The Dark Underbelly of a Paradise Called Barbados
Because I have been travelling quite a bit recently between Barbados and London, I hadn’t been keeping up to date with local news as much as I should have.
I had of course heard that a couple of female Canadian tourists had been mugged and beaten on Long Beach on the 28th of February. In fact the woman were severely beaten with a piece of wood and left unconscious.
One of the women Terry Schwarzfeld suffered serious brain injuries and never regained consciousness. A friend of the family confirmed that Schwarzfeld died at the Ottawa Hospital’s Civic campus Wednesday March the 18th.
The police thanks to a $20,00BDS reward have supposedly caught the killer, who is a 24-year-old local man. But that one wont be answered until he has been proven guilty in a court of law! What surprises me is that they never rounded up a few Guyanese and blamed them!
Is Barbados really a paradise like Caribbean Island, well sometimes it looks like one and feels like one, but at other times for me it has a dark and dangerous underbelly just like most other places in the world.
I have personally walked along Long beach numerous times and what I liked about it is was the solitude of the place and peacefulness, but what you always find at these quiet beaches in Barbados is that there is always somebody lurking in the bushes or in the trees that makes you feel a little bit uneasy and keeps you guard. I normally have my Staffordshire Bull Terrier with me and she seems to scare the hell out of the Scum and for very good reason, they aint as dumb as they look. But I have to admit my bite has been known to be as bad as my Staffies!
If David Thomson, the Police or anybody else in Barbados can answer me, why is it that every time I go out my door, I have somebody trying to sell me cocaine, weed, girls or are begging money off me, “any bad habits”. Does that sound like paradise to you, it doesn’t feel like paradise to me.
I will give it to you straight I have never had so many offers of people openly coming up to me in broad daylight and offering to sell me illegal things in my life and that includes places like Glasgow, London, New York, Paris. The druggies and vermin in these places are discreet because they don’t want to be caught by the cops and sent to jail.
It makes me wonder about the police force and for that matter the politicians in Barbados are they just totally useless or are they getting a cut of the drug dealer’s money? I for one am not too sure about the answer to this, but nothing in Barbados would surprise me.
I know for a fact that the tourist industry is taking a big, big, big hit in Barbados this year, and anybody that can read can go online and see the amount of complaints that tourists are making about feeling uneasy and in danger when on holiday in Barbados.
The only time you seem to see a lot of cops out and about in Barbados is on a Friday night down at Oistins and I personally feel that is because they must get a some free food and drink. I will go as far saying that the politicians and the Police haven’t got a clue about preventing, dealing with or even understanding crime on Barbados and I don’t just mean crime committed on tourists but on local people as well.
It doesn’t matter where you are in the world, whether you are on holiday in paradise, or in your local neighbourhood, wherever that may be in the world, there are dangerous and crazy people waiting in the shadows to create devastation on innocent people without any regards to the consequences.
All I can say is keep your eyes wide open and be prepared to react in whatever manner possible to protect your own life and the life’s of your family members. My own personal philosophy is to always stay alert and be prepared to do what ever it takes to take out the perpetrator, before they get you. So whether you are in Barbados, South Africa, Ireland or England stay on your guard!
Comments
9 Responses to “The Dark Underbelly of a Paradise Called Barbados”
Leave a Reply
Sponsor
it all depends on your luck. sometime u just happen to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
the beauty of the place not just the beaches but the hospitality of the people who lives. it is shocking to note that it is a peaceful place but someone is lurking secretly. and that is paradise waiting to become the place of underworld.
illegal activities in a place like that is posing danger to touristers.
Hi, just a quick reminder that the First Blog World Surf Day is starting soon, please refer to this post http://prague.today.com/2009/03/27/count-down-world-blog-surf-day/ to see who will link to you and to whom you have to link at the end of your post. I am looking forward to reading your post;-)
its interesting that you said this. I’ve always said its different to live there than to visit.
I think concerning what you’ve mentioned one of the issues is that the authorities havent kept up. Yes once upon a time you could feel safe in Bim, you could trust that you werent going to have people trying to sell you illegal stuff, you could feel mainly safe leaving your doors open or walking in deserted areas but those days are long gone and the police and government havent made the changes to deal with that. they’ve also done their best to market the country as that elusive paradise where everything and everyone is great without putting in the safeguards to make sure that it is or at least that its better than it is currently.
i hope they wise up and make some effort before its too late
For me Barbados is a truly beautiful Island and I really love visiting deserted beaches to get away from it all! And as you know you can still fortunately find quite a few of them in Barbados. I have walked in many deserted beaches in Scotland and have never once felt uneasy!
Virtually every single time I’m at one of theses places without fail you seem to come across some unsavoury looking characters lurking, hidden in the background, just waiting for their opportunity for a payday!
It is about time the Government and the police made a bigger effort in doing more to tackle the problem of crime on the island. I personally feel it is a much bigger issue than it has publically been made known by the newspapers, police and the Government!
Also if there are any Bajan drug dealers reading this, no I don’t want any Charlie, Weed or any girls and for that matter if I have any bad habits it has sweet F***all to do with you!
Alas, Paradise! That’s a loaded word these days, especially in our world full of narco traffic. Living in a supposed “paradise” I really must agree with deejay, you judge a paradise by its people not its weather, scenery, food etc. There are some places in the world, cold as hell, but whose people are just nice to be around. They are basically honest, hospitable, love culture. The drug traffic has made a hell out of most of our tropical paradises in the world today- sad to say.
“Also if there are any Bajan drug dealers reading this, no I don’t want any Charlie, Weed or any girls and for that matter if I have any bad habits it has sweet F***all to do with you!”
They wouldn’t keep asking you, if tourists (and unfortunately you do happen to look like a typical tourist, although you are not one)didn’t keep demanding these things.
I also come across plenty of local people that smoke lots of weed, in fact my wife has loads of family members in Barbados that smoke the stuff like crazy…. is there anybody in the whole of St John that doesn’t smoke the weed………
I have to agree with Nia. You get approached because you look, or sound, like a tourist. Also you wouldn’t go to other places in the world and walk down deserted beaches at night because you would fear for your safety. Why would you then do it in Barbados? People here are facing the same problems as people everywhere else so of course there’s going to be the same crime.