Syne Village

Syne Village (pronounced “sign” village) is home. It’s changed a lot since I lived there, but when I talk about “back home” it is still Syne Village. When I was a child there was not much to it. I remember when “Darcie Phoo-Phoo” (Aunt Darcie) and family built their home on the hill next to us I resented the open field where I used to roam and find high adventure, invaded by a house. Later, of course, it meant that we had playmates in our cousins Marilyn, Clarence, Rawlins and, later, Roy. But at the time the invasion was not welcome.

Syne Village is located on the San Fernando-Siparia-Erin Road equi-distant between Penal and Siparia. It stretches for a couple of miles between Charlo Village on the Penal side, and De Gannes Village on the Siparia side. In my childhood the village was mostly along the road, although now it has expanded into the interior through side roads and traces on both sides.

Pa’s family moved to Syne Village from Siparia Road when Dada (Jaimungal Seesaran) bought some lands there. Dada (grandfather) was Nanee’s eldest brother. Nanee (Miriam Moorti) was really our Agee (paternal grandmother) but our cousin Pearly lived with us and called her Nanee, because she was Pearly’s Nanee (maternal grandmother), and we grew up calling her Nanee, too. Dada was the oldest male relative (although Nanee was older) and was recognized as the head of the clan. Ma’s family (the Mahabirs) lived in Mondesir Road, Fyzabad, and later moved to Rochard Road near Barrackpore.

Our home was almost exactly two and a half miles from Penal and/or Siparia. By the time I came along Penal was our home town. We went to the Jagat-ka-Prakash (Light of the World) Presbyterian Church in Penal, and to the Penal C.M. (Canadian Mission) School, which was later renamed the Penal Presbyterian School. Both my older sisters Cecilia and Ermine completed elementary school there. In my last year my brothers Ezekiel and Nahum and youngest sister Evangeline and I transferred to Siparia Union School. (It had a better record in preparing students for High School entrance under the feared and revered Mrs. Niamath, better known as “schoolmistress”.) Later brothers Joshua and Moses would attend there, too. But our mailing address remained and still remains Syne Village, Penal (although we occasionally got mail in Siparia, too).

Our home was on a hill on an acre of land. Next to the road, “down-the-hill”, was another third of an acre which my parents owned, of which a large section was occupied by a pond, when I was a child. My parents had bought the land from Bhokhal Sadhu, who apparently used the pond for his “pujas” (prayer ceremonials). The pond was a village well, had wide concrete steps going into the pond, and I remember village women coming there to do their laundry. I remember, too, alligator stealing chickens, and our having to be extremely careful if we ventured near the pond. It later had to be filled in because it bred mosquitoes as well as alligators. In addition my parents owned a couple of acres of cocoa land “in the trace” (about a quarter of a mile from the road, accessed by a side road.) Here they grew cocoa, coffee, bananas, oranges, grapefruit and other fruit (and yams! real yams, not sweet potatoes). We made frequent excursions going “in the land” to harvest fruit in season, as well as to help pick cocoa, and coffee.

Niece Rowena wrote a research paper on the history of Syne Village when she was at the University of the West Indies a few years ago. I have a copy somewhere, although I am sure I don’t know where.