 Welcome to another episode of Stepping Up, where we explore the world of innovation, creativity and advocacy to aspire to greater and new things. I'm your host, Daniel Dubois. This week, I wanted to explore the world of women in agriculture. I was deeply inspired by Keith Linkaru, who is the founder of Helen's Daughters, a foundation which seeks to support women in agriculture with training and access to information and resources. After check-handing over ceremony this week, where funds were handed over from the Prime Minister's independence ball, I was moved by Ms. Karoo's candid thank-you speech, which spoke to the importance women played in feeding the nation and how they are often forgotten. In this episode, we head to Babano, where we chat with Ms. Karoo and two women agriculturers from Helen's Daughters, all immensely proud of what they do and so excited to show me around. A little later, you get to see how I did at Harvesting Eggs. Let's take a look at the first interview. Hello guys and welcome to another exciting episode of Stepping Up and right now I am here on Michael Lina's farm and we will get to meet her a little bit later. But right now we are zoning in to the lady of the hour, the founding director of Helen's Daughters. How are you Keith? Good, Daniel. Thank you for having me. So happy that you agreed to say yes to being a part of this interview here today. And of course we know that this week you guys were the recipients of some support from funds raised at the officers, not the officers ball, sorry, the prime minister's ball. So I was like, hmm, who is she? And the way she came when she spoke about what she does, and you know, everybody had to give the little speech. I was just very moved by, you know, the way you spoke about women and farming and you basically inspired me to want to feature you this afternoon. So thank you so much for saying yes. So my first question for you is basically why farming and why women? And how did Helen's Daughters begin? Farming for me is close to my heart and second nature. I was proudly born and raised in the community of Fawasaw, Babano, and that community and like most of Babano is largely an agricultural area. And my background doesn't lie in agriculture. It lies in political science and international relations, which is a bit far, one would think. But when I noticed that the vision, like the perspective of the country was sort of turning away from agriculture and we were relying more and more on tourism, I felt that there were sustainable ways to sort of combine the two without neglecting any sector. And the reason I chose women is because I felt like women tend to be like the invisible force in farming, just like Miss Paula, Miss Michaelina, there's thousands of those misses in the country. And I'm sure you Daniel have probably known or know of someone who's a woman farmer. And I felt like a lot of times you don't hear their stories, they don't get the recognition for feeding the nation. And in general, they're overlooked. Just like I mentioned at the award ceremony, you can go into castries market and you'll see that 90% of the vendors are female. But when it comes to choosing like persons, farmers and so on for programs of financial assistance, a lot of times it's men. Because the idea is that women tend to be vendors and not growers. And I'm sure in the castries market is a good example of it, that most of the women there most likely grow their own produce. Absolutely, they do. They really literally feed in the nation. So let us know a little bit more about what exactly does Helen's daughter's offer. She was very specific, please don't drop my S. So Helen's daughters, what is it that you guys offer to any woman who is in farming or interested in farming? All right, well, we really focus on four areas. One is highlighting the role that they play in agriculture. So we do quite a bit of advocacy on social media, sharing their stories and what all our members are doing. The second one is we're quite focused on economic empowerment. We want, like Miss Michaelina had mentioned, for them to realize that there's a difference between a farmer and an agricultural entrepreneur. So we want them to run their farms as a business and we provide support in terms of business development. The third thing that we provide, which sometimes you don't find is linkages to the actual markets. Like a lot of our farmers who only vented in the castries market before now have contracts with Massey or formerly before COVID actually used to sell to hotels and restaurants large scale. So they would actually get a normal decent sustainable income rather than something that they're unsure of when they're vending. And the final thing is that we want to inspire women that normally felt marginalized like women farmers to feel like they can own positions of leadership not only in the agricultural sphere but outside of it as well. I must say that I'm deeply moved and inspired and it's interesting that we did the show moving backward because we introduced the farmers and really gave me a unique context for me to be able to do the questioning now. But not only that, I am inspired because when you hear about farming, you just think about agriculture and like you know, it's like probably older people and you know, not everybody wants to do that. But then when having that conversation with them, they spoke about how farming really is a means of empowerment for women and I am really moved and inspired by that and it's a means of empowerment and it doesn't matter how old you are or where you are and how small your backyard might be. Once you could get that plant in the soil and get it out there. So tell me a little bit more, how many people have you been able to impact and how far reaching is your support nationwide? Well nationwide, we're still quite a very young organization. I would say that overall in our programs and so on, we're this year marks three years since we're in existence and we've impacted about the lives of about 150 female farmers. Currently, we have two flagship programs. We have a six month capacity development program called the Rural Women's Academy that Miss Nelson and Miss Paula were part of. And we're actually running a virtual ag academy. Currently, it sparks through COVID and so on. And what we're doing is we are running it in collaboration with facilitators from the University of Cornell and it focuses on hydroponics, which is like more we're trying to also exactly and protected agriculture and so on. So giving them more modern options and more sustainable options for their farm. Would you say, would you say that COVID-19 changed? Well, you mentioned hydroponics, but probably before that, was it able? Did it change your programming in any way? And did it probably put a spoke in your way in terms of any of your plans? You know what's amazing about it? And I don't want to say amazing, but in a way, interesting because COVID-19, I think made the country realize that we can't put all our eggs in one basket. And it also made us realize the impact of a nation's food security. For example, if the trading routes had been completely disrupted, we would essentially be starving in a way as a nation. And Senusha is too bountiful. The soils are too fertile for us to be in this position. A lot of my farmers, like Miss Paula mentioned, it was a way for them. It was an obstacle for them to market it. But when they did, they noticed that people were really right now invested in trying to buy local and eat local foods, not only because of COVID, but also because there's like a new wave of trying to be healthier and live. Yeah, and it's everything is organic and, you know, not important, no GML. And, you know, it's true. It's a move and it's a wave. And it's interesting to note that again, the linkage that as a country, we can support that need and that demand for, you know, fresh fruits and vegetables to be able to to do that. Next question is 10 years from now, where do you see Helen's daughters? What will be your biggest dream and your biggest accomplishment? And what is it that you really want to aspire to? Ten years from now, I see Helen's daughters as spreading all over the Eastern Caribbean region. I see some of the women that we've impacted right now, like Miss Michaelina, to be ambassadors for Helen's daughters, to actually be facilitators that they've learned enough that they can actually teach other people as well. And also, I because of the fact that I know, like in my grandfather's days, he actually learned farming practices and agriculture in school. Technically, right now in Saint Lucia, we don't have those agricultural programs in a lot of our elementary. For some reason, I think that we do. I just don't know how much about what we learn in school is translated outside into the open world, you know, because I did agriculture and nobody liked agriculture. I never had a class in agriculture in all my years in school. I did agriculture, see? I remember doing it and I remember it had two components and it was it's there. So what school you went to? I went to S.J.C. And I went to Agiluria before that. That's a special, you know, being excluded from these, what do you call this, comprehensive subjects? Right. But they do have access to it, actually. They do, but I would say that when I mean like access to it, not only not in terms of secondary, but actually starting from in front and primary. I feel like it's important for kids to learn from an early age, where their food comes from and also for us to sort of revitalize the whole idea of the food pyramid, you know, like, I think that what we've learned before from the U.S. and so on is not necessarily the best in terms of what we consume. And we have to sort of retailer that to a Caribbean diet, I would say. Yeah. Yeah. I'm ready to start taking ownership of what is ours and that probably since you're in primary school, because even back in the days, you know, when you learn history, because I did study a little bit of history at a level, they talk about how everything was life was revolved around bananas. And like how on Fridays, children will not come to school because they're in there in the on the plantation helping their parents. You know, so why can't we not embrace that? And it's not only bananas, but all the other aspects to farming and agriculture right now. You know, at a younger age, we can really encourage persons. Absolutely. And when you look at the biggest economies in the world, the similarity that all of them have, Brazil, the U.S., Canada, France, China, they are huge. The GDP is agriculture contributes a big part to their GDP. You need to start focusing on a little bit more. And we have foundations like you who are taking up the mantle to encourage women to get into agriculture and to support the endeavors. How do you feel that you were selected this year to be part of the Prime Minister's ball list of recipients for support? I was actually pleasantly surprised when I got the call, I was honestly quite shocked again because the organization is young. But even though we're young, I think we're we're feisty. In terms of our membership. I could put this to that. So I think that and I don't think we're giving up any time soon. I think we've only just begun. And I would have to say that we're truly grateful because it was the largest amount of locally sourced funding that we've ever gotten to date. All the funding that we have received has come from outside and and grant funding. But this is really our first local form of support. And for me, that's important because oftentimes in Saint Lucia, we like to say we don't support one another. And to me, it was a testament on a national level that it was realized that women farmers do play a vital role and that money literally is going to go directly into our training programs and expansion. So it's quite exciting, you know, so even though we're sort of in grim times, but at least we finally have some solid a little bit more positivity is peeping out. Exactly. Yeah. But congratulations. Let our audience know how they could join Helen's daughter, Helen's daughters. Helen's daughters. And just let us know how we can contact you. Well, you can join Helen's daughters by simply emailing us info at Helen's daughters.org or you can go onto our website. Helen's daughters.org as well. And we are on WhatsApp on 758 287 7700 as well. So any questions we're here to answer and trust me, once you reach out to them, you have friends. I feel like I've made long friends here today and they will help you there. They say they're going to see my backyard to see how they could help me start my own little farm or my little any little thing, my garden. So we'll be right back. And when we come back, you'll get to see our two farmers that we met here today. And I actually got to harvest some eggs. So I'm looking forward to that. Stay tuned and we'll be right back. Good afternoon. And how are you, mom? I'm great fine. All right. So tell us a little bit more about your farm and what exactly you have planting. Well, I'm planting celery, Chinese cabbage, sweet peppers, bell peppers. Eggplants, Swiss chard. And over there, I have beets and lettuce, thyme and chives for now. Nice. And before we started the interview, Michaelina was telling me that one of the things that she looks forward to doing as a farmer is talking to her plants. So tell us a little bit about how much you pluck to your plants and let us know how proud you are as a woman to have your own farm. Well, I learned to speak to my plants from an older lady. She's dead now. And she was always speaking to her plants as well. So she told me, you must talk to the plant as you plant. You must talk to it to them as you weed. You must talk to them. And one thing she always emphasizes prayer, prayer before I come to my farm, because you never know. You know, and I just tell the Lord what you want. Talk to the Lord as if he's there with you. How important it is for women and you are an executive of the Helens Daughter Foundation. How important it is for women and what the foundation does in terms of encouraging them and supporting them to be farmers. Well, gone are the days when women were dependent on men. Gone are the days, OK? And I used to depend on my husband. But since we bought this property, I decided to go on my own and to plant. Grow my own vegetables. I have a worker. He comes here on a morning and he works. And then it's very important because then I don't have to depend on him for everything. And it just gives me pleasure when I take my stuff to Marseille, that's why I sell. And next week, go to Marseille, collect my check. That is it. And the check is on my name. It's what to speak. It's on my name. It's not on anybody's name. But if anyone. So then, just with that, what can you tell women and young women? Because I'm so inspired by what I have seen this morning. A while ago, I was saying I want to be a chicken farmer, but now I want to be a produce farmer. And I want to do it all. What is it that you have to tell women, no matter what age? What message do you have for them? And why they should be interested in agriculture? Well, women, if you don't have the amount that I have, you can start small in your backyard. Use tires, boxes and start small because that's how I started. My husband was making beds on top, you know, until, you know, we bought that property. But when you start small, then you will you will want to expand and, you know, and have more and more and more. And it is a challenge for women to depend on themselves. And when you see we plant, we know that we are feeding the nation. We are feeding people, you know. And as the saying goes, eat local, buy local, you know. And that's what I do, buy local. I don't buy local, but I eat local because I am planting the same things I'm eating. And it sounds like you just take so much pride in what you do. Oh, yes. Some on mornings, sometimes I dream of my garden, you know. I dream of my garden sometimes. I dream of my garden, you know. When I have to harvest, I have to, I'm coming here around six to eight in the morning. My helper, the day before, I would tell him what I'm going to harvest and he would start and then I would join him. He would cut the stuff because as you see the plate is not, the place is not flat. So he carries it up to the shed for me. And I take care of it right there. And then my son would take me to Masi. And you collect your check. I collect my check the next week, you know. But before my husband used to collect my checks for me. He used to sell for me and he used to sell on his name. But now I'm selling on my name and the checks come on my name and he doesn't know what amount of money I'm making. So say the truth. I'm proud. You know, and you know, and I say again, Helen's daughter's that's what I wanted to come up with now, cause me to. Expand my knowledge. Sometimes when I would speak to the other women. You know, I would learn from them. And because of Helen's daughters, I was able to have more crops growing. I was not planting radish. I was not planting beets. But then in speaking to the other women and. With Helen's daughters and having some of the facilitators coming to speak to us on farming, I said, oh my, but I'm no way. Look at what the facilitators are saying, but I'm no way. You know, and I remember speaking to one of the facilitators and he said to me, my dear, you know, you can make $10,000 in a month. That boosts me up. That boosts me up $10,000 in a month. He told he told me, yes, it depends on what you plant. I'll tell you what to plant, plant, try tomatoes, try carrots and cabbage along with your and have. And did you do that? I have not done it because it's just in March. We had graduation in March. Yes, OK. And the day of graduation, I was going to say graduation. What exactly did you do with Helen's daughters? How did they assist you? What is the first program that you did with them? Well, with Helen's daughters, I was introduced to Helen's daughters by the president of another group I am in. And then I decided to come on board and in coming, I never missed a session. It was always exciting and they used to encourage us to grow. Good food, make sure whatever you grow and be business like, be business like, you know, they have two sides to it, like when you you go to your farm, don't go anyhow. I'm not living from the time I joined Helen's daughters. I'm not going to my leave my house anyhow. When I come here, I always imagine sometimes I my skin on my top is matching, you know, because we have to I am doing my farming farming as a business. That's right. It's not anything on the sideline as a business. You know, and I love the soil. You know, I love playing in the soil. So what message do you have just to conclude our so what do you have to tell me who is thinking about being a farmer and getting into that side of things? How and what do you have to tell the nation and anybody watching the show about farming and why you think women and men? Why do you think it's important? It's first of all, I must tell you to join Helen's daughters. All right. I hope I can get a form again. I'm joining today. Yeah, you can get a form. You can get a form. As long as you have a backyard, you can start there. That will be yours. If the Lord permits and you buy a farm, you can expand. But then it has its challenges because, you see, eating foods from overseas is not the best, you know. But when you eat what you grow, you can even live longer than buying, you know, foods. Buying the regular foods from the supermarket. And anybody can join Helen's daughters. Anybody. So tell them about, let us know about Helen's daughters. It's for daughters, not for sons, for now, women, for women. And Helen's daughter will daughters will inspire you. They'll encourage you. If we have a problem, we will call each other. We will, we have promised to visit one another's farms because we just started about a little over a year ago. But then joining Helen Helen's daughters will encourage you to move on, but do not be stagnant and to aspire to greater things, to greater things. Now I am looking forward to maybe one of these days, I'll go overseas to inspire overseas women. That's right. And in the beginning, you were telling me that you decided to choose farming because when your children got a lot older, you realized that you're like, yes, what to do, you know. And then the first thing I did when my children got older was to learn cake decorating. I do cakes, cake decorating on the side. If I get a job, I'll do it, you know, because the two monies does not fight. The two monies does not fight, you know, so I do that. But then in farming, I have. I get more in farming than than what you're doing than the cakes. And in fact, I don't have time for my house, because I don't have time for my house. I, you know, whenever I come here, like I don't want to live. I don't want to live. But the challenges before I forget, before I forget, the challenge that I have is water, water, water during the dry season season. I have those four times there. They were given to me by Ika, because I'm a member of a group in Babylon called the producers, women's producers. And Ika gave me those four times. It helped during the dry season. But that's one of my challenges. It's the water to get it there, to get it. Although I will live just in 20s right over there, but I'm not having water all the time. Like today, I don't have. I have not had for the week. Praise God, a little water's rain is falling every night. So we can help, help, you know, but I love, I love to know what I do. You love what you know. I love what I do. I don't mind getting my hands dirty, my feet dirty. But when I get to my relax and then I go for a bath, I, you know, then you know, your money is yours. My money is mine. Yes. Well, Michael, you know, thank you so much for chatting with us. I realize you put down the cutlass so you know, it's no longer a hazard. No, no, no, no, I'm just joking because I realize it's like an extension of you. But have my time there. I'm just there. I'm done there. I just have others a habit when I talk, you know, your cutlass, a part of it. Part of it. Thank you very much and all the best in all your future endeavors. And guys will be right back. And now we head to our second farm. I've been in the chicken farm business for 17 years. One time I met my husband, Jojo, but he's deceased now. And then it's two years of his passing and I'm still continuing doing the layers. I'm doing layers. I used to do broilers, but now I'm all into the layer birds. You need to let them know what's layer birds. Yeah, what's layers? Well, there's those who lay. Those who lay, but in the broilers are those you grow to eat for six weeks. OK, OK, OK. So when I get the birds at the beginning of it from the hatchery, I usually bring it into a place where I call a brooder. Leave it there for eight weeks, the layer birds. And then I dig them at six weeks. And after eight weeks, I put them into the larger pen, which is where I have them now. After a while, you can see where I have them. And then I feed them with grower. I'm started for eight weeks. And after I'm started for eight weeks, I give them grower, fine grower. I like the fine grower instead, because I feel the birds enjoy it better. And then after that, they consume more water. I'm de-beaking them for them not to peck each other and not to peck the eggs. That's the important. But some people don't de-beak them, but I like to de-beak mine. Yeah, and I like to de-beak them early. And I don't really have problems. Sometimes if they go through stress also, then they do that. Nice. So I know that you're on the foundation. You're on the board of the foundation. I hope I'm saying it properly. And she's a public relations officer of Helens Daughters. Let us know about the foundation and the work that you have been doing in your community. I have been mobilizing a lot of people about Helens Daughters, letting them know because of Helens Daughters. I'm being a better person today, to be able to manage my farm a little better. Because I did, I think, a six-week course with six months course with Helens Daughters. And that have brought me a better person today. I'll be able to manage my farm better because what I used to do before, I used to feed, full of the feeders. But I've seen that at a loss to me. So what I do, I know 200 birds supposed to eat a bag of feed. According to the amount of birds I have, I know how much feed I have to put into the feeder. So they consume that amount of feed for the day. And also it prevents rats from coming and eat the leftovers for the next day. So I'm saving on that also. So Helens Daughters basically help give you the information that you need and nice. How have other women benefited from Helens Daughters? And tell us why you think it's important women are in agriculture. What's the story we don't know about women who are farmers? Women, sometimes you go out there to get a job, you don't get a job. But with being a farmer, you can manage your farm and manage your home also. You can take time off to go and take your children at school, go and pick them up, you're having time to go and do your sales. You know, well, I can do my sales within that time, with that time. And then I have to make time for my family. So if you are employed somewhere else, it will be more difficult to make time for your family. But being a farmer, then I feel it's for me, it's easier for me to be able to make an income and also be able to maintain my family. So you see farming as an as an opportunity to empower women and women to be able to have their own opportunity to make a living, not just looking or sorting out and eating, you know, what to give them to your family. And you also to your family because you grow it yourself. So you know, you can give them health everything because it's so costly to maintain health in this country. So if you have a healthy farm, you know what I'm producing, then you know that you can give your family a healthy meal. My next question for you is how has Covid-19 changed the way you do things or what has it done? Has it affected you in any way? And if so, how has it changed the way that you conduct your business? Before I used to just take my eggs to the other small shop in the cashless market, I used to just take my eggs to the shop and then I used to sell. But now the money has been so limited that I have to go from door to door to be able to sell my eggs. And I said that have been so good to me because some a lot of people didn't probably thought I had already forget about doing that layered thing. But since they see me coming to their doors and selling eggs, they said, are you still doing the birds? Are you still doing birds? So with that, that can help me. And then I can also bring in some more customers to my business. Nice. So to conclude, what message do you have for St. Aleutians and what would you like to see moving forward and speaking to Helen's daughters? What's next for you guys? I would like to see that the government help us a little bit, not only just talk, but to have a one to one talk with the farmers and have a concern because sometimes they more intend to tell you what they want to do for you, but they don't want you to hear what you need for yourself because sometimes you hold an empty bag and you know what you're going through. And I feel if they do that, I think we'll have a better St. Russia. And Helen's daughters now. And Helen's daughters. Well, thank you so much for joining us for this episode. You told me that you have a task for me for me to go and pick up some eggs. Yes, I clean them and also pack them. A whole job. But anyways, guys, thank you very much. We'll be right back. So moved by this episode, getting to chat with Paula and Michaelina and understanding how they have empowered themselves to be independent and financially stable. If you have been thinking about starting a little kitchen garden, now is the time. And as our guests said, we must start small and be consistent. And now it's time for Link up. We head over to St. Vincent and the Grenadines to chat with Shabazz Ghan Manroo. He's a consultant in the Ministry of Youth Affairs, a radio announcer and entertainer. He talks about St. Vincent's COVID-19 response and reflects on the journey thus far. So Shabazz, thank you so much for joining us for this segment of Link Up. And as you know, we try to reach out to our regional brothers and sisters. It's been a while since we've done a regional Link Up with one of our colleagues from the CYDU movement. And we just want to know in short, how is St. Vincent doing today? We know that we could basically say we've passed that level of fear and we're now on that road to recovery and having to find a way to move forward, balancing, you know, lives and livelihoods and moving forward. So just let us know how is St. Vincent doing as of today? Well, I will say that today, what restaurant are we now presently? It is the fact that we weren't well prepared for COVID. We just assume COVID would have been like another hurricane that would have, for some great reason, just pass it by magically and head to the other islands. As a result of that, we have seen a lot of closure in businesses. We've closed over 350 businesses at the closure doors due to COVID and the country of the country and the access to the country. Now, persons lost work, but now we're in a stage of rebuilding. We're restructuring. We're trying our best to see how we could be more resilient because, you know, COVID hasn't finished it. Matter of fact, I think this is actually the middle of it. This is the middle of the storm and there might be another end. We have put measures in place to be testing as well as quarantining and make sure that persons that adhere to the guidelines, which was a problem for us earlier in the year, persons who weren't really paying attention, everybody was very jovial and they were ready for carnival and all of that. And I think St. Vincent was one of those countries in the region. They didn't close their borders. You guys, according to, I spoke to Arya, she was like, we jam in still here in St. Vincent. And, you know, and you could say relatively, you know, you guys, in terms of your cases, it wasn't what you say, it wasn't that bad. And I guess you just got lucky and, you know, was on the ground. What's the feeling like? The feeling is on the ground. It's still a lot of this grunge because we did not have a carnival. But I think what we have to always prioritize is the safety and well being of all citizens as to our entire response to COVID administration wise, government wise, I will say that we did not have any plans to deal with a pandemic of this magnitude and we still don't have any plans to deal with a pandemic of this magnitude. What we have is a day to day struggle as to let's try this today and see if it works or let's try this tomorrow and if it don't work, let's try something else. There is no affirmative plan. There is no structure in place to say, OK, these are the measures we're putting in place to ensure our borders are still more or less open and what we work with about two weeks ago after the flight stopped coming, we noticed our COVID cases dropping to zero from 25 to zero. And after that, we had a charter from American Airlines who came to Sylvain to stand the Grenadines and immediately we were back in the 20s with cases. We actually now have 15 active cases. So we went from zero to all of these important cases. And I think that's something absolutely to be done about our borders for now until we have a proper concrete plan as to how to control the uncontained COVID as itself. Because what we have are important cases. We don't have local transmission and we reduced the quarantine period from two weeks, reduced it down to a week and now we're at five days and we only got back to five days because we took it to two days. Now I want to be candid and say that, you know, if you have to talk about the same Vincent story, you know, probably you could talk about what would you put on your hand as a success in terms of the whole COVID thing? For me, I could probably say that you guys are basically lucky and very brave because imagine this week we were supposed to have kind of all on Monday and Tuesday and it was very hard for some of us, including myself. And in St. Vincent, you're talking about you had a wetthread Friday. What really going on, boy? I actually got my credit back to my credit card. They say, well, the Airbnb, I had a residence in Lucia. They just can't, but it's down for this. But at the long end of this, Daniel, what I really hope does not become the result is COVID-19 as a pandemic. Growing into this standard is because we don't have the facilities to handle COVID-1, we don't have the expertise to handle COVID. And that is my main point. So the fact that we've just reverted everything to the conversation of normalcy, knowing that we have a pandemic on our hands, that's going to be a lot of stress. And a break of COVID. I mean, if we have over 50 cases, I know it's going to be a national emergency. We have to be a national emergency where our neighbors might not be in the position to help because everybody's trying to safeguard their citizens now as it pertains to COVID. While we're over here, just living our lives freely, living our best lives, basically to put it. So what I would really hope for and what I advocate for is for persons to be more aware that, you know, COVID is here, it hasn't gone anywhere. While as we may go down to zero and we bring in another plane, and we have another plane coming on Saturday, I believe, yes, another plane is coming on Saturday. So I am hoping that there are no positive cases on board that plane. But you can be too certain and the precautions, as I explained, are not in place to ensure that that person is contained and works. But for me personally, on the flip end of COVID, while businesses were shutting down, I took the opportunity to open a restaurant that has been doing. Congratulations. But so that would have been that would have been my follow up question, though. On the lighter side, what are some of the positive things coming out of the whole COVID situation? And like you said, you know, when there's a lot of disappointment and uncertainty and chaos, there's lots of opportunities. So you said that you open your own restaurant, talk to on the ground and nationally in St. Vincent, what are some of the amazing things you've seen citizens do to basically innovate and continue to thrive during this ongoing pandemic? What we saw that was excellent. You saw business houses, mountain pipes, and putting soap dispensers outside. You saw people doing that, even from their local houses in a large community where the populace in that particular space might not be one that is rich or wealthy. You see persons providing materials. You see persons making masks from their machines and distributes. Thank you. Going to the school and assistant teaching children how to properly sanitize how to properly wear their masks, how to save their themselves from COVID. It was a community effort and it brought the community closer. You know, I mean, unfortunately, there are circumstances. But I think now as a society, we're more caring for each other. And we look out for each other as if I'm in the office and I don't have hand sanitizer, for instance. I know my colleague will already be more than happy to offer some hand sanitizer to me and it has been well. I mean, you see little children educating themselves on COVID, understanding, OK, these are the procedures that we need to take to save our ourselves to control the spread of COVID-19. And it has all been good. It has all been good on that end. We're not going to bring us to that place. But, you know, you can't you can't just disclaim the way how the universe works on certain things. Yeah, it's a it's a balance. It's a balance because even in St. Lucia and as much as, you know, we can basically state that we did really well in terms of how we handled it on the ground. You have we face a major economic problem. You know, lots of people are still out of work and, you know, a lot of people are just not too sure what, you know, when the next set of money is coming in. So, you know, I think right now this is probably the focus of the government right now trying to focus on how we could get money back into people's pockets and return life to some sort of normalcy, you know. And, you know, we still under state of emergency. We only lifted our curfew recently. It was up until 11. So our cases, our situation has been very stringent. Yeah, and it was up until I think for the longest curfew we had was five to nine p.m. So and, you know, people was off the road. People would be off the road. So I think, again, on the flip side, as much as we've safeguarded ourselves as much as possible on the flip side, you still have a lot of people who struggle daily to get things done and it's not over yet. You know, it's not over yet. But Shabaaz, thank you so much for speaking to us. I don't know if you have anything that you want to say to wrap up our conversation. Let your brothers and sisters know in St. Lucia, how is St. Vincent today and, you know, any final messages from you? I wish to commend you on this beautiful program that you have invited me to thank you so much for the invitation, of course. To Vincent, of course, remains beautiful as St. Lucia. To praise St. Vincent. Whatever. I have a Lucia at heart. I am part of St. Lucia for myself. But I wish you guys the utmost best. I hope that as a region we could all recover from COVID and get back to show in the world the beautiful islands we have to offer and also stabilise our economies and stabilise our people. Of course, I must commend your government for the steps that they took to ensure that the St. Lucia's uphold was protected from COVID. If only I were to be so lucky. But I must. I'm sure there are a few things that you can probably commend your government for. But, you know, I don't know. I don't know. Shabazz. Enjoy your day. Be safe and all the best. Yeah. And wear your mask and sanitise your hands. All right, goodbye. What an amazing show we had this week. I love reaching out and meeting people and learning about how they beat the odds. Work and aspire to greater things. If you know anyone who's doing something amazing in your community, please shoot me an email at stepping up758 at gmail.com. Thanks again for joining me. I'm your host, Daniel Dubois. Keep safe. And until the next time, don't forget to keep stepping up.