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Expats in Guyana


 

Making Georgetown your home

If you’ve recently arrived in Georgetown, Guyana’s bustling coastal capital, you may be feeling a little lost at sea. Where do I find an apartment? Who do I ask for advice on setting up a business? How do I go about making friends? Here are a few tips to help get you started.

Find a home from home

Accommodation in and around Georgetown varies widely in cost and quality. First of all, budget how much you can spend on rent and then think about your needs. Unfurnished or furnished? Solid concrete or breezy wooden? AC or no AC? In the heart of Georgetown or in the quieter outskirts? If you can’t find anything through friends, check out the Classifieds section in the Guyana Chronicle newspaper on Sundays, trawl Facebook groups where people post available apartments, or find a realtor like Total Office (Guyana) Inc. or Demerara Realty to help in your search.

Eat out – and in

Georgetown is full of restaurants, cafes and small snackettes where you can pick up tasty local food and some international specialties too. Exploring them is lots of fun, but you’ll also need to fill your cupboards at home. Street markets like Bourda, Stabroek and Plaisance are lively and cheap places to pick up fresh local fruits and vegetables, and you can pick up pretty much everything else (including imported brands) at one of the increasing number of local supermarkets, such as Massy, Mattai’s, Bounty and FoodMaxx at Giftland Mall.

Shop right

While Georgetown may not have the quality and quantity of stores you’re used to, it is possible to find most things – if you know where to look. Central Georgetown, especially Regent Street, is the place to go for inexpensive homewares – everything from curtains and fabric, to electric fans and gas stoves. Then there’s fashion, gifts and more at Giftland Mall, MovieTowne and the older City Mall. Next to the General Post Office, you’ll find a row of small huts selling locally made leather bags and sandals, paintings and other souvenirs. And whatever you can’t find you can simply order in from outside the country and collect through import services like Zoon.

Seek out events

A good way to meet interesting people and find out more about Guyana is to attend local talks and public events. Moray House hosts regular discussions on everything from the oil and gas industry to architecture and art. Castellani House, the national art gallery, holds private views for new exhibitions. While The University of Guyana runs special series of events, both on and off campus, such as ‘Turkeyen and Tain Talks’ and ‘Conversations on Law and Society’. Keep an eye on Facebook events and join mailing lists to stay up to date with what’s on. 

Meet other expats

Members of InterNations Guyana, the local branch of a global network of expat groups, meets once a month in different locations around Georgetown. While primarily for foreigners, the group is open to all and is a useful place to get advice on everything from setting up a bank account to where to go on a Friday night. Another group fostering intercultural relations is Voices GY, which hosts a regular ‘Spanglish’ event where participants switch between speaking in English and Spanish at the ‘ting’ of a bell. Embassies are another goldmine of activities, ranging from Portuguese classes at the Centro Cultural Brasil-Guyana; to yoga, music, dance and Hindi courses at the Indian Cultural Centre. As well as connecting with other people from your country of origin, you can meet expats from all around the world and learn a host of new, useful skills.

Contacts are everything

While some online resources exist, it can be hard to navigate yourself in Guyana without a helping hand. So it’s encouraging to know that making personal connections is easy. Guyanese pride themselves on their hospitality and you can easily leave an event with a clutch of business cards, phone numbers and new acquaintances. Just make sure you always have a business card handy, bear in mind that the degree of separation is very low (with less than 800,000 people in the country, it’s inevitable that everyone is connected somehow), and remember that personal introductions trump cold calls.

Cash is king

If you’re used to tapping your credit card on a card reader to pay, it’s time to dust off your old wallet. Very few places in Guyana accept card payments – and if they do, you may need to show a passport for added identification. So, always carry cash with you and make use of the ATMs scattered around the city to top up when you’re running low (for withdrawals using international Visa cards, ScotiaBank and Demerara Bank seem to work best). Internet banking is growing in the city, but cheques and cash payments with stamped receipts are still common – even for business transactions.

Do your market research

If you’re setting up a business in Guyana, it pays to know your market. The best way to do this is to draw on local expertise from consultancies like Project Development Consultancy and The Consultancy Group, as well as individual specialists such as tax advisors and lawyers. When you’re ready to get the ball rolling, a good starting point is The Guyana Office for Investment (GO-Invest). It’s worthwhile building industry connections too through private-sector associations such as the Private Sector Commission, Georgetown Chamber of Commerce & Industry (GCCI) and its counterparts across the country; the American Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM) Guyana; the Guyana Manufacturing & Services Association Ltd (GMSA); and the Tourism and Hospitality Association of Guyana (THAG). A Centre for Local Business Development in Guyana has also been set up by international development company DAI through funding from Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Ltd. There are also an increasing number of private support services such as ActionINVEST Caribbean Inc., which has a four-year history of assisting local and foreign individuals and organisations in meeting their objectives.

Stay safe

Staying safe in Georgetown means using a trusted taxi firm, avoiding walking alone at night, not wearing flashy jewellery out on the road, and getting to know your neighbours so they can keep an eye on you and your property. “I would always recommend people look at Foreign and Commonwealth Office Travel Advice on www.gov.uk/fco”, advises British High Commissioner Greg Quinn. “This provides a wealth of information including on the ‘Know Before You Go’ campaign. One of the most important things to think about is ensuring you have adequate insurance to cover all eventualities – if things do go wrong.”

Get out of Georgetown

Make time to travel around the country’s beautiful hinterland areas and extensive coast. Within an hour or two of Georgetown you can swim in fresh water creeks, visit indigenous villages and walk in wild forests. Take advantage of Guyana’s location too to visit nearby Caribbean islands like Trinidad and Barbados, as well as neighbouring Suriname and Brazil. Guyana may be Caribbean in culture, but don’t forget it’s part of South America too.