Street Theater #2 – Jango’s and Myrna’s Shop
I love just walking around Negril and seeing what happens right in front of me. I’m never disappointed. Here are a couple of recent incidents of Negril Street Theater . . . . .
Jango's . . . .
Jango’s barber shop is located on the street just behind Scotia Bank. Walking by there one morning I heard a commotion coming from within. I peered into the darkened interior of the shop. A small Jamaican man with long dreads was shouting at one of the barbers. And this guy was really leaning into it; his dreads were whipping around as he waved his arms pointing this way and that. I couldn’t understand what he was saying, except, of course, for the obligatory ‘clatts’ that he liberally employed. Neither the man he was hollering at nor the other barber or any of the customers who were in the shop paid the guy the least bit of attention.
I paused on the road in a little piece of shade under a bush and unshouldered my backpack. Here was an opportunity to watch another act of spontaneous Negril street theater. There was a guy sitting on a scooter just outside the shop. He too was observing the confrontation within, laughing quietly to himself and slowly shaking his head.
After about thirty seconds of non-stop, but totally ignored diatribe, the dread-headed dude gave up and exited the shop. Outside, he paused, looked around and then walked nonchalantly around to the side of the shop where he stopped and talked to a woman who was sitting there. He spoke in a completely normal voice and acted as if his recent rant had never occurred.
This act, a mere interlude, was over.
Even though it was a minor confrontation, if a scene like this had taken place in my home town, say in a barber shop in a small mall, it would have drawn a crowd of onlookers and the police would likely have been called.
Myrna’s Shop . . . .
There is a classic scene in Western movies where a fellow gets tossed out of a saloon – A big guy throws someone out through the swinging doors and he lands on the dusty street.
Much the same thing happened at Myrna’s Shop the other day. This event was observed from the bench at Sunnyside. A troublemaker was bodily ejected from the store. He skittered out over the concrete steps, slid across the wooded decking and tumbled out onto the sand. He stood up, brushed the sand from his clothes then turned to the doorway and let loose an emphatic stream of cussing. The guy that had thrown him out was inside the door and was thus out of sight.
Upon seeing this, one of the local girls sitting on the Sunnyside bench started to laugh so hard that she doubled over. She sat up straight to catch her breath, said, “Oh Lawd!” then laughed even louder and bent over again.
The man inside the shop must have made a threatening move toward the guy he’d thrown out because the guy suddenly stopped cussing and scrabbled his way out of there like a sand crab being chased by a beach dog.
This brought another outburst of laughing from the local girl at the bar. When she stopped laughing I asked her, “What’s so funny?”
“Oh my Lawd!” she said, “Him try to tief sumting an him get what him deserve.” She shook her head and chuckled as she wiped her eyes. “Dem tief in Jamaica so tick dem like sand on de beach.”
Sometimes Jamaica is like the Wild West.
Likkle more . . . . .
