Pastor Brown
on George Hamilton (Jamaica), 28/Feb/2011 02:40, 34 days ago
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I first found out about Pastor Brown when Dominic Ali posted this photo above on his Facebook page as his photo of the day. Pastor Brown looked like such an interesting person I started asking questions about him. Someone else responded to me on Facebook telling me all about Pastor Brown so I became compelled to find him myself. It wasn't difficult. His house was easy enough to find, we'd seen it before and knew more or less where it was located but we weren't sure we'd actually get to meet the man himself.But as luck would have it, meeting Pastor Brown was almost easier than finding his house. He was out in his front yard busily painting everything in sight (flower pots, corrugated steel, a satellite dish and even the clay on the road edge across the street). He greeted us with a paint brush covered in blue oil based paint in his left hand and reached out to shake our hands with his red oil based covered right hand. Our hands were now as beautifully coloured as his were.Pastor Brown is always happy to tell his story. He'll be 79 years old in March and has been painting his house since 1963. He's visited the Queen and had his picture taken with the Guards at Buckingham Palace but his real claim to fame is that he and his house were featured in the German Time magazine, but more impressively, in the January 1985 issue of National Geographic. The issue with Koko the chimpanzee holding her beloved kitten on the cover which included a section on Jamaica as well. I sure hope he's still got a copy because those back issues of National Geographic now sell for $800 plus. Yes, I know how many National Geos we've recycled over the years and have none to our name any more. Ooops.Pastor Brown left us posing as he did for National Geographic. We on the other hand had red painted palms to contend with and George muttered something about not letting him loose in the Sistine Chapel with a paint brush. A delightful man who we will definitely stop to chat with as we pass again.
