guyana

in june i was able to go to georgetown, guyana for 2 days! historically there were 3 guyanas – british guyana (now guyana), dutch guyana (now suriname), and french guiana (still part of france). as the latter 2 are currently closed to travel due to the covid-19 pandemic, i will have to go back to visit them.

guyana is quite a large country, composed of mostly jungle, and very sparsely populated, with essentially everyone in the country living in the capital georgetown. it is the only english speaking country in south america, and considers itself more a caribbean country than a south american one, evidenced by the accents and by the headquarters of caricom (the caribbean community). the population is very diverse, with the highest proportion of ethnic indians of any country outside of india – indians compose almost half of the population. the remainder are black and amerindian, with a few chinese and portuguese.

guyana means “land of many waters.” the country is divided by the essiquibo river, the third largest river in the amazon basin. guyana has been one of the poorest countries in south america to date, but it is expected to become the continent’s richest country per capita over the next decade as vast oil reserves have been found off its atlantic coast. so things there are going to change a lot!