Though the road may be rough,
I’m not givin’ up.
Some days may be tough,
I’m not givin’ up,
I’m not givin’ up.”
Osei James
In the remote village of Matura on the northeast coast of T&T there is a house in a secluded and serene area with a stream nearby where lost young men go for help. Osei James, 23, is one of the people at the Recovery and Discovery (READI) centre who has been helping in the rehabilitation of drug addicts and depressed youths who seek help there.
The son of a petroleum engineer of Palmiste, San Fernando, and former University of T&T (UTT) student, he is also involved in the development of support groups across the island to help young men in trouble.
“The support groups counsel to folks in crisis,” chairman of the READI centre, Pastor Clive Dottin, said.
James, a former music producer and soca artiste who went by the name, Noble Vox, now uses his music to give a message of hope to souls enslaved by drugs. He has been singing in church crusades all over T&T and plans to visit soon hot spots like Sea Lots.
James’ exceptional talent and motivational abilities have so impressed the managers of the centre that a recommendation was made to appoint him as a national field officer with the related group, Friends Forever, Dottin said.
But James is no ordinary counsellor. His power to reach drug addicts was acquired because he was one of them. He was a hopeless drug addict who reached the doorsteps of hell and was, only up to July last year, in and out of psychiatric wards and mental institutions.
Drugs made him quit UTT in his final year and get put out of his father’s comfortable Palmiste home. On his own, James roamed all over Trinidad, literally singing for his supper with his guitar at street sides, and even ended up by his mother’s family in Grenada.
Recalling his story, he said it was the same music that took him down the path to hell. It began when his father bought an acoustic guitar for him one Christmas. “I was 14 and I started singing and writing my own music.” He learned, online, how to produce music and before long had his own recording studio.
Among the people who came to do recordings were aspiring hip hop, soca and dancehall artistes and James was urged to give marijuana a try.
“That’s the lifestyle behind this kind of music. You come to the studio, light up, get high and do a track.
“They told me it would relax me and improve my music. I gave it a try and I became addicted. I needed it so much, I could no longer exist without it.
“We would buy a $20 piece local and smoke about three times a day. I thought it was making me better but that was an illusion.
“I would not eat or sleep for three days at a time, only smoking marijuana. I was drinking too.
“I ended up with a nervous breakdown and my father got me admitted into Ward One, the psychiatric ward at the hospital.”
James was so heavily sedated with medical drugs he became like a zombie. His father sent him to the rehabilitation centre at Mount St Benedict.
“I spent one month there and left. I was still craving for marijuana.”
This time, his father did not want to take him back and James went to Grenada by an aunt.
“I went back on marijuana and I started to do crazy things in Grenada.”
James said one day he stole a garbage truck. “I made a couple of rounds and picked up someone and dropped him off. Then, I parked up the truck and walked home.” James ended up in the “Pink House” in Grenada, the mental hospital.
When he returned to Trinidad, he was on his own.
“I used to play streetside. I had a little bucket people used to put money in. I made enough money buy food and keep me afloat. And I continued on marijuana.” On more than one occasion during this period, James was admitted to Ward One and, once, to the St Ann’s Mental Institution.
“One day, I just got fed up. My brother visited me at Ward One in July last year and told me about the READI centre.
“I really wanted to go. I did not want to be in this position anymore.” James had already had what he called “messages” through his music.
“It was around this time I wrote, “Not Givin’ Up”, a key factor in my recovery.”
James has been at the READI Centre for the last six months, drug free. He will graduate on January 22 a new man, ready to complete his UTT course, pursue music and theology at the University of Southern Caribbean and help others on drugs.
“I would really love to help in that area,” he said.