December 16, 2004

Dear Sir,

Imagine being a good looking 24-year-old man, planning a night out with your girl and your friends. Then think about how you would feel if you went to the door of the newest nightclub on the Island during the week of their grand opening and found that your friends could go in but you were not welcome ... all because you are in a wheelchair. There are no ramps and once inside the club, the restrooms are upstairs. So you push yourself away and thank God that you have good friends that go with you to a club that is accessible.

This did happen, right here in Bermuda, to my son. He hasn't always been in a wheelchair. At age 20, he damaged his spinal cord in a trampoline accident and as a result is now a quadriplegic. It was an accident, the type of thing that could happen to anyone, anytime. He is remarkable in his attitude and is determined to live his life as normally as possible, all the while praying for the stem cell research to find a cure for spinal cord injury. His independence and pride are a big part of who he is and how he copes with the day-to-day struggles that he faces. When he comes upon issues like he faced at the nightclub that night, he would rather turn away then have a bunch of strangers lift his chair up some stairs and have to wait for someone to help him out.

It is a mystery to me how new establishments can open in Bermuda today and not be fully wheelchair accessible. In Canada and the US, those establishments would not be able to open their doors. As a matter of fact, a friend from Holland told me that even his new residential property had to be wheelchair accessible.

My son and the many other Bermudians who are in wheelchairs deserve to be treated with much more respect. They have been discriminated against and forgotten long enough. In a country such as ours, we need to ensure that all public places are made wheelchair accessible. Anything less is totally unacceptable.

GEORGI BARBOSA

Hamilton Parish

Racism's ugly head

November 28, 2004

Dear Sir,

I listened intently to the radio talk show Sunday on 1450 AM. The UBP has a speaker here to talk about race relations and I agreed with a few callers who said race relations between black and white people will never change, but I'll take it even further than that.

We have all kinds of people from many countries in Bermuda, these people come from many backgrounds and for this reason they may not be liked. People are dying because of religion in other parts of the world and as many people that would like to see this change there are a lot who don't.

For those who don't, I believe their prejudice is being passed on from generation to generation. For some, they have grown up with privilege and it's passed on to their children. When they become adults they are used to people being submissive. I note this on the way some people talk.

They will make racist remarks about people who look white like them or black like them, but because of class destination don't consider them equal.

Even some who may not have grown up rich will adopt an attitude of arrogance when they think they have made it to the top.

History has shown that the harder you try to stamp out racism of any kind, the more it'll raise its ugly head.

SHARONLYN WILSON

Hamilton Parish

Trial and error...

December 9, 2004

Dear Sir,

In response to Vox Orientalis's letter on December 4 concerning erroneous road signs, my favourite is “Railway Trial” on Cobbs Hill Road. This is a clear example of trial and error.

CLIVE R. DAKIN

Bike rider apologises

December 14, 2004

Dear Sir,

I just wanted to make an apology for treating a truck driver rudely.

I was taking my child to school and coming down Collector's Hill. I was on a bike, and I went to pass this huge truck with a flat bed. He tried to turn and almost hit us. Following this I was very rude to him, and I would like to apologise. So, to whoever you are out there, please accept my apology, and have a very merry Christmas.

APOLOGETIC

Paget

Sorry state of affairs

Dear Sir,

I have served for a number of years in different parts of Africa, including Eritrea and the Sudan.

Therefore I follow with interest the developments in different countries in Africa, but particularly so today in the case of what is happening in the Darfur region, inhabited by the Far people.

The Sudan is still a huge place and has no specific indigenous tribe, no common religion, nor a common language, although Sudan's Arabic is now the “official” language.

There is a long history of Arabic influence in the Red Sea area, across which sea, the Arab slave - traders raided for years.

At one time I myself was stationed in a rather notorious town which was on a direct West-East land route to the Red Sea then ultimately the port of Jeddah. Whilst I was there the Arabs were running slaves along that route past the town, and probably still are.

This is why they came to this part of Africa for in the first place, although perhaps in this day and age there is the more sinister objective of the world-wide spread of Islam. c.f. Europe, etc. (What are the Janjaweed doing in the Sudan?)

There is a solution to the situation in the Sudan; but one hardly dare suggest it; and now that Black Gold has been discovered, it is difficult to fund a satisfactory way but of the situation.

Almost the whole of Africa south of the Sahara is in a mess. One of the chief problems, which also affects other areas of the world is over-population. In Africa this is mainly brought about by the fact that many of the old tribal customs have gone, yet it is still, generally, a male-dominated society.

This results, amongst other things in indiscriminate sex, with the accompanying results: too many children, poverty, too little food, STDs (fairly common for years) and, of course the AIDS epidemics.

Connect this with the power-hungry factions and leaders, and corruption, which is endemic, and a sorry, sorry state of affairs exists.

Now, before anymore starts blaming the old colonial powers, let me remind them that countries in Africa have been independent for many years and have had a great deal of financial aid during this time.

The further problem is that many countries are politically unstable and have no sound economical infrastructure nor significant GDP.

Where the latter does exist at all, they cannot compete internationally with state-subsidised competitors.

Let us hope that the proposed UN intervention in the Sudan does obtain some measure of success, if it takes place, but I am afraid that they will be in for a long haul if it does.

AFROPHILE

New ICU ‘impressive'

December 15, 2004

Dear Sir,

We must all count our blessings if we are able to live a life free of the Intensive Care experience. Yesterday I was allowed a glimpse of the newly renovated Intensive Care Unit at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital; it is, dare I say it, mind-blowingly impressive.

The visionary architects, designers, builders and staff of our Hospital are to be applauded for the creation of a space that is completely sensitive to the psychological, emotional and physical needs of both patients (whether young or adult) and staff. The space needs to be seen to be believed; and may I say, Mr. Editor, whilst I genuinely hope none of your readers ever live to see the inside of the ICU, at least I can today give assurance that every measure has been taken by the professionals to ensure that the end result of many months, even years, of planning and building, has resulted in space that is vital, efficient and best of all, uplifting.

Congratulations, you guys.

E. RUTH KEMPE

Pembroke

Hurting ‘the little people'

December 14, 2004

Dear Sir,

Along with 44 other tenants of Ship's Wharf, Southside - representing over 150 blue collar workers, I attended a meeting called by the BLDC yesterday evening.

The two BLDC representatives stood there and baldly stated that every commercial tenant present would be given notice shortly to vacate their premises by the end of February, 2005, thus ending dozens of tenancies, some of which have existed for as many as ten years, with a stroke of the pen. They went on to say that any new warehouse building which is yet to be constructed (for which the lighting, roads, etc. have been in place for a number of years now) would not be available for six months after the end of the present commercial tenancies as it takes three months for the materials to arrive and anyway they have to find a new source as the manufacturer they used previously no longer ships outside the US.

The casualness and the arrogance with which they spoke about destroying the livelihoods of so many Bermudian entrepreneurs speaks volumes for their complete lack of knowledge of business and the lack of empathy and understanding of ‘good government' evinced by those who make these sweeping ‘directives'. Do they really think that these companies can just close down for four months or more, especially as the BLDC gave no guarantee that even if they were able to build new warehousing, the displaced tenants would have first choice of occupancy?

Some people in the meeting said ‘don't blame the messenger' - well sorry - as very well paid managers of BLDC - they are responsible - and it was shameful of them to hide behind their board who in turn hide behind the fact that apparently a directive has come directly from ‘the two shareholders', the Premier and the Minister of Finance! Who is there to appeal to except possibly the court of public opinion?

It is of course what we have come to expect from this Government - a dictatorial attitude that only jumps to the current short term political agenda - somewhat reminiscent of the way the Jews had their businesses destroyed in Nazi Germany. Certainly the two ‘soldiers' delivering the message yesterday had about as much sympathy as the Nazi Storm troopers whose excuse given later was that they too were only ‘following orders'. Just squash the little people.

One interesting point which was made at the meeting was that if each tenant does not take this lying down and takes out an injunction against their lease being terminated then it could be tied up in court for a quite a while. At least six months maybe, by which time new warehousing could be built. And who really believes that they will start building these ‘Peoples Park' housing units on February 1?There is still a large school to be completed and even a replacement bus terminal has taken six months simply to clear the site and put in a few concrete foundations.

SOUTHSIDE TENANT