September 05, 2004

• Splitter!
• We must do what we must. We are on the path to the future and we are not turning back. (It was a trilateral decision between the three people left in the thread...)
• When all is perishing moment by moment Who has time to be bored. Monkeys come and be not bored, flashboy's second dance starts here. We have left a thread abhorred (not for its content but its slowth) -- bring on your Snarks and let us prance for now begins a second growth! Yet, 'ware! for Bashi's spies are everywhere
• Oh, great gravy! How wonderfully fast that loaded!
• **round of applause for beeswacky, and the speed of loading**
• I think I've developed a crush on you guys...
• wait, is this that "i love sex!" guy?
• How many bees could a beeswacky whack if a beeswacky could whack bees? ..sorry, it's late and I'm drunk etc.
• A beeswacky would wack as many bees as a beeswacky could wack, if a beeswacky could wack bees.
• When beeswacky gets going, apiarian shenanigans are bound to ensue.
• Grumbeldy grumbeldy.
• And here I was thinking the Bashi thread could die a natural death...how wrong I was. :)
• Some lovely poetry in flash's link. Coincidentally, I'm listening to a lot of Sufi music at the moment.
• I haven't come here to settle down. I've come here to depart. I am a merchant with lots of goods, Willing to sell to whoever will buy. I didn't come here to create any problems, I'm only here to love. A Heart makes a good home for the Friend. I've come to build some hearts. I'm a little drunk from this friendship -- Any lover would know the shape I'm in. -- Yunus Emre
• Another thread, another show, The loading speed so apropos. For those of us on dial-up, We thank you, flashboy! Yup, yup, yup!
• wolof - any tips on how I might also find myself listening to sufi music? Where'd you get it from? <
• Any lover would know the shape I'm in.<.i> Any lover would know the trouble I'm in: The blotchy pustules on my skin, Show that I shouldn't have given a try To those who sell to whoever will buy! (after Emre)
• Hey, bone! Did you make it through the hurricane all right?
• sorry for the f-ed up tag...
• Hi, bees! Yeah, life is grand. We're through the worst of it, and right now I'm just trying to figure out how to use iPhoto to modify pics for my hurricane photoblog
• Guns and flame will never tame the monkey in my breast; but its heart beats slow as sweet verses flow from the east into the west.
• Monkeys, lovers, madmen, Inside them all, the ceaseless fire -- even in the tiny beetle, green as a drowned emerald, fallen deeper than petals into the heart of the blowsy rose. And the silly bee squeezing past pollen-laden stamen after stamen tumbles out, joyous, his fur floured yellow, his antennae bobbing pom-poms, all his feet refusing to tread the meter as he jigs.
• New thread, new poems I'm glad to see Inspires monkey ribaldry! My pocket holds no coin, no manna I have for thee a big banana.
• Trees rise up, knit earth to sky, and bow before the hurricane and fall and rise and stand again. And now we stand here, small, alone, and breathless in the quiet rain; no voice to wonder what remains, what dry bones crumble in our veins.
• spackle -- eek! You're not in that storm, too, I hope>
• Into the garden I go, watch a breeze flutter brown-edged leaves that have weathered a strange summer. I lift one yellowing leaf, let the wind seize it. "My ambit lies only here, among these crooked trees, the flickers of a dappled day," I say to the high ones, knowing they will know I lie, as sun belies the presence of a shadow. "I trust they will accept you, leaf, frail and thin, ferrying a frail hope that water will run clear again, that reed-heads stand up tall again, and that the storms which tear us pass."
• Awesome verse by Emre. Many thanks, flashboy...this is exactly what I need.
• Spackle: That was rad. I muat admit, I resisted the call of the Turkmanbashi thread for a long, long time. But now, I'm hooked.
• I mean, Plegnund -- stuff it! ?Or i'll point a Spider at your tuffet!
• *cowers unobtrusively*
• Oh for heavens sake, Pleggers, ignore that silly tuffet, and tell the sillier bees he oughta stufffit!
• Little Miss Mophet Sat on a Tophet, But not for very long. "Is that a beast, Or a knife-wielding priest?" And so I end my song.
• Tophet, dammit.
• flashboy, do you know anything about Numerology? Is 4446 compatible with 1178? Or do we need to perfomr appropriate pujas before using this to continue the Turkmenbashi thread? It seems poor wendell is stuck in the old thread, and is bumbling about trying to turn himself into a spelling bee. As any fule can tell bees can't spell. Or not well.
• Hominy padme hummmm...there. That will have to suffice. I watched young dogs when I was young. They were given bones to gnaw. Those of you whose teeth have fallen out did not gnaw on bones. -- Turkmenbashi the Great New Entry for Do-It-Yourself Bashi Calendars: On December 19, Turkmenistan will hold its first parliamentary 'elections' in five years.
• Ooh, I just bet the election campaigns will be hot!
• If there surprises, we'll never know, tracicle. Only Bashi knows, only Bashi plans, Who and what are foes, And wot is best for Bashi's land.
• I think we are in rats' alley, where the dead men lost their bones. The gate creaks; it is autumn and the blackbirds are flying, bearing my heart into the wind.
• The skies have opened, Bridges are torn from their buttresses, valley roads become washouts. People shift to high ground. Cats climb onto tilting roofs and complain bitterly to the rumbling water and the rising winds. But such scenes come seldom in Turkmenistan, Eighty per cent of which is desert land.
• Word on the Rukhnama and its sequel. The Turkmen Spirit: apparently the second of Turkmenbashi's works is currently being read to Turkmenistans's government officials and other notables. Attend, ye servile masses! Ye Turkmen lads and lasses, Don't try to cross the passes When Turkmenbashi's beckoning; Government officials shall be read to From the Rukhname, Volume Two. (O, there will come a day of reckoning!)
• In Turkmenistan, there's no dissent! For all independent political groups are effectively banned, their leaders exiled or sent to prison. So our land is run by Bashi's nincompoops. In 2002 some tried a coup d'etat -- But Bashi isn't having that!
• "When it becomes evident that Turkemns will go to war, they pay attention to what they eat for three or four days before the battle. They feed themselves up on melted white fat, and they exercise to become supple. They always have logola (a round food made up of oil or dough for the animals) for their horses. Logola is made of a mixture of the tail-fat of the sheep and salt. It is given to Turkmen horses which will go to battle. If the war lasts a long time, then the soldier will give more logola to the horse. It gives the horse more stamina. It can maintain its strength even if it does not eat for a few days after eating logola. Our shepherds still drink a half plate of melted fat before noon in summer so that they do not become hungry and thirsty until the evening." -- Turkmenbashi the Great, Rukhnama September has been renamed the month of Rukhnama in Turkmenistan.
• *sigh* Link to Rukhnama.
• (Now for a little of Bashi in the night...it is true love.) I sometimes get so tired. I take the first opportunity to visit the stables at that time. My white horse starts neighing and moving around when he hears my footsteps, He expresses his love for me like that. He approaches. I caress his head. I comb his mane. I look into his eyes that are like apples. Gorogly's saying comes into my mind: "White hoirse, if you can speak, then do so." Although he can't speak, he expresses his pleasure with his eyes. I feel like I should give him a hug. Then I remember Gorogly again. I understand better why he says, "I didn't wish I had a son, but I wished I had my horse." -- Turkmenbashi the Great, Rukhnama
• Xenophon advises first see to it the walls of his hooves both before and behind are high and hard lofty enough to keep the frogs from touching ground the feet come first and thick horn's better than a hoof too thin his feet should chime like bells upon the earth while he goes hoofing it with those elevated frogs
• I don't want to go to sea; Rolling and pitching and yawing and I shall never agree. The camel's called 'ship of the desert'; the name is a sure guarantee that sitting astride a camel is not my cup of tea. Camels sway. So I'd rather ride horseback any day.
• And besides, Camels have that "Surgeon General's Warning sticker" on them, right? I am so late to this party...
• The faces of camels seem so constructed as to give camel-watchers an impression of supercilious hauteur. But then, again, Bashi doesn't go into panegyrics over camels, so camels have at least that much going for them.
• Panegyrics? beeswacker, you're already our Poet Laureate (or Poet Lariot); are you now challenging languagehat for linguistic supremacy?
• Don't try to start something between Bees and me, wendell. He's the MoFi Muse and I bow to his buzzing laurel wreath. Where are your pants, by the way?
• I do think Poet Lariat is suitably silly, wendell. (BlueHorse has a wonderful way with words!) languagehat is a polyglot. And I'm not. ad a classiclanguagehat is a polyglot, which I am not.
• I wondered where that went -- bizarre hiatus.
• Turkmenbashi to his horse: i like my body when it is with your body. It is so quite new a thing. Muscles better and nerves more. i like your body. i like what it does, i like its hows. i like to feel the spine of your body and its bones, and the trembling -firm-smooth ness and which i will again and again and again kiss, i like kissing this and that of you, i like, slowly stroking the, shocking fuzz of your electric furr, and what-is-it comes over parting flesh....And eyes big love-apples, and possibly i like the thrill of under me you so quite new Apologies to e.e. cummings.
• I like it, spackle! You have plumbed and found the best of Bashi there, I think.
• Newtonbashi Turkmenbashi Danke Schoen, Darling, Danke Schoen. Thank you for all the joy and pain. Picture shows, second balcony, was the place we'd meet, Second seat, go Dutch treat, you were sweet. waynenewton.com - winner of 36 Internet awards!
• Where are your pants, by the way? Sure is dark in here...
• For your Bashi-Calendars: The twelfth day of Rukhnama [more crassly known as September in the world outside Trukmenistan] is the Third Anniversary of the initial publication of the Rukhnama by Turkmenbashi the Great. And Rukhnama 12th, 2004 will be the first day of broadcasting for Turkmenistan's new internaitonal television channel; viewers can be subjected to propaganda in different six foreign languages.
• Last Gorbansoltanedzhe (that's April to me and you) Bashi said Turkmens' water resources were a "national treasure"; and hinted that everyone would do well to preserve this desert-country pleasure. (But there are as yet no plans to implement frugal measures.) How many fountains in Ashgabat? These things are everywhere! Running down the entrance at the presidential palace, and visitors stare at cascades flowing over golden statues* dotted about the landscape here and there. A giant water park is also in the works. (And though they oughta no one saves water -- a free supply for every house is one of the governmemt's perks.) Then there's the Friendship Dam, on the border with Iran, And that Lake Turkmen, where the plan is to plunk a thousand square miles of lake ker-splash in the midst of the Garagum Desert** (the hottest desert on earth, where everything and one must bake) This Bashi doesn't seem to know such grandiose schemes are neighbouring countries' worst dreams -- they wonder where the region's water table is supposed to go. It seems Turkmenistan is ripe for water woes. * golden statues of Guess Who ** or Kara Kum, the spelling is variable
• fields lie by the river and the sea where melons swell and cotton cracks its seeded shells here youngsters and their teachers bend to pick what may clothe them for a time away from schools the Turkmen children don't attend white cloud above and sand below - rainwater soaks the earth and brings up bitter salt
• Very nice.
• Every citizen of Turkmenistan should have knowledge of science....Intellectuals and scientists have special place in my world and I show them great respect. --Trukmenbashi the Great, Rukhnama Algebra, physics, and physical education are taught no more. College degrees only take two years now instead of four. Twelve thousand teachers have been fired, no more have been rehired. Compulsory education is only for nine years now. Forty thousand scholars a year used to enter enter college somehow, Now not one tenth of those get in -- and they pay bribes, And individual approval of each is a process to which Bashi subscribes. So what is taught? The 'spiritual values' embodied in the Rukhnama's gibberish, loyalty to the current regime, and 'native tradition' (whatever that is). The country's walking backwards into a national dark age, Where few Turkmen children have much chance to appear on the world stage. [In the mid-month of Rukhnama (= September) school-children and teachers alike are often sent to harvest Turkmenistan's cotton crop for several weeks. A practice which this past May Bashi promised to stop, along with the bribery to get into college, but so far neither one seems to be happening.]
• On and after the Twelfth Day of Rukhnama [= September]: They can tell us in English, French, and Russian Also Chinese, Arabic, and Persian How wonderful the Bashi is, and how very grand It is to live in Bashiland. Turkmenistan's total satellite tv channels will be four, And what further joys could viewers waiting for? The other three channels all broadcast in Turkmen exclusively, This Foreign one will add more languages but serve up still the stale ideas of national unity.
• Bashi's taken control of the Sunni Muslim community In the interests of national unity, Creating a council to approve who the leaders will be. The basic snag for all religious groups in the country Is that the Bashi needs to be in charge, quite absolutely, A thing with which many find it hard to agree. Bashi's law prohibits all unregistered religious activity, And registration --if it can be done -- is done with great difficulty.
• "Bread is sacred, and the clay oven also sacred. Though bread falls in the dust, it doesn't get dirty. Eat it, this is sacred bread. It has power to keep demons away. When leaving home, take bread, have bread as your companion. Here, put a piece underneath your pillow, to ward off care," the Turkemn say and mean this.
• Oh, there's nothing that a Bashi cannot do. Now he is a mountain, too. The highest mountain in Turkmenistan, formerly called Ayrybaba, has been officially re-named and will henceforth be known as Turkmenbashi the Great Peak.
• Smile! Rejoice! For this is Rukhnama Day*! And Ashgabat gets a new freeway! And three new medical diagnostic centres for Turkmenistan, hurray! Oh, and all member of the People's Council are to receive pay! And parliament renames a Turkmen town and a district Gorbansoltanzheje** Formal presentation of volume two of the Rukhnama book today -- At a ceremony crammed with "deputies of parliament, members of the Cabinet of Ministers, heads of ministeries and establishments, public associations and mass media of the country, representatives of science and culture and numerous guests", and more flapdoodle, so they say! *12th Day of the month also known as Rukhnama [ = September] ** after Bashi's motherl. Town and district formerly named Yylanly
• In Turkmenistan, using the net isn't easy; first find an outlet. Then, should you have the chance to use a cybercafe Expect the police to know whatever you did say. Censorship in Turkemnistan is very strong, Bashi wants to know everything that's going on. Police may very likely come to question you, for users must defend whatever they may do.
• Love, sweet as water to dry vines, I parch away from you I find I close my eyes and think I hear your voice a music in my ears I'll bring you sherbets cold as ice when this ripe moon's a melon slice
• When Bashi said, "That'll be about enough, see" His Council got rid of a second mufti.
• The 19th day of the month of Rukhnama [= September] is Speak-Like-A-Pirate-Day, which is not, insofar as can be determined, much celebrated in Turkmenistan.
• The Barrrshi?
• a.k.a. Turkemenbashi-bazouk!
• Captain Haddock Curses and Talk Like a Pirate. Two great tastes that taste great together.
• Town and district formerly named Yylanly Whee! Ylanly! Ylanly! Aaahahahaha! *hysterical* Thank you, Bees, for telling me that. MonkeyFilter: I'll Bring You Sherberts MonkeyFilter: a.k.a. Turkemenbashi-bazouk!
• Gleaned from the L.A. Times, schoolchildren are required to study Rukhnama every day, while adults do so every Saturday -- (presumably at their mosques).
• Bashi says, "Let us know if a fly buzzes past." New surveillance equipment was placed this year in all Turkmenistan's government buildings. Bashi's nation is ruled by fiat and by fear. "If you are honest in your deeds, I see this; if you commit wrongdoing, I see that, too," Bashi writes. In future could there be a rendezvous with Turkmen observers in the elections in the U.S.? (Bashi might know, because he'd pick 'em. But otherwise it's anybody's guess.) Turkmenistan is a member of the UN group which will monitor the U.S. Novembe election. As yet no mention of just which member countries will be sending observers. Small world.
• both pots and paths are terra cotta, and water wanders where it oughta each drop as precious as a pearl the jasmined air so richly scented the poppy's silvered leaves indented all garden work done for my girl the blooming marigold attracts the bees a blossom rubbed on stings their pain allays my lady smiles when many flowers she sees and richer makes this scene with just her gaze.
• *bows in appreciation*
• I wonder how long before Turkmenistan is ejected from the UN. Maybe we should place bets.
• Probably a while, tracicle, since Turkmenistan seems to present little threat to regional stability, and also, there seem to be countries which are held to be far more dangerous -- or are currently perceived as having even worse human rights abuses (North Korea, Iran, Sudan, etc). International affairs seem to be in a ferment of change, and possibly the case may seem quite different in another few years. Turkmenistan's oil and gas are likely to make it a focus of international interest for some time to come.
• Nas-ty subject information: there are two common types of nas, one used orally, the other nasally. For those who missed its description on the older thread, this "tobacco snuff" as the Turkmenistan business report terms it, is composed of a mixture of tobacco, slaked lime, and chicken excretions, and use is common throughout central Asia. Nas has a mildly narcotic effect on users. Last month Bashi stunned the world by banning use and curtailing sales of this disagreeable substance almost nationwide -- a ban by Niyazov which, for once, no one thinks unwarranted. Nas has been implicated as a cause of cancer by users
• When a broadcast ends in Turkmenistan, Each sews reader swears this oath (which is Bashi's drivel): "May my hand be cut off if I harm my country. If I slander the homeland, The flag, or the President, may my tongue shrivel." The sole political party allowed Is called The Democratic Party; the rest are outlawed, A concept of democracy that's seriously flawed. Bashi's son Murat controls oil and gas, Rumour has it these assets are banked in Cyprus. Criticism of the government is against the law -- In this despotic system which eats its critics raw.
• each desert is a lonely place sand grates beneath your leathered tread and rutted stone becomes a wellworn staircase you trudge for many miles and never see a human face you almost taste the shimmered air above a broken terrace a footfall some long silence breaks here time is fled without a trace dust lies on crumbling pyramid a sphinx lies riddleless beside its base
• Shakespeare referred to seven ages of man, but Bashi figures there are nine ages of man, to wit: ...childhood lasted to 13, adolesence to 25, youth to 37, maturity to 49. Later there followed the age of the prophet, from 49 to 62; the age of inspiration, from 62 to 73; the age of the white-bearded elder, from 73 to 85; old age, from 85 to 97; and the age of Oguz Khan (an ancient ruler of the Turkic ancestors of the Turkmen) -- from 97 to 109. Bashi, born in 1940, is currently in the age of inspiration. (The lifespan of the average Turkmen is pretty much finished by 60.) When Bashi turns 73, it should be interesting to see if he then stops dying his hair and grows a white beard. Do pension plans and retirement in Turkmenistan not kick in until age 85, assuming a person survives that long?
• President-for-Life Turkmenbashi the Self-styled Great dyes his hair black, and when he started doing so, he also ordered the hair in all his portraits be touched up accorsdingly. Heh. So much for the Age of Inspiration. Though perhaps a trifle discouraging on personal reflection, since I'm in this age bracket myself. Now I must cast about me to discover wot absurd thing I can do next.
• Hard to suppose there'll ever be a coup, for those who wish Bashi's works to undo (or at least undo portions of it) are lamentably few. Turkemen! such a change is up to you! Not easy to live in a Golden Age, Where Basho's least whim becomes the rage, While important decisions are made backstage, And most Turkmen have a miserable working wage.
• Only one Turkmen child in five receives a formal education, which bodes very ill for the future of this nation.
• Bees: That comment at 12:54 was remarkably seditious. When black-haired, nas-chewing men start inquiring about you at the local pub, don't say that you weren't given an opportunity to praise Bashi rather than bury him. oh, and "both pots and paths/are terra cotta..." was wonderful.
• Heh. Hope Ivan's not giving you any more trouble, bone.
• More for your Bashiland calendars: April 27th is Horse Day July 10 is Melon Day December 1 is Neutrality Day
• The CIS is a group of 12 nations which were formerly part of the USSR (only the three Baltic nations are not members). The CIS met recently. However, Bashi did not attend. Why not? He had a former medical appointment. Seems Bashi is reclusive, and some think a bit of a hypochondriac as well.
• Don't worry, everyone, it was just a small cyst in the turkmen sphincter. All going well, it will be cancer.
• President-for-Life Turmenbashi the Great was the first patient to be treated at the newluy opened medical centre in Ashgabat. A team of six specialists from Gernman, headed by Hans Meisner, who is Bashi's caediac surgeon. A remarkably sycophantic report lauds the wonderfulness of Bashi the patient, for those interested in following his progress.
• Asian Times has an article here on modern Turkmenistan. This link was on the old thread a while back --I'm posting it again here so new monkeys may read it, if they wish.
• Into the outhouse, Bashi! And hang your head in shame, For this is Talk-Like-a-Pirate Day, and for once you are not to blame!
• Re the Paucity of Bashi-related (however vaguely) Comments here yesterday. On the 18th, I submitted a comment to this thread, intending to submit more, but They broke in on me, damanding uncle bees grab his chainsaw and help remove a ninety foot tall red oak lying across the roof of a friend's house. Being a Fool of No Small Magnitude, I did this thing. And today I am very VERY SORE -- (and I smell bad, too, because of the aromatic but ineffectual unguents I have been ordered to apply to my person by those who co-habit with me and have tired of hearing of my ill-suppressed shrieks of anguish). My dogs, the faithless louts, won't come near me now -- and I can't blame them. Come into the outhouse, Bashi, for today I am just in the mood to describe your wholly inadequate 'poetry', and now speak as one deeply moved: Having read a whole book of your work, Bashi, you consummate jerk, I do think as a poet you totally stink! Now I feel better. A wee bittie.
• Pastoral (Sans Bashi, Just Bee-cause...) Days flower like a shooting star -- Yon rose which bloomed for months so fair now casts its petals on the air. The wine spills smoothly red from out its earthen jar, one great draught goes to the head. One last crop of new-fledged birds land in the feeders so they swing. The walnut and the hickory tree drop fat green globes that startle me. The eager moths that fluttered everywhere now fold their powdered tissue wings as on the undersides of curling leaves they cling, and for much cooler nights prepare. And now, the bolder rodents try to come inside the mice are safe indoors unless a blacksnake hunts them where they hide. Inside a chest of drawers we find the rovings of a mouse's nest -- three half-grown are within, we carry them outside -- and leave them in the uncut meadow grass.
• Some Turkmens are seeking employment and/or education outside their country, because of current poor opportunities for both in Turkemenistan. Only 1200 students a year enroll in college there now. And Bashi has declared that people with foreign degrees will not be able to work in Turkmenistan. Which latter is especially interesting since Bashi's own team of medical specialists are German, and were, presumbaly, not educated in Turkmenistan.
• The road ahead is blocked. My girl and I agree to take the other, walking close together, we're glad this road is longer.
• at last the wind that was a terror stops now I hear the steady music of the horses' jaws heads buried to the eyes in long grass they stay near the broken panels of the fence where it's relatively dry the stream through the field forgets its banks meadow magically transforms to shallow lake where blooms of queen anne's lace now float like lotus set on lapis blue scattered twigs and leaves and leafy limbs -- some thrust straight down into the ground -- tell of the violence of the winds along the ridges and the broken roads some trees are down a bridge is gone
• Turkmen, poor Turkmen, you only think you've finished school, for each Saturday all adults must study Bashi's Golden Rules. The Rukhnama has a second volume and to study this new work seems a truly dismal doom, one Turkemn dare not shirk.
• "Population growth rate (2002 est.): -3.2%... Education (2002 est.): Literacy -- 98.8%... Political parties: Democratic Party of Turkmenistan (formal opposition parties are outlawed)..." Gleanings from the US Department of State on Bashiland here.
• Abbreviated history of Bashiland: ?: Nomadic tribes of horsemen in area 4th century BC to AD 1800s: Conquest after conquest. c. 1880s: Tribal warfare, preying on caravans, selling captives as slaves. Russian conquest. Turkmen becomes part of the Czarist empire of Russia. 1917: Turkmenistan now a 'member state' if USSR, controlled by Moscow 1991: attains 'independence' with breakup of USSR under the leadership of Bashi
• Bashi is an inconsiderate beast to say the least. He hasn't been in the news of late and so we wait to find out what new oddity or blunder his people have to labour under.
• To impress my girl I did it threw the Rukhnama in the trash and said that Bashi I would like to bash. I probably should (but don't) regret it. The neighbours were impressed (though it wasn't the neighbours I addressed) -- they reported me. And so I had to flee. My girl in a few weeks followed me.
• It sounds simple to sell oil and gas until you realize where the pipelines have to pass. Bashi has to use a Russian pipeline for his goods or else build ones in some dangerous neighbourhoods. Iran and Afghanistan make it hard to reach ports on the southern seas, And Uzbekhistan is trading now with the Chinese and not too friendly with Bashiland, so Bashi deals with Russia who is close at hand. Turkemen people have no say in all this, Bashi pockets the money which the Turkmens miss.
• X was an ichthyologist, his name wasn't put on Bashi's list of those approved for entry visas, so he went home without a fuss. "Yes, Bashi's system is too quirky. I knew I should have stayed in Turkey!"
• Turkmen sheep are fat-tailed, not merino; their tails grow so big, they're hauled after the sheep on a little wheelbarrow which the sheep tows behind and apparently doesn't mind.
• Turkmenbashi has been Farked
• The self-styled President-for-life Turkmenbashi the Great calls himself a poet. Thus far, no one seems to have cught on that this is a FAT LIE. Bashi is as much a poet as your old razor-blade is like a tortilla. In fact, this outrageous statement is what first brought my blood to the boil about the bastard. How dare this miserable Bashi call himself a poet?!? I don't care how many books he bulldozes into print -- what he writes is NOT poetry! Hell, not even adequate prose, to judge by the translations of the Rukhnamaon online. Bah! /buzzes off to cool down a bit
• In Bashiland, simply going online is an undertaking that consumes a lot of time, the idea is that limiting access by Turkmens will help them be obedient, compliant citizens. Policy, part one: If they can't get online, then they can't get the news, or see what the outside world really thinks of Bashi and his crazy views. Policy, part two: block access to many websites starting with news and all concerned with human rights, and independent magazines are out, so are religious sites. With only one ISP in the whole country, and it under Bashi's scrutiny and control, it seems keeping people from information is the goal.
• Today a mountain, and always a star, a poet, a floorwax, an orphan, a scholar, a head of state, a meteorite, a city, a school, an avenue -- nothing our Bashi cannot be or do!
• Bashi is as much a poet as your old razor-blade is like a tortilla I so agree, my Bees! Therefore, Monkeys, UNITE! Let us overthrow this unlettered Bashi and put a new Bashi in his place. A Bashi with a poetic soul, a compassionate Bashi, a Bashi for the people--I give you Beeswacky.
• NOOO! NONONONO!!! *pounds head against nearest wall* I am SO not the stuff of which Bashis are made, BlueHorse!!! You do it!!! I would vote for you, you have skills -- you are good at making monkeys keep their pants on!...If we are allowed to vote for tyrants, I will vote for you!!! Yes, orse for Bashi!!! BLUEHORSE FOR BASHI!!!
• = Horse! Halways haspirate your haitches... *mumble, mumble, Allapoosa...*
• ...adrift in the namestream....
• Allah the Almighty gave us limitless land and water. -- Turkmenbashi the Great, Rukhnama THE ACTUAL SITUATION: The water is finite, the land is finite, neither is limitless. Someone did not do his homework, it seems.
• I woz watching my TV hoping for tranquility, when I saw a too-familiar face he was onscreen in the broadcaster's place -- my heart sunk when the Bashi says to me, now Turkmens! I'll read you my new poetry." So I switched the channel, (in Turkmenistan we have three) and there he woz again, reading his poems to all Turkmen. I peeked at the third: same old story, Bashi poem's about Turkmen history and glory. On every blessed channel he reads his poetry. This goes on for an hour and a half, (serious stuff with never a laugh) and I felt he informed us of all he knows. If I could, I'd move to another country, One where the leader speaks only in prose and a TV viewer gets someone else to view!
• One Bashi to rule them all, One Bashi to find them, One Bashi to bring them all, And in the darkenss bind them.
• Bashi portrait here Warts and all?
• "I have presented you a selection of poems from my new poetic work entitled 'The Spring of Inspiration'. I hope you will express your opinion about it," says Bashi at the conclusionj of the 1 1/2 hour, unscheduled poetry-reading he gave on Turkmenistan TV. If a Turkmen knows what's good for him, he'll be fulsome in praising it.
• The beginning of oppression in the world starts small. But those who follow, increase it mightily. Should a sultan eat an apple from the garden of a subject, Then the sultan's slaves will uproot the whole tree. Once the sultan allows five eggs to be taken by force, His soldiers snatch a thousand fowls for their spits. No tyrant lasts long in this world, But his name lasts, accursed forever! --Sa'di, from The Gulistan
• 'Our cotton harvest's really lame and you officials are most to blame!' Bashi says. The country's cotton harvest simply isn't up to snuff -- ongoing now, it's not brought in enough. 'Some facts you gentlemen have forgotton: our cotton-picking machinery can't work until leaves fall, revealing each cotton boll. Because the plants were recently given water, leaves haven't fallen off as they ought to.' Bashi banned the use of student labour in the fields but now he's growing angry about poor cotton yields. Under Bashi it's not easy being an administrator, 'Yes, you're all in Trouble if the harvest isn't greater!'
• Neighbouring Uzhbekistan suffered the first suicide bomber in a central Asian nation at the end of July. In the month following this month of Rukhnama, Bashi will visit Uzhbekistan's leader; the two will try, hopefully, to smooth over past edginesses and tensions that could become more serious messes.
• Bashi in a Wednesday speech urges tranquility to ensure Turkmenistan's political stability (this means keeping Bashi in his current position, the same reason that he outlawed opposition). 'Discriminating against any tribe is to be a criminal offense -- whether for tradition, language, or religion. Some seek disrunity and enemies will seize the first opportunity.' He singled out Wahabism, the backbone of Islamic extremism.
• Reporters Without Borders has a list of predators on freedom of the press, and Bashi is on it.
• "Think as I think," said a man, "Or you are abominably wicked; You are a toad." And after I had thought of it, I said, "I will, then, be a toad." --Stephen Crane
• Bashi's idea of religious tolerance is not so new: he tolerates any religion which lets him tell it what to do. This means Sunni muslims and Eastern Orthodox aren't hassled very often, their members arte less apt to end up in prison or a coffin.
• Bashi's newest book's in print now, and so to every Turkmen couple getting married, he's going to give one copy of his new guide-spiritual. "Our honeymoon just wouldn't be a honeymoon, or right, without a little touch of Bashi in the night!"
• Bashi calls it a "national revival"; most of his people struggle for survival. Any objections must be hidden -- criticism of the "revival" is forbidden.
• Oh, it's Bashi this, and Bashi that, let's chuck him up, the brute, but he's President-for-Life and a despotic old galoot -- and tomorrow, when things are hopefully calmer, perhaps he'll choke on the word "Rukhnama".
• Bashi has a favorite nag, A stallion named Yanardag.
• 'Your job's to stop a crime before it even starts, to get the bad guys while the crime's still a plan. You mustn't ignore the doings of any man.' So Bashi says. And Bashi must be wise. The US just gave Turkmenistan forty gadgets which spot gamma-rays; these will be used by customs, the border guards, and such gentry. This should allow them to impound radioactive stuff before it enters the country. Summarizing the concerns and doings from Bashiland at the first of this month.
• Back in July, the three thousand villagers displaced when Darvaza houses were razed to the ground have not received any compensation yet, nor has alternative housing for them been found.
• Now, in English, Russian, Arabic, French, Persian and Chinese, Turkmen's newest TV satellite channel, showing movies. There's also to be propaganda, excuse me, "news", just don't expect to hear Turkmen's honest views.
• I carouse and sing all night long on the mountain slope and only the silver moon for company in the morning I'll walk down to the village houses like toys beside the dry river
• this morning's air ripens with the rich smell women gather near the oven and the young children play closer to the older boys laughing at the well some girls draw water as everyone's shadow shrinks the old women take sticks and paddles to they loosen loaves from the hot bricks and everyone smiles while we wait for the flat loaves we carry home
• = to loosen loaces
• = to loosen loaves *sigh*
• If all is Divine, then even our mistakes are holy, and our misspellings are little sacraments.
• Alas! Humiliation is my handmaiden, bone.
• Who the bee?! You the bee! :)
• My comment was made out of encouragement and fondness, rather than mockery. Do not bee so hard on yourself! :)