I don’t usually embed YouTube videos, but a friend pointed me to this talk that features some of my absolute favourite things in life: travels stories, evolutionary biology, Douglas Adams and lemurs!!!
Ninety minutes of the funniest, wittiest and most insightful rant you will ever hear on Parrots the Universe and Everything:
Dear local Kyoto-fu LDP candidate for the upcoming upper-house election:
True: I cannot cast a vote in this election and sway your chances either direction.
But let me assure you that, if you keep insisting on circling my block multiple times, every morning between 8 and 8:30, inane election slogans blaring from your van’s speakers at top volume, I will be more than happy to contribute to your historical legacy by setting post at the closest grassy knoll with whatever long-range weapon I can get my hands on.
Thanks.
Really, Hawaiian… it’s just Japanese pronounced with a thick US accent, right?
Shortly after my arrival yesterday, Fred&Co mentioned they were off skydiving today. Having enthusiastically accepted an offer to join, I found myself this morning at 7am, mildly jetlagged and ever-so-slightly hangover, riding a mini-van to a small airfield 1 hour away from Honolulu and subsequently jumping off a moving plane, 10,000 feet above the Pacific Ocean.
Among other observations, in no particular order:
Leaving for Honolulu in a couple minutes…
Japanese cell won’t be on, but email will be checked occasionally (I hear they have Internet there, but don’t tell my advisor).
Back on Tuesday. Enjoy tsuyu, suckers!
These “volunteers” will teach you English (and the Word of Jesus Christ Savior) for free, at three convenient locations around Kyoto.
Obviously, Japan is not doing enough to discourage missionaries these days…
Yep, that’s my daily commute.
It is an understatement to say that the entire frame of Israel-related issues has long been overtaken by vociferous extremes. Increasingly weak attempts at launching reasonable, moderate discussions around the topic are bound to be drowned in the heady, simplistic rhetorical bullet points peddled on each side and gladly amplified by scores of well-intented moronic third parties.
Of course, for all the wishful thinking out there: Gaza is not some sort of plucky little nation bravely resisting a cruel barbaric invader. And Israel is not acting out of pure self-preservation to preserve its legitimate borders from impending invasions by neighbouring countries.
Israel is not the source of all oppression and abuse in Gaza. Gaza is currently ruled by a bunch of muslim extremists who have amply demonstrated their lack of concern for basic human rights and are not above propping up kids for their war, presumably because the adults are too busy stoning gays and impure women. Incidentally, hatred of gays and women: a point on which their conservative archenemies on the Israeli side seem to be in complete agreement.
Conversely, Israel has long slipped from its legitimate goal of ensuring its survival against hostile neighbours, toward appeasing a vocal ultra-orthodox minority, whose views on Arab-Israelis and their right to exist are only a couple degrees removed from what could be heard in the streets of 1930’s Berlin. It is no surprise that Israel has started alienating even its staunchest allies over the past decade: claiming to work toward peace while rushing to approve new settlements, like some schoolboy cramming as much as he can into his test sheet before the headmaster snatches it (or, for a more appropriate analogy: like victor nations of past World Wars, rushing to grab as much land as possible before calling in an armistice). There comes a point where no amount of denying the obvious through intellectual contortions can hide the fact that your policies are the exact opposite of what you claim them to be.