It happened! It happened!

Been to Alko this morning, and wow, look at the prices! Especially the hard liquor prices. Forum's Alko was almost empty of actual liquor, and I asked them if people have bought everything out already, but they said they did not get a delivery yet.

Wow, cheap booze! I did not think I'd live to see the day.

Speaking of stress (the entry of couple of days ago), I saw a really nasty nightmare last night. Don't remember the details, but it involved me and three other people killing and eating people and getting in trouble with police for that. Ugh.

Niyazov (what, you don't know who he is? He is the president of Turkmenistan, of course!) has banned long hair and beards on young men. The article doesn't say how young is young, and probably the law doesn't either.

Turkmenistan is an unbelievable shithole. You can read the latest US State Department human rights report on it here, but since you probably won't, here are some choice bits:

"A 2001 presidential decree prohibits foreigners or stateless persons from marrying citizens without meeting several requirements. The noncitizen must have been a resident of the country for a year, own a home, be at least 18 years of age, and must post a "divorce bond" of $50,000 with the Government. "

"During the year, the Government continued to demolish large numbers of private homes in Ashgabat, including those to which residents had valid legal title, as part of a beautification program. The Government required many evicted families to pay for removal of the rubble of their destroyed homes."

"No master's degrees or doctorates have been granted in the country since 1998. Since 2000 universities have reduced the period of classroom instruction from 4 years to 2 years in accordance with President Niyazov's declaration that higher education should consist of 2 years of classroom education and 2 years of vocational training. The President also decreed that foreign languages in the public education system could be taught only in special language centers and classes."

"Since September 2002, each child is required to bring to school a personal copy of the Rukhnama."

(Rukhnama is a spiritual and cultural guidebook written by Niyazov, sort of the Turkmenistan equivalent of Mao's
little red book.)