Top 5ive things I hate…

…about living in the land down under. I’m only writing this to give you poor souls a break from all the politics, mayhem and what not. At least that’s all you need to know. (Note to Manshark: this is for reminding you things you might forget if Sri Lanka were to start driving you mad someday in the near future).

So, the Top 5ive things I hate about living in the land down under:

1. When the sky goes all blue and rains down blinding sunshine and I, like the fool that I am, run out (and still miss the damned bus!) without a jacket and freeze my butt off since the cold wind won the contest over the sun

2. People who have no respect for running mansharks and beep their horns and scare the living day lights out of me

3. Crazy tram drivers who ding-ding-ding! at running mansharks and scare whatever remains of the living day lights (what are living day lights? The number of ‘light’ of days one lives? So does that mean manshark shall now only live at night?)

4. Vicious, lunatic magpies

5. People who run over possums and leave their carcasses (the possum’s, not suicide-ed people’s) in the middle of the road (okay, I’m not asking for a sob-fest burial here, but at least leave ‘em on the road side so the rest of the possum-brood won’t possibly get run over looking for mum)

6. (Hyper) footy crowd at Richmond station on Sat arvo – no, the stink of beer is just not attractive

7. People who say ‘she’ll be right mate’ instead of giving me a hug when I tell them I have failed my exams

8. Big, neat roads with polite drivers that make driving such a bore. Now, in Sri Lanka, it’s a bit different, y’see. First, when you manage to nudge your way on to the main road from the itty bitty lane you were on, there’s the exhilaration of your first triumph of the journey. Then comes the mad go, stop, go, STOP!! (fucking three-wheeler full of grinning dimwits), go, stop, shit that dimwit-full three wheeler is after me, go, go, GO!!, stop, apologize to the biker you almost ran over (yes, it’s always the non-bikes that are at fault), go, stop, etc. Then comes the best feeling of all when you reach your destination: knowing you achieved, albeit verging on near insanity now, all that you set out to achieve and have gone the full distance of the journey you set out to travel. THAT feeling is just not there in the land down under.

9. People who find tiny people mansharks cute for they not only selfishly withhold (much deserved) hugs, they also selfishly don’t understand how much time it takes to try to get a good foothold just so I can at least see the bloody exam paper that’s on that abnormally high desk from the abnormally low chair

10. Lack of humidity – when my hair doesn’t go crazy people mistake me for a normal sane person manshark and tell me normal sane things about their normal sane lives which are just too normally, sanely boring. Well, except maybe “Bob” who lives on swanston street and once told me he knew I was one of ‘em the minute I stopped to listen to his crazy li’l songs (I actually stopped to pet the lab who lives with him, but why burst his bubble?) Besides, “Bob” hates chocolate so I don’t need to share my choc waffle with him while I listen to the stories ’bout people he’d met who have fires in their head (“Bob”’s been places you’ve never dreamed nightmared of!)

I know I said “5ive” above, but once I got started, there were just so darn many…Why did I not get my one-way ticket outta here earlier??

Go give your mom a hug! ;o)

A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie…

- Tenneva Jordan

Now go give your mom a hug!!

I gotta wait two more months!! :’- (

Painting: “Mother and Children“

Future of Sri Lankan Elephants: the wild or the sheltered?

I was watching a tv prog today about Sri Lankan Elephants. And what did I learn from it? I really don’t know for it left me asking more questions at the end than I had at the beginning. Especially since I’d just heard that SB Dissanayake had requested Ranil W to appoint him as the Assistant Leader of the UNP. Kinda funny ain’t it? Me ! Me! Did I say Me?

Anyways, to get to the Elephant story:

Elephants in Sri Lanka are respected and held in high-esteem. One man (in the tv prog) even went as far as to say that if there are no elephants, there is no country. However this sentimental view is not wholly shared by villagers who can’t sleep at night for fear of elephant attacks. They don’t see the elephant through the rosy hue that others do. For them, it’s not about the “elephants”. It’s about the one elephant that terrorizes them every night. The Wild Elephant.

The Wild Elephant, the one that is unloved for his uncouth ways. He does not fit in with the elephants that are respected at all those dignified Perahera’s. So what do the people think should be done to him? Killed? No, no, a village woman says. Elephants need not be killed. Just this wild uncouth one must be removed so that they can get on with their lives in peace.

A conservationist later talks of the problems brought about by elephant orphanages – they were meant to be (and still are) institutions which care/d for orphaned elephants. However, the elephants within those gates have doubled and tripled over the years and none of them can now be released into the wild for they were born “in captivity” and could not survive “in the wild.” What a conundrum this is. But then again, nevermind elephants, even men with the best of intentions, born in captivity and shelter, can’t really and truly survive in the wild these days can they?

There was more in the prog about people and elephant migration and several what-to-do’s that were not all that interesting, hence shall not be repeated here.

But, now I’m left trying to answer questions I had not thought of before.

At the end of the day, which ones are the best?

Those born in shelter who knows not the ways of the world?

OR

Those born in the wild who knows not common decency and self-respect?

Elephant and Baby – Wasgamuwa Park (Dec 2004)

Pregnant men and such..

So. I was browsing thru the website of Lee Mingwei – the man who is pregnant.

What bothers me most about this issue is that there a lot of people out there who think men were never meant to have babies and therefore must not. How does this reasoning work though in this day and age when we put so much money and effort into finding ways and means of prolonging life and comforting bodies that don’t wish to go on?

There are those who think Peter Singer is the devil’s incarnation for his views on euthanasia – for all life is special and no one has a right to decide to take it by will and anyone who believes otherwise is damned. Peter Singer is a blog post by itself (which I will get to at a date in the near future cos yes, I’m a big fan!), but why I thought of him now is cos he says some “lives” are not worth living and the (huge) opposition to that statement say oh, but they are so very worth living. Then my question in this context is, is life so very special only when it is brought about by those things with which we are famailiar with or taught as “right”?

There’s the (very common) religious argument against men having babies – cos it’s against what God/ Bible said. Perhaps, but I can’t really answer that question seeing as I don’t know enough about God/ Bible to say what He said or didn’t say. So I’ll leave that as it may and go on to the other) argument that I can not understand.

This protest runs along these lines (got off the comments on the website): “..wondering why you would want to mess with human life? If males were meant to have children they would have been able too have them. If a man wants a child he can adopt there are enough poor children in the world already with out a home that need one. Leave the human body they way it is suppose to be. Don’t mess with it…“

Firstly, does this mean then that we must not research and find new medicines/ procedures, etc? Or maybe even, throw all those medical researchers, doctors, nurses and medicines (yes, even the panadols!) into a bottomless pit so they will stop “messing with human life” so we can all die of disease seeing as the body was meant to be prone to disease and hence we must leave it be? But even if I were to be less extreme, this attitude still throws out IVF and other such procedures cos some men/ women have bodies that are not “meant” to produce children. Wtf?!?

Secondly, should we also perhaps ban any more women from having children seeing as there are so many poor children in the world already without a home? At least till all the homeless children are adopted? Would not that be the “moral” and “ethical” thing to do ?

Of course there is some hope for (possible future) pregnant men for there are men who actually think it would be a beautiful enough experience if it could be done successfully. But I wonder how many Lankan men would be threatened by share this thought? Boys?? Men??

On a serious note though, what I’m curious about is (and on which I couldn’t find info during my cursory reading of the website)>> “Oral doses of female hormones were administered to Mr. Lee to make him receptive to the pregnancy.“

(1). Would this be the same as hormones taken by men who undergo gender changes?
(2). After the birth of the baby (fingers crossed), would the man still be a “male” hormonally?
(3) Is “hormonally” a valid word?!? ;o)

Anyway, at the end of the day, the common reaction seems to be – men shouldn’t have babies cos it’s “wrong” or just plain unconventional and therefore must not be attempted. At some point in history, wasn’t a woman choosing to ride her man thought to be unconventional (not to mention sinful!) too? Do men regret this “unconvenionality” now? Do they still believe ‘missionary’ is the best way?

the Only way?

Lee Mingwei’s site here.

With my own two hands..

I can change the world
With my own two hands
Make a better place
With my own two hands
Make a kinder place
With my own two hands
With my own,
With my own two hands

I can reach out to you
With my own two hands
With my own,
With my own two hands

I can hold you
With my own two hands
I can comfort you
With my own two hands
But you got to use

Use your own two hands
Use your own
Use your own two hands

With our own
With our own two hands

With My Own Two Hands – Ben Harper (Diamonds on the Inside)