I, like most red-blooded Bajans, enjoy our local dishes, some more than others.
There are some foods I don’t care too much for but won’t mention them here lest I run the risk of being accused of high treason.
A well seasoned piece of pork is among my favourites. You know, the type my colleague Ridley Greene, the word master, wrote about in his column some time ago that sent me running for the dictionary before deciding whether I would sample it.
The fish cake almost ties with pork at the top of my food list. In my experience with this delicacy, as with pork, I haven’t butt up on any bad enough to cause me to swear them off.
I have a system for purchasing the delicacy. If they are being fried on the spot I look at the consistency and colour of the batter. If they are done already, they must be to a near golden perfection. Then I’ll take the risk. Mine is also a particular bias towards women vendors of a certain age; I just believe they make a better batter.
Quarrels have erupted over the fish cake, especially the last one on the table. But apparently there is a fish cake that can cause a strike.
Incredibly, fish cakes were at the centre of a wild cat strike at the Transport Board last week.
From the undisputed reports thus far, the bus driver in question, three hours into his shift which began at 5:30 a.m., asked the supervisor to allow him to get two fish cakes. The supervisor denied the request whereupon the driver went outside the terminal.
Here is what he told the Press:
“I did the 5:30 am. shift from Flat Rock, then the next schedule, 6:15 a.m. back to Flat Rock. I got back late and I was sent back without a minute [rest] and I got back around 8:30 a.m. I went to the supervisor to ask if I could get two fish cakes and he bluntly refused my requests with some threats and abuse, as he’s accustomed to act, so I went off to get something to eat just alongside the terminal in his sight and when I finish eat in front of him, he tell me he cut my hours. So I call Human Resources, who tell me to speak to the general manager and I did, and as far as I understand, I was dismissed for the day.”
I imagine that the driver didn’t simply eat the fish cakes but ate them in a manner to prove a point. It could be that he ate them in a slow and deliberate way, with each bite designed to get under the skin of the watching supervisor.
The other scenario is that he ate with a certain amount of gusto, tearing into the fish cakes, sending the message “take that” to the nearby supervisor.
I must find out what was in that batter that would make a man risk his job and livelihood.
Anyhow the action of the supervisor triggered something in a self-proclaimed agitator, who called for a downing of tools and was followed into that piece of fatalism by other workers.
Meanwhile, because a man wanted to eat two fish cakes, commuters were paying the price. Old people couldn’t get to the doctor or for their medication, hundreds of workers could not get to their jobs and schoolchildren were stranded.
Granted that the incident was the straw that broke the camel’s back as there were other “simmering issues”, it must be something more than two cod fish balls.
This time I can say I agree with the Barbados Workers’ Union to pack the strikers back to work.
When there are pressing workers’ issues under discussion or being negotiated, fish cakes should not be in the mix. I believe that sometimes we take too much for granted.
A medical emergency I could forgive or a family emergency. When we set off to work, we know how the day is going to shape up and we make arrangements accordingly.
Before anyone rushes off believing I am not sympathetic to the “cause”, know this: I am a worker and have been a union member all my working life.
Antoinette Connell is the DAILY NATION Editor. Email antoinetteconnell@nationnews.com
