Henrietta Hassell

My name is Henrietta Hassell. I was born on Saba in July 1990. I'm a mom of four kids, and I work here at the Queen Wilhelmina Library. My mom and my dad was born here on Saba, and also my grandparents. Basically, everybody from my family was born here on Saba.

My grandma, Miss Charles-Simmons, opened a daycare here on Saba back when I was a little girl. So then my mom went away to study teaching, and my aunt went away to study teaching, and I also have cousins and an aunt in Holland who also teach. So, you know, it’s basically in the family. I always thought I wanted to be a teacher when I was growing up. That was my main goal, and I loved it.

We do a lot of different things [at the library]. We have movie nights, and we have spelling bees for kids, and we offer extra classes in the afternoon for kids like math and English and homework support, and Dutch and Spanish and French. And sometimes people hold different functions and host their events here. Working along with somebody like Miss Tiffany, we're young and we can bring fresh new ideas to the library.

I love kids, and I have four [of my own]. Trying to help guide them is what I love so much about being with kids. My big daughter is 14; she told me she wants to be a pilot. My son wants to join a band — I guess he wants to be like his dad, who’s part of a band here on Saba. And my youngest daughter, she wants to be a teacher. And then I have a three-year-old who loves cars. I always tell him, "You seem like you want to be a professional mechanic," because every time he sees a car, he wants to check out the tires and so forth.

I love to take my kids to different places. We go to the beach, or we go out to eat, or hiking, which is a very famous thing here on Saba. Cove Bay is very relaxing — sitting outside of it by the rocks and listening to the waves is amazing. For me, I love being here [on Saba], especially for my kids. The safety here is so different, compared to what you hear out there in the world.

Culture-wise, my mother does the maypole dance. That’s a pole that has ribbons, and the kids learn how to go in and out of each other to intertwine and tie a knot on the pole. There's also Saba lace that the women do here, and we also have men who go out and plant the different vegetables and fruits that you can buy and eat, and we have farming, where they have chickens and goats and so forth.

Miss Tiffany was saying that my grandmother, Miss Charles-Simmons, was the first person who brought carnival here to Saba. And I can't remember what year that was, but she spoke a lot about how everybody used to come together and just bring different materials together and put those things together to make a costume. She also has her own museum that she made here on Saba where they have different old-timey things that they used to use back then showing the way they used to cook and the way they used to wash. All that is in the Osmar Ralph Museum. My grandfather from my father's side, Ishmael Levenston, was a politician here on Saba. He brought down the cost of water supply here on Saba, because it used to be all in the hundreds, like for one load. And he brought it down to $60, which was very good. It's nice to hear those things you know, of what your family used to do back then. But especially for the community of Saba.