The Jamaican Mother

“Yes man, bruck it”, “You doing very well”,- what the Jamaican mother tells her child who is misbehaving.

You are balancing your mother’s favourite glass on your forehead and she catches you, applauds and tells you “Keep it up.” If you are foolish enough you will believe her and continue. If you have one iota of sense, you will know that if you continue, you are working your way towards some sort of punishment.

When she tells you “bruck it man, caw mi have plenty money fi buy more” do not listen… it is a ploy. And when you do actually bruck it, she tells you “Well done”, but that does not make you feel that your mother is proud of you, it makes you know that punishment is just around the corner.

She just baked a nice potato pone, you know di one wid di wetty wetty top, and every minute you go for a slice. Watch it. Some will take one big ol ‘junk’ (chunk) of di pudden and they are seen as ‘craven’ (greedy). Your slice is so thin that your name and 'craven, would never be in the same sentence. The thing is you have gone back five times.

When she sees you with the knife in your hand, having already cut your sixth slice, and says sweetly ‘So why you stop ? Finish the whole thing one time, cause nobody else don’t want any.” You know that what she is really saying is “if I ketch yuh back inside yah one more time tideh, me an yuh.“


And of course the classic is when she sends you for the belt with which she will give you a ‘beaten’. Most times she does not have to do anything, because the process of going for the belt is in and of itself punishment enough. One a dem ol time mother would send you fi go cut yuh owna piece of 'wis wis' that she plan to beat you with. Believe mi, no beaten kyaan hot, like a beaten wid a switch, especially pon yuh foot. It sting fi days.

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