Ramayana

Some time ago, I decided I should read "Journey To The West", one of the most wellknown pieces of literature in east asia. Couldn't find it though (my Tai Chi place seemed to have volumes 2 and 3 but not 1), though I found a few general Monkey King tales. Anyways, when I was in San Fran in september, I went to the museum of asian art, and discovered many scenes from the Ramayana, and learned that it is perhaps an even more fundamental and well known story for most of asia. So I resolved to learn it. Unfortunately, procrastination got its way, and I never got around to it when I should have. During my recent time in asia, in multiple temples and palaces, there were again scenes from Ramayana. In fact, in two such places, there were incredible murals, a continuous painting along the entire hundreds of metres of wall surrounding a site. And the way they were done was amazing too, rather than individual frames, the scenes continuously flowed into each other. Unfortunately, as I hadn't gotten around to learning the story, the contents of these magnificent pieces of art were meaningless to me, except the most important battle scene. Alas, it's too late for that now, but I have started reading it, and am enjoying it.

Cooking

Is there anything less enjoyable? So far, I've come up with self-immolation, and baseball bat to the groin. After that I'm drawing a blank. Any suggestions?
Can't believe some people actually like it. Then again, there are people in this world who like having sex with dead animals, so I suppose cooking is not really that absurd.

Worse sign

When the stranger actually then stood you up.

Bad sign

I think it's a bad sign when strangers are more willing to hang out than people who know you.

Cynical and religious

So cynicism tried to invade today but I've mostly pushed it away. It was concerning meeting my old friend yesterday. We met 11.5 yrs ago, and she was very important then. Kept in touch for some years, and got to visit her 7.5 yrs ago. but things slowly dropped off, and haven't really had much contact for some years now. And now we meet up, like we're reuniting. We say things like "so happy to see you again" and I think we mean it. But really, after this long, and knowing so little about each others lives, are we really still friends? Or are we strangers who happen have a little extra reason to meet? We could be quite different people compared to when we became friends, if we were to meet today, not knowing we'd met in the past, how would things go? A lot can change in that many years, especially from being a teenager to being an "adult". But I guess a lot of things can stay the same. I dunno, it's kindof a weird thought. But overall I'm choosing to ignore it, cause it feels better that way. And maybe it is irrelevant anyways, it is today that matters, if we can hang out and like it, it doesn't matter what led up to it. Still, in some ways I feel like many religious people must feel... to know something, but actively choose to pretend it's not the case cause it feels better that way.

Realization

Somehow I only just realized tonight, this could be my last field work rotation. Who knows. It's a sad feeling and a scary feeling.