Ghostly, Recursive BHH 2037

Mood: Ghostly, Recursive
[Toot!] Index: 0.2
Communism Bit: Off
Location: Job, of course

[The real BHH commentary is in the comments. :o) Enjoy this, meanwhile.]

The crowds are glowing, everybody is laughing. The mood is right, for everyone. The kind of situation where even the assassin will let you finish your drink. Where the sniper will unload his gun, walk over to you, toast to your health, and, after the party ends, go back to take aim.
It is jam-packed. There is only enough space for the waiters not to have an excuse if they are slow with the Cabernet Sauvignon Rouge au Limonade—`with a touch of vinegar, if you don't mind'—that Baz ordered.
Me, I'm scribbling observations, the ones you're now reading, on my palms and arms, to post them to my blog on Sunday.

The crowds are big, because the bloggers are—by far—more numerous now than they were back in our days. I am glad I—the 27th Comrade—don't take up any space. Not that I am thin—that was true when I was alive. But ghosts, however fat, don't take up any physical space. So I mill through the crowds, knocking waiters, who don't notice me.
Although nobody demanded it, the bloggers present have split into two groups. Those who were bloggers from back then before the War, and the younger generation who take blogs for granted.

So, I walk to the elders of the Ugandan blogging phenomenon. They don't see ghosts, so they don't see me. Iwaya is there, with some journalists from his paper. Baz is done signing autographs. The kids on the other half of the hall are blogging live updates of this Bloggers' Happy Hour. LCD monitors, thin as mirrors, and touchboards (even thinner) are swinging from shoulders here and there, as the kids—the younger generation of Uganda bloggers—update their blogs and take photos. One, called `Boy Wonder', will later receive an award tonight for his blog's writing quality.

`In our days, the best real-time update of a blog we could do was by phone,' Carlo says. `And the screens were small—it wasn't worth it.'
Dee says `And there was a wi-fi thing near Santo's back then, but it cost a bit. These days, internet is free everywhere. These kids don't know what we went through.' But Santo's no longer exists, now. That whole area had been converted into one train terminal.
Ivan is there, and he refused to leave his bodyguard outside.
CB, SAGE, everyone. Those who had profited from the War and those who had been hurt by it were all here—they'd done well for themselves.
As Duksey<sup>*</sup> put it, `Bloggers, it seems, were wired for success.'
Heaven is here, her face still looking like a love song, exactly twenty years from her first BHH. There are millionaires in this hall. And three billionaires. (Maybe four, we aren't sure of Cheri's worth ...)

I walk over to the table where Kelly is seated (her daughter, Isis, is one of the younger bloggers with green dye in their hair on the other side), with Scarlett Lion and Dave, and then beyond to where Baz, Cheri, Iwaya, Ivan ... just about all the pre-War bloggers are.
Ivan, being Ivan, asks, `Isn't it funny? It's the twenty-sixth of July, right? Exactly twenty years ago, we had a BHH. And Comrade attended it, right?'
Everyone nods, almost seeing where this is leading.
Ivan goes on, `Funny, because he was executed on the twenty-sixth of July, during the War.' The co-incidence starts to sink in. `And when he blogged about the July 26th BHH of 2007, he didn't actually write any of what happened, even though he always said it was one of the best ever'.
`Yeah ...' Cheri says, seeing where this is leading.
Ivan goes on: `In that post of his, if you remember, he talked of himself showing up at a BHH twenty years later, as a ghost.'
`Heh. You believe in ghosts?' CB asks Ivan, who just laughs, saying neither `Yes' nor `No'.
`If that post was true, he'd be hearing us now, you know,' Cheri notes. `As a ghost.'
`I'll be frank: I don't pity Communists when they die. They are war mongers. Just being a blogger doesn't buy him points, when he dipped us all into a useless war.' That is Baz, refusing to forgive me, even at this point. Fuck you, Baz.
`Didn't your mother tell you to say good things about the dead?' Cheri asks Baz, in total shock.
`Yes,' Baz replies. `And I said Good!'^**
Nobody mentions the mystery of my blog that keeps updating itself. The government says there is an underground blogger writing to it. But underground bloggers can't know so much detail about twenty years ago, and everybody knows that.

Just then, Jackfruity is heard from the platform, her American `R' still intact, after all this time in Uganda:
`Welcome to this Ugenduh Blaagrrs Heppy 'Ourr ... It is ov'rr twenty yearrs since the f'rrst one ... Mateo's no laangrr exists ... [chuckle, chuckle, chuckle] ... But blaaggin' is forev'rr ... Enjoy yarrselves.'

I walked to the stage, later that evening, to receive my `posthumous award' for the `Posts That Consistently Made Little Or No Sense' category, but they didn't give it to me, mbu I am dead. It's alright. Segregation against the dead isn't about to end.

^* Yes, the same Duksey who caught me staring at her bosom for the fifteenth time last BHH. :o)
^** The line is stolen from the Desmond's comedy sitcom.

Rantdom Thurogitts 2.1

Mood: Random, depressed, hoping.
[Toot!] Index: 0.0
Communism Bit: Off
Location: Job, of course

There's a Bloggers' Happy Hour on Thursday, at Mateo's, starting at 6:30pm. Now, I don't want a lame excuse for missing ... If you miss, it better be for only three reasons: baby, anonymity, sex. No other reasons are good enough. :o)

Mid-week post. Very un-characteristic. I guess it is that depression stuff I've been talking about of late.
I'm out of my element, and doing weird stuff I'd not do if I were in my normal mind. I'm not in my normal mind. If you've been at other end of my weirdness, I pray you are benevolent.
Anyway, so I attempted a return to normal life, and it failed miserably. As it is, I dunno what next. Do I (a) pull the dagger out, and with it my heart, or (b) leave it in 'til it festers and I die?
A. Pull it out.

And ...
Ish, are you having exams or something? Missing in action quite a bit.
Dennis, are you in jail? :o) Missing in action quite a bit.
Degstar, did the suicide finally succeed? Missing in action too bloody much.

In closing ... there are three chics I once knew who were like extensions of my Mum. You know, cute, kind, patient, and all that shit I like about chics. So I liked them, needless to say. And at a time like this, I find myself very nearly calling any of them up ... One is a world away. One changed numbers. The other ... I have her bangle on, even now. I'm gon' call her up.
Yes, gentle women repair my spirit. Usually, it is my Mum, but now she is too far away.

Huit Faits au Hasard

Mood: Random mood. :o)
[Toot!] Index: 0.2
Communism Bit: Off
Location: Job, of course

Nga why don't I get tagged to give `eight random facts' about I and I?
Hmm ... let's see. Since I'm just tossing my chest open and inviting all the passers-by to poke that wriggling red thing, I hope I don't get to regret it. Someone may conceal a dagger ...
Okay:

1. When I left home, I walked out with barely anything other than my wallet. And t-shirt and jeans. And I decided to build a new history in the slums. First thing was to get a nice-ish crib, which I did. But then I started planning to make it a replica of home. I realised that was the wrong approach, so I settled for having little and buying only what I get to need.
   That was when I realised I didn't need much. I so loved the minimalism that I started getting rid of stuff I'd already bought. From the Persian rug to the extra curtains. The purge was great. And I loved my shack more. By now, it was almost bare. I just love living lean. Every once in a while I toss my eyes around and there is only one thought on my mind: What do I have that I don't absolutely need?.
   You should see my crib. There's almost nothing. And I'm lovin' it! :o)


2. When I was about twelve or thirteen, I and a friend got a nestling. It fell out of the class ceiling and—miraculously—didn't die. So we put it in my desk. And started feeding it. And it survived. And it grew. And the feathers started forming. And whenever I opened the desk, it let off stanza of chirps. We fed it. I never opened the desk during lessons, lest it gape at the teacher, asking for food.
   Visitation Sunday came, and some parent saw it. Thank God he was something like a vet. He told us what to feed it on. Insects. Being young boys, we went and got insects. But, by then, the malnourishment (on primarily bread, which has nearly no nutrients for a baby bird) had taken its toll. The bird's sibling flew out of the ceiling, some day, struggling on amateur wings. And ours wasn't even well-covered yet. It died soon later. :o(
   
   With this same friend, we kept kittens in the school farm. We rescued an injured one (the leg was still dislocated by the time we lost him) and a litter of many cold, abandoned kitties. We had a meowing crew of comrades. And then the askaris discovered them. We never saw them again. :o(


3. I'm too secretive. I always act as though I'm being watched by some evil sisterhood. I act haunted and paranoid and secretive. I've been writing in a certain code in my diary since 2002. As though one code is not enough, I have had a number of them. And there are some for digital diaries and others for hand-written diaries. Because of the secretive habit, I won't say more about the codes. :o)


4. As a kid in school, you could have thought I'd end up writing fiction novels. I used to spin all these outrageously-impossible fibs and tell them to my friends. And they'd, along the way, tell me `Oh, cummon. That is one big fat lie.'
   And I'd go over my lie, line-by-line, finding the weak points. I'd think everything over again, and I'd be like `Hm ... Alright, next time I won't be so powerful. I'll let the lion at least rip my shirt before I squeeze the the life out of its neck.'
   Maybe I should become a fiction novelist, after all! :o)



5. May I make the wiser choices, even without intending to,
   May it be in the arms of a lover that I die, if I ever have to die,
   May my hand never cause the tears of a child.
   —The 27th Comrade

   Unfortunately, none of those three Mays will happen, it seems. I seem to screw up all the time. I may be hanged or executed by firing squad, after having been captured in a long, destructive war. I have these dark expectations lingering under my brow ... :o(
   


6. I am expecting. A kitten. For my crib. I am waiting for the fuzzy little ball, when the Ma-kitten who carries it around drops it. And then I worry it will scratch my mattress. And let the air out, so that I have nowhere to put my head. That's not even counting the suffering it will cause before it knows how to do toilet well. My nose is already twitching of its own accord! And that's a feat, considering it has to lug some weight around to do that ... :o(


7. Expat blogs piss me. Especially those of Westerners in Africa. Some don't (like the majority of the Uganda-centric ones, which I find okay to some extent), but most do. Why? Because when they leave their places out there, they come over here with that I-R-SUPERMAN feeling, going to `Save Africa'. Because, as we all know, the Africans are seated in the dust, waiting for them to come and fix the problems. And it gets worse. When they get here, they are doing what I'd do if I went off into the desert to observe the workings of a primitive tribe of semi-humans. All of a sudden, the latest cool things are adopting poodle puppies and saving another African today. We are at the sad end of yet another spate of the superiority complex of the West. So they will be flying in to save me from hunger. `First stop starving the niggers, then we can talk about you exploiting us anew,' is what I'd say if I were Africa's Dear Leader. :o)
   Say, what you may, but this is true. Here's someone who thinks the same (link got from here).


8. The last fact is that there is no eighth fact.\0
   
   But as an aside, I'll just let this one out. I feel like I'm slipping back into being the kind of kid I was back in the days. Not talking to people, talking more to myself and my pets than to humans. And I'm serious—some fat depression done hit me of late. I need a shoulder to lean on, but, as is always the case, I have none. :o(
   At its extremes, you'd even cease to hear from The 27th Comrade. Once upon a time, I was a solitary, mystical recluse. I may become one again soon. I'd hate to, but it happens. :o(

Poke my heart. :o) Looks like all my comrades were tagged ages ago. So ... I'll let the recursion stop here. But if I see one who should spill some beans, I'll update here (complete with the Rules).

Rantdom Thurogitts 2.0

Mood: Bored
[Toot!] Index: 7.2
Communism Bit: Off
Location: Job, of course

We roll, no wasting time and words.

From a comment I posted on Kelly's blog:

I find it creepy that the general idea of democracy sounds, to me who is an infidel as far as democracy is concerned—a non-believer—much like a Western Jihad. Your country starves us until we are `democratic enough'. That starving us is un-democratic by their definitions, in the first place.

So if we hate terrorists, because they are Jihadist fanatics, who are we referring to? Those who refuse to pay back what they stole, starve us and shoot at us, until we have been crushed and humbled and we suck on their `democracy' ideology, or those who bomb us and shoot at us until we have been crushed and humbled and we call on the name of Allah?
It would be sad if Hitler had won the War and besieged Uganda and declared that we must believe in his version of democracy, or he won't let any anti-retrovirals into the country.
In short, no matter what you have brain-washed into believing, the West is just another terrorist gang that we happen to love more that the terrorist gang in the (Middle) East. Full stop.
Wait. Don't you glean anything from the co-incidence of the arrival of the Western downpressors and the rise of dictators in Africa?
They yap and yap about making us democratic—who giveth them the right? Democracy is not an American/Western concept. It is a human concept. It existed long before America was formed, long before Europe was populated. These Johnny-come-lately states are trying to bully the world and extract subservience by means of propaganda with a concept that is richer on Kampala's streets than in the Pentagon, and promising a utopia—`if only you worship at this altar'. Is the West even democratic (where democracy is defined by me, not by the Bush dynasty)?
War is Peace! Iraq is Free! Freedom is Slavery! Colonialism/Occupation is Democratic! Ignorance is Strength! Guántanamo Bay is Paradise!

Wake up! Rise, ye mighty People! Don't be free to choose slavery!

Back to the slums.
I found myself giving a lecture on HIV in the slums. :o)
Some slummer (called Ibra, which is sane compared to other names I've had to recite down there) was talking about AIDS, and saying if you lay a chic who is HIV positive once, you can go commit suicide. And some fat woman there was saying it isn't true. Nobody seemed to believe her when she said her sister's husband died of AIDS, and the sister is still well, probably negative.
Let me extend my lecture to the blogren. Grab your pencils and notebooks, please:

In Rwanda, a research found that 40% of all couples where there is HIV were discordant. In Uganda, the figure is around 60%, if I remember correctly.
A discordant couple is one where one partner has HIV and the other doesn't. This is usually in spite of continued sex between the two. It is shockingly-common. And it is painful to imagine how many people didn't know about it, and hence ended up getting infected in the end, because they didn't take steps to avoid infection, thinking they were already infected.
The stories abound. Very many. Including that of the presenter of The Untold Story, whose husband died of AIDS.
So, even if you have been exposed gravely to HIV, do not assume a status. Checking is the only way to ascertain.

In closing.
You know the evil part about having a knife stuck in your chest? If you pull it out, you drag your insides out with it. If you leave it in place ... well, it's not very healthy to have a dagger dangling from between one's ribs, really.

Also, no more Communist ranting on this blog. Either I open a new one, or it goes unsaid. I know it bores you, blogren, but what will I and I do?

Seven Newer Wonders of the World

Mood: Disagreeing, confessing-to-having-big-...
[Toot!] Index: 5.2
Communism Bit: On
Location: Job, of course

I am knocking Concrete Jungle. I have written and deleted five things. I dunno what is going on. I will just nod to this music meanwhile.
Oh, and forget that rant I promised last week. Forget it. [toot!] it.

But here's one. It's the seventh of the seventh month in the seventh year of this millennium. Actually, eighth year, but let's ignore that.
And guess what. Some idiotic Europeans have conducted a poll by SMS and e-mail to vote on the new seven wonders of the world. I don't know why these things are `wonders'. Are we insinuating that ancient world was too stupid to build towers and long-standing monuments, that wherever we see them, oh, that's a wonder that they did that! Fuck the world. We over-rate ourselves too much. I guess my boots will be wonders in 1000 years.
The worst thing about that list is that it is so fixated with buildings. These things we build are not wonders. They will go away, anyway, when George Bush thinks he can take on the Invincible Army of The Dear Leader Comrade Kim Jong-il, the Bright Light of the Millennium, Holding High the Banner of the Invincible Ideology.
This is the true list of the seven wonders of the world:

1. The Communist Ideology. You've got to give it up for an ideology—whether you agree with it or not—that swept a third of the world in so short a time. Nothing has ever been able to do that before or after.
2. Semitic Spiritualism. Come to think of it, the majority of humans follow a belief system hailing from the Middle East.
3. Western Brutality. No other people have ever been (or will ever be) as brutal and evil as the West. Nobody will trade in humans so much, nobody will starve a continent, nobody will have thousands of nuclear bombs wrapped in a cloth labelled `Peace', nobody will ever be so imperialist, nobody will ever spread a fuzzy hope of `democracy' with such a gaping absence of the same `democracy', nobody will cause so much death, pain and suffering as today's Western world. Come, O Great Revolution! :o)
4. Africa: No spot on Earth will ever, or ever has, recover from centuries of being the object of the perverse acts of Western Brutality like Africa. There are no native Americans in Washington, because they were not Africans. Africa is immortal. If we were any less African, we wouldn't exist. We are a wonder.
5. Survival, the Bob Marley album. It is simply the finest expression of wauling, shouting, screaming, skankin', trumpetin', strummin' rebellion against imperialism and the basic notion of inherited suffering.
6. The Long March of the Chinese Peasants and Workers' Red Army. This was a retreat—under fire—by the Army, led by Chairman Mao, for 12,500 kilometres, crossing rivers, mountains, valleys and obstacles that, until then, had no names. And they emerged victorious, breaking through enemy lines with a spirit that can still be seen dashing across the Chinese night sky, leaving glowing coals of red in its wake.
7. Cheri L'Amour. Okay. There. Phew. That wasn't hard. Just typed it.
   For all that ever went wrong in the world, none did on this here girl. She restored my faith in God. There must be an Almighty Creator out there. And He must be Almighty to come up with the chic who made me edit my Scales of Beauty, and add a new category to the extreme right, many places beyond `Unbelievable', named after her.
   Rejoice, o sons of men! The Goddess of Beauty, prophesied for ages, hath arrived to walk among us!
   Hehehehe. Ah. Near-worship, eh? :oD Relax. It happens, sometimes.
   

In other news tonight:
Some stuff's been going down of late, over here. It is why I am not too ready to deny all the claims that I am going soft. Maybe I am, indeed, going soft. Of course, it is not the posts. Some of my earlier posts, like The Soldier's Woman are very much the kind that would get me suspected of being soft.

Anyway, yeah. Some stuff has been going down. But I am a bit in denial about it. I'll see how long I can keep this up.