Author: Milan

In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. Between 2005 and 2007 I completed an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford. I worked for five years for the Canadian federal government, including completing the Accelerated Economist Training Program, and then completed a PhD in Political Science at the University of Toronto in 2023.

Off to Ireland

Fishing float in Jonathan's garden

In a few hours, I will be departing for Dublin, to return late on the 23rd of this month. Quite probably, I will have the chance to post something here while I am in Ireland, but please do not expect prompt responses to emails. My thanks to the many people who provided suggestions regarding what to do while I am over there. I still haven’t decided exactly where I will go for my away trip, but if Galway and the Aran Islands prove feasible, that would be my first choice at the moment.

All told, I don’t feel as though I am in the very greatest shape to be going on a solitary week-long trip. That said, I am generally anxious immediately before such travel, especially when it involves waking up so early and concerns about security and flights working out. That said, I am sure once I am there it will prove an interesting and worthwhile expedition.

Those looking for some entertainment in the interim should have a look at my brother Mica’s videos or my friend Alex’s ruminations on the papacy as an international actor (link removed 26 Sept 2006), according to taste.

[Update: 26 Sept 2006] Alex Stummvoll’s blog has been discontinued.

Planes and bicycles

Good thing I double-checked my flight booking: I am actually going to Dublin by Ryanair tomorrow, not Easyjet as I had previously written. That is, if Ryanair’s cancellation of flights does not affect it. The prospect of getting up at 3:00am, taking a three hour bus ride, and waiting two hours in security for a flight that may not happen is not a delightful one.

Also, with regard to my friend who was able to get to Madrid after all: she is now stranded there, until her flight is re-scheduled.

On an unrelated transport matter, the pedal of my bike broke off while I was riding to college to print tutorial essays. I have a nasty little bruise where my leg slammed down onto the top bar of the frame, and it looks like it will be making another maintenance visit to Beeline Cycles. While they are very kind about fixing things under warranty, I rather wish they would hold together a bit better in the first place. So far, they have had to repair the handlebars, replace the entire gear and chain system, replace one pedal and the shaft it is on (before today), and straighten out my rear tire (which may have been my fault).

[Update: 4:30pm] My flight to Dublin is meant to leave at 10:00am. They say to be there three hours early for security and, given how many people are missing flights because they get held up amidst the x-ray scanners and metal detectors, I mean to be at Gatwick at 7:00am. The coach ride is meant to take two hours but, mindful of how two successive coaches broke down when last I went to London, I am banking for three. Catching the 4:00am bus would mean waking at 3:00am to shower and lug my suitcase to Gloucester Green. Since that is only an hour later than I would probably go to sleep anyhow, the sensible thing seems to be to restrict sleep tonight to a short nap, and adopt a tax on my vitality for the first couple of days I will be in Dublin.

All that said, I need go go buy some film (since my digicam is still off at the repair centre) and a copy of The Dubliners to read while in the city.

[Update: 12 October 2006] The pedal fell of my bike again – the same one as before. I need to take it to Beeline Cycles on Monday.

I love Vancouver

Things I can’t wait to get in Vancouver:

  1. All you can eat sushi
  2. A cheap(er) 1GB stick of RAM for my iBook
  3. Cobb’s bakery Twisted Delight
  4. Dental care from someone I trust
  5. Galleria sandwich
  6. Coffee made with Vancouver water
  7. Naan vegetarian poutine, with miso gravy
  8. Delicious veggie curry, as made by my mother
  9. Cheap Bic four-colour pens, to bolster my supply
  10. Delicious peanut-sauce-saturated food from Tropika
  11. Chilled sake at Hapa Izakaya
  12. Tasty soup at Kintaro
  13. Mountains to the north!
  14. Additional sushi at Honjin
  15. Photographic banter at Lens and Shutter
  16. At least one dose of Curry Point curry. I still have my frequent customer card (half full).
  17. Food, wine, and conversation generously granted to myself from the benevolent Ellan family
  18. The view from the Lions Gate Bridge
  19. The view from the northern end of Canada Place, at night
  20. The view from atop Crown Mountain
  21. 99 cent pizza, downtown
  22. Welts in my head from low-ceilinged Kitsilano basement suits
  23. Episodes of 24 watched on Jonathan’s basement couch
  24. Pure liquid funkiness: Commercial Drive
  25. Granville Island Winter Ale
  26. Thesis related books at Canadian prices
  27. Proper, West Coast rain
  28. A copy of The Georgia Strait to read on the bus
  29. Competant barristas at Starbucks
  30. More clothing and gear from Mountain Equipment Co-op

That is more or less the lot. Or did I forget something?

Oxford summer theatrics

Amidst the drilling and pounding in Wadham today, I realized that Oxford University during the summer is much like a theatre between shows. The set undergoes modification and repair; the wiring and lighting gets tweaked and redone; and nearly everyone present is out of character. As such, it is unusually interesting for the kind of person who likes to learn how magic tricks are done, and unusually challenging for those who would rather not know.

Luckily, I fall within the first grouping. I suppose it is somewhat ironic that the great flood of tourists see the colleges while they are being sandblasted and re-paved, the quads while their grass is dying from the ban on lawn watering, and the gardens while they are kitted out as theatres for summer productions of Shakespeare and Wilde.

Something New Under the Sun

Flowers in a window, London

Happy Birthday Zandara Kennedy

Extensively footnoted and balanced in its claims, John McNeill’s Something New Under the Sun is an engaging and worthwhile study of the environmental history of the twentieth century. It covers atmospheric, hydrospheric, and biospheric concerns – focusing on those human actions and technologies that have had the greatest impact on the world, particularly in terms of those parts of the world human beings rely upon. People concerned with the dynamic that exists between human beings and the natural world would do well to read this volume. As McNeill demonstrates with ample figures and examples, that impact has been dramatic, though not confined to the twentieth century. What has changed most is the rate of change, in almost all environmentally relevant areas.

The drama of some documented changes is incredible. McNeill describes the accidental near-elimination of the American chestnut, the phenomenal global success of rabbits, and the intentional elimination of 99.8% of the world’s blue whales in clear and well-attributed sections. From global atmospheric lead concentrations to the depletion of the Ogallala Aquifer, he also covers a number of huge changes that are not directly biological. I found his discussion of the human modification of the planet’s hydrological systems to be the most interesting, quite probably because it was the least familiar thing he discussed.

Also interesting to note is that, published in 2000, this book utterly dismisses nuclear power as a failed technology. In less than three pages it is cast aside as economically non-sensical (forever dependent on subsidies), inherently hazardous, and without compensating merit. Interesting how quickly things can change. The book looks far more to the past than to the future, making fewer bold predictions about the future consequences of human activity than many volumes of this sort do.

Maybe the greatest lesson of this book is that the old dichotomy between the ‘human’ and the ‘natural’ world is increasingly nonsensical. The construction of the Aswan High Dam has fundamentally altered the chemistry of the Mediterranean at the same time as new crops have altered insect population dynamics worldwide and human health initiatives have changed the biological tableau for bacteria and viruses. To see the human world as riding on top of the natural world, and able to extract some set ‘sustainable’ amount from it, may therefore be unjustified. One world, indeed.

Vancouver music in September

One thing I would like to do while in Vancouver is see a concert by one of the city’s more distinctive musical acts: someone like Tegan and Sara, the Vincent Black Shadow, Melissa Ferrick, or Spirit of the West.

Does anybody know of such a concert between September 6th and 23rd, excluding the dates between the 10th and the 12th, when I will probably be taking part in Cabin Fever 2?

Also, would any Vancouver friends be interested in attending such a concert en masse?

Creepy stuff

Who runs http://www.vroomfondel.co.uk? Also, why do they keep scanning through my blog? They do so through this page and seem particularly interested in anything involving NatWest: the bank where I foolishly opened an international student account.

Is anyone else getting several hits a day from these people? I don’t know who they are, but their URL is registered at the following address:

c/o Net Rank
Suite 1c, Western Way,
Exeter,
Devon
EX1 2DE
GB

Suffice it to say, I do not appreciate their attentions, at least so long as I don’t know who they are or what they are doing. If you run your own server, it is easy enough to ban people referred directly from their strange login site. Just add this to your .htaccess file:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} vroomfondel\.co.uk [NC]
RewriteRule .* – [F]

Depending how automated the system is, that might foil it. If it is run by a group of people working through that portal, they will be able to find another way to access your site, regardless of the above addition to your .htaccess file.

Perseid shower peaks tonight

Lost Lagoon, Vancouver

Taken during a walk with Astrid in late April 2005, this photo shows Lost Lagoon in Vancouver’s Stanley Park. Nearby, to the southeast, is Vancouver’s central urban district. Equally close, to the north and through the park, is the southern end of the Lions Gate Bridge to North Vancouver.

In an announcement particularly relevant to those who live outside of big cities, the Perseid meteor shower will reach its peak of intensity tonight. Generated from dust and fragments from comet Swift-Turtle, the Perseid shower occurs annually. The comet in question was discovered in 1862 and is notable for being the largest object that regularly approaches the earth.

The best time to see the shower is in the hours immediately before dawn, but there should be more than eighty meteors per hour visible to the naked eye for most of the night, for those in reasonably dark places. Because of the way in which the planet rotates, the rate at which the meteors appear is about twice as high right before dawn as it is shortly after sunset. This is because, at that time, the particular part of the planet’s surface where you are is both hidden from the sun and facing in the direction of its the planet’s around the sun. Because of that combination, the most visible collisions with material from the comet will occur.

The shower is called the Perseids because the meteors appear to be coming from the constellation Perseus. Those who are going out to watch may find it worthwhile to familiarize themselves with how the constellation looks and where in the sky it appears.

If anyone has a particularly dramatic experience, I would be glad to hear about it here. I continue to look up with dismay at the thick rain clouds over Oxford.

[Update: 13 August 2006] On account of the constant presence of rain clouds blocking the sky and reflecting back city light, I saw not a single meteor. I hope others did better.

On pen varieties

For some time, I have been wondering about the difference between ballpoint and rollerball pens. They do, after all, seem quite similar in construction. Each uses a ball bearing (often made of tungsten carbide) as a mechanism to moderate the flow of ink from reservoir to paper.

As it turns out, the difference lies less with the mechanism than with the ink. Anyone who has ever accidentally broken open a Bic ballpoint pen knows that the ink inside is thick and goopy. This partly explains why ballpoint pens can be hesitant to start writing after a long period of non-use. Rollerball pens, by contrast, use a thinner, water-based ink. It is more vulnerable to smudging that ballpoint ink, but less likely to leave a spot where you begin writing. They also feel smoother to use, though not as much so as fountain pens, since you are still exerting the effort to make the ball turn, despite friction.

Generally, I use a four-colour Bic pen to take notes and mark up things that I am reading. I have developed a system over the years that lets me find specific things and kinds of things in books and articles I have read much more quickly than by skimming unmarked versions. The flexibility of the four colours makes up for how the pen is somewhat thick and inelegant in the appearance of the text it produces. For letters, I use a fountain pen, in hope of making them more legible to my much frustrated correspondents (I never really learned how to print, much less handwrite, in a clear manner. It is generally legible enough, but certainly not elegant.) When writing to myself, or trying to make my writing look as good as it can, I generally use my better Cross ballpoint pen, or a rollerball.

What do other people use, and why?