this and that

I wrote a long something a couple of days ago, but the internet wouldn't post or save it for me. Lame.

It's getting very hot here. I am glad that I am going on trek soon because I'm just not good at this dry heat thing. Yesterday, I walked with Ama-la, the kids, and Tsering Dolma to a gompa outside of the city. Tais and Daniel came by taxi and met us there and we walked to Kopan. I'm glad I finally got to go. It is a really lovely place. afterward we all walked back home. In all I think we were walking for a good 4 hours. It was nice though because it gave me a chance to talk to everyone Diki and I spent about an hour of the walk discussing the art of making animal noises. She has a strange affinity to goats and can mimic their noises so well that some of them actually called back to her.

Today, I was just in a crummy mood. I should have just stayed in bed. We had a walk with Anil, but I just wasn't in the right mindset to enjoy it. The day got much better after I got home and had some alone time. I walked around the stupa for a while and right around sunset a flood of monk, followed by nuns, followed by school children, followed by what seemed like the rest of the Tibetan community all came in through the main gate chanting and carrying candles and protest signs. I called Tais to tell her what was going on and she told me to meet her at one of the roof top restaurants so that we could have a good view of what was going on. It took me about 20 minutes before I could actually wade through all the people and find Tais. It was a really beautiful sight. It was good to see such passion. From now to the Olympics is the time for people to make themselves heard before the world looses interest again.

That said, my moms brought this to my attention:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
~Barack Obama

As someone raised as poor white trash in small town Pa, I'd really like to know how being poor equates to being a gun toting, bible thumping, bigot. It reminds me of hearing people from not so economically depressed regions always say "illegal immigrants take the jobs that Americans won't do." It always makes me laugh at how detached people from higher social standing can be that they actually think that everyone else is so well off that there could possibly be jobs that the unemployed are above. I'm certainly not saying that I have a problem with immigration. The more the merrier. We were all immigrants at one time (except the native Americans, but we don't like to talk about them in polite conversation). Maybe the reason that there is such a small population of recent immigrants in most of pa is that us damn rednecks keep taking all their jobs.

Back to Barack, what the fuck is he thinking saying that just before the pa primaries? Did he not get the memo about how many electoral votes me have? Is he trying to throw the election to the ice queen? Granted, I didn't like either of the dem candidates prior to the above comments, but really, it is times like these that I'm proud to be green.

I think that blaming people's small mindedness on being poor is just giving them an excuse to stay that way. I mean, I didn't let a little thing like money stop me from traveling to the other side of the world. I mean, sure I'll probably be in debt an extra five years or so because of it, but that's life, and as far as I know I have plenty more of it to enjoy. So in June I will go back to working for 90% of my waking hours, but everyone does what they have to to survive so how can anyone complain?

This should have ended a few paragraphs ago and I've just been dragging it out because I'm not tired. But lights go out soon, so night night.

catch up

The other day at the clinic, an American came for treatment because he got punched in the face the day before and he thought the cut on his lip was infected. After, making fun of him for being dressed funky, Dr. Pradham told him to gargle with salt water and he will be fine. He said "but I heard that mouth wounds are really bad, because mouths are dirty." Dr. Pradham looked at him funny and told him that it wasn't a concern when it was his own mouth. I am always infinitely disappointed by by people's lack of knowledge of their own health.

Today is election day, so the only class I have is Tibetan language with Phuntsok, so other than that it is a lazy day and I plan to spend it writing.

Two days ago, Vidhea took us out for dinner to Cafe Mitre. The food was spectacular and the atmosphere was very different from what I have become used to here. The owner and the other people who were there were fantastically entertaining. It was strange being able to chat about American politics with someone who lives on the other side of the world from America yet had very knowledgeable ideas on the topic.

oh, yeahs

I almost forgot something of some note. Miki wanted to pierce her nose and since I can't be in a tattoo parlor without making use of it, I had my belly button pierced. It actually kind of hurt because he went back through the spot where I had pierced it myself, and scar tissue piercings are never fun. What was really cool about it though was that without even asking, he used tornado spray and also he used a needle that was a lot like the ones we use to start IVs because once he put the needle through he pulled it back out and left a plastic catheter in its place so that he could just pull the ring though with that rather than trying to keep it on the needle itself. I was impressed. It was way more professional than any place I've seen in the states.

oi

I'm not so good at this keeping up with a blog thing. Though, I partially blame network connection (though I can't blame it too much since we aren't exactly paying for it most of the time).

Miki and I have both had unhappy tummies lately which makes wandering difficult, so mostly I've just been going to class then back home to curl in a ball.

The weather here has been fantastic. We have had a few thunderstorms during the afternoon and I love I watching them roll in. Then after the rain, the view is becomes very clear and the mountains are visible on all sides. Last night, Tias, Daniel (or whatever the Brazilian spelling or it would be), and I went to Saturday cafe for dinner. The view off the roof was amazing because the mountains peaked out behind the stupa. I tried to get pictures but it was already getting dark and they didn't come out.

I talked to Brenna, and she got into CMU so chances are she will be going there and living we me come fall. I have mixed feeling about it. Part of me is excited, because she is my sister and I will be happy to have a closer relationship with her, but I'm also a little tired of her antics. While I've been gone, she has totaled the Saturn (while driving home from a male strip club no less), come home drunk and gotten Rory to help her cover it up, gone to CD warehouse to try to get Amanda to buy her alcohol, and caught a bus down to Pgh to stay at my house without permission. I didn't ask Nigel, but if I find out that she asked him to buy her alcohol I may strangle her.

Now that I've written all that though...she's no worse than any other house mate that Nigel and I have had. In fact, Nigel may see her as blessed relief from the first one who would stumble into the house at two and start drunk vacuuming and from the current one who left water running in the bathroom and brought down the ceiling in the kitchen. Maybe she won't be so bad after all.

It's kind of funny, but that little house may be the only thing other than my kittens and puppy that I miss.

Anyway, Miki and I are heading out to run some errands soon. Maybe I will have something less boring to write about later.
cheers

April fools day

Yesterday was April Fools day, and Ama-la kept playing tricks on us. First thing in the morning she told Tias that Phunsok called to cancel class, and didn't tell her until a few minutes before Phunsok would be arriving that she was joking. For lunch she handed me a glass telling me it was juice, but when I drank it it was the bitter black tea. I didn't listen to a word she said for the rest of the day, except when she told us that we should play a prank on Yanik.
I called him to tell him that Miki and this boy who likes her, Sid, took off on a motorcycle to the mountains and that she emailed her dad to tell him that she was leaving and he called worried and said he was headed for the airport to come here and bring her home. Yanik seemed more confused than anything, but we all got a good laugh out of it.

Lights are out and my lappy battery is dying.
cheers

less of an entry than a very long ramble

I have to start this post out with an exchange I overheard between Tais and Phuntsok:
Tais-"In Tibetan, do you have the expression 'he could be my father'?"
Phuntsok-(confused expression) "you mean like in another life?"

Anyway, the other day Dr. Pradham asked me to clean out the "surgical cabinet." It seems that things are cleaned on the basis of having someone tall enough to reach them, so often when I go to clean things, the top shelves are much dirty than lower shelves. It makes me feel useful. It was odd for me to be handling suction caths, lidocaine, amniodarone, and so forth in here. I'd gotten used to extremely simplistic medicine, so it was strange to see 'modern' medicine here gathering dust. All the time I've spent at the center, the only medicine that I've seen being given is salve and even that is just a mix of honey and turmeric that anyone could mix up in their own center. In America, those same patients would be packed so full of antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, steroids, cardiac meds to protect their hearts from the steriods, and whatever else the drug companies could push the docs into pushing into the patients, yet everyday the patients here get better without all that crap. It's such a ridiculous waste. I'll stand behind most paramedical pharmacology because it gives people the choice of coming back from the dead-which is cool (I'm only half joking), but when you have commercial on day time TV putting ideas of all the horrible things that people could have into the uneducated masses heads telling people to go to their doctor start popping these pills- it's no wonder that most of the country is fat with DIABETUS (that one is for you Mike) and depression, because no one can take responsibility for themselves. I'm gonna stop here because this isn't the direction I wanted to go with this entry.

The weather here is beautiful. Yesterday we had a fantastic thunderstorm. Miki and I sat out doing work while it rolled in. It had been thundering all day, but it didn't rain until late afternoon. The lights kept getting knocked out so Miki and I had to use lamps to read by as we waited the storm out.

I didn't bring any music to save room on computer for pictures, so I'm starting to miss familiar music. I've even gone so far as to get on myspace just to look up bands that I like so that I can listen to any music that they have posted.

I've been very busy, but I'm enjoying it. I started taking yoga with Miki in the morning and it seems to be giving me more energy.
Time for class, I will write again later.

yikes

They finally unlocked my blog, but I don't have time at the moment to post a real entry.
More to follow when time allows.