So here it is, I have something to bitch about, well a few things. So grab a seat and make yourself comfortable.
First off, the iPod...cool device, very much in demand, an icon of our time, and those white earbuds have become a fashion must have. What's wrong with it you ask? Well nothing that I can really say actually, except it now does too much. When the iPod first hit the market it was a dedicated mp3 player, then slowly Mac added the photo viewer, and now they play video...why? A friend recently purchased the latest iPod and was shocked to find out that in order to play videos on her iPod she had to go out and buy extra software. Now if I was going to be spending my hard earned I would really think twice about buying something that doesn't do what it says on the box. They should say; "Yes, you can watch videos on it if you also buy our conversion software", but I guess that would kill sales a touch.
Here's another thing, you and that special someone are off on a week trip somewhere special, you take your digital camera, and iPod, but you have a desktop PC so you can't take that can you? What is the point of having the capability of viewing photos on that tiny screen if there is no way to directly link the camera to the iPod???
So why these extra features? Well my theory, and it is just that my theory, is to place the humble iPod in a higher price bracket. The original play music only one was a hit for being the first true digital music player at a affordable price. Now it is a kind of all singing (still does that well), all dancing (as long as you buy the extra software to allow it to), do everything (but it doesn't do the dishes yet, that's the next version) device. Well I am sorry my hard earned will stay in my pocket for now.
Well the other day I was supposed to take a young lady out for dinner as a thank you for some valuable insights she gave me into the world of call centres and we made an agreement to meet at the Annapurna Coffee Shop before deciding where to go for dinner. At 6pm on the dot I am enjoying a cup of coffee and waiting for her. Now this wasn't to be a date as such, more a case of getting together and getting to know one another to see if a possibility of a date may arise in the future. Well as she hadn't showed up an hour after the time we were to meet I went off and had dinner by myself. I had been stood up. A few days later I called up her office and asked to speak to her, and her call out that she wasn't there. My reaction was to tell the poor guy who answered the phone was to tell her not to shout if she isn't there. Women are strange creatures no doubt about it, and that one stranger than most.
I picked up the paper today and gave it my usual once over, and something in the letters column caught and held my eye. There are people outside the US Embassy protesting the fact that they were not issued a visa to the US! They are want to go to another country for work, studies, escape, whatever and they got turned down, sucks don't it? But protesting because they feel they were turned down unfairly? And then someone writing in to the Himalayan Times about it???? What the hell? Here is a quote from Nirakash Shresthas' letter on the matter "The student visa, in particular, should be merit-based and not doled out according to the whims of duty officers." ok, now I am no expert on the foreign policies of other countries but I am fairly sure that anyone applying for a visa has his or her case fully examined before any decision is reached, and as for the "whims" of the duty officers, well they are employees of a foreign government and therefore have to justify their individual decisions to their superiors. This is a case that is becoming more and more the trend of this country, you don't like something go out on the streets and have a good old protest about it, and it doesn't matter what it is. Well tell you what, there is a dog that wakes me up barking every morning outside my house at five o'clock in the morning so I request all of you to be at my place at the civilised time of ten in the morning for a relay hunger strike with chakajam and a bandh of all Wai-Wai selling outlets calling for the dog to be hung, drawn, and quartered and for the owners of the dog to pay all of us ten lakh US dollars each and to get all of us visas to Australia. See you all at ten, tea and biscuits will not be served as I am not associated with any political parties at this time.
Gandhi over in India developed and used the hunger strike to great effect to get the English out of India a few decades ago. In Nepal we use the relay hunger strike to not as great effect for anything we damn well please. Now, in Gandhi's' case, he was not eating until his demands were met, and would have died for his country, very credible. In a relay hunger strike, one does not eat until relieved by another person. Hmm. I call that the time between lunch and dinner, skipping afternoon tea and biscuits. Like the majority of things a relay hunger strike is protesting about, the whole thing is rather half assed. And sadly it proves that no matter how much the protester believes in what he or she is doing they are not willing to put their life on the line. It is, I think, a rather sad situation.
I guess by now you have noticed my references to tea and biscuits a couple of times now, and are probably wondering what I mean by that, so allow me to explain. Every now and then you will pick up the newspaper and there on the front page will be one of our politicians or the other happily attending a tea party, and then the next day some politician different tea party. That makes me wonder, if all they do is attend tea parties, who runs the country?
It is taxi, microbus, mini bus, bus, SAFA tempo, tuk tuk tempo, micro mini taxi tempo bus owners and drivers that run the country while our politicians are at the tea parties. Don't believe me? Well over on Sunday and Monday there was a chakajam called by the transport entrepreneurs which saw just about every black plated vehicle off the road. And what bliss that was. Within a few hours the government agreed to the ten point demands of the transport entrepreneurs. Now it is said the meeting between the two started in the afternoon and was only concluded around 2am, but no one know how long the tea break was, but I will bet biscuits were the order of the day. I can just see the transport entrepreneurs saying next time we will make it eleven points, point eleven being during the tea and biscuit break chocolate bon-bons must be served.
Nepal hasn't fallen into complete anarchy just yet, but we are hovering on the edge, Maoists are saying "peace peace" government is saying "peace peace" while the people are saying, and doing, whatever the hell they please. I, for one, find it really sad that the current trend among the people is this new thing of hating the history this country has. They fight anything that is even remotely related to the monarchy. Well here is something that should make the people sit up and take notice, if a chap by the name of Prithvi Nayan Shah hadn't got it into his head to take his band of merry men around the country to unify it...there would be no Nepal at all. So the current king has made mistakes, some small, some big, and some "Holy shit! What the fuck was he thinking?" class mistakes, we need to remember that he is a man before a king, that he puts his trousers on one leg at a time, that as he is human he is fallible, and every other cliché imaginable, but just because he has made mistakes his ancestors should still be honoured, even if he is not. The previous kings to this one has always been here for his country and hopefully ten generations from now, we will still have a king to put his country before himself. We lost one king to tragic circumstances and we bemoan it and protest about it, let's not lose another because we can't see far enough down the road.
Wow, I got fairly serious and deep there, better lighten the tone or all of you will think that this blog has been hacked. I was having a rather enjoyable discussion with a small group of buddies the other day when the conversation turned to the supernatural and related creepy crawlies. Now I love a good ghost story and I like going to haunted houses and the such, I have an open mind and like that little shiver of fear that one tends to get with spiritually odd stuff. But what is it about a ghost that scares us so much? You ask person A if they are scared of ghosts, and they say yes, ask them why and you get mostly the same answer, because they are scary, because they are creepy, and others along that line. Now I have been to several haunted houses and seen many ghosts, and yes some are scary or creepy, but do I fear them? No, not really. Normal reactions people have in ghosts is get afraid, why? I think because of two reasons, one, because we are conditioned to feel fear when in the presence of a ghost, or two, whether it be conscious or unconscious we are scared of death, and a ghost represents death. I have a curious view towards death in that I am somewhat interested in what happens when one dies, but on the other hand, I am in no great hurry to experience it first hand, maybe that is why ghosts don't really give me the creeps that much. Of course I could be completely wrong and find out the reasons ghosts don't give me the creeps is because I am too thick in the head to appreciate the fact that they are trying their best to make shit my pants and run like fuck away from them. Next time I run into one I will be sure to ask, very, very politely.
So anyway, our little touring trip has been postponed due to chakajams, bandh, and general misbehaving of the public at large, so all of you got to read more of my twisted, somewhat weird views on Kathmandu life, you are welcome. Do look out for the next posting which should be lighter in tone and back to my usual ramblings and whatevers, and hopefully not written in Kathmandu. Also "Hungry man on a bike" should be getting it's first review in the next few days.