Second City Origins ~ North America Part 1

This blog is composed of all of the Caribbean island nations. Coincidentally, a friend of mine has just returned from a cruise around the Caribbean, although, I can't think of anything worse than being on a ship with several thousand people that all want to visit a small town on an island at the same time. But, each to their own I suppose.

Anyway, as usual I can't think of what to write in the introduction, I'm just winging it and writing as I think, sorry, typing, not writing, there's no pen involved, just a black keyboard sat upon a pine desk. I say pine, but I think it's actually chipboard with a pine coloured veneer. Sorry, I'm off again.

Back to the blog, we start at the southern end of the Caribbean, just off the coast of Venezuela in Trinidad and Tobago. Is that still the Caribbean I wonder. I've just "googled" it and it seems that the sea extends to the Venezuela - Colombia border, so we're all good.

Enough of the "jibber-jabber" as Penny from The Big Bang Theory would say, lets get onto the first place....

The city was originally a settlement of indigenous peoples until a sugar refinery and estate was built nearby causing an influx of migrant workers, mainly from the Indian Subcontinent. These inhabitants named the town Chauhan after an early Indian Dynasty. During World War II there was a US airbase nearby, but it was dismantled in 1950 and turned into an agricultural area, very little of the base survives today.

The name Chaguanas derives from the original indigenous tribes that settled in the area, the Chaguanes Amerindian people. This name derives from the name given to the native palm trees, chaguaramo.

CHAGUANAS = NAMED AFTER LOCAL PEOPLE THAT WERE NAMED AFTER A PALM TREE

Gouyave, pronounced locally as Go-ov, is the centre of Grenada's fishing industry and the surrounding lands are used to produce spices such as nutmeg, cloves, and cinnamon. The largest building in Grenada is the nutmeg processing plant in Gouyave. It is known as the "Nutmeg Pool".

The town was originally called Charlotte Town after Queen Charlotte of Britain, the wife of King George III. However, it was renamed Gouyave by the French, who named it after the guava trees that grow there.

GOUYAVE = GUAVA

There isn't much to say about Calliaqua, mainly because there isn't much to read about Calliaqua. The village is home to a thriving fish market and several restaurants and bars. Actor, Franklyn Seales, best known for playing Dexter Stuffins in the 1980's US sitcom, Silver Spoons, was born in Calliaqua. (Nope, me neither).

I tried to Google the etymology of Calliaqua, I thought you might like to see the result....

"The etymology of Calliaqua is unknown, but here are some other words and their origins:

Rawlplug: John Joseph Rawlings, the inventor of the wall plug, named his product after the first syllable of his last name."

However, I found an article from an old journal about names in the islands and found this (I have copied and pasted it on this occasion)...

"'. Calliaqua - still so called, and to-day a popular bathing resort - bears what must be one of the queerest names in all the Caribbean; for it is an attributive derived from a verb meaning 'have sexual connexion with', or 'tickle'" Don't believe me? Here's the link !

CALLIAQUA = SEXUAL CONNECTION or TICKLE (sorry about that, only thing I could find).

Speightstown was settled in around 1630 and quickly became the busiest port in Barbados. Ships carried sugar back to ports in the UK especially Bristol, earning the town the nickname of Little Bristol. The town is twinned with Charleston, South Carolina. Many cotton and tobacco planters emigrated to Charleston from Barbados after the widespread change to sugar cane production.

The name Speightstown comes from the former owner of the land settled and member of the first Assembly of Barbados, William Speight.

SPEIGHTSTOWN = NAMED AFTER WILLIAM SPEIGHT

Like Calliaqua, there isn't much to say about Bisee. It is mainly a locals town, that has a few resorts and is becoming more known to travellers. The St. Lucia Bureau of Standards has it's home there. The only articles I could find about Bisee, is a report of a shooting at a house, and an accident on the road. Even Tripadvisor only has about six entries and they are all for hotels.

There is no definitive explanation for the meaning of Bisee, however, due to the accent I checked languages. Apparently, it comes from Old French, Middle English and Germanic origins and means "north wind".

BISEE = NORTH WIND

Portsmouth was designed by Royal Engineer, John Simpson, who built the town around a central park area with the intention of the settlement being the capital of Dominica. However after a short time, it was discovered that the swampy lands around the town were a source of malaria and yellow fever. The government moved to a new base in Roseau, where it remains to this day.

Portsmouth was named after the naval seaport city in the United Kingdom. The origin of the name is obviously from the words Port and Mouth. Although Winston Churchill wrote in his book, A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, that Port was a pirate that founded Portsmouth in 501. The truth is that the Romans called it Portesmuða,  derived from port (a haven) and muða (the mouth of a large river or estuary).

PORTSMOUTH = NAMED AFTER PORTSMOUTH, UK

All Saints was established in 1840, but was originally called Free-Centre Village and then Hyman's Village before taking its current name. Workers from the surrounding sugar plantations built a chapel and other amenities in the village making it into a thriving community that survives to this day.

When the chapel was built it was given the name of All Saints because the surrounding parishes all had the names of different saints, St. John's Parish lies to the north-west, St. Peter's to the north-east, and St. Paul's to the south. The name was used so as not to offend any citizens of other areas.

ALL SAINTS = NAMED AFTER THE CHAPEL

Sandy Point Town was established in the early 17th century and soon became the islands commercial centre. It was for a while the busiest anchorage in the archipelago. However, when most of the activity was moved to Basseterre in 1727, its importance diminished, until in 1984 Hurricane Klaus caused so much damage that the port was closed completely. Nowadays, the town relies on tourism and the aeronautics manufacturing facility nearby.

Sandy Point Town was named after a feature of the island that is....well...a point, and it is sandy. What more can I say!

SANDY POINT TOWN = NAMED AFTER A SANDY POINT OF LAND

The city's name is often shortened to just Santiago but it also the nickname of "La Ciudad Corazón" or Heartland City. It is the largest non-capital settlement in the Caribbean. It was founded in 1495 by the first wave of European settlers. The city was devastated by earthquakes in 1508 and 1592. It is now a centre for cultural, financial and agricultural trade.

The name comes from an event during the Dominican War of Independence when 30 knights arrived in the town from La Isabela, one of the first stable Spanish settlements. The name means Saint James of the Knights.

SANTIAGO DE LOS CABALLEROS = SAINT JAMES OF THE KNIGHTS

The area where Carrefour now stands was originally a military encampment until it was destroyed by Haitian rebels that ousted the English troops. The founding fathers of Haiti designed and built the village of Carrefour in 1813. The town was the residence of the first President, Alexandre Petion. His homestead still stands and is used as a school.

Carrefour is pronounced Kafu in Haitian Creole, but the name actually comes from French. It translates into English as Crossroads.

CARREFOUR = CROSSROADS

Portmore as a town was built in the 1960s as a development to ease the overcrowding in Kingston, however, according to the Jamaican government website there were scattered communities of fishermen and farmers in the area prior to the building of the town. Most residents commute to Kingston for work.

The name of Portmore was given one of the early English colonists, the Dawkins family, who named it Portmore Pen, in honour of one of their ancestors who married the Earl of Portmore in Scotland. The title became extinct in 1835.

PORTMORE = NAMED AFTER THE EARL OF PORTMORE

Santiago de Cuba has a long history starting with its founding in 1515. Just three years later it was the starting point of many expeditions into central and southern America by explorers such as Hernan Cortez. There was a large influx of immigrants, including freed slaves, in the 18th and 19th centuries from many parts of Europe and North America. Fidel Castro declared victory after the Cuban Revolution from a balcony of Santiago's city hall in 1959.

As with the other Santiago names in this series, Dominican Republic and Chile back in the Capital Cities blog, it translates to "St James". In this instance it is "Saint James of Cuba". He sure got about a bit this James character!

SANTIAGO DE CUBA = ST JAMES OF CUBA

Here we are again! The end of another blog episode where I have to try and write something from scratch. I always find this the hardest task. I will quickly type a few lines and then....nothing! I sit and think, get up, make a cup of tea, us Brits love our tea, it makes us think, it calms our nerves, it is a cure-all if you like. But it has to be made right. No microwaves are involved. You boil a kettle (or a pan of water at a push), pour the hot water over the teabag in the mug, and add milk and sugar to taste after you have removed the teabag. Well that's the way I make it anyway, some purists will have you warming a teapot, and letting it stand for a while, I could go on, but I've realised I'm rambling again.

Enough of that, next up in my blog career will be a 100 special, this being number 99 obviously. That will be out soon, it's nearly finished. Then in a week or so will be the last Second City Origin blog featuring the Central and North American mainland. After that I think I am turning my attention to the 50 US states. (That doesn't sound right, US states is OK, but it means United States states, but then if I wrote the 50 United States it doesn't sound quite right either. Perhaps the 50 states of the USA...yeah that works!) Y'all knew what I meant anyways.

To quote the aforementioned Fidel Castro "We do not exploit our dolphins for profit." Nope, no idea either!

Adios Amigos !