#thingsaren’talwayswhatheyseemPt2

With all the thought I put into figuring out Siwa and Siwis, mainly men of course as women are at home, it never occurred to me that they might be trying to figure me out too. Well of course, Siwis are more likely to be getting on with their lives and have little inclination or time to dedicate to understanding me but, you know what I mean. The Dalai Lama says something like, ”We are all the centre of our own universe” and I guess we are to a certain extent moreso, in the capitalist world. So, I’ve been thinking more about what Siwis think of about building a friendship with me (that makes it sound like a big thing, a thing even – it’s obviously not) with me from the Siwi perspectives. The obvious one is that the large majority of visitors to Siwa are just that, ephemeral. Few foreigners stay. So, why bother to work people out especially when you have a tendency to live in the moment – just enjoy the moment.

In the interactions I had with Siwis they would have been building their own idea of who Nicola is, from their own perspective. Who is this woman? What are her values? Is this someone I want to have a coffee with, invite home to meet my family or that I just need to walk past? They each have their own frame of reference, which would be informed by their individual, familial and community experiences. Again, I’m saying all this from a point of analysis, not because Siwis are doing mini-theses on ‘Nicola’. If you’re walking down a street and a stranger runs up to you you assess the situation – maybe you ask, are you in danger? Are they? What’s happening? Most of it is automatic you’re not ‘thinking’ about it. I would have been as ‘new’ to the Siwis as they were to me. The only difference would have been that there was one of me and a whole town of them- comfort in numbers. Siwis who met me would have assessed me according to their lens. Can she be trusted? Is she worth hanging out with? For some even, will she sleep with me? What is Nicola’s net worth (although again, for some that might have been a real concern)? Perhaps, less of a question might be, is Nicola from a good family (although this information might be ascertained indirectly through status, education etc. as part of a Siwi’s subliminal assessment of me)?

Of course, in Port of Spain there is my own perceived societal worth that comes with my family name, being Ulric’s daughter, my job (or lack thereof), my friends, with having a sometimes-English accent (especially at the bank), maybe my lack of religion, yadda, yadda and of course my own personal history or reputation. In Siwa, I have no reputation so, I guess people piece together a ‘reputation’. Who does Nicola hang out with? How does she behave? Does she conform to the rules of our community? All these are stirred in a pot and decisions are made on the resultant soup. Do we actually respect, or even like, Nicola?

I’ve never put much weight on reputation because, I had a good one, I suppose - mostly conferred through inheritance. So, I had a ‘doh care’ attitude. Us Trinis know people does make shit up in small communities and yuh know not t’ believe everything yuh does hear ‘bout Janice. We also know that people with good reputations are not necessarily what they seem but, we like de stylish people, with de nice clothes, nice house, nice job, the life of the party – pillar of the community and we happy to go along with the narrative until their failings are revealed, or if they’re revealed, and sometimes even then we, “cyant”, “won’t” believe it”! I think… Michael Jackson, R Kelly, Bill Cosby.

I guess that’s one of the things about being human. Life is messy. Where there’s smoke there’s often fire - ‘sUmting happen’, emphasis on the ‘u’. And sometimes not. The thing about living in a small community is that where there is fire somebody usually knows something. I remember my father, who was a judge, joking about criminals who couldn’t keep their crimes secret. They just had to tell someone. I’ve always felt secrets are damaging and I try to avoid them. I remember when I had a boyfriend who became addicted to crack cocaine I strongly believed secrecy facilitated his continuing his habit. I also remember just how uncomfortable people were when I spoke about his struggles openly. I do know some of the people I told had their own loved one who had their own addictions (no secret in a small community) yet they felt shame? Embarrassment? For me? For themselves? For their loved one? When there are no secrets you can make the links, see the patterns, see the bigger picture, maybe even solve the ‘problem.’

I’m a foreign, black woman who came to Siwa in the employ of a film production and I operate in the male-dominated public spaces. My profile grants me certain privileges. It may also be disadvantageous. People’s ability to read people varies, some are better at it than others. I continue to be shit at it, frankly. And there, are those who have honed this skill maybe even using it to their own advantage and the disadvantage of the person being ‘read’. The other day, I was forced to think of something I had never considered. If someone in Siwa were to misrepresent me to others in order to protect themselves and people believed them would, or how would that affect me? I may not give a shit but others may and I might have to live with those consequences.

In communities where clean reputations carry weight people may go to extremes to maintain them and parallel lives abound. What’s been interesting living in Siwa is finding out one person’s story and then hearing the other party’s perspective. Watching how the strands of lives weave together, what’s on the surface and what’s much deeper. I think it’s the same in Trinidad but I have known most of the people in that drama all my life. I also have a deep understanding of Trinidad’s society that I do not have of Siwa. The characters in the Siwa drama feel new and interesting yet familiar.

A foreigner who’d been living in Siwa came into the coffee shop but we never served him cause we didn’t know how to use the coffee machine. He waited and then gave up and left. Days? A week? later we heard he’d been murdered – stabbed repeatedly in his home so many times that it sent a clear message of a crime of passion. The shock on my friend’s face when he was told. He didn’t know him all that well but they were both non-Siwans living in Siwa for years. I wasn’t in shock. I mean, I didn’t really know the victim. Then I realised, I am a Trinidadian. Violent murders in homes have become the norm – should I bother qualifying that with ‘almost’? Us Trinis all know people who have been murdered gruesomely and unnecessarily. Neighbours, relatives, friends, loved ones. It is one of the reasons I feel safe in Siwa. And as they say in Tobago, “Is a Trini who did it”. As they say in Nariva, “Is someone from outside”. As they say in Siwa, “It’s not a Siwi”.