Peace and goodwill

(Picture from Sherlina Nageer)

Motorcade
'Ker yuh po$$$ey" - the woman shouted to the other woman, just after the Diwali Motorcade had passed, the night before Diwali.



An hour or so later, 18 year old Dwayne Durant was stabbed on the seawall. There were lots of bombs and squibs on the seawall, and the people selling and throwing the bombs, they are not interested in celebration. The bombs were there to terrify and make noise.  I accidentally brushed into someone coming home, and there was this .. aye aye Mistuh, watch wheh you going.


Alcohol, meat .. were on sale alongside the floats passing chanting the maha mantras and the bhajans.


A woman , amazing singer, I met her on the seawall and asked what was happening at home, realising something was wrong, but did not realise that things were so wrong.  And the story was unravelled.. the cursing up at home, the constant arguments, humiliation .. she is now in her thirties and it is now getting to her. My friend is keeping the fast. Her mother calls her a whore every now and then. She thinks that it is her karma to live with this, but it is getting to her. She said she will light one or two diyas on Diwali Day.  I offer her the support of the group and curse silently about the many Hindu homes where the crap is hidden for the sake of karma and family and where the beautiful lights and diyas hide a lot of the pain which must not be spoken about because secrets would be let out. I should not curse though.


Another friend is witnessing the motorcade for the first time. I am grateful to her for bringing the bar of Green & Black's Dark Chocolate with inherent warmth from crystallised ginger. The bombs are going off, a baby sleeps next to us and I open the chocolate. It is beautiful.. it had been a rough couple of days and the chocolate and the ginger.. seemed to work, lift the mood.. the breeze is nice. She does not believe that the chocolate could work so fast.. but yep, it does.



Gender
Mother Laxmi is on all the floats when they pass. A Christian woman I know, Diwali is her favourite festival. She likes the idea of the Universal Mother. While I munch chocolate, my friend and I talk about gender.. advertising. She had written about a particular advertisement with a semi naked woman selling Internet options. We talked about the two billboards from Digicel Guyana and the Guyana Hindu Dharmic Sabha - Happy Diwali, and there are pictures of young girls dressed up in 'Indian' finery.. and she like me, recognises the dilemma in Guyana over women as objects (I am still trying to figure out how a Happy Diwali message has to be come with pictures of young girls, why not with a mixture of faces and people?) .


I should not curse. A few years ago, a man had killed his former wife the night of the motorcade, right on the Seawall.


This year, President Jagdeo urges Hindus to respect women and children. His wife had claimed he abused her, a claim she has not withdrawn and which he has not spoken about.


Cool and still..

Diwali morning, I feel like I do not want to get up. I know that I should but I still feeling tired and my mind is racing. I get up late, and do half the number of surya namaskar. I make the parsad and then I write up a blog post. The afternoon comes, I put out the fairy lights and it looks like it will rain. The place is nice and still , not too hot. I soak the wicks in the oil.. and think shucks, if I had known it would have been like this, I would have had more diyas and oil. A younger cousin has come through a surgery. Friends in St Lucia are cleaning up after Tomas


We get confirmation that my young friend, little sister, will do a masectomy.. I am trying to imagine what removing my breasts would be like., she is talking to people though and not doing the old time Indian thing of secrecy and shame.
An older cousin has to do a medical check for heart issues - she told me she is meditating this weekend, and her spiritual training is being brought into force as she avoids the worry., while another older cousin might have some mental health issues.



Message from Mother
A few weeks ago, the Murti at Radha Krishna Mandir gave off sindoor.  Different people had different reasons for this manifestation. Pandit Rajin Balgobind wrote that this miracle is a call to faith. In the middle of my madness, I have been dipping into the Bhagvad Gita again.. and this verse came up..
"

yada yada hi dharmasya
glanir bhavati bharata
abhyutthanam adharmasya
tadatmanam srjamy aham"

Lord Krishna says that he will manifest himself during times of 'adharma' or 'irreligion'.  Many of us who lit diyas that night, were happy that the diyas stayed lit with their unwavering flames for a long time. In my house.. one burned for about four hours. I think that this night, without wind, is another call to faith.
This is another reminder about the importance of that inner light, that spark of divinity which exists and has to shine through. I can be sanctimonious and talk about others.. but that is really for me.

Sorrow and joy..
Saturday morning.. still feel not to get up, and want to cover up. I get up, do the full round of surya namaskar and nibble a bit of the Green & Black's chocolate. The Bhagvad Gita talks about not being a slave to one's senses... I know, so I just eat a little piece.

I get up slowly, take breakfast, go look for the diyas to wash and to clean the soot from the fence (I don't mind). I hear my parents start arguing again.. my father seems to hint that it is my mother's fault that he is unfaithful.. the breeze is nice downstairs. I remember the childish desire to throw a bucket of water on him, but that memory comes and goes and I am happy.. I listen and don't feel the urge to scream to stop or to go hide my head at my failure to keep the peace.


As long as no one will be hurt or killed. Things cool down afterwards.


The man brings the newspapers I read word for word the article on making pera (this woman spent about 15 hours to make pera). I munch on the bitter alas as I read it.. then come up and eat each piece of pera slowly.


I am feeling lightheaded now. I have this project, which requires a similar kind of determination to do.. and I spend the afternoon building up the Amar Deep Ramayana Gole channel on YouTube. It is a good experience, listening and editing. In between, I start a conversation about 'unlikely metaphors' with a woman in England and a poem by Selima Hill. This week has been great like that.. unexpected interactions with amazing women - one sent me Phaedrus to read, another an essay/interview with Wilson Harris. A man sent me the recordings of a training series to cope with depression. He is the last person I ever expected to talk to about depression.


I posted a long post to my journal, about resolving to be happy and being glad that I could come through another period of the blues again. As I browsed the journal, I laughed when I realised that last year this time, I had a similar post.


Sunday..
I wake up, 5:30am.. and I feel good and I actually want to get up and get going. I do not feel the desire to stay in bed and I do not miss the darkness. I wake up early.. and have a whole set of things I want to do. There are a whole set of unknowns.. a professor sends two emails requestings an abstract for a chapter in a book, there is this ambitious article for Hinduism Today and other things.


I am not on the manic upper where I feel I could conquer the world or do anything (still hesitating over that chapter). But I have not had any Green & Black's chocolate as yet today, so I know I good.