Here come the 2006 lists

It's that time of year when people roll out their "bests of" lists. Canada's CBC has composed a list of the top of 2006. From Ugly Betty's kid brother to Daniel Craig's James Bond the list is an amalgam of US and Canadian 2006 phenomena. Oh yeah, there is some international stuff too, like Zidane's world cup soccer headbutt.

BTW, Happy Boxing Day!

Santa's On His Way

My Christmas Eve dinner is comfortably digesting and my husband is enjoying his scotch while we hang out at home waiting for Santa. We have a fireplace in our new apartment, but of course we didn't light it because we don't want to scorch Santa.

I just checked the NORAD Santa Tracker and right now he is in Colorado Springs. I guess he is on his way to Vancouver. Thank goodness for NORAD, the American-Canadian collaboration that keeps our airspace safe for Santa Claus.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

A Year of Sunsets

A year of sunsets
Originally uploaded by jbum.

Everyone loves sunsets.

Wander over to Flickr.com and you'll find thousands and thousands of sunset photos. One flickr user graphed the year's uploaded sunset photos with the time of day and date. Here is the graph he obtained that coincides with the winter and summer solstices. Pretty cool, eh?

Yesterday was the shortest day of the year. Paradoxically, I was able to get a ton of work done. I did all my meal planning and shopping for the holidays, wrapped a few gifts, cooked, cleaned, etc. AND had time in the evening to view the lights in Stanley Park and have a peppermint hot chocolate at a local cafe. (OK, so it was a Starbucks, but all the local Canadian cafes were closed.)

I am relieved that the solstice has passed. The short grey days and long, wet nights of Vancouver are quite dreary. I am looking forward to some extra daylight!

Finished!

Shrimati shawl back
Originally uploaded by nanodudek.

My knitting goal for 2006 was to have all my projects completed by December, and I finished this shawl on Monday. It took me about five months to knit this shawl, and I love it! It is too light to wear during the winter, but I will be wearing it a lot this summer. I can't wait!

2006 was a good year for knitting. I finished a toy dog, a baby sweater, a blanket and my shawl. As a reward, I bought the yarn to knit my first sweater, which is my only goal for 2007. If I can knit a well-fitting sweater with two sleeves of equal length, I will have won the Stanley Cup of knitting. Wish me luck!

Busy News Day

Wow, it was a busy news day today, so let's get started! I want to start with the serious stuff and end with the silly stuff, so here goes.

In the U.S., Florida has suspended executions because of the botched lethal injection of a murderer. Meanwhile in China, the government has executed two bank employees who stole $51 million dollars from their customers. (Imagine what the U.S. would be like if we executed frauds like Ken Lay and Martha Stewart.)

A new report by UNICEF describes how India has been killing its daughters for the last 20 years. It is disappointing that a country that has elected a woman prime minister and worships female Gods can have such low regard for their female citizens. The skewed sex ratio is apparent everywhere you go, just look around and you will see that men out number women. While sex determination by ultrasound is illegal, the practice happens anyway and girls are either aborted or killed at birth. My heart weeps for India when I hear this kind of news.

Indians in America were confronted with a racial slur earlier this year when Senator George Allen called an Indian-American "macaca" during a rally. The Senator's insult cost him his seat, AND his slur was named the most politically incorrect word of 2006 . Way to go, Senator Allen! Thanks for introducing a new racial slur into the American lexicon. Because we didn't have enough already.

Last night during my husband's department Christmas party I met a fellow who once stuffed a pig carcass with sausage and slow roasted it in the courtyard. I thought that was a foolish thing to do (would the sausages heat up enough to kill all the germs?), not to mention karmically compromising. Well, it turns out that meat-eaters are stupid. No, they are not, I am just teasing you carnivores. Actually, a study has revealed that vegetarians are just smarter. Don't you love it when a "scientific study" makes a conclusion that flatters you and makes you feel smart? But, if you read the BBC article closely you will see that some of those "vegetarians" eat fish and chicken. These must be the same wacky vegetarians who eat Turducken on Thanksgiving. (A Turducken is a turkey stuffed with a duck and the duck is stuffed with a chicken, the ultimate trifecta of poultry gluttony and greed.)

Hey, check out this guy who shot a seven-legged hermaphrodite deer . Despite the fact that the deer was clearly a mutant, the hunter ate it anyway. Does his meat addiction support the "vegetarians are smarter" theory? I won't even eat funny looking potatoes, never mind mutant animals. If you eat meat and have no qualms about eating a mutant, leave me a comment.

Whenever I go grocery shopping with my tall husband, short old ladies ask him to reach for items on the top shelf. I am always impressed by his height-inspired community service. But that is nothing compared to this tall dude who stuck his arm into a dolphin's stomach and pulled out plastic that couldn't be removed by surgery. I proclaim him the patron saint of dolphins.

Have you seen the movie Snakes on a Plane? Was it scary? You know what would be scarier? How about a movie called Mice on a Plane? It would go something like this:

You are flying at 28000 feet and some crazy passenger had a carry-on bag filled with mice and the mice got loose during the flight and the next thing you knew mice were in your hair and chewing through the electrical wiring and pooping in your pretzels.

Yeah, that would be scary. Too bad it happened on a real flight. I couldn't even get my toothpaste on the airplane and some dude was able to get a bag full of mice onto his flight. Nice job, security!

Whew, now I am exhausted. I still have to post pictures from my India trip. I think my next post will be about macacas. They were everywhere in India. And I am using that word in the zoological definition, not the Senator Allen definition.

Two Pictures

I have over 600 photos from my trip to India and find myself paralyzed by the sheer number of photos to choose from. So, I thought I would start small, with only two pictures.

First, a photo of the Taj Mahal, me and 60,000 of my closest friends. It is truly a jewel, and no surprise that 60,000 visitors a day from all over the world come to marvel at the Taj Mahal's beauty.


Second, is a photo of two bricks. A little bit of background about these two bricks is necessary....

We visited the town of Ayodhya, which is the birthplace of the Hindu God Ram. It is also the site of temple and mosque bombings. In 1992, a mosque was bombed and a temporary Ram temple was constructed. You can read more about the temple/mosque controversy at Wikipedia. Anyway, in support of the Ram temple, Hindu pilgrims from all over the world come to Ayodhya carrying a single brick to be used in the construction of a new Ram temple. They leave their bricks in stacks with an inscription of where they have come from.



Someone lugged their bricks all the way from North America, on taxis, through baggage claim, etc. and then on a pilgrimage to Ayodhya to support the construction of a new Ram temple. That's pretty heavy.

I hope to get more pictures posted, but I am feeling very overwhelmed by the large number of photos, so it will take me awhile. Check back often : )

Of Melanin and Men

Here in Canada, I am almost always the darkest person in the room. It doesn't bother me, yet I frequently have an awareness that I am a minority surrounded by white folk. Especially when it is pointed out to me by a white person, like yesterday during my husband's department holiday party.

The news that we were travelling in India had gotten around, and during the party several people welcomed us back and asked us about our trip. But one kooky white lady took it a little far by remarking that I "looked like I had gotten a tan." Ha ha, get it? Hee hee, cause when white people go on vacation to a tropical location they come back darker, yuk yuk,, but when dark people, chuckle, go on vacation they just come back looking the same. Get it? Har har!

No, seriously, WTF? What is that supposed to mean?

I have received this odd comment before (it's never funny) and usually attribute it to the 'nervous tic' white people have when they don't know what to say to us melanin-blessed people. Like when they ask me what tribe I'm in. Or if I know their grandfather's oncologist in Topeka who also happens to be Indian. Or whether I can read and write English. Anyway, it's pretty harmless, especially in light of the Kramer rant, and I just ignore it.

When I was in college, my friend James asked me about the diversity of skin color in India. James had noticed that some Indian people are as dark as Eddie Murphy and others were as fair as Penelope Cruz. I confirmed his observation and explained to him that fair skin was valued in Indian society and that children are discouraged from playing in the sun because if they become dark that is considered unattractive.

Then, James held out his arm next to mine and I saw that we were the exact same color. James had spent the summer working outside and acquired a tan that matched my natural skin tone. I was floored that I was the same color as a white man! And here was a white man the same color as an Indian woman! It was an unforgettable moment for me.

One nice thing about my trip to India was being surrounded by people who looked like me. It was an unusual experience to have average skin, eyes, hair and height. I enjoyed being average, for once I wasn't the darkest and shortest person around, it was really nice just blending in. And I hate to admit the joy I experienced watching my husband be a lonely minority. Finally, the tables were turned. Everywhere he went, he was the tallest, whitest person around. People stopped and stared, children pointed, school girls giggled, cyclists rode by with their necks craned, "angrezi" was whispered (angrezi means English or white person) and photos were discreetly snapped. My white husband made quite a stir wherever he went, and this was a constant source of amusement for both of us. Thankfully, the attention was all positive.

Next post........photos. Stay tuned!

Indians! In! Space!!!!!!

Only one more day until the next space shuttle launch. The crew departs from Florida on December 7th for the International Space Station, where they will be doing several spacewalks to "rewire the space station". That sounds a little too McGyver, IMHO, but that's what the mission homepage says. I imagine they will be doing some serious reconfiguration and assembly that is way beyond my comprehension, so rewire is probably the best word for the job.

On board will be Astronaut Sunita Williams, an Indo-American from Massachusetts. She reminds me of my friend Pam cause she is pretty, has long hair, is bi-racial and kicks-@$$. Astronaut Williams is a helicopter pilot, triathlete, bow hunter and has lived underwater. Seriously, you guys, she has lived underwater, I kid you not!

Astronaut Williams is probably not a Hindu, judging by her space shuttle menu (sausage, beef tips, chicken, etc) but I won't hold it against her : ) In my book, you can be a beef eating Hindu as long as you dedicate yourself to the pursuit of dharma. Astronaut Willams clearly has lived her life with a clear sense of purpose. I mean, c'mon, she has lived underwater and now she is going to live in outer space.

I congratulate Astronaut Williams on all her achievements and wish her and the crew a safe journey.

I'm Back!

I am back from my trip to India! It was a long 36 hour journey home, and I did it with a raging case of Delhi Belly. I have been home since Friday, lounging around, napping, drinking tea and watching TV. India is 12.5 hours ahead of PST, so I have been trying to adjust to the inverse photoperiod too. It will be at least two weeks before I am fully adjusted.

What can I say about my trip to India? I could write pages about all the things I saw and experienced. Malls, camels, family, food, traffic, trains, rickshaws, monkeys, temples, mosques, MTV, saris, Nike, the Ganges, Pizza Hut, peacocks, the Taj Mahal, the list is endless.

I will be writing more in the coming days after my mind clears from the jet lag haze and I get a chance to download photos from my camera. More to come..........