Thoughts of a minibus traveller

People have told me I that I sexually abused children. People have told me that I have defended child abusers and that I have otherwise endangered the lives of children (especially in the LGBT advocacy work). Accusations come and there are no follow up investigations and they die away. One organisation , Help & Shelter with which I has involved, has a child protection policy . The policy is clear that any person associated with Help & Shelter and who is accused of harming children has to  step aside and allow an investigation which has to be concluded within five days. All persons who work with Help & Shelter are supposed to sign on and agree to this. It is clear also that not all investigations will conclude in court cases. Due process. course of the law People have faith that the justice system will provide justice for survivors of sexual violence.  The justice system, in Guyana, and elsewhere, most times does not provide justice, nor healing. Cases ...

Sun is up, alarm rings. I lie in the bed and stretch and think right, yep.. get up.. warm up the back. I laugh at it. I say the prayers, and say today will be a good day.   Back stretches a bit and it feels loose. Get started. Things are busy. Chores.  I get going. taking time. I hear the raised voices. I am on the phone talking work. I hear the voices raised, the quarrel that I never wanted to hear again. The man's voice, ugly, contemptuous, mocking. The violence was never physical . The woman's voice , raised too, voice which I had hoped would never have to raise like that. People would hear. I try a weak.. please stop.. but like in the past, it made no difference. I want to choke the man, stop the voice. I had hoped to run away from it. I hang up the phone. Body crumples, I lose control. I am supposed to breathe deeply and smile. I feel like falling and I hold on. Dry sobs come out which I keep silent as I hear the ugly words which I thought I could have st...

Running a lil late and I breathe deeply and I praying that I don't ketch a loud dutty music bus. I learn about Chronnix and I hope the bus dem playing the music at least. Bus come up, music loud. I in a hurry. I shut up. Bus has mostly children, teenagers, women. The lyrics nasty and dutty coming out, the driver realise and shift the song. Music loud. Next song got nasty lyrics tuh. "Lakshmi blessings" write on the roof above the window. The dashboard look like it have a Ganesha and Durga murti. I holler from the backseat near the windwo.. Conductor signal to turn down the music because he think I want to come off. I ask fuh different music. Nobody else say anything. Nobo  I was going to ask fuh coolie music but I don't know if was a coolie man already singing de nasty dutty lyrics. I ask for gospel from the back seat by the window. Nobody else say anything. Nobody else ask. My back start hurt again and I say let me shut up. Driver look in rear vi...

The woman had two purple passion fruit in the whole bowl of yellow and  I asked her for them - because the colours were different. I was trying to be present in the market though I got conned with some cheap cayanne bananas and the pineapple could have been better. The purple/red still stood out on the pile in the basket which I will write gratitude for later as I will write about the other things. So I see the pile and I think it would make a nice picture to write something about. Then I l earn of the editor. and I start messing around There is a course to complete but my mind is not on it. There are other things to write and to test and to update but my mind are not on them.  It is a difficult time, strange moments of functioning but not pushing boundaries or testing new things or growing. So I play around with the online editor which I have not heard about. I open the lengthy document ,legal stuff.. a woman whose work has been awesome has asked me for my perspec...

Snap from Openstreetmap A woman corrected the spelling of Princess Street in Georgetown  to Princes (pl of Prince) Street. A young man corrected the names of the streets which he rides along to get to work. He lives in A field Sophia and he drew  the bridge which he walks over when he has to catch a bus. He will  put in the bike path and the short cut to get to the road. The GIS Collective is a group of people who are Geographic Information System (GIS) professionals. They have been finding different ways of commemorating GIS day over the last three years or so. This year, they decided to hold a Map A Thon. People were invited to the University of Guyana campus. The CIT was made available. The group included students from St Josephs High School, the University and some other people like me who were curious about the whole mapping thing. Vijay Datadin introduced the concept of Open Data and noted that 15 November, 2017 is a Guyana Open Data Day. Open Data i...

Brochures available from Help & Shelter website Sunday morning chat. Young man, brilliant writer and me talking about this and that and one of Guyana's prominent citizens.  'He does beat woman.." the young man types in the chat window. There are plenty stories are coming out of the USA of powerful and popular men. In Guyana, things are more complex. There is a lot of  mourning and anger when men kill women or beat them up so that the stories get into the media. Some of the men who are abusive but who do not leave marks or who do not kill also join the condemnation of the murders. The young man heard from the brother of a woman who the man had hit. The woman and her brother decided to leave well enough. The story telling often comes with promises to be confidential. The first rule of counseling or hearing any story is ensure that the survivor of violence is safe and no further harm is done. The more powerful and popular the man who beats and abuses women, ...

Dear sweet genip I did not expect to be enjoying you today. I passed the woman, said no, then passed back again and tried one in the way that I didn't really care.You melted in my mouth. I asked for $100 then $200 and now I wish I had asked for $1000. But.. you are probably the best I have had for the year.  So far , 2 out of the 5 passion fruit for $200 are bad and I curse the people who sell , but passion fruit you can never tell from outside. Like pineapple. The disappointment in the passion fruit is like part of the other madness. Genips are not supposed to be in season. Now is not the time for you. This is in my head.. now is not the time to look backwards, now is the time to be in the present . Now is not the time to worry about the future, now is the time to be in the present and try to get through Now is not the time to worry that you cannot stretch the back which huts because the body tensed up after the quarrel, now is the time to stretch where you could a...

Dear Chocolate cup cake.. Thank you for the pleasure and the relief you have brought to me. I know I should not have enjoyed you. It is self destructive when the morning sugar level is highest than it has been in awhile to have you with coffee when the plan was to try to take the remaining eight weeks off to reverse the trends of the last year. I made you again because I wanted to hold on and remember, and to see if I could do something which was not failing. It was a risk. The morning of the day I made you I broke another thing .  Hands and clumsiness. This  is the first year I have had to replace so many things which I broke. because those things were useful and needed. I can't seem to break the useless and harmful things. Some things like the social connections have been lost due to the social awkwardness, in words and so which have been violent and angry and  harsh because I thought I was talking to people who knew me.  So it is easier to take refuge in...