February 5, 2012

It felt simply weird to get up in the morning and not be able to log on to the Internet to catch up on my email, read the news online and see what the weather would be like. It’s hard to believe how dependent I’ve become on this medium to provide me with sources of information and read the latest bits of gossip on the doings of family members and friends. In its absence, I knew I had no excuse but to buckle down and work on putting the final touches on my presentation for the conference in Nepal which is merely a week away. I feel like beating myself in the head for choosing such an obscure topic for my talk, “Intertextuality”, while both Corrie and Caroline are rehashing something they had already presented someplace else

I made quite a bit of progress on it and then tidied up the apartment as my landlady had called the day before to indicate she’d be stopping by to collect the rent. There was no running, again, as the pipes must have frozen overnight. The landlady never showed up most likely because there was no way her driver could bring her directly to my front door given the amount of snow accumulated around the building. She didn’t even call to cancel the appointment.

I called Marydean, the American woman who’s been in Dushanbe for 11 years, to inquire about her need for someone to house sit. She’ll be gone for a week, a trip to Paris nonetheless, and is asking me to look after her two cats. She has a spare bedroom, tons of books and a stocked refrigerator for me. I didn’t mention that Caroline was interested in doing it since she might not want to stay for just an additional week. I said it should be fine and agreed to meet with her upon my return from Nepal. I started to read the book she had loaned me “Choosing Civility: The 25 Rules to Considerate Conduct” by P. M. Forni.

There was a documentary on the last czar of Russia, Alexander II, and the extermination of his entire family in 1918 by Stalin’s orders. The cruelty and senselessness of the whole affair left me with a feeling of revulsion toward the power-hungry individuals who cannot stand the slightest shadow on their ascent to the top.