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I grew up playing games on Pearls Airport. I have spent hours flying kites up and down its tarmac. I grew up going to the garden with my grandfather to take care of his cattle, cow dung accessorizing the airstrip, fertilizing the green grass from which they came. I grew up playing in the abandoned aircrafts that are visible signs of war, the remains of political powers and great nations.
I grew up attending events on the abandoned airstrip and spending Easter Sundays on the beach with friends and family. I grew up with the mysteries of that airport; the histories inherited through night-time stories and fragmented tales—stories of drugs being smuggled at night. I grew up knowing that young couples would go for strolls on moonlit nights and do what couples do. I grew up with the memory of the gentleman who hung himself on top of the hill; on Sunday mornings he would bring us vegetables from his garden. I am still haunted by the news of his suicide. I grew up with the early morning murder of a farmer in his garden by someone we all knew and feared.
I grew up running with friends chasing the mirage of heat steaming from the tarmac on a sunny day. I grew up with the death of our neighbor Dorset Peters, killed on 19th October, 1983. I grew up with the memories of Gemma Belmar, my aunt’s best friend, also killed on that same day. These stories contour my childhood. I grew up crossing the river that ran behind Ronnie Bubb’s house, jumping from stone to stone until I reached the other side—Pearls Airport. These memories, I inhabit. I grew up with stories of my family hearing the sounds of war, U.S. helicopters at 4 a.m. To this day, the throb of a propeller triggers memories of fear and hopelessness; memories deeply embedded in tissue and nerves, 35 years later—ask my uncle.
I grew up hearing car engines racing along the fast tarmac, modernity. I grew up with so much and simultaneously, with so little but,
I grew up.
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Atiba Rougier is an anthropologist living in Brooklyn. This piece of writing remembers his childhood on the island. It describes what it was like growing up in Grenada in a post-revolution society where stories are not just stories but impregnated with history. Where tales are burdened by truths and where fiction is not distinct from fantasy. It focuses on sounds (loud, soft, whispers, and the intervals of silence) and on memories. It is hopeful. His writings connect him to his family, to the volcanic soil that nourishes the Grenadian people, and it reminds him of a sense of self and place—past, present, and future.