As we approach 31 December, the question humanity must ponder is whether it is really such a good idea to embark on a new year at this juncture. Do we actually want to go through another 365 days of this? If your answer is in the affirmative, and you have made up your mind to take the bull by the horns of a dilemma in a china shop, then let me compliment you on your courage, shake you by the hand, and wish you god speed.
And for that you will need the Donkey’s blessings for 2015. May your days in the new year be filled with joy, prosperity, happiness, an absence of coliform bacteria in your bottled drinking water, an annual average concentration of less than 550 parts of million of soot particles below 10 microns in the air you breathe, a mobile data plan that won’t drive your family to starvation, and a new constitution by the end of the Quaternary Epoch.
Without naming names, there are among you valued readers of this column some chronic pessimists who like to wallow in hopelessness. You see a new year approaching, and you insist on looking at 2015 as a glass half-empty. And then there are perennial optimists like yours truly who will stagger across to the bar and get myself a refill.
Given the way things are going in Nepal and our immediate vicinity, I have decided to pay my dues as a life member of the Nepal Bar Association which means you will find me most evenings this week at the friendly neighbourhood watering hole nursing a double Black Dog on rocks, and already well on my way to fulfilling my personal new year resolution which is to make an even more complete ass of myself in 2015 than I already am.
My other new year resolutions (which are copyright, protected by the International Biopiracy Covenant, and may not be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, and transmitted in any form electronic, mechanical, photocopying or by telepathy) are:
- To be grouchy and cantankerous throughout the coming year. After all, what is there to be cheerful about?
- To be a teetotaler by totally avoiding tea since it causes ulcers. And take up whiskey instead.
- It’s dangerous to keep anger bottled up, so I will personally strangle any motorcycle that tries to overtake me from the left on the Lazimpat Uphill by choking its windpipe. But as a believer in non-violence, I will let the driver off.
- I will spend less time aimlessly stalking people on Facebook this year, and switch to Candy Crush Saga.
Like it or not, the new year is upon us and, like it or not, tradition demands that we all come up with new year resolutions, or face the consequences thereof. I have been going around the past few days asking important Nepalis to tell me completely off the record what their resolutions, if any, are:
Assembly Chair Nembang: “Try not to do today what can be done tomorrow.”
UCPN(M) Chair Comrade Awesome: “Become president by hook or by crook. Mostly by crook.”
Comrade Baburam: “Have more followers on Twitter than in my party.”
Prime Minister Jhusil Da: “Try not to do anything in 2015. If a government does nothing, nothing can go wrong.”
KP Oily: “Tell all foreign hands that they needn’t bother trying to destabilise our country, we’re doing that just fine by ourselves.”
Bijay the Gutch: “We will meet our nationwide bandh target to ensure the government machinery is well-rested, and functions smoothly in 2015.”
Comrade Energy Minister: “What? There are still some mega hydropower projects that are nearing completion in 2015? Quick, cancel their contracts and extort them!”
NEA Chief: “Reduce danger of high voltage electrocution by increasing load-shedding in rural areas to 24 hr/d.”
Comrade Big Plop: “Try not to learn any lessons from the history and move onward with the great proletarian revolution and the strategic counter-retaliation offensive campaign against running dog imperialists and their blood-thirsty hegemonistic expansionist reactionary fascist mongrels.”
Dog loitering at the BICC premises: “Being a son of a bitch, I guess I’ll strive to be an even greater son of a bitch in the new year.”