Morris Cargill

THE OTHER day during a few moments of idleness I got to thinking of the kind of food I ate when I was a child. I am talking, of course of the early 1920s.

In those days my diet was largely prescribed by my strict Jamaican nanny who had very definite ideas about what was good for children. I have been trying to remember which of the foods in my home were imported. Wheaten flour of course to make bread. 'Quaker Oats' for my porridge in the morning. Some dry biscuits called Marvin's which came in a large tin. I suppose that the rice that I was given was imported, though I do remember that some rice was produced in Westmoreland. And of course every now and again as a treat I was given some sardines out of a tin which must, too, have been imported.

In those days, however, modern refrigeration and, of course the deep-freeze, were very much in the future. In consequence I cannot remember ever seeing any imported meats or fish. There was, of course salt fish, that, with ackee, formed quite a regular part of my diet. I never saw bacon at home. Women would come along selling chickens, two or three live ones tied together by their feet. One or perhaps two would be selected by my nanny if she considered that they were plump enough.

'Boiled fowl' was the order of the day. And of course, for me, chicken soup from which the fat would be removed by the simple process of floating a sheet of blotting paper upon the surface which soaked up all the fat. Ha! blotting paper! An essential commodity needed when one wrote with pens using liquid ink. I haven't seen a sheet of blotting paper for years. There was also a horrible thing called salt butter, I suppose imported, but I was never given any of it.

As to other meats the only beef I ever saw was mince, probably because anything else would have been too tough to chew. I would occasionally be given lamb chops from local sheep, sold by a gentleman who was called the Pottinger and who, like the chicken ladies, visited our house from time to time. I was never given curried goat because my nanny forbade any kind of curry which she regarded as unsuitable for children.

For the same reason I was not allowed coffee and the cocoa that I drank did not come from abroad in tins. It was bought in the market in what I remember were small round balls which were grated. As to vegetables, apart from a regular diet of rice I was given various kind of yams, but I don't remember ever seeing a potato. And I was also forced to eat a lot of what was called spinach, which was of course callaloo. My diet, and that of my parents too, was in those days rather spartan, and looking back, I realise that Jamaica must have been very nearly self-sufficient in food.

Other memories come to me. On one occasion my nanny decreed that I should be given goat's milk instead of cow's milk. So a large nanny-goat became part of our household. I don't remember what happened to the goat. Her regime did not last for very long, for which I was very glad for I disliked goat's milk.

Except for our journeys to England by banana boat I cannot remember seeing much of 'foreign' food, and it was not until I was 14 years old, when I was sent to school in England, that I ever ate an apple. I was familiar with strawberries because they were grown in the garden of our summer home called Straw- berry Hill.

Perhaps we should blame the current invasion of imported foods upon modern technology in the form of refrigeration and the deep-freeze.

Some other thoughts

I suppose too that we can blame many of our current ills upon technology, for films and television have expanded our awareness of violence. We now import not only 'foreign' foods but foreign habits and fashions as well including a wide assortment of sophisticated firearms. I do not know from where we import our callousness. Nobody in my younger days in Jamaica would ever have rounded up the poor and the mentally handicapped and put them in a truck for deportation. Nor do I remember, as a young lawyer, ever having seen or heard of children being thrown along with adults into filthy cells.

Apart from giving us an excuse not to work, which of course is always welcomed, I cannot see the point of the holidays prescribed for Emancipation and Indepen-dence. A nation which treats its poor like cattle can hardly be said to be emancipated nor can it be said to be independent when it depends so heavily upon imported money and imported foods and goods of every conceivable kind.

Talking of the delight in holidays. I see that the trade union known as the Bar Association has won its battle for lazy lawyers against the Chief Justice. I see that the same trade union is sharply criticising the Government for its intention to withdraw from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Beautiful and splendid reasons are given for our continued participation in the IACHR. I suspect, however, that the real reason is that the lawyers find an infinity of appeals very profitable.

At the moment our entire legal system seems to be in a bit of shambles. It would be so much better if our distinguished lawyers exercised their great minds in helping the Chief Justice to improve matters.

Speaking personally I am very glad that I gave up the practice of law nearly half a century ago. I am very careful of the company I keep.