eateggs.com

Well, to a lay person, there may not seem like much different between dir *.dll and del *.dll, but if you’re a computer guy, you’ll notice a subtle and, oh, rather important difference. Especially when you run that command in the system32 directory. And you don’t have any operating system disks or fun things like that.

Oh, and it would be one thing if it was MY computer. It’s not. My computer doesn’t feel like turning on these days. It was Shukla’s computer. Who is Shukla, you ask? Oh, just the founder and head of Parikrma. No, she won’t mind. It’s not like the information on her lappy is important, or anything.

But it’s like this: why am I still at the school at midnight? Because of a wonderful piece of spyware called VX2 (at least I think that’s what I’m dealing with). It’s ingenius, really: I can tell you just how it works. I just can’t tell you how to stop it. But it goes something like this:

When installed, it creates various copies of itself to the system32 directory as .dll. Amazingly, despite all being the same file, it ranges in size from 220kb to 240kb– yeah, go figure that one out. Having created a copy of itself, it latches onto a Windows service called WinLogon, which handles, as the name suggests, log-on and log-off operations. When Windows 2000 or XP boots up, WinLogon is called, which in turn calls all of its dependencies– one of which is VX2. WinLogon is a critical system process– meaning that it can’t be stopped or paused while Windows is running. So long as WinLogon is running .dll is in use, and can’t be removed. .dll does two things: it randomly throws up some pop-ups when there’s an internet connection, and it perpetuates itself. It monitors its registry keys such that if they are deleted, they are instantly replaced.

Since WinLogon is a critical system process, it runs even in Safe Mode. There’s no way around it.

When you shut down the computer, .dll builds a new verion of itself and changes the registry, such that even if you shut down, go through the recovery console and delete the file, you’re not going to get the RIGHT file. There’s no way of knowing which instance is going to be used next, and no way of deleteing all the instances because the file name and size are both random in a directory full of important DLLs.

The ONLY possible way to beat this, that I can think of, would be to use a program like ERD Commander, which provides CD-based access to both the Windows file system and the Windows registry.

Unfortunately, I’m in India. I certainly don’t have a copy of ERD Commander.

So, I’m at an impasse. Fortunately, there was a backup of all the DLLs I inadvertently deleted with my typo under the system32\\dllcache directory– getting the computer back up and running was just a matter of finding that fortunate trove of DLLs, and then pressing “n, enter, n, enter” about a thousand times while I copied back the DLLs I deleted, and didn’t overwrite the potentially newer DLLS already in system32.

I’ve scoured the net looking for solutions. No luck. So I’m going to go home and sleep. I’m good at that! =)

The lappy is, officially, dead (see: doesn’t turn on). Again. =)

Some dude just rode past the internet cafe on a horse, smoking a cigarette. Which makes me laugh.

And the power is out, yet again. Thankfully, the internet cafe, like any other business that wants to do business in India, has a beefy generator. Although, frankly, I wouldn’t complain if the power for the stereo went out– it’s been playing the same annoying pop-40 tracks for the last two weeks. Ug. I don’t know how the workers here can stand it. I come in for an hour a day, and I’m sick and tired of the cd. They work here for 10 hours a day. Hmm. Maybe they’re on drugs (unlikely, because I don’t think any Indians are on drugs, but hey–).

Heh. I’ve been actually quite concerned about how I’m going to manage transporting home everything I’ve accumulated over here. When I arrived in Bangalore, I had too much stuff. I had so much stuff that I had to strap things on to the outside of my bag. And now? Well, I have even MORE stuff. Mostly books. But if I keep coming up with clever space-saving ideas, I’ll be ‘aight. Like this one, that occurred to me late last night: I’ll unstring my guitar, and fill it with shirts and other soft, small items. Brilliant! And, of course, the guitar itself gets to wear my sweatshirt (which, mind you, was an entirely stupid thing to bring to South-East Asia in the first place)– both as protect, and as one less thing to put in the main bag.

Solid. =)

I can now cross “get hit by a car” off my list of things to do before I die.

Heh. I had the iPod on and wasn’t paying much attention anyway as I walked down the road back to my apartment. They drive on the left-hand side of the road, here, but I generally walk on the right-hand side anyway, cuz, well, I’m an American. =) So, as I’m walking down the right-hand side of the road, the rickshaw driving towards me pulls off to its left: right in my path. So, of course, I step out left, into the middle of the street, and HORNSCREECHTIRESBOOM… fortunately, the driver wasn’t going very fast, and had lightning fast reflexes. I wasn’t even hurt, although I probably deserved to be. Well, my pride was rather hurt, but that’s nothing new. It now occures to me that the rickshaw pulled off the road not to be a jerk and block my path, but rather because there was a a vehicle coming behind me…

When I say “mini van,” I mean that in a rather literal sense. Here’s a picture:
They’re rather amusing. They have an amazingly high center of gravity, an engine smaller than a lot of motorcycles in the United States, and are the only alternative to autorickshaw for a taxi. The engine is in the back, so when you sit in the front seat, sometimes your toes are less than 12″ from the car in front of you. And that’s just normal Indian driving. =)

I realize that I’m overdue for a post. But, for once, I’m rather at a loss. So I’ll William my way through it, and see what gives.

Here’s my observation of the week: in many smaller American towns, garbage is picked up, curbside, once a week by a strange, automated vehicle with an arm that reaches out, grabs the trash can, dumps the contents of the trashcan into the truck, replaces the trashcan on the curb, and then drives away. (Meekyung, I’m sure, would be eager to add that Whitehall, MT, is one of these elite-trash-disposal towns!) The arm is operated by a single man sitting inside the truck, who then drives to a waste transfer station, where the trash is dumped into a bigger container, then dumped into larger trucks, and eventually driven out to one of those wonderful byproducts of a modern, consumer driven society: a landfill. (as a side note, go hang out at a landfill some time. bring your friends for a jolly good time. Despite a dozen showers, you probably won’t feel clean for a week, after wading through the trash-dirt-birds-mud-trash-up-to-your-knees refuse, but you’ll probably think twice before you throw away that perfectly recycle-able sheet of paper next time) Simple, effective, and sanitary.

Just for fun, let’s follow a empty Coke bottle through its afterlife.

An American Coke bottle has the assurance of quick, impersonal and sanitary disposal. After the excruciatingly cold days in the refrigerator, our Coke bottle actually finds itself quite relieved to be removed and unthinkingly guzzled. He understands that his purpose in life is to sate the thirst of … a thirsty dude. And everyone likes to feel purposeful and fulfilled, which is exactly how Cokie feels, despite being emptied.

But now our thirty dude’s thirst is sated (or rum is mixed, as it were), and Cokie finds himself suddenly empty. “Now what? Is there an afterlife?” he wonders, as he sits, derelict, on the counter. The next morning, in the flury of the infamous morning after, Cokie finds himself hurriedly shoved inside a cramped plastic bag, with all his other friends. The crammed bag becomes even more suffocating when shoved in the trash can, and then unbearably hot when left to sit on the curbside, inside layers and layers of plastic, on a hot summer morning.

Aarfy is whistling. It’s a good day, since it’s a Thursday. On Thursdays Aarfy drives the Mustang Ridge route, which is his shortest route of the week. Right on time, he expertly guides his shiny new garbage truck up to the curb, where a city-issued garbage can, filled with the remains of last night’s party (which Aarfy has no idea took place). It’s hot outside, but Aarfy doesn’t notice from within the air conditioned cab, where he controls the mechanical arm that picks up the trash can, dumps it in the back, and replaces it on the curb.

Aarfy drives from house to house for another hour until his truck can hold no more. Then he drives to the transfer station, and pushes the “dump” lever, and hums along with the radio while the contents of his truck dump into the larger truck parked below. Aarfy completes his route in two more trips, and then heads home, takes off his shoes, and opens up a nice, cold can of Coke.

Cokie, meanwhile, realizes that it’s getting cold again, and concludes that the sun must be going down. It’s been a tumultuous day for him: first being dumped from the trash can into the garbage truck with MORE garbage, and the being dumped from the garbage truck into the semi trailer at the transfer station with even MORE garbage, and then finally being pushed out into the biggest pile of trash of all, before being rudely ran over by a huge, spiky-wheeled tractor, and partially buried. All of these things Cokie has been vaguely aware of, from within his after-party-clean-up-plastic bag. Cokie doesn’t like his new surroundings very much: it’s crowded and filthy; the stench is awful. And, feeling strangely tricked, he muses to himself: “so this is it, eh? This is the afterlife.”

(Actually, if I believed in an afterlife, I would expect it to be something like that a landfill. Or a dark, dusty room, surrounded by black eternity… that’s a heaven–an afterlife–I could believe in. I don’t know where all these notions of paradise come from–no sorrow, no sadness, and apparently a shortage of virgins, that has helped spawn an international crisis…)

Unbeknownst to Cokie, his 2nd cousin, thrice removed is going through a very similar process in India (which has also been colonized by the East India Coca-Cola Company). Excerpts from Spritie’s Diary: (oh god, somebody shoot me):

4:00PM
This refrigerator is nice and cool. Any other country in the world, and being in a refrigerator would be a cold, uncomfortable experience. Thank god I’m in India where everything’s cool (and, consequently, nothing is cold) except what’s hot.

7:30PM – Plastic Personality
I feel rather empty. Probably because I’ve been offhandedly thrown on to the street. Or maybe I feel empty because, well, I was drank before being so callously discarded, and now my liquid personality is gone.

7:30PM – Liquid Personality
Oh the wonders of the small intestine!

…

9:00PM – Liquid Personality
I’m flying! Wee! Look! A wall!

7:00AM, the next day – Plastic Personality
Was awoke this morning rather rudely by a stooping woman with a reed broom, who pushed me along the street with the other trash into a big pile. I felt important and wanted again when I was picked up and put in a small barrel on a push cart, but the feeling quickly faded when more trash was piled on top of me. This barrel is so dirty and dusty…

8:00AM
After being pushed in the barrel, with much bumping, bouncing and effor, up the narrow street between the apartments, I was again unceremoniously dumped on to the street. This time into an even bigger pile of trash.

12:00PM
The sun is blistering hot. I think I might be melting a little.

7:00PM
Narrow escape! A roaring rattletrap of a dump-truck came by some 15 minutes ago, and a half dozen men threw most of the trash in slatted-boards back of the truck. Luckily, I rolled out of the way just in time, and they left with a ground-shaking roar and plume of black smoke.

8:00PM
My escape no longer seems so lucky, as I’m once again being swept by a reed broom down the street… but this time things don’t look so good. In fact, I’m getting closer, and closer to a smoldering fire of other trash, putting out blackish, caustic fumes… closer… aaaaah! I am melting…

If I actually post this, I really should be shot. =)

My point was simply to draw out the contrast: in America, we produce 20 times more trash (because we consume 20 times more stuff…), and after we drop it in the wastebasket, it’s whisked off the dump without ever being so much as lifted by human hands again. One man runs the $85,000 garbage truck with the mechanical arm that dumps the trash. In India, $85,000 would buy at least a dozen of the dump-truck cum garbage trucks that they use, and leave plenty left over for the salary of the 8 men that accompany each truck as the mechanical arm.

—

Actually, I did have something to write about when I sat down to it, and it wasn’t Coke bottles and garbage men. I wanted to take a few paragraphs to complain about the Grammy’s.

Well, no. Not complain. Just reflect. Actually, I don’t care about the Grammys at all, any more than the rest of the top-40 industry ilk, but I happened to see the results

The fact that U2 is doing nothing new and still winning Grammys is indicative, in my opinion, of the advancing age of the Grammy selection panel. While innovative artists like Franz Ferdinand and Coldplay (ok, well, X&Y was a flop, I admit…) went home empty handed, U2 received their Best Album for a record that, to a casual listener, sounds substantially similar to … The Joshua Tree. Which was released in … 1989? It’s like Sagar says: “Yeah, U2 is great. It’s just a damn shame they peaked with their first album.” Heh. I’m not sure that I completely agree, but in general he’s probably right.

It’s not that I don’t like or appreciate U2: I most certainly do. And sure, he helped put together Live 8, and sure Bono is an outstanding human being, and has a great voice, and blah blah blah… But How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb didn’t bring anything new to the table. Nor was I particularly impressed by it. Yeah, there’s a few good tracks. But on balance, there’s too much airy opera vocals about love and miracles, some of which strike me as really clumsy…a lot of the tracks seem a little scattered, lacking focus or theme…

But, then again, U2 won best “Rock Album.” So sure, maybe it was the best rock album. But who’s making rock albums these days? The industry has moved on. It’s not the 1990s any more, after all…

I was pleased to see that Kanye West won Best Rap Album, but that pleasure was tempered by his failure to win Best Album. Late Registration has a fresh sound, clever rhymes, and pointed lyrics. U2’s rhymes aren’t half as good. =)

—

This has been a powerfully stupid post. Ug. Oh well. I guess I should note, in closing, that anonymous comments have been re-enabled. Ya.

—

I warned you!

Since most of the Western media is to pathetic and/or sensible to reprint the cartoons that have the Islamic world up in arms, I’ll post them here:

(Muhammad with a bomb-shaped turban)

(Suicide bombers are told to stop becuase heaven is out of virgins)

Understand, reader, that I love Islam. As I understand it, Islam is a beautiful, peace-loving religion of brotherhood and reverence. It’s a privilege for me to live in a country where Islam is widely practiced: to have my days punctuated by the megaphoned calls to prayer, that find me, regardless of where, five times daily; to smile at burqa- wearing women; to be both intimidated and amused by them (he he– has anyone else noticed that burqa wearers look more like Lord of the Rings characters than religious devotees?); to bask in the architectural magnificence of Islam’s mosques… (aside: hell, if I wasn’t an atheist (er.. pantheist?), I’d convert!)

Note: Islam is consistently portrayed in a negative light by the sensationalist western media– a media that chooses to focus on the aberrant behaviors of a militant minority rather than the peaceful whole. Small wonder America tends to be Islamophobic: American ignorance coupled with the stupid sensationalism of Western media could turn Americans against Mother Theresa, if it would make newspapers sell and people afraid.

That being said, why have I reproduced these inflammatory and sacrilegious cartoons on my blog? Because, in this instance, I feel the Islamic community brings the fearful portrayal Western media upon itself. There doesn’t seem to be much protest on the behalf of the rest of the Muslim population who are content to live in a Western world, embrace freedom of speech, and oppose violence as a response to insulting sacrilege.

Or perhaps this segment of the Islamic population is being equally vocal, and is being largely ignored by the media. Who’s to say?

Or maybe I’m just reproducing these cartoons because I love sacrilege– as much, if not more than I love religions. Or maybe I love religions because without them, there would be no sacrilege. Without religions, how else could the whole world be whipped into a frenzied protest by the publication of a couple semi-witty cartoons? I mean, c’mon– how amusing is THAT?

I blame Google’s new blog search (http://blogsearch.google.com/) for the recent plague of spam-in-the-comments section. It’s super cool, but as we all know, everything cool has it’s not-so-cool side. Or maybe it’s just a coincidence that, within a week or two of the release of Google’s blog search functionality, I’m suddenly getting copious amounts of spam…

Heh.

Which brings me to the next point:
The spammers seem to be using quite a range of IPs. Meaning it’s a lot of people, not just one isolated loser who likes to try to bring in some extra cash by being a sniveling pain in the ass.

Which brings me to the next point:
I’ve flipped the switch, disabling anonymous comments. To post a comment, you’ll need to create an account (if you haven’t already) and log in. Sorry. =(

Which brings me to the next point: I’m looking into other options (like building a simple spam filter), but because I generally don’t like coding, it may be a while before anonymous comments are once again enabled.

Look, I’m going to make this perfectly clear: I don’t believe in terrorists. Your game is up. The distraction is over. I don’t believe in the threats of nuclear proliferation. I don’t believe in the danger of tyrants with weapons of mass destruction. I don’t believe in terrorism.

But I do believe in tyranny, especially that tyranny which is supposedly sanctioned by a democratic process. I do believe in terror: but the terror of hunger, the terror of unemployment, the terror of ignorance, and the terror of a too-small world. News flash: last year hunger and malnutrition killed more people war and natural disaster combined; war killed more people than terrorism; and while terrorism was broadcast internationally and headlined in every newspaper, journalists were somehow prohibited from photographing the bodies of dead American soldiers, returning in body-bags, to answer the question: how many lives per gallon?

But I don’t believe in Saudi Arabian funding. I don’t believe in networks that go deeper than most rabbit holes. I don’t believe in cunning purpose and imminent danger.

And so, when your headlines pronounce the latest act of terrorism, I’m going to put your newspaper down. When your headlines announce a higher terror warning, I’ll unsubscribe. I won’t be afraid. I refuse to be afraid. I refuse to be distracted. I refuse to be entertained. When the headlines announce a new lead on a terrorist attack, a terrorist organization, I’m going to do just the opposite of expectations: check up on my politicians, check up on the democratic process. When the headlines shout the news of the latest attack, the latest tragedy, I’m going to see what’s in front of the legislature, and what golf-course my president is on, and which corporate executives he’s with.

And I’m going to demand a new media. I’m going to take Jello Biafra at his word, and become the media. I’m sick of the lies. I’m sick of the distractions. I’m sick of the interested dinner-time conversation about red-herrings and the smoke and mirrors of terrorism, of otherness, of far off places that amount to a direct threat on my life and property. I’m tired of stale news. Of dry news. Of broken politics, of politicians who are above corruption because they operate with impunity. They sanction all their activities, and convince us that we’ve sanctioned them, too. And the media wraps and packages it all in layers and layers of print. But its time to tear the print away. Time to turn off the evening news. See what’s inside. What’s under all the pretty print and scary pictures?

Enough of the lies. Enough of the middle-path, makes-everyone-happy bullshit. Enough of the middle-ground. Enough soggy newsprint. There’s more than enough people in the world to support an alternative media. More than enough people to allow for a publication that reports on things that matter.

Every time a terrorist sneezes, a newspaper owner smiles.

Every time a terrorist sneezes, a corporation gets a contract.

Every time a terrorist sneezes, a politician gets his wings.

And now I begin to understand: it’s not just that the gender roles are different over here: certainly they are, but that’s not difference to be observed. It’s something more basic, more foundational. It’s not a different way to assigning men and women to roles and actions, but rather a fundamentally different way to dealing with “gender.” It’s an entirely different way of coming to terms with the reality that people have two distinct genders.

In the west, we have this gender understanding that each gender was created as distinct, almost as two pieces of a whole, and that man and woman were created for each other (or evolved for each other). There’s a suggestion of unity– of the interconnectedness of everything, as it were. That a man should be with a woman, and a woman with a man: apart, they’re incomplete. Romeo needs Juliet, just as Juliet needs Romeo, to be personally and emotionally fulfilled. Two different types of people. Different instincts, differently formed bodies. Parts of a whole: a matrimonial (or physical) whole.

But that’s not how these things are viewed over here. It’s as though there’s two teams: the women’s team, and the men’s team. There isn’t this perception that a man and a woman SHOULD be together. They come together, to form teams of their own: families. But the world of women isn’t the world of men, nor should the world of men be shared by the world of women. It’s not different gender roles, it’s not separate spheres: it’s distinct world’s. Sacred worlds: the woman does not, can not enter the world of the man. And the man cannot enter the territory of the woman.

At the base, people are the same, with the same basic desires, lusts, instincts. But everything else is a construction of society. The way that men view women, and women men, is entirely a societal construction. If, in western society, men have a tendency to view women more as objects than as individuals, its because the society is driven by materialism, because that society has joined lust and the desire for things. Objectification is a western reality. Not only is that sort of materialism (as of yet) still largely absent in Eastern society, but so is that mode of viewing how men and women should interact.

I mean, really, at the heart of it, men and women are different. For the man, the woman is unknown– and man or woman, what is unknown is frightening. And what’s more natural than to try to subjugate what one fears? But we’re no longer at the heart of it: we’re 3,000 years of society later, and we no longer have to answer, for ourselves: how do I deal with this difference between myself, and members of the opposite sex? Society, whether eastern or western, has set in place a construct through which and by which we may view the opposite sex. A means of coming to terms with the differences.

So in the west, we date. We share. We marry. We attempt to fit together, like pieces of a puzzle– in an emotional form, an intellectual form, and of course, physical form. Boys and girls can and should be friends. At a young age, I think the difference between boys and girls is minimized: we have tom-boys and effeminate boys. These things happen. Here, I realize: I’ve never seen a boy playing with a girl. I’ve never seen a girl out flying a kite. From day one, from age 2, boys and girls do not interact. They’re separate. They’re segregate. It’s more than a segregation of activities, it’s a segregation of worlds. They’re NO interaction, aside from professional interaction. You don’t have a change to meet or get to know the other: at every turn, the society has protected and insulated you from the staggering difference of the other.

So it’s understandable why marriage (and the way it’s approached) is such a big deal: it’s a meeting of the opposites. A joining of the two worlds: to some extent. No: it’s a meeting at common ground: neutral territory. I don’t think the worlds are ever joined or shared. But that’s why arranged marriages make so much sense: the idea of romance is completely lost. That a male and female should be joined by an arbitrary alignment of planets is perfectly sensible, as the process of identifying desirability, and pursuing that desirability, to possess is, is completely absent. There’s no foundation of male-female interactions that would allow love-relationships to form. There’s no set of social functions that allow men and women to meet, to get to know each other, to fall in love, or lust, or whatever else brings people together. There aren’t bars where guys go and meet girls. Female friends of guy friends don’t come along for activates and meet that way. The whole construct of how we meet, of how we date, etc, is different.

My apartment is male-only. Female guests are not allowed. Yes, this demonstrates the division of males from females, but more importantly, it demonstrates the lack of framework by which males and females can meet. I’ll bet anything that there are NO co-ed college dorms in India.

And there’s elements of redundancy as well: not only is there a lack of structures or frameworks that would allow women and men to meet, but once they’ve met, it’s not socially acceptable for them to associate. A guy can’t

If India were to rely on “love-marriages,” well, it would have a quick solution to its population problem: few, if any, would marry: there’s no way for people to meet and fall in love. There’s no system of courtship, or dating. So, of course, marriages should be arranged. How else are man and wife brought together? And working from that perspective, the idea of an arranged marriage seems completely natural.

But even once married, the division remains in place: or such is my perception. The separate worlds. The husband has his friends, his job. The wife has her friends, her job, her responsibilities. The husband doesn’t “possess” his wife, nor does the wife possess the husband, although a bond of fidelity is expected. Divorce is when an arranged marriage goes awry: the wife and husband are simply and entirely unable to get along, to adjoin their two personalities. It’s not that the husband has simply grown tired of his trophy wife, and wants a new one. It’s not a form of wanderlust or boredom.

Of course, I exaggerate. Some of this isn’t quite accurate, some of this, I’m sure, is flat out wrong. This traditional structure is breaking down in Bangalore (with the influx of Western money). But once you get away from the larger cities…

Indian money makes me happy. Or, rather– lest you think I’ve sunk to the depths of materialism– I should say that Indian currency makes me happy. It’s not I’m happy to have the money, but rather that I’m happy to be carrying a wallet full of a rainbow of colorful, smiling Gandhis (that’s the plural form of Gandhi, mind you!). I mean, c’mon: if this was in your wallet, you’d be smiling, too.

It’s not that particularly like the rupee as a currency— in fact, in terms using it to pay for things, it borders on being rather annoying, but, well, there’s a certain fun to it just the same. It’s fun because, well, you never know what you’ve got, or what you’re going to get. The bills, which come in smiling-Gandhi denominations of 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1,000 rupees are color coded, and in increasing sized. Or, mostly– except for that one 500 rupee bill that I got from the ATM that was the 100 rupee color, not the 500 rupee color. And, no, it’s not a fluke, either.

But the coins are where it really gets fun. Sagar admits disappointment at discovering that rupees weren’t, in fact, shiny gems, gained by fighting monsters and killing chickens, as in Zelda, but rather dull silver colored coins, although the procedure for getting rupees is much the same (pressing the right series of buttons), but at an ATM, rather than on a Nintendo… Although not little, shiny gems, the rupee coins (which come in 1, 2, and 5 rupee denominations) are rather fun– not only because they’re relatively large, and make a satisfying “clink” sound in an empty pocket, but also because they’re pretty random. The new 1 rupee coins are actually marginally smaller than the 1 rupee coins, but since there’s about 6 different 1 and 2 rupee coins floating around, well… the only way to tell which is which is to flip it to the side with the numeral and take a look– size is of no help. But that just adds to the fun of it. =)

Of the currencies I’ve encountered, the Thai baht is far and away my favorite. It’s amazingly simple– three coins, four bills– and amazingly sensible. The both coins and bills increase in size increase according to value. Thus, a 10 baht coin is larger than a 5 baht coin. Imagine that. And not only do the bills get larger as their denominations increase, but they’re sensibly color-coded. Every 500 baht bill is the same color. Red. And it’s the only bill that’s red. Imagine that. The 20 baht bill is green. The 100, blue. The 1000, white. It’s almost as though someone thought about the currency system, before the mints went into operation.

And then there’s the fact that every coin is meaningful. 1 baht isn’t worth much, but it’s still valuable. 20 baht is enough for a cheap meal. 20 pennies is enough to make your pocket heavy. And, unless you’ve got some greenbacks to go with that 20 cents, that’s about all 20 pennies is enough for.

Singapore was just a mess. They have more coins and bills than the United States. Coins in 1,5,10,20 and 50 cents, bills at 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100… Singapore dollars. Talk about confusing!

And then there’s the Cambodian riel. The current exchange rate for the riel to the US dollar is about 4,000 to 1. And they have 100 riel bills. Yeah. That’s a bill for fourth of a cent. And they don’t have coins– or, rather, the riel takes the place of the coins, since most transactions are done in US dollars. It was rather weird being Cambodia, and using US dollars for every purchase, and getting my change in riel. At least they have the sense not to use the ridiculous system of American coins.

So. I love the rupee, just for being … almost adventurous. And I respect the Thai baht for making sense. And I wish– oh I wish– that America would finally buck up to inflation and get rid of that annoying penny. I must say, being penniless (heh, so to speak) for the last 6 months has been rather pleasant.

—
To combat the recent influx of spam in the comments section, I’ve once again returned to Pliny for another round of updates.

I realize, last round, that many of you may have been scratching your head when I noted that you can edit your comments. Well, silly me, I somehow mixed up > with < (um, yeah), so that you would need to travel at least seven days into the past to be able to change your comments. That's fixed now. More to the point, anonymous posting is still allowed (although Pliny now has a configuration option to easily disable it) but I can now “nuke” a comment– delete it, and ban the IP of the person who posted it, with a single click. Hopefully, after I ban a couple IPs, it’ll stop being a problem. If the problem continues, I’ll start banning groups of IPs… and if that doesn’t fix the problem, well…

I attended recently an inter-faith dialog on topic of “the concept of God in Hinduism and Islam in the light of sacred scriptures,” sponsored by a Muslim educational group. In a loosely structured debate, Dr. Zakir Naik of the Islamic Research Foundation, a prominent Muslim scholar and orator, and Nobel-prize nominated Sri Sri Ravi Shankar (heh! what a great name!), well-known for both his Hindu leadership and international aid involvement– he’s the founder of several international NGOs.

It was a huge event– widely promoted in Bangalore, and televised internationally. I estimate that there were perhaps 100,000 people in attendance, mostly Muslims. Dr. Naik, from the Islamic perspective, spoke first. In short, he was remarkable: to stood and spoke forcefully and convincingly for fifty minutes in front of a crowd of 100,000 people. He quoted the Qu’ran in Arabic, before translating into English, and quoted the Vedas in Sanscrit, before also translating to English. He was exceptionally well-organized, using quotes, properly cited, from international sources and the sacred scriptures to support every point. He was very easy to follow, and commanded one’s complete attention. He a balanced view of both sides, in a thoroughly scholarly manner– and did it all without notes.

Unforunately, he wasn’t well matched. Although Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is an impressive individual– one with exceptional heart and compassion, he’s not a scholar, and his response was only marginally related to the topic, rather rambling and disorganized, and actually made very little mention of the sacred scriptures, except to quote them occasionally (heh, and NOT translate them into English). But one thing he said, in particular, stood out in my mind. “Thirty years ago,” he told the crowd, “religious tollerence was the goal. But tollerence is a feeble word. You tollerate something you don’t like. We need to go beyond tollerence and learn to love. We must see the commonness in everything, and celebrate the differences.”

Heh. I was much ammused: at one point, someone near the front of the crowd stood up and looked behind him, as though something interesting was happening at the back of the event. Like doing the wave, people behind him stood up and did similarly, and it spread its way to the back of the crowd– people standing up to see what everyone else was looking at. Which, of course, was nothing, but people are curious like that. =)

Most outstanding was spending an entire evening at a psedu-religious event, and never once was money mentioned. No mentions of donations, or support. No mention of tithes, or giving, or of god being poor. That impressed me, a lot.

But most poigniant– and perhaps one of the startling moments since my arrival in South-East Asia was the realization, after two hours of sitting in the crowd, that there was not a woman in the crowd! Or, rather my part of the crowd– the event had been entirely segregated by gender. ALL of the women who had come were seated in a walled-off section on the left-hand side. Proportionally, there were probably only 20,000 females (mostly vieled) in a crowd of 100,000, but… I don’t even know how to describe my reaction. HOW had I sat in the crowd for two hours and NOT noticed the complete absence of women? It wasn’t until the question and answer session began, and the chairman was explaining the position of the microphones– two for men, and two for the women– that I realized that the women were all in the partition to the left.

I can’t describe the effect this had on me. There’s been a number of cultural elements in India that have challenged my western notions, but most I had been at least partially prepared to deal with. I knew, for example, that many marriages in India were arranged. I didn’t understand that, for all intents and purposes, all marriages are arranged– and many are arranged entirely according to arbitary placement. In short, society randomly joins pairs of stranges, and bids them to be happy and multiply. I’m still trying to come to terms with that. But it wasn’t totally unexpected. But being at a huge, public event, and suddenly realizing that it was completely segregated by gender– that was genuinely startling. I’m sure I fail to convey the immensity of the event– how much space 100,000 chairs takes up (it was held outdoors, in the huge, open Palace Grounds (although from what they gain that appelation, I don’t know), and just how stark the division was. Not a woman in the crowd– all the women protected from the probing eyes of men by a tall, white cloth barrier. And by their veils– covering them from head to toe, save their eyes, hands and… toes.