Tuesday, July 18 Dinker's Words of Wisdom

Today in class people were asking Dinker about his political views. Apparently he is a raging BJP (super conservative Hindu party) fanatic (yet his son-in-law is Habib the Muslim), and believes that terrorists should be instantly killed “even if there’s only a little bit of evidence”. He also gave an example explaining how populated India is: Apparently at any given time, there are as many people on the Indian train system as the population of the whole continent of Australia. Then he explained how he is writing a textbook on owls and fairies…what? Oh man, I’d definitely buy it. He was also telling us that STD stood for Standard Trunk Dialing, and also “something dirty” (as he grabbed his genitals). And Taslim told us that if we wanted to have a “fun time” with marijuana, Dinker knows how to get it. Every day is a new adventure with Dinker. He also explained how India has all these engineers who have no opportunity, so are driving taxis. So what do they do? The government puts them to work….in their new SPACE program. What is this, the sixties? Seriously, everything in this country is 30 years behind schedule. But about the space thing, that’s seriously the biggest waste of time and talent (it’s like when Madeleine Albright said “we have all these nuclear weapons from the Cold War, we should use them”). It’s like those intellectuals like Condoleezza Rice whose specialty is in Russian studies during the Cold War. Now what do they do? They’re all professors at Linfield or some other random college. We were also discussing how because the fee for Indians to the Taj Mahal is 40 cents compared to the foreigner price of $30, Non-Resident Indians have been known to get fake Indian IDs (which consist of a photocopied piece of white paper with a picture of a random brown guy on it), and you could probably get one made at the local fax/phone shop. But it’s also sketchy….like drugs, where if caught the minimum sentence is 10 years in prison. What’s also weird is how when you introduce yourself in India, you give your “good name”, for which you can tell one’s caste and jati and place of origin. Or in other words, you’re telling your social hierarchical status. That’s like asking an American how much your annual household income is, your race and ethnicity, and how many people you manage at work. I also learned the word for miser is “kuhnjuus”. Just sound that one out for yourself and you’ll know why I nearly peed myself.