Melville Cooke

Me an dem no grouns man

So me haffi frowns man

See dem dung a town man

Hug up pon a brown man

- Baby Cham

A few months ago I went to Christopher's Jazz Cafe on the ground floor of the multi-level Quad, New Kingston, to report on a concert. Some of the wide chairs - more like love seats, actually - can comfortably hold two, with room to ventilate the crotch. At a squeeze they can hold three, preferably close friends.

On that night, three young adults, all white and with that eager 'wow, I am actually in Jamaica' tourist look, got close in one of those seats, so close that one had to sit forward, packed minibus style, to make shoulder room for all. Nothing remarkable about that. But it was two men and woman and the men chose to sit beside each other.

Nothing remarkable about that for the people who were there that night, but for me, the fact that it was unremarkable makes it remarkable. If a pair of Jamaican men chose to get so close to each other it would have caused at least a second glance. But a couple of Jamaican men would hardly be in that seating arrangement; more than likely the woman would be flanked, even if she is a decoration and the conversation takes place across her chest and face, spittle, smoke and all.

Conscious of 'groundsing'

It is amazing how many Jamaican men are conscious of 'groundsing', being what they deem to be too physically close to another man, yet spend so much time in each other's company. About two years ago (or more - time does fly) a construction worker killed another at a mass lodgings because the man was sleeping too close to him. In a bus heading out on a rural route, a man dare not sit in the seat beside the driver; in fact, under the Corporate Area bus system that preceded the JUTC, the seat beside the front window was reserved for women only.

And from that seat there was no chance of a 'grounds' as the bus rocked too and fro.

If two men and a woman are in a car, chances are the woman is in the passenger seat (unless the front appearance or the reputation leaves much to be desired). Two men in the front and the woman in the back just does not look right.

But while there is this great concern about what does not look 'proper', with the intimation of intimacy, of course, many Jamaican men spend an inordinate amount of time with their 'bredren'. They go to parties with each other - and leave together (his place or his place first?), they dance together at the parties under this coordinated dancing display set-up (give me a hip lock and rub a dub with my girl anytime); they play with their palms together, all in the name of a nice high; they play dominoes together at all hours of the night (which makes it easier for a next man to hold hard end in their women's beds).

But yet there is this determination to not appear to be too close physically, maybe fearing they arouse suspicion - or maybe, in some cases, simply arouse? It is a bit like apartheid, together but separate. And that did not work either.