Thoughts of a minibus traveller

   Taking tablets and enjoying life..  The man cheerfully shows me the coke and says "is my second one today". He has been diabetic for 10 years.. "I arite.. i tek me medformin and daonil and don't tek stress'. The other man tells me 'I like roti and cake and so.. I take the meds and enjoy my life'.  The other man takes meds, and has his snocone and barfi and chocolate and so and when he shares the pictures on social media I want to say.. but budday... .  The other man takes the meds on his doctor's advice and has a continuous glucose monitoring system and enjoys life.. he has been surprised at which foods he can tolerate and which ones spike the glucose levels.   Another man is about to work to change his lifestyle as his sugar levels are high.  Another man went on meds for a short while but had bad reactions, and then went on a regime of diet, exercise, Ceylon Cinammon, chromium etc and brought down his AIC levels to normal. All these men are y...

  This is the Twelve Thousand and Twelfth post on this blog which was launched 12 years ago today and I have no idea what to write but feel like I should write something to make the post in the way of 12 12 12 thing. The first post has 172 hits since them and most of the other posts have less than a 50 hits but this one about a Minister and this one - a speech - and this one about Turpentine mango were read more than five thousand times each. I wrote about Why I write/blog in 2011. And anniversaries are no reason to write really.. but a good time to write here about some of the lessons - 12 to match the anniversary I picked up along the way.   Lesson 1: Write when you can't speak Lesson 2: Write when you want to talk too much and need to be clear, concise. Lesson 3: Write when you have things to write about. Get things off your chest. Lesson 4: Write when you think you have nothing to write about. Take pictures and write about them. Lesson 5: Write as though nobody will re...

 "The session was therapeutic" is in my head as I rush home, bathe and clean skin and try to cleanse mind as the session was not meant to be 'therapeutic' but in these times.. what happens when the laptop does not connect to the projector even though it did in the test run and I was breathing through the mask and wondering whether the windows should have been open in the room instead of AC while paying attention to the objectives of the session. Ice cream truck bell is ringing and I am feeling the cravings for milk, ice cream, sweet and resisting the cravings. I can't remember when I decided to mix cold milk, passion fruit and water to deal with those cravings.. something about the refreshing of the slight tang of the sour masked by the milk and thinking that it is not too much milk in case dairy would also cause slow dying like the sugar. Whip up the passion fruit in some cold milk, not to break seeds as the mashed seeds cause bitterness while the whole seeds are...

This golden apple has been hanging for days.. drying it seems.. normally they fall down or birds eat them but something about this one here.. hanging on.. hanging on..   Things are fuzzy, messing up things and then check the calendar and realise the moon is moving so I go walk around the yard to exercise the mind a bit while waiting for the moon and dark clouds to pass... ..   Mango tree in blossom again and flowers show promise of turpentine tasting then sweet mangoes to be shared with birds and other animals Looked closer and realised that the blossoms on this tree are beautiful like the fruit they promise   Orchid on the palm tree and seeing how a few palm fruit decomposes in the roots on the branch and realising that there is more than one way for the palm to nurture the orchid Walking around the untidy yard and did not realise that leaf dries in this lacy pattern "Dat tree gun grow out of hand" they said.. not sure how it seeded in the unus...

 Wake up at 330am or so, tossing turning and then decide let me put on light and pick up the book to start reading. New habit now as the disrupted sleep - get up, empty bladder, put on light, pick up book and read and not worry about sleep while waiting for the sun to rise. I can't remember where I got the book - either from a Groundings or from the discard table at the National Library. Or somewhere else where well read books go before they hit the rubbish bin. One morning a piece of paper falls out of the book. I am distracted from the poems and prose from Ghana by the three words , scribbled on a paper which was once white. Something about Dreams, Vision the other V - Violence? ..   The book has some markings inside - one of the joys of reading books which others have scribbled in is the connection with the unknown person who might think the same phrase is worthy of note that you would have noted if I could read with a pen. I can't read with a pen though. The book has...

  We carry guns, nah feelings.. is written above the window inside the minibus standing in the rain waiting on the police to check the driver's papers.  One of those days when the buses are passing full and I am running late so I have to take whatever I get kind of like how living in Guyana is with how the voters recycle those who make sure we will never get a good public transportation system. And so a bus pulls up and I just jump in to get in from the rain because I do not want to open the umbrella and I am running late. Conductor with mask on chin, driver without mask and most passengers wearing mask. Music loud. Sit at the back near a window in the hope that the Covid would blow away.  At the other end of the seat a young man, no mask.. not even on his chin. And I try to meditate to avoid the music and the lyrics but every now and then the conductor change the song when he realise is a dutty song. Between us a bird in the cage which belongs to the young man. I reme...

  Tostones.. The plantains are not too green and I think what the heck, let me try any way to make the tostones.  The place which used to sell them closed at the end of 2019 and I used to eat once a week.  I can't fry and I know that I can't fry but if I want to treat myself, I have to try frying. Youtube shows a way to do the tostones partly in the microondas and then to fry. Not bad.  Plantain comes out of the microwave.. slightly difficult to peel. I think heck, this is not going well. I use a small plate to smash.. two of them break slightly so I take my hand to form them back. Oil is heated in the pan.. I wince at the oil and imagine the oil flowing in my veins and pancreas and so on. But I think nah.. some will leave over. Put the pieces in and splutter and so on.. all the things abotu frying which don't happen on Youtube and other videos. But nice smell and golden colour.. and with the second batch the oil disappears.. and I say to hell with it. A bit of salt....

  Pain..     "Don't tek no' mo tablet" the man told me.. older man who did not believe in tablets but had bush cures for everything.  Man I interact with almost every day , sometimes the only interaction in these Covid times. He asked how I was doing and I told him about the body pains.. and not being able to explain except to say that the two paracetmol I took the night before in anticipation of the pains did not help. I move and the joints seem to crack. Left shoulder blade and around there paining in waves.. worse in the night.. no sense really as I am right handed so it is not carpel tunnel. Body always feeling like it need a good stretch and even as I do the yoga and so.. do the postures, some temporary relief  and feel good in my mind in a way even as the body seems to resume a natural state of well 'tenseness'.. Stress.. The man and I talk about stress. "What you got to stress about.." he asked and laughed in the way men do when they ask '...