When the dead text back

Jan 03, 2026 Dem Boys Seh, Features / Columnists

(Kaieteur News) – From the very stroke of midnight on Old Year’s Night, my phone turn into Philharmonic Hall. Ping! Ping! Ping! WhatsApp ringing like tassa drum, steel pan and church bell all beating one time. By morning, the thing wasn’t a phone again—it was an orchestra pit, and I was the only miserable conductor without a baton.

Messages start pouring in from people I ain’t hear from since Burnham time. Some send long essays about “new beginnings” and “divine alignment.” Others just fling emojis—fireworks, champagne, folded hands, hearts beating like they training for Mashramani. One brave soul send a three-minute video, holding a plastic cup, shouting “Blessed New Year!” over music loud enough to wake ancestors.

What really frighten me is the resurrection. People I assume had long crossed over to the Great Beyond suddenly reappear on WhatsApp, alive, typing, and very enthusiastic. All year they didn’t know me. Didn’t see me when rain fall, sun hot, or cost of living climb tree. But come New Year, a virus infect them: Acute Greeting Syndrome. Symptoms include sudden affection, recycled Bible verses, and forwarded messages promising riches if you “share with ten contacts.”

I panic and turn off the phone, thinking I smart. Big mistake. When I turn it back on, is ambush. Messages been lining up quietly like pensioners at NIS, waiting their turn. The phone vibrate so hard it nearly walk off the table. One message still arriving while I reading the previous one—efficiency Guyanese-style.

By afternoon, I so overwhelmed I start replying in bulk: “Same to you and family, all the best.” If Dem Boys Seh could see me, they would say I mass-producing blessings like factory goods. Some people I reply twice; others I miss completely. If you ain’t get one, don’t vex—assume I love you silently. By nightfall, battery dead, patience gone, and phone sweating. New Year lesson learned: next December 31st, I changing my ringtone to funeral march. Maybe then, some of the dead will go back to rest.

Talk half. Leff half.

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