On strike

Stating the obvious: I have been on strike for a while now and was urged by fancy to make this fact official. Given that it is now official, I will probably start writing again tomorrow (for an ever increasing readership of mostly fancy himself).

One in 8 Million

Great series - makes me miss New York.

The size of the Statue of Liberty

Can you imagine growing up in Ebbsfleet valley, telling your friends to meet you for a beer under the upper belly near the left front hoof?

It was the best of times...

As a German girl exiled in non-German speaking places I have long gotten used to just smiling and nodding at people quoting TV shows, movies and famous lines by famous dead people. It is thus not unusual for myself to actually start using these phrases myself without being completely clear on the connotation or the source. Then, one day, I often stumble upon the source or true meaning and realize I have been saying profound none sense for years. Why don't my friends ever stop me?

The past few weeks we have been meeting a lot of new people here in the Spore and as the evening progresses we usually pull out the good old India/Nepal stories. Then, as the evening progresses more, fancy usually sums up his feelings about India in a quote that an Indian guy threw at us one fine day as fancy and I were climbing into a rickshaw causing the usual spectacle, loaded heavy with bags, fancy with crutches in his hands due to his post Everst knee situation and me sick and tired of being stared at. The quote is: "Just remember, when it's the worst of times, it's still the best of times". Until now I thought this clever man had made this up, but alas, not so.

He was quoting Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..." - am I the only person who did not know that?

So 2004

Blogging is so 2004 according to Wired Magazine. I am not sure that is true, but I certainly am no "oasis of folksy self-expression and clever thought". What can I say, worked till midnight on Friday, went swimming drunkenly post BBQ on Saturday night and then spent Sunday chasing people who manage to look alive and dead all at the same time. Thrilling?

Myanmar

I'm a big fan of not relying on the news and instead finding out about a place myself. However, going to Myanmar is a bit controversial in my head - does it inadvertently support the current government? I don't know. I will try my best to avoid buying anything that does so and pack lots of things to give away. That is if I get a visa. A little visit at the embassy today revealed the customary SE Asian official, who, sitting behind a see-through plastic wall, mumbled something, mostly to himself, that I finally deciphered as: "come back in the morning". Of course there was not another potential tourist anywhere near the counter nor any reason why he could not just accept the heap of papers I had to offer to him or for that matter, why he could not look at me while he mumbled. But I suppose that is a mute point and I will be back tomorrow.

And Then There Was Light

A, originally uploaded by Christiane B.

Our first exciting photo outing: abandoned hotel guarded by a nice old man and a furiously barking, tail wagging, large dog.

Afterwards we went for beer and murtabak, the latter being fantastic for all non-vegetarians.