IT was a hot and sunny day in Iterboreale, St Mary, but landscapers lined the street at a section of the community nonetheless, working diligently to play their part in making Jamaica beautiful.

As they trimmed overgrown bushes, packaged debris, and took short breaks under shady trees, the 16 workers expressed gratitude for the opportunity to earn while helping to clean up the country. They said that they were hired by St Mary South Eastern Member of Parliament Christopher Brown, and were charged with debushing the section of road from the border of Portland and St Mary to the Annotto Bay Cemetery.

For Gideon Brown, landscaping was a hobby he took on seven years ago, temporarily, but now it is one of his main sources of income.

“When I just started using a weedwacker, I did not use the [weed]wacker straight through. I would just use it occasionally with my family, because they have some little apartments and they gave me the [weed]wacker every time I was there and said, ‘Cut the place.’ I never knew anything about [weed]wackers, but over the years I got to learn,” he told the Jamaica Observer on a visit to the parish last Wednesday.

“Most of the men out here are skilled [weed]wacker men who handle their work. I don’t see no man on the work who quarrels too tough about the bush. We know it’s rough, but I don’t see any man quarrelling about the bush. We just come to cut, and we cut and go through. Everywhere has to be nice when we pass through,” he added passionately, with nods of approval from other workers who stopped to listen in on the conversation.

Brown said, with the showers of rain at the start of the year and Hurricane Melissa last year, the roadside was overgrown with bush that made the streets look unappealing. When approached and tasked with clearing the greenery, he said he and the other workers jumped at the opportunity.

“We are glad to know that we are a part of making Jamaica beautiful!” he exclaimed.

“Me love that we come out and we blend together in a united vibe and know say we a clean up Jamaica and do our thing. If they even put us on a next part of the island to clean it up, we a guh still passionate and clean it up, because it is Jamaica we live in and we want to see Jamaica beautiful,” he added, proudly.

Pointing out that he also does landscaping privately, working with residents to keep their yards trimmed, he admitted that landscaping is not always easy as a business. However, he’s stood the test of time and has been a full-time landscaper for five years.

“A lot of the time we don’t make [any] money, but we still go and go do it, because we know say is our people them and we can’t pressure the people them when we know they don’t have it. We just do it for whatever they have, and we just work with it, but now it’s kind of better because you can charge your money, and people will try and meet the demand,” he told the Sunday Observer.

Though a newcomer to the landscaping business, Carlton Prendergast was just as passionate as he spoke about the role he plays in making Jamaica beautiful.

“We love what is going on…Look how the place pretty. Everybody, all tourists pass by and say they love it, and they wouldn’t mind come here every season. The thing looks good…It pretty, pretty like money,” said Prendergast, smiling brightly as he gestured to the clean-up taking place.

A skilled labourer, he shared that he takes advantage of any opportunity to provide for himself, adamant that he will not allow laziness to consume him.

“To sit down and beg people for things, that is not going anywhere. People a guh chat you say you are a big man, so you [should] look work, so that is what me come do — look work — because that is what I want. I can’t afford to come see a man and a beg him this and that. Is work I want, so I do my work to achieve what I am to get,” he told the Sunday Observer.

“I don’t want it to stop…I wouldn’t mind working Saturdays and Sundays,” he said in reference to the clean-up work along the main road.

“Me not even a make the grass grow high so again; as it reaches [the ankle], we will cut it down. It nah go have no time fi grow. As it push up it head, we will chop it off to make the place look beautiful. We know people love to see the place look beautiful and it a guh prettier,” declared Prendergast.

As he prepared to return to work, Brown pleaded with Jamaicans to keep the country clean.

“We find some things on the roadside sometimes that are not supposed to be on the roadside. We need to dispose of the garbage more responsibly. Don’t dispose of your garbage in the wrong [way]; just dispose of it in a responsible manner so that everything is alright. Certain things should not be thrown out in the public,” he pleaded.

He also advocated for the addition of palm trees along the roads so that, “when we clean up and when people are driving by the roadway, it looks like some foreign country to how nice and pretty it looks”.

PRENDERGAST…we love what is going on

BROWN…we are glad to know that we are a part of making Jamaica beautiful