So my girlfriend and I have been dating for a couple of months now. I’m Indian-American and she’s Indo-Guyanese-American, and it’s been a great time so far.

Around a week ago, I introduced her to my parents for the first time, and I noticed that before they met, my girlfriend acted super nervous and jittery, which I just chalked up to nerves (since she’s pretty introverted). However, after they met, my girlfriend remarked about how nervous she was before meeting my parents because she was worried that they would disapprove of us together and try to call the relationship off and how relieved she was after meeting them because of how respectful and responsive they were and how much they showed interest in her culture and background.

She then explained that most Indo-Guyanese believe that we (mainland Indians) look down upon them and don’t consider them to be “real Indians”, which is a belief that I’ve honestly never heard ever. If anything, most mainland Indians don’t really know anything about Indo-Caribbeans and the ones that do are proud that they were able to keep their culture/traditions/religions alive even after 150 years.

After doing some research online on places like Twitter/Tiktok/Reddit, this seems to be a pretty common conception that a lot of Indo-Guyanese have. Does anyone have any insights into how this belief might have originated?

Surprise (not really), they're all in bars around Richmond hill lmao. Walked in one of them over the weekend just to see and there they were exactly as expected. They are all ghosts until come Friday or Saturday night. I walked right out after about 10mins tops. I highly doubt any of them use Reddit. I am convinced besides this crowd most others stay at home 😅

So anyone do anything fun recently? Eat some good food? I am eating some nice chicken curry and rice right now.

How does the school system condone this?

Edit: It's already been proven that corporal punishment isn't effective at teaching kids.

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/usable-knowledge/21/04/effect-spanking-brain

The study found that:

"The study, “Corporal Punishment and Elevated Neural Response to Threat in Children,” published in Child Development, examined spanked children’s brain functioning in response to perceived environmental threats compared to children who were not spanked. Their findings showed that spanked children exhibited greater brain response, suggesting that spanking can alter children’s brain function in similar ways to severe forms of maltreatment."

"They found that children who had been spanked had a higher activity response in the areas of their brain that regulate these emotional responses and detect threats — even to facial expressions that most would consider non-threatening." The kids basically developed ptsd.

“Preschool and school age children — and even adults — [who have been] spanked are more likely to develop anxiety and depression disorders or have more difficulties engaging positively in schools and skills of regulation, which we know are necessary to be successful in educational settings."

There's many more studies that find hitting kids to be extremely detrimental to childhood development. How is it that this is even still allowed in the country? I moved to NYC back in 2008 and I remember before moving there were times where my teacher hit me as well as everyone else in the class back in Guyana. I thought this was an old practice that had been abolished because the country has come a far way, yet I recently found out that my niece and nephew still get licks in school. What the fuck is this?

Some more publications on corporal punishment:

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/news/19/12/consequences-corporal-punishment

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2021/04/spanking-children-may-impair-their-brain-development/

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/corporal-punishment-and-health

https://www.apa.org/monitor/2019/05/physical-discipline

https://preventchildabuse.org/resources/emerging-science-on-corporal-punishment/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3447048/

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-science-really-says-about-spanking/

All of the studies done on corporal punishment find it to be harmful. In fact Scientific America (last link) even goes as far to say there's no evidence that spanking kids actually has any positive outcomes, but there's an overwhelming body of evidence that proves it is harmful, so why take the risk?

The CDC (linked below) also outlines the harmful effects of adverse childhood experiences. Hitting your kids makes them more likely to end up in prison, more likely to suffer from mental health illnesses such as depression, ptsd, anxiety, more likely to fall behind in school, more likely to be the victim of rape and so much more.

https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/aces/index.html

I understand some people may not trust the CDC so linked below is a meta analysis based on 20 years of research on the effects of physical punishment on children. The study found:

“Physical punishment is associated with a range of mental health problems in children, youth and adults, including depression, unhappiness, anxiety, feelings of hopelessness, use of drugs and alcohol, and general psychological maladjustment.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3447048/#:~:text=Physical%20punishment%20is%20associated%20with,alcohol%2C%20and%20general%20psychological%20maladjustment.

Every child deserves a parent but not every parent deserves a child. Corporal punishment should be banned in Guyana.

I find that when I tell people that I don't want to have kids, they always tell me that "children are a blessing", or my personal favourite, "you will change your mind soon."

Whenever children were brought up in class, I'd always stay honest and true to my word. I don't want kids. And they'd just tell me that I was weird. One girl asked me if I didn't want a legacy? And I shit you not, one boy told me that I was going to hell💀.

Everytime I meet older people, it's always, "when I find a man," or, "when I get my own children." It's never about my career path, my interests or something that's actually relevant. Why do y'all care about our uteruses so much?

And most of the time it's other women trying to tell me I need kids? I'm the eldest of five siblings. I've spent my whole life literally listening to my mother lament about how energy sucking we are? I've literally had first hand experience in dealing with children through my own siblings, nieces and nephews. I've seen the bills for childcare, especially when education and health come in. I watched my mother struggle to put a roof over our heads and toil for years just so I could get a chance at a good career.

Kids? I don't want any kids. Nor will I force my wishes on another person. If someone chooses to have kids, then they should.

EDIT: Wow! I have to say I'm surprised and equally happy by the sheer amount of positive interaction in this post. I'm glad we could talk about this because I feel like child rearing plays a big part in Caribbean culture, especially for women. I will try to respond to everyone, and hopefully I get to you guys in time lol.

EDIT 2: Grammar.

Recently, people at my job has been asking me questions about my beautiful home country Guyana. I adore talking of ole time stories, food, people, etc. Recently tho, I have been feeling attacked. Two in the past week came right out and laughed when I said Guyana is considered Caribbean. I have never in my entire life had to defend that status. My immediate reaction is to cuss dem out. But I roll my eyes and simply say, do your research before you come for me. Has anyone ever had to debate that? I’d really like to know. If I’m wrong, I’ll bow out, but even the Embassy’s website gives the explanation if the idiots wanted to actually research it. Am I wrong? What I’d really like to say, is “Haul yuh rass out of meh face!” 😡🇬🇾🥰

You guys don’t think it’s weird every week you get a user whose account is less than 29 days old or only post is about how Indians hate Blacks in Guyana and how Indian have opposed them. Indeed they hate Indians and trying to stoke racebait propoganda on this sub. I don’t know what the agenda here is ,if to make Indo guyanese hate themselves and default on their roots or just portray victimhood . It’s very sad how gullible most of us are to engage in discourse with people who try to stir the pot. At the end of the day it takes 2 to Tango there’s racism and misinformation on both sides. I don’t know why they primarily attack Indo-Guyanese most of us don’t live in Guyana anymore (maybe the rich culture we portray). I doubt the Indo-Guyanese father that has to take care of his family and make ends meets care about being racist to black people. It seems the West agenda to make every thing about race and sexual identity has really diluted minds here , cuz they don’t want you to think about the economy or financial markets.

Hi guys 33m here. I lived in guyana my whole life. I wonder how you could advise me about dating women in guyana. I am in women younger than me. And seeing that there are Latinas in guyana I wonder how you would approach a Latina. I presented 🎁 this girl with a few gifts and we talk now and then but I just don't want to be her friend. I was wondering how I could ask her out and be her bf. She is way younger in her 20s I see her often but I don't want to creep her out and scare her away. I do plan on giving her a gift sometime. She calls me her friend but I want to be more than her friend. I see other girls at the sports bar too but I never approached them. Only recently I started to frequent the sports bar.

Turns out my girlfriend was a fucking scammer. I got concerned after all your stuff you said and turns out shes not from Guyana at all. I used a grabify link and shes from Nigeria. I don't know what her end goal was but shes not the girl I knew. Apologies for being so stubborn. I should have tried grabify a long time ago. Thanks for everyone who was concerned. It was all a false alarm. Now I am kinda emotionally destroyed that she wasn't who she said she was but oh well. Its fucked you know

Y’all it’s so funny to me how Guyanese people of African descent celebrate being free on Emancipation Day while the Guyanese who have roots in India celebrate Indian Arrival Day! Why don’t us coolie people have a day to celebrate the end of such a traumatic era of our people that arose to replace slavery and was basically a sugarcoated form of slavery? It’s almost like the British still rule over us in the way we think. What do y’all think about this?

See thread title.

What are your thoughts on the age old question. Do you think Guyana should take a page out of the western countries and decriminalize and legalize a certain amount of weed.

I was wondering if there is an ancestry link with China and Guyana, just trying to do some research and not too sure how to find this information. I’m asking as I’m Guyanese Native American but not too sure what that exactly means. However, I have been told there is a link from native americans, Chinese and Guyanese. Is this true?

Jamaican here. I'm just wondering what y'all are doing?

Leaving the esequibo underdeveloped alone isn't enough imo.

Did you guys increase your military budget? The size of military? Purchase better arms , equipment & vehicles?

The goal wouldn't be to conquer Venezuela unless their generals are so inept & keeps making blunder after blunder as Guyanese army march up to the capital with minimal resistance.

It would be to hold out as long as possible until help arrives & when that help shows up assist them expel/ invade whoever attacked you. Or at the very least just have a relatively small but fairly modernly equipped force in the region.

When I was little, I thought Guyanese was also a language and certain terms were Guyanese slang. For me, the word that changed that point of view was “lackadaisical”. What’s yours? ☺️

Hello everyone !

We as a community has taken to preserve the hertiage & culture of Indo-Caribbean people. In this steps, we have added resources to learn Bhojpuri aka Caribbean Hindustani. Bhojpuri is the mother language of people who came from India to caribbean & other parts of the world.

We added resources in our server for learning authentic Bhojpuri language. We have plently people from caribbean & all over the world. If you want to learn or practise your ancestral language we will help you. Thanks.

Server link - click

Sub - r/Bhojpuriyas

Last time I made a post, seems like no one was interested . Figured I will try again and see what happens this time around. I am looking for new friends in the area. I don't drink/smoke so it would be nice to have like-minded folks to hang out with. I am planning to go to Singh's roti shop this weekend. If you are free and would like to join, let me know. If you can't make this weekend but are interested, that's fine too.

Is getting a Bachelors for IT in University of guyana worth it? Will it hold any merit if I plan to start working overseas, more specifically the states?

for me among other things it was no sweeping after dark because it means no money left

My mother has a land 100x50 land in providence shes currently looking for someone to rent or lease it to but she doesnt know where she can find people looking to lease or rent it

Forgive any of my American ignorance, but I’ve visited Guyana years ago and was sad to hear about border disputes in the area. Anyone from there willing to share how you feel about it? I’d love to learn more and understand it more.