Thoughts of a minibus traveller

The man sells good food and snacks nd he made the move to open his own business a year or two ago.  I have dropped in now and then and we get to talking and so .. The man said. you know dat name Vidya.. it aint suit you. I laughed.. why man? It is unique.. everybody would remember me as the man wid the girl name.. He wasn't amused.. nah.. man, it aint suit you.. I said.. well I glad I got it Nah.. I gun call you Anand.. Anand is the name of another guy who works over there.. I said well you know.. you can call me what you want.. I tried to imagine though, this naming thing.. and how identity is so tied to name. The first time I did a major transformation of my name was in High school, deciding to move from Vidya to Vidyaratha the full name. Some teachers used it, others didn't and the shortened form took precedence and Vidya remained. I never imagined myself as anything other than Vidya/Vidyaratha. I have to use my 'book name' now for official bu...

Dear cashew I don't normally go after you , but I am glad you came my way today as you are sweet and crunchy and I needed that. I woke up this morning.. the night was okay.. deep sleep and I prayed that I could be useful, not make any mistakes like I did yesterday, and just move on with life. Unlike the mistakes from yesterday, you were a welcome surprise today. I am still mourning again, for the loss of what might have been with a loved one. I had grieved and recovered before.. but the restoration of contact seemed to indicate that there was some possibility and again I grieve.. Now is not a good time for grieving as it makes the other the other things worse. I am grateful though, that you came my way.  I wish though, as with so many other things, that even as I enjoy the time I spend with you, I am not attached to you and it doesn't matter if I never see you again. I wish I could be as detached from other desires , including this desire not to keep messing up...

Dear passion fruit, tangerine and banana I know I shouldn't have put you on the stove , but it was to catch some light so I could take a picture to write the blog as a way of trying to sort myself out. I am glad I could have bought you, The passion fruit and banana are supposed to be good for me and for helping to organise my thoughts. I know things are not getting better and that I have to learn to adjust in healthy ways and that 'better' will be about managing things. As I write this, I think of the loved one who contacted me again and who then disconnected.. it isn't what I wanted like how I am dealing with many things which I did not plan for. I am glad though, that people got information they wanted who asked me for it. I am glad that after buying you, I was able to walk a bit in the hot sun because sun is good and walking is good. I know I should have bought the other things but my mind could not sort out what to buy, what to cook.. those questio...

by Vidyaratha Kissoon “Na mek de guvament fool yuh, dis oil is a waste of time.. we were in Suriname in 1981 when the Oil talk started.. now look how tings bad in Suriname,” . The man and his wife sell fruits in the market. He was talking about Guyana and oil and resources. “Why dem nah a develop wid odda thing..like land.. oil alone cyan wuk”? There are probably a few people who don’t believe in the oil dream. There are probably few people who are not wondering about ‘odda ting’. The Minister of National Resources had said that the Exxon oil deal would come out in bits. Lying and withholding facts are different things, but the impact is the same. We learn for example that the transparency standard will take four years to implement, and that there is a ‘plus’ with more of the stuff which should come out. I could imagine that after the oil starts coming out, we will start to argue about the standard and whether it is being implemented rather than actu...

Dry leaf on the ground and I pick it up and I feel the 'coolie colours' , so I move it to some sunlight on a wooden beam and then move the leaf around and then I move around the leaf to take different pictures of leaf and shadow .. Hilton Chan said photography includes manipulating light.. I could have chosen one to do another blog about mental health and so on but then what the hell.. just put them all about and let it be about the images... The leaf, and the shadows and the light shining through the leaf sometimes..   

Dear cool almost cold shower.. Thanks to GWI and their early morning rise in pressure, you kind of woke me up. The days have been rough and the nights have been disruptive which make the days rougher.  The crash should come but it doesn't come and so there is just a long period of anxiety of waiting and hoping and then trying to create it It is easy to lose focus on thoughts as many different things keep coming up. Losing focus and concentration mean that things get sloppy and hours pass without anything productive happening. The decline continues. Exercise is supposed to cure the most recent thing but there is irony that the exercise can't happen the usual way because of all the pains. But cool almost cold shower.. the mind had to shift to the skin reacting to the temperature , and the dance under the water.. dodging and not dodging the water, which warms the body up and creates movement.. so the body adjusts to the coldness. Mind becomes a  bit more alert. Dea...

by Vidyaratha Kissoon “I aint know.. is a big APNU racial lady” .. the text message read. The woman who sent the text was in a police matter. She assumed that I would understand and sympathise with her race lens. I have never had a conversation about race with her. This message was a few days after Dameion Gordon and Vernon Beckles were attacked in Canal No. 1 Polder. It has been a week since that attack and the Guyana Police Force have not arrested or charged anyone. The statement from the Guyana Police Force as Mosa Telford writes in Stabroek News does not help.  The GPF seems to want the public to believe that there was no attack, there was no racism involved in the violence and that those who attacked the men do not deserve to be targets of police intervention. One journalist used social media and declared it was “an East Indian mob” which attacked the man. Many persons used social media to share their own experiences of racism i...

(This is the interactive version of an article which appeared in Diaspora Times International March 2017 Vol 3 Issue 1 , edited by  Rtd Colonel Desmond Roberts. (LGBTIQ – lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer) On Monday 27 February 2017 Georgetown Magistrate Dylon Bess shut Ronnel Trotman out of the Courtroom . Ronnel Trotman, called Petronella, is a transgender Guyanese citizen and was the complainant in an assault case. Less than a week after Guyanese celebrated Mashramani with 'dignity, liberty and greater Unity”, citizen Petronella and other LGBTIQ citizens were reminded that Guyana's Unity excludes them. Magistrate Dylon Bess was not sanctioned by those responsible for the Justice system. The Magistrate is working in a cultural and legal context which says that human beings are born either male or female and that normal is heterosexual. Citizens who did not find themselves in these two categories are born into a State which does not punish p...

Walking on Church Street in nice Georgetown, and a black man dressed in nice long sleeved shirt, pants and shoes passes me. He has a book in his hand. We make eye contact, I dip my head in a greeting. My head is not good and I forget people and faces so I nod in default. He looks back and says in a Bollywood English accent 'Aye, Indian... ' I turn around. he continues.'.. you from Bangladesh or Pakistan.." in the stronger accent  I tell the man, Nah.. I from right hey' The man comes up.. stretches out his hand.. 'What is your name?" I say 'Vidya'.. He said.. "Me Mugabe..., glad to meet you".. we shook hands and he walked off.. I  laughed.. South Asian politics.. India, Bangladesh, Pakistan. It happens often.. people think I am not from Guyana. Fortunately, I have no yearning to own Guyana or anywhere else or I might have been traumatised every time I am asked. Sunday 12 March 2017, after many Guyanese were lauded ...

by Vidyaratha Kissoon “You wuz just on the programme?… let me tell you something… my daughter was 17 the first time I beat her, I had to beat her to straighten her out” said the taxi driver, an old man with beard and cap and who probably don’t break any traffic rules or anything like that. International Women’s Day 2017 . People being polite about being bold for change and so. Some men want to know about men’s rights. In other places, men talk about keeping their women in place – abuse and violence are man things and the taxi man talked about beat his 17 year old daughter. In other countries, fathers kill their daughters to keep honour . The Guyanese father though, was proud of having to ‘straighten’ his 17 year old daughter. He had other stories he wanted to tell about why it is okay to beat children. There is no shame in Guyana when people talk and are consulted about their need to beat children. Stan Gouveia wanted to talk about ...

Group Discussion : Police Recruits, workshop on prevention of Gender Based Violence Roadside Baptist Skills Training Centre, October 2016 "You don't know what you talking about, why don't you shut up" - the retired headmaster told me. We were talking about alcohol and domestic violence in the space under the No 68 Village Roadside Baptist Church. Nalin Katryan smiled at him and I took courage from that smile. The man was a respected elder and she had invited him to the workshop on preventing domestic violence.  I was young in the facilitation work, nervous about breaking uncomfortable silences and not wanting to offend anybody. The smile was encouraging. The man calmed down and did not walk out That smile was always present. Always encouraging.  The first time I met Nalin Katryan and her husband Pastor Almond Katryan was in 2001. I was nervous, taking on the challenge of a workshop in Black Bush, a place where I did not know anyone.  People of Indian origi...

Time flies and three months into the time to 'take a break' things continue to decline and the numbers are showing the danger levels which have been the outcome of all the other things. If I am to keep surviving... I have to accept that while life can't be managed by numbers, the numbers are important and help to not make things more difficult than they should be I have to accept that without a plan, no amount of 'time off' from anything will work and that 'rest' or 'break' is not doing nothing but resting and taking a break should be active I have to accept that I cannot change everything in my environment and that when the environment does not change, I have to try to move physically to a new space and not feel bad about it I have to accept that there will be no reconciliation with the married loved one who used to call in the night as though nothing had ever been wrong between us and who does not want to talk about reconciliation but ...

Feeling like eating something different but not sure what and also not feeling like cooking too much or chopping up too much.. so soaked some chunks in hot water and left it. Found a tomato, - chopped it,  and carrots - grated it and sweet pepper - sliced up. There is some blended green seasoning in the fridge so rolled the chunks in them for a bit. Some schellot mixed up with some old fine leaf thyme Found ginger and grated up some. Put some oil, a lil too much in the frying pan, heated it and threw in the tomatoes and some shellot. If was able to peel onion and garlic I might have thrown in some. Threw in the carrot, sweet pepper, ginger, chunks.. and then stirred up and everything started to simmer down nicely but water still visible I remembered I had some grated coconut in the freezer (somebody had the idea of just go on a grating spree and then freeze portions to mix up with hot water when you want coconut milk) I chipped off some of hte frozen coconut and thr...

A long day, struggling with blackout, Internet access, anxiety about teaching , including to a blind student and managing other things.. last thing was to go home. I get in the taxi. Say Goodnight, and man doesn't say anything. He has on cap. Some drivers are like that I thought but my mind on home and the next day and the next day after. An involuntary sigh comes out of my mouth as we do sometime when we around people who we think are not listening. "Like you had a rough day... " the man asks. Voice is soft and level. Firm. "Yeah.. was anodda one'.. I replied instinctively and the man said 'That is how it goes sometimes.. what did you do?"... Counselling involves listening, and listening is a skill which involved opening statements to encourage talking. A woman called me Mr Deflector when she asked me how I was doing and i answered other questions. and shifted the conversation. I laughed and deflected.. conversation shifted.. blind cri...

by Vidyaratha Kissoon “Dey should cut dey salary den” the elderly woman said . She knew about austerity, having reused, mended, repaired all her life. The woman washes plastic bags to reuse them . She heard Vice President No Apologies Harmon talking about the need for ‘austerity’ and that one thing An old man laughed and said ‘dis was like Burnham’ days. He used to work in a Ministry in those days and would have had to reuse envelopes and probably not use them. This thrift continued long after Burnham died. In 1993 , the secretaries at GuySuco where I worked encouraged reuse of envelopes. I used to take in the old ones with some embarrassment and the secretary would say “oh yes, bring them in.” It seems that the austerity thing shifted to some idea of saving trees. I still have a pile of old envelopes because I hardly use them and there is a dilemma now with  discarding them. Some of them are 10 and 12 years old according to the post marks . I...

Coolie man driving the bus , coolie woman who might be his wife is conductor. Man older dan me and wife my age and de dutty music on low volume. I keep my mout shout because i in a hurry. but when we reach lamaha and vlissengen he reach to turn up he volumen and I holler 'aye, you got customers who don't want dutty music' He look back at me and try again and I tell he dat he is de driver and he doan have I had in meh head fuh start up about how black people like gospel too but den i remember andooda east coast bus wid coolie driver and flower pun de dashboard and de dance hall wid de dj disrespecting east coast gyurls .. So i holler about play lil gospel, dey have dance hall gospel too and chutney gospel and dat at least you could put lil God in dem instead of poison. Driver change de music and put on soul music and conductor seh Uncle you like dis now? I seh is nah fuh me, is fuh when yall poisoning dme yute fuh money and dat money dat mek like dat aint gun las...