, a river fish, no one had to tell me that fish there is a great fighter. I told you about that machaca already, how there’s more bones in the fat flesh of that fish than there are needles in a pin cushion. Bah, that fish can grow to four pounds, but it can’t ever make a fillet. A little story I saw from Costa Rica, where the machaca has fame as a sport fish, says people who eat it put it in soup. I bet they put the fish in a mesh before they drop it in the pot. I haven’t heard about anyone fishing the machaca for sport in Belize, or it having any protection here. I’m not that excited about fishing, but if I had that kind of game in me, I’d head up the Moho River and deal with them.
Closing out with a bit of trivia (you can’t utilize what I’m going to share here): one of my cousins who has more sea in him than I have, told me they had a way to deal with tarpon, before the law intervened. He said after cleaning it they beat the flesh with a heavy spoon until it was soft. Then they scooped up the flesh with the spoon. I thought I’d like to try that on bone fish. Look, one of these days I may be at sea and one might jump into my boat. Hmm, boanifish panades!