Thoughts of a minibus traveller

By Vidyaratha Kissoon “We do Prithvi Puja to give thanks to Mother Earth, we depend on prithvi for our food, our clothes, our medicines our existence, we honour her with this puja” the Pandit said in the soft voice which could change into song at any time. It is a nice imagery , the all powerful Mother nurturing humans and doing the small worship as a way of remembering. Another man talking , smooth voice , no distinct accent.. “.. around 17 wells will be drilled in to the reservoirs, half of these are production wells taking the precious hyrdocarbons up to the surface.. the other half are water and gas injection wells, as the reservoir depletes, the pressure drops, water and gas injection helps to maintain pressure and maximise oil recovery..this technology will set an industry record for deep water gas injection” in the ExxonMobil video which was launched just before Mash Day when the rains fell and flooded some places. A different imagery from...

Every day is not predictable and quick decline from waking up with structure in my mind to focus on tasks into restlessness, pacing, mixing up requests and feeling like I am moving around. Body is feeling tense and I try to go do the yoga routine which used to help. Rain is falling and it seems a nice thing to do.. yoga in the rain and breathing. Start out slow, try with the breathing but the bad mental health has really crunched up the body and the joints instead of loosening seem to be paining more.  Balance which used to be okay, is not okay and the time taken to hold the poses to stretch, is not enough to relax and help bring back focus. I give up at some point when I realise that not today, the body will continue to be crunched up for a while and maybe some other things gotta be done. Despair that the coping skills are not working while more things are coming through to need coping skills to adapt.. Rain is pouring and I make way down, truck splash water on my body ...

  Page 257 of the Whats Cooking in Guyana has this pile of nice golden looking 'Corn Meal Hot Cakes' with butter and syrup on it.. the little bit of corn meal left over which has passed the expired date is an incentive to try a thing on a day when new things don't want to be tried. Thing call for egg and I think nah.. let me see how it will work, let me average out because I don't have the full amount of corn meal that the recipe call for. Is breakfast time and I know some people quickly cook up whole meals for breakfast, while others have oats or nothing at all. So instead of oats, I mix up the expired corn meal, some flour, 1 tablespoon of oil b ecause I too lazy to melt the  butter and some sugar and baking powder and milk though not too sure how much milk. Heat up the tawa and the recipe said.. let the thing bubble when you throw it on the tawa and then next thing you know the thing is bubbling and browning. And then I say right.. time for jam....

By Vidyaratha Kissoon “It is contradictory for Guyana to have been a signatory to the December 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change, yet pushing the development of the oil industry. “ citizen Clairmont Lye wrote in a letter to Stabroek News in March 2016 . Nobody bothered to reply or explain why it was not contradictory. ExxonMobil and the oil finds are expected to bring Guyana back from “the brink of calamity’ as one writer put it. There is no news about whether the Parking Meter contract allows for emergencies if Georgetown floods and citizens cannot get to the Parking Meters. There is no news about how much of the projected oil money Guyana might have to use if Georgetown becomes more vulnerable to the rising seas as more of the oil is burned from Guyana’s seas. The December 2015 Paris Agreement followed on from a Kyoto deal in which nations were expected to reduce their carbon emissions and to sort things out so that our seawall does ...

The man who gave me the book "I Am Malala" by Malala Yousafzai and Malala Yousafzai said that Malala's story is very inspiring. On 12 October, 2012 a young Taliban shot 15 year old Malala Youfsafzai and wounded two of her friends when they were in a bus going home from school. She had become the target for the Taliban in Pakistan because of her advocacy for girls education. Her father, Ziauddin Yousafzai had been advocating in the Swat Valley, and in Pakistan and amongst the Pashtun people for girls education. Malala joined him in interviews and other media activities. The attack on Malala increased her visibility in the world. She subsequently met with celebrities and global leaders. On 24 October, 2012 - US drones killed Nabeela Ur Rehman's grandmother in Pakistan. Nabeela and other children could have been killed in the attack.  Nabeela's father is also a school teacher.  Nabeela though is not as world famous as Malala. An Al-Jazeera article desc...

by Vidyaratha Kissoon “Look over deh, is like a different country, look how over dis side nice and clear and orderly, look over deh is share madness, is a different country.” The bus was in the traffic light line on Regent Street in the parking meter zone. The bus conductor and driver were talking about the chaos over the Camp Street border from the empty parking lots in the parking meter zone . The bus conductor had an American /British accent which strengthened every time he talked about the Guyanese and their love for lawlessness and which faded every time he cussed Jagdeo. It has been fascinating-  random coolie man talking to random black people about parking meters. The response is about what the PPP did , who didn’t protest what the PPP did and talking about how we accustomed to dirt and lawlessness and don’t want order or to give Granger a chance. A taxi driver in Bourda Market shouted ‘taxi taxi’.. and I said..’oh shoots man, ...

Dear Hibiscus I am glad that I was a bit alert today and that I noticed you. There might have been others like you on the tree but at the moment after the rain when the sun came out, you were beautiful. You are on a tree which has been around for a while. At one point all the leaves had come off, and the tree had been trimmed. I wish I knew how it is that your tree bears you when other things I am nurturing are not bearing anything. When I saw you, I thought , yeah.. this is good for another blog. It has been another rough week of trying to get through moments. I have told myself that I have until the end of February to be on a break, but there really is no break and really and truly, sorting out is an immediate , here and now thing. So Hibiscus, I am glad you appeared today.  I dragged my feet to one work assignment , and then realised as I was delivering it , that I was doing the wrong thing. I found myself wiping the same surface more than once as I was cleaning and ...

Dear woman I did not see you in the minibus. I jumped in the front seat, silently cursed the driver and conductor for the woman hating dancehall they were playing and then zoned out as my mind was cloudy. When the bus stoppped, I heard the driver say , "Wheh yuh going, come out de bus and go home nah" I didn't pay attention. I did not look back. I thought he was making joke as his ugly face seemed twisted in a half smile.  I heard the conductor say..'Woman, you aint hear yuh man seh go home?" I heard your voice say you going to the park, and then heard him say no, come out now and go home, and I heard you ask for the key and then I saw him give you the key. I still thought it was some joke thing but in trying to stay in my own zone, I realised that it was no joke. I saw you come to the window and look at him straight in his face and collect the key. I saw you with the child and I heard some bottles clinking - the conductor saying tek des GT bott...

Salara was too red to resist and the first 2/3 went down quick.. Succumbing to the salara rather than the urge to reach out to the loved one who had said 'call any time' even though we both knew I couldn't . Thinking this would be the last one in a day of binge eating.. because time has to shift to healing and to reduce the sugar and the calories and to find other ways of coping with the mental health issues. Random requests come in for information and I hope and pray that I answered properly. Another man asks about a work thing and I feel a bit silly saying I am on some time off because I said that before and the time off thing is not true since there is work which I have to do. Rain falling and I go walk in it.. watching older Shah Rukh Dancing around with the younger woman and thinking yeah.. that would be me when I reach his age and when I stop eating salara and drinking hot chocolate mix which I put back in the grocery store. But cool evening, nice breeze, ...

A random conversation leads to rediscovery of cinnamon toast.. easy to make.. toast butter cinnamon sugar , and then heated a bit more in the microwave to soften the sugar a bit .. and this kind of rush which comes from sweetness though a quick thought to using a very tiny spoon to dip out the sugar to spread on it. So easy to do these things, easier than exercise and meditation and trying to do the mental exercises to get organised for learning and teaching and working and healing. But still, it is nice when And when a loved one asks "How are you?" and I struggle whether I should answer honestly because of fear of loss of contact since there is a way in which depression could create a black hole and consume the joy out of any interaction.. I do write honestly about being grateful for many things while dealing with other things. There is no reply but that is okay.  Some interactions are easier than others and honesty instead of polite holding back seems like a good...

The young woman was on lunch break and said she was looking for books on communication. She seemed unsure about Guyana and the future of Guyana. "In 2015, I was pregnant and I had problems and I could not afford to go private. I went GPHC , my baby was premature but they told me that the 15 incubators were being used so my baby died. They killed my baby... I couldn't speak for two weeks after" She took a journal with her.   The conversations could go anywhere. A taxi driver said he liked to read but he had no time now. He said more than one time that wished his children were there.  He went down to the Parking Meter protests as his hustle was being affected by the additional costs. "We try to move when we see them coming.. we aint getting wuk nobody aint hey" A group of students passed and looked back at us like we were mad. It is the usual initial response. Two of them then turned  back.  Conversation topics were 'What are you doing to look ...

Mind whirls around the prison made more real by the need to close windows tight because cold breeze is blamed for the illness which could be from something else but acceptance of not struggling to see if there are alternatives. The calendar shows the end of a month and the looming work and trying to think of ways to radically change the way of the work but mental energy is needed to learn new things. Managed to learn some new things and grateful the mind is there. Environment is so key and the physical clutter could make things worse.  Not my clutter the old wood which rotted and the leaves from trees which mould and stain the tiled mosaic which is nice when it is clean and shiny. So removing the old wood, and throwing caustic soda to deal with the tiles and hoping that there will be no conflict, no questions asked of what I am doing and why I am clearing up. The wood though is taken to the back to be removed later because another set of energy is needed in anticipation...