The Bird Race is intended as the first in a series of books to introduce young hearts to old stories and to promote ideas of caring and respect for each other, animals and the environment. The author relies on the stories he heard from his parents and grandparents told for a time when television and the internet did not exist. However, the themes of being grateful, cautious and respectful remain as relevant as any time before. The Bird Race features a canary, a species once used to warn miners of toxic gases in the mines and now used for warnings of all kinds. As in the old tradition of storytelling, these birds have language and can even understand humans. Unfortunately, for birds in this story, humans see birdspeak as something that could be best appreciated in captivity. This story begins in the backlands near the canefields of the author’s childhood in Guyana and features the cherished and peculiar cultural practice of capturing and caging birds. But there is hop...
Indigenous citizens of Guyana and Venezuela must lead a challenge together against the idea of a border dispute. As the first ‘American’ victims of European expansion, Indigenous ‘Americans’ have an opportunity, and obligation, to lead the resistance against war, European expansion and resource seizure in the Americas as part of a global, intentional, reconnection of all indigenous peoples hemmed-in by borders drawn by European settlers. No one should feel left-out. We are all indigenous somewhere. And some of us, like myself and most of you, have multiple indigeneities and therefore multiple levels of responsibility. The Warrao nation that straddles the Guyana/Venezuela border, the other 8 nations in Guyana, the Maori in New Zealand, the Lenape in the USA, Inuit of Canada, Papuans, Africa's Ogoni, Hausa, Tutsi, the Adivasi of India and the so-called Aborigines of Australia, all need to add their voices. This is not about Guyana's and Venezuela’s legal claims to the land. Euro...