Do’s and Don’ts

What not to do when going on a Trek (through hell ).

DON’T wear sneakers!

Don’t be deceived by the image. These shoes aren’t designed for rough terrain. They’re no different from Sam Vimes’s cardboard sole shoes. Yeah sure, Sam likes it that way ’cause he can tell where he is just by feeling the cobblestones on the street, but when you’re legging it through a trail, and a rough one at that, the last thing you want is to feel the ground!

With sneakers on you’ll first feel EVEY single stone. A bit later each stone will feel like a sudden spark of electricity shooting up your foot. If you press on, eventually, your foot becomes numb. Yup, sneakers are a definite no-no! If you’ve got nothing else when taking on a trek, go buy yourself a proper pair of trekking shoes.

Do eat and get plenty of rest before your trek

You need to be charged up for it. ’nuff said.

Do take water and food along with you.

If you think you’ve got enough food and water, you haven’t. Take more. And then some…

_______

Do’s and Don’ts aside, I got a fair share of cuts, scratches, leech bites and bruises.

Got a cut on my wrist trying to fish for some mackerel… out of a tin can.  Yeah, alright that may not seem very ‘rough n’ tough’, but when there’s nothing else but can of jack mackerel, and 10 people share it right out of the can… THAT’S… ok, pure desperation caused by hunger. Heck, if we didn’t have that tin can we would have resorted to cannibalism and eaten each other by night fall.

The leeches weren’t too fond of me though. I had only two of the little blood suckers bite me. One at my ankle and the other on my clavicle (shoulder blade). St.Fallen and Little_Boy_Blue on the other hand… The leeches were drawn to them… possibly the effect of the weed in their blood

Here’s how leeches suck blood:

A blood sucking leech attaches itself to the skin of its victim using its suckers. It makes a small wound in the surface of its hosts skin using three serrated jaws just inside its mouth. It then releases saliva into the wound, which contains the anti-clotting agent called hirudin. This keeps the blood flowing freely. The saliva also contains a substance that blocks nerve transmission from the pain sensors in the skin, so that the victim does not notice its bites.

It may sound like something out of a horror flick but it’s fine. You don’t feel it. You’ve got nothing to worry about ’cause the only superficial blood vessels are your veins. So at the very most you’ll just have a bit of a scar for a few days.

And here’s the bruise I got after a buffalo pulled a Zinedine on me…

The picture was taken this morning, it’s turned a ripe shade of deep purple now.

It was a crazy trek but the guys were awesome. All the rest of you girls should join them on their next adventure. You’ll be in safe hands I can vouch for that.

As for me, I’ll be sitting out the next one. My parents weren’t too pleased that I hadn’t kept them up to date every second of the day about where I was and whether I was still alive. So I’m going to have to wait for this to fizzle out before I can go anywhere with friends again

Caricatures of Bloggers II

Makuluwo was my first caricature so I played it safe and stuck more or less to a proper profile instead of exaggerating her features in true caricature style. This time around I thought I’d be a bit more adventurous and well… here’s PapareBoy

At the risk of blogger anonymity being at stake… but I don’t really think anyone who hasn’t met him before will be able to recognise him after having seen this.

So, while I’m polishing my caricature skills by drawing Kottu.org bloggers, if you are on my Facebook Friends list, you might just be my next victim!

Love or Lust?

Disclaimer: The reference of ‘love’ in this post is in the context of an inamorato/ inamorata. Not love for your parents, kids, siblings, friends, etc.

At the risk of having an angry mob hunt me down and them subjecting me to a tiresome harangue about how wrong I am, I’d say it’s all lust. Since the time matrimonial rituals were of cavemen bludgeoning the object of their affection over the head and dragging her back to their cave/home, love has been confused with lust.

Then again, I believe the emotion we have termed “love” (refer disclaimer) has been conjured up by some sadistic individual. I don’t think it’s natural or innate. After quite a bit of deliberation I’ve concluded that it’s a synthetic emotion that with the brainwashing of the media, we are beguiled into believing it’s genuine.

Often I find myself consoling love burned friends. And more often than not these hopeless, broken friends happen to be guys! I’ve thus come to the conclusion that men are more faint of heart when it comes to the myth of love. It’s amazing really! I’ve heard it all, from “she’s the one!” to  “I’ll never love anyone more than I love her, for all of eternity!”…

At which point I want to just grab them by the shoulders and shake some sense into them!

My cynical opinion could have been developed while consoling these cupid damned souls. Being the person consoling them, I’ve found myself looking at this sort of love objectively.

Also, it’s only fair that it be known I’m more emotionally detached than the average person. There have been a countless number of times when people, including my friends and even my mom, have told me that I’m not the sort of person who’s ruled by my heart.

When faced with a problem, I tend to step back, analyze it and come up with the best possible solution. How I feel about it or how others may feel about it is irrelevant, ’cause everyone/ everything will be as right as rain when the solution is put into effect (and it always is).

Here’s a bit of what my heart-broken guy friends are going through-

* Friend One tends to fall hard. When he falls in love with someone, his “love” becomes engraved in stone. He’ll love all his crushes and ex’s till his dying day. He’s also the guy who believes that there is only one girl for him. And even though she’s just cruel to him AND it’s been years since they were together, he is still madly in love with her. (Where’s the logic in that?)

* Friend Two falls in (and not necessarily out of) love with a new girl every two minutes. His feelings are always intense, the “I can’t survive without her” sort. Would you believe there’s ALWAYS some complication in hooking up with the girl.

* Friend Three is your regular badass- sex, drugs and rock and roll. He loves his weed and booze, and he smokes like a chimney. He says he was a saint before, it was love that had driven him towards the afore mentioned. According to him “one innocent” girl who broke his heart is to be blamed for his addictions.

Those are the three main types, other friends (including the girls) are mixes of the three.

I love my friends to bits so you can imagine how infuriating it is to see them hurt and depressed. Especially when it’s pain inflicted on themselves for something ridiculous as being in love. It isn’t surprising why I’m cynical about love, is it?

If you think things through and not give into your heart so easily, you wouldn’t find yourself in these situations. It’s all pretty simple really.

And come on, there are more important things in life than having a main squeeze! Love is nothing more than a mythical construct designed by a sadistic caveman, and has been exploited by the media since menhirs were used for advertising. Wake up and smell the deceit!

Defying the laws of physics and the embarrassment of doing so…

You’d think being closer to the ground would reduce my chances of falling, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.  Being… fun sized should ideally mean that my centre of gravity is low– making me more resistant to stumbling, yet I’ve no balance what-so-ever.

I have defied the laws of physics! Take that, Archimedes!

Although, that’s just a part of how klutzy I am. My navigational skills are bit wonky to boot, cursing me with a tendency to bump into things. My thin frame should enable me with effortless maneuverability through the obstacle courses of my bedroom, the office or an empty arena for that matter. But I’m such a pro at being a klutz that I can actually trip over dust particles!

Now while I may crow about being an example of defiance and having put great physicists to shame, this does have it’s sour consequences… From tripping slightly, to an all out belly flop!

The worst I’ve experienced of the latter, was back in school. I was making my way to the corridor along which the bio, chem and phy labs are located, when a slight mental miscalculation resulted in the tip of my shoe meeting the end of the little step at the entrance. I belly flopped flat on the floor. This happened to be during the interval so the whole senior school was out and around to watch me tumble. Took me a good 5 seconds to recover from the initial shock, before literally springing to my feet and responding in general to all the gasps with… “er, I’m alright! I’m good! Carry on”.

I received a few bruises but surprisingly my ego was unscathed. The time my ego was wounded was yet another interval when I was climbing down a flight of stairs. Now, it may seem impossible ’cause when descending there aren’t any obstacles that your foot may trip up against, but I have proved Reebok right- impossible is nothing!

I never exactly figured out how… but I tripped, landed on my bum and bounced down the flight on stairs! My so called friends were doubled up in laughter long after I had ended up at the foot of the stairs with my bum and ego, terribly sore.

Friends’ weddings are the worst. It’s become expected of me to trip at these gala events. From almost dragging a group of my friends down with me in full view of ALL the guest while having our picture taken with the bride, to the most epic fall I’ve had to date! Mind you, that epic fall had nothing to do with me being a klutz…

Having reached our reserved table, I stood for a few minutes talking to a friend on the left of me. My bestie on my right, couldn’t get to her seat ’cause my seat was in the way, so she pulled my seat out. Ill-timed and typical of me, that was just when I decided to sit down.

It all happened in slow motion… The thoughts in my head rushed in nano seconds-

“Hmm… these seats are rather low. No… wait! This is way too low!”

I could hear the alarms go off in my head!

“There is no seat! Panic! Panic!”

My right hand shot for the table, landing on the little plate of dessert and a fork, tipping it forward and sending the pudding and fork flying over head! My bum met the floor with a thump, a little distance away I heard the splosh and clank of the wattalapam and fork (respectively) hitting the ground. All of which was promptly followed by a roar of laughter from my so called friends.

Strangely though, I wasn’t embarrassed by that. Probably ’cause besides my chums no one saw that epic fall occur. We all just goofed off and I pranked called another friend at the SAME table! Hehe… good times… Damn, I miss my friends!

Saturday was interesting…

I had been asked to speak on journalism at a career guidance conference organised by my school OGA. But I had intended on spending the whole of Saturday with some friends, so I referred them to a schoolmate who was a journalist up until a few months back before she got hitched.

Come Saturday morning, I buzzed the president of the OGA, only to find out that they’d had no luck in finding a replacement. She reassured me that I’d be done by 11.30 am, and since I was to meet up with my friends for Transformers2, at 12.00pm, I figured what the heck! All I had to do was get up on the old school stage and speak to a bunch of brats about journalism, right?

Wrong…

11.00 am, I found myself sitting at a panel at some place that did not remotely resemble the school assembly hall. The other past pupils on the panel were all my seniors, and were going through prepared speeches, one even had a powerpoint presentation! I was completely unprepared! Now, I could have jotted down some important points on the palm of my hand while waiting to be introduced to the podium, but I was too engrossed in what the other speakers had to say and thinking to myself in turn, how far more interesting and exciting my career path was to theirs! I know, that’s terribly cocky of me but you can’t blame me for thinking that way. The two who were at the podium before me spoke about being a desk lawyer or lecture! Yawn… All I could think was- man, that’s dull!

When it was my turn at the podium, I just spoke off the top of my head. And now, I feel I could’ve said a lot more… Dang!

Right after I was done, instead of returning to my seat at the panel, I hot-footed it straight to the exit. On my way out I was given a little gift, sort of like a token of appreciation for speaking at the conference, my first thought on receiving it was- I hope it’s a pen and not some silly dust-collecting memorabilia. That’s just me for you, I find ornaments useless… if it doesn’t do anything, what’s the point????

Transformers 2!

With all the last minute additions, we ended up with 7 guys and 2 girls. Four Kottu bloggers, two non-Kottu bloggers and three lame duckies. The movie was good. Except for when Hish, and PaparéBoy, wolf whistled whenever Megan Fox appeared on screen (hooligans!). The WhacksteR took it upon himself to censor the kissing scenes for me by promptly obstructing my view with the back of his hand. Makuluwo was the only one among us who didn’t enjoy the movie. As for the lame duckies… of what I gathered from the ‘after-movie-discussion’ they seemed to have appreciated the movie mostly ‘cause Megan Fox was acting in it. *cough-typical-cough*

Few ‘hours’ of lunch later and one guy short, we crammed ourselves like sardines in a can, in Mackie’s car and headed off to the only coffee joint in Colombo that’s easy on the wallet- Coffee Stop.

After drowning their coffee, the guys got to talking about how to pick up girls. The concentration, the solemn nods of concurrence, the intense look across their faces- anyone passing by would have assumed they were discussing something of gravity, like politics or even the Armageddon. To my female ears, it sounded more like they were discussing fishing for bass- the right bait, how long you should wait, how to reel in the biggest baddest bass out there… And all this from 6 guys who are all single! Ha! Shows how much their theories work!

And finally they ask the two girls, what the best pick up line would be. Did they honestly think we’d share that valuable bit of information?