GROWING UP in Buxton in the early 50s was as fun-filled for Husman Khan and his three young brothers as it was for other children their age being raised at the time in any other countryside community outside of Georgetown.
Now a medical doctor living in the United States of America for more than 30 years, he looks back with fond memories on his childhood and the rare thrill it gave him and his siblings to be a part of a community as pastoral and as exciting as Buxton …which is something they did not quite experience in the city where they were born.

“I have fond memories of Buxton, of which I am very proud. The villagers lived in harmony and with great respect for each other,” he told the Sunday Chronicle while on holiday here recently.

It was one of those villages, he recalled, where people were very close-knit, and everyone knew each other, most times by their first names. He also spoke of the good old days… when neighbours looked out for each other, and the elders within an extended family played a dominant role in defining the values that would help mould the character of younger family members. Buxton, at that time, he said, was one of the few villages where a high premium was placed on education, and indeed, it did turn out many a notable scholar.

Born and raised in Kingston, one of the city’s more affluent suburbs, he’d probably just turned ten, Husman said, when his parents Subhan and Sugra Khan decided to move the family east to Buxton, just 11 or so miles outside of the city.

Once settled, he and his siblings very quickly cottoned on to the way of life there, to the extent that they grew to understand and appreciate the rich cultural and other norms peculiar to the village, and to savour every waking moment of the good life the village had to offer. And believe it or not, there was that aplenty.

Looking back, he cannot help but reflect on the many sacrifices children of his day made to ensure they took in what little education their parents could afford to give them; sacrifices he’s not sure the average youths of today are prepared to make.

He used as a typical example of the kind of sacrifices he was talking about the fact that many a young boy in his time did not mind having to go to school without yachtings if it rained, or the one pair they owned did not dry in time for school the next day.

Not so today. School children - particularly those at the adolescent stage - insist on having the most expensive name-brand footwear or clothing, even if the items at reference are beyond the reach of their poor parents.

Likewise, few children back then could have afforded the luxury of taking to school pocket money, as against today, when many a youths would ‘cry their eyes out’ if they did not get what they consider to be a desirable sum so they could spend it at will on junk food during the lunch or snack break.

And usually, there were ‘village fathers’ for each generation, who, by definition, happened to be a very knowledgeable and respected elder in the community who always seemed to have a ready solution to problems affecting the village, albeit, discipline was the order of the day.

Invariably, such a person would be an educator, as in the case of the late Mr Dudley Younge, or ‘Teacher Dudley’ as he was called, who was the headmaster of Friendship Primary School.

Generally, children saw themselves as children, and behaved that way. For boys, there was no recreation without a ball game, and running, jumping, swimming and climbing fruit trees were always fun things to do.

A walk through ‘Big Market’ — that’s the Stabroek Market for those who don’t know it — also brings back fond memories for Dr Khan, as does the recollection of the thrill it gave the Buxton boys to climb the huge mango trees in the ‘back-dam’ to get at the sweet, juicy fruits known as ‘Buxton spice’ mangoes, or having to brick them down and plunge into the trenches beneath to retrieve those that fell into the treacle-coloured water.

As for swimming, there was no ‘Luckhoo Swimming Pool’ as in Kingston, so the village lads had to make do with the ‘punt trenches’, which they did without any qualms.

Moonlit nights offered children a much-anticipated treat, as it was the time when in almost every household, they would usually huddle around one of the elders in the family to listen as they recounted ‘jumbie stories’ and shared their fascinating experiences.

As a boy, Husman attended St Anthony’s Roman Catholic Primary School which had a profound influence on the quality of education he would receive and was to form the foundation for his later intellectual achievements.

Recalling what a privilege it was to have been able to bond with elders in the family, he said: “My grandfather, Sheer Khan, was a butcher, and I often went to the market with him there in Buxton.”

In his mind’s eye, that was, perhaps, where, at an early age he developed an appreciation for the hard work and sacrifices the villagers subjected themselves to, in order to eke out a living so their families’ needs could be met.

His father, Subhan, was a businessman and imported and redistributed goods such as cheese, peanuts and other merchandise. His mother, whom we established earlier was named Sugra, was a housewife and very good with her hands.

However, the riots of the early sixties brought with it a searing temperature which saw the family moving over to Annandale, the neighbouring village. But, for sentimental reasons, it is not easy to get aged persons who would have set up homes and expanded their gains through the years, to relocate.

And so, his grandfather remained in Buxton. Husman and his brothers continued to visit and spend time in Buxton from time to time. By then he had written and passed the Common Entrance Examination and was attending Queen’s College. In 1966, at age 20, he won a Commonwealth Scholarship to India where he studied medicine. Having successfully completed his studies, he returned to Guyana and in 1973, landed his first job as a doctor here, working with the Public Hospital Georgetown (PHG) as the institution was then called.

Thereafter, he was to be called Dr Husman Khan – an achievement of which his parents and grandparents and others were eminently proud. In 1974 he moved to the St Joseph’s Mercy Hospital. It was during this period that he met and married Joan Butisingh, a Registered Nurse at the Georgetown Public Hospital before embarking on post-graduate studies in the United States of America.

By the time he had completed his studies, his wife was about to give birth to the first of their two sons. That was in 1978. The family has since decided to settle in Miami, Florida, where it was much warmer than New York or New Jersey. Today, 30-odd years later, Dr Husman Khan, having made his name in the Department of Internal Medicine and Geriatrics, tells of having found those years to be very rewarding.

An internist geriatrician by profession, he currently works with the elderly at the Broward General Medical Centre in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

But, with retirement just around the corner, he is giving some serious thought to relocating to Guyana so he can “give back” something to his people. It was with this thought in mind that he visited several communities and health facilities while he was here, so as to determine where his services could best be utilized.

Chances are we haven’t seen the last of Dr Husman Khan, as the pull of growing up in Buxton is still as strong as it ever was.