Coil : Archery, Phagwah, culture..

Participants in the 11th Annual Wildlife Festival, March 2016 held under the auspices of the North Rupununi Junior Wildlife & Development Council

by Vidyaratha Kissoon

The teenage girl raised the bow and aimed at the target. Her face was relaxed. One arrow was mounted and the other two were on the ground. The girl managed to hit the target twice in the second round. The sun was up, the wind was high and sand grains were blowing from under the dry savannah grass. Many Amerindians use bows and arrows to hunt. The girl and other children were participating in the Archery competition in the 11^th Annual Wildlife Festival in the North Rupununi.

The bows and the arrows are light. In the Hindu epic, the Ramayana, there is a story of a heavy bow from Lord Shiva– Shiva Dhanush. The bow was given to King Janak. His daughter Sita, as a child , had lifted the bow while playing. The story goes that King Janak decided to use the bow as a test to find a husband as good as her. He arranged the Swayamvara where her husband would be chosen. Rama was the only man who managed to lift the bow, and break it.

Rama is depicted with a bow and arrows. There are other references to bows and arrows in the Hindu tradition. In another Swayamvara, in the Mahabharata, the suitors of Draupadi had to hit the reflection of the eye of a fish which was rotating in a pool.

Hindus though have not maintained any tradition of archery in Guyana.

I saw a Hindu man with his licensed revolver in the Rupununi. He is a man who used to pose with the PPP and now, as easy as the children lifted the bow, poses with the new Government.

I only wanted to kill mosquitoes in the Rupununi, I would not use a revolver.

Another devout Hindu man in mandir had asked me to hold on to his firearm when he went to pray. I had said no, no. I could imagine back in the day the bows and arrows and weapons would have been left outside, but with licensed firearms, it is not so easy.

Culture evolves – bows and arrows , to other weapons. I had forgotten that bows and arrows were part of the Guyanese tradition.

I was hooked on watching the arrows leaving the bows, and landing anywhere. I know that this was warfare downplayed. The boys and girls made the thing seem easy.

I held a bow, first time I have held any weapon in a long time (cutlass included). The contraption was light. The first arrow fell not far from my feet – an experience many men have as they age with aiming other things. I would have not been able to find any wife in any Swayamvara of old.

The Archery competition in the Rupununi was not the only one this week.

Archery Guyana had their indoor competition. The Archery shoot off launched the ’50 Shades of Games’. The National Sports Commission probably choose this very unique and innovative name for Guyana’s 50^th Independence Games to show how far Guyana has progressed. It probably has nothing to do with the book and film which depict a man’s stalking, abuse and violation of a woman as romance and love.

Archery Guyana apparently is a recent initiative. According to a Guyana Times report, there was training in form and the conditions for international competitions. There was training in making low cost bows from locally available materials. “The first phase of the seminar which concluded 

Wednesday saw participants instructed in hands-on fabrication of PVC target archery bows, complete with stabiliser system… Members were trained in the safe use of power tools and handling chemicals in order to shape and assemble the low-cost archery tools.

This phase materialised several PVC bows for use by the members of the GSSF…”

The bows in the Rupununi were made from wood which looked like purple-heart, the string made from the fibres of a vine , pasted on with a dark gum from a tree. The arrows were made from a reed.

It is not clear whether Archery Guyana includes Archery Rupununi and how local bows would have a place in International competitions.

Culture and development though might mean as world standard archery spreads, the bows would move from purple-heart to PVC just like 50 shades of Guyana’s Independence games.

While archery might not have moved from the Rupununi to the Coastland, Phagwah had moved to Rupununi. Radio Paiwomak played Phagwah songs and sent greetings. One Amerindian woman laughed at me and told me that if I come back for ‘heritage’, she would rub kari juice all over me .. “that is our culture”

The night before , a teacher chatted with me. Soft spoken, quiet. Memories of the old teachers around Guyana who were read a lot, and who were not wealthy. We talked about the state of education, early school leavers – he estimates that about 40% of his students who complete primary school do not complete Secondary school.

He explained about the travel around the North. The river with low water . We laughed at “When buck man say it rough, dat mean it rough” .

“Would you like something local to drink” he asked me in a softer voice.

I stuttered about not drinking alcohol. We were at the wild life festival where a boy, Stefano had done a poem about ‘Alcohol is a bad man’. He recited the poem at the start at the festival and at the end – a plaintive message to ‘stop drinking alcohol’.

There is a struggle, without bows and arrows, between people who don’t want alcohol and people who encourage drinking.

One woman said that she was working with the children when they were disturbed by men who were drinking. She complained but nobody bothered with her – common cultural practice in Guyana when alcohol is present and people appeal for the consumption to stop.

The teacher explained the local alcohol. The process for kari , and paiwari involves fermentation. He said that kari is stronger than high wine.

Dousing with kari juice would be a new way to use alcohol at Phagwah.

I stopped playing Phagwah when I realised that alcohol had taken over from God. While God is in everything apparently, including alcohol, the ease with which a Hindu religious celebration could turn violent is common. There are accidents, incidents of violence, and violence which leads to death – all involving revellers who find God in their liquor.

The Hindus had bhang (cannabis), but civilisation took over and alcohol replaced bhang. One Surinamese company in Guyana, aiming to be the largest distributor in the Guianas, extended love for Phagwah with big pictures of liquor.

The Virat Sabha objected to the ad. Tragic irony really given that many devout Hindus sell and share alcohol on Phagwah Day and traditionally do their own thing and not bother with letter writing.

The company probably thought it was doing a good thing in feeding into local cultural practices. 

There are other events, Phagwah Wash Downs , etc with alcohol available cheaply.

A few of the foreigners who visited have enjoyed the alcoholic celebrations – one man “Phagwah without alcohol is impossible”. They might not know anything else about the reason for Phagwah except having a good time with the natives.

A Christian woman engaged me about the Hindus on her street. Shame on the bar she said, (named after the woman in the Ramayana who had lifted the heavy Shiva Dhanush as a child. I tried to say to her that maybe the Hindus worshipping there were finding God in the alcohol and dance hall.

Alcohol at Phagwah and other religious events like weddings; the different dates for Diwali, all part of the Unity in Diversity message of Hindu culture.

The calls for no alcohol at Phagwah are like the arrow which fell at my feet – far from achieving anything. The company with full page ad has achieved their objective.

Guyanese culture is this uneven mix of bows made from purple-heart and bows made from PVC , Phagwah without alcohol, and Phagwah fuelled by alcohol, good and bad.