day of the dog.

yesterday was my favorite day in the south asian year. it's tihar (the nepali hindu festival of lights), during which a different animal (or sometimes person) is honored for each day of the holiday. yesterday was dog day. kathmandu is full of dogs (oh, i'm in nepal! i forgot to say that). these are perfect dogs--smallish, but with big-dog shapes and personalities. they're exactly the sort of dog i'd get, were i to get a dog (which i will, someday). yesterday, in celebration of tihar, the dogs of kathmandu were given tikkas--red blessings on their foreheads--and malas: garlands of marigolds, to wear around their necks. having spent the night at my coworker amrit's, the first thing we saw as we coasted, engine off, down the driveway on his new bike (an upgrade from his far-less-macho scooter, or "scootie," as he calls it), was a fat yellow dog stretching out in the sun, freshly clad in tikka and mala, and we both strated to laugh. how can you not love a holiday where street dogs dress like devout hindus? hmm. sometimes i think i'm meant to be a hindu. i spend so much time with tibetan buddhists and buddhism resonates in my life in a million tiny ways that i don't usually take the time to notice. i fight against it, but i grow within it. and still, i almost never have what i would describe as a religious experience in the buddhist world. but hinduism is another story; it transports me. it fills up my chest with this feeling like i'm about to cry. were i to be religious, i'd have to sing and dance. i'd have to jump around and wave my hands in the air, or i don't think i could let myself really GO there. the closest i ever feel to religious is through music, anyway, so i guess that makes sense. (for the record, i know hindus do more than sing and dance and jump around). the philosophies of hinduism and buddhism aren't so different--it's the expression of those beliefs that marks a greater divide. my connection to hinduism is mostly superficial; i visit temples, i attend ceremonial events on holidays. sometimes i want to go further. i've always been jealous of people who have religion; maybe it's time i got mine..?

i am full of chocolate cake. kathmandu is anything you want it to be, tourist trap very much included. yesterday i was a hungry ghost; i just couldn't get my fill. my coworker and i went shopping and both spent WAY too much money on clothes. today, it's all about food. for breakfast i had a nepali omelette stuffed with fresh herbs, inclding copious amounts of cilantro. then it was israeli food for lunch--hummus and baba ghanous and falafel and naan (a little south asian twist), with chocolate cake and chai for dessert. and i'm not done yet; i'll probably still eat dinner.

i feel like a real working woman. it's sunday evening now, and my work week begins again tomorrow, which is making me a little sad. not that i haven't been working this weekend (we spent about four hours on our budgest this morning), and not that my job happens in an office or anything terrible like that... what will i do if and when i DO have a job that happens from 9-5 at a desk? would i or could i ever enjoy it? do most people enjoy working? it's so hard to know when i don't have the experience of the thing that so much of the world thinks of as "work." i've worked a lot in my life--i can say that with confidence--but always at a restaurant, which brings with it the rush of staying up too late, flirting too much, acting in manic burts of energy when you're already exhausted, and then calling it quits--or in south asia, where my work and life are mostly inseparable. maybe some day i'll have an apartment in south asia and a job too, and i'll go to the job and then come home and still be in south asia but no longer be at work. huh. a bit hard to imagine, really.

well, it's getting dark outside so i'll stop--put my energy into digesting my cake... you know, that sort of thing.
love and love
e.