ON THE FACE OF IT

I was on the edge of the crowded dance floor, blithely bopping around with my French Canadian friend, Yves, right next to the gigantic pulsating speakers belting out “Sweet Dreams,” you know, the 1983 smash hit by the popular eighties British synth pop group, Eurythmics. It was Friday night, the night when we, the city’s cosmopolitan cocktail of university students, dressed to impress in our cut-price New Wave outfits and invaded and took over the town’s number one night club, outnumbering the “locals” by at least three to one. The dance floor was our Friday campus; it was the spot where we boogied away our academic preoccupations, where we could pretend we weren’t the sort of people whose paucity of funds made us very nervous at rent time. The rich voice of Eurythmics’ lead singer Annie Lennox started to fade. I told Yves I was taking a break — quite a lot of the eighties music was sonically unsound — and the DJ’s next choice was particularly jarring synthetic junk. I decided to try to make my way to the pool tables. Directly blocking my path was a large middle-aged woman, a local black Canadian.

“Excuse me,” I shouted, hoping she’d hear me above the blaring speakers. “Can I get by?” Her response filled me with a mixture of dread and annoyance. “So, you like to dance with white boys,” she screamed, blowing hot, alcohol filled air into my face. “Look,” I yelled back, “just leave me alone and let me pass.” I realised I was reeling. What the! The woman had slapped me in my face. Hard. I recovered my physical balance in time to avoid hitting the ground. I could not locate my psychological, emotional and mental equilibrium, though. I was also suddenly catatonic. I could hear someone yelling for a bouncer and I could see the woman heading for an exit. I could also detect that the awful music had stopped. The immediate arrival of a bouncer snapped me out of the assault-induced trance. I knew him. He was a university pal and he had a black belt in karate. He asked me what had happened. I replied, sotto voce, that I just wanted him to escort me out of the club. Outside, while I was waiting with him for a taxi to take me home, I could barely muster, “A woman hit me.” My friend urged me to go to the police. I just wanted to see my apartment so I did just that.

By now you must have realised why I’m telling you this story. I’m still trying to figure out how UNC MP Chandresh Sharma could have been “pushed in his face several times” by PNM member, Dr Keith Rowley’s “hand,” still attend and participate in Finance Committee and UNC caucus meetings before going to report the assault to the police. Was it unparalleled dedication to his constituents that made him willing to withstand any amount of pain to speak on their behalf, to seek their interests before he pursued justice for himself. Is he Super Sharma? I always knew the Fyzabad rep was a pundit who could spot celestial blue beams, but now I’m wondering if I should see him in a whole new extraordinary light. Me, I got one slap and called it a night. Sharma by his own accounts takes some serious blows from the Rottweiler, can function as normal, and then go to the police station to make a report. Wow! Talk about MP; that is MP!

I mean, the eyes may be famous for their role as the windows to a person’s soul, but it is the face that we usually hold dear because the face is the shop window; it is the countenance that others regard as the initial source of evidence of an individual’s personality. A slap in the face — whether the blow is literal or figurative — is a startling insult: we view it as a grievous assault on our identity. Sharma, according to his additional police report was “pushed” in his face several times and didn’t even blink. If you don’t see Sharma as the heroic type, then the only other explanation for his unbelievable steadfastness after such a “brutal assault” is that the man was in a severe state of shock, which brought on bouts of oral paralysis and amnesia. This meant he could talk in committee and caucus, but later would find difficulty articulating his case to the media. His shock would make him forget to tell the police when he went to the station that he had been hit in the face. He also forgot to mention that he had called Dr Rowley a racist.

Luckily, half an hour later, the MP was able to recall the facial attack. Psychologists might opine that returning to the “scene of the crime” kick-started Sharma’s memory. I can only hope that the UNC man now enjoys total recall and that there are not other new details he will remember he forgot next week. We shall see. I’m quite certain that both Sharma and Rowley “went for each other.” You know the clich?, “it takes two”! Who started the fight matters not. I feel though that my “slap” experience all those years ago in that night club leaves me in a position to sign off this week’s column with a few words of advice — none of which is obscene — to both men. If you don’t want egg on your face again, next time one mentions race, the other should walk away. And if you want to save face now, apologise to the public and purchase a new set of china for the parliamentary tea room. Oh and promise that you will never again resort to slap shot or slapdash politics. Am I asking too much? Then, can we at least get a new tea set and a “sorry”?

suz@itrini.com