Arriving

Walking up the stairs,

The same stairs I’ve hopped, skipped, and

Pondered over, most of the vacations of my life,

My mind flashed to the happy scenes of pre-marital bliss,

Those first co-vacations,

The occasions 

When photographs could not hide my joy,

My happiness, my

Gratitude—

Now bereft of

That source,

Who must be scattered far and wide even if self-contained,

Deep and vast and across dimensions,

As people of that caliber do not simply 

Vanish from this Earth,

Even if living subdued lives,

I know,

Her impact reverberates…

Now thinking of my late uncle,

Who barely would have made it to 28,

if not for a sudden eviction from our realm,

In the hands of my forevermore-scarred aunt,

Disappearing and appearing,

In the numbers of his death anniversary,

13/1,

The role number of my ex-wife when she was in school,

The number of test matches played by my favourite cricketer,

The hours and minutes spoken to my long-lost soul-friend,

When I first revealed my true self to another,

Who hit me with the shock of loss,

Forever numb,

Deaf and dumb,

When she chose to end her life…

Now sitting up in the bed,

That those dark stairs lead up to,

The room in which so much fun was had,

An idyllic childhood of monsoon summers

And dark moods pervading an otherwise

Beautiful life,

Filled with every privilege and experience one could ask for,

Debts impossible to pay back to parents,

For their long-suffering patience and 

Buoyancy of loving labor,

On we three kids’ behalf,

None the least for me,

And as I continue to live, 

Half-child, half-man,

Drawing spontaneously,

Letting these words flow out,

Thinking over and over and over,

Of bygone days,

Finding myself with the challenge of establishing

Myself

In this city,

Where we all suffer,

Though I suffer less still,

This City of Joy,

I embrace with open and patient arms,

Hoping for a prolonged hug with this unique civilisation,

Enough to keep me charged for another day,

Another year,

Another life,

Starting now.

Leaving Town

Grateful this Thanksgiving week for the Athens community, a special place in my heart that feels hard to part with, when Athens has taught me so much thru schoolyards, classrooms, bar patios, and the most blessed days when I could write and draw on my father's collegiate blackboards anything in chalk, easily eraseable with a puff of chalk dust, and in my mother's office at Nelson and Hill play a version of civilisation and Castle of the Winds on a now oldfashioned computer, keyboard, and mouse. 

St. Mary's Hospital to my parent's and sister's loving arms, Parna's nursery, Athens Montessori for three grand years of playing duck duck go, singing "He's Got the Whole World, In His Hands"... playing on the old firetruck, the ropeway in the back, hiding in the overturned truck tire, breaking pecans with my shoes and learning tool use. David C. Barrow to follow, where we'd sing, "I love to go to Barrow school, to Barrow school I gooo, Five days out of every week, to Barrow school I goo," when we weren't singing the song with all the school sponsors named at school assemblies, where we received so much love from our teachers and Principal Wright, the unique moment of the 90s when multiculturalism was a blessed reality, shifting into Clarke Middle School and the joys of learning creatively, most of all in Mrs. Nagao's class, where I met future friends once we were separated from our Elementary school bonds in a haphazard way, thrown into the deep end of 9/11 on the TV in Mrs. Causey's class in 7th grade, Earl Ayers the bandleader teaching an entire class to play every single instrument single handedly, we in percussion pushing each other aside to get on that big bass drum or the snare and the cymbals. Bloody knuckles and Mossing each other on the playground, Yo Mama jokes that on this day I can understand the pain that could be inflicted on a peer if the joke hit home. Into high school where we all self-segregated into cliques, racial divisions in the cafeteria, College Prep, Advanced College Prep, and AP classes to divide us further. The humiliation of my peers having fallen behind in their studies and eeking out an existence far from the dreams of mothers and fathers envisioning their children going to college one day. Kids having kids and growing into the responsible parents as if it were destiny, wisdom I never have known. Dropping out of school and going on my experiments thru the woods, jumping over hedges, stacking chairs and trying to learn how to land...thinking I could feel the air to the degree to catch the winds and take flight. All foolishness, as were my many experiments with sound, sungazing, altered states of consciousness, and awakenings that had to be put to somnolence if not to sleep.

Leaving town for college at a private school on half scholarship, losing the connection to the peers who raised me in Athens, coming back to complete a masters in public health and a masters in social work, by the skin of my teeth, every year returning to a stupor once the delusions had been properly sedated. 

All this to say, working at Advantage must be my finest moments here in town, not to mention my marriage of which books could be written, where I felt I was giving back to the place that has given me so much, teaching me empathy and compassion in action, and recalibrating my playlist back to soul, Indian classical, and far from gangsta rap, some ill-informed rock, too, and their lures. Listening to the lyrics deeply and changing my mind to change my environment. Changing my environment to change my mind. And as I now depart to another world city, with the heavy feeling that I did not do enough for Athens, I embark on opportunity for redemption and reconciliation, non-violent communication, empathy and conflict resolution, courage and commitment, conviction and resilience, adventuring into the unknowns lurking in the shadows of the known, to complete my task I began 19 years ago, and maybe earlier- to make known the unknown, to know the demarcation of these in myself, to know in others for all good intents and purposes, and to get into the ground, plant the seeds to grow this tree, this tree of life that I hope to see one day as the fruition of public health, the indefinite lifespan, free of fear for all-too-preventable death. Because as the logicians said: "All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Socrates must die". Is it so unreasonable in this world of senolytics to dream of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? As I said in the beginning, so I will say in the end...seek no fame, no glory in the game, go against the grain, try to stay sane, entertain the untamed unnamed lion's mane, be Adam's outstretched finger, be God's brain. 

The Best Days of my Life:

 The Best Days of my Life:

"some lessons are learnt too late"
some customs are burnt by fate
some immigrants are usually late
some locals share the exact same fate

met my Sita at the circle K
agua linda, la montana, light and gay
CaliNTitos and fine museums
historically a part of my dreams

"death is a part of life" you said
As an MPH, I think not instead

Learning, Mate!
Loading...(fate)...
Wheelers spinning multicoloured
Microsofts hour-glass blurr'ed

chasmhudin jaise Vettori
Daniel ki parivar hain ek kahani

Clinton, Inc, Obama Inc, Bush colour ink
a moment of remorse, a drunken drink

The Big Three rule the ICC
the International criminal court, too

love over power
I'll see you, you see me?

World Population Pie Chart

This pie we share, ever expanding,

Could be more gracious, less demanding

More generous and kind

On our neighbour's porches

More responsible and just

Like Polaris Northest

'Cause the value of a chart

Is not in its appearance

It's how it leads our way

As we think about experience

And as we think about ourselves

And the gifts we want to open

Made by Santa's elves

Or by aMMa's eloping

What diyas we want to light

In the core of darkest night?

I have a party to attend

I've got to catch this flight

What a world we could create,

With the rightest interest rates

This pecan, walnut, apple pie

Above the ground beneath the sky

Where percentages and ratios

Don't define our solo souls

But each person is heard

And no one is sold

Sweet and salted, gooey goodness

Gushy, crunchy, nutty hoodless

Gullible enterers of a gully narrow

Gulliver's travels of the mind's marrow:

Imagination will take you places

When you stop playing games

Stop running rat races

Put out the flames

(Dedicated to Jesus and the baker's dozen disciples)

Stairway to stairwell

Stairway to stairwell

 Enjoyed the Athens porchfest festival is dupehar aur sham. Caught the whimsical early wisps of the hair at the nape of my sky friend in the form of a pinkish blue sunsetting, not on the phone but in my arbitrary access memory. 

Chose wisely today after starting a quibble with my source, that was put out before it could trickle down like the water droplets that together constitute Victoria and Niagara Falls. 

Remembering now the time I excitedly and chillfully fell down the steep stairs of a once haunted home, dropping the green ceramic plate covered with Choo Choos chicken and rice all over the last steps down to the landing. The yellow sauce and rices I had to handsomely clean up but my life was spared by an Act of God, unlike our home's predecessor, who drunkenly lived out her last moments falling down the very same stairs.

Public health announcement: falling down kills more individuals every year than lightning, hurricanes, and tornadoes combined. Most people who are not homeless die in their homes. 

Say what you feel to your loved ones, for no moment is promised. If you know me, I love you, and I wait every mindful moment for the refrain that will bring us home. Om Shanti Om

Tabalchi

Tabalchi, Yours Truly

Throwback to the last time I had the great honour to meet Anindo Chatterjee in-person, touch his feet, with my guru Masterji (Amitabha Buddha), a disciple of Anindo Chatterjee. Through learning tabla and doing my best to return to it no matter how many hours, days, weeks, and even years I may have strayed away from it for, returning to tabla is always a mental-physical psychosomatic health check-up for me, and a spiritual saviour. 

I savour each moment in audience of such Masters of music, men and women who understand the whole life as music, who dedicate their whole life to music- and teach countless students. 

Ever since I went to an Indian reservation near the 4 corners of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona and took home a drum, singing and beating along to "Humma humma humma (ek a ho Gaye ham aur tum), I have been a percussionist (unless you count piano, also a percussion instrument, which came first). 

I wish all the love in the world to all my teachers, be they my friends, my acquaintances, strangers, frenemies--enemies (the one's I learn from how not to be)- I hope you know who ya'll are to me. I never forget a friend and I never forget a lesson, even if time elapses in the interim of my exercising of these lessons. 

Music is universal, compositions plan the way and distill the past into crystallised packages, much like the packages of data sent through the internet protocols. 

How you play music is what matters, with what in your mind, what love in your heart, what feelings in your skin, what beliefs about where to begin? "With what does the Science of Logic [philosophy] begin?" (George Wilhelm Frederique Hegel)

I pose that question to ya'll. Where have you been, tell me, where do you want to go, how can I help you get there, and which pathways will be for the betterment of all? "Via the spectrum road"? - (Tony Williams Lifetime)

signing off...your tabalchi

Sanam Manas

Reflections on 10/18/25

Reflecting on the days events, so far. Today was a good day. A young man and woman of our community got married in peace (I stayed home to watch the Dawgs beat up on Ole Miss- Rebels? that's a little archaic of a mascot, don't you think? Are they talking Confederates or Luke Skywalker? Definitely not the Mujahideen). Educate your young boys not to grow up to be Nazis or Mussolinies or Stalins or Musks or elephant tusk poachers (roll tide!), before it's too late and you're bailing them out of the prisoner of war camps of the Allies. Nuremberg Trial oncoming.
I have great respect for Richard Sherman (shoutout Clarke Middle School!)and William Tecumsah Sherman who said: "I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell."
I've never been a prisoner of war, but I know what it's like to be systematically psychologically tortured (I'll tell you about my experiences at the Tel Aviv airport later one day- "What kind of name is Manas??" they asked me lol [one of a kind] ... "What do you know of Al-Shabab [well I am self-educated, too, you know] ... "why did you come to Israel first if you're going to Ethiopia first??" [clue: the tickets were cheaper that way, sorry, stereotype away!... ~ "You're saying your grandfather changed his name in America to escape anti-semitic racist persecution and discrimination? Since when do Jews get discriminated against in America?"... well I learned a lot about Israel after that point, but not before a month in Abyssinia, the best days of my life)- mind you, I was later in Haifa for a study abroad (HU has a magnificent museum on their campus, btw, check it out!), sponsored by UGA and got the best medical ride home after checking out the mental hospital where one young man ran around like a chicken with its head cut off running around like a chicken with its head cut off, and the other older guy giving me medicine kept telling me in English "I don't speak English!" (Medical translation is important).
All to say, it's good to have traveller's insurance if you plan on getting swept up by the mental health police because you decided to skip class to go on a walkabout (more on that later)..." Suffice it to say, sometimes I am suffused with enthusiasm (why shouldn't I be? Go read my undergraduate honours thesis, and you'll understand. Or just listen to "Hey Jude" (or watch the Youtube live version- I imagine John Lennon was thinking of my father when he was a boy, and soothing his soul with the beauty of the rock and roll) I LOVE CHUCK BERRY! (if you know, you know).
The following were some thoughts I shared with my mentor/mentee: The wise man's greatest challenge is the fool, and the wise man's greatest joy is the wisdom of others, of whatever age or vintage. "The wise man falters the fool, (or is it flatters?) [somebody call Flanders! I need a left-handed version of a record player, ASAP]"
Dha dhin dhin daha
dha dhin dhin dha
na tin tin na
te te tin tin tha
any job offers for a Master of Public Health?

Everyday Person (9/9/25, 8:21 PM)

If I free myself today, how will you?

Hearing and seeing from close and far,

We remember, forget, and remember more,

But I wouldn’t dare assume, 

I’ve been in your shoes

News reaches my ears and eyes,

A child’s crying,

A Mother’s wailing,

A Father’s derailing,

An elder statesman’s heart failing,

News reaches my body and mind

A billion men torn up inside today,

A billion women even more, and others too,

We can deduce by hearing and looking up what’s new-

Straight-faced and strait-jacketed,

Holding back tears to be worthy of one’s “work”,

We forge a copy of our authentic self,

 “Professionalism”- it’s called, well…

(We all know what that means)!

Wisdom may be passed from generation to generation,

Shared and handed off, warm, into soft hands-

Father to son, mother to daughter,

Friend to friend…

My neighbour and I are Thirty years apart,

And I see his wisdom and humility,

Maybe forged out of necessity,

In our local Southern-American scenery,

I mumble on and on, about what I can only perceive,

Combined with the facts that’ve reached me of our local history,

The spices sprinkled in the eyes of our County-

Brushed aside and marketed by the State Uni,

As Damn Good Dawg win parade confetti,

We speak peace and what could be-

I’d rather all my oldschool classmates graduated,

And got their tuition free,

Rather than trying to play the lottery.

While for others without this privilege of leisurely observation,

I see you out there in the economic wilderness-

Some doing good works,

Others more malicious deeds,

Conforming to orders from above-

Who’s commandments did you follow today?

And who’s commandments did that person follow?

When will you and I be free, to be?
To pick between our own free will decision tree?

I hear about “you” from a news article,

Predefined in neat categories with messy ramifications-

“Black, White, Latino, Indian, Chinese, African, Australian, Indigenous, Multiracial, American, Gazan, Congolese, Korean, Sudanese…”

Numbered for accountability-

This many dead, this many buried, this many cremated-

And these capsized at sea…

Calamities avoidable once and for all,

When we’ll work to preview what we see!

Let’s shift our focus?

How many lives saved today by unspoken means?

How many lives we’ll extend by a Malaria Vaccine?

How many couples married today?

And how many lucky marriage escapees?

How many children born,

How many brought home, happy and healthy?

How many with grandchildren, remarried?

How many political prisoners let free?

How many warheads spared, 

on our so-called enemies?

(Why the beefed-up arms? 

Why the patriotic insecurity?)

I think we need to have a little faith-

How many trade deals, 

bringing opportunity to the lowest rungs?

How many exceptional farm yields,

fertilised by simple cow dung?

How many farmers’ children-

enjoying a childhood their parents never got?

How many farmers literate with smart phones, 

taking breaks to share online their thoughts?

How many peacekeepers anticipating

The moves of power-brokers?

And giving a tip here, and tip there, gently guiding the canoe,

How many dreamers praising midnight, 

and how many gentle jokers,

Turning Green to Blue…?

Say bon voyage! 

Espionage be gone!

Trust in fellow Earthlings, 

the Unity of The Song!

Make America Better Than It’s Ever Been! I can say out loud, Easy- because I’m classified American,

And together with all of ya’ll, (Who aren’t demons!)

We can live more easily, effectively,

Trying to pick the right things to do-

Shall we come together now with peace,

Across national borders?

I say- Do Your Thing, Do the Right Thing, 

Even if it’s against (Whose?) Orders.

I’ve spoken a few words here, now take your turn,

We have long lives to live and many ideas to learn.

Waiting, leaning-in, 

I’ll be listening to your version

Of what it means for you to be you, 

As I dream of being an Everyday person…