By Johnny Coomansingh
Without mentioning Mimae and Flemo, two denizens of Kowlessur Road, Sangre Chiquito, my story about the Cocoa Woman would be incomplete. This story is part of the cocoa estate culture that was extant in Trinidad during the dying stages of the cocoa industry in Trinidad. My book Cocoa Woman illustrates the activities of Neeta, my godmother, in her quest for wealth and who she used and abused for every penny she acquired.
Mimae and Flemo lived in a little bamboo and dirt wattle hut on the summit of a hill almost measuring the same elevation as Neeta’s house. Because of a huge bamboo patch, the hut was hardly recognizable from the road below. No one knew whether anyone really lived on that hill, only for the presence of a thin wisp of smoke that emerged from the chulha (fireside) that faded as it rose over the tops of the bamboo patch.
Never once did I walk up the steep reddened dirt path on that hill to Flemo and Mimae’s house. In fact, I was told not to go there. Neeta, my godmother, cautioned that they were not the type company that I should keep. Flemo was an alcoholic. The scent of booze was always on his breath. A brown-colored tobacco pipe was always stuck between his drooping lips at the corner of his mouth. Living his life for the moment, he never cared if Sunday fell on Monday.
Mimae stammered. Presenting a greasy, rounded face, her almost toothless mouth would mumble some words in quick succession. It was difficult to understand her erratic speech while she manipulated a half-burnt, non-filter, Anchor Special cigarette between her discoloured lips. It was as though she was eating, smoking, laughing, and talking at the same time.
In a calf-length, unhemmed, heavy, dirty, brown-cotton dress that swung on her shoulder like a sack, Mimae walked barefooted up and down Kowlessur Road. Neeta informed that Mimae had relatives living in London and they would usually send her a couple of dresses; dresses she wore down to rags.
Moving swiftly from side to side, as though questioning everyone’s move, Mimae’s eyes had a wild focus somewhat like a crazed, trapped cat. Her gait was likened to an untidy, stomping, aggressive march. Her calloused feet looked tough; her toes were spread apart like a fan and they never looked clean or washed. It was abundantly noticeable that fissures in the thickened skin of her feet overpowered her muddied heels.
Her tough curly hair was short and matted, probably not seeing a comb or brush for an extended period of time. Her greasy face offered obvious signs that Mimae was hygienically challenged; a person’s olfactory lobes would go on high alert when she passed by. It was obvious that she did not see the need for a bath, the maintenance of dental care, or cleansing her muddied feet.
Without any doubt, most people in the little village that sprung up in the recesses of Kowlessur Road avoided Mimae. Despite her unkempt attire and seemingly rough grunting responses, the residents in the little village would still hail out to her with a daily greeting; they more or less pitied Mimae’s penury. Nevertheless, when harvest time for the cocoa, coffee or citrus (grapefruit) crop came around, Mimae would find herself up the hill at Neeta’s house in the quest for work.
Neeta, a cocoa estate proprietor, would intermittently employ Mimae to do little menial tasks and odd jobs, but during ‘croptime’ every hand was needed. With enough labor, Mimae collected quite a few dollars for her work. Mimae never wore any protective covering on her feet. She worked in the same dress and probably slept in the same attire. I never saw her in any other form of apparel.
Hired to help harvest the coffee crop, Mimae would pick one or two baskets of coffee for her day’s work. A basket of ripe coffee berries weighed around 50 pounds. She would be paid at the end of the day a sum of ten Trinidad and Tobago dollars per basket. Flemo her significant other, would sometimes come to help her while she worked to fill her baskets.
Coffee picking is tough work which requires a large paal sewed from several pieces of hemp or jute bags. I knew these bags as “blue seam” bags. Sometimes eight to ten feet in diameter, the paal would be spread and moved around under the branches of the coffee trees to collect the ripe berries. After picking the branches there would be several leaves and twigs mixed in with the berries. Two people would then winnow the contents of the paal, remove the trash and pour the berries into a basket. I had my full share of picking coffee.
Most of the coffee trees were of the Robusta variety that bore profusely. Although touted for its fine flavour, the few old stands of Arabica coffee trees present on the plantation did not produce much. The ripe red coffee berries attracted all kinds of arthropods inclusive of scorpions and spiders. Black biting ants would also nest in the leaves of the trees and sometimes a snake or two would fall on the shoulders of coffee pickers. The snakes were present because of the other creatures around that served as their food source.
I remember Eula who was another regular coffee picker. She was very, very afraid of the snakes. If she saw a snake she would drop everything in her hand and run, really run far, very far away from the tree yelling “O gawd! O gawd! Snake! Snake! Snake!” as she ran. Eula could not control her hysteria when she saw the little green, non-poisonous snakes hanging from the coffee branches. It was so much fun to see skinny, redskin Eula travelling at light speed; literally floating through the field like a water skipper on a lake. Eula came to work quite early, and the first thing she would say to me was, “SSSSnake! Snake!”
When Flemo was not helping Mimae he would be occupied in cutlassing (brushcutting) cocoa trees for anyone who would employ him. Cocoa production is dependent on good management of the trees. Keeping the roots of the cocoa trees free of weeds was very important; the less competition with weeds, the better for the cocoa crop. Manual cutlassing cocoa was quite a laborious job.
Around the cocoa plantations in Kowlessur Road, Flemo was a famous cutlass man with enough style. With a pipe lodged at the corner of his mouth, he would slowly pass by with a broad grin that would suggest that you are not better than me. I made him out to be a kind of sagaboy (a smooth-talking, fancy-dressing young man who seeks the affection of several women) in his day.
Despite his garb, he was a man full of pride. His muddied Wellintons (tall rubber boots) were not perfect. One side was shorter than the next, and he did not care if they were busted up. The fact remains that he had some footwear.
Over his shoulder he carried a crook-stick, his brushing cutlass, a dirty-looking, well-worn, plastic one-gallon water bottle, and a Nicholson file wrapped in polythene. A brushing cutlass is a tool constructed from a flat, sharpened 18-24-inch machete (cutlass) blade bent at an angle which is then fitted with a long wooden handle and tied together with binding wire. The brushing cutlass has many names including swiper, boze, langmat, and zagai.
Cutlassing requires strength, fortitude, and a certain kind of art in wielding the brushing cutlass. In those days a man would receive a mere five cents to clear one cocoa tree of brush (tall bush). Not only was the cutlass man required to clear the heavy bush, he also understood that it was his chore as well to roundeer (to clean around) the root of the cocoa tree and clean off the excess moss on the trunk of the tree as far as his hands would allow. Cleaning the moss off the trunk of the tree aids with the production of more flowers on the cocoa tree. More flowers meant more pods. In those days, many men could only realize five dollars for a day’s work, having cutlassed 100 cocoa trees. Cutlassing from sun up to sundown, there were others who could make ten dollars for their day’s work.
[Photo by author]
As the name implies, a crook-stick is a wooden tool cut from a branch with an 80° to 90° hook on a handle almost as long as the swiper handle. This special stick aids someone in the act of cutlassing. As Neeta would say, the crook-stick offers a peton, somewhat of a third “foot” for greater balance. Assuming the person is right-handed, the crook stick is held in the left hand as a means of control to hook and pull the brush or grass, which allows clearance for the fall of the swiper blade at the base of the bush. This synchronized action allows the brush to be cut with ease. Without the crook-stick, cutlassing will be more than a chore; a definite struggle. A good crook stick is a treasured tool. Many cutlass men do not lend out their crook-stick or brushing cutlass.
Flemo worked faithfully for Neeta, but there were many instances when Flemo thought that he was being robbed. Sad to say, Flemo was probably correct in his assumption. For this reason, Flemo stopped working for her. Although she offered a small cup of coffee sometimes to her workers, she did not really care about who worked for her. She saw the dollars. That’s all. I noticed the coldness between them and guessed that she was trying somehow to short-pay Flemo for some cutlass work which he had done.
With Neeta, there was always some error in checking the several hundreds of cocoa trees that Flemo cutlassed. This was Neeta’s management style. She always complained about the work people did for her; always dissatisfied. The work was never good enough because she never wanted to pay. It was difficult for money to leave her hands. Although she promised Flemo a better deal by raising the price to cutlass the cocoa trees, he decided that he did not want to work for her anymore.
Flemo reasoned that he could not trust her. One day, I overheard him saying, “Not because ah man poor and struggling yuh go want tuh take advantage ah him. Some people feel dat yuh have tuh wuk fuh Congo jahbone.” With Flemo’s disappointment, Mimae also stopped working for Neeta. On this cocoa plantation there obviously was a high turnover of workers.
In many ways, Neeta was more of a slave driver. Flemo’s and Mimae’s story is only one of the instances where Neeta was involved with the people on Kowlessur Road. The Kowlessur Road interior village was small, and invariably, she knew everybody. Some of them said nothing to her while others became her sworn enemy.
(Adapted from my book: Cocoa Woman – a narrative about Cocoa Estate Culture in the British West Indies).
