To the fellow in Middle Eastern history class who sits at the front row, left flank—yes, you, the lanky one in the Chelsea shirt with Didier Drogba’s name and number emblazoned on the back—I have just one question for you: does it hurt when you wear that shirt? I bet it does. I bet it burns like napalm.

To the young man in English Composition: why do you too choose to make such poor choices in life? Do you not know that when you don an article of clothing marked with the England insignia on it, your life expectancy goes down by about ten years? Now stop upsetting your mother and start acting like a responsible adult.

If you refuse to turn from the dark side, then I will see you both in hell, my friends. You can’t miss me: I will be wearing my fabulous KNVB shirt with the hopes of blinding the both of you with its glorious fluorescence.

Signed,
Antiguit

Edit: To the positively, spledidly upright chap in American Politics with the Barcelona shirt: you, good sir, are a first-rate human being. Well done! My faith in humanity is still on its deathbed, but at least you have given it clean sheets. Thank you.

Posted on February 22nd, 2007 by Antiguit

Every evening before bed, I re-stock the left pocket of the coat I had been wearing that day with Tootsie Rolls. Sadly, I do not display the same diligence in the unloading of used Tootsie Roll wrappers from the right pocket of of the coat, which results in a bi-weekly discovery of thick wads of waxy wrappers. This discovery is never fun, sometimes alarming, and always unpleasant.

As I was fishing for a pen in the pockets of my jeans the other day, I found a twenty dollar bill in one of the back pockets. Needless to say, I was jubilant. Others around me were less enthusiastic about my discovery and translated it into a cause célèbre. The madding crowd then went on to execute a plan of action that resulted in my contracting serious bodily harm; but still, I walk away the victor because I have twenty dollars, and they do not.

I love pockets. It seems when I’m not pulling candy or writing utensils out of them, I find money. I feel like Doraemon incarnate.

Posted on February 18th, 2007 by Antiguit

There is a great book on Amazon entitled Love and Death in Kathmandu. It is not, as the title suggests, published by one of the fine bastions of literature that is Harlequin Enterprises Ltd., but can you imagine if it was? What would you do if you were commissioned to write a book called Love and Death in Kathmandu that was targeted not at academics and historians, but at romantic idealists and soccer moms?

Here is my $0.02: under the pseudonym Magnolia Powers, I will woefully weave the heart-wrenching tale of a war-hardened military observer’s stint in Nepal, where he duly falls in love with a free spirited Maoist rebel. Her warmth and passion will transform him from the cold and detached soldier he once was to a zealous and sensitive lover. But what ho! Trouble in paradise arises when her overly possessive brother schemes to brutally eliminate all foreign neutral military observers to let the international community know that national affairs will be handled by inside belligerents.

She-Rebel will be beautiful, He Military Observer-Man will be handsomely built, and they will rendezvous in secret. Oh yes, it will always begin as nothing more than innocent debates over chai and momos—with a little bit of Lenin here, some Das Kapital there, a pinch of Adam Smith to stoke some controversy—but they will end these meetings with minimal clothing and a hot session of tongue hockey. Bound by convention and entangled in political intrigue, the ill-fated lovers do all they can to salvage a romance that was never meant to be (it will end in tears, of course). The words “passion” and “ample” will be cause for repetition, and there will be generous mentions of shallow breathing and bosom-heaving to fulfill the smut quota.

Other fantastic books with titles that sound like dirty novels but are, in fact, not:

- Original Sin by P.D. James
- Lady Into Fox by David Garnett
- Journey Along the Horizon by Javier Marias
- Pederasty and Sodomy by Pinhas Ben Nahum

All right, the last one is hardly subtle about its subject matter, but subtlety has never been a telling characteristic of steamy women’s fiction. Anyway, e-mail me your uncouth story lines, and the author of the most lecherous of all will receive a spiffy map of Nepal.

I think that is enough mention of love to commemorate Valentine’s day. Happy pre-heart day! I hope it will be all hearts and roses and chocolate, if that’s your kink. If you happen to detest that sort of romantic comedy finale crap, well, you can come have a book-reading party with me (I’m up to my neck in books, reports, and essays about the social-economic-political facets of Africa. Absolutely riveting stuff, this. Europe is now officially boring, and European history never puts anyone to sleep).

Posted on February 14th, 2007 by Antiguit

I have been listening to the soundtrack from Band of Brothers all day long, and then made the terrible mistake of finishing the final two chapters from Roméo Dallaire’s Shake Hands with the Devil as the poignant strings served as filler background music to the words I was reading. But now that it has been tucked away safely in the company of other great books, I feel shaken and extremely embarrassed, knowing that more than twelve years after the international community turned a blind eye to the atrocities that quietly took place in Rwanda, nothing has changed since.

What a difficult, difficult read. I wanted to hold on to it a little longer after I finished the last sentence, and putting it away on the crowded bookshelf was harder than I anticipated; when you put a book away, you indicate that you are essentially done with it and will move on to the next title—but God almighty, this book felt more like a heavy burning burden on the shoulders, an issue that needed further reading into, a newfound raison d’etre. You don’t let go of burning burdens at will: they take a little more time and effort to relieve.

No other book has ever left me this exhausted. I want to vomit and cut my wrists and punch something. In that order.

Posted on February 2nd, 2007 by Antiguit