My New Backyard

As an update to my previous post, I entirely retract what I said about the dude at the help desk. I made that post from one of the computers on campus and then as soon as I got home I had Internet access in my room. I don't know if it was a coincidence or not, but I hate to be rude if the guy did go out of his way to hook me up.

Anyways, today was a lovely day and the student village where I live is a 5 minute walk from a lake so I went with some of my new friends and we had a picnic. I even went swimming! Here are some pics (keep an eye out for the pig on a leash):

Norwegian Bureaucracy

A Norwegian girl told me today that bureaucracy is the price that you have to pay for living in a socialist welfare state. Originally I thought it wasnt so bad, but now im beginning to question that.

I went to the student residence desk to ask why internet access hadnt been hooked up to my room yet. They told me that my account hadnt been activated and that I needed to talk to the IT deptarment. So I went to the IT department today and asked them to activate my account. The guy at the help desk asked me whether I had registered on StudentWeb (the universitys online course registration system) and I told him yes. He asked whether I had paid my semester fee and I told him yes. I then logged into StudentWeb and showed him how the screen acknowledged that both of those things had been completed. He asked when I paid the fee and I said last week. He asked how I paid the fee and I told him at the post office because I dont have a Norwegian bank account yet (I have to jump through about 3 more hoops before that one is ready, and it will probably take another month or so) and he said thats likely the problem - the payment takes longer to register on their system from the post office than from a direct transfer (despite it somehow ALREADY REGISTERING in StudentWeb). I asked if there was anyone I could talk to in order to show them my predicament and he said no, I just have to wait, and that I should come back on Wednesday if its not working by then.

I get the feeling, however, that if the guy at the help desk had to live without Internet access for 2 weeks that perhaps something might be done to remedy the situation a little more quickly...

Norway

...is where I live now.

R.I.P.

Man, Ingmar Bergman yesterday and Antonioni today...it's time to start watching your back, Godard!

Let's Get Something Straight

This has been a pet peeve of mine for a while and I would like to take a moment to clear things up.

If you are, for example, unfazed as to how someone else feels about something than the proper expression would be:

"I couldn't care less."

As in, you care so very little about their opinion that it would not be possible for you to care any less than you already do. You do not care at all, therefore you could NOT care less.

Now this seems fairly straightforward to me, yet I continually see/hear "I could care less." This makes no sense!!! This phrase signifies that you ARE able to care less about the given subject than you currently do. Which means that no matter how little you care about it, you do care about - which defeats the whole purpose of the proclamation! If you COULD care less then why don't you?!!??!

Now don't get me wrong, this is all about the context in which the phrase is used. If I were to say about my friends "I could care less," this would be true, because I care very much for my friends and it is possible for me to care much less for them. However the context in which I hear people saying it is "I am a fan of (band xyz) and I could care less what other people think." To reiterate: that means that you DO care what people think as you just stated that it is possible for you to care less than you currently do. ARGH!!!!

All right, I apologize for such a high and mighty rant, but populist bad grammar frustrates me.

UPDATE: History of caring less.

Ok...CRAZY!

This story was just too good to pass up.

If ever there was a good argument against constitutional monarchy, I think this is it. But then I've always been of the opinion that royalty are a waste of money.

And yet, I'm still going to do my Masters there...

Shoe sale

I was in the mall today, and saw a sign hanging above a bunch of shoes that read something to the effect of:

"Massive summer clearance! Two for the price of one!"

And I thought to myself "Isn't this how shoes are normally sold?"

Arigato Gozaimasu

A modern day Robin Hood?

Haight St.

As If I Needed Another Reason To Love Scandinavia

yes, Yes, YES!

Memories of Oxford

Never thought of looking for Slam Poets on YouTube, but here are two videos of what are, in my opinion, Taylor Mali's two best poems. I saw Taylor perform at the first slam I ever went to and he is fantastic. Rich has even had him over for supper I believe!

WTF?

Pardon me, but this is fucking ridiculous.

A 3am Thought

Human beings are designed with great redundancy. We have two eyes so that if one is damaged, we still have the ability to see. We have two arms so that we can still function if one is incapacitated. And yet, we only have one set of reproductive organs. Surely this is the part of the body which is most intrinsic to our survival as a species, so why not two each? Or 4?

Comments encouraged.

Us Kids Know

I've been listening to No Cars Go by Arcade Fire a lot lately. It was originally released on their debut EP, but they retooled it for Neon Bible and it sounds incredible. I'm not entirely sure what attracts me to the song so much...I'm sure part of it is that they closed their set at Coachella with this song, during which the band visibly poured their heart and soul into it. Chanting the end part along with 50,000 (or so) other people was pretty amazing too. But then I realized tonight, I think that a large part of my attraction is a lyric that is repeated toward the end of the song:

"Between the click of the light and the start of the dream."

I guess I kinda feel like that's where I am these days. I'm in that liminal state again - I'm not quite awake and I'm not quite asleep. Not that it's a horrible thing. In fact, in many ways it's quite comforting to actually KNOW what I'll be doing for the next 2 years of my life. And it's exciting to think that I'll be a student again, living abroad and learning a whole new language/people/culture. And it's not like I'm in a bad place right now either - it's summertime and Guelph is a great place to live. I've got friends here and I'm making new ones. Life is actually pretty sweet, but I guess it's just that sense of not wanting to invest myself entirely, knowing that I'll be taking off in 2 months time, and the anticipation of starting another 'new life.'



By the by, for those not on Facebook, my Coachella pictures can be seen here.

Wanderlust

"Lust for comfort suffocates the soul
This relentless, restlessness
Liberates me.
I feel at home whenever
The unknown surrounds me.
I receive its embrace
Aboard my floating house.

Wanderlust!
Relentlessy craving wanderlust.
Peel off the layers until you get to the core.
Did I imagine it would be like this?
Was it something like this I wished for,
Or will I want more?"

And you wondered why I loved Björk so much...

Up and Coming

I know I haven't blogged in a long time. I'm trying to devise a smooth transition back into the blogging world.

This is not it.

Symantec Redux

If you scroll down and read the comments for the post entitled "Bollocks" (I would include a link but its not very easy from this terminal) you will find a very respectful dialogue between myself and Ron Bowes, who is the editor in charge of the bloggers at Symantec who wrote the original post that the CBC article is based on. I really respect him for responding and appreciate his perspective on the issue. Go read it!

Oslo-bound

I received an e-mail this morning from the University of Oslo in Norway stating that I had been nominated for the M.Phil in Intercontextual Theology and that my letter of acceptance was in the mail, so it looks like I'll be headed to Norway mid-August sometime!

I'm not entirely sure when orientation week is or when classes start yet, but I will definitely try for a stopover in England, and, if I can swing it, a trip to Greenbelt ;)

As well, 24 hours from now I will be in San Francisco. Woo hoo!

Bollocks

I hate articles like this one.

"This illusion of privacy leads people to be a little freer in their disclosure," Symantec Corp. security researcher Nick Sullivan wrote in a post to the company's security response weblog on Friday.

Of course, no where in the article does it mention that Symantec is arguably the largest purveyor of computer security software (a little program you may have heard of called Norton AntiVirus), and that it is in their best interest, financially, to spread FUD about identity theft and computer crime. It's like writing an article about a study some guy did complaining how long it takes to walk between places, and then you find out he works for a car company.

The concerns he lists about Facebook are blown out of proportion -- he says the danger comes from Facebook sending e-mails including links for users to click on. His argument is that identity thieves could send e-mails with fake links and try to steal information from people. Well then the problem isn't with Facebook, it's with idiots who don't pay attention to what links they're following. This isn't a danger specifically with Facebook, but rather with the ENTIRE INTERNET. People should know by now that just blindly clicking the 'Yes' button and not paying attention to what you're doing on the Internet can lead to spyware and fraud. He only brings up Facebook because it's a popular site and will get people's attention.

This frustrates me on another level because it panders to the consumerist mindset. People feel like they shouldn't actually have to think for themselves, and that everything should be safe and easy from the get go. And while I agree with making laws to curb illegal schemes and the dangers of using the Internet, I also think people who don't exercise caution on the Internet deserve what they get. After all, just because we have lanes painted on our roads and light signals hanging above them doesn't mean I should expect to be able to cross the street with my eyes closed and end up still in one piece. We still need to take basic precautions to protect our own well-being. It almost seems to me as if people today, more and more, feel the 'entitlement' to ignorance. Like they have the right to not be bothered with details. Well, if one can't traverse a regular highway blind, then I don't see why the information highway should be any different. But I think that the general populace would rather have an easy, cookie-cutter solution (like, oh say, I don't know, purchasing & installing a computer security software program) than actually taking the time to pay attention to what they're doing. This doesn't just go for computers and the Internet, but many aspects of Western living. Like rather than hanging out with the poor and getting to the bottom of the problem of poverty, people would rather just write a cheque and then walk away and think about something nicer, but I digress...

At any rate, back to the original point, I would expect shill articles like this from American media companies, but I have a higher standard for the CBC....disappointing.

Update

Wow, has it really been 3 weeks since my last post? How about that...

Well, my blog has always served mainly two purposes:

1. To keep my friends overseas up to date with my daily life
   
2. To share my thoughts on stuff with people
   

I'm not saying these are the ONLY purposes for a blog, or even really good purposes for a blog, but they are the ones that mine has served nevertheless. Inasmuch as these purposes are concerned, there really hasn't been a whole lot to post about. I'm still in Waterloo and have been working full time doing data entry. I haven't been having a bad time by any means, just a rather mundane one. All of that is about to change however!

Next Wednesday I will be arriving in San Francisco for the first time in my life and spending a few days there, followed by renting a car, heading down the coast, hanging around LA and then off to Coachella. The day after I return, two of my Scottish friends that I met in Russia are coming to visit and I'm going to show them around this great country. After they leave, my mom is talking about heading to florida or north carolina or somewhere warm for a week or two and taking me with her. Following all of that business, I will be moving to Guelph and living in a home with some kinda-old-but-actually-new friends and their two young boys. Somewhere in there I should find out whether I'm going to school in Norway in the fall or not.

So, comparatively, you can see why I haven't really been posting anything exciting lately...all the exciting stuff is just around the corner, and I'll make sure to share all of THAT when it happens...

Japanese Philanthropy

I think that this story is worth commenting on. I'm not entirely sure what my comment is yet, but I do think it's positive. Hmmm...check back tomorrow for more...

Under the Category of: Things I Wasn't Expecting Today

At work this morning I pulled a mug out of the communal kitchen cupboard. I started to fill it up when I noticed it was one of those personalized mugs where you get one of your own photos printed on the side. This mug had a picture of someone else's kids. In the bath tub. Naked.

I'm not sure that sort of thing belongs in the company cupboard. In fact, I'm not even sure it belongs on the side of a mug in the first place...

I put it in the sink and pulled out a generic "91.5 The Beat FM!!" mug instead.

Ha!

Booyah!

Let the cognitive dissonance begin...

Now With 50% MORE Powerpoint Presentations!

I just noticed for the first time this morning that the office I work in has an 'Ultimate Meeting Room.' I can only imagine what fantastically amazing, ultra-rad, life-or-death meetings take place in a room labeled with such a name...

Bum Rush the Charts

Ok, I realize this is only 3 days away, and that I don't exactly have a large audience, but I wanted to share something with you nonetheless:

I will be participating in Bum Rush The Charts on Thursday, March 22nd. You can get more detailed info by clicking on the link, but the premise is this:

On March 22nd a large group of people will be protesting the evils of the RIAA by purchasing a specific song by a specific artist (Mine Again by Black Lab) through the iTunes Music Store in an effort to make it hit #1 that day and show the record labels that the days of their stranglehold on the music industry are finished and the independent artists combined with new media technologies are ready to take over.

I realize that this isn't quite like standing in front of a line of tanks at Tiananmen Square and I don't believe it's going to change the world overnight. Nevertheless, I think it is a powerful message to send to the record labels and symbolic proof of what grassroots, independent efforts are really capable of achieving. Therefore I urge anyone who cares about such things and who has iTunes installed to participate this Thursday.

PS: If anyone's afraid this is a get-rich-quick scheme for a band, you can see the money break down here and check the whole website for a lot more info.

A Pet Peeve

The seasons were wrestling again today and the decisive winner -- at least, in Kitchener, Ontario -- was Spring...blue skies with a high of 10 degrees C!

I decided to celebrate by walking over to the mall during lunch. It was at the mall where I saw a billboard which ignited the fire to write about a pet peeve I've had for some time.

The line on the billboard read "Are you a shoe-aholic?" Ignoring the blatant consumerism and materialism contained within, let's examine for a moment the language used here.

First of all, someone who is an alcoholic is addicted to what? Alcohol. What, then, is a workaholic addicted to? Workahol? Rageaholic --> rageahol? Workahol and rageahol are not, to my knowledge, actual words in the english language.

The word 'alcoholic' was created by adding the suffix 'ic' to 'alcohol,' NOT the suffix of 'oholic' to 'alc.' Thus, while it may sound somewhat crude and irregular, surely we should have "workic's," "rageic's" and "shoeic's" instead. I realize this is just one case of MANY in which the english language doesn't follow its own rules, but for goodness' sake people, you can't suggest people are addicted to things that don't even exist.

Alternatively, we could just have alcoholaholics, if that's going to be the norm...

Scheming

Inspired by Bill, I began looking into freighter travel and found that Los Angeles to Auckland only takes 14 days and costs about $1,200 US. That's about as much as a one-way flight to New Zealand anyhow.

Interesting....

Living Heroes

I have several.

The newest is this guy. He's traveling around the world and making a video diary on every weekday. He's just starting out, but his entries so far have been insightful and well-produced (he uses clever angles and his sound editing is fantastic). He's got a satellite modem so he can upload from pretty much anywhere in the world (including, already, the middle of the Atlantic ocean).

I am both significantly impressed and insanely jealous.

He's also a living testament to my theory that -- with a few rare exceptions -- you don't really begin to produce anything of significance before the age of 27. That gives me 2 more years to get my act together...

The Light at the End of the Tunnel

Ok, so it's a cheesy and cliched expression, but until someone comes up with a better analogy, there isn't a more apt metaphor describing my current state.

You must understand that the work I do (and have done for the last couple years) is solely for the cash and that I have absolutely nothing invested in it -- there is no love for what I do day in and day out. Therefore, the worst days at work are the ones when I'm stuck in the middle of 'the tunnel,' so to speak -- when I'm working hard, head down, with no distinct goal or future reprieve in sight. These are miserable, miserable times.

Yet at some point this week (I think it was Thursday), it all just clicked for me. I realized that 5 weeks from now, I will be flying into San Francisco, spending a few days there before heading to LA and finishing with one helluva festival. Suddenly at work I had visions of bombing it along Highway 1 by myself in a rental car, windows down, tunes blaring with the sun shining on some of the most amazing scenery in the world. And y'know what? That was enough.

Which isn't to say there won't be frustrating times at work between now and then (in fact, there already have been), but simply that I have motivation to work through such things. I suppose everyone has their own driving factors, and adventure -- especially when combined with uncertainty and live music -- is definitely high on that list for me.

However, I am not only excited about my trip to California. The week I return home I am going to meet up with the 2 Scottish girls I met in Moscow and spend some time showing them around my corner of Canada. This should also be when I find out whether I was accepted to do my Master's at the University of Oslo or not, and so my next adventure (whether to Norway or elsewhere) should be in the works by that point as well.

Finally -- and perhaps as equally uplifting -- is the notion that spring will be here soon enough. Although we haven't had a particularly long winter this year (it didn't really get cold til mid-January), it's still been 2 years since I've experienced a Canadian winter and I'm ready for it to be done. It's been warmer the last couple days and the snow and ice has begun to melt. Again, this isn't to say that it won't be cold or snowstormy again, just that if it is, it will be bearable, because the worst is behind us and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

So Close!

Dammit, it almost happened! Snakes on a Plane...cargo complex.

A Day of Discoveries

Man, today just keeps getting better and better! Following a link I saw to a LibriVox reader's blog, I came across Kiva.org

This website is amazing! You can go check it out to get more detailed info but basically they partner with microfinance institutions around the world to provide small loans to business operators in third world countries! This is not charity but an actual loan that is expected to be repaid. Only instead of coming from large financial institutions that will suck them dry, it comes from first world investors, such as ourselves. Now, the loan does go through a few middlemen, Kiva.org being the first and then whatever the local microfinance institution is -- and the local institution is allowed to charge interest, however Kiva has stated that they won't partner with anyone who charges ridiculous interest rates and that the main purpose of the whole site is to invest in the lives of people in developing countries, not to make money (in cases like these, the money made from interest rates tends to go towards administrative and upkeep costs anyhow).

I really can't expound on the brilliance of this project enough. If the Internet was ever to be used for the good of humanity, truly globalizing the planet, then surely this is the ultimate example of such a thing.

Perhaps controversially, I have chosen to make my first investment to a business in Afghanistan. My reason for this is due to Canada's current military presence there. Now, I'm not naive. I realize that although the Mercy Corps (the local lending organization) investigates each business thoroughly, money could still be funneled to terrorist groups. I also realize that even if it's not, my small donation is not going to do much to combat feuding warlords or power-hungry extremists. And yet still, the idealist inside of me SCREAMS that this is such a better way of supporting and empowering the people of Afghanistan than sending in a bunch of young men and women, armed to the teeth with guns and tanks. From a big picture perspective, if you want to talk about fostering terrorism, then surely sending in armed Western forces is doing a lot more to harvest such notions than my $50 loan could ever do.

Please, I implore you to go to Kiva.org and invest in a business. All you need is $25 US and a credit card -- the money goes through PayPal but you don't even need to sign up...you just punch in your credit card number and you can make an immediate & immense difference in someone's life. I know from my travels that what may seem like so little money to us really goes a long way in developing countries. So far, Kiva has a 100% loan repayment rate, so once your money comes back you could keep it or, of course, you are free to invest in someone else ;)

Here's a PBS documentary on how it works:

Watch the PBS documentary from FRONTLINE exploring the impact of microfinance in Uganda and how Kiva is helping.

My Heart Will Go On

I have found work increasingly difficult to focus on lately. Although I am allowed to listen to music, and although my MP3 player has at least 15 gigs worth on it, I find myself growing weary of the tunes that I've got.

I've tried to compensate by downloading new music, and it has helped, to a degree. The problem is that most albums are shorter than an hour so I require several in order to keep a rotation that holds my interest. This is a lot of work to do every day, and there's no guarantee that I'll actually like all the new stuff I get. I was about to give up hope, when suddenly I remembered something...

Back when I was 15 and 16 I used to work during the summer at a computer firm that took about an hour to drive to in the morning. I remember that one of the other guys, Rob, had roughly the same commute and HATED it. He said the only thing that saved his sanity was the discovery of books on tape. Thinking about this, I remembered that Project Gutenburg had a lot of audio books online as well as original texts, so I headed over there to see what I could find. The first thing that jumped out at me was Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. The office has a fantastic internet connection which takes less than a minute to download a 40mb chunk of audio. And since all the works are in the public domain and read by volunteers, it's completely legal -- this is a black and white area, it's not even remotely grey (ironically, much like the setting of Heart of Darkness, ho ho ho). I reckon I'll be able to finish the book by the end of the day.

The book is read by the lovely Kristen Luoma and hosted on LibriVox. Although she occasionally fumbles over her words or mispronounces some of the British phrases, she does a pretty good job overall! Heading on over to LibriVox I found they have a ton more titles that, for some reason, aren't listen on Gutenburg! Certainly enough to fill the rest of my time here at the office. I've always wanted to read some more 'classics' but have just never made the effort to get around to it (recall my comment about self-discipline yesterday). Now I can do the next best thing and listen to 'em!

Since LibriVox is entirely a volunteer project, I'm totally gonna do some readings for it! I've got a nice deep voice and I like acting, so I don't think it will be too difficult! Apparently you start out doing chapters here and there and then 'graduate' to entire books. I'll be sure to let you folks know when I've completed a few recordings!

On the Subject of Blogging...

Through a series of unexpected events, I have recently been turned on to some new, fantastic blogs. Not that I don't enjoy reading about what my friends are up to, but there's something very interesting in reading about a complete stranger's life and their views on it -- even more so when they do a good job of documenting it.

Which has gotten me thinking more about this blog right here. I started it when I first moved to the UK in Sept. 04 as a way of keeping in touch with friends and family back home. I absolutely downright LOATHE mass e-mails that people send with updates of their lives and had no desire to inflict that horror upon the ones I love. I figured that those who actually cared about me would bother to look up a website a couple times a week and those who didn't, wouldn't. It morphed a little bit from there, as I would throw in a little political commentary or share something interesting that had been shared with me, but that was about it.

Ok, so here's the part where I pull back the curtain and reveal the SUPER-DUPER, BRAND-NEW, ULTRA, STEP UP OF MY BLOG!!!! Except I'm sorry to say that's not going to happen. What *is* going to happen -- at least, I hope -- is that I will be a little more intentional about my blogging efforts. I purposely never set a goal or target for my blog because I always wanted it to be something I enjoyed. If it ever felt like a chore, well then that would kinda be self-defeating. Nevertheless, there is something to be said for a little self-discipline (an area I've never particularly excelled in), and I find I do get quite a lot of satisfaction out of putting my thoughts into words...often I don't realize how therapeutic it is until after I've done so. I'm finding it particularly difficult to write lately -- there's something about the combination of a full-time job and the Canadian winter that just zaps the life outta me. And yet I've realized this is really the time I need to write the most.

So I'm still wary of throwing down a specific number or tangible goal, but just know that inside there has been a significant shift. And that's about the best you'll ever get from me -- sorry, it's just how I roll.

221

Today was my 25th birthday. Unlike 16, 18, 19 and 21, the only thing that happens at 25 is that your car insurance rates go down and most big rental companies will let you borrow their vehicles. I guess the whole 'quarter-of-a-century' idea is a big deal too, but I hypothesize that's only because we live in a culture founded on the decimal system. For example, if we only had 3 fingers and 3 toes, it is likely that we would function on a base 3 system, and in Ternary, today I would be 221 -- that's not a very special number now is it? (next year, 26, would be 222 and that would be kinda cool...) I bet in a ternary society, the big celebrations would be every 9 years (100, 200, 1000, etc.), and 81 would be huge (you're 10,000!) After all, us human beings are often just silly creatures who attribute false importance to symbols we arbitrarily create....


NEVERTHELESS! I had a wonderful 221st birthday! I had brunch in the T-Dot with all of my family members and their significant others (minus my cousin Greg whom we all missed cuz he's living out west!) It was a great meal and good to spend time with everyone since I haven't really had the opportunity to do so very much in the past 2 years. Hanging out with my family is always lots of laughs. Afterwards, my mom and I did some birthday gift shopping at the World's Biggest Bookstore, followed by Sam the Record Man and MEC, where I received a light-weight, one-man tent named Big Agnes (although having set it up in our living room, Matt and I reckon you could squeeze two men...er...people inside. Whether we actually tried this or not, I will leave up to your imagination). Hopefully she will see me through Coachella as well as future adventures. Then it was back down the 401 to Waterloo for a relaxing Sunday night at home. All in all, a pretty darn good day, if I do say so myself! Happy birthday to me!

Oh My Goodness!

Someone making SENSE with regard to Canada/NATO in Afghanistan! Unfortunately this will probably fall on the deaf ears of our current pro-military, pro-U.S.-style government. They will likely retort with some such nonsense about 'not supporting the troops.' Bah.

Sorry for lacking posts as of late. I'm working full time and though I have lots of thoughts to share, I just don't have the energy to make it happen all the time...

February Sucks

Today was a balmy 3 degrees celsius! It was a nice break after the -20's we've been having lately. That said, I've still managed to contract my annual cold...boourns.

Anyway, someone shared this with me, and I thought I'd share it with you. It's dedicated to Matt:
(for those that care, the guy drops a couple f-bombs in the middle - you've been warned)

Finally

Ok, here we go....for those who don't know, here's what I'm up to these days:

I've found a job through another temp company, and have been doing work in the finance department for a big Canadian food supplier. It really is my ideal work for the moment, which is to say, maximum payment for minimal responsibility. The duties of my job pretty much consist of me sitting in front of a computer and punching numbers into an excel spreadsheet all day long. I have little interaction with others, and can listen to my MP3 player all day, enjoying music, podcasts, audio books or whatever tickles my fancy. It pays pretty well, and my supervisor(s) are really nice to boot. As I've said to folks before, if I had to do this for the rest of my life then I would probably rather kill myself as it is extremely monotonous work and really does very little to make the world a better place, however currently, as a means to greater ends it does the trick just fine. Yes, it takes up a lot of time, I have to get up early and I still come home tired after work, but it beats the coffee shop job, where I would be there til 9pm sometimes, sweaty from having to mop up, and run down from people complaining about too little or too much milk in their tea.

Hopefully this will see me through until the end of April, when I plan on attending Coachella. The big reason for the trip there is, of course, the Rage Against the Machine reunion. I absolutely love Rage and thought I would never get a chance to see them after they broke up in 2000. So far it is being billed as a 'one-off' performance by them, but I've read interviews with Tom Morello who says he hasn't "ruled out the possibility of future activities" for the band. So even though it's likely there will be more shows in the future, you never know. However, Rage isn't my only reason for going...the other two headliners (The Chili Peppers and Björk) are also performers whom I love but have never seen live. And that's in addition to the 100 or so other bands that will be there. There's a bunch in that list that I am big fans of as well, so combined with a trip to southern California at the end of April, it didn't seem like such a bad idea. To top it off, I found out a couple days ago that my buddy Ryan and his wife are planning on going too, so I'll have folks to camp out with! Score.

Well that's about it really. Sorry if I got your hopes up for something huge. I'm supposed to find out in May whether or not I got into the program at the University of Oslo, and so I should have a better idea of my next move after that. Until then, it's simply work followed by Coachella....

Stalling

I do have a big update that I would like to share, but I keep putting it off with little bite-sized entries, like this one.


Anyhow, recently I've had friends in places like England and Texas who have experienced unusual amounts of snowfall. I recognize that for the part of the world which they are in, this is indeed an unexpected treat and should be celebrated. Nevertheless, it is always a bit funny to me to see people guffawing about snow, given forecasts for the place where I'm currently living -- like this one for tomorrow: (click the little picture for the big one)


That's right, the HIGH tomorrow is MINUS TWELVE. Which, when combined with the windchill factor, will feel like MINUS TWENTY-THREE! That is tomorrow's HIGH. The 15-20cm of snow will be added to what's already frozen on the ground.

And again, this isn't to say that I'm better or tougher or anything (certainly there are people who live in much more snow than I!) It just strikes me that what is novel for some is usual for others. Conversely, if I had to live with equatorial heat all the time, I would probably drown in my own perspiration.

A lot more to come soon

I promise I have a lot more to write about, and I will do it real soon, but first I wanted to share this story about an honest guy with a good sense of humour. The summary is, he found $10,000 beside a bank machine and handed it in, but my favourite quote is this:

"Although it was short-lived, Hawkins said he enjoyed his newfound fortune by pumping his money-filled fist into the air and yelling, "party time" as astonished cafeteria-goers looked on, mouths agape."

I hope I would have done the same.

Good work Jack!

Before I get to writing today, I need to give you a little context for the story:

For my UK/non-Canadian readers:
In Canada, we also have what are known as "The Big Five" banks...these are roughly equivalent to places like Barclay's, Lloyds, Natwest, etc. However, in Canada whenever you withdraw money from a cashpoint that doesn't belong to your bank, that bank charges you a service fee. Now I'm not talking about the little privately owned ones (although we have those too) but even the big ones from another bank - it's like getting charged if you had an account at Barclay's but took your money out from a Natwest-owned machine. The fee here is usually $1.50 or something close to that.

For my Canadian readers:
In the UK, as long as you withdraw your money from an ATM from one of the big banks, you don't get charged a service fee. They do have the little privately owned ones as well which DO charge a fee, but they're usually only found inside pubs and convenience stores.

So today I read a story on CBC about how the leader of the NDP (which is the Canadian equivalent of the Lib-Dems in the UK) is proposing that Canadian banks should stop charging fees when customers from other banks withdraw money from their ATMs.

Now, the banks make a couple of good points. In the article, they claim that would be like owners of a gym allowing members from another gym to use their equipment, and that banks in the UK make up the fees by charging more for other services, which may very well be true. But you know what? Combined, the big five made a PROFIT of over $18 BILLION in 2006 ALONE. I realize that they are trying to make a profit for their shareholders, but y'know what? Not all of us are shareholders, but we are all STAKEholders. I would also like to point out that the CEO of the bank I use, Royal Bank, was given a "bonus" of $1.8 million dollars in 2004. Yeah, I'm sure $1.50 to use another bank machine doesn't really bother him to much. Basically I wouldn't give two shits if each bank lost a billion dollars in profit so that the rest of us could have the convenience of taking money out for free. Wouldn't bother me a bit.

I'm glad that Jack and the NDP are still on the backs of big business, cuz frankly, they're ripping most of us off, and giving our money to a very select few.

Tsk, tsk

It is indeed likely that the BBC is a better authority on this than I am, however having finished and posted my application to the University of Oslo this past week, I was disappointed when this story about "Storms in Northern Europe" kept discussing the Netherlands and Germany.

Really? That's considered Northern Europe??

Lack of Keyboard

Sorry for the slackness of blog posts lately, it's just that my computer doesn't currently have a keyboard. Well, one of them does, but it only works for 45 minutes at a time. It's a complicated situation. Anyway, I'm working on remedying it and I should be good to go again in the near future.

That Day of the Week

I was sitting in the living room of our new apartment watching Elling, when my roommate, Matt, walked in. I hadn't seen him since last night because he went to visit his girlfriend.

He was carrying two plastic grocery bags and didn't even say hello...he just shouted "IT'S CHOCOLATE MILK DAY! IT'S ONLY A DOLLAR FOR A LITRE! I JUST GOT 4, WE NEED TO GET MORE!"

I concur. Perhaps we'll combine the effort with the beer run scheduled for later today.

Not Dead Yet

I'm still alive, just been busy moving and such...more soon.

In the meantime, while I generally don't like advertising, I find this commercial to be hilarious!

Where the lowest price is the LAW!

Why does every Zellers smell EXACTLY the same? I swear, it's like they have the scent bottled and every night, before going home, the employees are required to spray a fresh batch.

I really can't think of any other department store that has its own unique scent...

Explanations, theories and hypothoses -- practical or otherwise -- are welcome.

Christmas Shopping

*deep breath in*

I am about to venture into the evil abyss of consumerism that is the local mall. I long for the day when I can dump this 'tradition' altogether, but for the time, it remains a necessary evil. Lately, I've been working on having a more generous attitude towards other people (even the moronic imbeciles, of which there are many) and trying to ward off my creeping cynicism and general antipathy - so, I have developed a little bit of a strategy to aid me in this descent to the underworld:

First of all, I'm going to take my MP3 player and listen to my own, chilled out soundtrack (so as to avoid the inevitable, incessant Christmas carols and general crowd noise). I also plan to walk deliberately slowly -- after all, I'm not actually in a rush, so there's no need to get caught up in the crowd. That's all I got really...walk slowly, listen to some good tunes, but hopefully it will help. Wish me luck!


*submerges self into holiday consumerism*

Eh?

Can someone explain this to me? I mean, I guess it has to be more complicated than pulling down the pants to check, but I just have no concept of what that is. What decides a gender, scientifically?

EDIT: Nevermind, I googled "gender test" and came across this. It's actually quite informative!

Christmas Spectacular

Exactly one year ago today, I posted the audio from a Family Guy episode -- well, that was before youtube took off, so this year, you get the audio AND video. What can I say? I'm a generous guy...

Speaking of Holiday Cheer....

Thanks to Rich for sharing this one:

Holiday Cheer

You all know I'm not a huge fan of Conservatives, but it's nice to see that even they have a good heart around Christmas time. Bravo!

Story comparison

Again, because I like this sort of thing, let's compare some stories in the media today:

I first noticed that the BBC had an article entitled "Ex-Iraq hostages forgive their captors" The first two paragraphs of the online article read:

Three peace campaigners who were taken hostage say they "unconditionally" forgive their Iraqi captors.

Briton Norman Kember and Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Singh Sooden said they opposed the death penalty for the hostage-takers.

The article also quotes the men as requesting "all possible leniency" for their captors, and that they have "no desire for retribution." Finally, it ends with "A fourth captive, American Tom Fox, was found shot dead in Baghdad in March."

Now, the BBC is a state-owned corporation which is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world, and generally thought to be somewhat left-leaning. The BBC website also has links to articles from other news agencies on the same story. Let's compare to the one by Sky News (sister channel of Fox News in the US) which is owned by Rupert Murdoch and considered to be more right-leaning.

The first thing I would like to draw your attention to in this article is the difference in graphics chosen: note that the BBC uses a current picture of the three men while the Sky News article uses a current picture of only Kember (the British captive) as well as a photo from the footage from the hostage video distributed by the kidnappers. The article also does include the quotes about unconditionally forgiving and no desire for retribution, however a couple other things are worded differently. For example, despite the fact that the trial has not occurred yet (let alone anyone having been found guilty), the article explicitly states that "The militants who held peace campaigners for 118 days murdered a fourth hostage, American Tom Fox." The article also includes a paragraph that begins with "Asked if he was naive, [Kember] said: ..." and concludes with the statement "He faced criticism for his apparently dismissive attitude towards the troops who had risked their own lives to save him."

Now, I am a biased commentator, and make no claims to hide this fact. I strongly agree with the position of the captives, and I much prefer the BBC's style of reporting to Sky News. My argument -- which you are free to agree or disagree with -- is that by framing the event in the way that they have, Sky News is appealing to xenophobia within the UK, while at the same time arranging quotes in such a way that the position of the captives looks foolish. To be fair, this is never stated outright, and it could very well just be me projecting my own preconceptions onto the story. Let's take that closing line as an example though: "He faced criticism for his apparently dismissive attitude towards the troops who had risked their own lives to save him."

While there is nothing wrong with including criticism in a journalistic article, by ending with it, the critics are given the 'last word,' quite literally. Also, while there is nothing factually wrong with the statement about the troops risking their own lives, it plays into that "patriotic, you-must-support-the-troops" mentality. It suggests that he OUGHT to be thankful they risked their lives to save him. But then, why do you think he was dismissive (not even dismissive, apparently dismissive)? Perhaps because he was a PEACEMAKER whose goal in Iraq was to LESSEN violence. He was prepared to become a martyr for his cause. It's not surprising then, that he wasn't thrilled to be saved by people using guns.

Like I've said, these are just my opinions and you are free to disagree with them. In fact, I would love to hear comments from people who DO disagree.

Finally, the story in the Daily Mail (arguably the most right-wing paper/tabloid in the UK) doesn't even MENTION that the captives forgive their kidnappers. In fact, the story is titled "Kember in first reunion with fellow hostages" Not once does the article mention forgiveness, only that "they are understood to be very concerned the accused may face the death penalty for the kidnapping." In some ways this version of the story sits better with me than the Sky News one, because it doesn't come off as demonizing the subjects. On the other hand, it's even more frustrating because it ignores their message completely! They choose to simply not report forgiveness. Such dissent towards the modern implementation of the Military-Industrial Complex is effectively censored by this publication. Thankfully we live in a free society where we have access to other various versions of the same news.

$1,000,000,000 For Peace

I'm not saying I am for or against this, but I certainly find it very interesting...

Take a few minutes and watch (or go here to see the original page)

Nuclear Suffering

I was very disappointed to hear about Tony Blair's plans to spend £20,000,000 on upgrading Britain's nuclear arsenal (despite cutting the stock by 20%). However I was somewhat buoyed by the Archbishop of Canterbury's response.

I have already shared my own responses to the Peace Memorial Museum in Hiroshima, however I would like to amend that I think that ANY leader making ANY decision regarding the funding or improvement of a nuclear program should be made to walk through said museum and consider the real, practical implications of not just using, but owning nuclear weapons. I understand the whole deterrence argument (which I'm not even sure I agree with), but in this specific case, Britain already has the deterrent -- Blair just wants to pump money into making sure they work properly in case Kim Jong-Il (or some other nutjob) goes off the deep-end. However, Kim Jong-Il has clearly proved that he doesn't care about his people, so he probably wouldn't care if a few hundred-thousand died a slow, painful death. Hell, it is likely that they already are at this very moment! In my mind it is so, SO hypocritical for developed nations to decry terrorism while simultaneously owning a weapon which kills civilians indiscriminantly. But enough preaching from me, the real purpose of this entry was to share pictures that I couldn't upload before.

Diorama of city immediately before bombing

Diorama of city immediately after bombing

I just found out that you can take a virtual tour of the museum here. It doesn't have nearly the same impact as seeing it in person, but it'll give you an idea. Here are some of the more powerful images from their site:


Sculptures of children with melting skin



Actual uniform of a female student who lived for the rest of the day then died that evening


The steps of a bank where someone was sitting when the bomb exploded. All that's left is their shadow.




I am loathe to do this because I think some people might not watch, however I really believe these are important images to see....but anyway, the next slideshow contains really graphic pictures. Now that you've been warned, please don't take the easy way out.



That about says it all.

Musical Origins

Left to my own devices, I always seem to put myself onto weird sleep patterns - hence why it is now 3am and I'm not feeling tired.

Anyway, I was laying in bed with the lights off, listening to some relaxing instrumentals by various Icelandic bands when it struck me what a disproportionate amount of Icelandic music I have on my MP3 player. Or at least, what I assumed was a disproportionate amount. So, not being able to sleep, I decided to go through my MP3 player and document where each band was from, and then compare the data. Before we get to that though, a little info about my (extremely simple) methods: I only counted each artist once, regardless of how many or few albums I had by them and I only included artists of whom I have full albums - mixed albums and singles weren't included (not that I have very many of those on there anyways). Also, in cases where the band was from various countries I referred to Wikipedia or just went with where ever they were most prominently based. Finally, I fancy myself to be pretty clever and know a whole lot of things, but it is quite possible that I simply assumed an artist or band to be from some place when in fact they are from another place entirely. Basically what I'm trying to say is that this data isn't very accurate and that I wouldn't draw any serious conclusions from it (plus I switch stuff up on there all the time, so this will be correct for, y'know, the next 12 hours or so). I'm not trying to 'prove' anything about my musical tastes either - in fact you'll see from the results that they are fairly homogenous. Pretty much I was just bored and trying to kill time in order to get to sleep.

Ok, so here are the numbers, in descending order:

American - 45
Canadian - 23
British - 23
Icelandic - 5
Swedish - 2
Australian - 2
Norwegian - 1
Irish - 1
Jamaican - 1


I did think it was kinda neat, however, that if you combine the brits and canadians, you eke the americans out by 1 ;)

You can probably guess the Irish and Jamaican bands, but anyone wanna take a stab at the Norwegian(s)?

Plans Pt. I

The first lines of "Arc of Time" by Bright Eyes go like this:

You can make a plan,
carve it into stone.
Like a feather falling,
it is still unknown.

In fact, you can listen to the first 30 seconds of the song here.

My plans aren't even carved into stone, and are still subject to many changes, but here is what I'm thinking for the near future:

First of all, I'm planning on moving to Waterloo and living with my buddy Matt and maybe 1 or 2 other guys in the New Year. Matt's still finishing up his degree there and I need my autonomy and own space back. Waterloo is still close enough that I'll be able to see all my other friends in the area pretty regularly. I plan on finding a job there and working to save up money until the fall whereby I'm thinking one of two things will happen.

1.) I'm going to apply for an M.Phil in Media Studies at the University of Oslo. Why Oslo?
a.) I like Scandinavia
b.) I like Scandinavian women
c.) Free tuition

Ok, the classes and program look really good as well, and seriously, I loved Scandinavia when Mark and I briefly traveled through a couple of summers ago, I'd love to do my Master's abroad, and it would be great to live in Europe again. I was also looking at a course at NYU, but it would require me doing the GRE, getting academic references, and all kinds of other junk. Plus, tuition for foreign students was like $10,000 US per year! I know that living in the capital of Norway wouldn't be cheap, but it can't be much worse than NYC -- actually, according to Wikipedia they're tied (as a side note, my last big trip took me through 5 of the top 6 most expensive cities in the world - I didn't make it to Seoul). But in Oslo I wouldn't have to pay any tuition - thank you Norwegian taxpayers for your liberalism and open-mindedness!

2.) If that falls through (ie, I'm not accepted) then I'm thinking of taking advantage of the Working Holiday program with Japan and going to live and work out there for a while.

I'd love to do both, really, and maybe I will, but one thing at a time. I know I could write a lot more about both of those topics, but I'll leave it there for now.

Plans Pt. II

"Plans" is also the title of the latest Death Cab For Cutie album, which I have been listening to lately. I was enjoying it until I came across the lyrics for Someday You Will Be Loved. The beginning goes like this, and gives you a feel for the whole song:

I once knew a girl
In the years of my youth
With eyes like the summer
All beauty and truth
In the morning I fled
Left a note and it read
Someday you will be loved.

I cannot pretend that I felt any regret
Cause each broken heart will eventually mend
As the blood runs red down the needle and thread
Someday you will be loved

You'll be loved you'll be loved
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams
Just a series of blurs
Like I never occurred
Someday you will be loved

You may feel alone when you're falling asleep
And everytime tears float down your cheeks
But I know your heart belongs to someone you've yet to meet
Someday you will be loved


Now my problem with this is that, to my knowledge, Ben Gibbard has neither psychic powers nor a time machine, so it is impossible for him to know whether, in fact, she will be loved.

This may seem like a small beef, but my problem is with the greater implications of it all. This is quite a good example of what may be the number one malaise of our postmodern existence: responsibility, or rather, lack thereof. He clearly states that he doesn't feel guilty about (presumably) lying to her, stringing her along and sleeping with her, and he gets out of it by claiming (in a melodic croon) that someday she will be loved, again presumably by someone that's better for her than he is. But like I said, he can't know this for a fact. Maybe her life will consist of a series of men taking advantage of her like this and eventually she ends up dying alone and dissatisfied. It's nice to think that there's one, true match out there for all of us, but I just don't buy that. What pisses me off is that he's shirking the responsibility of confronting her about the break-up, and then making it sound romantic by singing a song about some idealized vision of the future. Again, I'm extrapolating to larger elements of life here, but that's like singing to people in sweatshops "Someday you will have reasonable hours and wages," or to starving Africans "Someday you will have food," but then going about our daily business and doing absolutely NOTHING to make this a reality.

Now I can accept that not every relationship works, and that sometimes break-ups are necessary, but seriously, take some responsibility for it. Apologize, dammit! Confront her and let her know it's not working out! Don't take off while she's asleep, leaving a note that's optimistic about the future, and then move on to the next chick. That's just selfish and irresponsible.

Now, I know some people will think that I've put too much thought into this, and maybe I have, however;
a) I'm willing to bet that since this record has been released, someone else, somewhere has pulled this stunt in order to get out of a break-up
b) I really do think it says something sad about our privileged, Western, consumeristic society that we leave it to 'fate' to decide things rather than acknowledging that, in reality, we have the ability to change things but we don't because we are too selfish and it would be too uncomfortable for us to help others. I guess that's the meat of it right there, really. That's the analogy I see: he could break-up to her face, but that would be hard for him to do, so he takes off, leaves a note and writes a song. We could actually drop third world debt (for example) but it would mean spending more money and giving up some of our things, and we're not willing to do it. We would rather let other people suffer, at our expense, so long as we don't have to see it happening.

I guess the other thing that bothers me is that I really like Ben Gibbard's side project, The Postal Service, but now I see him in a different light. Not that it affects the music at all, but, oh, I dunno.

I'm unemployed and want to do a Master's degree in Media Studies...posts like this were bound to happen sooner or later.

I Heart Movies

I just re-alphabetized my DVD collection (can you tell I'm unemployed?) I counted and it turns out I have over 160 different titles (that's not including TV shows or music DVDs or anything). I think I'd be proud if I wasn't so disgusted with my own consumeristic tendencies. What's worse is that I noticed a few choice titles were missing and made a mental note to pick them up sometime. What's even worse is that there's probably a dozen or so movies in there that I haven't ACTUALLY watched yet.

Public Theatre

Like my fellow blogging cohorts, I have been rather lackadaisical with my blogging attempts as of late. But I found out about something that I just had to share:

I followed a link from a site about a recent prank that Ben Folds played at a concert in NYC. He got a group of guys from Improv Everywhere to come on stage and pretend to be the band. What they were really doing, however, was lip-synching to a CD recording the band had done. This CD would then 'skip' while the band was 'playing' and it would look as if they had been caught doing a fake performance. Then, the REAL Ben Folds came in, kicked the fake band off the stage, and started the show for real. The whole thing (and a better description) can be seen here.

This got me to thinking about the whole point of live music. I have certainly been to many concerts in my time, some of them in big stadiums. Sometimes a band is much better live, due to both vocal and instrumental improvisations (Pearl Jam, I would contend, is much better live than recorded). Other bands are TERRIBLE live. I've seen Our Lady Peace a bunch of times (mostly on festival line-ups, but also in smaller venues) and Raine just can't seem to get his voice to sound like it does on the records. However, I think it says something when fans can't even distinguish impostors 'playing' along to a recorded CD. What it says, I'm not quite sure, but it's very interesting. It's not like the venue they were at was a stadium with a capacity of 50,000 people. According to the site, the Hammerstein Ballroom has a capacity of around 3,300. And except for the hardcore fans at the front, it seemed as if most were willing to rock out to the actors & CD for the entire evening. What is it, then, about a live performance that is so interesting? Like I said above, I'm certainly not knocking live music, I love it! I just think it's a very interesting question - one I don't necessarily have answers to yet (feel free to post comments).

So anyway, I started checking out their site some more, and found out these folks are hilarious! They do stuff like this on the streets of New York City all the time! Apparently they even have experience as a fake band, since they posed as U2 on a rooftop the day of a scheduled U2 concert at Madison Square Gardens! Some of my other favourites (at least, from the ones I have looked at) include: dancing in the windows of department stores, throwing a birthday party for a stranger, a bunch of people shopping in slow motion at Home Depot, a business man threatening to jump from a 4 foot high ledge, a bunch of people wearing clothes similar to the Best Buy uniform walking into the store and helping customers, installing a high-class bathroom attendant in a McDonald's bathroom, a bunch of phones going off simultaneously in peoples' bags at a coat/bag check, and a bunch of people dancing in sync at the listening stations in a Virgin Megastore.

Videos can be found towards the bottom of each page, but I urge you to read the write up that goes along with them - they're really well done, and it gives you a bit of the context for the event, plus the comments that people report over-hearing are often hilarious. You can find a list of all of the events here - be sure to check out my favourite of them all: the annual installments of No Pants Day (as in 'trousers' for the Brits).

True Story

Why is it that the things we want the most are the things we can't have?

And I'm not speaking in a profound, philosophical or existential sense here - I mean practical, down-to-earth examples.

It happened like this:
I was sitting in the bathroom today waiting for the bath to run (I like to read in the bath occasionally) while finishing my breakfast of a toasted bagel sliced in half, each side covered in peanut butter. I was down to the last quarter of the bagel and SO looking forward to it when the damn thing slipped out of my fingers and into the garbage can.

I will admit, with no shame, that I did pull it out of the garbage and considered eating it. I can't explain just how MUCH I desired that last bit of warm goodness in my stomach. After a thorough investigation however, I decided that it had been too tainted, even for me, so I begrudgingly put it back in the can. Honestly mom, it's still there. You can check if you don't believe me.



Also, this link comes via Kyle, and I think it's pretty insightful (I particularly like the one from Toronto). Check it out, if that's your thing...

World Cup Humour

I don't know how long this will last before it gets pulled for copyright infringement, but I saw this on the latest episode of family guy and had to share, particularly with my friends in the UK where the show doesn't air.

(The first second or so of the video is screwed up, but it corrects itself after that)

An Ellipsis

It's no secret that I'm not exactly thrilled to be living back in southern Ontario. I'm not entirely sure why, but for whatever reason(s), it feels like a step backwards in my life. I'm sure that for many people, it is a good place/space to be for them at this stage in their lives, but for me...well, I'm just not feeling it. I guess that part of the problem is that it seems old and boring and uninteresting to me, especially when I know there's a big-ass world out there with so many quirks and quandaries just waiting to be explored. I think an even bigger part of the problem is that while I know I don't wanna be here, I'm not exactly sure where I do want to be...or where I'm going next. I'm usually a pretty laid back and easy-going kinda guy, but this whole liminal, between-life-phases kinda deal is stressing me out a bit.

Having said all of that, I'm determined to make the most of the time I have while I am here.

I've been doing quite a bit of thinking lately and have realized if I'm looking for gloom and misery, I'm going to find it. In fact, I've set my expectations for the next few months so low that really, life can only get better than I have imagined it is going to be. So I really want to seize the approaching days, and get the maximum, well, whatever...experience? I guess? that I can from them. True, I'm not entirely happy with where my life is at the moment, but I have the ability to make choices and really, that's all life comes down to - your choices about your circumstances. So I'm choosing...or at least, attempting to have a good time while I figure out what to do next.
Ride the waves...

short video

a collection of videos i took during my time in china & japan. unintentionally, they all involve water in one way or another.

in chronological order:
1. the ferry from shanghai to kobe
2. a canal in kyoto
3. the seaside of beppu at night
4. a public onsen outside of a train station
5. my feet in the same onsen
6. a waterfall in kirishima
7. a turtle in hong kong park


i will upload my pictures to flickr when i get off my lazy ass

The Beard

I know that beards are controversial. People seem to love them or hate them. Here are my reasons to keep the Beard, at least for a while:

1. I didn't grow one during the past 2 years when I was in England
2. It adds and extra layer of warmth during the Canadian winter
3. It requires less shaving

Ta Da!

Those of you with eyes may have noticed the new layout. I figured that since my time in England was finished, I was no longer a 'Canadian Boy Across the Atlantic' (although Matt pointed out that now, to my British friends, I am 'across the atlantic'). Also, the likeness to the title of another blog further contributed to my need to differentiate myself. So, seeing as how I've spent a good chunk of the recent months of my life on sitting on trains and staring out the window, I thought the theme would be appropriate. Thanks to whoever took the photo that I stole for my funky new banner.

I'm heading up to Pook's cottage this weekend with Mark, Matty and some other folks, so I probably won't update again til late next week. It's been all right being back home, but I've definitely experienced reverse-culture shock in a couple ways already. For example, I forgot that taxes weren't included in the printed price, which caught me off guard. And then when I was 10 cents short, I pulled out a quarter instead of a dime (because a quarter is roughly the size of a British 10 pence piece, and my brain was looking for the 'ten'). It's also just strange to walk past groups of people and realize they aren't speaking in English accents. Plus a coffee and donut at Tim Horton's is now $2.09 instead of just 2 bucks -- what gives?! It's not all bad though. True, the weather is getting cold, but I really did miss it. It's that crisp cold that you don't get in England...it's sunny, and there's no dampness about it. Autumn, here we come!

One More Time

Well I'm off again in a few hours to catch my flight back to Canada. Although I'm not particularly looking forward to living in Southern Ontario, I am looking forward to seeing friends and family again. I'm also looking forward to staying in one place for more than 4 days, since I haven't really done that in the last two months! If you're on the other side of the Atlantic, I shall see you shortly.

The disconnect

EDIT: I think this entry came out more sappy than I originally intended. The point I was trying to make was not 'woe is me, I've never been in a serious relationship' but rather the difficulty of understanding and connecting to other people with regard to this, in my mind, rather monumentous topic.

---

A quick disclaimer -- this one is going to be a bit raw, so if you're not into awkward emotions, it's probably best you just skip it...

All right, so this is something I have thought about for a while now, but just feel compelled to write about tonight, for some odd reason:

I don't think I've ever been in love. I've certainly never had a serious relationship. And I feel subhuman because of it.

And the hardest part of this whole situation is that there's virtually no one to talk to about it. I mean, almost everybody has been in a serious relationship at some point in their lives, so when I try to share this sentiment with people, I get the typical responses of "Oh, it's not that big of a deal," or "it's not as important as you make it out to be." This advice is, of course, quite useless to me. It's all well and good for someone who's been there to make a judgement call about it, but after having experienced such a thing, I have noticed that it is very difficult for people to imagine never having had the experience in the first place. Do you get what I'm saying? What I mean is, it's easy for a person who's been in a relationship to say that it's not important, because at least they have had one and have experienced all the things that go with it. They don't know what it's like to not have that, and the fact is I have never experienced all of that and it makes me feel like I'm missing out on a big aspect of being human. Since these other people have already been through all of this, they don't have the same sense of not belonging, because even if they're single now, they've done it all at least once before in the past.

I urge you to really, seriously, consider this. I imagine that the majority of people who read this entry will have had been in a relationship at some point in their lives. Whoever you are, where ever you are reading this, I ask you to think of these important relationships with others and then to imagine that they had never happened. Imagine all those moments you shared together were erased and that you had never learnt how to compromise and exist with regard to another human being. You've never looked deep into the eyes of someone you cared about and then kissed them. You've never woken up next to someone who chose to sleep beside you. You've never droned on about stupid crap because another person was genuinely interested in absolutely everything you've had to say. In your mind, get rid of all of that but try to keep who you are as a person. And then try to imagine talking to people about such things. It kinda sucks sometimes...

Another Quick One

This is just a quickie for those who don't know. Sorry I haven't updated more often recently...Hong Kong was great, albeit far too brief. I am now back in Oxford until Tuesday when I fly home to Canada. I am staying with my friend Jim, who, I would like to say publicly, is one of the most generous men I have ever met.

Heather and Steve came to visit yesterday, so I got the chance to hang out with them a bit as well. I had supper at Brad's new place last night and tonight I will attend hOME and see some more friends. It will be sad to leave England, but in many ways I have already 'detached' myself from this place. And although I am not particularly looking forward to living in Southern Ontario, it will be nice to see my friends and family from there again.

If I get around to it later today, I might upload some pictures to my Flickr account to share with you folks.

See you soon.

Well sorry about the lack of recent updates folks. Tonight is my last night of the trip though. Ive still got all day tomorrow, but then I fly out at 12:30 at night for a 13 hour (!!!) flight directly from Hong Kong to London. I will have a few days in Oxford before flying back to Canada. Because of my limited time, this is all I'm going to write for now, as it is likely I will see most of you again and be able to speak in person in the not-so-distant future. See ya soon!

Destination: Tokyo

Well I finally made it to Tokyo...alive and in one piece. I just got in late this evening, so I havent really had a chance to explore it yet, although Im sure it will yield some fantastic results. Tomorrow I plan on making a pilgrimage to the Park Hyatt Hotel where Lost in Translation was shot. In the mean time, here are some interesting facts about my trip:
(Please note that none of this includes Hong Kong, where I will be flying to next monday)

Kilometres travelled without flying: 13385 (note that this is a rough estimate using a combination of the City Distance Tool and my Trans-Sib Lonely Planet...in actual fact it is far more since it also doesnt include all the side trips ive taken, this is just my guess for Oxford to Tokyo)
Number of nights spent sleeping on a train or ferry: 11
Number of countries passed through: 10
Number of time zones crossed: 9
Number of different currencies used: 6
Amount of money lost: $150 US (somewhere in Mongolia i misplaced 3 AmEx travellers cheques)
Number of pig races witnessed: 1
Number of times I have hit my head on something in Japan (so far): 16
Number of those times that I have really smoked my head hard, leaving some sort of bruise or mark: 5

Blargh! As per usual I tried to upload photos, but to no avail...you will just have to hold your breath.

August 6th, 1945 - 8:15am

I went to Hiroshima yesterday and it was overwhelming. After getting off the train, we found the tram to the A-Bomb Dome. All but a few sturdy structures were wiped out by the atomic bombing of Hiroshima - the dome was the closest remaining building to the hypocentre of the explosion and has been preserved as a reminder of nuclear devastation. As we walked around the dome, the skies were clear and there was the sound of a plane flying over head...it was extremely unnerving.

After the dome we headed over to the Peace Memorial Museum which was incredible, albeit completely exhausting emotionally. I wish I could hook up my camera to this computer to show you some of the photos I took...I will make a real effort to upload them in the near future. Basically, its easy to think of a nuclear explosion on the macro scale but the museum brought it down to the micro scale. The lucky victims were vapourized instantly (I have a picture of an exhibit in the museum which was transported from the steps outside of a bank...there was no person left, just the shadow of where they were sitting). The unlucky ones had to watch as their melted skin dripped from their bodies while they wandered around, desperately in search of some water (the irony is that any water they found was, of course, highly contaminated with extreme amounts of radiation).

It is at this point that I would like to make a comparison between the events of August 6th, 1945 and September 11th, 2001. But let me write a few disclaimers first:
1.) I dont believe that anyone deserves to die, ever. The loss of all human life should be mourned.
2.) I dont believe that the wrongs of previous generations can be blamed on current populations or governments.

With those out of the way, let us then consider the act of dropping a nuclear bomb on Hiroshima. An estimated 80,000 people died as a directed result, with another 60,000 dying (slowly and painfully) over the course of the next year due to the effects of radiation. They didnt drop this bomb on a military complex, they dropped it IN THE MIDDLE OF A FUCKING CITY. Granted, military activities were taking place, but that was the case in most cities during World War II. In addition to military activities, there were also kids on their way to school, old ladies grocery shopping, etc. etc.

So like I said, this isnt to diminish the pain or suffering caused by September 11th, but put into perspective, less than 3,000 people died in that event - over 140,000 died in Hiroshima (and thats not taking into consideration the bombing of Nagasaki a few days later). So while the United States has every right to condemn the killing of their innocent people, it strikes me as a bit of a double-standard...like somehow American lives are worth more than the lives of 'others.' I believe this sentiment is echoed in the recent Gulf conflicts as well. (Interestingly, one of the reasons that Hiroshima was chosen as a target was due to the fact that it was the only city on the short-list which didnt have a POW camp...another reason was to justify the enormous expense of the research & construction of the a-bomb to the American people). Now, I am also not saying that there is any sort of direct link between Sept. 11 and Hiroshima - clearly the terrorist acts of Sept. 11 were carried out by Islamic militants. I guess its just in some sort of cosmic karma thing that you cant be the only country in the history of humanity to drop a nuclear bomb on people and not expect it to come back and bite you in the ass. To reiterate: not that the victims of Sept. 11 deserved to die, but rather, the American foreign policy has been slowly building upon a foundation which devalues and is hostile to the outsider.

Anyhow, after the museum I wanted to sit down and cry for about an hour, but resisted the urge. Instead I started thinking about nuclear weapons today. And seriously, if Stephen Harper (or any other Canadian prime minister) allows the American government to put nukes over Canadian airspace as part of their crazy 'Star Wars' missle defence system, I will see to it that I personally kick his ass. Its absolutely ludicrous. I have enough problem with killing, let alone on a massive scale. The last thing we need is one of those puppies malfuctioning, flying astray and hitting the ground somewhere.

Finally, just in case anyone has anything positive to say about the use of nuclear weapons, like how it 'ended the war' or some other nonsense, I seriously urge you to visit the Peace Memorial Museum in Hiroshima. In the case that you are unable to make that trip, I ask you to conjure up in your mind an image of the person you most love walking around with their melted skin dripping off of their body, and then re-consider your position on nuclear weapons.

I will try to write a happier, more expository entry in the near future.

The Land of the Rising Sun

Well Ive made it to Japan. Just a quick story for now:

Got off the boat from China and while waiting in line for customs I hung out with 3 Japanese girls and a Kiwi who is living in Kyoto. One of the Japanese girls was from the port town we arrived at (Kobe) and took us to a local market for good, cheap food. So we got to this place, which is essentially the dudes living quarters as well, went in and sat at his work desk while he used what looked like a waffle grill to cook pieces of octopus inside spheres of some egg-ish batter. It actually tasted all right, but wasnt nearly filling enough. That said, I think it was a very authentic first experience of Japan, and I cant wait to see more of it!

Shanghai Nights

Especially the morning rush hour: