Humor--Jamaican Style: Dis, Dat, and the Other

By Ashton Lascelles Walters

Most of the anecdotes presented here are centered around actual events that took place in the island of Jamaica, West Indies. Hence, the humor may be more apparent to fellow Jamaicans. However, the book is full of laughs for just about everyone.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: May 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781466916548

Ashton Lascelles Walters

Ashton Lascelles Walters comes from a long line of writers. His father Edwin Walters prided himself in submitting a “Letter to the Editor” every Sunday religiously in The Sunday Gleaner, the “national” newspaper in Jamaica, W.I. Lascelles was also a featured letter writer of The Gleaner. His daughter Beverley vividly remembers him submitting even letters that she had written to The Gleaner. Lascelles migrated from Jamaica, W.I. in 2005 and currently lives in the Bronx where he spends his time writing his anecdotes and his autobiography, which he hopes to release shortly.

Book preview

Humor— 

 Jamaican Style

Dis, Dat, and the Other

Ashton Lascelles Walters

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© Copyright 2012 Ashton Lascelles Walters.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-4669-1653-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-1655-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-1654-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012905126

Trafford rev. 04/16/2012

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Contents

Foreword

How I Got My Name

Introduction

PartI:   Strange Happenings

Judge Brandon and the Mule Man

The Identical Twins

The Teacher and the Preacher

Mr. Giles Was a Coward

He Was Too Curious

John Stupid, the Driver

The Students

Turn Him Around

The Warboat Woman From South St. Andrew

He Went to Jail for Stealing His Own Goat

Mr. Forgetful

From a Hogg to a Roach

Miss Gloria’s Brilliant Grandson

Mrs. Johnson’s First Motor Car

John Hohn and the Watchman

Miss Gravely and the Coolie Duppy

The Man Who Tried To Hang Himself

Mr. Fowler and the Workman

PartII:   Ungrateful people

The Boy and the Ocean

PartIII:   No license to drink

John Homer Could Not Find His Home/

The Evil of John Crow Batty

PartIV:   Swindlers

Mr. Thomas Bought a Blind-Eye Horse From Mr. Jones

The Coolie Man Stole His Neighbor’s Ram Goat

The Two Salesmen

Miss Solow, the Money Lender

The Christmas Ham

Goodgame Played a Bad Game

The Deacon Robbed the Collection Plate

PartV:   Personal Matters

My Wife and the Lodge Sister

My Cousin Vee Thomas Was Satan Sister

My First Use of the Telephone

PartVI:   Love & Hate

Brother Johnson and His Outside Woman

She Was a Flirt

He Wants To Marry An Ugly Woman

PartVII:   Conniving Artists

The Banker Was a Bigamist

Afterword

This book is dedicated to all my children. The number currently stands at seven, though it was 8 until 9 years ago. All my children also include my 24 grandchildren, my 22 great grandchildren and my 2 great, great grandchildren—and these are only the ones that I’m aware of. I have been told that there are others. I’m truly blessed.

Foreword

I’m ashamed of myself—the most important writing project of my life so far—and here I’m putting it on the backburner for so long to pursue work and other menial events that I’ve been pursuing for a lifetime and getting nowhere with.

How could I deprive the world so long of this genius of a man who for the past couple of years has labored night and day—one keystroke at a time—to produce this marvelous piece of work.

As a child, I loved and deeply admired my father. Now, as a grown woman I cherish and admire him even more—his humor, which I grew up on—his quick wit, which he uses like a razor, sometimes close to drawing blood—his generosity of spirit, the refusal of much of which I apologize profusely to him.

But, let me stop and allow you into the mind and spirit of Lascelles (Last Hell) Walters.

How I Got My Name

The greatest gift from God to man is life and from that life that is given, man starts a journey which must have a story of its own—some will be good, some will be will be bad, and some will be ugly.

For what it’s worth—this is the story of my journey, as best as I can remember.

It was on a Wednesday evening, May 10, 1922, when I was told Miss Mae gave birth to a child; he was