A Rambling Review

Old Time is whittling away. Another week gone, so soon?

This week, I had dinner with Adrian, friend of seventeen years, who firmly stated, over braised lamb, that this move to Cambodia was not a surprise. (Really? It still surprises me.) I thanked Adrian in advance for my care packages and postcards. He was right: I will miss English text very much. This week, I also had dinner with Joelie, over juicy pork dumplings immersed in ginger, soy sauce and vinegar, steaming, hot to the touch, the best this side of California. We talked about his criminal law practice, the Thai festival I missed, our friends, our colleagues, the Pacific Northwest, my move, his growing love of southern California and my lessening distaste of it. The curious thing, every time we talk, I am convinced criminal law may be interesting enough to try, someday, maybe, if this international human rights lawyering thing doesn't pan out, or if I grow disillusioned. Then, there was dinner with my sisters and mum, always an amusing affair, with mum asking if I will return to traditional firm life in 2011, asking us about marriage and kids, commenting about this and that, and the three of us shrugging our shoulders in response, muttering something irrelevant before bursting into laughter.

I did not see Jason, Desiree, or Joseph this week. I did not make it to the Getty. I did not try the fancy churros with Jack. I did, however, get poked in both arms, Japanese encephalitis and rabies. Like a baby, I confessed to the nurse that I hated shots and pleaded for gentleness. I was reminded of my dislike of cold hospitals, of their stark walls and unnatural light. I forgot to pick up the antibiotics and the 267 malaria pills prescribed -- I will.

I stumbled upon the coffee shop in Monrovia, the place where I, barely twenty, fell in love, and it was there, as I stared at my returned passport and flipped through the glossy blank visa pages tucked in the middle of the thread-bare booklet, that I wondered where this year would take me, wondered how markedly different life would be.

I had a good week.

Wendy

via Wendy Bevan Photography (gorgeous!)

On this warm Friday, Wendy is on my mind.

via Built By Wendy

Game Show

via Scenestirz

My grandma Elpidia has never forgiven Bob Barker, the former host of her once-favorite game show, The Price Is Right, for slighting her. Six years ago, before my move to Portland, my sisters, my grandma, and I queued up for a taping of the show in Los Angeles, hoping to be part of the audience and therefore a potential contestant. That morning was pregnant with possibilities, and you could sense my grandma's giddiness.

But, after five hours of sitting around, we were told that a large group had reserved most of the seats for that day's taping. My grandma was not going to be part of the show that day; she was, like us, a reject.

Thus began my grandma's boycott and growing resentment of a show that my sisters and I had grown up watching with her, on days when school let out early (or, when we feigned illness), while she painstakingly prepared our lunches.

It is all very funny, but if you know my grandma, you know she'll hold this grudge for a very long time -- she's not the kind of woman you cross, even if you are Bob Barker. In her stead, Cherlou and I are plotting to get on a gameshow, maybe as a pair.

Note to Self: Bathing in Siberian Lakes

High on my short list of places to revisit is Olkhon Island, Russia. Olkhon Island sits on Lake Baikal, the deepest fresh water lake in the world and also one of the oldest--at least 25 million years old. From Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, it is over a day's journey via train and then another six hours via bus to the island. To the Buryat people and to shamans, the island is one of the most sacred places on earth, a place of pilgrimage, the source of folklore and legend. According to one legend, a dip in Lake Baikal will add 25 years to your life.

Summers on the island, I've been told, are crowded and busy. When I visited, however, it was the cusp of Siberian winter, so my memories are of a place that appeared untouched, pristine and quiet, the stillness blighted only by the shrieking wind.

We set out in the morning to explore the island by foot, agreeing to return to our guesthouse by dark. I will tell you that exploring that island made me feel like a child, gripped by simple awe, open-eyed and open-mouthed, with constant murmurs of, "Krasiva, krasiva" (beautiful, beautiful).

My two days there were not enough. And, yes, in warmer weather, I will take another dip in the lake. Someday.

Things I Could Do Without, pt. 4

via Bona Drag

Today, the weatherwoman told me it is going to be a sunny day, over eighty degrees, a clear glaring sky.

Today, I want to wear a floppy straw hat, oxfords, and anything Samantha Pleet.

Punishable by Destruction

In Cambodia, as in the United States, the legal system requires you to take an oath of truth before bearing witness in court. In the Cambodian system, however, this oath is a tad more colorful, the potential consequences of perjury a tad more dire:

I will answer only the truth, in accordance with what I have personally seen, heard, know, and remember.

If I answer falsely on any issue, may all the guardian angels, forest guardians and powerful sacred spirits destroy me, may my material possessions be destroyed, and may I die a miserable and violent death.

But, if I answer truthfully, may the sacred spirits assist me in having abundant material possessions and living in peace and happiness along with my family and relatives forever, in all my reincarnations.

* * *

Thanks, Jeanice, for sending this my way. I'm thinking the courts here could take a cue, though it may not go with our puritanical roots or anything. Oh my, just a taste.

Plotting

via Aaron Huey and You Me The Royal We

Le sigh.