A brief history of seven killings - fiction

[Marblehead]

One other comment about my first trip. I learned that Regan was a communist!

We got caught in a sudden thunderstorm and took cover at Miss Cool's spot on the beach. It was just a low, scrap-wood shack with a tin roof. I had a flask of Appleton and passed it around. Miss Cool's son, Eddie, expounded upon the political scene and their PM Spy-aga (Edward Seaga defeated Michael Manley in the last election). Eddie told us Regan was a communist. I asked why he thought so. He said that when Manley was PM there were lots of Cubans on the island. Tourism fell way off, and the Cubans would brag that they were going to eradicate ganja. Regan forced many nations to spray herbicides to eradicate the pot crops including Jamaica. Eddie said that Jamaicans often grew veggies alongside the ganja so Regan was just like the Cubans and therefore must be a communist, only worse! I still have my coconut "Reggae Not Regan" pin and wear it regularly.

That was back in the days when almost all stuff for purchase was locally made. Now much of it is made by women and children on the other side of the planet, in god awful conditions, who are virtual slaves to their masters. Globalization has certainly created more purchasing opportunities, but I try to find stuff that I'm pretty confident was made in Jamaica. Respect --Marblehead

[Rob]

That was back in the days when almost all stuff for purchase was locally made. Now much of it is made by women and children on the other side of the planet, in god awful conditions, who are virtual slaves to their masters. Globalization has certainly created more purchasing opportunities, but I try to find stuff that I'm pretty confident was made in Jamaica. Respect --Marblehead

This is what is known as "capitalism" - make your product as inexpensively as possible and sell your product for as much as the market allows. Personally, I have always been a believer in "enlightened capitalism" - I am glad to have met Bill Gates and seeing how he and his wife are benefiting the world through their philanthropy. My gut instinct is that Bill and Melinda have not even begun to reach the goal, that he told those of us at the Comdex suite years ago, to become the world's biggest philanthropist (prior to his marriage)!

Marblehead, thanks for backing up my assertion that the "High Times" article you mentioned was written at the same historical time that cocaine was hitting the island over 30 years ago. I wanted to clarify that you were speaking in an historical reference as opposed to anything to the current Jamaica.