Land of Look Behind (standard:non fiction, 261 words)
Author: Juggernaut	Added: Aug 03 2011	Views/Reads: 2896/0	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
In Jamaica, there is an area called "Land of Look Behind" where the run-away African slaves took shelter from slave masters in the distant past, but always living in fear of capture and looking behind their shoulders for safty. In broader contex

Land of Look Behind 

Subba Rao 

In 17th and 18th century, some of the African slaves in 

Jamaica ran away to an interior mountain area to live in freedom from 

ruthless Spanish and British slave masters. Despite the British efforts 

to capture them, the run-away slaves lived independently on the 

mountains but always looking behind their shoulders for safety from the 

enemies. Thus the area even after two hundred years called “Land of 

Look Behind.”   But this is an ancient Jamaican history. 

United States is known as a Land of Opportunities, since 

millions of immigrants enter United States for opportunity.  It is a 

country built with immigrants. United States is also “Land of Look 

Behind” for several million residents both legal and illegal.  Millions 

of illegal immigrants living in the United States were always looking 

behind their shoulders to avoid deportation.  In this way, United 

States is also a ‘Land of Look Behind' for those to live in free 

society, ran away from their native lands; some are corrupt with least 

opportunities to the poor. 

As the legality of illegals in US is debated, for many native 

sons of America and millions of legal immigrants, US is also a ‘Land of 

Look Behind' hiding from various agencies such as IRS, law enforcement, 

debt collectors, etc.,   In a broader context, everybody lives in 

a ‘Land of Look Behind.' So for those descendents of run-away slaves 

in ‘Land of Look Behind' in Jamaica you were not alone, everybody 

everywhere more or less live in ‘Land of Look Behind,' always looking 

behind their shoulders. 


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