The Motivational Adda

Henry from the island of Jamaica : Jamaican digging crews have to sleep eighty men to a room; in huge warehouses like the ones where big wooden crates of dynamite are stored. My hands feel like scorpion claws, clamped on to a hard hard shovel all day; then curled into fists at night. At dawn, the steaming labor trains deliver us by the thousands: down into that snake pit where we dig until my muscles feel as weak as water and my backbone is like shattered glass. But only half the day is over. At lunchtime: we see sunburned American engineers and foremen eating at tables, in shady tents with the flaps left open; so that we have to watch how they sit on nice chairs: looking restful. We also watch the medium-dark Spanish men: relaxing as they sit on their train tracks: grinning as if they know secrets. We have no place to sit. Not even a stool. So we stand, plates in hand, uncomfortable and undignified. Back home; I used to dream of saving enough Panama money...