Chinese Chicken Song

Not sure if there is a message and meaning to this video other than humor. It tickles the ribs and is a few minutes of mindless entertainment…well done Wang Rong Rollin!

Audacity of Russell Brand

Please be inspired by the pluckiest speech that I have heard in a long time. Russell Brand calls into question the pomp and pretensions of the GQ suits and shameful, past sins of Hugo Boss (they made a fortune supplying the Nazis with uniforms).

I Ate a Potata

The following video makes it startlingly clear why Idahoans completely lost the vaunted potato market to the Maltese:

Light on B.K.S. Iyengar

Insightful article about a beloved teacher of yoga and life,

www.newyorker.com/business/currency/iyengar-invention-yoga

Gossip Whoring Expats

Is there anything to love about smarmy gossip whores that infest the free world (Kathmandu and Rishikesh are especially overrun)…mainly expats with little better to do and incessant energy for it. Busybodies gather in low-rent flats over cheap dinners and drinks and conjure half-baked ideas about their community of fellow humans based on anecdotal ‘evidence’…e.g., if these flibbertigibbet-bimbos spot a gal and guy hanging out together then it is presumed that they are lovers…base envy or because they themselves would never have an opposite-sex friend that they were not immediately snogging?

Well, the smarmy gossip harlots (of both genders) cannot be too happy if they have to distill satisfaction from fabricated chinwag (and those among them that are chain dope-smoking or excessive drinking obviously cannot be too happy with their expat lives that they are escaping through chemical assistance). Here is an unsolicited suggestion to these busybodies, stop thinking about and talking about others for an immediate boost in personal well-being.

The ridiculous human monkey mind is at it constantly (and viciously) and the gossip whores are clear and present evidence. Give the monkey mind nothing to do and it will return a lower-intestine load of ignorance as a main offering to an already, overly-miserable world…ignorance until the end of eternity—hopefully not beyond.

Here is a message for the condescending, wiggle-waggle floozies that infest the planet, don't mind,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzWkqfQ17Eo

The Curious Case of Clear and Present Apartheid

By now readers have an idea that I am a cynic (aimed-for realist rather than a reviled pessimist). That said, please don't be offended -- the following is only my opinion after all and a very fallible opinion that is commonly proven wrong...

Rishikesh is a town in a province in a country run by Brahmins...no problem...well, except the wretched caste hierarchy that is very much in place and pervades the mind set and actions of the populace (the entitled castes will tell you that caste discrimination and abuse has been done away with and they largely run the media, government, bureaucracy, schools, businesses, hospitals, military, police etc and so on--ultimately holding the reigns of power and influence). Don't believe it for a moment, caste discrimination, segregation and abuse is alive and strong, and as I've said before, casteism is simply a euphemism for apartheid.

Casteism is as insidious and dehumanzing an apartheid as ever was...curiously, nearly all foreigners are unawares here. They just don't see it and don't make distinctions and are sold a pack of lies from those in power with influence and glib tongues eager to exonerate themselves. In truth, the 'upper' castes are the chief reason for underdevelopment and are at the forefront of societal ills including--discrimination, lack of education, grinding poverty, ill-health, old-guard-myopic patriarchy, female infanticide, female oppression, lack of opportunity, lack of representation by women and youth and so on and so forth in many grisly, unholy ways. They have been in power for centuries with much pain to show for it and much to be ashamed of.

Yet, despite a dismal track record, the entitled castes still hold a holier than thou attitude and sense of entitlement by birth...for example, the leading hatha yoga schools of the world today were developed and led by Brahmin boys...the other children simply weren't allowed to practice yoga and attend higher classes on spirituality and to this day there is that prejudice and especially in northern India where it is very subtle but pervasive and insidious...most happens outside the radar of foreigners.

Some visitors come and get beguiled by Hinduism, even becoming fanatical, gleaming-eyed devotees wearing the dress and accessories and participating in rituals...while there is much good in any religion, generally such participation occurs generally with the 'elite' castes and helps glorify Hindu conservatism and reinforces the holier than thou priestly-Brahmin mindset.  These foreigners often don't know but a sparse spattering of language (mostly mispronounced), are generally blind to culture and history and some are tantamount to fanatical Christians in Hindu clothing...

Conservative Hinduism is the cause of as much harm and suffering as Conservative Christianity and Conservative Islam et cetera...probably more because it validated caste discrimination and abuse among many other horrors. Then again, conservatives of other religions don't exactly have a clean chit.

The docu-movie Kumare...entertaining and eye-popping...is a must see for would-be travelers to Disneykesh (Rishikesh), especially those wishing to don the apparel of a conservative Hindu...

BOL! BAM! Shiva Ratri

Maha Shiva Ratri occurs on the new moon--February 17th this year.

An occasion to honor the marriage of Shiva and Parvati that is celebrated with festive activities a few days before as well. All-night vigils with bonfires are held at shrines throughout the land of Hindus. One of the largest takes place at the World Heritage Site of Pashupatinath Temple along the banks of the holy Bagmati River in eastern Kathmandu, Nepal. Visitors travel from afar to take place in rituals including fasting, feasting, music, chanting, singing, praying, reciting of sacred text, and meditating (along with consumption of cannabis which is overlooked by authorities during this devotional time). 

One interpretation of this festival is that it represents a mystical celebration of the marriage of the 'twin realities' of Shiva energy (male energy) with Shakti (female energy, the primordial force of femininity or Universal Mother)

Bol! Bam! O Namo Shivaya! O Namo Parvatiya!

(how about a Parvati Ratri festival, too?)