Thoughts of a minibus traveller

Stabroek News 16 June, 2007  Letter to the Editor  "Is who you really think you is?" was the only reaction I ever had to the first letter I wrote to Stabroek News way back in the 1990s. The letter was sent via fax in those days. I was happy that at least one person read the letter.  Many people have paid tribute to Stabroek News since news of their closing hit us. Many people have talked about the letters to the editor section especially.  Stabroek News has published many letters which I have written.  Many people have told me that they read the letters. Others said they hear I write some letter and I would then send the link to them. Stabroek News has also not published a few letters - at one point I thought they were not publishing the letters I wrote about the alcohol industry and its contribution to our alcohol problem in Guyana. I wrote in the third person, or sometimes, in the first person plural 'We' not as in the royal 'We' but hoping that I could inc...

  Pumpkin  Man in the market asks if I want the pumpkin cut at $400 which is the same as 2 pounds of carailla and 2.5 pounds of ochro and I say no, then I see that it dry and look nice and I have not cooked pumpkin for a long time as the price was too much in the oil and gas luxury range .  Visitor to Guyana asks me 'is that grown here?" and when I tell him yes , the man said "wow, that is so expensive"  and I tell him since oil flowing, the vegetables and fruits more expensve and he ask me why  and I say, 'I don't know'.  Kadoo And is a nice pumpkin and I think would be nice to make something else other than the regular pumpkin and the internet throw up 'Borani Kadoo' ..   کدو Kadoo  - is Pashto/Urdu/Persian for pumpkin though the pumpkin might be a different one from the expensive one which growing in Guyana. And 'Borani Kadoo'.. as with food, so many different ways to cook it. All start with slicing the pumpkin into thin slices and dee...

  Invasions  Day after USA invade Venezuela and kidnap the dictator Maduro, the man who supports PPP because he feel that no one else better while also afraid of the PPP - asks me 'So what yall gun do now about Farnum Playground"?   Residents of Subryanville  have been calling on the Government agencies to restore Farnum Playground to the community after the occupation of the land by private business interests who to this date, remain unknown. Much like the appeals to the United Nations on the other occupations in the world, it seems the residents' calls on the Central Housing and Planning Authority, the Ministry of Education, The Ministry of Local Government, the Mayor and City Council are going to be useless because the only thing matters as the USA Government showed last Saturday.. law does not matter, only power.  Venezuela/Guyana In April 2002, a woman sitting next to me in the square in Havana who offered me one of the cakes she was eating asked me i...

  Alarm rings and I hear it and realise that wait wait, I sleep through the night and so I lie down in wonder as night sleep can be interrupted by heat, or dreams which seem to be real or healthy bladder and kidney function.. which has to be attended to but you know you not supposed to jump out of bed immediately..  but is cool and dark - sun come up but it aint shining yet on the bed  so I could lie down and read out the book as you do when there are cool rainy mornings and you don't want to sleep back but you don't need to get up.. and the book is nice.. and sometimes you belly rumbling because your body has this clock but the book and the bed.. little things like lying down in bed on a cool morning and reading a nice book.. which is a gift really as other times place get bright and hot too quick .. and in the yard.. zinnia which come out on 6 December and still there until now.. and this is flower I put down from a woman who hand good with plants.. and three weeks lat...

Far Left: Joshua Tujay Macey: Right Mad Cow, Stilt Walker and flouncers from Victoria Renegades Masquerade  Saturday afternoon, humid. Loud drums, triangle and flute making noise all over the Guyana National Museum - Museum which is usually quiet except for traffic outside. The music is floating around all the old things.. historical things - which relate to Guyana.. the beats and tweets I imagine could be absorbed by the things which are in cases .. things which are 'dead' in a way.. dead history....  Masquerade though is living history..  and so I turn the corner and see the masqueraders.. and the musicians and the people brought together by the Masquerade Association Guyana Inc   for the first Masquerade Day on 29 November, 2025.  A man tells me 'masquerade is for outside, open spaces not inside .. too confining' and it is true.. but something about how this masquerade is weaving .. the Museum 'used to have' an exhibit in one alcove of masquerade but it was...

 ( This post refers to the exhibition Perspectives: Dialogue of a Brush  which features work by artists Roann Pierre, Leon Hardowar, Tammy Walker, Chelsea Ramotar, Demion Mack, Sheliza Rampersad, Lisa Thompson and Pekahiah James. I regret that I did not note down names of the pieces properly as I was not planning to write this blog. I mean no disrespect to the artists). Dancing Skeletons   The two dancers have on the black leotards with the bones marked on them. They are covered in fabric with oranges and yellows. - in the shape of butterfly wings on one dancer They move to the La Llorona   One of Roann Pierre's stunning pieces is near them, also with black, with oranges and yellows .  The piece refers to the duality of existence (I think). Roann Pierre used fabric in the piece, and it provides this unintentional backdrop to the two dancers from Guyana moving to the music from Mexico in commemoration of El Día de los Muertos - Day of the Dead....