LIKE A WILDFLOWER ON ...

FROM PAGE XII

“Not the kind of guy I would like to share my life with,” Tanya had voiced in a serious tone.

Aunt Theresa had looked at Tanya, liking the young woman for her quiet and simple demeanour and she had said to her, “You really deserve someone good in your life.”

Tanya had smiled at the kind woman warmly but said nothing.

Her main focus was to continue earning her own money and becoming self-independently strong. She was saving so one day she could expand into a small, classy restaurant in the city.

She had already drawn up her plans but had to be patient because she couldn’t save much after living expenses and regularly contributing to charity for the poorer kids.

“I will realise my dream one day,” she kept reassuring herself, “one day.”

But life took an unexpected turn.

She was at a Christmas concert when he walked into her life; tall, dark and immensely attractive. But being the simple girl, she was, she had thought he wouldn’t notice her but he did.

She fell for the sincerity in his words and the charm in his smile.

“Such a deceit that was,” Tanya bemoaned as she packed the food containers.

A special relationship had begun and though it brought happiness in her life, she wasn’t sure if it was what her heart really desired.

“Maybe time will tell,” she said to herself, “he’s quite a nice guy.”

And he had started his own small business too, along with a few small investments in trade. One day he had told her, “When I achieve greater success, I will take you away from here for a better life.”

“That’s good,” she had expressed, feeling excited for the future.

But less than a year after they began living together, cracks began to show underneath his façade of charm. At the beginning of the abuse, he had always expressed regrets after hitting her and she had forgiven him, trying to understand the disturbing change. It had left a sense of fear and uncertainty in her heart.

“Where did the guy I gave my love to go?”

She continued her food business on the tarmac but Mark’s business seemed not to be doing well and whenever he made any losses on his investments, he blamed it on her. It came to a point when she couldn’t take any more of his bad moods and the constant abuse. She told him she was leaving.

But he would not let her, promising to change, that things would get better, but things got worse when he came home one night with a gun.

“What is going on?” she had asked him with a deep feeling of dread.

“Nothing,” he had answered casually, “It’s just for protection.”

She did not like it and she did not believe him.

Something was going wrong with Mark’s life and he kept it hidden from her. He had a den in a part of the lower flat that was his own private space and late in the nights, strange men in heavily tinted vehicles came to meet him. It was something he had forbidden her to talk about.

She had grown up in an underdeveloped community where crime was like lurking tentacles waiting to hold captive the weak and the vulnerable. She had stayed strong in mind, not to become a victim, now the one she was sharing her life with had opened that door to her home.

“I can’t allow this to continue,” she had decided and the last night when she had tried to talk to him about it, he had gotten angry and hit her.

And he had warned her with the gun in his hand, “Don’t ever think of leaving.”

“Just when I had thought I found happiness,” she cried silently as she attended to her customers.

“How do I free myself from him?”

To be continued…

GUYANA, IN ITS ANTI-TOBACCO DRIVE, FOCUSES ON THIS YEAR’S THEME “GROW FOOD NOT TOBACCO” AND DR LESLIE

RAMSAMMY, GUYANA’S REDOUBTABLE ANTI-TOBACCO CRUSADER LENDS SUPPORT

On 31st May every year since 1987, “World NoTobacco Day” has been commemorated under the auspices of the United Nations. The commemoration aims to raise awareness of tobacco use’s harmful effects and non-smokers’ exposure to tobacco smoke. The theme of this year’s commemoration was “Grow Food Not Tobacco”.

The consumer community worldwide has always been championing the elimination of tobacco use, and we take the themes of World No Tobacco Day seriously and see how they could be effectuated each year.

Tobacco contains 4000 poisons or toxic substances which, when smoked, chewed or inhaled, damage various body organs, resulting in the tobacco user being afflicted with dangerous ailments. Among the toxic substances are tar, ammonia, acetic acid, carbon monoxide and nicotine.

Tar, for example, damages the teeth and gums and causes tooth decay or carbon monoxide causes oxygen deprivation resulting in shortness of breath and asthma or nicotine, in addition to being addictive, damages the blood vessels and heart. The list of diseases tobacco causes is very long and includes oral and lung cancers and other cancers; heart disease; osteoporosis; arthritis;