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It starts in Miami at the Suriname Airways counter. One can always pick the Surinamese passengers; they are different from other Caribbean peoples. They are probably the most diverse multi-racial mix; quieter, more reserved yet one feels from their open friendly smiles, hints of something shared amongst themselves that outsiders can only guess at. The chaotically casual check-in disarms, disquiets, just as the applause the pilots receive as a reward for each successful touchdown affirms, Suriname Airways only owns one small twelve-seater and one never knows whose logo will appear on the larger chartered aircraft for the twice weekly flights. |
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South from Florida’s Keyes flying across the Caribbean, the reptilian humps of Cuba and Haiti, their mystical, arid landscapes forbidding; doze like giant water monsters in surreal blue. In Curacao one eats to avoid hassles with stern customs men who search for gut filled drug-runners. From here starboard seats give views to ragged coastal mountains and Venezuela. As a soft twilight falls, velveteen darkness closes in and we cross the coastline of South America. Now, not even one dim light glimmers below us to send a reassuring sign of fellow human habitation and we disappear into the unrelenting Amazon night. |
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ON FLYING INTO SURINAME AT NIGHT |
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With the aircraft droning on in suspended velveteen darkness people chat, attempt to read, snooze listlessly, a nervous quiet falling over the cabin; then sudden rustlings, flurries of excitement, everyone readying for landing as the plane follows suit, diving unexpectedly. What here, in the middle of jungle? But - like tiny fireflies the dim, flickering fluorescent lights of Paramaribo, sporadic, barely discernable in the all engulfing night, appear, strung out towards Zanderij and the tiny runway that lies amidst rampant uncut elephant grass. Everyone claps when safely down; the heat hitting like hammer-blows before we even reach the opened doors. |
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One sees only a quick flash of iridescence as wings flushed prawn red in afternoon sunlight take flight against a background of rice paddy green; lumbering Brahmin bulls adding brown to the mix of hues, topped off by cloudless blue skies. These birds catch the eye and draw them in as Firebirds in a Russian fable; only this is Suriname with its savannah and the mighty Amazonian jungle just beyond, all riddled by rivers with exotic names such as the Marowinje and Saramacca. These, Surinam’s Scarlet Ibis, elegant shrimp eaters of the waterways turn wondrous boiled pink from their food.
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The plane’s rear opens like a gaping sphincter from which we walk across the tarmac; our way illuminated only from lights in dimly lit concrete reception buildings still riddled with bullet holes, reminders of their civil wars. Desultory groups of people await friends and family but I must take my place in a separate queue, hoping like mad my name will be on the list of those lucky enough to be granted entry permits. Sweating in the visa office the laggardly pace at which the three men write out my visa papers in triplicate slows me down into Suriname time.
Colonial architecture – Paramaribo |
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Travelogue