In this personal memoir of the bloody civil strife, "Stories the Fire could not Burn", Hauzel documents the bloody civil strife and massacre that tore through Manipur in 2023, and whose fire still rages, away from the mainstream nationalistic jingoism.

Your body and mind are exhausted from the week that sits heavy on your chest like the old mortar in your kitchen your grandmother left you. Sometimes you wonder if she shifted her own weight in that lifeless object, something for you to carry.

I looked at the nameplate once before boarding the taxi. The address was still the same- 14/A Ahiripukur Road.

Ashu later realized that the angry smile of Mana’s uncle came from a place of deep-seated hurt. Every story, every poem that he had read carried an image of that pain.

It is amazing when children run towards their loved ones in utter delight. Even the most ill-tempered individual, after a troublesome fight, would be moved to smile at such a scene.