please to explain

Hi everyone,

This is a collection of posts I originally wrote and published over the course of a year or so in India, but then archived at some point because of various concerns that I no longer have. So here they are again, in the correct order (newest first), but appearing all as having been posted on a single day, because that was the simplest way to get it done.

(There are also India posts at my main blog that were never taken down in the first place.)

this one is for the linguists

Long Distance Scrambling and the Typology of WTF-questions: A Minimalist Approach to Life in India

Tonight Gina and I were discussing the Chomskyan grammar of life at the Asia Pacific office and at points I was laughing so hard I almost thought I would die. Think "SPEC of AP" and "Long Distance Passive" and "Blocking Effects" and "The Last Resort Principle" and "Dependent on the Syntax of Local Processes" and "Local Binding" and "Long Distance Head Movement" and so on.

OK, you probably (1) had to be there and (b) had to have spent at least four years of your life immersed in X-bar theory and (iii) have I mentioned the copious amounts of alcohol? Gina just dragged her jet-lagged ass to bed, but seriously, I am still laughing.

india: entertainment capital of the world

Gina and I just polished off a bottle of wine and now we're flipping through the available TV offerings. This guy has been talking for the last 15 minutes:




Updated to add: OMG we just cruised by that channel again and now he's SINGING!!

Jesus tapdancing christ! It only gets better (different channel)!:



Do we think YOG SCIENCE CAMP is anything like band camp?

bendy

Gina arrived this afternoon, which means my remaining two days will be a lot more fun, in addition to a lot more likely to involve alcohol consumption.

She was just looking through the kitchen cabinets and found a package of straws that she purchased almost a year ago back in the old neighborhood of the original corporate apartment. I had noticed the package before but never looked at it, since I don't use straws. Gina just pointed out to me why she bought them:



BENDY STRAWS PVT. LTD.!!!! NEW WAY TO ENJOY DRINKS!!!

Pvt. Ltd. (Private Limited) is the Indian equivalent of "inc." in the U.S., by the way.

Now I am instructing her on the Mysterious Ways of The Corporate Apartment, including what to do when the lights go out, how to get filtered water, how to use a pen to wiggle the washing machine latch, what that crazy chirping sound is (doorbell), what to do if you hear running water (INVESTIGATE IMMEDIATELY), etc. It's a lot to learn, but Gina is a smart cookie and I'm sure she will survive the 5 or 6 days here without me starting Saturday.

more from the x-treme knitting files

As I have discussed in approximately 9,007 previous posts, I am so over India, which means I tend to leave the air-conditioned, relatively comfortable apartment here only to (a) go to work, (b) procure nourishment, or (c) finally, finally, finally go back to the airport in order to return to California. This means that on weekends I have a lot of alone time on my hands, which means a lot of knitting and/or crocheting. Possibly too much knitting and/or crocheting, in fact. Can you see the red, inflamed areas above both wrists?

This has happened before, and it goes away with a few days of rest. It's weird--it doesn't hurt really, even though the spots are noticeably warm and red and a bit swollen. X-treme knitting, my friends. What can I say?

Speaking of knitting, having too much time on one's hands, and getting inflamed, I recently joined a site called Ravelry, which is sort of like Facebook for knitters. There are well over 125,000 members, and naturally a lot of discussion groups exist there, including many that have nothing to do with knitting. One is called "Language Lovers." I'm sure this is already setting off alarm bells for the linguists in the audience, because y'all know what sorts of things get discussed on those boards:

"ZOMG yesterday I heard someone pronounce something wrong and it made me so crazy and Western civilization is crumbling because no one knows when to say it's and when to say its and OMG OMG OMG what is happening to young people don't they teach grammar in schools anymore and why don't people know the rules like I do??? AAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!"

You know, or something like that. Yeah, these people love language alright. And if you can't see me rolling my eyes from India, you're not looking very hard. I find it difficult not to comb through the posts and carefully point out each and every grammatical error they themselves perpetrate within their pedantic little screeds. But I don't, because, well, I have better things to do, such as post to the Bob Dylan fan forum. ("Visions of Johanna: best song in the history of the universe. Discuss.")

toilet training

It's my first day back at the office in Bombay and I just noticed a helpful new list of suggestions ("LOO MANNERS") in the women's bathroom. These include:

Please lift lid before sitting down.
Please use toilet paper as far as possible.
Please flush toilet before and after use.

There is also an admonition to keep the washbasins clear of hair and "bloggs of soap."

I swear I do not make this stuff up.

bada bing bada bombay

By the time the plane touched down in Bombay last night I'd already been called "sir" THREE TIMES. Once by the gate agent at JFK and twice by a flight attendant. Awesome.

Many things about India make me crazy, as you probably have gathered. One of those things is people's inability to behave like civilized human beings at the airport. At the baggage claim I actually had occasion to say to someone, out loud, "Are you fuckin' KIDDING me? Jesus Christ!" Which I guess doesn't speak much for my own ability to act civilized, but I'd just had an 80-pound suitcase heaved into my legs with no room to recapture my balance. Here's a tip for my fellow travelers: if y'all would leave your damned luggage carts off to the side instead of lining them up directly against the baggage conveyor belt, we'd all have room to actually pick up our bags and go the hell home without injury or use of the word 'fuck.'

Fernando is here, so that's nice, but he will be gone after tomorrow night. So we only get 48 hours of pretending to hate each other.