“Fundamentally, poverty is a denial of choices and opportunities, a violation of human dignity ... It means not having enough to feed and clothe a family, not having a school or clinic to go to … It means insecurity, powerlessness, and the exclusion of individuals, households, and communities. It means susceptibility to violence, and it often implies living in marginal or fragile environments, without access to clean water or sanitation.”
—United Nations, June 1998
The first time I saw Tanty, she was standing outside JTA supermarket in Carlton Centre. As I was about to enter the supermarket, she said, “Asking for a lil help to buy some food, please.”
She spoke so softly that I almost didn’t hear her. I did not stop to talk to her, but I purchased some basic items and handed them to her on my way out. About three weeks later, I saw her again on High Street in San Fernando. This time she said, “Asking for a lil help to buy some medicine, please.”
This time, I stopped to talk to her. She was half the age that I thought she was—a hard life made her look older. She was illiterate and married when she was 17 years old to a man twice her age. He was an alcoholic who physically abused her every time he had money to buy rum. They lived in a one-bedroom apartment owned by her husband’s former boss, who felt sorry for them. She said that they managed to be okay enough.
She planted a small garden, which provided food, and he worked in construction whenever he was sober. They were able to afford the basics. However, he died from COVID about three years ago, and everything went downhill from there.
Their teenage son started liming with the boys on the block, doing drugs. One day, he was attacked by men from another block. He suffered a head injury and has been unstable since. She is not sure if it is drug addiction or the head injury, but he has become very aggressive and mentally unstable.
He smashed the neighbour’s car and was arrested, and he is now in St Ann’s Hospital. Before he was sent to St Ann’s she spent all her money taking him to doctors and buying medicine for him. Whatever she had remaining was spent on medication for herself, as she suffers from a heart condition.
After the pandemic, she grew vegetables on the land next to where she lived. She would sell these on the side of the road, so she still had an income. People started stealing all her crops, so she stopped planting.
She then started selling anything she could make—pholourie, anchar, sugar cake, and fudge. A couple of times the police warned her that she could not sell without a food badge, so she goes to different areas or hides when she sees them passing.
Sometimes she sells enough to buy food, but there are days when she barely sells anything.
Her biggest problem is affording her medication, the price of which has increased significantly. She is in the clinic at San Fernando General Hospital, but she cannot remember when she last got medicine from the hospital pharmacy. She said, “The pharmacy in the hospital said they don’t know when they will get this tablet, so try the health centre. The health centre doesn’t have it either. The nurse there called two other hospitals, but none of them had, so every month I spend about $1,000 on that. I am supposed to take two tablets a day, but I can’t afford it, so I take one.”
Tanty is very sad and ashamed that she has to beg on the streets. She is willing to do housework, and sometimes she will go from door to door in different communities, asking if people need anyone to do housework. Only twice she got work because most people are suspicious of having strangers in their homes, given the high crime situation.
She went to her MP’s office to get help, and they put her on to the Ministry of Social Development and Family Services. However, she does not have some of the documents needed to process her application—a valid ID card, an electronic birth certificate, and a utility bill.
For the past two years, she has been trying to get these documents but with no one to guide her, it’s been difficult for her. She said she feels like she is stuck in a deep black hole, and she just cannot come out of it, no matter how hard she tries.
“The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”—Franklin D Roosevelt
