random points over the past couple days

i went to kakinada yesterday to complete my visa extension. i got the ORDER to extend it in delhi, then i have to take that wax-sealed order to kakinada for the superintendent of police to sign and make the extension official. i got wrangled in by the ACP (assistant commissioner of police, or something). i walk in and he is working on an official document of some sort, and when he's done, he tosses it on the floor. amazing efficiency there. anyways, i thought this guy was going to be signing my passport and all so i'm trying to be as non-offensive as possible... he asks if i believe in god (no, but i say yes... don't want him denying on grounds of me being a heretic), do i go to church, blah blah blah. he wants me to help him set up an organization to help the homeless in india. he says i should be responsible for helping since i'm here. WTF?! i'm not responsible for the fact that you don't educate your country in how people get pregnant. there are some remote villages that i'm sure don't understand exactly how it happens. anyways, i'm like, OK, OK, i'll try. then i find out this guy is a nobody. the SP signed my passport an hour ago and this guy just likes talking to foreigners. i was pissed.

still, during one of the lulls in our inane conversation, i noticed the calendar behind him and there is a footnote on the holidays... "dates may be modified depending on visibility of the moon". huh? so if i can't see the moon, it isn't christmas? fukkdat. and what if i see it and someone else doesn't? crazy country. and this guy calls rajahmundry, my personal hell for the past 339 days, "the second Paris". come on, now. yeah you smell bad, have bad accents, and wear funny moustaches, but Paris? i think not.

enough of that ponce, the rest of this will be quite random, but just some things that have popped in my head or some causal observations (plus i've been liking to use block quotes and lists of late).

• my driver only completed 5th grade due to money problems


• my driver's house (him, wife, 2 children) is one room, no bigger than 10'x10' - one bed, no bathroom, and costs him like Rs. 300/month (~$7.50)


• my driver is one of the few love marriages you'll find in india, in that it was not arranged. this being said, he is still having his daughter's marriage arranged, she is 13


• a 15-year old (!) girl was given an award of bravery for going against the SOCIETAL NORM and leaving the arranged marriage she was placed in with a 22-year old boy. she did this because she prefers to go to school than be married


• i'd estimate 90% of indian men who can grow facial hair do, and it's in the form of a moustache. i've heard anecdotally that it is a sign of wisdom and superiority over someone without


• and finally, i wonder if female animals know what is going on with them when they are pregnant. we have a site dog who just had some really cute pups, and i'm wondering, did she know what was up? she felt like ass and was getting fat, then when she thought it was all over, she was gonna die, these little things pop out the bottom of her, that look like little copies of her, and want to attack her funbags. i'm guessing that is a bit traumatic. now you have all this responsibility you weren't prepared for, and the dad ran off with the postman's leg. no good bastard

well that's what i've been thinking about lately