Me neither.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
My elephant was hungry...
So he grabbed a snack midway through our walk.
I do find it unsettling that an elephant's trunk is powerful enough to casually snap a healthy tree as he passes by.
An elephant ride is not a soothing journey, involving as it does a ludicrous amount of swaying, bouncing and lurching. Four or more people cram themselves into a small carriage of approximately the same configuration and comfort as the underside of a wooden chair, and bumble about atop an animal thoroughly indifferent to their comfort. But you've got to do it at least once in a lifetime - and really, it's the only reasonable way to see a handful of the world's essential places.
One such is Chitwan National park, a surprisingly large swath of virgin savanna and jungle straddling the Nepal-India border. It's in the Terai, Nepal's vast, blisteringly hot and mildly anarchic southern plains. The Terai is one of the more ungovernable portions of one of the world's more ungovernable countries, and it's been the wellspring of much of Nepal's recent chaos; indeed, another economy-crippling blockade began there this morning. Even the route there forced we tourists to skirt a feeble but inconvenient banda; we had to abandon our bus when tractors blocked the road, hoof it across a road bridge, its surface painted with the carbon-smear remnants of burnt tires, to reach the tourist enclave of Sauraha, at the mouth of the park.
Once there, thankfully, there's no indication you're in the troubled Terai; in fact, I half-forgot I was in Nepal at all. With its plentiful elephants, loudly diverse birdlife, and gorgeously expansive grasslands, Chitwan seduced my subconscious into thinking I was back in Southern Africa, notwithstanding the heffalumps being a touch smaller and the people noticeably paler. Chitwan is famously crowded with rhinoceri, and hosts most of Nepal's remaining (and dwindling) tigers. I saw neither from my elephant on the next morning's early ride, which is apparently unusual (re: the rhinos, anyhow). I did see much hauntingly beautiful fog-shrouded savanna.
And a few unexpectedly lazy deer, sitting serenely in the underbrush, with the confidence that evidently grows from the knowledge that Asia's tigers are nearly extinct
The ivy-like vine surrounding the deer is (according to our elephant handler, or mahout) an invasive South American weed, furiously overrunning the forest. It has apparently consumed more than a tenth of the very large park, and is resistant to all reasonable methods of extermination short of napalm.
From a wildlife perspective, it was an underwhelming journey. It was, however, crowded with exotic birds, the occasional camera-shy warthog, and and beautiful scenery.I did see a few elephants (namely the ones carrying us):
Better was to come later in the day. My uncooperative internet connection, I regret to say, is stubbornly refusing to upload the remainder of the day's photos, so it appears that finer photos will be yours tomorrow. More to come!
So he grabbed a snack midway through our walk.
I do find it unsettling that an elephant's trunk is powerful enough to casually snap a healthy tree as he passes by.
An elephant ride is not a soothing journey, involving as it does a ludicrous amount of swaying, bouncing and lurching. Four or more people cram themselves into a small carriage of approximately the same configuration and comfort as the underside of a wooden chair, and bumble about atop an animal thoroughly indifferent to their comfort. But you've got to do it at least once in a lifetime - and really, it's the only reasonable way to see a handful of the world's essential places.
One such is Chitwan National park, a surprisingly large swath of virgin savanna and jungle straddling the Nepal-India border. It's in the Terai, Nepal's vast, blisteringly hot and mildly anarchic southern plains. The Terai is one of the more ungovernable portions of one of the world's more ungovernable countries, and it's been the wellspring of much of Nepal's recent chaos; indeed, another economy-crippling blockade began there this morning. Even the route there forced we tourists to skirt a feeble but inconvenient banda; we had to abandon our bus when tractors blocked the road, hoof it across a road bridge, its surface painted with the carbon-smear remnants of burnt tires, to reach the tourist enclave of Sauraha, at the mouth of the park.
Once there, thankfully, there's no indication you're in the troubled Terai; in fact, I half-forgot I was in Nepal at all. With its plentiful elephants, loudly diverse birdlife, and gorgeously expansive grasslands, Chitwan seduced my subconscious into thinking I was back in Southern Africa, notwithstanding the heffalumps being a touch smaller and the people noticeably paler. Chitwan is famously crowded with rhinoceri, and hosts most of Nepal's remaining (and dwindling) tigers. I saw neither from my elephant on the next morning's early ride, which is apparently unusual (re: the rhinos, anyhow). I did see much hauntingly beautiful fog-shrouded savanna.
And a few unexpectedly lazy deer, sitting serenely in the underbrush, with the confidence that evidently grows from the knowledge that Asia's tigers are nearly extinct
The ivy-like vine surrounding the deer is (according to our elephant handler, or mahout) an invasive South American weed, furiously overrunning the forest. It has apparently consumed more than a tenth of the very large park, and is resistant to all reasonable methods of extermination short of napalm.
From a wildlife perspective, it was an underwhelming journey. It was, however, crowded with exotic birds, the occasional camera-shy warthog, and and beautiful scenery.I did see a few elephants (namely the ones carrying us):
Better was to come later in the day. My uncooperative internet connection, I regret to say, is stubbornly refusing to upload the remainder of the day's photos, so it appears that finer photos will be yours tomorrow. More to come!
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
In which I am shamed...
Because it would never have occurred to me to play ping pong with a temple step as the playing surface, a row of bricks as the net, and books taped to sticks as the paddles. Necessity is truly the mother of invention:
This is from Pashupatinath temple, the holiest Hindu site in Nepal, and apparently something of a recreational hotspot as well.
Because it would never have occurred to me to play ping pong with a temple step as the playing surface, a row of bricks as the net, and books taped to sticks as the paddles. Necessity is truly the mother of invention:
This is from Pashupatinath temple, the holiest Hindu site in Nepal, and apparently something of a recreational hotspot as well.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
My new favorite Youtube!
For today, anyways: not only is it intolerably cute, but also it contains somewhere the germ of an incredibly interesting study in information ecology and non-reciprocal altruism. Fun!
For today, anyways: not only is it intolerably cute, but also it contains somewhere the germ of an incredibly interesting study in information ecology and non-reciprocal altruism. Fun!
The Roof of the World...
Or, at least, closer to it than I've ever been before.
Life trundles along apace in Kathmandu. Work is a harmless drudgery of proposal research and proposal writing, punctuated by flurries of deadline-motivated hyperactivity and the occasional spasm of frustration, all of which are entirely par for the course in the part of the world (i.e. the poor part). I'm tolerably content with my work; dream job it ain't, but it's worlds better than being stuck behind a desk wondering whether I'd ever get back out into the great wide world.
So, short of enlightening revelations about my job, I offer instead more photos from the high Himalayas!
A couple of hours North (and up!) from the waystation of Namche Bazaar is the minute Sherpa village of Khunde, a hive of nestled in a shallow valley in the shadow of Khumbila, a snowless peak mildly sacred to local Buddhists (among whom the Sherpas are entirely included) and thus forbidden to climbers. Khunde is a resilient community of surprisingly precise and sturdy stone houses, intermingled with scattered patches of unwatered gravel that the locals somehow coax into producing vegetables. From the village itself, there's little to see, aside from the local Stupa and Khumbila itself which, in a landscape positively crowded with its more towering sisters, isn't much to look at.
There's a hidden gem above Khunde, however, unknown even to our Sherpa Mingma and most of the villagers, and which we found solely through the assistance of a hand-drawn map provided by my trailblazing Canadian friend Craig. About 400 meters above Khunde, on a unnerving knife-edged ridge overlooking every village and valley in the region, are three memorials erected in the memory of Sir Edmund Hillary, first summitteer of Mt. Everest (along with Sherpa Tenzing Norgay), and his wife and daughter, who sadly predeceased him in a plane crash. Hillary is "our God" in the words of Mingma, and is widely revered for spending much of his post-Everest life bringing schools, medical services, and other vital social improvements (many of which bear his name) to the unspeakably remote Solukhumbu region that hosts the Everest mountain range. After his death in 2007, local Buddhist monks in the Khumbu built these traditional stone memorials in a location whose startling inaccessibility and even more impressive view fit the legend of the man. Forest fire smoke wreathed the valleys below, but the view lost none of its power.
From the memorials, there's an astonishing view of the Everest range, perhaps the best you'll find without making the two week trek to Base Camp and Kalapattar.
The distant black pyramid at the photo's center is Everest, which must be seen to be believed, and which is sacred to all the peoples of the region and has acquired more names than I can recount. For the record, here's the closest view I had of Sagarmatha, Chomolungma Goddess Mother of the World:
By Mingma's estimate, we reached 4500 metres, a kilometre up from Namche and a hair over halfway to Everest's peak. Not surprisingly, that's the highest I've ever travelled. Ye gods, what a walk it was.
More photos and tales will come, in characteristically discontinuous and scattershot fashion. With Nepali power and internet connections, this is a slow process, but I've much to show of the rest of the trek, an elephant ride, and last month's rather different sojourn to Hong Kong.
Or, at least, closer to it than I've ever been before.
Life trundles along apace in Kathmandu. Work is a harmless drudgery of proposal research and proposal writing, punctuated by flurries of deadline-motivated hyperactivity and the occasional spasm of frustration, all of which are entirely par for the course in the part of the world (i.e. the poor part). I'm tolerably content with my work; dream job it ain't, but it's worlds better than being stuck behind a desk wondering whether I'd ever get back out into the great wide world.
So, short of enlightening revelations about my job, I offer instead more photos from the high Himalayas!
A couple of hours North (and up!) from the waystation of Namche Bazaar is the minute Sherpa village of Khunde, a hive of nestled in a shallow valley in the shadow of Khumbila, a snowless peak mildly sacred to local Buddhists (among whom the Sherpas are entirely included) and thus forbidden to climbers. Khunde is a resilient community of surprisingly precise and sturdy stone houses, intermingled with scattered patches of unwatered gravel that the locals somehow coax into producing vegetables. From the village itself, there's little to see, aside from the local Stupa and Khumbila itself which, in a landscape positively crowded with its more towering sisters, isn't much to look at.
There's a hidden gem above Khunde, however, unknown even to our Sherpa Mingma and most of the villagers, and which we found solely through the assistance of a hand-drawn map provided by my trailblazing Canadian friend Craig. About 400 meters above Khunde, on a unnerving knife-edged ridge overlooking every village and valley in the region, are three memorials erected in the memory of Sir Edmund Hillary, first summitteer of Mt. Everest (along with Sherpa Tenzing Norgay), and his wife and daughter, who sadly predeceased him in a plane crash. Hillary is "our God" in the words of Mingma, and is widely revered for spending much of his post-Everest life bringing schools, medical services, and other vital social improvements (many of which bear his name) to the unspeakably remote Solukhumbu region that hosts the Everest mountain range. After his death in 2007, local Buddhist monks in the Khumbu built these traditional stone memorials in a location whose startling inaccessibility and even more impressive view fit the legend of the man. Forest fire smoke wreathed the valleys below, but the view lost none of its power.
From the memorials, there's an astonishing view of the Everest range, perhaps the best you'll find without making the two week trek to Base Camp and Kalapattar.
The distant black pyramid at the photo's center is Everest, which must be seen to be believed, and which is sacred to all the peoples of the region and has acquired more names than I can recount. For the record, here's the closest view I had of Sagarmatha, Chomolungma Goddess Mother of the World:
By Mingma's estimate, we reached 4500 metres, a kilometre up from Namche and a hair over halfway to Everest's peak. Not surprisingly, that's the highest I've ever travelled. Ye gods, what a walk it was.
More photos and tales will come, in characteristically discontinuous and scattershot fashion. With Nepali power and internet connections, this is a slow process, but I've much to show of the rest of the trek, an elephant ride, and last month's rather different sojourn to Hong Kong.
Friday, April 17, 2009
Guilty as charged...
Behnaz, who has been communicating telepathically with my blog (again) over my explicit objections, tells me that it misses me (and despises purple). I too, despise purple, and in recognition of this commonality (and the very gradually improving electrical situation in Kathmandu) have found the opportunity (though barely the bandwidth) for some photoblogging of a portion of the 2000+ photos I've taken in the last few months. I even managed to upload 4 photos from my recent trip into the Himalayas, a feat that only required 4 hours (the uploading, not the trip). You will be sick of mountain photos by the time I'm truly done, and you'd best make your peace with that now.
These birds, whose names I do not know, chased thermals in the valley between Namche Bazaar, a key trekkers waystation en route to the Himalayan peaks, and Kongde, an astonishing 6,187 metre peak that looms over much of the lower Himalayas. Shorter by nearly 3 kilometres than Everest, Kongde Ri is nonetheless indescribably beautiful in person - the impact of seeing such a mountain for the first time is something that I, rarely at a loss for words, am still seeking to vocabulary to convey. You'll probably have to come see it for yourselves.
Behnaz, who has been communicating telepathically with my blog (again) over my explicit objections, tells me that it misses me (and despises purple). I too, despise purple, and in recognition of this commonality (and the very gradually improving electrical situation in Kathmandu) have found the opportunity (though barely the bandwidth) for some photoblogging of a portion of the 2000+ photos I've taken in the last few months. I even managed to upload 4 photos from my recent trip into the Himalayas, a feat that only required 4 hours (the uploading, not the trip). You will be sick of mountain photos by the time I'm truly done, and you'd best make your peace with that now.
These birds, whose names I do not know, chased thermals in the valley between Namche Bazaar, a key trekkers waystation en route to the Himalayan peaks, and Kongde, an astonishing 6,187 metre peak that looms over much of the lower Himalayas. Shorter by nearly 3 kilometres than Everest, Kongde Ri is nonetheless indescribably beautiful in person - the impact of seeing such a mountain for the first time is something that I, rarely at a loss for words, am still seeking to vocabulary to convey. You'll probably have to come see it for yourselves.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Happy New Year!
It's 2066 by the Nepali Hindu calendar! My bottom-floor neighbours rang in the New Year by getting furiously drunk, hurling bricks at each other, and apparently breaking a bottle over our guard's head. Bloody hell. He's all bandaged up now (no thanks to the bludgeoner) and I'm very cranky at the stupidity of it all.
No news as yet on my Foreign Service application - which is, I'm told, good news. I should have a more definitive answer by the end of the month.
It's 2066 by the Nepali Hindu calendar! My bottom-floor neighbours rang in the New Year by getting furiously drunk, hurling bricks at each other, and apparently breaking a bottle over our guard's head. Bloody hell. He's all bandaged up now (no thanks to the bludgeoner) and I'm very cranky at the stupidity of it all.
No news as yet on my Foreign Service application - which is, I'm told, good news. I should have a more definitive answer by the end of the month.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
The world begins to oblige...
It's raining. That's fantastic.
Mind you, it's not coming down hard, and the sky is giving us fitful volleys of hail along with the rain. But I'm optimistic that it will disperse a bit of the suffocating ABC (Asian Brown Cloud) that's currently choking Nepal, along with most of South Asia. The ABC is a kilometres-thick layer of haze and soot, an unhappy consequence of unregulated vehicles and power plants, burning agricultural waste and literally billions of cookfires fueled by wood or cow dung. It reduces sunlight so much that it's been markedly colder here the last couple of weeks, obscures anything a kilometre away and, incidentally, kills millions of people each year. It's both fascinating and horrifying, and I'm eager for the end of it, which will only really come with the start of full monsoon rains in May or June. Today's short shower is only that, and sadly it's already over. Damn.
In other news, the Nepalese Free Student Union, a student government pervasively aligned with the uncountable, incomprehensible political parties, held its elections this week. Since most of the affected campuses were between me and my office, I skipped work for the day and took photos instead. This being Nepal, it's inconceivable that such an event wouldn't cripple traffic across the entire city. The elections blocked Durbar Marg, the main North-South street in central Kathmandu, for the entire day. Traffic would have a rough time getting through this:
The enthusiasm was remarkable, and occasionally unsettling, given the alignment of the various student parties with larger political groups who cheerfully demonstrate their capacity for violence whenever given the opportunity. There was even a super-fan, with his support painted across his body, leading a marching rally:
Police, either fearing violence or eager for it, kept a careful eye on the whole thing:
Oh, and Nepalese students are still rather like ours, give or take a few years, in some fairly universal ways:
But there's no denying the marked fervour of the whole process, relative to the much-ignored (but nearly as corrupt) process of student politics in Canada.
I spent a few hours there, curious as to whether the zeal would turn to aggression and the relative order to a maelstrom. Most students cheerfully obliged my intrusions with my camera and, satisfied that things might actually remained peaceful, I took off.
Later in the day, riots at polling stations in East Nepal (and the heavy-handed police response) killed one student and injured hundreds, some of whom are not expected to survive their wounds. Pipe bombs went off at university poll about 90 kilometres from here, wounding six students. This is Nepal, after all - can't have things being settled by a free and peaceful election, can we?
I neither know nor care who won the election.
It's raining. That's fantastic.
Mind you, it's not coming down hard, and the sky is giving us fitful volleys of hail along with the rain. But I'm optimistic that it will disperse a bit of the suffocating ABC (Asian Brown Cloud) that's currently choking Nepal, along with most of South Asia. The ABC is a kilometres-thick layer of haze and soot, an unhappy consequence of unregulated vehicles and power plants, burning agricultural waste and literally billions of cookfires fueled by wood or cow dung. It reduces sunlight so much that it's been markedly colder here the last couple of weeks, obscures anything a kilometre away and, incidentally, kills millions of people each year. It's both fascinating and horrifying, and I'm eager for the end of it, which will only really come with the start of full monsoon rains in May or June. Today's short shower is only that, and sadly it's already over. Damn.
In other news, the Nepalese Free Student Union, a student government pervasively aligned with the uncountable, incomprehensible political parties, held its elections this week. Since most of the affected campuses were between me and my office, I skipped work for the day and took photos instead. This being Nepal, it's inconceivable that such an event wouldn't cripple traffic across the entire city. The elections blocked Durbar Marg, the main North-South street in central Kathmandu, for the entire day. Traffic would have a rough time getting through this:
The enthusiasm was remarkable, and occasionally unsettling, given the alignment of the various student parties with larger political groups who cheerfully demonstrate their capacity for violence whenever given the opportunity. There was even a super-fan, with his support painted across his body, leading a marching rally:
Police, either fearing violence or eager for it, kept a careful eye on the whole thing:
Oh, and Nepalese students are still rather like ours, give or take a few years, in some fairly universal ways:
But there's no denying the marked fervour of the whole process, relative to the much-ignored (but nearly as corrupt) process of student politics in Canada.
I spent a few hours there, curious as to whether the zeal would turn to aggression and the relative order to a maelstrom. Most students cheerfully obliged my intrusions with my camera and, satisfied that things might actually remained peaceful, I took off.
Later in the day, riots at polling stations in East Nepal (and the heavy-handed police response) killed one student and injured hundreds, some of whom are not expected to survive their wounds. Pipe bombs went off at university poll about 90 kilometres from here, wounding six students. This is Nepal, after all - can't have things being settled by a free and peaceful election, can we?
I neither know nor care who won the election.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
What a change...
It's been a complex week, for a number of reasons. One of the biggies is that it's quite a transition to move from
Over the last two weeks, much of southern
This is the brutal logic of
With the exception of
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Regarding all things afoot...
Life may begin to calm down a bit after this week. I've just concluded the toughest and most important interview of my life (thus far). I'm tolerably confident I succeeded, but it'll be up to two months before I truly know.
Meanwhile, I LOVE Hong Kong! Though it's ridiculously consumeristic and not the least bit friendly, it's kinetic, clean, effective, and full of fascinating sounds and alluring smells. It has reliable electricity, drinkable water, traffic lights (that are consistently obeyed) and enticing food left and right. Most compellingly, not once in the last two days have I felt the need to scream "Why #@$^%$@# bloody @#$@#% doesn't this work the way it's supposed to!!!"
Methinks Kathmandu has lowered the bar for what amazes me. It will be a hard adjustment going back, which I'll be doing in a few minutes.
Pictures to follow, if the electricity ever comes back on again in Nepal.
Argh.
Life may begin to calm down a bit after this week. I've just concluded the toughest and most important interview of my life (thus far). I'm tolerably confident I succeeded, but it'll be up to two months before I truly know.
Meanwhile, I LOVE Hong Kong! Though it's ridiculously consumeristic and not the least bit friendly, it's kinetic, clean, effective, and full of fascinating sounds and alluring smells. It has reliable electricity, drinkable water, traffic lights (that are consistently obeyed) and enticing food left and right. Most compellingly, not once in the last two days have I felt the need to scream "Why #@$^%$@# bloody @#$@#% doesn't this work the way it's supposed to!!!"
Methinks Kathmandu has lowered the bar for what amazes me. It will be a hard adjustment going back, which I'll be doing in a few minutes.
Pictures to follow, if the electricity ever comes back on again in Nepal.
Argh.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Update...
Definitely going to Hong Kong, on March 8th... now I'm just waiting for DFAIT to send me the vital details so I don't show up hideously unprepared.
Power still goes out 16 hours a day, but may improve by the beginning of March.
And I'm going to make a concerted effort to resurrect the blog despite the energy crisis in Nepal.
Definitely going to Hong Kong, on March 8th... now I'm just waiting for DFAIT to send me the vital details so I don't show up hideously unprepared.
Power still goes out 16 hours a day, but may improve by the beginning of March.
And I'm going to make a concerted effort to resurrect the blog despite the energy crisis in Nepal.
Sunday, February 01, 2009
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Fun with scientific notation!
Zimbabwe's inflation rate is now believed to exceed 13 quadrillion percent per month, which works out annually to the absolutely fantastic number of 2.3 * 10^193. Now since that number isn't nearly as fun in scientific notation, let's also think of it as:
Isn't it amazing what going absolutely bonkers with a banknote printing press will accomplish?
Zimbabwe's inflation rate is now believed to exceed 13 quadrillion percent per month, which works out annually to the absolutely fantastic number of 2.3 * 10^193. Now since that number isn't nearly as fun in scientific notation, let's also think of it as:
- 2,329,800,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000.
- Two thousand three hundred and thirty vigintillion vigintillion vigintillion.
- More than the number of elementary particles in the entire universe.
Isn't it amazing what going absolutely bonkers with a banknote printing press will accomplish?
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
It's been a very big week...
During which the full force of the energy crisis hit me, crippling my ability to blog. But in brief...
I published my first book, of which I am the editor and uncredited co-author: "Reporting Safe Migration and Human Trafficking: A Guide for Media Practitioners". The bloodless title was not my idea.
I was named the Best-Dressed Person working for CECI (my employer) in Nepal. That's a little like being the tallest midget at the circus, but hey, it's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
I've got a job interview with the Canadian Foreign Service! I'll be off to (probably) Hong Kong in (probably) early March. Joy!
I'm trying to come up with something profound and insightful to say about Obama's epic inauguration tomorrow, but so far I've been lethargic with an incredible swell of relief that the catastrophic reign of Bush is finally at its end. I'll think hard about what to say by tomorrow.
During which the full force of the energy crisis hit me, crippling my ability to blog. But in brief...
I published my first book, of which I am the editor and uncredited co-author: "Reporting Safe Migration and Human Trafficking: A Guide for Media Practitioners". The bloodless title was not my idea.
I was named the Best-Dressed Person working for CECI (my employer) in Nepal. That's a little like being the tallest midget at the circus, but hey, it's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
I've got a job interview with the Canadian Foreign Service! I'll be off to (probably) Hong Kong in (probably) early March. Joy!
I'm trying to come up with something profound and insightful to say about Obama's epic inauguration tomorrow, but so far I've been lethargic with an incredible swell of relief that the catastrophic reign of Bush is finally at its end. I'll think hard about what to say by tomorrow.
Monday, January 12, 2009
It's that time again!
When the Buffalo Beast's delectable new edition of the 50 Most Loathsome People in America is released onto unsuspecting web audiences. If you can tolerate bitter satire laced with a total lack of regard for human decency, this one's for you. Just try to get past the Obama listing if you're fragile.
When the Buffalo Beast's delectable new edition of the 50 Most Loathsome People in America is released onto unsuspecting web audiences. If you can tolerate bitter satire laced with a total lack of regard for human decency, this one's for you. Just try to get past the Obama listing if you're fragile.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
May I live in Nepal in interesting times...
This is a complex place.
We have 4 hours of useful electricity per day.
There are occasional street riots, though I've been unable to find them each that they've happened.
Cows graze on garbage here, rather than grass, which contradicts everything I thought I knew about ruminant gastroenterology.
And there are rumours of an imminent military coup swirling about. I don't think it would be like the one in Thailand.
For such a small, poor country, Nepal has phenomenally Byzantine politics. This blog will, for the foreseeable future, focus on decoding this insanity, until my employers or more sinister forces tell me to stop.
This is a complex place.
We have 4 hours of useful electricity per day.
There are occasional street riots, though I've been unable to find them each that they've happened.
Cows graze on garbage here, rather than grass, which contradicts everything I thought I knew about ruminant gastroenterology.
And there are rumours of an imminent military coup swirling about. I don't think it would be like the one in Thailand.
For such a small, poor country, Nepal has phenomenally Byzantine politics. This blog will, for the foreseeable future, focus on decoding this insanity, until my employers or more sinister forces tell me to stop.
Friday, January 09, 2009
It's late and I'm tired...
Which merely emphasizes the urgency of what I'm about to say: Slumdog Millionaire is absolutely fantastic. If you haven't already seen it (and if you're in a comfortable Western country, shame on you) cancel all other plans, skip work, and go see it right now. It has quickly elbowed its way into my all-time Top Ten, and may even have dethroned The Dark Knight as my favourite movie of the year.
OK, now I'm going to bed.
Which merely emphasizes the urgency of what I'm about to say: Slumdog Millionaire is absolutely fantastic. If you haven't already seen it (and if you're in a comfortable Western country, shame on you) cancel all other plans, skip work, and go see it right now. It has quickly elbowed its way into my all-time Top Ten, and may even have dethroned The Dark Knight as my favourite movie of the year.
OK, now I'm going to bed.
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