Characters: Thom and Shoraz. They're both gay, and Nepali.
***
T: Hey Shoraz, whattup bro? What are you doing?
S: Nothing, I was watching modern family. You know. What are you doing?
T: I was bored. What do you think about meeting soon?
S: Ok. I'm not doing that again.
T: You had lost the bet. You had to do it.
S: You do it from now on and see how it feels.
T: Wait, what are you talking about? I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing.
S: You tell mee what you're talking about.
T: Nevermind. Lets meet in 20 minutes.
S: Kk.
***
In BankGaffe in Thamel.
T: So I was thinking. We should go out.
S: Where should we go to.
T: Nono, that's not what I meant. I am asking you out k, you know, we should do dating.
S: Why?
T: Because we like each other, and we hang out with each other.
S: But we already hang out with each other, and we already like each other, and don't tell my straight friends because they're all so naive and they're still shy of girls, so much so that a common friend will comment after four years that it's so funny that most of them talk about girls all the time and entertain her, but never actually do anything, you know, but we do things besides those too. So why the urgency now, Titi?
T: Because I don't want it to be so invalid, you know. I want to be like, a legit couple, and stuff.
S: ..so if we start dating, how are things going to change?
T: ...we could change our facebook relationship status, etc...
S: So you're saying we should date for facebook's sake?
T: I'm saying we should be brave for a change, and put it out their for everyone to see that we're seeing each other.
S: You realize noone here's going to take that seriously right? Don't you see all the chicks all putting 'married' to their 'besties and all that. The most everyone's going to think about us is that it's so gay that we're doing things that girls do, instead of thinking we're actually gay.
T: Hmm, so what should we do?
S: That, I don't know, but I definitely know what I am not doing.
T: Ok, seriously, the way you put it, you make it sound really dirty. It's not like we've done... you know.. you're making it sound like oral. What exactly are you talking about, explain it to me ta?
S: The kiss k, the kiss! Remember, we kissed two weeks ago, and I had to take my tongue all over you mouth. If we Kiss again, you're going to do that, and not me.
T: Oh yaa, you're getting allover me. I was going to tell you take it down, but we were both kinda' into the mood. So I didn't say anything.
S: Haha, really. And I thought you liked and and kept on doing it even harder.
T: Okay, don't you hear it? You're making even the most innocent thing sound so dirty k. People will think we're fully-fledged real gay couple.
S: We are not?
T: We are not dating yet, you know.
S: So once we start datig, we'll be fully-fledged real gay couple and do all the gay things?
T: Yes, yes that's what's going to be different.
S: Hahhhh!
T: What, what? That sounded evil. What the Hahhh about that?
S: As if you're not soo gay already.
T: What the hell?
S: Hoho, those Polo Shirts man. Only rich Indian metropolitcan who think they have a great sense of fashion, but are possibly blind wear polos of that color. Or my boy---.. whatever you are. So ghinlagdo color cha.
T: My dad bought it for me.
S: Well then, now we know gayness is genetic.
T: Oh you're saying your mom's gay too, with all her short hair, and office works and everything?
S: Hey you're being offensive and sexist. Women can work in industries too just as much as men!
T: Yes. Though I'm sure it's one of the rarer instances when women work in the all-women motorcycle-gang industry.
S: It's not a motorcycle gang! They just all love motorcycles, and can afford them, so they're like a support group for all the motorcycle riding women in Kathmandu. And dude, that was mean.
T: You called my dad gay! What did you want!
S: He does that thing with his hands.
T: We're both gay, and WE don't do it! The hands have got nothing to do with your sexuality.
S: Sure, sure. You know what would be really fucked up? What if we were not gay but your dad was.
T: And your mom too.
S: Whatevs. That would be so crazy! Eww I would have kissed a guy for no reason.
T: Yeahahaa. No. Are you like, supersure you're gay?
S: ..and you ask this AFTER I do the tongue flick?
Both get up, go to a corner and kiss. T tries to grab S's butt but he doesn't let him.
Inspired fully by this:http://sewasmusings.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-non-lvoe-story.html
Letter for Prakash
Prakash,
By the time you get this letter, I will have gone. I don't want to be too dramatic, but I will have left Nepal when you're reading this. It was kind-of urgent. Sorry.
You're wondering why I had to write a letter when I could have called you, or texted you, or emailed you, or facebook-messaged you. I'm writing this to you because, Prakash, I don't want you to try to contact me in any way for at least the next few months. It hurts me just as much as it hurts you, but I know you will understand.
When I came to Nepal four months ago, I was expecting to lose any remaining love/respect I had for it. I knew the streets were dirtier, the men filthier, the buses unsafer, the water undrinkable, nights darker and days... silent. My family was not in Nepal anymore. I had friends from school, whom I hadn't seen for the better part of the decade. Friends from US who had returned were few and few. I knew I was going to be lost. I was not going home, I was going to bid a place I'd called home a final farewell, I'd thought.
Then I came across you guys. I realized the Kathmandu of when I was young, and the Kathmandu I lived in for the summer, were two different cities. I never had to go in a bus, to be groped, stared at, spit, looked at strangely, asked for bribe, or anything else I expected from the old Kathmandu. Your apartment was considerably better than most apartments I've been here -- the freedom everyone enjoys (our friends) in Kathmandu is in no way less than what I enjoyed in the US. You can drive to whatever place you want to, at any time. I was amazed. I expected to see the Kathmandu of my teens. This was an adult Kathmandu, where I was free to do whatever I wanted to. I'd connected the US with my personal freedom... I began realizing it was not the US that'd given me the freedom, but my adulthood.
I came to love the life. A weekend in Sara's apartment, the next in Ashu's, the next in ours, another in your, and so on. It was the life, yaar. Maybe part of why I loved it so much is that I never expected to get so much out of my Kathmandu trip. It was cheap, mostly, and it was real fun. I ate from bhattis and I did things I wouldn't have imagined myself doing in Kathmandu, like that night we stole all the concrete dividers in Durbarmarg.
And so my three-week trip extended to become a four-month vacation. The last time I had been in Kathmandu, maoists were still not as big as they later got. And now they had 'gone big', become legit, and were in power. I thought these things in Sara's penthouse in the evenings, while staring at the mess of lights that Kathmandu is. It's amazing yaar. My life was so different from what I'd imagined, and it was good.
It was so good, I wanted more of it. You know Natasha didi, Anisha's sister who works at the state department. I talked to her, and there was a very real possibility I would get an consultancy in Kathmandu. I would be making American talab in Kathmandu yaar, and I'd get one of the cool apartments like you guys, and I'd get a car, and life would be awesome. Don't freak out, but sometimes I could imagine myself settling down...maybe even with you?, and those thoughts freaked me out. I had always thought 'settling down' was at least eight years away. I'd live the dream yaar, and it was amazing how happy the thought made me.
I know you've been waiting for the 'turning point', or else I would not be running away from you -- I'd have asked you out. The turning point wasn't anything dramatic that you read in the books... it wasn't The reluctant fundamentalist's September 11. And there were no particular events I can remember that made me feel queasy.
It was just-- what I was seeing was so different from what I'd seen. So I started looking more carefully. I saw that the buses were still as packed, and the girls still as abused. Crime ghatyaa chhaina yaar, it's grown muchmuch worse, it's just we don't bother seeing it anymore. All the malls were fun, but, you know, I felt like I was one of 'those' people. Rich people. Privileged people. And I swear, it felt soo wrong.
There are poor people in US too... a lot. And maybe even here, I'm one of privileged. But... there's more people who're doing better, you know? Nepal maa... I saw that there were few people who did sofuckingly well, and good for us, and them, butbut.. most people did alright. Paru Jajarkot gaako thee, she was telling me about everything there. Ani I realized, I'd become an expat in my own country, without ever denouncing my citizenship. Mero US work permit le matrai ni expat jasto feel huna thaalyo. You know, the regular aid-gang, the newspaper-waaalas, the models, the singers, the who-knows-what-but-they're-hots. I started feeling nauseous yaar. I hated the old Kathmandu, but... this was... not Kathmandu even. This was... some smalltown America with exceedingly poor population, that thought it was the center of the Universe. Kathmandu America bhanda kei different feel huna chhadyo, except it didn't have any good parts. A cheap chinese production of some middle-America city.
I thought about the future. What would I want to do in twenty years? Would I still hang around the same art-galleries, go to the same restaurants, attend the same conferences, and party at the same places? I didn't want to. I wanted... a more.. khoi k bhanney... this probably sounds hypocritical coming from me but... I wanted a more... wholesome life yaar. I wanted my feet on the ground.
But they were just nagging feelings. The biggest argument for staying in Nepal was, always has been, that you're a 'someone' in Kathmandu. Everything you do can appear in Page4 if you want to, you can write whatever and they'll publish and pay for it, and you can be as big a celebrity you want to be. People know you, maybe even respect you, and it's a great tight-little community. Contrast that to the lives most Americans live -- office and home, office and home, maybe friends sometimes, but, the same sense of community that's in Kathmandu is not there. You can't make it to the papers, you don't become a celebrity right-away. And there are so many people, no matter what your accomplishments are, you're still a nobody that nobody cares about. You're a person who matters in Kathmandu; in the US, you're someone who happens to be there. It was a good argument to be in Kathmandu, so I suppressed all other emotions that contradicted it.
And then the realization hit me. That argument is not new yaar. It's not even a particularly creative one for Kathmandu. Everyone says that. That's the decision people in small towns and cities even in the US make before moving to bigger cities. In a small city, you're someone, and people know you -- specially if you make lots of money. That's a Universal truth. The idea of a strong community exists in towns too -- you'd be surprised how patriotic they are about their parts of the country. And then this whole wave swept me over.
Kathmandu is no different yaar. Kathmandu is America, the Kathmandu you and everyone lives in. It's a shitty shitty part of America, but it's smalltown America nonetheless. It's a part of America that doesn't have white people. In the end, that's what I was left with. I didn't care about Kathmandu anymore. I realized if I wanted to live in Nepal, it would be because of Nepali bhasa and the Nepali-pan -- whatever that means. There would be no point for me to leave America to live an another America.
And then I was back to square one. The Nepal I grew up in.. where we'd go to temples early in the morning during festivals, where we'd be overjoyed in riding the cable car, where we'd spend weekends in Manakamana...that wasn't there for me anymore. We (us, meaning you, me, everyone, the guys, you know) weren't that kind of people, I realized. The life I wanted in Nepal, I couldn't have with you (there, I said it), or with anyone I could find on my own. That was when I decided I would leave Nepal.
I couldn't leave you yaar. You're too hot, hahaha. You may or may not have asked me to stay back, and I may or may not have given up, and I may or may not have spent more time in Nepal. I didn't want any of that to happen. You know esto sentii things don't work out very well. So the only thing I could do was to get the hell out of there. I reserved the tickets in secret, and left without telling you. Or the guys. Aru lai text, facebook, sasebook gareko chha. I just told them there was something serious that I needed to attend US ma. I'll be in touch with them. I won't, with you for some time. Tell them about this if you want to.
I know you know why I'm doing this. We were too good together. We would have melted and frozen into each other. And I didn't want to .... you know what i mean. It's been very painful, and if it makes you feel any better, a little crying was done. Maybe a bit more. I guess that's going to make the plane-ride great because I sleep really well after crying. You know.
I want to talk to you. A lot. Not just now. Bujha hai, please. I need peace.
Timro,
Rebbi
PS: I'm heading to a Snake farm in South Africa. Heh, kata kata bata ayo. Three months there and back to work. I'm hoping to pass off this 6-month period as 'research'. I guess it has been, in a way.
By the time you get this letter, I will have gone. I don't want to be too dramatic, but I will have left Nepal when you're reading this. It was kind-of urgent. Sorry.
You're wondering why I had to write a letter when I could have called you, or texted you, or emailed you, or facebook-messaged you. I'm writing this to you because, Prakash, I don't want you to try to contact me in any way for at least the next few months. It hurts me just as much as it hurts you, but I know you will understand.
When I came to Nepal four months ago, I was expecting to lose any remaining love/respect I had for it. I knew the streets were dirtier, the men filthier, the buses unsafer, the water undrinkable, nights darker and days... silent. My family was not in Nepal anymore. I had friends from school, whom I hadn't seen for the better part of the decade. Friends from US who had returned were few and few. I knew I was going to be lost. I was not going home, I was going to bid a place I'd called home a final farewell, I'd thought.
Then I came across you guys. I realized the Kathmandu of when I was young, and the Kathmandu I lived in for the summer, were two different cities. I never had to go in a bus, to be groped, stared at, spit, looked at strangely, asked for bribe, or anything else I expected from the old Kathmandu. Your apartment was considerably better than most apartments I've been here -- the freedom everyone enjoys (our friends) in Kathmandu is in no way less than what I enjoyed in the US. You can drive to whatever place you want to, at any time. I was amazed. I expected to see the Kathmandu of my teens. This was an adult Kathmandu, where I was free to do whatever I wanted to. I'd connected the US with my personal freedom... I began realizing it was not the US that'd given me the freedom, but my adulthood.
I came to love the life. A weekend in Sara's apartment, the next in Ashu's, the next in ours, another in your, and so on. It was the life, yaar. Maybe part of why I loved it so much is that I never expected to get so much out of my Kathmandu trip. It was cheap, mostly, and it was real fun. I ate from bhattis and I did things I wouldn't have imagined myself doing in Kathmandu, like that night we stole all the concrete dividers in Durbarmarg.
And so my three-week trip extended to become a four-month vacation. The last time I had been in Kathmandu, maoists were still not as big as they later got. And now they had 'gone big', become legit, and were in power. I thought these things in Sara's penthouse in the evenings, while staring at the mess of lights that Kathmandu is. It's amazing yaar. My life was so different from what I'd imagined, and it was good.
It was so good, I wanted more of it. You know Natasha didi, Anisha's sister who works at the state department. I talked to her, and there was a very real possibility I would get an consultancy in Kathmandu. I would be making American talab in Kathmandu yaar, and I'd get one of the cool apartments like you guys, and I'd get a car, and life would be awesome. Don't freak out, but sometimes I could imagine myself settling down...maybe even with you?, and those thoughts freaked me out. I had always thought 'settling down' was at least eight years away. I'd live the dream yaar, and it was amazing how happy the thought made me.
I know you've been waiting for the 'turning point', or else I would not be running away from you -- I'd have asked you out. The turning point wasn't anything dramatic that you read in the books... it wasn't The reluctant fundamentalist's September 11. And there were no particular events I can remember that made me feel queasy.
It was just-- what I was seeing was so different from what I'd seen. So I started looking more carefully. I saw that the buses were still as packed, and the girls still as abused. Crime ghatyaa chhaina yaar, it's grown muchmuch worse, it's just we don't bother seeing it anymore. All the malls were fun, but, you know, I felt like I was one of 'those' people. Rich people. Privileged people. And I swear, it felt soo wrong.
There are poor people in US too... a lot. And maybe even here, I'm one of privileged. But... there's more people who're doing better, you know? Nepal maa... I saw that there were few people who did sofuckingly well, and good for us, and them, butbut.. most people did alright. Paru Jajarkot gaako thee, she was telling me about everything there. Ani I realized, I'd become an expat in my own country, without ever denouncing my citizenship. Mero US work permit le matrai ni expat jasto feel huna thaalyo. You know, the regular aid-gang, the newspaper-waaalas, the models, the singers, the who-knows-what-but-they're-hots. I started feeling nauseous yaar. I hated the old Kathmandu, but... this was... not Kathmandu even. This was... some smalltown America with exceedingly poor population, that thought it was the center of the Universe. Kathmandu America bhanda kei different feel huna chhadyo, except it didn't have any good parts. A cheap chinese production of some middle-America city.
I thought about the future. What would I want to do in twenty years? Would I still hang around the same art-galleries, go to the same restaurants, attend the same conferences, and party at the same places? I didn't want to. I wanted... a more.. khoi k bhanney... this probably sounds hypocritical coming from me but... I wanted a more... wholesome life yaar. I wanted my feet on the ground.
But they were just nagging feelings. The biggest argument for staying in Nepal was, always has been, that you're a 'someone' in Kathmandu. Everything you do can appear in Page4 if you want to, you can write whatever and they'll publish and pay for it, and you can be as big a celebrity you want to be. People know you, maybe even respect you, and it's a great tight-little community. Contrast that to the lives most Americans live -- office and home, office and home, maybe friends sometimes, but, the same sense of community that's in Kathmandu is not there. You can't make it to the papers, you don't become a celebrity right-away. And there are so many people, no matter what your accomplishments are, you're still a nobody that nobody cares about. You're a person who matters in Kathmandu; in the US, you're someone who happens to be there. It was a good argument to be in Kathmandu, so I suppressed all other emotions that contradicted it.
And then the realization hit me. That argument is not new yaar. It's not even a particularly creative one for Kathmandu. Everyone says that. That's the decision people in small towns and cities even in the US make before moving to bigger cities. In a small city, you're someone, and people know you -- specially if you make lots of money. That's a Universal truth. The idea of a strong community exists in towns too -- you'd be surprised how patriotic they are about their parts of the country. And then this whole wave swept me over.
Kathmandu is no different yaar. Kathmandu is America, the Kathmandu you and everyone lives in. It's a shitty shitty part of America, but it's smalltown America nonetheless. It's a part of America that doesn't have white people. In the end, that's what I was left with. I didn't care about Kathmandu anymore. I realized if I wanted to live in Nepal, it would be because of Nepali bhasa and the Nepali-pan -- whatever that means. There would be no point for me to leave America to live an another America.
And then I was back to square one. The Nepal I grew up in.. where we'd go to temples early in the morning during festivals, where we'd be overjoyed in riding the cable car, where we'd spend weekends in Manakamana...that wasn't there for me anymore. We (us, meaning you, me, everyone, the guys, you know) weren't that kind of people, I realized. The life I wanted in Nepal, I couldn't have with you (there, I said it), or with anyone I could find on my own. That was when I decided I would leave Nepal.
I couldn't leave you yaar. You're too hot, hahaha. You may or may not have asked me to stay back, and I may or may not have given up, and I may or may not have spent more time in Nepal. I didn't want any of that to happen. You know esto sentii things don't work out very well. So the only thing I could do was to get the hell out of there. I reserved the tickets in secret, and left without telling you. Or the guys. Aru lai text, facebook, sasebook gareko chha. I just told them there was something serious that I needed to attend US ma. I'll be in touch with them. I won't, with you for some time. Tell them about this if you want to.
I know you know why I'm doing this. We were too good together. We would have melted and frozen into each other. And I didn't want to .... you know what i mean. It's been very painful, and if it makes you feel any better, a little crying was done. Maybe a bit more. I guess that's going to make the plane-ride great because I sleep really well after crying. You know.
I want to talk to you. A lot. Not just now. Bujha hai, please. I need peace.
Timro,
Rebbi
PS: I'm heading to a Snake farm in South Africa. Heh, kata kata bata ayo. Three months there and back to work. I'm hoping to pass off this 6-month period as 'research'. I guess it has been, in a way.
An idea for a Nepali graphic novel based on the life of a friend
This is an experimental piece. Alternately, I did not have enough self-motivation to write something that made sense, so now I'm making it 'look' like 'experimental' but it's not well-thought out and I'm ashamed of it, but hey i gots to keep the promises I made yo!
The background is a black-and-white drawing of what looks like a result of a nuclear blast.omious.
We began the experiment because we thought the tests were far from us.
More scenes of distruction.
very far.
A rose. Black and white, black and white, black and white.
No dialog.
A man rafting on a rocky river, big waves, very determined face
We should have caught our mistake early on.
A woman on a bigger raft, following the first raft. Long hair, well-built. She's not the same race as the man.
We should have understood people better, with our unlimited access to human communication.
Sand. Beach. The woman is tying her hair. The man is tying his laces.
We prided ourselves on being a pot.
Hands, together, zoomed in. Clasp each other in the next frame.
Two bodies, sleeping on the sand, facing the sun, their rafts by their side.
We were stupid.
Zoom into the face of the man in the previous frames. Face shows many shadows and in great detail. Almost-baby face.
I m not a lover.
I know.
I have had enough broken hearts, and unbroken hearts, to find out.
[above is shown by several frames. Him and hotwoman in a paraglider. Him and hotwoman using binoculars. Him and hotwoman climbing mountains. Him and hotwoman biking. Him and hotwomen beachvolleyballing. Him and hotwoman bathing in the river. Him with several hotwomen with medals. imply somehow, many olympians]
In movies the drug dealers have a rule: never use your own product. My field never had any similar rule. We were rather encouraged to get intimate with clients if we so desired.
Him coming out of a tent. Him mid-dive into a river. Him looking uncomfortable in a suit at a party, with a taller, attractive woman.
Many of my coworkers didn't handle the lifestyle too well. I saw my friends marry athletes, people serious about taking their sport as a lifestyle, within few years of taking the job.
A tourist bus, seen from the inside. People talking, sleeping, playing, reading, listening to music, teasing. Mostly young people. No kids.
It didn't look like it from outside, but it was life at fast pace. I loved every moment of it.
The background is a black-and-white drawing of what looks like a result of a nuclear blast.omious.
We began the experiment because we thought the tests were far from us.
More scenes of distruction.
very far.
A rose. Black and white, black and white, black and white.
No dialog.
A man rafting on a rocky river, big waves, very determined face
We should have caught our mistake early on.
A woman on a bigger raft, following the first raft. Long hair, well-built. She's not the same race as the man.
We should have understood people better, with our unlimited access to human communication.
Sand. Beach. The woman is tying her hair. The man is tying his laces.
We prided ourselves on being a pot.
Hands, together, zoomed in. Clasp each other in the next frame.
Two bodies, sleeping on the sand, facing the sun, their rafts by their side.
We were stupid.
Zoom into the face of the man in the previous frames. Face shows many shadows and in great detail. Almost-baby face.
I m not a lover.
I know.
I have had enough broken hearts, and unbroken hearts, to find out.
[above is shown by several frames. Him and hotwoman in a paraglider. Him and hotwoman using binoculars. Him and hotwoman climbing mountains. Him and hotwoman biking. Him and hotwomen beachvolleyballing. Him and hotwoman bathing in the river. Him with several hotwomen with medals. imply somehow, many olympians]
In movies the drug dealers have a rule: never use your own product. My field never had any similar rule. We were rather encouraged to get intimate with clients if we so desired.
Him coming out of a tent. Him mid-dive into a river. Him looking uncomfortable in a suit at a party, with a taller, attractive woman.
Many of my coworkers didn't handle the lifestyle too well. I saw my friends marry athletes, people serious about taking their sport as a lifestyle, within few years of taking the job.
A tourist bus, seen from the inside. People talking, sleeping, playing, reading, listening to music, teasing. Mostly young people. No kids.
It didn't look like it from outside, but it was life at fast pace. I loved every moment of it.
Bhupi's poem : I find the history of my country wrong
Today's post is Bhupi(Sherchan, the friend of my grandfather)'s.
गलत लाग्छ मलाई मेरो देशको इतिहास
यो बाटोमा बीचमा माटो खनेर
बसेका देवताहरु
यो बुझेर पनि लाटो बनेर
बसेका देवताहरु
यो बुझेर पनि लाटो बनेर
बसेका मानिसहरु
यी भूकम्पपीडित मन्दिर
र
ढल्केका गजूरहरु
यी सालिक बनेर दोबाटोमा
उभिएका हजूरहरु
जब देख्छु म यी सबलाई
सधै त्यहीं सधै उस्तै र
सधै एकनास
तब मलाई गलत लाग्छ
मेरो हुरीको इतिहास
जब म
असङ्ख्य सीताहरुलाई सधै
बाटो-दोबाटोमा,
गल्ली-गल्लीमा,
देश-विदेशमा,
यूक्लिप्टसका रुखझै नङ्ग्याइएको देख्छु
अनि जब देख्छु असङ्ख्य भीमसेन थापाहरुलाई
निस्पन्द, निश्चल, शिथिल, चुपचाप उभिएका
आफ्नो आत्माको गीत मारेर
कल्कीका बोटझै
दुबै हात तल झारेर
तब मलाई गरुँ-गरुँ झै लाग्छ
आफ्नो रगतको उपहास
Source
गलत लाग्छ मलाई मेरो देशको इतिहास
यो बाटोमा बीचमा माटो खनेर
बसेका देवताहरु
यो बुझेर पनि लाटो बनेर
बसेका देवताहरु
यो बुझेर पनि लाटो बनेर
बसेका मानिसहरु
यी भूकम्पपीडित मन्दिर
र
ढल्केका गजूरहरु
यी सालिक बनेर दोबाटोमा
उभिएका हजूरहरु
जब देख्छु म यी सबलाई
सधै त्यहीं सधै उस्तै र
सधै एकनास
तब मलाई गलत लाग्छ
मेरो हुरीको इतिहास
जब म
असङ्ख्य सीताहरुलाई सधै
बाटो-दोबाटोमा,
गल्ली-गल्लीमा,
देश-विदेशमा,
यूक्लिप्टसका रुखझै नङ्ग्याइएको देख्छु
अनि जब देख्छु असङ्ख्य भीमसेन थापाहरुलाई
निस्पन्द, निश्चल, शिथिल, चुपचाप उभिएका
आफ्नो आत्माको गीत मारेर
कल्कीका बोटझै
दुबै हात तल झारेर
तब मलाई गरुँ-गरुँ झै लाग्छ
आफ्नो रगतको उपहास
Source
Jumps
Some jumps are so small that there's no perceived motion at all. And yet, they are called jumps because the motion was not linear -- the moving object didn't travel through every point in the surface, it skipped many. Our walks are jumps because we're taking discrete steps on the ground -- play the footage of a person walking on the road, and she won't seem to be walking anymore... She'll be hopping, skipping -- slowly but surely.
Some jumps are rather big. Imaginary spaceships can jump not only across galaxies but across Universes and cosmoses and realities. Real spaceships... don't jump, because for a jump, you have to come back at some point, or else you leave your ground. That's the difference between a Kangaroo and a bird -- the Kangaroo jumps because he returns to where he started his jump from but a bird flies because she may or may not return.
Some jumps are rather big. Imaginary spaceships can jump not only across galaxies but across Universes and cosmoses and realities. Real spaceships... don't jump, because for a jump, you have to come back at some point, or else you leave your ground. That's the difference between a Kangaroo and a bird -- the Kangaroo jumps because he returns to where he started his jump from but a bird flies because she may or may not return.
Writing
Pardon the cliche, but writing is like a river
The river flows, and it flows quickly. Words follow words. There's blocks, but they're like landslides on a river: they're followed by an outflow of words. Surging ahead, one letter on the keyboard after the other ( i considered myself a pen and paper person until i realized whatever I wrote on paper would have to be typed anyway, and I'd too all the donkey work of reading my dirty handwriting). Sometimes it makes sense, sometimes it doesn't. But the words flow.
Sometimes, you think it went well. You close your eyes and type into the screen whatever comes to your mind. You stretch your sentences far beyond their breaking points, you don't even need to look at the screen, you keep on typing while you're talking to other people engrossed in conversations, and the fingers to all the work. Everything doesn't have to be world class- you just have to keep on writing and writing and writing, and then reading what shit you write, so you know what a bad writer you are and man do you need to improve, and you start noticing patterns in your writing, you start noticing patterns in your writing, you start seeing the flaws, the rags that join your tattering poncho. You try weaving better ones. You won't succeed and you keep on writing and writing and writing.
But you would have thought wrong. The writing is not always as smooth as you imagine it is when you write. Your sentences are obstacles to yourself. What you consider to be a flow unhindered by grammar is a shit of rock no one wants to read, because seriously dude, did you write that unpara'd 1200 words with only three fullstops? Really?
That is still salvageable though. Language matters, but what matters more is what's in your writing. For me, being honest is all that counts. You should be able to tell your deepest darkest secrets to the reader without ever letting them know that you're a very very disturbed individual, like every other individual, and instead convince them that you're a master of personas, the king of conversations, the mahaguru of nuances, and the emperor of emotions. In your mind, they're real, because everything's so sick and stupid, and man, you should really see a therapist, but in the pages as words, they become stories other minds secretly tell themselves are not real, and neither are their own dark thoughts.
Honesty is important. Often, to add flourish to your unremarkable writing you add curves and hickorydickory pakhey phrases because you can, not because it adds anything at all to your story. You're lying in your stories because you're distracting the reader from the version of reality in your head to a distracted version, one that got sidetracked because you wanted to show them that you're hip, you're cool, you're not conventional bro.
They are lies. Those pieces don't deserve to exist. Don't kill them, though because they serve as reminders of what not to do. Don't lie to your readers. Serve them the version of reality that your head tells you to, not that you think you need to. It's always wrong, dead wrong, and it will embarrass you in the future. But that's good, because that embarrassment is what pushes you onwards. You realize you are not in your prime, you are nowhere near your prime. And that's when you know the only way is upwards. You keep writing, not because you are good, but because you can always get better. Always. Unless they give you the nobel prize. Then you can't get any better, and you're so totally screwed, and you should totally stop writing and go to bed. The cows have returned home.
The river flows, and it flows quickly. Words follow words. There's blocks, but they're like landslides on a river: they're followed by an outflow of words. Surging ahead, one letter on the keyboard after the other ( i considered myself a pen and paper person until i realized whatever I wrote on paper would have to be typed anyway, and I'd too all the donkey work of reading my dirty handwriting). Sometimes it makes sense, sometimes it doesn't. But the words flow.
Sometimes, you think it went well. You close your eyes and type into the screen whatever comes to your mind. You stretch your sentences far beyond their breaking points, you don't even need to look at the screen, you keep on typing while you're talking to other people engrossed in conversations, and the fingers to all the work. Everything doesn't have to be world class- you just have to keep on writing and writing and writing, and then reading what shit you write, so you know what a bad writer you are and man do you need to improve, and you start noticing patterns in your writing, you start noticing patterns in your writing, you start seeing the flaws, the rags that join your tattering poncho. You try weaving better ones. You won't succeed and you keep on writing and writing and writing.
But you would have thought wrong. The writing is not always as smooth as you imagine it is when you write. Your sentences are obstacles to yourself. What you consider to be a flow unhindered by grammar is a shit of rock no one wants to read, because seriously dude, did you write that unpara'd 1200 words with only three fullstops? Really?
That is still salvageable though. Language matters, but what matters more is what's in your writing. For me, being honest is all that counts. You should be able to tell your deepest darkest secrets to the reader without ever letting them know that you're a very very disturbed individual, like every other individual, and instead convince them that you're a master of personas, the king of conversations, the mahaguru of nuances, and the emperor of emotions. In your mind, they're real, because everything's so sick and stupid, and man, you should really see a therapist, but in the pages as words, they become stories other minds secretly tell themselves are not real, and neither are their own dark thoughts.
Honesty is important. Often, to add flourish to your unremarkable writing you add curves and hickorydickory pakhey phrases because you can, not because it adds anything at all to your story. You're lying in your stories because you're distracting the reader from the version of reality in your head to a distracted version, one that got sidetracked because you wanted to show them that you're hip, you're cool, you're not conventional bro.
They are lies. Those pieces don't deserve to exist. Don't kill them, though because they serve as reminders of what not to do. Don't lie to your readers. Serve them the version of reality that your head tells you to, not that you think you need to. It's always wrong, dead wrong, and it will embarrass you in the future. But that's good, because that embarrassment is what pushes you onwards. You realize you are not in your prime, you are nowhere near your prime. And that's when you know the only way is upwards. You keep writing, not because you are good, but because you can always get better. Always. Unless they give you the nobel prize. Then you can't get any better, and you're so totally screwed, and you should totally stop writing and go to bed. The cows have returned home.
Futures
What's a time bomb? Why is it a bomb that goes boom when the times goes numb? Why isn't it a bomb that booms through time?
Our futures are uncertain. We travel through this cone, ever upwards because...entropy, bro, entropy. The electrons in our brains don't run backwards and the atoms in our genes don't run around like a seven year old boy in Basantapur chasing the pigeons while groups of Japanese and Chinese tourists take his photo as his parents sit on the temple steps, imagining his bright future but who are they to be certain he doesn't turn into a drug addict etcetc because, the Universe is lazy. The universe, from the very strings that compose it, to the superduper massive structures that span billions of light years, is lazy. We're here because our ancestors were lazy and they didn't want to carry around the tents every fucking where they went to, and dig using their hands. Laziness, right.
Travel backward in time from the future. Take any arbitrary point ahead of us, say year 2103 March 16, 12.02.22 AM. Travel back to the present. Travel, travel. You see this whirlwind of things moving, shifting like a long-exposure photograph. But backwards. Smokes will whirl back into volcanoes and tsunamis will go back into the sees, and people will arise from the graves and go back to become cells, ultimately returning to what they came from (what my parents told me, very rightly, was 'air'. that's where I was before I was in my mom's tummy. Don't haggle over the timeframe.). Why is that not our existence? I don't know. Maybe swami maharaj does -- why don't you go ask him?
Our futures are uncertain. We travel through this cone, ever upwards because...entropy, bro, entropy. The electrons in our brains don't run backwards and the atoms in our genes don't run around like a seven year old boy in Basantapur chasing the pigeons while groups of Japanese and Chinese tourists take his photo as his parents sit on the temple steps, imagining his bright future but who are they to be certain he doesn't turn into a drug addict etcetc because, the Universe is lazy. The universe, from the very strings that compose it, to the superduper massive structures that span billions of light years, is lazy. We're here because our ancestors were lazy and they didn't want to carry around the tents every fucking where they went to, and dig using their hands. Laziness, right.
Travel backward in time from the future. Take any arbitrary point ahead of us, say year 2103 March 16, 12.02.22 AM. Travel back to the present. Travel, travel. You see this whirlwind of things moving, shifting like a long-exposure photograph. But backwards. Smokes will whirl back into volcanoes and tsunamis will go back into the sees, and people will arise from the graves and go back to become cells, ultimately returning to what they came from (what my parents told me, very rightly, was 'air'. that's where I was before I was in my mom's tummy. Don't haggle over the timeframe.). Why is that not our existence? I don't know. Maybe swami maharaj does -- why don't you go ask him?
Context
Context eaters
are no wife-beaters
have no six-seaters
or log heaters
For context eaters
like girls
and like most liberals
don't judge the curls
but appreciate the furls
As context eaters
are quite bright
never get a fright
nor lose the sight
of the prized fight
to let it blight
the might
of light.
"if i'm given a gift that i don't want, i will either throw it away or return it back'' sounds just as bad in context as it does out of context.
Updated
are no wife-beaters
have no six-seaters
or log heaters
For context eaters
like girls
and like most liberals
don't judge the curls
but appreciate the furls
As context eaters
are quite bright
never get a fright
nor lose the sight
of the prized fight
to let it blight
the might
of light.
"if i'm given a gift that i don't want, i will either throw it away or return it back'' sounds just as bad in context as it does out of context.
Updated
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Photoblog: Shouting fishi
As you are aware, fishes live in water. They don't live in soda, nor do they live in Gatorade. They also don't live in electrolytes, though I'm can't confirm at the moment if anyone's successfully raised fished in electrolytes. If they have, I'm sure they are pretty jacked because that's what happens to you when you take electrolytes. You get jacked.
Fishes are usually either vegetarian or omnivorous. The vegetarian fish like to pretend that they don't eat smaller fishes because they're moral, and they can't stand the slurry watery cries of other fish as they get chewed and swallowed. The other fish think the vegetarian fish are overdoing it, because please, finding a vegetarian stuff in the see is a hard thing compared to other animals-- those frikkin' plankton are everywhere, and you might as well filter them when you breathe water. But then the vegetarian fish will claim they don't like the taste of meat either...and which point the other fish get so mad they eat the vegetarian fish. That's actually how nature's course takes place -- it happens to every generation in every part of the sea.
Fishes are also known to be bony. That's because they're too thin. When they were younger their mothers had told them that to be a healthy fishie they would have to eat healthier, and and they didn't want to be all bones, but they never listened to their mothers because they actually thought they had a serious shot at getting a gig with Finding Nemo and other Hollywood productions so the kept thin, and were all bone when they were caught. That's the reason you have to take bones out of the fish you eat -- because they were insolent.
Fishes also have gills, where you have to attack with strong blows to give the fish painless death. The gills is where fish breathe from. In that sense, it's like our nose and lungs combined. Not coincidentally, Gills is also the name of the catfood brand that I once saw in Bhat-Bhateni. I thought it was quite an unappetizing name for something that was meant to be eaten, but what do I know about seafood.
Talking of cats, did anyone catch my previous post on cats and how evil they are? Like, seriously. They're not cool. Cat's are temples of diseases and craziness. I don't find that very surprising though, because you can't expect any better when you feed them something named 'Gills.' It's like murdering your husband by feeding him minute doses of arsenic every day for six years, and then getting super-suprised when he dies, and believing it was such a shock.
Photoblog: Hyderabad, India
It was hot, humid and sticky. I was dripping sweat from my feet, which I had imagined would be impossible until then. Extra care was needed, for I was with a lady of color (white, that is), and if India's unsafe for any group more than women, it's phoren women. Hyderabad was surprisingly moderate though, even though the place we stayed in stank. Banjara hills is a great place to be if you can afford it, and the restaurant we went to this one time -- Yellow Chilli-- was 'really' good.We stayed at the place that served the 'best sizzler in Hyderabad'. I learned something new -- Americans don't know the concept of a sizzler, and are surprised to see food with fire on it. Ooo.
Add: Sizzler is apparently an American chain that--well, serves sizzled food. Huh. It's a thing in South Asia.
Naked
I don't have a lot to add to the recent discussions on feminine nakedness, and how it's gross when the women are not hot, and how it's okay for attractive to be nekkid in public. Thanks to the recent episodes of Girls, it's all over the news, with The NewYorker absolutely fawning over Dunham. I've not watched season 2-- I'll probably catch up during my coming stunt at the ahm dungeon.
People are unhappy that Dunhan dared show her naked self -- the almost-flabby self, playing table-tennis nonchalantly. The problem is, I imagine, not that she was naked, but that she was naked in a non-sexual context. She was naked on tv because she could be naked on tv.
That's interesting because it's heard over and over again-- Dunham's nakedness on tv is different from everything else, because it's so..normal. Dunham doesn't have the most desired body for a model. Her kind of body is the body every woman has -- imperfect as it may be, it is what it is, to be shown for what it is. My friends tell me even though they are a lot thinner (and shapely?) than she is, they identified with her body because... they have flabs, and their skin is not rubber-tight, as prime as they are.
So how are we supposed to stare at a non-sexual naked body?
Above, you see an exposed body of tentysomething Nepali (presumably). What are your first few thoughts after looking at the photo? Stare and length, and explain in detail how you feel and why. Would a woman with a wholly unremarkable body in a wholly unsexual nude scene in a film be just as censored as a more attractive women in a similar scene? How does that concept of nakedness extend to your own nakedness? Where are the pants? Did you put them in the laundry and forget to pick them up, so now you have to go to office in sexy tight shorts?
People are unhappy that Dunhan dared show her naked self -- the almost-flabby self, playing table-tennis nonchalantly. The problem is, I imagine, not that she was naked, but that she was naked in a non-sexual context. She was naked on tv because she could be naked on tv.
That's interesting because it's heard over and over again-- Dunham's nakedness on tv is different from everything else, because it's so..normal. Dunham doesn't have the most desired body for a model. Her kind of body is the body every woman has -- imperfect as it may be, it is what it is, to be shown for what it is. My friends tell me even though they are a lot thinner (and shapely?) than she is, they identified with her body because... they have flabs, and their skin is not rubber-tight, as prime as they are.
 |
| Source: http://www.dendrophiliadiaries.com. Credit due to whoever owns it. |
Above, you see an exposed body of tentysomething Nepali (presumably). What are your first few thoughts after looking at the photo? Stare and length, and explain in detail how you feel and why. Would a woman with a wholly unremarkable body in a wholly unsexual nude scene in a film be just as censored as a more attractive women in a similar scene? How does that concept of nakedness extend to your own nakedness? Where are the pants? Did you put them in the laundry and forget to pick them up, so now you have to go to office in sexy tight shorts?
Guilty
I have tried to bribe into affection using Rohinton Mistry's 'Swimming Lessons and other tales from Firozsha Baag'. It probably(edit: definitely!) didn't work, but the stories remain. If you want to understand the India of the 70's, 80's, 90's, and Nepal of who-knows-when-maybe-even-today, read the book. Highly recommended.
The Bombay police, in a
misinterpretation of the nation’s mandate:
garibi hatao – eradicate poverty, conducted
periodic round-ups of pavement dwellers,
sweeping into their vans beggars and street-
vendors, cripples and alcoholics, the homeless
and the hungry, and dumped them somewhere
outside the city limits; when the human
detritus made its way back into the city,
another clean-up was scheduled
Namespaces
The buggy software stopped working.
The glitches were obvious. The namespaces overlapped, and values that were not supposed to map into one another started mapping into anything they wanted to.
There seemed to be a hidden rule within all the incoherence, but it was difficult to isolate. It seemed that whenever a variable was referred to by something that was closely related to it categorically, there would be no syntactic clashes, but the greater the distance between the actual variable and the ones the user used, the greater the possibility of a namespace clash.
What are we, but a bunch of names, corresponding to the values of our identity. Our unique namespace, within reasonable domain, is guaranteed only by the human ability to distinguish one individual from another. It's not our personalities that make us different-- it's everyone else's ability to distinguish them that matters.
So the clash doesn't really matter, because as long as we know who we're talking to, and they know who we're talking to, names are but unnecessary variables. Sure, languages increase the breadth of our thoughts, but our names for each other are unnecessary once we could get rid of the issue of namespace clash.
It leads to the obvious conclusion that what you refer to me as doesn't really matter as long as you're consistent with it. Even the consistency doesn't matter, as long as I know that you are calling for me and me, and no one else. Of course, one assumes under emotionally close circumstances, it's obvious, but it's not nearly as universal as one might think. At my grandparents' house, whenever my grandmother calls for 'babu', there's four 'hajur's.
That shouldn't stop us from making our names whatever we want to, because names are personal, and the more personality we put into it, the more they're ours, even though they may refer to others.
The glitches were obvious. The namespaces overlapped, and values that were not supposed to map into one another started mapping into anything they wanted to.
There seemed to be a hidden rule within all the incoherence, but it was difficult to isolate. It seemed that whenever a variable was referred to by something that was closely related to it categorically, there would be no syntactic clashes, but the greater the distance between the actual variable and the ones the user used, the greater the possibility of a namespace clash.
What are we, but a bunch of names, corresponding to the values of our identity. Our unique namespace, within reasonable domain, is guaranteed only by the human ability to distinguish one individual from another. It's not our personalities that make us different-- it's everyone else's ability to distinguish them that matters.
So the clash doesn't really matter, because as long as we know who we're talking to, and they know who we're talking to, names are but unnecessary variables. Sure, languages increase the breadth of our thoughts, but our names for each other are unnecessary once we could get rid of the issue of namespace clash.
It leads to the obvious conclusion that what you refer to me as doesn't really matter as long as you're consistent with it. Even the consistency doesn't matter, as long as I know that you are calling for me and me, and no one else. Of course, one assumes under emotionally close circumstances, it's obvious, but it's not nearly as universal as one might think. At my grandparents' house, whenever my grandmother calls for 'babu', there's four 'hajur's.
That shouldn't stop us from making our names whatever we want to, because names are personal, and the more personality we put into it, the more they're ours, even though they may refer to others.
The story
Observe.
Observe carefully as they speak, and move their hands, and shake their heads. Observe their lips and eyes. Carefully. The flicker-- you noticed the flicker? Look more carefully next time-- it's more obvious than they think it is. The cheeks give away too. The cheeks, usually fat and chubby, are crinkly today, wrinkly like the cheeks of a forty-two-year old new mother. What's happening, you ask? Just watch, events unravel themselves.
As you see, the hands clasp and unclasp and clasp back The fingers snake around themselves, popping sometimes, and cross each other. Notice they don't go into the pockets to check for cell phones or watches. Notice they don't go into the purses for handheld mirrors. The fingers are there, entwined with each other.
Did you feel that, the gust of wind, that blew hairs away? It was more than a cheesy cinematic effect, or a deux et machina to give the story away before there is one. The story doesn't exist. Yet. It's being written. Be patient, and you will read it. You don't know which story you're looking at, but you know it's a story happening because you can feel the energy. The surge of excitement that you feel...yes, that's the energy overflowing from a story happening. Your and our lives, they're all only lives, what we live is our lives. But this, happening here right now, that's a story. Their lives are stories. The feeling of strangeness and suspense that you feel deep in your heart right now is the affect of the strength of the stories.
Be patient. The twirl of the non-existent mustache could mean a lot more than you see. And the asymmetrical smiles on both sets of lips-- what's that? Is it genuine humor, or forced humor, or does it even have to do anything with humor at all? The sculpted forehead looks sweaty now, as you can see, even plasticky. I feel it's going to melt anytime soon-- do you feel that? Feel the tension-- the heat of the story is building up. It's not the talk-- conversations are irrelevant... it's the story that's raising the heat. You don't hear anything, but you see the lips and the eyes and the foreheads, and that is enough. Enough for the story to be told. You miss the details, but that's okay. Pay attention here.
Why, what strange turn did our story just take. An extended invitation, accepted, it seems. Or perhaps a self-invitation, unappreciated. Quick, both their eyes now, caught that moment, did you? The wide-eyed look, yes? That's important. That was our story. Everything else is irrelevant.
Two more invitations extended. And accepted. They are moving to a new location. You know where it is... you caught it on their lips. But the emotions aren't their anymore. The power is decreasing...it's going down. Soon, it'll be barely distinguishable from life. It won't seem like a story anymore.
But don't be fooled. Every story has an ebb, a flow. The story is ebbing down, taking a rest, showing you just the parts that matter. You won't see the life parts of the story because there's not enough energy in the story to sustain our interest. Now they are gone, all of them to the Afghan restaurant. They will enjoy, and it will become a tale, but that won't be a story in itself. The story has begun, and to follow it, we must separate it from every other story there is.
Partly inspired by my self-invitation into Abu..'s and X...'s date, which turned a date into a party of six.
Observe carefully as they speak, and move their hands, and shake their heads. Observe their lips and eyes. Carefully. The flicker-- you noticed the flicker? Look more carefully next time-- it's more obvious than they think it is. The cheeks give away too. The cheeks, usually fat and chubby, are crinkly today, wrinkly like the cheeks of a forty-two-year old new mother. What's happening, you ask? Just watch, events unravel themselves.
As you see, the hands clasp and unclasp and clasp back The fingers snake around themselves, popping sometimes, and cross each other. Notice they don't go into the pockets to check for cell phones or watches. Notice they don't go into the purses for handheld mirrors. The fingers are there, entwined with each other.
Did you feel that, the gust of wind, that blew hairs away? It was more than a cheesy cinematic effect, or a deux et machina to give the story away before there is one. The story doesn't exist. Yet. It's being written. Be patient, and you will read it. You don't know which story you're looking at, but you know it's a story happening because you can feel the energy. The surge of excitement that you feel...yes, that's the energy overflowing from a story happening. Your and our lives, they're all only lives, what we live is our lives. But this, happening here right now, that's a story. Their lives are stories. The feeling of strangeness and suspense that you feel deep in your heart right now is the affect of the strength of the stories.
Be patient. The twirl of the non-existent mustache could mean a lot more than you see. And the asymmetrical smiles on both sets of lips-- what's that? Is it genuine humor, or forced humor, or does it even have to do anything with humor at all? The sculpted forehead looks sweaty now, as you can see, even plasticky. I feel it's going to melt anytime soon-- do you feel that? Feel the tension-- the heat of the story is building up. It's not the talk-- conversations are irrelevant... it's the story that's raising the heat. You don't hear anything, but you see the lips and the eyes and the foreheads, and that is enough. Enough for the story to be told. You miss the details, but that's okay. Pay attention here.
Why, what strange turn did our story just take. An extended invitation, accepted, it seems. Or perhaps a self-invitation, unappreciated. Quick, both their eyes now, caught that moment, did you? The wide-eyed look, yes? That's important. That was our story. Everything else is irrelevant.
Two more invitations extended. And accepted. They are moving to a new location. You know where it is... you caught it on their lips. But the emotions aren't their anymore. The power is decreasing...it's going down. Soon, it'll be barely distinguishable from life. It won't seem like a story anymore.
But don't be fooled. Every story has an ebb, a flow. The story is ebbing down, taking a rest, showing you just the parts that matter. You won't see the life parts of the story because there's not enough energy in the story to sustain our interest. Now they are gone, all of them to the Afghan restaurant. They will enjoy, and it will become a tale, but that won't be a story in itself. The story has begun, and to follow it, we must separate it from every other story there is.
Partly inspired by my self-invitation into Abu..'s and X...'s date, which turned a date into a party of six.
Brahe
I need to pee, but having used three of my fuck-imgonnafailcollege-prime-homework-hours on valentine's day talk, it seems unfair to. Wasn't it Tycho Brahe the astronomer who was too polite to pee at the party, and died because of the bladder hemorrhage? Good man Brahe.
Relationship Runil takes your valentine's day questions
So Republica think they can match the level of the former Agony Aunt, yours truly. False. The agony aunty is me, and I am the agony aunty. So, here are the questions they got, and MY answers.
I have been talking to this guy over SMS for some time. He’s a friend’s friend. Do you think I need to take permission from my friend to meet him or ask him out?
- Sheetal
- Trisa
- Confused
I have been talking to this guy over SMS for some time. He’s a friend’s friend. Do you think I need to take permission from my friend to meet him or ask him out?
- Sheetal
Hey Sheetal! I hope you're doing well. I am doing well also. Long time, huh? You know me right? We met uh, in 2008, and you may or may not have had a crush on me, but your friend kept giggling all the time, and that confused me quite a bit. Or you may have had the crush on my friend because you kept stealing glances at him in the darkness of the Jeep as we got down to the Kathmandu Ditch, but I won't believe that you'd have forgone a, lets admit it, more attractive younger man. Oh man, I miss those days, amirite. We should hang out together, yo.
So anyway, I hear you've been talking to this guy over SMS for some time, and that he's a friend's friend. I'm assuming you're not sure if you need to talk to your friend about it, amirite, Sheetal? Yeah? See, I know things about you, because I think that, you know, you tots had a crush on me. Don't lie, ok.
Anyway, back to your original question, nope. Nope nope. No you don't. You don't even need to let him know that you asked him out, and that you guys are together, happily married to a lesser mortal than other greater mortals you might have had the chance of asking out but never did because you know what, Sheetal, I think you may have had a crush on my friend because as I hear it, you kept texting him a lot, and added him on facebook, and chatted him up and stuff, and add to all that, he was a good friend of a friend of yours. So how about that huh? You're such a playa' huh, Sheetal, you keep texting everyone, and getting their hopes high, because they think you have a crush on them, and they're like omg, the v-day is coming soon, so Sheetal's tots gonna ask me right now, whatshouldIdoWhatShouldIDo but you never really ask them out.
My point is, I think, maybe, that you should be brave about it, and ask him out. Screw your friend-- unless he has a crush on your crush himself.I’m 24 and I’ve been going out with this 22-year-old guy. But he hasn’t asked me to be his girlfriend. Should I wait? Also, my friends think he is ugly and dirty looking.
- Trisa
Hello Trisa! Not to sound creepy, but whatAcoincidence, I'm 22 too, and I have an older girlfriend like your boyfriend(?) too! OMG, right? If things don't work out between you two, we should hang out... LOL. It tots sounds like I'm hittin' on you right, but I have other plans, so get a life Trisa, and pay attention to your boyfriend(?). Kidding!
For the first part, do you feel he needs to 'make you his girlfriend' by maybe doing the 'rounds of girlfriend' around the fire, and making a vow to never check other girls' bosoms because he has a girlfriend and he should totally stop creeping other random women out, specially those who may or may not have directly asked relationship advice from him. If so, you should let him know that you're waiting for it. He might have assumed you like the pace your relationship is going, and be okay with it, but if you want him to know that you don't want him to claim in front of other people that he's single even when you're right there, you should really-really let him know. Waiting is okay, if you're in no hurry for him to admit that you're together, but you might wait forever, so beware.
Are you looking for a clean and handsome guy Trisa? Because, let me tell you, there's only one in Nepal, and currently he's in the US, with a person he wants to be with, and no, he is not shy of admitting that, unlike your boyfriend(?). Does it matter to you if he's ugly and dirty looking? Are you looking for an attractive fashion accessory that you can show around, or someone to be with, that's your decision. If you are looking for a 'boyfriend' and not a 'boytoyfriend', then his ugliness and dirty looks (what the hell does that even mean?) shouldn't matter a lot. Otherwise, you wait. Ta-Ta. Happy Valentine's day Trisa!There is this boy who I liked and he liked me too but I dumped him a few months back and I felt terrible. Now I am back with him but every time I go out with him, I am confused and upset again. What’s happening to me really? HELP!
- Confused
Hiya!
Soo... I don't know who you are but I'm gonna go on a stretch here and assume you're a dude. So, you say you had a boy who you liked and it was reciprocated, but you felt terrible. But now you guys are together. It seems that you both have realized that you really wanted to be with each other, and it was difficult to stay separated, and you decided to get back. Now that you guys are back, you should stop worrying -- I'm assuming you're feeling insecure about the relationship, and you wonder if something similar might happen again. Cherish those moments you are together, and try not to worry too much about the future. Enjoy what you've got, Confused.
However, if you DO break up, I understand your concerns. The gay dating/hookup scene in Nepal is not too cool, they say, and it's understandable. Your parents would be a lot more Confused than you are now, Confused, if you came out out to them, so it's only fair that you want a stable gay relationship, because you fear the future, and the uncertainty with your sexuality and the cultural perceptions.
I hear there's some dudes that hang out in Thamel looking out for other dude. Go to Himalayan Java, I've met guys openly talking about their relationships their, and how much their ex-es sucked, and LOL, only their elder sister who's already married know that they're gay, but it's okay, the boyfriend is nice, and they spend a lot of times with kuires, and being in the business where you see lots of kuires helps too, so they're alright about it. Besides, you don't always have to be very at-your-face about things like these, amICorrect, Confused? Go to Himalayan Java with your boyfriend, Confused, or your friends, look around, and soak up the environment. If you can, maybe go to a club/bar, chill out, and talk to the guys and the girls. Dance if you can, if not, rip your hips, bro, rip your hips. They rhyme.
When languages die
The death of a language is more than the death of a language -- it is the death of a way of life of peoples, the death of cultural lineage going back to thousands of years, the death of one more way of looking at the world. Languages are not merely tools we use to communicate with, they are the physical imprint of our collective culture, vocalized and/or written.
The death of any language is to be mourned, to be cried over, for not only have we lost a way of looking at the world, but we have also lost a way of understanding the world -- something that might be impossible through existing languages. There are languages not in the Indo-European family that classify things not by their structure, but by their shape: a round table is just as much a table to us as a regular rectangular table is. For speakers of those languages, it is preposterous, illogical to say that these things are the same.
Our languages reflect how we categorize things. When we lose our language, we lose our way of categorizing things-- we forget that there are alternate ways of looking at the same old structure. The Indo-Eurpean linguistic family -- that comprises from Nepali to Hindi to English to Spanish to Latin to Italian and Greek, for all its diversities, has a rather similar way of looking things. Newari is a hybrid -- it's dying. Languages of the North -- the different dialects of Gurung and Tamang languages are different...they're Tibeto-Burmese families, and they're dying much faster. Someone I know would rather be a Brooklyn hipster than live with the 'baggage' of language, culture and the way of life. They're not my languages, and their culture is not mine. In the farce of the American democracy, we're losing the true democracy of thinking differently in our languages. I weep for languages that are not mine, and cultures that are not mine, that will certainly be on their deathbeds within my generation. These are sad days.
The death of any language is to be mourned, to be cried over, for not only have we lost a way of looking at the world, but we have also lost a way of understanding the world -- something that might be impossible through existing languages. There are languages not in the Indo-European family that classify things not by their structure, but by their shape: a round table is just as much a table to us as a regular rectangular table is. For speakers of those languages, it is preposterous, illogical to say that these things are the same.
Our languages reflect how we categorize things. When we lose our language, we lose our way of categorizing things-- we forget that there are alternate ways of looking at the same old structure. The Indo-Eurpean linguistic family -- that comprises from Nepali to Hindi to English to Spanish to Latin to Italian and Greek, for all its diversities, has a rather similar way of looking things. Newari is a hybrid -- it's dying. Languages of the North -- the different dialects of Gurung and Tamang languages are different...they're Tibeto-Burmese families, and they're dying much faster. Someone I know would rather be a Brooklyn hipster than live with the 'baggage' of language, culture and the way of life. They're not my languages, and their culture is not mine. In the farce of the American democracy, we're losing the true democracy of thinking differently in our languages. I weep for languages that are not mine, and cultures that are not mine, that will certainly be on their deathbeds within my generation. These are sad days.
Cats
Cats are dangerous creatures yet the creative minds (or idiots people who like to showcase themselves on the internet) seem to have lots of those. I say cats are dangerous because...science, but it is in the very nature of 'the creative person' to show it to the big man and live life like she pleases. Whatever public health hazards it may create. Perhaps then, cats have played a significant role in our recent literary traditions, for what is a writer if not for her eccentricities and those habits ( seriously people, you don't need to wash your hands for ten minutes after you pee) that set them apart from the common man.
In that, perhaps cats have become a status symbol, not necessarily of cuteness, as one might quickly presume, but rather of the finesse of one's tastes, one's interests in the subtle arts that are (one assumes... or hopes) beyond the reach of science, and the cultivation of practices to lead a more ...bohemic, shall we say, lifestyle.
Dogs have been our friends for tens of thousands of years. They have proven their loyalty, safety, and their usefulness. However, a dog is too much of a cliche for the creative mind, an overused trope that no longer demands merits. Dogs are not known to cause subtle disease of the psyche, so perhaps they have never played a role in the creative development of the human society. Cats have been, if you discount Cleopatra and the buds, around for less than the twentieth of the time dogs have been us. But cats are fat. Cats are hip. Cats are social network, cats are synergy, cats are leverage, cats are anti-establishment, cats are sassy, cats are a sex symbol, cats are slutty and rightfully so you ignorant judgmental moron for you have no right to comment on other people's lifestyles, cat are power symbols, cats are...puffs of allergenic hair.
In that, perhaps cats have become a status symbol, not necessarily of cuteness, as one might quickly presume, but rather of the finesse of one's tastes, one's interests in the subtle arts that are (one assumes... or hopes) beyond the reach of science, and the cultivation of practices to lead a more ...bohemic, shall we say, lifestyle.
Dogs have been our friends for tens of thousands of years. They have proven their loyalty, safety, and their usefulness. However, a dog is too much of a cliche for the creative mind, an overused trope that no longer demands merits. Dogs are not known to cause subtle disease of the psyche, so perhaps they have never played a role in the creative development of the human society. Cats have been, if you discount Cleopatra and the buds, around for less than the twentieth of the time dogs have been us. But cats are fat. Cats are hip. Cats are social network, cats are synergy, cats are leverage, cats are anti-establishment, cats are sassy, cats are a sex symbol, cats are slutty and rightfully so you ignorant judgmental moron for you have no right to comment on other people's lifestyles, cat are power symbols, cats are...puffs of allergenic hair.
Burn, man, burn
I'd like to go the Burning Man festival some day. While I'm in college. I tell my friends, who are Americans, that, and they snigger knowing. "Do you really," Ne asks, apparently you need to have RV's and tents and that kind-of skills. I read up on the Burning Man, and my friends -- American or not-- don't seem to be the type. Maybe Su is, but then he doesn't need Burning Man anyway.
I was reading this (long-ish) piece in GQ about the burning man. The writer Wells Tower breaks whatever walls non-fiction narrative may have -- he talks about his taking notes and taking notebooks to places and his friends talking about the article project. Which made me thing if you could really have a 'genuine' experience if it was intended to be a writing project. Wouldn't the fact that you're writing about it influence your otherwise behavior, and make it somehow not genuine? I guess the answer comes in two phases: real life will always things create situations beyond your control, writing or not, so experiences cannot really be scripted. Besides, even if you DO influence your experience, I guess your experience as a writer trying to 'experience' things for your article is genuine, and if you are not hypocritical about that, the writing will feel genuine.
I was reading this (long-ish) piece in GQ about the burning man. The writer Wells Tower breaks whatever walls non-fiction narrative may have -- he talks about his taking notes and taking notebooks to places and his friends talking about the article project. Which made me thing if you could really have a 'genuine' experience if it was intended to be a writing project. Wouldn't the fact that you're writing about it influence your otherwise behavior, and make it somehow not genuine? I guess the answer comes in two phases: real life will always things create situations beyond your control, writing or not, so experiences cannot really be scripted. Besides, even if you DO influence your experience, I guess your experience as a writer trying to 'experience' things for your article is genuine, and if you are not hypocritical about that, the writing will feel genuine.
Resolution
Matt Cutts started the 30-day challenge. He succeeded. If he did, there's no reason I should not.-Me, Jan 2012
I'm beginning to feel stronger. Powerful, I think, is the word. Disciplined maybe.
A year ago, I made four resolutions. I didn't keep them very well: I kept forgetting they existed. Now that I have a better phone, and a better eye for better photos, and greater self-discipline, let's(?) give it a second shot. Here we go. Most of the resolutions are copied and pasted from a post from Jan. 2012.
Resolution 1
I'll take at least one photo every day, and post it here. I'll do that for a month.
Resolution 2
I'll post daily to this blog for a month.
Resolution 3
I ll use twitter, google reader, etc only one my phone, and avoid them if I can. I'll read books, catch up on all the work and writing I need to do, and work on my projects instead.
Promise,
Me
...getting out of hand
...and you know things are getting out of hand and you have become Americanized when you start missing your middle-of-the-summer India trip. I'm not American enough yet though. I can hold it.
Diary entry number blegh I don't even remember the count anymore
Dear mr. Diary,
We have a blizzard day off tomorrow. Which is great because all my classes and meetings are now cancelled. It sucks because the very important interview that I'm dreading will now be over the phone.
Things have gotten to a good start for the semester. I have become a more organized and proactive person that I have ever been. I have been getting up two hours before most of the college does, and my time has been productive. I'm almost keeping with all my readings, and am only slightly behind my readings. Good things are on for the future.
Today, I scraped some wood data for Cyrus's new super-detailed game. It was two lines of code, but it felt like something. Cyrus told me about his super-fast sorting algorithm which would sort a list in O(n), though there was no algorithm. He'd made the data structure to insert members in a sorted manner.
I have many things to do, and too little time. My arduino hasn't gotten attention from me since I got it; my camera hasn't been picked for a very long time. I am reminded that Bill Gates and the Facebook guy had the same 24 hours as I do, though I doubt they worried about the BigSoftware interview as much as I am worried.
I met Cas after a long time on the street, and I feel like we might be going out to a vegan restaurant soon enough. I ate out three times last week (all cheap eats though) so I'm not sure if I want to eat out this week, but I've not talked to Sam and Abu and Muk for a very long time so I might as well.
Everything else is fine. I hope to talk to you soon.
Much remembrance
S
We have a blizzard day off tomorrow. Which is great because all my classes and meetings are now cancelled. It sucks because the very important interview that I'm dreading will now be over the phone.
Things have gotten to a good start for the semester. I have become a more organized and proactive person that I have ever been. I have been getting up two hours before most of the college does, and my time has been productive. I'm almost keeping with all my readings, and am only slightly behind my readings. Good things are on for the future.
Today, I scraped some wood data for Cyrus's new super-detailed game. It was two lines of code, but it felt like something. Cyrus told me about his super-fast sorting algorithm which would sort a list in O(n), though there was no algorithm. He'd made the data structure to insert members in a sorted manner.
I have many things to do, and too little time. My arduino hasn't gotten attention from me since I got it; my camera hasn't been picked for a very long time. I am reminded that Bill Gates and the Facebook guy had the same 24 hours as I do, though I doubt they worried about the BigSoftware interview as much as I am worried.
I met Cas after a long time on the street, and I feel like we might be going out to a vegan restaurant soon enough. I ate out three times last week (all cheap eats though) so I'm not sure if I want to eat out this week, but I've not talked to Sam and Abu and Muk for a very long time so I might as well.
Everything else is fine. I hope to talk to you soon.
Much remembrance
S
Defending fiction
Bhai, k bho ajkal timlai. Khub katha satha fiction lekhne garya chhau ni. Paila paila ko essay sessay harip hunthyo yaar testai lekha.
I think.
Dai, aba ta depression matra huncha non-fiction lekhna thalyo bhane. So many things to complain about, so many things that are not right, you know, and I want to talk, no shout, about them all the time if I write non fiction. At least with fiction I can move around and breathe more freely.
I think you write better non-fiction though.
I was told that in class 7. My stories are terrible, most never make it to the end, and those that do are horribly paced, with no suspense, and there's no good beginning and an end, and very little in between. My commas stop the flow of my stories like the maobadis stop a private car during a nepal banda. My stories flow like a microbus during office-time in Kathmandu.
My non-fiction doesn't flow like koshi either, of course. But there I can break more rules without admitting that I'm doing it. I can put as many commas as I like, or put none, and claim that's what the piece needs, that's my isstaile, and no one can complain about that. I'm not doing this for a class.
I've forgotten what it's like to be funny. My funnies don't seem to translate to Ameringlish. They're forced, and not very clever. I don't have anything to talk about. When I do have something to talk about, it's so cynical, I find it too disturbing for public consumption. Think Swift's modest proposal, but much angrier, and meaner. And poor writing and limited vocabulary and misuse of punctuation and the overuse of the word and, of course. And overusing of course too. And too too. You get the idea. I also talk too much to the second person. And can rarely talk in anything but the first person. Gets boring after a while.
Jo has had the misfortune of reading every one of these. A very disturbed mind it must have unraveled. I know people who have attempted in their fits of boredom to read every one of the posts here. And then got bored after the first three posts. There's limit to how kind you can be to people.
The stories come to me. I swear. I have to think non-fiction, force it upon myself, and craft the jokes, giggling to myself. The stories come out of nowhere. Like this one time during the Winter Break when I had a brilliant idea for a movie. A person whose family is destroyed by the villain does some long-term planning, and after a decade kills the villain in the prison by poisoning his food. And every other prisoner's. The 'hero' is a crazy person himself. You don't show that, obviously. He's the nicest person(not tooo nice though or the smartasses will guess right away) and good with people, with revenge boiling his blood every day. So on. I didn't think it though. It just came to me.
I think I asked (i forget who it was) how he did his assignments. He joked that they 'just came' to him. I wish cooler things than stories that are not going to be liked, and movie ideas that are not going to be put on paper came to me too. Senti life.
I think.
Dai, aba ta depression matra huncha non-fiction lekhna thalyo bhane. So many things to complain about, so many things that are not right, you know, and I want to talk, no shout, about them all the time if I write non fiction. At least with fiction I can move around and breathe more freely.
I think you write better non-fiction though.
I was told that in class 7. My stories are terrible, most never make it to the end, and those that do are horribly paced, with no suspense, and there's no good beginning and an end, and very little in between. My commas stop the flow of my stories like the maobadis stop a private car during a nepal banda. My stories flow like a microbus during office-time in Kathmandu.
My non-fiction doesn't flow like koshi either, of course. But there I can break more rules without admitting that I'm doing it. I can put as many commas as I like, or put none, and claim that's what the piece needs, that's my isstaile, and no one can complain about that. I'm not doing this for a class.
I've forgotten what it's like to be funny. My funnies don't seem to translate to Ameringlish. They're forced, and not very clever. I don't have anything to talk about. When I do have something to talk about, it's so cynical, I find it too disturbing for public consumption. Think Swift's modest proposal, but much angrier, and meaner. And poor writing and limited vocabulary and misuse of punctuation and the overuse of the word and, of course. And overusing of course too. And too too. You get the idea. I also talk too much to the second person. And can rarely talk in anything but the first person. Gets boring after a while.
Jo has had the misfortune of reading every one of these. A very disturbed mind it must have unraveled. I know people who have attempted in their fits of boredom to read every one of the posts here. And then got bored after the first three posts. There's limit to how kind you can be to people.
The stories come to me. I swear. I have to think non-fiction, force it upon myself, and craft the jokes, giggling to myself. The stories come out of nowhere. Like this one time during the Winter Break when I had a brilliant idea for a movie. A person whose family is destroyed by the villain does some long-term planning, and after a decade kills the villain in the prison by poisoning his food. And every other prisoner's. The 'hero' is a crazy person himself. You don't show that, obviously. He's the nicest person(not tooo nice though or the smartasses will guess right away) and good with people, with revenge boiling his blood every day. So on. I didn't think it though. It just came to me.
I think I asked (i forget who it was) how he did his assignments. He joked that they 'just came' to him. I wish cooler things than stories that are not going to be liked, and movie ideas that are not going to be put on paper came to me too. Senti life.
Pointless gaff
The nepali male, it seems, does not believe in the sexuality of a woman. That implies two things: he believes that a sexually active woman is not really a woman, but a whore, to be used by anyone at anytime without permission. And he believes that a woman who talks about the rights of the women, and women abuse, and harassment, doesn't believe in the concept of sex. For him, a woman who has the power to choose her sex partners who also talks about women empowerment is a hypocrite, full of contradiction. He doesn't realize that sexual freedom for women is a thing...Consensual enjoyable sex is intended to be for men, and for women......I'm not sure.
Also, NGO's. They come somewhere in the story, fucking everything and everyone up. The idea of women's right and empowerment was so inelegantly pressed upon us that many idiots believe its a donor issue, not an issue of our hearts and common sense and the respect for the fellow man. In their shithole, the NGO's have taken all the important issues with them. We need to de-NGO'fy the important issues, or we are in the danger of seeing them go down the same hole the trust in NGO's has gone.
Also, NGO's. They come somewhere in the story, fucking everything and everyone up. The idea of women's right and empowerment was so inelegantly pressed upon us that many idiots believe its a donor issue, not an issue of our hearts and common sense and the respect for the fellow man. In their shithole, the NGO's have taken all the important issues with them. We need to de-NGO'fy the important issues, or we are in the danger of seeing them go down the same hole the trust in NGO's has gone.
Brother Makhoosh
Brother Makhoosh's name literally translated into 'uncertain', but brother Makhoosh was very certain about a lot of things. A man and a woman must make love to make a baby. A man fucking a man must be punishable by death. So some saw it as ironic that brother Makhoosh had young boys as concubines, often changing in less than a month.
When questioned about his young boys, brother Makhoosh would 'pshaww' and laugh it away. His war against homosexual infidels and his love of young boys was not contradictory for him. In fact, he saw his practices as a confirmation of the Holy Book. He saw it as a man satisfying a man, without having sex. The boys would satisfy, as he liked to joke in private, his holy staff, and he would sometimes poke around theirs. A man satisfying a man was not wrong -- it was the act of fucking that was wrong. When men satisfy men, they become independent of women, and are not dependent on them for satisfaction. Why give women the unnecessary leverage of pleasure when all they were needed for was making babies, brother Makhoosh argued. A man who lusted after women was a man not to be trusted, brother Makhoosh thought, he could compromise the ideals of the glorious nation and religion in his heat. Men could be trusted, and men satisfying men was not lusting. It was more like a business, or a get-together. Brother Makhoosh prided himself on comparing men satisfying each other with men going out to a coffee shop and getting hookah together. A hookah. Brother Makhoosh would never let it out, but he was really proud of the joke.
It was a good deal for the boys. Brother Makhoosh treated his former concubines rather well. Many of them would go on and rise the ranks in the army, and politics; many would become businesspersons, a few artisans; and a very few really naughty ones would turn out to be whores. Brother Makhoosh never quite understood the logic of paying an older man to satisfy you when you could get young, lovely flowers with cheeks like apples for free, but he never brought the issue in the deliberations. Men had certain needs, and they needed to be satisfied. The boys would never go into academia of religion though, and they would never make it to the Council, but it was acceptable. He had brought them out of nowhere and poverty to the city, and had arranged acceptable living conditions for them. Without him, they would be dead as lowly conscripts, or be raped by their landlord; he had given them a future, a good life, and rarely but surely, pleasure. They were often thankful, and he was glad about that. Brother Makhoosh prided himself in making the world a littler happier.
Brother Makhoosh never imagined that his growing concubinage of nine-to-twelve year old boys from outside provinces would change the very structure of capital years later. The center had lavished upon itself since the great war of the people, always at the cost of provinces. Some provinces were higher in the food chain than others: brother Makhoosh's province, which was particularly rich in minerals did quite well. The capital, however, was much further ahead than even the closest province. Brother Makhoosh's rule on getting his boys was simple: no one from the capital, and no one from his province. Brother Makhoosh's rise in popularity was quite a coincidence-- he would go out to the provinces several times a year looking for young boys with milky skin and rosy cheeks and eyes like coal and lips like red chillies. The subjects, optimist and stupid as they always are, assumed that the honorable member of the grand Council was there to see them. Every province he went to, every village he graced with his presence, he was welcomed wholeheartedly with goats and dances. Where native sons of province in the Council didn't go, brother Makhoosh went often. The people loved him. Brother Makhoosh's interests laid elsewhere.
Scouts would be sent, bargains would be made, promises would be given, and attractive young men meeting brother Makhoosh's requirements would set to the capital with brother Makhoosh, vaguely aware of their future. Young boys like to gossip, more than young women do for they are not burdened with the baggage of being seen as gossip-mongers, and the boys in the provinces and villages brother Makhoosh went to did. A brother of a friend's cousin's first uncle's son who was in the army now, had said that brother Makhoosh's man-part was green and thin like a garden-snake. No, no, someone else would claim, he had it in good authority that it was red and blue, and nothing like a garden snake at all. The third one would chime in that his uncle's son had told him he had a friend who knew it was shaped like a plum, and shriveled and brown like an apricot. They would then go research on each other to confirm who was the likeliest to be correct.
These boys, who went to the capital with brother Makhoosh and spent most of their lives there, would number 612 by the end, though brother Makhoosh would long have lost count by then. They would be the true representatives of their provinces in the capital -- the representatives in the Council didn't want to be seen as provincial, and the businessmen who made trips to the capital had their own interests there. The women from the provinces in the whorehouses of the capital and brother Makhoosh's grown young men would form fraternal relations, those only beacons of hope for the lands no one thought or cared for.
When questioned about his young boys, brother Makhoosh would 'pshaww' and laugh it away. His war against homosexual infidels and his love of young boys was not contradictory for him. In fact, he saw his practices as a confirmation of the Holy Book. He saw it as a man satisfying a man, without having sex. The boys would satisfy, as he liked to joke in private, his holy staff, and he would sometimes poke around theirs. A man satisfying a man was not wrong -- it was the act of fucking that was wrong. When men satisfy men, they become independent of women, and are not dependent on them for satisfaction. Why give women the unnecessary leverage of pleasure when all they were needed for was making babies, brother Makhoosh argued. A man who lusted after women was a man not to be trusted, brother Makhoosh thought, he could compromise the ideals of the glorious nation and religion in his heat. Men could be trusted, and men satisfying men was not lusting. It was more like a business, or a get-together. Brother Makhoosh prided himself on comparing men satisfying each other with men going out to a coffee shop and getting hookah together. A hookah. Brother Makhoosh would never let it out, but he was really proud of the joke.
It was a good deal for the boys. Brother Makhoosh treated his former concubines rather well. Many of them would go on and rise the ranks in the army, and politics; many would become businesspersons, a few artisans; and a very few really naughty ones would turn out to be whores. Brother Makhoosh never quite understood the logic of paying an older man to satisfy you when you could get young, lovely flowers with cheeks like apples for free, but he never brought the issue in the deliberations. Men had certain needs, and they needed to be satisfied. The boys would never go into academia of religion though, and they would never make it to the Council, but it was acceptable. He had brought them out of nowhere and poverty to the city, and had arranged acceptable living conditions for them. Without him, they would be dead as lowly conscripts, or be raped by their landlord; he had given them a future, a good life, and rarely but surely, pleasure. They were often thankful, and he was glad about that. Brother Makhoosh prided himself in making the world a littler happier.
Brother Makhoosh never imagined that his growing concubinage of nine-to-twelve year old boys from outside provinces would change the very structure of capital years later. The center had lavished upon itself since the great war of the people, always at the cost of provinces. Some provinces were higher in the food chain than others: brother Makhoosh's province, which was particularly rich in minerals did quite well. The capital, however, was much further ahead than even the closest province. Brother Makhoosh's rule on getting his boys was simple: no one from the capital, and no one from his province. Brother Makhoosh's rise in popularity was quite a coincidence-- he would go out to the provinces several times a year looking for young boys with milky skin and rosy cheeks and eyes like coal and lips like red chillies. The subjects, optimist and stupid as they always are, assumed that the honorable member of the grand Council was there to see them. Every province he went to, every village he graced with his presence, he was welcomed wholeheartedly with goats and dances. Where native sons of province in the Council didn't go, brother Makhoosh went often. The people loved him. Brother Makhoosh's interests laid elsewhere.
Scouts would be sent, bargains would be made, promises would be given, and attractive young men meeting brother Makhoosh's requirements would set to the capital with brother Makhoosh, vaguely aware of their future. Young boys like to gossip, more than young women do for they are not burdened with the baggage of being seen as gossip-mongers, and the boys in the provinces and villages brother Makhoosh went to did. A brother of a friend's cousin's first uncle's son who was in the army now, had said that brother Makhoosh's man-part was green and thin like a garden-snake. No, no, someone else would claim, he had it in good authority that it was red and blue, and nothing like a garden snake at all. The third one would chime in that his uncle's son had told him he had a friend who knew it was shaped like a plum, and shriveled and brown like an apricot. They would then go research on each other to confirm who was the likeliest to be correct.
These boys, who went to the capital with brother Makhoosh and spent most of their lives there, would number 612 by the end, though brother Makhoosh would long have lost count by then. They would be the true representatives of their provinces in the capital -- the representatives in the Council didn't want to be seen as provincial, and the businessmen who made trips to the capital had their own interests there. The women from the provinces in the whorehouses of the capital and brother Makhoosh's grown young men would form fraternal relations, those only beacons of hope for the lands no one thought or cared for.
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