The Coil: Musing on Miscreants and Melas

by Vidyaratha Kissoon

The young man  of Indian origins dances with a group and the Indian arrival celebrations usually have them busy. This year though, he and the group are conscious that they do not want to end up in political situations  and so he is not dancing. He is not sure if he is voting either. He also told me that he did not believe bheri ramsarran, the Minister of Health would have been fired if it was not elections. A woman of Indian origins who first told me of the firing also said that this was just elections gimmicks. She might not vote either.

President Ramotar apparently is remorseful about the firing because he believes bheri was set up and provoked and taken out of context and all kinds of things.  A couple of the people of Indian origins have been condemning bheri and condemning Sherlina Nageer for being rude and disrespectful and so. So now President Ramotar has given them some nice language to use.

177 years after the arrival of the first Indian immigrants to Guyana, the President of the country still wants to excuse his Minister’s contempt for women.
177 years after the Indians first arrived, a lot of people of Indian origin who voted before might not vote now as their only way to reject bheri and those who feel sorry for him.

Saturday is when I go to Mon Repos market.  I jump in a bus and find that it has APNU+AFC stickers inside. The bus fulling up as we move along. Some low reggae music, nothing too loud. I wonder whether the APNU+AFC stickers mean that the drivers will go easy on the music (even if they going heavy on the speed ).

Different people joining the bus.  I jump out the bus not far from a cane juice stand.

A request came in this week for introductions to Indian sugar workers and their families for a project which will compare the stories of sugar workers in Guyana , Mauritius and other countries which had Indian indentured labourers. Sugar on my mind.  I see the man turning the mill to grind the cane to get the cane juice while his wife feeds the cane in the mill.   I decide to drink the juice from the glass without a straw, fly footprint and all, thinking of all the others who were involved in bringing the juice to my lips. Stupid and nostalgic but it is either drink the cane juice from this glass or go to the melas which are organised by the PPP associated groups.

I meet a man who sings in another Ramayana gole near to the young woman who had told me she had been selling fish since she ‘been in she mudda belly’.  We talk a bit about the Ramayana gole , in the fish market,  We did not talk about elections. I hold on to this singing as my tribute to the Indian sugar workers who came to a place where now the President feels sorry for the Minister he fired and  other descendants of the Indian immigrants did not complain but think that Sherlina Nageer must apologise.

Most Hindus do not mix the carcass with the religion and 177 years after arrival, I still feel a twinge when I hear bhajans in the market before or after buying fish or in this case, thinking about the Ramayana gole and the way we sing it which is linked to the way in which it was sung by people who left India for the unknown.

I hear President Jagdeo’s voice on the TV. He read the APNU+AFC manifesto it seems before most people and was discussing it and it seems they were gotaying the discussion on TV.
I hear a girl near one of the stalls say .. “I tek car, was a Indian man car, and he had a big picture of Granger inside..” . I did not  hear the rest because I might have looked fast and I have not mastered the art of listening without being seen..
I jump in a green bus without any APNU+AFC signs. Driver, conductor and passengers –  all of Indian origins. The music is loud dance hall , some with the dutty lyrics.  I ask for music for old people since I cannot get the Vitamin S E X and the driver decides to change the music to chutney music. It sound like one of the local singers.
A lot of the chutney for the Indian Arrival melas is being imported. It has been a while since our local chutney singers toured abroad.  Maybe somebody will make a chutney about how “Donald knack  bheri an’ feel sarry aftah. “
A lot of people of Indian origin wanted to know why bheri could not have gone like how Kamla let go of the Ministers in Trinidad & Tobago where a lot of Indians had arrived.  The email about Mauritius is to be answered. 177 years after the first Indians arrived in Guyana, I wonder about what it would have been like if I had arrived in Mauritius instead. Mauritius which became independent in 1968 has good rankings for governance and its economic status.  Mauritius also has music like chutney . https://youtu.be/Gh9fl0qoK5w