So much that is unusual to the point of dysfunction, in the Trump administration, from his Press Secretary to his fuming over his daughter’s lagging business; the struggle to get Education nominee DeVos appointed, requiring VP Pence to break a tie; Iran and North Korea’s missiles, neither illegal; his concrete curtain against Mexico; and other peccadilloes; to the abrupt firing of National Security adviser, Micheal Flynn for breach of trust by denying that he had talked to a Russian diplomat re sanctions during the transition period. The unfolding of Trump’s term is déjà vu for me.

I reproduce here a page from The Indelible Red Stain, Bk 2;, 2nd ed.: “It is worth stressing the degradation that world politics and US-style business had brought to developing countries, retarding growth and stymying whatever little progress they had made since WWII, as the USA stomped over nations, old and new, and shamelessly seized power over them, colliding head-on with an equally rapacious, if less confident USSR, and now China. A physical clash had threatened as ideological paranoia raged in each camp. US armies in full regalia, and bristling with weapons and engines of war, roamed the world seeking to destroy 'Communist' entities wherever the Soviets or Chinese did not hold sway, using the phony argument of spreading 'democracy'. Corporate oligarchy and plutocracy, perhaps, but it is doubtful that the mighty republic could ever recognise, much less create a true democracy.
“Since WWII, it has targetted Korea…South-east Asia ('ended' in US defeat); Cuba, and others in Africa (Zaire and Angola 1975-80s, Chad 1982, Libya,); Myanmar, Iraq 1963, 1991, 2003; Philippines, Syria 2012, Ukraine 2014; Australia 1973-5; Central and South America (BG 1953-64, Bolivia 1964, Brazil 1962-3, Chile 1964-73, Costa Rica 1955, 1970-71, Cuba 1959-now, Santo Domingo 1963-5, Ecuador 1963, Guatemala 1954, Jamaica 1976-80, Nicaragua 1981-90, Panama 1989-90, Grenada 1983, Suriname 1982-4, Venezuela…); Albania 1991, Bulgaria 1990, Greece 1967, Communist partners 1947-1992, and Yugoslavia 1999-2000,…Kosovo 2005, Libya, Syria, Egypt, Somalia, Yemen, Russia, and others, in the last decade). To obtain a foothold in the Levant, the US armed Israel to the teeth, and legitimised Ashkenazim terrorists. States that would feel the full force and venom of US might for the long haul, included Cambodia 1967-75; Laos (1953-75), Viet Nam (1955-75), Burma; Iraq, Syria, Iran, 1978- present, and Cuba. More and more killings are done by US drones.
“Terror lingers in many of these, and elsewhere, selected by the USA for the gift of 'democracy', even where war had ceased, for example, Laos, which forty years after hostilities had ended, still suffers injury and death from unexploded bombs, hundreds of thousands of them, both regular big bombs and cluster types, that the US had methodically dropped there, up to 1975. 'How could seemingly rational people – Americans like me – imagine they could win the war in Vietnam by subjecting Laos to such indiscriminate destruction? TD Allman, writing in the National Geographic, August, 2015, lamented;' ...ask any Laotian what was happening in the country. Every lady selling lotus blossoms in the morning market, every rickshaw boy offering you every imaginable enticement, knew all about not just the Ho Chi Minh trail but the secret CIA army and the secret US bombing of civilian populations. They also knew of the secret US involvement in the opium trade.
“This was the same USA that called Burnham a liar just two years after the end of atrocities in Laos, which had received a gift of 270 million cluster bombs and 4 million big bombs, about one ton per person! 80 million bomblets and 40,000 big bombs, which failed to explode then, do so from time to time, continuing to maim and kill, only now many of the victims may be too young to realise that they are casualties of a war that never really ended…
“In the same year, the UN General Assembly debated a Charter of Economic Rights sponsored by Mexico, which advanced the idea that sovereign states had the right to choose an economic system without external intrusion, to regulate activities of foreign companies within their borders, and to expropriate them. The USA scoffed, and instead promoted the WTO (1995) and FTAs globally, eroding these protections to dominate all business and expose countries to crippling financial penalties, under the FTAs’ notorious Chapter 11 when invoked. Today Mexico’s wealthy have become wealthier under FTAs, while its poor watch hungrily as their birthright falls to US corporations.”
Perhaps might help Mexicans by scrapping NAFTA. At least, the meeting with Trudeau was civilised.

I came across the French phrase recently, namely, “Faire l’école buissonnière”, which translated, means to skip school, to play hooky, or be truant.
Of course, I knew right away if I were to say this to my dear friend, the reply would be: “What?! That isn’t how we say it back home!”
“Well, how do we say it back home?” I then leaned back to listen, thankful a million French speakers were not in the vicinity. “Back home, we say, ‘Lacquer beach’. It means to run away from school and spend the day bathing!”

“No, you’re pronouncing how it sounds. Back home it is, ‘L’école biche’. You’re sounding like that character Big City in Sam Selvon’s ‘The Lonely Londoners’ who learned to say words one way, and would beat and cuss anybody who dared to tell him otherwise.”
Then came the trip down memory lane.
“Boy, I remember when we used to break beach from school, and go and pelt mango. We used to breakaway from school. That is what “lacquer beach” means. It means to break out of school, as if you breaking out of prison and running for the hills. We used to go into the hills and thief everything you could eat, from A to Z, avocado to zaboca. Yes! The good old days!”
“Do you know avocadoes and zabocas are the same thing?” I asked.
Indeed, thinking about it now, I recall the empty seats in the classroom some days when a band of classmates (mostly the boys) would decide to skip school and head into the bushes. Then it would be what was called the “season”. This mean a fruit tree was ready – perhaps the mangoes were at its optimum state, not of ripeness, but green and sour enough to be eaten with salt and pepper. Or the guavas were at the half-ripe stage just before the birds were ready to descend and feed with happy flutterings of joy. Or the plum trees were so over-laden with fruits the soft branches were bent enough for a young boy to reach up, pull it down and eat it off the branch.
Whatever the reason, it was always the low-hanging fruit that got some of the boys into major trouble with the teacher for skipping class and heading into the bush, or as the French say, “faire l’école buissonnière”.
The book, Dictionary of the English/Creole of Trinidad & Tobago: On Historical Principles, by Lise Winer, lists the phrase “make l’école biche” as being absent from school without permission. The listing also cites “faire l’école buissonnière”, adding it means, “to make school in the bush”. Of course, this is certainly stated with some humour, and mostly irony. Interestingly, the listing goes on to cite another instance of the phrase, as in “l’école buishe”, which is perhaps the French patois getting closer in spelling to “bush”.
Winer’s citing also touches on an important point, which is the price typically paid by the young men who decided to attend classes in the bushes, and not the classroom. What it cites is the fallout in the number of lashes doled out the next day, in what was then called “benching” for “breaking biche” and being absent from school without permission. In this case, flogging consisted of 40 lashes, called a “benching” for “making l’école buishe”.
Of course, I was never one to skip classes, despite the temptation being held out to me when my classmates were putting together the team to head out foraging in the bushes.
“What!? You don’t want to come? Think about all the plums you are going to miss! And the mangoes! You don’t know what you missing!”
How I would have loved to skip a class or two then, just for a break from the rigorous schedules of learning and preparing for examinations. It was just that I was being taught the best of manners at home in not double-dipping into anything. At dinner time my mother would say, “Take what you can eat, and nothing more.” So it was from my early childhood where I understood it was not right to take seconds of anything, at breakfast, lunch, and dinner-time, and especially when it came to dessert.
So it was I did not really care for a second round of punishment for skipping classes – one from the teacher, who wielded a heavy guava rod, and used it with the skill of a virtuoso drummer whenever a truant boy broke the rules. Then this would be followed with another round of drumming, this time from a vexed parent, who would find out about the class skipping offence first hand when the teacher visited the home of each offender.
As I said, I was taught early that double-dipping was discourteous, whether it was for ice-cream, or for the rod of correction, either at school, or worse from at home, since it would mean no dessert afterwards.
My good friend Big City said wisely, “You know, I think the poor work ethic back home has something to do with all this ‘Lacquer beach’. What do you think?”

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