Archive for April, 2007


Long time no see !!!!

Filed under: Creeping frustrations by Prajwol — 4 Comments
April 27, 2007

The latter part of April I really got very busy. Normally I write during the weekends, but past two weekends I had few parties to attend. Also, I was busy at my work too, sometimes even brought work to home.

I remember talking with my mom, couple of months back, when she forgot her purse in a bus. She got off at the bus park (the last stop) and there were only 4 other people in the bus. She rushed back to the bus park and found empty bus but no one (driver or conductor) present, guess they were done for the day. With help of police, she got in touch with the conductor (it might have been anyone who took that purse, but that’s the least she could do). When asked about the purse, he blatently replied that he has no idea, which might be true, but his other statement suprised me. He said to my mom “Didi tapai le malai chor dosh lagauna khojnu bhayo, ma ko ho thaha cha? Ma Prachanda ko bhanja ho”.

When I go through the news of Nepal, I see Young Communist League (YCL) doing stuffs, many times above the law. Some of them might be good too, but there shouldn’t be unlawfulness. Coming back to the conductors statement, if he can say those things I wonder how many more people are riding on that now. This is simply not acceptable!!!!!!

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Khana Khajana

Filed under: My kitchen by Prajwol — 11 Comments
April 16, 2007

Firstly I would like to wish you all a very happy Nepalese New Year 2064. This New Year, I wanted to begin my day by doing something interesting. So I signed up for a cruise in a local Bayou. It was part of ‘Acadiana Migratory Bird Day Celebration’ where a National Park Service ranger and Ornithologist abroad will identify birds by sight and sound in 1.5 hour long boat tour. My only problem was to reach there at 7 AM in a weekend (I don’t like getting up early in weekends). But since I had nothing lined up for Friday night, that was well on the cards. However, I got an unexpected dinner call by a Nepalese family, so by the time we finished our political guffs and ‘Jack Daniel on the rock’, it was way passed the midnight. So, as expected I missed my cruise.

I was also invited by the Nepalese Community in Louisiana State University (LSU) for a potluck that afternoon. It was fun there too, lots of food variety. After family persons departed, the real party started for the Bachelors. For a change, we watched couple of movies while drinking. Finally, when I went to bed it was already 4 AM. I really liked one of the movies that we watched, ‘Dog Day Afternoon’ by Al Pacino. This 1975 movie is real nice, if you haven’t seen it I recommend you to see it.

Sunday morning I woke up at 9 AM, normally I don’t wake up at 9 when I go to bed at 4, but I had to drive back to Lafayette then do the entire regular stuffs: laundry, groceries and cook food for whole week. Yes, I cook food for entire week on Sundays (i.e. for Sunday to Friday). Rice is easy, so is the ‘Daal’ (Lenticels) but the curry is the pain of all. When you live all alone, you don’t feel like cleaning the dishes and cook every other day. For last three weeks I had lamb meat, sounds fascinating, but it’s my coercion. After cooking lamb for the first week it took me something special to discontinue my lamb’s run. Every time I went for grocery I wanted to buy lamb, not because it is tastier but it’s efficient to cook as well. Rice is easily done, so just cook lamb in a pressure cooker like any other meat (I have a default technique for everything I cook) and then add water and press it; now I don’t even require ‘Daal’, one less dish to wash.

Before I got into lamb stint; chicken, cauliflower, cabbage, or pork were my regular curries. If not those, eggs are my obvious choice. In fact, I love making curry out of egg because it’s very convenient and you can make more variety of dishes out of it as well. “Variety out of egg?” Oh yes, if you are lazy and/or incompetent like me eggs can help you lot. My favorite dish using eggs are: eggs with onions, onions in egg, egg with onions and tomatoes, tomatoes and egg, etc. You can do the permutation your self to get as many different dishes using those three ingredients. :D One might say why bother, why not eat outside. But, always eating outside is not economically viable, and most importantly being a Nepali it’s hard to live without eating ‘Dal, Bhat, Tarkari’ at least once a day.

This week to overcome my lamb stint, I decided to have momo everyday for dinner. I made ‘keema’ (ground meat) ready for the whole week, so all I have to do each day is wrap about 20 momo’s and steam it. The picture is from my dinner yesterday.

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Year 2050

Filed under: Scratch of my head by Prajwol — 11 Comments
April 10, 2007

I am sipping Marfa (Apple Brandy) while sitting in my rocking chair, facing towards the ‘Ganesh Himal’ (mountain) in Dhulikhel (town in Nepal, about 15,00 m high from mean sea level). I always wanted to spend my retired life in Dhulikhel, so I am very happy to be here despite my several other shortcomings. My wife brings a chair near me, and starts knitting a sweater for me, a sweater that I’m unsure if I ever will get a chance to wear.

“Things have really changed” says my wife, I look at her and give my silent nod and we both stare at Ganesh Himal. The same Ganesh Himal that we both had seen together during our high school days at Kathmandu University. But it’s so different now, all the snow has been melted from the peak and it’s simply an ugly looking rock hill.

I remember last weekend, I wanted to visit my ancient home at Putalisadak (a street in Kathmandu). My wife, understanding my emotional attachments didn’t deny me in going despite the risk and my age, so I drove till Sanga (the highest point after which it’s all downhill to Kathmandu Valley). From Sanga I took a private boat and set off towards where Putalisadak used to be, I had the coordinates of my home so navigating with a hand held GPS unit helped a lot. Biggest threat was bumping into Telecom Towers, which sometimes can tear your boat apart. For a moment I felt like I am in Venice, people from 8th floor of the house were taking boat directly to their work, below that every thing is submerged. The global warming has melted all the mountains and the glaciers, Kathmandu now looks like what it used to be centuries ago, a big lake before Manjushree made the river outlet in Chovar (place near Kirtipur) to drain it (a folklore). I saw the peak of ‘Dharahara’, tallest tower in Kathmandu, so I knew I am closing in. Finally I got to my destination, too bad my house was not tall enough to be seen. As I stood in my boat, all the memories of my childhood comes pouring into my eyes.

My son has started a shipping company, he supplies food and resources from highlands to submerged areas, and he is really doing well. Last year when we got together for Dashain (major Nepalese festival), he was telling me that he will expand his business and make it multinational. With complete submergence of Bangladesh, ships from submerged Terai (Southern low land of Nepal) can directly go to Europe and America. He is bound to succeed, no wonder he used to love Kevin Costner movie ‘Water World’. I don’t really get to see my grandchildren; they are in some boarding school ship in Pacific Ocean. Sometimes I even compare my life with a song by Ugly Kid Joe: Cats in a cradle. I and my wife kill our time teaching in local school; it’s really amazing to see the faces of kids when we tell them how things were before.

It’s not that it is hot all the time; the weather has become so unpredictable that you never know what it will be like the next day. I was reading the news other day; ‘Northface’ filed for bankruptcy as there were zero demands for winter clothes. Couple of years ago, during all summer it had winter’s temperature, absolutely freezing, Lake Kathmandu was all frozen. I couldn’t even take my boat to visit my old house; however there was huge sale for summer clothes.

I remember the movie ‘Titanic’ where an old couple just hold each other in the bed when the ship was sinking, helpless. I think I am in that situation now, unknown to what’s in store for me tomorrow. As I lay down in my bed, clasping my wife’s hand, I begin to think of all the things that I could have done to avoid this:
• Shouldn’t have forced my dad to buy me a new Pulsar Bike because it had more power than my fuel efficient Hero Honda.

• Shouldn’t have bought a six cylinder Toyota Camry, simply because it had more power.

• Should have car pooled with my roommates when all four of us were going to same school, but liked to take our vehicle individually.

• Should have collected all the plastics that come in with my groceries and taken it to recycling center rather than dumping it to the trash.

• Should have used less heat and air conditioning.

• Should have put more energy efficient bulbs at my home

• Should have used my expertise in practice rather than in producing research reports.

• …………………………………………..and so on………………………

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My blood demons

Filed under: News/information and opinion by Prajwol — 1 Comment
April 3, 2007

For some reason I am always scared when it comes to donating blood. I always had skinny physique, so I constantly feared about me collapsing when giving blood. In Kathmandu University there used to be frequent blood drives, but I never gave blood. I used to bring band aid from home during those events and tape it around inside of my elbow and sip ‘Frooti’ (a local mango drink, given to the volunteers donating blood), posing myself like I too donated blood. I know I was a great waste for a universal donor (my blood group was O positive).

I avoided all the blood drives somehow. Then one day my uncle was in dire need of blood for transfusion, which too in large amount. I assembled half dozen of my friends (including me), who had O positive blood group. I was the last one to lie down in bed to donate. One of my friends was yelling “hey, close that door or else he will run away”. Among all my friends I had the best BP level and I was the quickest to complete the donation too. I was very happy; my blood donation demons were finally gone.

After coming to US, I tried to donate blood but I was told that since I came from a different country I had to wait for few years before I become eligible for blood donation, which makes sense too. So, all my life I have given blood only one time. There are lots of people in desperate need of blood every day, and universal donors like me aren’t helping the cause. But now scientists have come up with a technique to convert blood group from one to another. Thank god, now more people will be suitable for donation when need arises. I also promise that when there is next blood drive in my office, I will be the first one to sign up.

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My blood demons

Filed under: News/information and opinion by Prajwol — Leave a comment
April 3, 2007

For some reason I am always scared when it comes to donating blood. I always had skinny physique, so I constantly feared about me collapsing when giving blood. In Kathmandu University there used to be frequent blood drives, but I never gave blood. I used to bring band aid from home during those events and tape it around inside of my elbow and sip ‘Frooti’ (a local mango drink, given to the volunteers donating blood), posing myself like I too donated blood. I know I was a great waste for a universal donor (my blood group was O positive).

I avoided all the blood drives somehow. Then one day my uncle was in dire need of blood for transfusion, which too in large amount. I assembled half dozen of my friends (including me), who had O positive blood group. I was the last one to lie down in bed to donate. One of my friends was yelling “hey, close that door or else he will run away”. Among all my friends I had the best BP level and I was the quickest to complete the donation too. I was very happy; my blood donation demons were finally gone.

After coming to US, I tried to donate blood but I was told that since I came from a different country I had to wait for few years before I become eligible for blood donation, which makes sense too. So, all my life I have given blood only one time. There are lots of people in desperate need of blood every day, and universal donors like me aren’t helping the cause. But now scientists have come up with a technique to convert blood group from one to another. Thank god, now more people will be suitable for donation when need arises. I also promise that when there is next blood drive in my office, I will be the first one to sign up.

Comment