Revelation of my one (male) (Tibetan) coworker.

The other week, my one (male) (Tibetan) coworker and I were talking during our staff meal, and I asked him what his parents did when he was growing up in India.

He said they were farmers, and from that it emerged that his dad was dead now.

(His dad had a beard, by the way, so whenever he thinks of trying to grow a beard, he thinks of his dad... He doesn't like my attempts at a beard, too, he said.)

Anyhow, suddenly, it struck me and I asked him if he'd ever been to Tibet.

The answer was no, he was born in India, which his parents had fled to in 1959.

I asked him if he still had relatives there, and he said maybe, then he said he didn't think so, his parents were alone when they fled.

I asked him if he could go back, and he said no, the Chinese government would kidnap him at the airport.

I said I knew someone who's French and studies the history of philosophy in Tibetan Buddhism and has studied Tibetan in Tibet with people, and he said that was the difference, he studies the history of philosophy, not politics.

A reflection on Ethiopia.

The other week with another (Ethiopian) coworker, the subject of gay people came up, and she was like, "We don't have there."

. . .

(This is also the coworker with one kid, never married, and the dad lives on the other side of the country, so she seems to be relatively liberal minded.)

Ethiopian beard advice.

For the heck of it, I'm experimenting with growing a short beard, and whenever I'm at the resthome, I ask residents and coworkers if they like it or not, is it too long or too short or just right in terms of length, for random other advice they might have, etc.

Anyhow, two of my (Ethiopian) coworkers like it, but they said to trim it with sharper edges, where it's a "V" down the sides of my jaw and an "O" around my mouth.

As soon as they said that, I could picture different Ethiopian men I'd met or seen in pictures or on TV as having that same beard, and I knew that they were culturally generalizing something that they found normal or thought was attractive in their culture.

I asked them if that would make me look Ethiopian, and if so, could I get discounts at restaurants.

They both chuckled at that.

I think they like me as a coworker.

Same-ish subway sight twice in the same day.

The other week when I was going in and then coming back from work or somewhere I saw...

- On the way in, a guy standing on the crowded train and and reading a hardcover of George R.R. Martin's "A Feast for Crows."

- On the way back, a (younger) guy sitting opposite me and reading a paperback of George R.R. Martin's "A Feast for Crows.

. . .

...I wonder why both were on the same volume of that series...

Rest home crack.

A few weeks ago at the end of shift, I started telling the one (younger) (Latina) front desk worker who was just getting on shift about how I was tired, and then when I mentioned that I was trying to lose a little bit of weight and so had been taking the stairs instead of the elevator, she broke me off right there and was like, "Ooooh, hell no."

Observations from a daytrip...

...to a town an hour-and-a-half north of me to watch a plaque dedication at an author-associated site there:

1) During the ceremony, a man standing next to me farted, but when he did that he didn't move or even acknowledge somehow that he had done that.

2) After the ceremony, a woman who had been there and me walked around the park some and we chit-chatted, and we bumped into each other at a bar downtown later on.

She was a local, and she thought the turnout was disappointing. "Everyone should have been there," she was like.

3) For some reason they have video gambling in that town, and like every bar and many restaurants have multiple video gambling terminals, often with a roped-off area and a sign there that says "NO ONE UNDER 25 ADMITTED" or some shit like that.

The video gambling does not seem to be leading to prosperity.

Yet another idea of mine: Gimmick tour for extra money.

One of my other big ideas lately has been a tour of the sites in the downtown area that are associated with a celebrity scandal that's been national news.

The other week, I was coming home from work and was chit-chatting with a (younger) (black) woman on the subway who was asking me where I worked because I was wearing my scrubs - she's in the health professions too - and since she was looking for work, I didn't have a lead for her, but I gave her my tour idea, so she could maybe run with it and make some extra money for herself.

"You're evil," she was like, laughing.