7/09/2011 - Second day at Open Arms

After several phone calls to Mrs Grant this morning to check that she would be there to see me this time, and after repeatedly being told that Mrs Grant wasn't in yet but was on her way I took the plunge and decided to make my way to Open Arms anyway. The journey there was surprisingly uneventful - we were only cut up by taxis twice, and finally I arrived at Open Arms to find that Mrs Grant was in her office complaining about the internet connection. She apologised for not being there yesterday as she was in a meeting with members of the British High Commission and others discussing Open Arms; she said they hold these meetings once every quarter and that I could go with her to the next one. She started to explain that she was very busy when the door opened again admitting the man who was there to fix the internet, Mrs Grant then started to tell me about the HIV and Drugs testing that was going on in the main room at that moment when another volunteer popped her head around the door smiling widely. Mrs Grant spoke to her for a moment while I read the long list of rules that each resident had to abide by, then the other volunteer was gone and Mrs Grant turned back to me saying in a low whisper, 'we've been having a bit of trouble with one of the residents.' Apparently money had been going missing and one man had been named the culprit, Mrs Grant was waiting for his return from the doctors before she asked him for his side of the story. 'But this doesn't happen often,' she assured me after explain how this man had been seen rooting through the belongings of one of the other residents, 'we often have personality clashes but not stealing.' The man who was fixing the internet announced that there was nothing wrong with it, Mrs Grant just shrugged as she stood and ushered me out of the office. In the main room the woman who was carrying out the HIV and Drugs tests announced that she was getting new internet at home and wanted to know which network was best. Mrs Grant's receptionist Lucy told us that LIME was the best in the ghettos as they were too scared to cut off the houses downtown. Apparently the charity hasn't paid their bill for months. Mrs Grant then passed me off to the other volunteer, Mrs Collin, who was just about to start an assessment of a new resident. The two of us took our seats against a wall and waited for the man to appear; he had just washed and changed into new clothes provided by the charity and had his hair cut then he sat in the chair opposite. He stared listlessly ahead of him without barely giving either of us a look, the charity's psychiatric nurse joined us too and Mrs Collin started the assessment. She started by asking him simple questions such as his name and date of birth - although I was told that in Jamaica this question is not so simple as many people don't know when they were born! Then she moved onto the harder question asking why he was homeless and how long he had been homeless for. The man, Mr J (33), used to live with is mother, elder half-brother, twin and younger brother in a big house in Kingston which was owned by the elder brother then one day he turned around and told the three younger brothers that they couldn't live with him any more. Mr J had once had a job in a supermarket packing shopping but he had lost that and was reduced to living on the streets where he had been for a year, he had no idea where his brothers were or whether they were even alive and yet despite being homeless he still had a top model mobile phone that he checked continuously throughout his interview. He admitted that he had depression and that he had been taking medication for it but denied any other medical or mental conditions. At first he denied taking any drugs at all but it was obvious that he was lying, from the first he had appeared nervous about something. Mrs Collins had to assure him twice that no matter what he admitted to taking they would not involve the police; the Charity needed to know encase something happened to Mr J and he needed treatment. Eventually he admitted to drinking alcohol and taking ganja since he was fifteen and that he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. Mrs Collins and the nurse immediately told him that the alcohol and drugs would just make his depression and schizophrenia worse but Mr J had once again zoned out. The nurse managed to get him to describe his drugs to her and she named them all, jotting each name down so that she could pick up a prescription for him later.  Mr J then went to join the other residents while I helped Mr Collins cook lunch.
The Charity normally has its own cook; they provide three hot meals a day for roughly a hundred people, and the cook is helped by one of the residents but today the cook was ill so Mrs Collins and I helped out. The rice was already done, a staple of any Jamaican meal, so we were left to cook the mackerel stew. The mackerel itself was tinned in tomato sauce and the mixed vegetables were tinned too so all we had to do was heat them up in a large pan, crushing the mackerel into flakes and adding the cooked vegetables and water.
By then it was time for me to go, the woman driving me was waiting outside, as I got in the car she told me that on the way she had been driving behind a taxi, the taxi had pulled over and let out its passengers when another car pulled up beside him and as they started to argue the second man pulled a gun, threatening the taxi driver. By the time my driver had managed to get her phone out to call the police the two men had raced off, she said she was lucky she had not been directly behind them. After that the drive back home was thankfully uneventful!
When I did arrive back home I found four men crawling around the house fixing the plumbing and taking the doors off the kitchen cupboards. The men were asked when the cupboards would be returned and their reply - 'Friday, or at the latest Monday,' I was assured, but which Friday or Monday I do not know.
True Jamaicans know that 'soon come' means anything but!