Of floods and forests

Watching the news about a UK which is waterlogged for the second year in a row, and the tribulations of the people who have been repeatedly flooded out, had days-long blackouts and all sorts of other trials, strangely, I feel optimistic.  Sometimes it takes hard times to force people to reconsider the status quo, and in the process it seems to bring out the very best and the worst in people - sometimes it takes a disaster to get people to help each other.

In the last week, I have seen more air time given on the news to the need to have more trees on high ground, so that their roots can release water more slowly to the rivers, which should meander more across the land to slow them down and stop them bursting their banks.  There has also been coverage of moving subsidies from paying farmers for owning land, to paying them for taking on land and nature conservation activities.  It takes years for this kind of thing to take hold - consider the effects of the successive clean air acts in the UK (1956, 1968, 1993) and the USA (1963, 1967, 1970, 1977, 1990).  Before they came into effect, London was famous for its pea-souper fogs, in which you could barely see a metre ahead of you, and all cities in the UK were soot-blackened from the use of coal fires.  Now, after the instigation of smoke-free zones and with the help of changes to natural gas as a fuel, it has become worthwhile to sand blast the grand old buildings in the cities and restore them to their former splendor.

I'm looking forward to a future in which the UK is a more forested landscape, and in which news stories of people being washed out of their homes have become a rarity.

Posted by Ross

On Judgement

On Judgement

Nothing is calculated to induce a hissing fit in me more than exposure to the religious establishment in Romania.  When visiting the graveyard to pay respects to a loved one, we were not allowed to bring our own flowers and candles, but had to buy them from the church-sponsored shop on site.  Graves are inspected regularly, and anyone who has the temerity to use their own flowers or candles will have them removed from the grave by the BMW-driving priest.  There has been an unprecedented spate of church building in the country, with hundreds of large, expensive churches being completed in small villages where the money would have been welcomed on infrastructure such as roads and schools - enormous expenditure, provided by the government.  For a country pulling itself as fast as possible into the fast stream, it is a shameful distortion of priorities and display of the vested interests between state and church.

And yet...

...cut to the news of the recent uprising in Ukraine, where priests from the same church have displayed awe-inspiring bravery, standing and praying for peace in the cobblestone littered devastation between the two warring factions.  It is impossible to view the pictures without respect for their courage in a very dangerous place.  It also reminds me that, when times have been hardest under oppressive regimes, churches have provided a rallying point, hope and leadership to so many people, and that perhaps I should not judge a whole institution, and all of the people in it on the basis of the actions of a venal few.

Posted by Ross

In praise of Swiss garbage

If you are looking for a well thought-out exercise in cause and effect, you need look no further than Swiss garbage collection - it is impressive!

You can buy, at any store at the counter (not off the shelf), the plastic bin liners for your district. These are potentially the most expensive plastic bags that you will buy at about CHF25 ($24, €18 or £15) for 10 pieces. You can put anything in these, and it will be re-cycled by the city, but you can appreciate that if you put everything in it, you need to be rich...

What happens if you use your own (cheaper) bin liner? The collection folks will go through your rubbish and find something that identifies you, and you will receive a polite letter telling you that if you do it again, you will be fined.

But you don't HAVE to spend your inheritance on garbage collection. Very much of what you have is re-cyclable. There are collection points in easy reach across the city for glass of various colours and metal tins. These were large above ground bins until recently, but have recently been dug into underground silos, with a small, neat pillarbox for the 'goods'. Plastic milk and joghurt cartons, and PET bottles are collected at special collection points in supermarkets. Paper and cardboard are collected frequently from the street outside your dwelling, and you can either use the calendar to tell you when they will be collected, or you can register your mobile and receive a message the night before collection. The paper and cardboard needs to be tied up neatly with string, and left outside on the streetside by about 7 in the morning. Twice a year, there are similar services for old clothes and leather goods, and these are channeled to charities who can either sell them and use the money, or ship them to countries which need them. Bags are provided, with the collection date on them, and you get the usual SMS the night before.

All of these services are free of charge, and if you use them, the bin-bag lasts MUCH longer.

It works. Being lazy is expensive, being conscientious is cheap, and quite franky, it's garbage - it's just not worth getting into a lengthy discussion with the authorities about it.

On the optimistic peak

I guess that, like in any job, you go through various mood curves: you start all excited and seeing only hues and shades of pink - that would be at a Himalayan altitude. Then you realise you have to write the company's founding papers (Die Statuten) in German - and that's about where you discover the true depth of the Mariana Trench. Then - with a lot of help from your friends and advisors - you actually get to the point of signing the final registration papers and the public notary congratulates you. Celebration. When you finally wake up from the bubbly induced euphoria you realise that, just because you exist it doesn't mean you're alive. Yet. And you set a new world record in diving.

But then comes the moment when patches of crumbled projects start letting through a glimpse of commonality - wow: we have a couple of assignments. No pressure. Not tonight (last night was another story: didn't get a minute's sleep, worrying about one of them). Tonight we celebrate.

And get ready for the next round of free diving.

Just like a thirsty man drinking water from a fire hydrant

I'm beginning to realise how much I've learnt and panic at the thought of how many things there still are to be learnt. No, it's not the quantity that scares me, but the speed the learning has to happen at.
I think that only now did I "touch base" with reality: there are no more colleagues to ask or consult with, there are no more departments to brief and then leave them in charge with that part of the project...
Learn learn learn
I'm consuming tones of information: recycling, finance, social marketing, social networks, SEO and web design ... I have been absent a year (not in my life - here I think I was more present than in many years) and it seems that the world has changed completely.
I'm beginning to understand my mother's panic attacks.

It's exciting and scary. I realise that I shall have to face my fears and shame. I'll have to learn to "sell myself" - God I always hated financial discussions!

Two shy people much more introvert than we let see - ufff, we need to get out of our shells.
We know we must start networking and shamelessly boast.
So embarrassing for us...
Have blushed just at the thought of it...

Street image

Louis Vuitton bags taking the public transport, Street Parade passing by with its colourful and thump-thump techno music floaters, its hoard of uninhibited followers - this city fascinates me!

In praise of Swiss garbage

If you are looking for a well thought-out exercise in cause and effect, you need look no further than Swiss garbage collection - it is impressive!

You can buy, at any store at the counter (not off the shelf), the plastic bin liners for your district. These are potentially the most expensive plastic bags that you will buy at about CHF25 ($24, €18 or £15) for 10 pieces. You can put anything in these, and it will be re-cycled by the city, but you can appreciate that if you put everything in it, you need to be rich...

What happens if you use your own (cheaper) bin liner? The collection folks will go through your rubbish and find something that identifies you, and you will receive a polite letter telling you that if you do it again, you will be fined.

But you don't HAVE to spend your inheritance on garbage collection. Very much of what you have is re-cyclable. There are collection points in easy reach across the city for glass of various colours and metal tins. These were large above ground bins until recently, but have recently been dug into underground silos, with a small, neat pillarbox for the 'goods'. Plastic milk and joghurt cartons, and PET bottles are collected at special collection points in supermarkets. Paper and cardboard are collected frequently from the street outside your dwelling, and you can either use the free, supplied calendar to tell you when they will be collected, or you can register your mobile and receive a message the night before collection. The paper and cardboard needs to be tied up neatly with string, and left outside on the streetside by about 7 in the morning. Twice a year, there are similar services for old clothes and leather goods, and these are channeled to charities who can either sell them and use the money, or ship them to countries which need them. Bags are provided, with the collection date on them, and you get the usual SMS the night before.

All of these services are free of charge, and if you use them, the bin-bag lasts MUCH longer.

It works. Being lazy is expensive, being conscientious is cheap, and quite frankly, it's garbage - it's just not worth getting into a lengthy discussion with the authorities about it.