my best friend janet's been making raw, vegan ice cream with a schmancy ice cream maker & i can't wait to taste it! me, i'm making organic strawberry, kiwi, aloe vera ice cream with organic agave nectar and cow's milk in my tustly vitamix. i've reintroduced mik to my diet for ayurvedic reasons and so far, so good. i hope to build ojas, although ice cream may not be the best way to build it!this fiery chap would love my homemade ice cream, i'm sure. he's in bhutan at a pre-festival festival in ura, which is in middle bhutan. i visited there for almost a month in 2005 and man, was it a trip! travel stories on this gentle and disturbing country later. my good friend and tour guide, phintso dorji, currently wants me to sponsor him to visit the states and work here. i'm not sure how this would work, but i'm willing to give it a shot. he works for the UN in thimpu, the capital of bhutan.
during our trek in the himilayas four years ago, phintso unfortunately proposed a more intimate relationship with me in the tent that we were forced to share during a rain storm. i politely declined and this incident changed our relationship for the rest of my stay in this small and pretty country. i was so upset! for being a buddhist country, bhutan sure has a long way to go towards gender equalization. the idea of accepting everything gracefully with a buddhist-like temperament hasn't served the women in this country. the men have earned an unspoken right to sneak into women's homes in the middle of the night and have sex with them and take off, often leaving behind fatherless children to raise. this is called "night hunting". when i was there, the bhutanese i met said night hunting only takes place in eastern bhutan, where the hillbillies live i supposed. while i was there, one of the king's four wives was touring the country giving out condoms in hopes of preventing STDs during these night hunts. even though the hunts may only occur in eastern bhutan, she was certainly making the rounds.
anyway, i'm now fine with phintso's & my relationship. he has a lovely wife and son whom i hung out with in thimpu. there were true cultural differences that both phintso and myself could have been more sensitive about for sure. i shouldn't have given condoms to our driver so freeley (after that, the men thought i was "loose") & he shouldn't have assumed that since i'm a foreigner, i was there for sex (like the OL's from japan).
anyway, maybe phintso can come to the states this year - i think he'd like chicago. it's *really* different from the foothills of the himalayas, that's for sure. i will make phintso the best strawberry ice cream ever to welcome him!
