kandinunger

La Despedida

Thu, 17 May 2012 06:47:21 -0400

It’s amazing, really, how much one can learn in a little under 5 months. It’s strange how someone else’s house can become your home and how after only 4 months or so you feel like you belong in the country. No puedo creer que mañana no vaya a dormir en la cama un poquito pequeña, cubierta de sabanas estampadas de flores y una manta tan coloreado. La misma cama en que dormí por 4 y pico meses. No voy a andar por las mismas calles con tanta prisa porque me levanté 15 minutos después de sonar mi despertador. La ruta que tomo yo cada día no tomaré el viernes. No voy a anticipar el jueves por salir con amigos. Este jueves voy a salir en una manera distinta. I can’t quite express it in words, I feel so wonderfully happy I got to know you, Spain. All your streets and your buildings are so cool and different. Your words are too…Your way of living life has taught me a few things and so have your beautiful people. I can’t wait to be back in my house, drinking tea and watching some random tv show with my mom, but I will never stop missing this beautiful place with it’s beautiful music and it’s beautiful people and it’s beautiful language and it’s beautiful streets and parks and cities and everything. It has been one of the most intense and best experiences of my life. Sería bonito quedarme por más tiempo. A lo mejor vuelvo yo otra vez más pronto. What will I do without you, Spain? I might sleep more, pero es cierto que te echaré de menos muchísimo. ¿Qué más puedo decir? Nada más que te echo de menos ya y no he salido todavía. Nos vemos pronto. Te prometo. Hasta luego.

thedailywhat: It’s Caturday! [sirmitchell.]

Sat, 24 Mar 2012 14:23:48 -0400

thedailywhat:

It’s Caturday!

[sirmitchell.]

thedailywhat: Kickass Comestibles of the Day: Donna @ Apron...

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 16:14:11 -0400

thedailywhat:

Kickass Comestibles of the Day: Donna @ Apron Strings has a special place in her culinary cardiovascular system for cracking eggs into veggies. Back in December she experimented with eggs in avocado slices, and last week she gave Onion Ring Sunny-side Up Eggs a shot.

She says:

This is a great version of the eggs in veggie ring molds – sauteed onions are so delicious, and give a nice tang to the eggs. And they are, of course, beautiful on a plate!

If you’re feeling egg-venturous (sorry), you can follow Donna’s instructions here and make your own.

[neatorama.]

Better

Sat, 10 Mar 2012 13:42:56 -0500

I was on this thing called Pinterest today and I don’t know how to describe it. But it’s like a image blog or a giant corkboard that you pin pictures of things that you like to it.

But I came across some rattling images. There were before and after torso pictures of women who lost weight; there was a particular picture that kept coming up with some thin muscular, big-breasted sports bra clad girl that had been “pinned” to several boards with comments on it like motivation or work out. And I am all about working out. It’s a great, uplifting way to feel healthy and feel good in general. And I don’t know if the pictures are bad. They aren’t bad or inappropriate, but at the same time I keep thinking that we keep seeing these images that show things that are “better.”

Like my body has to be better. I have to diet and exercise so I can be better. Because the body that I have right now isn’t good enough. Sometimes it’s such a struggle to love my body. And I see pictures of toned, beautiful, athletic women who don’t look like me. That should be ok. It should be ok for me to carry the weight that I carry. Why don’t I feel ok about it?

Where doe this idea of better come from? What does better even mean? Is better a word that I should even use? Because this word translates into other areas of my life: could be a better musician, could be a better writer, could be a better flutist, could be a better planner, could be a better student. I feel like I should be better with a lot of things.

But there is just this part of me that wants so badly to believe and know that better isn’t true. We are just different. And I don’t like that answer because it sounds so elementary school. Or like an excuse.

We are just so different. Why do I feel compelled to compare myself to every girl I ever stand next to? Because I think I do. But there is no comparison. There can’t be. Because I never measure up. There’s always something we have on them and always something they have on us. It never works. And that’s when I should take my cue: we are two different people.

thedailywhat: On Kony 2012: I honestly wanted to stay as far...

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 06:30:52 -0500

thedailywhat:

On Kony 2012: I honestly wanted to stay as far away as possible from KONY 2012, the latest fauxtivist fad sweeping the web (remember “change your Facebook profile pic to stop child abuse”?), but you clearly won’t stop sending me that damn video until I say something about it, so here goes:

Stop sending me that video.

The organization behind Kony 2012 — Invisible Children Inc. — is an extremely shady nonprofit that has been called ”misleading,” “naive,” and “dangerous” by a Yale political science professor, and has been accused by Foreign Affairs of “manipulat[ing] facts for strategic purposes.” They have also been criticized by the Better Business Bureau for refusing to provide information necessary to determine if IC meets the Bureau’s standards.

Additionally, IC has a low two-star rating in accountability from Charity Navigator because they won’t let their financials be independently audited. That’s not a good thing. In fact, it’s a very bad thing, and should make you immediately pause and reflect on where the money you’re sending them is going.

By IC’s own admission, only 31% of all the funds they receive go toward actually helping anyone [pdf]. The rest go to line the pockets of the three people in charge of the organization, to pay for their travel expenses (over $1 million in the last year alone) and to fund their filmmaking business (also over a million) — which is quite an effective way to make more money, as clearly illustrated by the fact that so many can’t seem to stop forwarding their well-engineered emotional blackmail to everyone they’ve ever known.

And as far as what they do with that money:

The group is in favour of direct military intervention, and their money supports the Ugandan government’s army and various other military forces. Here’s a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army are riddled with accusations of rape and looting, but Invisible Children defends them, arguing that the Ugandan army is “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries”, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasn’t been since 2006 by their own admission. These books each refer to the rape and sexual assault that are perennial issues with the UPDF, the military group Invisible Children is defending.

Let’s not get our lines crossed: The Lord’s Resistance Army is bad news. And Joseph Kony is a very bad man, and needs to be stopped. But propping up Uganda’s decades-old dictatorship and its military arm, which has been accused by the UN of committing unspeakable atrocities and itself facilitated the recruitment of child soldiers, is not the way to go about it.

The United States is already plenty involved in helping rout Kony and his band of psycho sycophants. Kony is on the run, having been pushed out of Uganda, and it’s likely he will soon be caught, if he isn’t already dead. But killing Kony won’t fix anything, just as killing Osama bin Laden didn’t end terrorism. The LRA might collapse, but, as Foreign Affairs points out, it is “a relatively small player in all of this — as much a symptom as a cause of the endemic violence.”

Myopically placing the blame for all of central Africa’s woes on Kony — even as a starting point — will only imperil many more people than are already in danger.

Sending money to a nonprofit that wants to muck things up by dousing the flames with fuel is not helping. Want to help? Really want to help? Send your money to nonprofits that are putting more than 31% toward rebuilding the region’s medical and educational infrastructure, so that former child soldiers have something worth coming home to.

Here are just a few of those charities. They all have a sparkling four-star rating from Charity Navigator, and, more importantly, no interest in airdropping American troops armed to the teeth into the middle of a multi-nation tribal war to help one madman catch another.

The bottom line is, research your causes thoroughly. Don’t just forward a random video to a stranger because a mass murderer makes a five-year-old “sad.” Learn a little bit about the complexities of the region’s ongoing strife before advocating for direct military intervention.

There is no black and white in the world. And going about solving important problems like there is just serves to make all those equally troubling shades of gray invisible.

[kony2012.]

thedailywhat: Ramen Flavor of the Day: So it has come to...

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 18:14:35 -0500

thedailywhat:

Ramen Flavor of the Day: So it has come to this.

[obviwin.]

Anonymous

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 16:35:22 -0500

Whoever you are
I hope we meet on a busy street
I hope we meet in the middle of the road
And pause there for a moment
And nod to the mutual sound of humanness
And Whoever you may become
I hope that I meet that person
On the same street
In the middle of the road
And once again pause for a while
But dance this time

thedailywhat: Misconceptions Rundown of the Day: C.G.P. Grey...

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 13:19:19 -0500

thedailywhat:

Misconceptions Rundown of the Day: C.G.P. Grey follows up his random myth-debunking video with another misconception rundown devoted to clearing up eight long-held beliefs about animals.

[cgpgrey.]

Daddy long legs are not spiders!!!

The dogs speak Spanish here

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 13:02:01 -0500

There is nothing much to report here except that I am doing the same things I have been: speaking Spanish, dancing to Spanish music, learning about Spain in Spanish, and making and keeping friends while talking Spanish. Mostly I just love it. It’s really starting to pick up pace and move along quickly. Happy one month anniversary Spain 2 days ago!

thedailywhat: LMFAO of the Day: He-Man has the power, and he...

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 13:54:30 -0500

thedailywhat:

LMFAO of the Day: He-Man has the power, and he knows it.

[devour.]

I don’t know why I find this so comical, but I do.

thedailywhat: Dance Number of the Day: At their wedding...

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:28:12 -0500

thedailywhat:

Dance Number of the Day: At their wedding reception last week, Brian surprised his blushing bride Emily with a well-rehearsed dance routine set to Justin Bieber’s “Baby.” And then Emily surprised Brian with an annulment.

Just kidding! Congrats, Brian and Emily. You crazy kids are gonna go far.

[dpaf.]

I want this at my wedding.

pussiesonparade: Jumpstartle by Luke Bott

Sun, 08 Jan 2012 07:08:35 -0500

pussiesonparade:

Jumpstartle by Luke Bott

onlynina: professional-princess: What Are You Doing New Years...

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 22:34:30 -0500

[Flash 10 is required to watch video.]

onlynina:

professional-princess:

What Are You Doing New Years Eve? by Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt

i love this.

thedailywhat: So Shines A Good Deed of the Day: After the...

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 23:14:32 -0500

thedailywhat:

So Shines A Good Deed of the Day: After the blood-soaked shirt from their video for “You Only Live Once” sold for an unexpected amount of money, members of the extreme metal band Suicide Silence took their windfall and spent it on toys for needy kids.

<3 Suicide Silence.

[reddit.]

I am pretty sure anything can make me tear up nowadays. But this is still really cool.

thedailywhat: Year In Review of the Day: Google’s annual Year...

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 12:58:53 -0500

thedailywhat:

Year In Review of the Day: Google’s annual Year in Review video is upon us.

See how the world searched in 2011, and maybe, just maybe, leave with a little more hope than you had.

(Also: Check out a quick cameo from yours truly @ 0:32.)

[google.]

See Also: Top 10 fastest-rising global queries of 2011.

I may or may not have cried a little bit. I am such a sap.

Details

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 23:34:22 -0500

I just realized that I have been studying a little differently lately and I just identified what I have been doing: I have been intentionally paying attention to details. Interesting. They really do come in handy.

thedailywhat: Early Bird Special: “A few UT Austin students...

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 23:30:41 -0500

thedailywhat:

Early Bird Special: “A few UT Austin students take a break from studying for finals.”

Finals: Not even once.

[reddit.]

thedailywhat: Adorable Animal Being Adorable of the Day: An...

Sun, 11 Dec 2011 12:41:48 -0500

thedailywhat:

Adorable Animal Being Adorable of the Day: An adorable baby bat named Lil’ Drac (ikr?!) was rescued after being abandoned by his mother, and hand-raised by staff members at Bat World Sanctuary.

This is his story.

[iheartchaos.]

i can has adorable bat baby?

thedailywhat: Discussion Topic of the Day: Utah State...

Thu, 08 Dec 2011 12:51:57 -0500

thedailywhat:

Discussion Topic of the Day: Utah State University students Jesse Budd and Patrick Romero ask their fellow undergrads the age-old question: Can men and women just be friends?

Whatever you might think about this exercise, one thing is certain: You will have an opinion.

[reddit.]

I have no opinion.

thedailywhat: OMG! Adorbz of the Day: Tottenham-based hip hop...

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 18:21:35 -0500

thedailywhat:

OMG! Adorbz of the Day: Tottenham-based hip hop artist Alim Kamara freestyles with 2-year-old Khaliyl — one of the few MCs who can honestly say they were rapping before they could talk.

[drinkyourjuice / ratsoff.]

BEST THING EVER