-I retract my previous remarks about the overall misery of Nepali winters. The fog has passed and today is bright and sunny. I went for an extended run and walked for about thirty minutes afterwards to soak up the sunlight. I'm told that the fog will be backsoon though..
-The drop in temperature seems to have brought out the amateur badmintoners from hibernation, as I now have to dodge several pairs of players haphazardly swinging rackets to whack a shuttlecock back and forth in the streets. Along with the badminton, my current list of daily obstacles includes stray dogs, cows, feces, pot holes with and without water, trash, fires, old people, cars, motorbikes and hooligans. Aside from nearly being creamed by a truck who failed to give the obligatory 'approaching honk', all of the other obstacles have been manageable, save the hooligans.
-A group of kids probably around 16-20 like to hang out near one of the shops that I run past. For awhile, they would just point, say things etc. Then it was sending guys out in the road to get in my way. Annoying, but whatever, Recently, I saw the presumed leader holding a pit bull mixed dog that I often run past. As I reached the group, the kid 'sicced' the beast at me and it came within inches of tearing off my ankle. This gave the bunch quite the laugh and nearly gave me a heart attack. I was only halfway through the run and would have to pass the group two more times in order to finish. The next time around, there were more people in the road, so they only had the dog bare his teeth at me. I was enraged but unwilling to stop running the route, so I had to think of a plan of action for the final pass. To feign toughness, I walked up to the group and simply stood in front of them, expressionless, while internally praying that they weren't going to jump me or worse. I stared at the leader for 20-30 seconds until he had wiped the stupid grin off of his face and walked away. I haven't had problems since but always make it a point to stare at the group as I jog by, hopefully to remind them of my 'toughness' and to thwart any shenanigans that they may be planning.
-In science, the class is learning about the solar system, and while prepapring a Powerpoint I was reminded of Pluto's demotion to a lowly dwarf planet a few years back. I remember being anti-Pluto when it was initally reclassified, but found an eight planet solar system to be missing something. I propose that some other object be promoted to planet status in order to fill the gap, ideally something that starts with a 'P' to go along with the childhood acronym. I threw in a slide mentioning Pluto as a former planet with a picture of the Disney dog on it because it bothered me so much to only have eight planets.
-Aside from my enjoyment of anything Kardashian, being away from American pop culture news has been so liberating. I am completely out of touch with anything E! news related, aside from extensive coverage of Amy Winehouse's death and Justin Beiber allegedly knocking up a fan. The lack of news is replaced with heavy Bollywood coverage which I can just ignore because I don't know anything about it. A quick browse of TMZ has informed me that Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore split and Paris Hilton's brother smashed into parked cars; oh no, I'm getting sucked in again!!...
-Along with no American pop culture to deal with, I've also thoroughly enjoyed being out of the political loop and have decided that anybody who wastes their free time following the back and forth politcal banter is completely out of touch and needs to pursue a diffrerent hobby. Knowing issues and having opinions is one thing; watching/follwing ANY source of 'he said, she said gotcha' news is unhealthy and fruitless. Some of it is unavoidable and the Rick Perry gaffe was good, but nothing can ever top Howard Dean
-Ever since coming to Nepal and visiting Thamel, I have been transfixed by the endless array of what I call Icelandic yak wool sweater jackets. I held off on buying one in the summer months, but when the temperature dropped I went to Thamel to get one; much to my dismay, wearing yak wool feels like shoving both of your arms into massive ant hills. I can get it lined, but the lining would cost more than the jacket itself. They're so goregous that I think I'm still going to buy one and represent myself as a Euro to see if I get stared at any differently.
SImilar to this, but better.
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