outdoorFun

Sydney Life

2011-09-12T18:01:00.000-07:00

Cecilia's book at Berkelouw Bookstore..

Some of the sights available in this big cosmopolitan city, where the wild sea comes right up to the CBD.

Royal national park sunset, Bondi beach,
Sept 5 was "Vogue night out" with DJs and live models in shop windows...

Real flowers in David Jones

Army exercise Kapyong Warrior

2011-09-12T06:24:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year, 5 days of intense exercise in High Range behind Townsville. Blank firing, and 48 hours of live fire.. finishing with a hill assault.
A day of prep, then a big battalion parachute jump with a 40 kg pack , live grenades etc. 5 people got injuries on the landing zone - from concussion to broken legs. We had simulated mortar explosions on the landing zone, so it was quite realistic and exciting.

Sept 11 2001 thoughts

2011-09-12T06:10:00.000-07:00

From "mx news"(free in sydney), I read a short article by Aussie Taylor Schon, whowent and lived in NYC for a while as a young female model - she was on theobservation deck of the world trade center on Sept 9 2001...

September 11 hasundoubtedly changed my entire outlook and perspective on life. It haschanged me from normal attitudes of job,career, work,money,relationships.

Life is short,some people have had it cut shorter.

I live, Itravel, I pursue my passions, and I tell people I love them, I takechances and sometimes I get hurt.

I try to loveand get heartbroken.

But I wouldrather try and make the effort, because of this second chance atlife.

some juicy andrefreshing comment from the "one cosmos" blog:

Atrue "restorative" or "conservative" revolutionwould be like that of the Islamists, who utterly reject modernity andwant to return to an insanely "pure" form of Islam.Ironically,conservative Americans are routinely accused by the left of having asimilar agenda, when the opposite is true. Rather, the left wishes toimpose its religion on the rest of us, since one cannot be a leftistwithout a huge and intrusive state.

Butwhy look back before the job is even done? Often it becomes an excusefor the villainoustraitors inour midst to pretend they are actually on the same side we are, byexpressing sympathy for the victims -- victimsthey would otherwise regard as deserving of their fate becauseof America'sevils.They are not animated by a desire to avenge these deaths, which,after all, is the important -- and difficult -- part. With all duerespect, anyone can cry. What we need are people who can fight andkill, a very different skill set.

I rememberthinking on the day it happened, “nothing will ever be the same,”as if the veil of history had been rent right down the middle,revealing to us, if only for a moment, exactly what lay behind it:the principalities and demonic powers, the Cosmocrats of the DarkAeon -- those unseen forces that “are more than rational and whichmake use of lower things, things below reason, in order to conquerand rule the world of man” (Dawson).

Hereare the root causes: World.Trade. Center.

First, the World,the idea that human beings are actually one, and that, beneath oursuperficial diversity, there is a universal Way and Life and Truth.Itis the opposite of multiculturalism, the pernicious idea that theendarkened multitude of human streams evolve in their own paralleluniverses and that truth is somehow embodied in each culture.

Inpoint of fact, culture -- that unreflective torrent of custom thatdrags most souls in its wake -- is more or less a repository offalsehood and delusion, of things that are not true because theycannot be true. Time reveals this to be the case, but it isspecifically time that our enemies wish to arrest andreverse.
Trade.The spiritual evolution of which we speak is a system, and only anopen system may evolve. We are specifically at war with people whoobject to this fact, and wish to remain in a dark, dank, and airlessprison -- an authoritarian anthell with truth handed down from onhigh, preventing any hope for evolutionary progress.

Theseare literally deathcultures,for death occurs whenever a system becomes closed, whether it isbiological death, psychic death, epistemological death, spiritualdeath, economic death, what have you.

Center.The world is converging towards its nonlocal center, a spiritualtelos that is located outside space and time. This center can only bereached through liberty (...)

Spiritualityrespects the freedom of the human soul, because it is itselffulfilled by freedom; and the deepest meaning of freedom is the powerto expand and grow towards perfection.... --SriAurobindo

Thoughts on Education - especially secondary schools

2011-09-12T05:49:00.000-07:00

I've been reading criticisms of secondary schools as they stand on the net, some by ex-teachers of the year, such as John Taylor Gatto. One comment that struck me as true is that the adult institution that schools today most ressemble is a Prison... peer pressure or violence, wardens, bells and timings..

Education today teaches people towork for grades and fit in a system rather than really learn or learnto use their initiative. With a smattering of learning and few usefulskills. Education as a whole, needs a total rethink... I chasedgrades, but I now realise they mean little in the real world. (although a degree/ diploma etc is certainly useful and sometimes essential to open doors, once the door is open however, you need to be able to apply your passion and real knowledge... and no one will ask you what grades you got.)

Whatgets you ahead is your ability to follow your passion and doself-directed learning (which can include formal learning) and yourability to self-discipline (not so much your ability tofit in to a system, company or organization - which is to say, pleaseothers... that can only last for so long before one looses steam, asthe motivation is not from within).

Also, an abilityto work with others in a team, with egos and some friction, anability to use your initiative. You could teach all this to teensvia, say, a 4 week transatlantic voyage with other teens on a largesailing boat. Along with navigation skills, math, physics (ofsailing), astronomy, history of navigation, self-confidence indangerous situations (bad weather), physical courage and endurancedespite tiredness, the ability to do small repairs, to sew, to cookfood, first aid...

Why are westill stuck with secondary ed more suitable to producing clerks andassembly-line drones in this fast-changing internet age ? Iwould ask teachers not to fear change, but to facilitate the entry ofa more flexible and useful education.

Some havesaid that modern secondary ed was designed 100 years or so ago in the USA by Dewey,together with Ford and other big Corporate interests to produce fixedClasses... to condition people to keep in "their place" andsort them and condition them to be docile Worker Drones/ or Elitistaristocrats who can tell the rest of us how to live (Brave NewWorld....). I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but this is clearly partof the unconscious drive behind a lot of secondary ed. It's based onan entirely limitative and innacurate view of human nature - itdenies the real life examples of people transforming themselves,teaching themselves or learning on the job, of high schooldroputs like Bill Gates Or Steve Wozniak (Apple computers) inventingwhole new technologies and becoming very successful. And ofpeople with degrees who have become incapable of any creativethought, and merely parrot what they have been taught.

Gatto:

Genuine reform is possible but it shouldn't cost anything. We need to rethink the fundamental premises of schooling and decide what it is we want all children to learn and why. For 140 years this nation has tried to impose objectives downward from the lofty command center made up of "experts", a central elite of social engineers. It hasn't worked. It won't work. And it is a gross betrayal of the democratic promise that once made this nation a noble experiment. The Russian attempt to create Plato's republic in Eastern Europe has exploded before [our] eyes, our own attempt to impose the same sort of central orthodoxy using the schools as an instrument is also coming apart at the seams, albeit more slowly and painfully. It doesn't work because its fundamental premises are mechanical, anti-human, and hostile to family life. Lives can be controlled by machine education but they will always fight back with weapons of social pathology - drugs, violence, self-destruction, indifference, and the symptoms I see in the children I teach.

Right now we are taking all the time from our children that they need to develop self-knowledge. That has to stop. We have to invent school experiences that give a lot of that time back, we need to trust children from a very early age with independent study, perhaps arranged in school but which takes place away from the institutional setting. We need to invent curriculum where each kid has a chance to develop private uniqueness and self-reliance.

A short time ago I took seventy dollars and sent a twelve-year-old girl from my class with her non-English speaking mother on a bus down the New Jersey coast to take the police chief of Sea Bright to lunch and apologize for polluting [his] beach with a discarded Gatorade bottle. In exchange for this public apology I had arranged with the police chief for the girl to have a one-day apprenticeship in a small town police procedures. A few days later, two more of my twelve-year-old kids traveled alone to West First Street from Harlem where they began an apprenticeship with a newspaper editor, next week three of my kids will find themselves in the middle of the Jersey swamps at 6 A.M., studying the mind of a trucking company president as he dispatches 18-wheelers to Dallas, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

Havingseen the work of the elitists in the UK, which is a social basketcase, I can truly say the "Elite" coming out of Unis todayare Arrogant, Clueless and Suicidal. So the outcome is not good.

A film like "goodwill Hunting" exposes the fallacy of credentialism, and the factthat people can move up and down between intellectual and income levels,depending on how they choose to live, self-educate and work and save.

from the "One cosmos" blog:

Whenliberal (US democrats) pundits accuse tea party protesters of longing for the goodold days, it is in fact the pundits themselves who in truereactionary fashion long for the "good old days," specifically,"when the common people kept their heads down and listened totheir betters. "

Well the common people are starting to wake up......

The social welfare cesspit, apartheid multiculturalism, and the castration of the Police force that created the London riots, the bankruptcy of socialist Greece and near bankruptcy of most social-democrat European states (and now the US , thanks to Obama borrowing and spending like a drunken sailor).

All this has has made it clear to me that the Effete Elite (some of whom have never help run a business) who think they can social engineer a nation away from traditional family models, and replace it with a nanny welfare state that caters for all our needs and is supposed to produce a paradise on earth, are Clueless and creating nothing but a train wreck to bankruptcy, family breakdown, chaos and barbarity, Mad Max style..

Magical New Zealand

2011-09-07T03:53:00.000-07:00

In July, I went to NZ for 2 weeks. Christchurch to Wanaka , then Haast (west coast), Fox glacier , back to Wanaka, then back to Chch via LAke Pukaki (near Mt Cook ).

With a rental van (60$ per day) which we slept in 4 nights, but mostly we stayed in YHAs. Winter makes camping a bit cold, though not impossible.

Huge high altitude plains with mountains rising up from nowhere that made me think of Arizona, USA, big lakes with mountain backdrops, forests with moss on everything including branches, glaciers hanging.

The South West is Te Wāhipounamu (Māori for "the place of greenstone" - Jade) . The power of the alpine ridge that goes North -south and jumps out of the western plains, can be felt in the body and the mind. The Maori used to do journeys from the west coast to get jade, which is formed in these huge mountains, and then go back.

The west coast is wild.... hundreds of km of coast with almost no towns, or tiny ones. windswept beaches of volcanic sand and driftwood. We went up it with Adam, an israeli backpacker. Love meeting people on the road. At the Haast campground common room, I also talked to a Belgium ex-commando, who had been living in Canada since his 20s. He had mostly worked in forestry. He was 70, fit as a fiddle and travelling with his son and his son's girlfriend.

The YHA at wanaka was full of Japanese snowboarders, and other characters. This is the free world, the prosperous modern world we live in, where I meet a 21 yr old snowboarder from Belgium who has worked hard and saved, and is doing an entire snow season in NZ (3 months or more).

The free market allows people to do that - instead of reducing everyone to the lowest common denominator, which is what Socialism attempts to do via punitive taxation, and even Public education which is sometimes more about indoctrination and levelling of talents.

Thereby also robbing the poor of the chance to be upwardly mobile, or have inspiring rags-to riches examples around them. There is nothing worse than not being able to better yourself, or change your destiny. In this sense, Socialism is deeply anti-human and produces nothing but the equal sharing of misery and lack of opportunity.

It's like some ogre who decides to hold all trees from blossoming in Spring - "we can't let you blossom - you might outshine other trees !"

Statis is death.

Cyclical activity - good times, temporary stagnancy, bad times: Dynamism is life. Embrace it.

In the end , Socialism will burn itself out and will be remembered as an abberation and a sickness. You can't hold down human creativity and vitality and diversity any more than concrete can hold down a blade of grass. Although I know they will try, via the UN and other attempts at world dictatorship.

Click on the video below to make it play. If necessary, hit the pause button until it loads up, then hit it again to make it play.

Some Beauty from Christian Dior

2011-05-08T23:27:00.000-07:00

1. from the film "Dune trilogy" - twins

2,3 Dior models

net photos of a Dior fashion show .. this is what a woman should look like.

Say No to petulant-anorexic teen models !

Robert Bateman: wilderness painter

2011-05-08T22:58:00.000-07:00

Discovered this amazing hyper-realist painter, who paints wild animals and landscapes. In the US, Africa and elsewhere.

http://www.robertbateman.ca/

New Caledonia March2011

2011-05-08T22:48:00.000-07:00

(photos 2 and 4 from the net)

Went with the army, had a great time discovering this island of frenchness and tribal culture right next to Aus. Did a lot of interpreting French/English. I do love the tropics - you get into a different body/mind state there...

cocktails by the beach, coral, warm water....

see more , and a short video of French Paratroopers singing (very masculine and pleasant on the ear):

https://picasaweb.google.com/105767598484864553657/NewCaledoniaMarch2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCOW21_Sl-fP1lAE#

Sydney photos

2011-05-08T22:22:00.000-07:00

I'm doing a photo essay of Sydney, Here are a few of the best so far.

A city where the wild ocean comes right into the CBD at circular quay. With huge Ocean liners docking there. And people from all over the world admiring the harbour and the bridge.

I enjoy catching ferries, rollerblading , swimming in the wild beaches with rock pools and surf, minutes away from suburbs or the CBD.

Noosa photos

2011-05-08T22:09:00.000-07:00

(click on a photo for a larger image).

Some Noosa photos I took. From the last few trips, and latest the road trip.

Sunsets !!

Surfers !

lotsa space, Jungles

tropical warm water, Pandanas

walking around in shorts at night

fruit bat smells

this is Queensland..

Still got a pioneering feel to it, with Brisbane still expanding.

Noosa, Sunshine coast, Queensland , Australia

December 2010 Road Trip

2011-05-08T21:39:00.000-07:00

1. Blue mountains mist

2. Free hugs van

3. Blackheath , Blue mnts

4-7. Newell Highway scenes

8. Warrumbugles Nat park . volcanic plugs. And the Anglo-Australian observatory

Took another road trip up the isolated newell highway up to Noosa and back - just avoided the massive flooding on the way back.

Some great views . You start to feel the heart of this huge continent when you venture inland, away from the populated coasts. Utes, cowboys, awesome starry nights, flat landscapes that make you feel you are in Africa.

Youtube videos of myself in the van, with Savannah all around:

http://www.youtube.com/user/MrAussieJules?feature=mhum#p/a/u/0/ipuQT7FRuno

Blue Mountains, Sydney

2011-03-05T04:11:00.000-08:00

The amazing avatar-style wilderness , 1.5 hours drive from Sydney CBD...

UN world-heritage listed, and definitely one of my favorite spots in this World.

For more photos and some videos:

https://picasaweb.google.com/105767598484864553657/BlueMountainsSydneyAustralia#

Grampians with Marcus

2011-03-05T04:06:00.000-08:00

A link to photos of the Grampians in Victoria, where I camped with Marcus in June 2010.

https://picasaweb.google.com/105767598484864553657/GrampiansNdLakeMountainJulyMarcusNdJules?authkey=Gv1sRgCOTi17LMz8_1hgE#

Ice climbing NZ

2011-03-05T03:46:00.000-08:00

Hi there... back to my blog after a bit of a hiatus, where I used mostly facebook..

but I think I prefer the more diary-like and deeper format of a blog.

anyways, here's a link to my picassa photos of ice climbing in NZ in June 2010.

https://picasaweb.google.com/105767598484864553657/NZIceClimbingJuly2010?authkey=Gv1sRgCJqZi-SSypfl-AE#

There's definitely something about mountaineering that hits a chord deep inside me. The grandiose, awe-inspiring towering mountains, the unforgiving nature of mountaineering, the sweeping views you get, the focus you need just to survive. I become very focused and quite effective. Pity I do not live closer to some real alpine terrain.

We had a bit of an epic time exiting the valley - instead of going back over the mountain pass (steep at first but then easy), we choose to walk down the valley to the road. 8 hours later we had not quite reached the tree line, where snow is replaced by a forest track. So we had to bivouac.... and I had a plane to catch the next day.. But we did get out to the road the next day, and hitched to Queenstown. All because of crusty snow, which meant we kept on falling thru the snow (even myself with snowshoes) and had to haul ourselves out. exhausting with huge packs full of climbing gear.

First time mountaineering since I left France in 2005 though... and it came back quickly. Also I got some good huge mitts , a snow spade etc at a discount, as NZ is 20% cheaper for aussies due to the exchange rate.

Well... I just got a bit of a shock and shed a tear for my climbing partner Egg... I found out just today from his brother:

Eng Wu ONG (better known as "Egg"). Egg was a member of the Melbourne University Mountaineering Club (MUMC) who died in a mountain-climbing incident on 15 December 2010 while holidaying in New Zealand.

He's the first partner of mine who has died in the mountains.. but some famous mountaineers have 15 or more friends who have died - such is the nature of mountains, and mountaineering at high levels.

God bless you Egg. You had come to NZ several times , had done mountaineering courses... You could have just had a humdrum life like so many people living in the oppulent west.

Summary of my Para course

2010-05-08T00:58:00.000-07:00

1. Portuguese paras. They are doing free fall - the chute hasn't been pulled yet. The dog is also a paratrooper...

2. German paras

3, The wings

I'm back in Holsworthy barracks, after 3 weeks of Para course down in Nowra.

the first 2 weeks were ground training - intensive days of fall training, flight training hanging from the ceiling in harnesses, learning to maneuver the chute and emergency procedures, and aircraft drills in mock aircraft.

the fall training involved practicing falling feet together, sideways on judo mats: bend, fall, roll over feet together. So that the calf hits the ground, followed by thigh, then shoulder - ideally you turn away the shoulder a bit so that the meaty part of the shoulder hits the ground. We also used a trapeze type of swing to get a bit of momentum. On the last day, we spent the whole day outside, on the "fall Tower" and the "exit tower". On the first , you get hauled up diagonally on a wire up to 30m. you do your parachute manoevers, then you are lowered fairly fast, but not as fast as a real fall. You need to land feet together and ideally, roll .

the other tower was like a flying fox - we queued in groups of 3 and jumped out, just like in the plsane, we then did out drills as we went down the wire , almost horizontally. Good practice for the aircraft exit, which is mentally the hardest part...

On our first jump, some guys' legs were trembling as they waited to exit, but they still did it --- that's good courage. I was more zen than many, as I'm used to working at heights - running flying foxes for kids from a tiny platform on a tree, etc.

Still, we were all pretty silent and concentrated for the first jump. subsequent jumps were easier, but there is always some trepidation. chute malfunctions have been known to occur - in which case you have a few seconds to pull the reserve and deploy it.

last week, we did 6 jumps over 4 days. with 1 day of bad weather . 2 jumps per day.

Hercules Jump

the last day, we did 2 jumps from a Hercules transport plane. A big noisy powerful thing, like being in a cathedral inside. we jumped out of a side door this time. And as soon as you're out, you get whipped sideways by the slipstream . You see the aircraft go past , feel yourself rotating a bit, then the chute deploys and you enjoy the glide, which is always a great experience.

the first jump was with CE (combat equipment) we had a big pack hooked onto our front, under the reserve. 25 kg or so. As well as webbing around the waist, and the rifle in a pouch strapped to one's side so it won't move when you land.

When you get to 60m off the ground, you pull a strap and the whole thing releases and hangs on a 5 m nylon cord. Later, the pack lands and soon after, you land. This way, you have all the gear you need close at hand. You hobble along with all this gear and are relieved to jump , so that you don't have to stand up against the weight...

The second jump was at night, cleanskin (just the chute on yr back). It went well, and it was an experience to land on a field illuminated with glowsticks. I did good manoevers to slow down drift and did my best landing so far, with a good roll. At the end of the course, about 5 people were limping, some on crutches. Landings are the tricky bit.. as you come in at 4.5 to 6m/second, and must have feet together or breaks/strains are likely.

We had a small ceremony and were given our "wings". Very proud to be part of the Para community.

Women in the armed forces, global

2010-05-07T22:42:00.000-07:00

1. Pakistani special forces/ female - guarding a girls school against attacks by the Taliban... a living challenge to PO-MO university types everywhere.. you tell her the Taliban are misunderstood, and watch her reaction...

2. Peruvian armed forces

3. Italian female jet pilot

4 Onwards: Israeli Defence Force... Yikes. they all look so brave, healthy and pioneering. Not to mention hmmm, Beautiful...

I was browsing for images of paratroopers and I came across some great pictures of women in the Israeli Defence Force (IDF)... oh my GOD.

Define beauty combined with strength....

I think I may consider a transfer to the IDF!!

I've met a few female Israeli soldiers who were backpacking, and they were charming and kind individuals. Much less self-centered than your average western girl...

Those who know me will know I am a bit of feminist. In the sense that I love and respect women of all types... My feminism is certainly not of the PC "there are no differences between men and women" type. I think men and women share a common humanity, but are as different as 2 different species. I don't believe in forced quotas - it would actually do women harm.

And I do believe that overall, men and women do not have the same priorities or interest-centers., and generally speaking, men and women go into occupations that are suited to their mental and physical attributes and interests, and that this does NOT imply equality of outcomes. Basically, I believe anyone should be given a fair go achieving whatever they wish, but we should not expect equal outcomes or numbers.

I do believe that women can be warriors, if they wish. witness Joan of Arc, queen Boadiccea in scotland, Thatcher, Jessica Watson round the world solo sailor.

and the women of the Israeli defence Force.... Sigh.

Follmi the photographer

2010-05-04T23:14:00.001-07:00

Olivier Follmi from France has got to be the best photographer of extremely hard to get to places like Zanskar valleys, and of ethnic people, particularly in the Himalayas. He captures the awe-inspiring beauty of the himalayas, and the hard-working peoples who manage to survive there, and their beautiful monasteries.

his websites are in French, but easy to navigate even if you don't read French.

his photography website:

http://www.follmiart.com

his general website:

http://www.follmispirit.com/index.html

Photos of Paratroopers

2010-05-04T03:43:00.000-07:00

1. Poster for "Band of Brothers" HBO series - WW2 US airborne troops

2. Female Pakistani paratroopers.

3. Israeli paratrooper. I think I'm in love....

4. French Foreign Legion jump

5- various.

Also, tell Richard I saw all the pictures that he sent for that feature on the female paratroopers and they're all so deeply unattractive. ...

(from the "Devil wears Prada" movie, with Meryll Streep as the Uber-Dragon lady).

;)

Paratrooper Experience

2010-05-04T03:15:00.000-07:00

We move along on this grey and slightly misty day, seated in a very small but wide plane – the “CASA”. We are seated in 2 rows, facing each other. 10m from one end of the passenger area to the ramp, which is partially open , allowing us to see the ground below and the mist swirling past.

We approach the landing area (Nowra military airfield area, grass) and the ramp is let down, so that it sits at 30 degrees down towards the ground…

First, the guys in the seats opposite get up, put up their seats against the side of the plane, and clip their static lines to the cable that runs above them.

When they launch themselves out , they will drop until the static line pulls the chute system out of the pack, The parachute then deploys autonomously. And the static line stays attached to the cable.

Then its our turn ,we get up, hook onto the cable and check our equipment. “1 Minute” is called by the jumpmasters and we check each other’s static lines. “Action Stations” and we all shuffle forwards so that the first person is close to the top of the ramp - To a cadence we say out loud. “Stand By” and we each jump out, with the people behind shuffling forwards and saying the cadence out loud, until they themselves jump.

It all happens quickly, and it is my turn to take 2 strides down the ramp diagonally outwards , turn parallel to the plane and launch myself into the air. And into the hands of fate….

I do so without hesitation and before I know it, I am hurtling through the air and pretty disoriented, my mind saying “FUUUUUCK this!!! “ until I know the canopy is open and start calming down:

I follow the drills we have been rehearsing ad nauseam, hold onto my reserve chute with both hands so that it doesn’t get deployed accidentally, trying to keep looking straight ahead , so as not to start rotating in mind-air.

I listen to voice and notice it is edged with anxiety:

“1000”

“Nnnnggggguuuuuuuh!” I’m flying thru the air, disoriented but feeling the rush of the air, I see my legs above me and realise I am flying almost upside down – I have been rotating slowly

“2000”

“3000”

I now permit myself to look up above myself to see if the canopy is open –It is, thank God. (Otherwise I would have to apply the drill we learnt , pull the handle on my reserve chute which is fixed to my chest and help it deploy. )

I bring my legs back down and thank my lucky stars that I am now gliding gently down under a gossamer-thin green chute.

I go thru more drills: “all round observation”: where one actually flips upside down by holding onto the rises to the chute and looks behind oneself, to see if a collision with another paratrooper is imminent. And I then “pull away” to show the acessors on the ground that I can steer the chute in any of 4 directions by pulling down on a rise.

Once this is done, I relax and marvel at the experience of gliding in perfect silence with the ground still 200m off, I have some time to enjoy the view and experience. In front and slightly below me is a procession of green chutes, gliding down as well. It’s beautiful.

I access my drift, determine I am moving forwards relative to the ground. So I look up and transfer my hands to the rear rises, which will slow the drift a bit.

As I estimate I am approaching 30m off the ground, I ensure my feet and knees are locked tight, my feet are parallel to the ground. And I slowly pull down on the rises until my elbows are under my armpits (which slows the rate of fall) , and put my chin on my chest so I wont get whiplash when I land.

I see the ground come up, slower than I thought it would (good). But nevertheless my breathing increases in frequency as I prepare with knees slightly bent, to land without hopefully breaking a leg or an ankle…

Coming, coming, NOW. And I land with a thump on the wet grass. My knees bend am absorb some of the shock. I then land on my ass , and then come to a stop, relieved I have landed feet together (breaks etc can happen if the feet are not together) and without hurting myself.

The assessors come along and congratulate me for my good drills. As I approached the ground, my feet tilted down a bit (reaching) which was the reason I didn’t roll sideways (as we have practiced 100 times). But as my feet were together, I get a tick in the box.

I walk away with the chute packed in a bag, elated at having done my first jump without hurting myself.

45 minutes later, we are up again for a 2^nd jump, and it also goes well. This time, we are less nervous as we know what to expect. But the initial “whoomp” of hurtling thru the air under with no control, when we jump out of the plane is still a bit unnerving.

Back in our accommodation, I feel different – I realise I have changed in some way:

I am not quite the same, but it’s difficult to say exactly what has changed. I have danced with death and fear and come out alive. It reminds me of the feeling mountaineering gave me. Dancing with death in a controlled fashion should be part of any high school education, for both sexes… (16 yr old Jessica Watson in her round the world solo yacht tour shows that women can be warriors too).

http://www.jessicawatson.com.au/

As it is for men, anyway in Rites of Initiation in tribes around the world. These have been substituted with poor and half-hearted non-directed experiences – hooning in fast cars, taking drugs, vandalism, provoking the police, etc…

Male Teens know instinctively they need rites of initiation, but without direction by tribal Elders, they end up with animalistic nonsense and are nothing more than overgrown and destructive boys, not men connected to their Masculine Archetype, working for the benefit of their tribe.

We are Men, we are brothers in arms.

And if later, I die in action, I will look death in the eye and smile, knowing I have lived a full life and have given myself to the greater good: to protect what is Good and Pure and Alive against all that is Evil and Corrupt and Deathly. To defend our Free nations with all their diverse human creation against the smothering zombie conformity of radical islam and other totalitarian ideologies.

We,

We Happy few,

We Band of Brothers

(Shakespeare and the “Band of Brothers” series about 101^st airborne division in WW2)

When I finish the course in a few days, I will be part of an international brotherhood of “Paratroopers” – from France to Brazil to the USA, we wear the wings and the Red beret and nod knowingly when we pass each other.

I get the feeling one needs to have one foot in the “other world” (life after death) to really live fully without false restraint in this life and also with some detachment: a kind of a sense of humor and acceptance of whatever life throws at us. Cause we know that ultimately, “don’t worry because, death is not the end” as Nick Cave sings….

“We are spirits in a material world” – Sting.

2009-11-24T04:22:00.000-08:00

Just watched 2 films – “whip it” and "Anvil" .

the first: A girl from a small boring town, with a mother she finds too conventional, Clandestinely takes up a sport involving punk-like roller skate speed competitions. Makes me think my teenage life was too conventional for my own good…. Coulda done with some gentle punk stuff. Re finding yourself as a teen, and still loving your parents, though understanding

“your children are not your children, they are the arrow that is thrust forward by the bow of destiny”…. Kahil Gibran.

Goethe: We cannot fashion our children after our desires, we must have them and love them as God has given them to us.

AND “ANVIL” …. a documentary about a Hard Rock band from 80s making a comeback, guys in their 50s. Working menial jobs, and still trying to make it big with their band after 30 years. Very touching. It culminates with a successful gig in Japan, with a big crowd. The paradox about “Anvil” with it’s sometimes anti-christian overtones, is that I’m sure there are angels in heaven who cheered for this band. Anything that you do with all your heart gains support in the other world.

Like Goethe said: Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.

Where is the man who has the strength to be true, and to show himself as he is?

Destiny grants us our wishes, but in its own way, in order to give us something beyond our wishes.

re the army and war: When we did our grenade qualification, we sat in bunkers and heard the huge wallop and the ball bearings spray the bunker… and we kind of felt sorry for anyone who might be on the receiving end of one of our grenades. Even though from my readings, a lot of the Taliban deserve little mercy. And I'm sure I would have few qualms about killing them if one of my section members was killed by them.

the Anvil film also made me think : these are the people I want to risk my life and limb for. People come back from Afghanistan with limbs missing, or with mental disturbances. But we do it for them…. For the Afghan people, for the concept that Good must triumph over Evil, for people like “lips” in the Anvil band. So that they may live their dreams and inspire their children to do the same. So that they may bring joy to others.

We are the Stoics, the Spartans. We refine our bodies to be tough and strong, We build our martial skills and tactics. We live rough in the bush, in pits. We carry crazy huge packs. So that the people may harvest and see their children smile. I am in the army for them, and the people I see at Kmart – the ordinary men and women who pay their bills and raise their kids. They may not have the best dress sense or have travelled to as many places as I have, but I love them for their heart and their simple fortitude.

Summary of my gypsy van expedition

2009-04-25T05:27:00.001-07:00

10th Dec leave Queensland
– climb in Blue mountains; Christmas in Victoria, Falls Creek walks; Arapiles climbing; Grampians walks; march Shepparton Fruit pick, then up rapidly via Newell Highway to Coonabarbaran, then Qld. in april 09

4.5 months of travel…. On a few thousand dollars, with a 3 thousand dollar van.
And some life-changing experiences in the Warrumbungles etc.
2.5 weeks fruit picking , 1 week kids camp.
I met French backpackers who were working 12 hrs a day, 17$ per hr, free accommodation, on a farm just nth of Qld border (a better deal than most fruit picking farms). So if I ever want to take a year off, travel, sea kayak etc and do casual work , I know it’s possible.

It gave me a big sense of freedom (eg driving on deserted highways with huge plains), and reminded me of one of my top enjoyements in life – mystical communion with nature, and getting away from the predicability and routine of suburban life.

Joining the Army

2009-04-25T05:20:00.000-07:00

1. King Leonidas, of the Spartans, in full warrior mode

2. Mosley – the British Nazi leader, barracking for Hitler and “Peace”… or slavery and brutality under a fascist regime.
3. Ayaan Hirsi Ali
4. The Boating party – Renoir. If we want this kind of peace and insouciance, we need to fight wars from time to time to protect just that.
5. The great Massoud – leader of the Northern Alliance against the Russians, then the Taliban. Assassinated just after sept 11 by Al-Quaeda men posing as journalists.
6. –
7. Joan of Arc

“We believed without proof that peace was the natural state and the substance of the universe, that war was only a temporary agitation on its surface. Today, we recognize our error: the end of war was merely the end of this war.”

- Jean Paul Sartre, commenting on WWII.

And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.

My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.

- Inaugural Address by John F. Kennedy - January 20th 1961

“War is horrible, but slavery is worse.” -Churchill

"We sleep peaceably in our beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on our behalf." (George Orwell)

I have joined the Army, Infantry corps. In a few days, I start the Army recruit course.

After my epiphany when I almost died with a ruptured appendix (see Jan 08), I realized I had to use my potential in a fuller way. And then I found out that I was not too old to Join the Defence forces.
Many of the skills (navigation, camping, carrying a big pack…) I got from being an outdoor instructor can be crossed over into the infantry. And I was motivated to be part of the force that was tackling terrorism worldwide. So I applied.

I applied in Jan 08, and got final confirmation in Jan 09, after a battery of tests – IQ, Psych, medical… and big delays in getting paperwork for my former Army reserve service. Then I had to wait for the next Rifleman recruit course.

I am no spring chicken, but am fit for my age. During the waiting time, I increased my cross-country running frequency and performed series of pushups afterwards, with a clear goal motivating me to push myself. I had a special black diary in which I noted what I did sport-wise. Eg
Run uphill. Pushups: 10,20,20
I would run from 30 minutes to 1 hour – more would have been overtraining.
And at falls creek, I decided to see what I was capable of and ran 15km with a small backpack at 1700m.

I continued working as an outdoor instructor, getting increasingly professional . I found the cross-country running helped me be a better and happier instructor – I had more stamina, and more reserves in what is quite a draining job.

Missions in East Timor and humanitarian relief (eg Bandah Aceh after the Tsunami) etc would be good to take part in. The defence force is actually the most efficient and equipped humanitarian organization, as was demonstrated after the tsunami, much to the jealousy of some NGOs.
It remains to be seen if I do get posted overseas, but even if I stay in Oz, I will at least be a cog in the machine.

I have met a few serving members, and was impressed by their humanity and strength. I am looking forwards to serving whith such people.

I know I will sometimes chaff under restrictions, and no organization is perfect.
----------------

As others have remarked, contrary to some stereotypes, defence force personnel are amongst the most selfless and compassionate people there are.
Now, I don’t mean “compassion” for mass murderers, or sentimental /Marxist compassion for terrorism as being “the revolt of the oppressed”. The latter is merely the projection of rich country left-wing beliefs onto people who act out of religious hatred and a desire for global radical Islamic domination. - As it is clear from the speeches of their radical preachers ( to cite one example, the London preacher who wanted the death penalty for homosexuality, and the imposition of Islamic law in the UK). Or to cite a terrorist after a French tanker was bombed in the Gulf:

We would have preferred a US ship, but that’s ok, they are all infidels anyway.

No, I mean real compassion – active compassion that entails actually doing something at some cost to oneself, such as rescuing someone from a burning house (or from a mountain in the French Alps, as I have done) or tending to an injured enemy. And which sometimes means putting one’s life at risk.

I have Compassion for the Afghans, who are tired of war and now are attacked and tortured by the Taliban. Compassion for the moderate muslims and others worldwide from Malaysia to Holland to the UK, who are intimidated and killed by the radical branch of Islam, which is a thuggish mafia, worse again than Hitler, and sharing many of his hatreds: Jews, Capitalism, Modernity, the Open society, America.

Although paradoxically enough, Islamic radicals use the Internet, email, You-tube to diffuse their messages of bile and hate… all of which are very modern and invented in… the great Satan USA, with the help of freely available credit and capital. Can you imagine a start-up company inventing You-tube in a stifling medieval Islamic dictatorship like Afghanistan under the Taliban ? Neither can I. They use to even beat people up for listening to music.

If I make it through the training in one piece, my aim is to be as close to the point of the sword as possible. My sword will flash and the heads will roll. I will let them know there is still life left in western civilization. And they will feel my “rage divine”.
----------------------------------

On the Nature and Danger of Terrorism:

Consider an editorial published in a Lebanese paper on August 20, 2003, the day after a bomb-laden cement truck destroyed the United Nations’ center of operations in Baghdad:

“Yesterday’s operation against the Baghdad headquarters of the United Nations exemplifies this mentality of destruction. Expel all mediators. Banish every international organization. Let things collapse. Let electricity and water be cut off, and the pumping of oil cease. Let theft prevail. Let universities and schools close. Let businesses fail. Let civic life cease. And at the end of the day the occupation will fail. ‘No!’ protests Joseph Samara, ‘at the end of the road, there will be a catastrophe
for Iraq. . . . The attack against the United Nations’ headquarters in Baghdad belongs to another world: it is a form of nihilism, of absurdity, and of chaos hiding behind fallacious slogans, which proves the convergence among those responsible for this action, their intellectual limitation and their criminal behavior.’ ”

Andre Glucksman (french intellectual) on the new warfare:

We have entered another world. The threat of a new Ground Zero, small or great, advances behind a mask. The human bomb claims the power to strike anywhere, by any means, at any time, spreading his nocturnal threat over the globe, invisible and thus unpredictable, clandestine and thus untraceable. The terrorist without borders makes us think about him always, everywhere. Without an accidental delay on the tracks—just a few minutes—the pulverization of two trains in Madrid, at the Atocha station, would have claimed 10,000 victims, three times more than in Manhattan. Then there was London. Whose turn is next? Each of us waits for the next explosion.

The business of terrorists, after all, is to terrorize—so said Lenin, an uncontested master in the field. The ultimate refinement lies in the inversion of responsibility. Operating instructions: I take hostages, I cut off their heads, I show them on video; those who beg for mercy must address themselves to their governments, who alone are to blame for my crimes: my hubris is their problem. The less the terrorist’s restraint, the more he causes fear and the sooner you will yield in tears, or so he believes.

Recall the cries of hostage Nick Berg, agonizing as his torturers persisted laboriously over his bent body. “You know, when we behead someone, we enjoy it,” one of them informs us. “We did not kidnap to frighten those we hold,” another corrects him, “but to put pressure on the countries that help or might help the Americans. . . . It is not a good thing to decapitate, but it is a method that works. In a fight, Americans tremble. . . . Besides, I tried to negotiate an exchange of prisoners for Nick Berg. It was the Americans who refused. They are the ones truly responsible for his death.” Terrorist hubris bases its arguments on uncontrollable drives: I can’t help myself—give up! A similar strategy shows up on playgrounds: Stop me or I’ll do something terrible! The terrorist refines this rationale; he draws out his pleasure, prolongs death, cuts the throat slowly, goes beyond physical torture.

To resurrect the dead, if only by video, in order to execute them a second time: this compulsion prolongs war infinitely from the other side of life. It is pure hatred. A traditional war, however savage, comes to an end. Terrorist war, given over to limitless fury, knows no cease-fire. For the demonstration of force it substitutes the demonstration of hatred, which, nourished by its own atrocities, becomes inextinguishable.

The fight to avoid the Somalization of the planet is just beginning, and it will probably dominate the twenty-first century. If they resist the sirens of isolationism, Americans will learn from their mistakes. Europe will either resolve to help them or abandon itself to the care of the petro-czar Vladimir Putin, who stands ready to police the old continent, while preaching antiterrorist terrorism, with his devastation of Chechnya as a case in point. The borderless challenge of emancipated warriors allows us little leisure for procrastination .

Book: The Trouble with Islam

2009-04-25T05:04:00.000-07:00

I read bits of “the Trouble with Islam” by Irshad Manji (a gay woman , from a Muslim family, living in Canada) and realise that there are rifts and contradictions and obsessions within Islam. I have met and worked with decent muslims – I do not make a blanket accusation, but as she says:

Rather than own our dysfunction, we reflexively blame America, Israel, Christianity, materialism, MTV, McDonald’s, and the ever-convenient Jews. An equally popular coping mechanism is to remain mute about our self-inflicted shortcomings, for fear of damaging relations with our higher-ups — be they parents, imams, or even secular leaders of our communities.
-----

Respected Ms. Manji, people like you serve as a source of energy for the ones like me, living in Muslim states, who cannot afford to ’speak out loud’. I tried to, but I was made to realize that I would offend many and win almost none, with harassment being the cherry on the top. May Allah always bless you with the best. And bless me with the courage to stand up, like you have chosen to.” - Muhammad Khurram Yaqub, Lahore, Pakistan.

http://www.irshadmanji.com/

My path since 9-11-2001

2009-04-25T04:33:00.000-07:00

Sept 11, 2001

I am in Canada – in a backpacker’s hostel on the West Coast
I have just hitched a ride to this small town, and watch the scenes of sept. 11 being played over on the Hostel TV.

I take a shower, in shock. Then I find myself sobbing in the shower, under the water.
I sob for the victims in the towers, for the terrorists brainwashed by radical texts into their hatred for the infidels, who died committing such a crime.
It strikes me at the time that they were like a child breaking another child’s toy in spite “I envy you your toy, so I’m going to break it, so there”. An infantile rage of primitive Islam against the far more successful and opulent modern western world.

Later I learn that 100 different nationalities including Muslims, artists’ lofts, import-export companies, bankers, philanthropic societies were present in the towers – a Babel of modern enlightenment, artistic and business creativity and diversity.

In Islamic radicalism, a new satanic death-cult of grunting gargoyles has risen, foaming with hatred and rage and vowing to destroy everything that does not convert to it’s zombie culture.

---------------------

New York: the metropolis which prefigures the future: a multi-ethnic melting pot, all citizens under a simple constitution, which enforces democracy, the rule of law, accountability of rulers, the right to eject them from rule, using militias in the last recourse – should the ruler become a dictator. And which elevates the freedom to pursue one’s fancy , whether it takes one to riches, or to rags – “the pursuit of happiness” as above the state’s diktats, or comfort, or predictability, or the stifling pursuit of a levelling equality which has sapped the spirit of the French and done so much harm (and has led it to the the-state –owes-me-a-living and stuff everyone else , suicidal chaos which it it presently experiencing).
As one French entrepreneur living in NY at the time said:

No state safety net here, but that very fact is a statement: we believe in you; you can do it, providence and your hard work will see you through.

The freedom to succeed, and the freedom to fail. And try again.

The USA is the melting pot of the world – a new world consciously created by the founding fathers to be the freest country in the world – a misunderstood quantum leap away from old Europe, it’s wars, it’s ideological death machines: Nazism and Communism. And it’s attempt to enter stasis (no change) via nanny-state smothering socialism which ends up making many of it’s citizens feel as alive and self-directed as Zombies.

And now the death-cult of radical Islam, which worships suicide as a weapon.
Which challenges the last man standing to a high noon confrontation. Will Bush follow the Europeans’ advice and not respond ? should he follow their advice and be like the beaten wife who seeks to be nicer to her ogre so that he might beat her less (fat chance) ?
He does not, and the vitality and backbone of the US and some allies will be on display in the years following 9/11. Much to the hatred and bile of those in the west who purport to be sophisticated in their contempt of western civilization (whose branch they are sitting on and cutting off) , and particularly that independent entity which does not bow to their elitist pseudo-thought – that entity which values personal freedom above enforced equality, the USA.

----------------

I spend the next few years reading articles and books, trying to understand the enemy and how we can defeat him.

I did not buy into the self-flagellating ideas that were bandied around by some, that 9-11 was punishment for… what exactly ? stopping the genocide of the Kurdish Muslims in Kosovo ? Stopping Saddam H. invading Saudi Arabia (one of his ambitions) ?

or helping that tiny country , Israel – if 10 of thousands of arabs jews were fleeing persecution in arab lands and other jews from Russia etc were also fleeing persecution, where exactly were they supposed to go ? onto Mars, maybe. And the arabs have never cared much for the Palestinians – Egypt refused to give them part of the Sinai, which is huge. No, the real problem with Israel is that it is not a tribal Islamic society: it is cosmopolitan, women wear shorts and fight in the army ! imagine that! And it is successful – as Egyptian president Nasser said in the 70s:
how can we tolerate that they make the desert flower when we can’t even get close ?

Envy and tribal hatred, nourished by the radical islam of Hamas and company, which even Palestinians are become tired of. And the national socialist (Nazi) Baath party in Syria. (and in Irak under Saddam)

And say Israel was handed to the lions, what has that conflict got to do with the persecution of Buddhists , Hindus and Christians worldwide by radical muslims ? or blowing up a secondary school in Beslan (Russia is not exactly an ally of Israel) Or the Mumbai attacks ? or some UK preachers saying they are in favor of the death penalty for homosexuality ?
or… the thousands of death threats, bashings, murders worldwide.

It was clear to me we were up against some sort of conquering ideology, but I wasn’t quite sure what they wanted to impose on us.

------------------

Over the years, I link other events together – the destruction of the Buddhist statues by the Taliban, The beating up of gay queens in Amsterdam’s gay pride day by groups of Muslims, the killing of Theo van Gogh in Holland, the Beslan massacre where radicals blew up a secondary school with kids in Russia (which led me into cold fury), the Bali bombings, the civil war against radical Islamists I remember occurred in nearby Algeria in the 90s, the riots in Paris in 2005, where mostly Muslim rioters torched schools and buses with cries of “Allah akbar” – “God is great” , the muslim enclaves in Sweden where no-one dares to go…
I read “Londistan” by Melanie Philips, and see how radical preachers start the conveyor belt which led middle-class cricket-playing British Muslims to hate the modernity and diversity of their country and blow themselves up in the tube in 2005.

And of Sayyid Qutb, who wrote in the 1930s, mixing Islam with Marxism, and was the inspiration for the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, and then of Al-Quaeda, together with Wahab (founder of Wahabism – Saudi-style radical Islam).

Should I travel to America, and become flimsy, and ordinary, ... Is there other than Islam that I should be steadfast to in its character and hold on to its instructions, in this life amidst deviant chaos, and the endless means of satisfying animalistic desires, pleasures, and awful sins? [23]

Finally, Qutb offered his own explanation in Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq, arguing that anything non-Islamic was evil and corrupt, while following Sharia as a complete system extending into all aspects of life, would bring every kind of benefit to humanity, from personal and social peace, to the "treasures" of the universe.[24]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayyid_Qutb

On returning from a trip to the USA, Qutb said “the world is one big brothel !”.

I read arab-american writers such as Faoud Ajami, who point out that Irak is far more important to Al-Quadea than Afghanistan. The latter being just out of the stone age, and having few resources, whereas irak has the oil, and is the historic seat of the Muslim kingdom (Baghdad).
(Hence Obama is being simplistic when he says that we should have just focused on Afghanistan. Once the war in Irak became a fight against al-Quaeda, pulling out would have been suicidal – as Bernard Kouchner ex-boss of doctors without borders (MSF) was bold enough to say from France).

I read of Somalian-born Ayan Hirsi Ali, who speaks out against the radicalisation of Muslims in Holland, and against the non-intervention of the law in Muslim enclaves where women are beaten (and form most of the population in Dutch women’s shelters) and are even killed in Honor killings.
The killer of film-director Theo van Gogh pins a note on him, addressed to her. And now she is under permanent death threat.

The gentle and cultured Europe I grew up in has become a civil-war zone.

Grenoble 1999: I watch in rage as on the football pitch below, a young fit muslim 14 yrs old or so, kicks a be-spectacled jewish looking lad in the shins, down to the ground, makes him beg , then kicks him again to make him get up. And repeats, encouraged by a small crowd of other young muslims.

I realise years later this is a age-old religious hatred of jews playing itself out. He has probably heard his father talk of jews as pigs and apes.

A short while later, this alpha male stops kicking his ball for a moment to kick a young Peruvian-looking lad in the shins. The jew was serious fun to hate, but social Darwinism, Nazi-style is always fun.

Elsewhere in France:

And then the Muslim women I see being screamed at and sworn at by their husbands in public, as docile and passive as lambs.

I see teenage girls being intimidated.

In Paris, from my office window, I see a 5 yr old muslim girl walking along with 2 muslim boys her age, and an eastern-european looking mother with a pram. The 5 yr old girl is playful, and wants to play with the boys she does not seem to know well (I assume to be cousins or friends of her family). Then one of the boys wants her to know the score – to know that spontaneous fun is not what is expected of her, rather : fearful submission is what is expected. He punches her in the stomach in an uppercut movement. She bends over, winded, shocked, and shouts. He looks on with satisfaction. Then they move off, the woman wearing a perverse smug look – I assume she has gotten similar treatment.

In France, I see this kind of thing being played out on a street level, everywhere.

I also work and talk with decent and humane Muslims, but I realise there is something in Muslim culture which pushes some to these fascist and misogynistic behaviours.

I being to realize that if the US pulls out of irak, and hands a victory to Al-quaeda’s irak Chapter, the radicals in Europe and all over the world will become much emboldened and things will become much worse.

As a terrorist said after a French oil tanker was hit in the gulf:
We would have preferred a US tanker, but they’re all infidels anyway

------------

I become disgusted by the democrats in the US and the most of the chattering classes in Europe, who obviously want Irak to fail, and to hell with the millions of Irakis who want democracy, freedom and a decent life, so long as the defeatocrats can score points against Bush.
I want to grab them by their lapels and shake them out of their suicidal narcissism and blindness. If Irak is handed to al-quaeda, we are all in trouble ! this isn’t a game of point-scoring, your attitude can have disastrous consequences. I want to say to them.
As Bernard Kouchner said in 2007 or so:
The future of much of the world depends on what happens in Irak

In 2001-2003, I wanted to be part of it. I would have gladly volunteered to go and kick Saddam’s rotten ass in Irak. But I was in France, and I knew the French army would not go in. Not until Chirac had seen that the Americans and their allies had done the dangerous work, that is. I did briefly consider the UK army, but was concerned I wouldn’t fit in to the British culture, which I knew was fairly unique and not really me, having lived there in 2003.

I was beginning to realise I was not a European, in many ways – my way of thinking fit more into the New World : America, Canada, Australia. Pioneering, quick to adopt new and more efficient ways of doing things, unhampered by much historical baggage or a hankering for a once-was empire. Optimistic and forward looking.

And I was tired of the knee-jerk anti-Americanism I saw in Europe. The US was dammed for toppling a Stalin-like dictator in Irak, but then also dammed for not intervening in Sudan. But the Europeans, for the most part, intervened nowhere at all… not even in their own countries where entire urban sections were becoming violent Muslim enclaves.

They were like kids throwing small stones at builders working hard, risking their lives to build and protect a building which also protected the kids….

-------------

I am encouraged by the small number of courageous Muslim leaders who are speaking out against terrorism:

Thursday, July 03, 2008
Saudi Grand Mufti speaks out on al Qaeda
Arab News:
...
Al-Asheikh called on young Saudis not to be enticed by militants. He further demanded coordinated action from Saudis and residents to uncover members of the group.
In a nine-point statement, the mufti said the criminal acts planned by the militants would not come from the mind of a true believer, adding that these militants were acting as tools in the hands of the enemies of Islam and Saudi Arabia. Al-Asheikh, who is the Kingdom’s highest religious authority, said Islam does not allow the killing of innocent people. He also cautioned Muslim youth against deviant ideologies whose proponents want to undermine the Kingdom’s security.

“You should be aware that these militants, who claim to work for the cause of Islam and defend Muslims, actually hide their vested interests and vicious objectives,” he said.
Al-Asheikh warned Saudis and residents against providing protection and refuge to militants.

Sea Kayak Bribie Isl. Qld

2009-04-25T04:23:00.000-07:00

what a sunset !

Rented a Kayak for 2 days,

Then did a 2 day trip with Caz, sea kayaking along the inside passage of bribie island, just north of Brisbane. Great views of the glasshouse mnts (see above). And it reminded me how relaxing sea kayaking is. You carry all the weight in hatches , not on yr back , (eg 15 litres of water) and as a result you hardly notice it. We had a great sunset at the National park campsite. I could have continued for another 5 days or so more... up the coast, past Noosa.

Then drove up to Noosa – paradise on the sunshine coast (apart from the occasional hoon on drugs). Aus’s California. To get my gear ready , and put the van in storage at a storage place at Eumundi. Staying with my mother, who as luck has it, is house-sitting a big house next to a mangrove lake.

now got a wireless internet modem (virgin) - so I can update my blog from almost anywhere. yay !

Jules since the Warrumbungles

2009-04-25T03:32:00.000-07:00

0: Caz in front of Tropical Brisbane
1. Sunset in the Warrumbungles, NSW
2. Mt Mitchell path, scenic rim, Qld
3. The best of both worlds.. lake Moogerah, scenic rim, Qld
4. meeting Rosemary at campground, scenic rim, Qld
5. Sunset, lake Moogerah, scenic rim, Qld
6. Mt Barney lodge campsite, morning... life's tough in the van - Not.

Since Coonarbarbaran:

Drove up on the flat Newell Highway, past Silos, up to Goonwindi – first Qld town. Typical Queensland – with palms, big brash signs.
Then across to good old Mt Barney, did a recce day then a week later, did a 5 day camp with 15 yr olds. Great kids , great teacher, for a change. 2.5 days expedition walking up steep slopes, often in drizzle. Some leaches, good views, bush camping.
The 2 days getting 60 kids abseiling and climbing on small cliffs.

I really like the scenic rim area (border with NSW) rainforest slopes and eucalyptus areas, big steep mountains and lakes.

Spent a few days in Brisbane catching up with a friend.
When I looked over Brisbane city, after almost 4 months of travel in my van, it felt like home – the cosmopolitan city in the mangroves. There are still mangroves down on the river.

Let's roll back the 20th century, Not.

2009-04-20T23:36:00.000-07:00

Graph Source: UN Panel on Climate Change, 1995

more from Jules on his crusade against the pseudo-science of global warming.

I would rather see poor countries get out of their poverty – have cars and air-con, CAT scans and cheap nrj. Also, it’s fairly evident that poor countries are the ones which take the least care of their environment – eg Indonesia fishing out it’s stocks, and deforesting it’s great forests.
The way out of poverty for 3rd world countries is trade with rich countries, cheap electricity, and industrialization (or and/or services if you are Switzerland). The sooner it becomes evident that man-made Co2 has nothing to do with climate change, the better.

When humanity is colonizing Mars and has Fusion-powered power stations etc, they will look back at the present hair-shirt back to the Hamish-farm movement with amazement.

some cut and paste:

Professor Richard Lindzen from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said:

“future generations will wonder in bemused amazement that the early 21st century’s developed world went into hysterical panic over a globally averaged temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree, and, on the basis of gross exaggerations of highly uncertain computer projections combined into implausible chains of inference, proceeded to contemplate a roll-back of the industrial age”.

Dr Martin Hertzberg, a physical chemist and retired Navy meteorologist, sums up the climate - both intellectual and physical:
As a scientist and lifelong liberal Democrat, I find the constant regurgitation of the anecdotal, fear-mongering clap-trap about human-caused global warming to be a disservice to science...From the El Nino year of 1998 until Jan., 2007, the average temperature of the Earth’s atmosphere near its surface decreased some 0.25 C. From Jan. 2007 until the spring of 2008, it dropped a whopping 0.75 C.

Warming fears are the “worst scientific scandal in history …When people come to know what the truth is, they will feel deceived by science and scientists.” - UN IPCC Japanese Scientist Dr. Kiminori Itoh, environmental physical chemist.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/

Lord Monckton recently observed that the exponential forecasts of the UN simply don't match reality [PDF]:

"The IPCC's estimates of growth in atmospheric CO2 concentration are excessive. They assume CO2 concentration will rise exponentially from today's 385 parts per million to reach 730 to 1020 ppm, central estimate 836 ppm, by 2100. However, for seven years, CO2 concentration has been rising in a straight line towards just 575 ppmv by 2100. This alone halves the IPCC's temperature projections."

Roy Spencer argues that the reason there seems to be a consensus among scientists regarding "global warming theory" is that 1) most scientists don't actually conduct research on the forecasting models the theory is based on, and so, though they are scientists, are not any more knowledgeable than laypersons regarding this particular theory and 2) scientists are human too, and as humans, fall victim to group think. Spencer points out that the mathematical models used to predict future climate are NOT akin to the forecasting methods meteorologists use to forecast next week's weather. Some important points: Sure, we are good at predicting whether it will rain tomorrow or in two days, but the validity of even short-term weather forecasts shrinks to nearly zero when trying to predict 10 days ahead or more. Climatologists using mathematical models to predict future climate, say, 100 years from now are playing a whole other ball game.

Czech politician Vaklav Klaus :
Freedom, not climate, is at risk:

http://www.klaus.cz/klaus2/asp/clanek.asp?id=fmhiyKwAStnZ

A visit to an Backyard Astronomy dome

2009-03-17T22:46:00.000-07:00

above: one of the backyard telescope domes near the town. (not the one I visited).

Monday 16 march, I drive along small country road which leads to the Warrumbungles, and stop at a guy’s property. He’s the ex-director of the Anglo-Australian observatory, and has several telescopes in his garden, including one big one in a dome. He is now an entrepreneur – giving talks in the evening (to myself and 3 others, tonight), to school groups etc. Pretty fascinating to be in the presence of such encyclopaedic knowledge of Physics and Astronomy, made fun by the ability to look at huge nebulae (gaseous clouds), galaxies, planets, stars thru his equipment. $15 for nearly 2 hours of lecture and viewing.

He has a small dome, which he has set up for remote viewing by a fellow in Scotland. The Scottish fella operates it via the internet when he wants to (!)

He projects a film about scale using his laptop, and then shows us the night sky,
He gives us lots of facts, pointing out constellations, the Magellan clouds (nearby galaxies), facts about the size and distance away of stars. And we observe some thru his 3 telescopes. I take notes for my own interest, and so I can share some of the wonder of starscapes with the students in 2 weeks.
Near Orion’s belt (3 stars in a row), there is a reddish star called Betelgeuse, which is a ”red giant”, you can see with the naked eye. Meaning it is a dying star, and could explode and become a Supernova at any time. What we see with our eyes actually occurred many thousands of years into the past, however, as it has taken many light years for its light to reach us. When it does become a Supernova, it will be brighter than anything else in the sky for a month or so, lighting up our nights…. Spectacular.

Just having a little knowledge of astronomy is mind-boggling, and is awe-inspiring when you consider the scale of the universe, of which our galaxy – the milky way – is just one of trillions of galaxies… Also the fact that light travels at a finite speed is hard to imagine, as are other facts of Physics.

Oh that Science could be taught this way – by going to factories, observatories, power stations, talking with bike designers , and going “backwards” as it were to the theory, rather than teaching disconnected theory in the classroom to mostly bored students. In fact the whole secondary/tertiary school system could be outsourced to a multitude of small inspiring operators like this guy, combined with self-study using the Internet. The head of Noosa Sunshine coast uni suggested as much, mentioning the Internet as a new means of learning.

This guy really inspired me, with the facts about the night sky, his interest, as well as his entrepreneurial small-scale business, which he runs out of his front garden.

Town of Coonabarbaran and the Warrumbungles

2009-03-17T22:13:00.000-07:00

1: Museum at Narandera. First and only Aboriginal pilot and his plane "Black Magic"

should have been told he was a victim, given welfare for life and rotted on a community in the middle of nowhere... Not.

2: The Warrumbungles nat park - "breadknife" in the background.

3: nat park.

4: View from a small peak where I met the Eagle.

5: Rainbow in the evening.

6: Lake Eildon sunset

7: around lake Eildon

(click on a photo to enlarge)

-a close encounter with an Eagle

-why bother going to National Parks and sweating ?

Town of Coonabarbaran : Astronomy capital of Australia , private telescope domes on green country road that leads to Warrumbungles Nat park. Lots of swank properties – names like “Xanadu”… great place to raise kids. Also a hill at 1100 m with 11 telescopes, including the Main Anglo-Australian telescope. Was chosen by the ANU as having good location – no city glare, night skies clear 70 % of the time.
I saw some good starscapes looking up with the naked eye – shooting stars, the milky way pretty clear.

The Town has the usual practical amenities – a supermarket, information centre, library with internet, some swank cafes, It’s a small country town, but actually quite artsy, with an art gallery, pottery centre, Jazz festival, Astronomy week… (with local Astronomers giving lectures in the pub).
NSW so green after drought-stricken Victoria. .. green starting not that far north of the border with Vic.
I Get a fresh bag of ice for my eski, fill up with water and buy a bit of food at the supermarket. Also get some info and a free map of the National park at the info center.

I Drive to the Warrumbungles Nat park and spend two nights there. Sunday, I do a 14 km walk – the “Grand high tops tour”, which goes up and around some famous landmarks – the “breadknife” and such.
There are some other walkers in the park, but I met no-one. It’s kind of great being all alone in this stunning nat. park. I sit on the top of a lava block and just look at the scenery. I spot several wedge-tailed Eagles gliding around an adjacent volcanic plug. Then one comes right overhead – about 30 m above my head. I look up and we look at each other for a while as he glides past. I can see every detail of his plumage. Then he goes past. Quite an experience. This is why I get out to these places.., nothing I can experience in the city can beat this.

-Why bother get off the couch at all ?

On the way up to the viewpoint, there was a visitor’s book which I looked at. One the entries was written in big print, by kids of about 11, I guess:

WHAT I WANT TO KNOW IS WHY WE HAD TO KILL OURSELVES TO GET UP HERE WHEN WE COULD HAVE GOT THIS VIEW ON THE INTERNET.

mmm… yes, why bother get off the couch at all, in fact ? I could think of a dozen answers to that question. But at least they were being honest… the virtual age is here, as predicted by sci-fi writers many decades ago, and the fun has only just begun. Soon we will be able to experience views in 360 deg, virtual reality with sound.

I wrote in response: “stay at home and get fat and bored”. Which kind of sums it up. But the proper response involves explaining why tactile reality cannot be replaced by technology, why using your muscles to achieve an outcome – a view, getting from A to B, earning money, building something… can bring satisfaction not found on the couch.
And interacting with a real live Eagle, or scaling mountain rock and feeling it’s texture, or being surprised by an Emu, or watching an awesome sunset on a cold mountain top is not the same as simulated reality, however life-like.
(on my walk I saw grey Kangaroos and Emus).

Apart from the above psychological benefits of walking in a Nat. Park, there are also other benefits: It keep you fit, which helps at work, in social life, avoids medical problems and produces endorphins which makes you feel more chirpy.
If the walk is a bit challenging, or involves scrambling rocks, it increases your confidence in being able to tackle obstacles in daily life.

On a deep level, interacting with nature can be akin to a mystical experience – eg watching the stars at night from a campsite. Which can allow a person to see the bigger picture and feel part of a grand cosmos of inter-related beings and phenomenae. And maybe touch his own connection with the transcendent and the oneness of the uni-verse.

Or alternatively, you can feel depressed by convincing yourself we are all "just a bag of greasy water" as a Marxist lecturer in Paris once said to his students. And as Post-Modern lecturers are saying to their students in Universities around Australia. Apart from uni Lecturers of course... uni lecturers are Gods who have a divine right to tell us what to think, say and do with our lives. Somehow, I'm sure they don't include themselves in their reductionist viewpoints about humans.

Western Affluence and Teens

2009-03-17T22:03:00.000-07:00

Working with Students again. And thoughts on Western Affluence.

A few days ago, after several phone calls, I secured a week’s work with my old employer in Brisbane. At the end of March, doing a week with 15 yr olds in the Mt Barney area – which I know well (see previous posts on the area). Just on the Border of NSW/ QLD, on the scenic rim of mountains, it’s a great area for outdoor activities. With spectacular mt Barney rising up alone to 1300m above the plain. And several lakes and outdoor centres. This center is “mt barney lodge”, a very nice campground/ B&B combo, right next to Mt Barney.
I ring up the center and fall on Stafford, an English immigrant who’s been on several camps that I’ve worked on (with other kids). He’s an ex-fireman and quite experienced in the outdoors. Funny to be talking with him, now working at the Lodge. I’m looking forwards to our “Recce” day –Beer and BBQ nxt Sunday, then recce on Monday.

Now I’ve had a bit of a break from kids, I can work refreshed… they can be hard work between about 14 and 17 … you always get a minority who are lazy, surly and obnoxious, which can test my patience to it’s limit, especially on expeditions when they complain about being asked to do their turn doing the dishes.

You really need 3 weeks of expeditioning to work thru all the “attitude” of some teens, and get them spontaneously working for the common good and enjoying the expedition. I almost prefer kids from “working class” schools – it might take some work initially to reduce their swearing, but then they are more receptive to new ways of doing things, very interested in rock climbing which they have never done etc And they chip in and do the dishes and tell off those who are lazy… I know from having had such a group up in Nth Qld.

Many of the problems of today’s kids stem from an excess of ease – to many video games, too much food, too much given to them and not enough asked from them. They end up lazy, sometimes rude and with a vague sense of discontent (which stems from not having pushed themselves either mentally or physically, or taken responsibility for anything, I reckon) which they can try and fill with drugs, hooning etc.
Meantime, Kids in Kurdistan work to support the family, and brave minefields to smuggle textbooks over the border so they can write down stuff at school… Lots of western kids need a month in Kurdistan/ similar in my opinion. They’d never take anything for granted again.

Affluence is good – If you know how to appreciate it, don’t take it for granted. Also you need to know the difference between basic survival needs, useful things, and luxuries – particularly if living in a city – or you become a treadmill of working to buy luxuries you don’t need and which don’t satisfy deeply. I find I spend easily in cities – Melbourne was fun, but there’s nothing else to do but spend… on cafes, meals out, transportation, rent…
Whereas in the campsite at Arapiles I lived for 140$ + 10$ per week (my food bill + fuel bill to Horsham and back) . it was like being in a natural monastery – eat, sleep, do challenging climbs, read, watch sunsets, talk with fellow travellers… no temptations like cafes and such, unless you drive a bit.
The campsite is 2$ per day… when the ranger can be bothered collecting it.

The Kurds wish they could have the Aussie std of living – but you need to learn to appreciate it if you are born in it. Hence the immigrants from Italy etc who do well in Australia – they can see all the advantages and know that their hard work here can make them rich, as opposed to their home countries, where Corruption/Governement regulations and taxes/ mafias skimming profits/civil War, can make it very difficult to get ahead.

Pear-Picking at Shepparton, Vic

2009-03-17T21:28:00.000-07:00

photos:

1: Yorkshire couple Tom and Louise

2: Echuca figurants

3: The campsite at the farm

4: The dining area

5: The brits

Turnbull orchards 22 Feb. 09 onwards

After 2.5 weeks picking pears, the pears ran out on that farm, and we were told (on the last day) that apples would start in about a week. Interesting experience picking fruit – I got pretty fast towards the end, picking 3 bins a day (a bin is approx 24 sixteen kg bagfuls). Ie 3 times 35$ per day – 90 dollars after the 13% tax. Not all that good for 7 or 8 hours of hard labour. Plus there were some days where we were basically used as cheap labour – clearing a sparse field of fruit – taking 8 hours to fill a bin … 35$.
A lot depends on the farm you work on, and the quality of their trees in producing dense fruit. Some other pickers I talked to in town were doing 6 bins per day… now that’s good money.
Anyway, I saved 200$ the second week, after food and other expenses. Not too hot – the same as what I make in a day of Outdoor Instructor work , though this is not regular work (and more than this on expeditions). Given a farm with better fruit, one can make reasonable money, but one needs to shop around and put up with some bad work.
It’s certainly a job you can just turn up and find work in a day, if they happen to be picking that week. Good to have as a fallback.

Felt good to be using my muscles – I enjoy such work in itself, quite apart from the money I make at it.

Earlier entry:

Loving the social life – Alex the older guy who worked for Optus. Lots of French bacpackers . Crazy parties on Fri nite.
The work is not too bad – have to watch lower back ache. I stretch using yoga child's pose several times in a day, and get rid of compression ache.

Getting faster. Nice to have a break from spoilt kids…

The main entertainment at Shepparton is going to the Mc Donald’s in Town (!), buying a coffee , apple pie, and surfing the net for free… not much else to do, except maybe fish in the river and canals, which is what the 4 brit backpackers do.

Pretty dull place. One Saturday, I drive to Echuca with a nice Yorkshire couple. Enjoy the sights, swim in the Murray.

4 brits together – all got a tattoo of Australia on their thighs…
They are from Sheffield and surrounds. 2 of them do Thai boxing, and will travel on to Thailand where they will do a month or more of training in a Thai boxing academy – they let you train at reduced costs if you compete in tournaments.

Monastic experience at Arapiles

2009-03-17T21:22:00.000-07:00

Arapiles 16 feb

Sunset last night – a red ball of fire over plains and eucalypts. Flat golden fields just outside the national park boundary. The gnarly rock of Arapiles rises out of the plain like an apparition. Mitre rock, much smaller, stands nearby.
I run along track, into sunset, then walk. Feel peace, transcendence .
Feel very fortunate to be here. Just to feel the peace and quiet.

Every morning, I gaze out on the flutings on the rock – a mystical beauty which draws you to climb it.
My climbing has improved. Much less nervous than a month ago when I climbed with Luther. I lead second pitch of D major, with overhangs, quite easily.

Climb with local Guide “Mookie”, A Canadian fella working for OEG. And seattle guy.
Do 100m “arachne” route on watchtower. Get a bit nervous on last few pitches , seconding – due to exposure (when you have a lot of empty space under you) . Need to be exposed to more exposure. Also need more practice placing gear quickly.

More Climbing at Arapiles, Vic

2009-02-20T21:11:00.000-08:00

Photos:
1. Alex and Max from queensland in their Van

2. The morning view from the campground

3. myself climbing one of the "organ pipes"

4. The rock of Arapiles rising from the plain

5. climbing

6. Roos at nearby Halls gap, Grampians.

(click on a photo for a large image)

After the horrible heatwave, and the terrible fires, I drove to Arapiles and climbed for about a week. the day after I arrived, Alex and his brother turned up in their Van ! these are the guys who got me climbing "trad" seriously in the glasshouse mnts in queensland. On their way to Tasmania. Climbed with them, and on other days with up to 3 different climbing partners... who were alone at the camp. Including a local guide called "Mookie", and a Canadian dude.

With an American from Seattle and the Canadian, did a 100m climb up a big pillar. Quite a bit of exposure to the emptiness up on the last pitches... still getting used to placing trad gear quickly.

,
Then drove to Shepparton and found picking work in a day, at Turnbull property. camping out with other backpacking fruit-pickers.

Halls gap, Grampians, Vic

2009-02-06T18:06:00.000-08:00

1: View towards "The pinnacle"

2: Myself at pinnacle parking
3 onwards (not my photos). Viewpoints around Grampians, fun at Mc Kenzie Falls.

Quick roundup of last few weeks since Falls Creek 1700m:

Bright -> look for fruit pick around, half-heartedly, … realise Shepparton is better bet.
Go to Shepparton … bloody hot ! no shade in campsite, stinky marsh… aghhh
Drive around properties, ask if work. Meet other pickers – friendly.
They give me info … meet 2 quebecois pickers who were at Lennies’ last year.
Owner real nice guy, but says pears not quite ready yet. Best to come back Monday 3 feb. So I decide to shoof of, away from heat, 20$ campground.. to Arapiles. On the way, I decide to go to Halls gap instead. Wow – great slanting slabs of rock, wild-west style. Little ponds of water, wildflowers… quite alpine atmosphere. Peaks at 700m ,1000m .

I Go up “elephant’s hide” on foot – a slab of rock 400m or so at 20-30 degrees slope.
Also Run up to pinnacle from halls gap – uphill about 6km.

Then drive to Arapiles – there for 2 days … but heatwave !!! in vic ! 44 degrees !
So back to Halls gap, decide to check into a backpackers – for some coolth , free wireless internet and some company. Travelling in Van can get a lonely if one isn’t meeting people from time to time.

A group of Dutch backpackers comes in, and for a few days I am offered wine, play cards with them and have good fun. The Dutch are probably the most gregarious people I know. I cross country run mornings / evenings when it’s not too hot, and wait for the heatwave to go. Catch up on my emails etc.
Sleep in the van and get a 5$ reduction … to $20 . Also talk with a French couple from the same Paris suburb as myself, and Run with Arnie from Germany. The hostel has a big flat screen TV where one can watch videos. I watch the amazing Tennis final Federer versus Nadal.

Ring Shepparton and find out pear season hasn’t started yet. It’s either feast or famine regarding employement in this field, so best to wait a bit.
I talk with Arnie about Europe, it’s limitations re too many regulations, feudal minset etc. Also Irak – how it’s working now. His viewpoints are typically European – is terrorism really that much of a threat etc - , but he is intelligent and open to new ideas.
We do a bit of bouldering on rocks nearby.

Fri 6 feb
This morning I go off to climb with Alex from Canada. To a friction slab, 40m of climbing then an abseil. I do it gingerly the first time, few handholds – just small concave rests for the feet, and friction. Then Alex leads, then I repeat the route, going faster and more confidently.
Feels good, in beautiful creek setting. I wax eloquently about mountaineering and a few epics I had in Chamonix, the pleasures of mixed ice and rock climbing as we walk back to the hostel. Makes me realise I need to indulge my passion for mountaineering – by saving and then spending time in NZ.

Sat 7 feb

last few days, I've been cross-country running with Arnie and Alex, in the evening. My thighs are beggining to like a soccer player's thighs - big and round. Will help with the army.

Another scorcher today at 44 degrees... Great to have hostel for company, coolness, wirelless net...

More Falls Ck photos

2009-02-04T20:55:00.000-08:00

1: Closeup of the Brumbies (wild horses) I saw.

2: Just back from my 2 day walk, all geared up

3. It's sunny but there is a cold wind...

(Click on a photo to get an larger shot).

Kayak Lake Buffalo

2009-02-04T19:49:00.000-08:00

(This happened just after leaving st leonard’s – about 4 Jan)

Explore Lake Buffalo and go up tiny creek.

Felt great to be on the road again ! easy drive up Hume hway. Little traffic, car runs well. A bit vague today. Hot , Hot day ! Melts my brain. But do get maps at info center. Then off to Lake Buffalo (at foot of Mt Buffalo), near Bright. Read thriller, doze. Quite a few waterskiers. Afternoon, inflate Kayak and go out on lake. End up 2.5 hrs of paddling. I go up to mouth of lake and up creek – get smaller and smaller, and I end up walking and pushing the boat. VERY serene – birds flitting, water , rocks… therapy. Felt like a Kid – “exploring”, at one with magical nature.

Falls creek, 1700m

2009-01-14T20:37:00.000-08:00

1. Morning view at "pole 532"

2. Evening view at "pole 532"

3. Brumbies (wild horses)

4. River marshes and pools

5. Sunset

6. me and my outdoor campsite

7. my van and rocky valley lake (Falls ck lake)

8. Alpine flowers and burnt snow gums

(click on a phot to enlarge)

Wed 7 – Sunday 11 jan 09

in the NE of Victoria, in the alps.
Falls creek resort and surrounds -
Cool, sometimes icy wind. Sunny days. Resort is ghost town, but a few cafes open, plus small supermarket.
I camp near lake. Run 20km in a circuit one day – great views.

One overnight trip, from pole 532 , 5km to a wild camp, then 15 km round with view of Mt Hotham, down to pretty valley pond and back to pole 532. I see several Brumbies and get within 25 m of some.

I did a 5 day walk in this area with my brother Marcus, about 13 yrs ago…

Lots of old mountain huts up here – eg Wallace’s hut – more than 100 yrs old. They have wood beams and tin, lots of character. Very useful in a winter emergency. It’s a high plateau up here – rolling with streams and wide expanses of grass. Great for Nordic skiing in winter – must come back here when there’s snow. Plenty of scope for multi-day trips with a tent, and the huts in very bad weather.

In the evening, I put on the down jkt and bonnet – big contrast the warm Bright, down in the valley. Some athletes are high-altitude training up here – Japanese cyclists, Rowers on the lake.

Christmas, New Year

2009-01-14T20:16:00.000-08:00

1. Sunset near st Leonards

2. Cosmopolitan Melbourne. note the cat picture top left

3. Changing boxes at Brighton Beach

(click to enlarge a photo)

Spent christmas and new year at st Leonards, on the western side of melbourne's huge bay. Nice coastline. Good to catch up with the Wilkinsons. Got a bit lazy and fat tho, was good to get back on the road again and get into alpine country.

had fun buying 50% markdown gear in Melbournes outdoor shop ghetto, and taking pictures of Melbourne.

Arapiles and Relatives

2009-01-13T19:45:00.000-08:00

Sat 20 dec

After having spent a few days with my cousin Shona,
Drive 340 km West to Arapilies, just near the Grampians. And Horsham town.

Amazing bumpy, canyony cliffs, like something out of the wild west. Very good for climbers – lots of pinnacles, buttresses, good rock, with cracks to place cams and other devices in case of a fall. This place is actually world-renowned for climbing. it rises out of a billard-table flat wheat plain.

Meet Friday morn with a motorcyclist at the campground. He’s a math teacher from Wollongong, 40s. we do 2 climbs of 2 pitches each – photo of 2 groups of climbers from the top of our 1st climb. It’s all “Trad” – ie you need to place your own protection, which I am still getting used to. There’s a chilly wind, the morning is icy. The air warms as the day goes on, but it temps remain reasonable. Gets dark after 8pm which is convenient.

Camp ground is peaceful, 2$ per night… and mostly comprised of climbers, including from overseas.

Random Beauty - L. Casta

2008-12-14T20:08:00.000-08:00

1: NGC654 supernova or some incredible space thing.
2: Bud, my climbing partner in Chamonix, French Alps 1999.

3,4,5 Sigh. Laeticia Casta (see below). middle one - with Yves Saint Laurent.

Once in a while, I'll post up some random photos of beautiful things. I'm quite visual, and enjoy art and photography.

Laeticia Casta - model, actress (the Blue Bicycle) and representative of all that is beautiful in French women. Plus she believes in chastity (a rarity these days). Incidentally, the true meaning of the word "chaste" is not abstinence, but sex only when Love is present. Quite a few marriages are not chaste by this defn.

Sunsets and Big Sky country

2008-12-14T19:38:00.000-08:00

1: Sunset at rest area sth of Nerandera - the best things in life are free..

2,3: Rainbow sth of Ardlethan

4: Frodo's Hobbit van

5: Big Sky country sth of West Wyalong (sth west NSW)

6: Next to the laundromat at Cowra

Thur 11 – Mon 15 dec

Blue mnts – West to Bathurst – Cowra – South to Nerandera (Newell hway)

Friday 12 dec

Blue mnts.
It’s raining pretty constantly. I decide to walk anyway, from Govett’s leap carpark towards Pope’s Glen. I pass rock “Pagoda” formations, tree ferns, beautiful flowers, pools with tiny sand beaches along the creek.
I test out my nylon “softshell” with an umbrella. Works fairly well, you sweat a lot less than with Gore-Tex.
I’m at about 1000m altitude. Good for sports training… like Flagstaff in Arizona, Or Boulder, Colorado, or the Vercors In France. One of the towns up here is twin city with Flagstaff, Ariz.

Then decide I better get moving to avoid falling on my relatives and family friends in the middle of Christmas. Down a short steep road, onto the gently rolling hills West of the citadel of the Blue mnts.

City versus Country - thoughts

I arrive At Bathurst, Home of Holden V8 grand prix races on Mt Panorama.
Buy a new digital camera – Canon AS590 IS , for 140 $ (gd price). Pretty amazing features for such a price: manual exposure possible, 4x zoom, optical viewer (like old-stlye SLRs) . All in all, great to have a hi-qual camera with which I can capture and share the displays nature puts on for us (see sunsets above).

I get a pair of polyester long johns and some freeze dried food at the BCF store
The girl behind the counter has that sweet country look, like the mechanic-girl on the sci-fi movie “Serenity”. People in general are relaxed and down-to earth here – the country feel. Makes a nice change from the ghost-like Goths and other costumed city-fauna at Katoomba, which feels like a suburb of Sydney (I’m told there is a knifing per week on weekends in Katoomba – oh for Rudy Gulliani to apply zero-tolerance to Aus cities and reduce assault and homicide by more than 50% as in NY City ).

“Ragged” is the word that comes to mind when I think of people in Katoomba. Ragged youth who don’t take care of themselves, who have little to look up to except the local drug dealer in his flash car. Ragged mature people who’ve drunk too much or seen to much violence. Definitely not Scandinavian athletic types. Where are the bronzed Anzacs who work hard and play hard and are brave and enthusiastic? They’re out there, but not in inner cities.

I feel like getting a group of them and taking them on a wilderness walk, gradually increasing the difficulty. Or yachting. Get them to know the joy of using their bodies in the clean sunny air, the joy of work, the joy of swimming in ice-cold creeks, the free-ness and sacredness of nature’s beauty, including their own. Plus we could work on a farmer’s property, with horses etc.

The country life is definitely healthier, physically and mentally. There’s too much disconnection from reality, your body, nature, others and posing in most cities. City kids could spend 6 month in the country as part of their curriculum – so they can at least get at taste of reality, seeing where their meat comes from, giving birth to foals, working in the mud, getting old cars going… come to think of it, I wouldn’t mind working on a farm for a few months.

Sure, I can understand the attraction of the city lights. And I’m sure country kids need a bit of city from time to time. But the what with wireless internet, mobile phones, downloadable movies etc, the country is much less isolated than it used to be.
I’m reminded of Harrison Ford, who lives on a ranch near Jackson Hole, Idaho. Next to the amazing Grand Tetons mountains. I agree with him that LA life corrupts – especially kids, who fall right into the drugs and all the rest culture of LA.

-------------

Get to small rural town called Balney. Dogs in pickups, dusty streets, Big container rail terminal . I like it. Fuel’s going abnormally fast, some power surges. Van due for a service. Plus I’m out of fuel… and all the fuel places are closed at 6pm. So I stay the nite.

Sat 13 - Cowra, Ardlethan

Next day, get fuel, but no service possible. So go on to Cowra – bigger country town.
Nice historic towns before Cowra.
Not pos to get service there either. Shop at Coles, Move on towards town of Nerandera. Now in flat country – easy to drive, except for strong wind that buffets the van. After West Wyalong – it’s “Big Sky” country like Montana. (see photo above).
Golden Fields, almost Billard table flat. Stop at rest area after Ardlethan.
Go for a run up road, then dirt track. It’s good to feel my body after hours driving.
On return to the van, I am greeted by amazing double rainbow and the other end going into the ground (where the treasure is). (see photos above).

Sunday 14 - Nerandera

I arrive at Nerandera 140 km on a fill… half of what I ususually get. Decide to wait for Monday so I can get a service.
See a real Tiger Moth biplane at small museum . This area used to be the training are for pilots in WW2. 1000 pilots from here alone were killed in that conflict. One who survived was Australia’s only Aboriginal pilot, who flew a fighter. It seems to me Aboriginals had more opportunities back then than they do now… what with the victim industry constantly encouraging them to feel like perpetual victims. At least Aboriginal leaders like Noel Pearson don’t agree with this pandering.

In the library, I talk to the librarian about the WW2 training airbases. I mention my grandfather was in the RAAF in WW1, and killed in the R101 airship crash (1930), just north of Paris (in a strange coincidence, I ended up growing up just 200 km or so south of the crash site…) . She has just seen a doco on airships, including the R101.

WW2, Islamic terrorism, The will to win

Regarding WW2, I often wonder if the modern public would have the stomach for defeating Hitler, Mussolini, the Japanese empire if they were transported into the past. 400 000 American servicemen dead…. 50 000 dead in the German Ardennes counter- offensive alone… the 4000 or so dead in Irak recently seems like a mere blip.

The islamo-fascists count on western resolve crumbling, with time and wear. I hope for the sake of the future of kids today that they are wrong.
Personally, I would rather die fighting than endure the living-death of life in the shadow of a global Islamic dictatorship, Teheran-style.
“vivre libre ou mourir” – “live free or die” was the motto of a Captain of the resistance in a small high plateau near Chambery, France. He held out, until the end of the war when the Germans sent up forces on skis.

At one stage, he tried to recruit French people in towns around, but met with little enthusiasm. In fact, a documentary made in the 50s showed that most French were resigned to, even collaborating with Nazi occupation. This doco was banned for decades by De Gaulle, who wanted to perpetuate the resistance mythology… true there was resistance, but it was a small minority.
It seems that little has changed, and the French and other Europeans would rather submit and raise the white flag of surrender than fight Islamic terrorism in it’s bases abroad (Afghanistan); when it tries to take over a state or scuttle democracy (Irak). And verbally on their own soil, despite books like “Londistan”, denial and appeasement is still strong in the elites.
“The price of freedom is perpetual vigilance” (and blood) I forget who said that.

----

Out of Nerandera, I get bogged doing a U-turn. 2 farmers turn up with their machinery, and gladly pull me out with their ute. Country hospitality.

Monday 15

Sun at last ! but chilly wind.
I find a mechanic to do the service, go to the library to update my blog.

Climbing and Walking Blue mnts

2008-12-09T23:24:00.000-08:00

0: Gil the Quebecois, Marie, Me (not a very good shot of me!)
1: Rowan on the slackline
2,3,4 : Views of bridal Falls and track

Monday 8 dec

Walk down to foot of Bridal Veil Falls, from Govett’s leap parking.
Awesome fall, lots of moss on the cliff walls, very nicely built track down the cliff.

I do a bit of scrambling on boulders at thee base of the falls. Then Run/walk back up.
Shop at Katoomba, meet up with S&R and do “slacklining” with them in a park (see photo above). Rowan has awesome balance. I can only hold on 2 seconds or so.

Camp at the top of Shipley’s cliffs, and see S&R’s campsite just along a track.

Tue 9 Dec

At 730am, do Yoga, stretching and pushups with S&R. These guys are only just out of high school and are truly dedicated climbers. I’m impressed. Later I watch them climb like insects on hard overhanging routes.
Rowan explains how he learnt about “supermarket dumpster diving” at Arapiles. Climbers from all over the world camp for 2$ per nite at Arapiles, and climb for up to a month, with expensive gear (where their money goes). This is the Australian equivalent of “Camp 5” at Yosemite, USA – where climbers in the 60s and 70s pioneered “big wall” climbs where one uses etriers and such on mirror –like cliffs.
Several of these climbers went on to manufacture climbing equipment, which is now used worldwide.

So Rowan and others in the Katoomba area go to the Coles supermarket dumpsters and pull out intact packages of spaghetti, bread etc, which are past thier due-by dates.
They can thus climb for weeks on very little money.
It’s funny to see his state-of the art tent and headtorch etc. Reminds me of what was said of the famous French sailor Eric Tabarly - that he used the same old piece of soap for months, that he would pick up a discarded pair of shorts at the marina and re-use it. This was a man who was one of the best sailors in the world, winning world cup races with his uranium-keeled yacht “Pen Duick IV” . He had the money to have the best yacht because he was so thrifty in other areas….

A lesson for us all – find out what you really want to do and focus on that. Don't waste energy keeping up with the Jones... The social pressure to keep up appearances is there, but is it really worth the effort in trying to please others ?

Is authenticity not a better option for all - authentic climbing hobos ; authentic white collar yuppies who value luxury above all; authentic businessmen who provide products, make money and create jobs (give me a break with "corporate responsibility" ahhhhg ), authentic tough cops (not nanny-state PC enforcers) etc.

I climb my first Blue mnts climbs with Gil. I lead an “18” , then Gil does a “19”, which I top-rope, with difficulty. The edges of the rock are sharp, and I’m out of practice at climbing at this level.

We stop at lunch. Evening: I run along the track overlooking the Grose Valley – sun setting on red cliff-faces.

Wed 10 Dec. 08

Climb with Ricky, whom I met thru Marie. At Bordsen’s lookout. Short climbs which get my forearms pumped. I take a fall towards the top of one – about 5m. the rope and belay device does it’s job and I come to a stop. Scary, but as Ricky says – it gets it out of your system. Fear of falling makes one climb less well, and in sports climbing, falls are usually anodyne (except when there is a ledge underneath).

On another I almost fall and get quite uncomfortable desperately hanging on in a difficult overhung posn. , trying to clip onto the anchor at the top of the climb. I finally manage to secure myself. A lot of mind games in sports climbing. Prefer mountaineering with it’s easier routes , resting places , great views and mixed ice/rock terrain. But sports rock climbing is fun in itself , not just training for “trad” routes or mountaineering. It’s just that you get scared when you are pushing the envelope of your skills (even though you are usually safe). Even Pros get scared when at the limit of their abilities.

Thru Northern Rivers, Tamworth, to Blue Mnts (Sydney)

2008-12-09T22:53:00.000-08:00

1,2: re-enactemnt of British soldiers with real muskets, at Windsor west of Sydney

3: Sunset at Govett's leap, Blue Mnts NSW

4: The Van at Uki, Northern Rivers region, NSW

Friday 5 Dec. 08

350 km today
NSW border – Muwillnbah – Kyogle – Tenterfield – Glenn Innes

In the morning, the sharp ridges of the scenic rim to my left and right are mist shrouded, and I can see 2 eagles soaring.
I drive down towards Murwilembah thru very cute tiny country towns. Eg Crystal Creek with its Hippie cafes and shops.
Horse agistment centers, amazing mountain surrounds.
I am aware that I am approaching my old 2005 stamping grounds – déjà vu is to be expected. I go thru Mbah – poverty is apparent – rundown house, olds shops.. I’m not quite sure why this region is fairly poor. Mt Warning in the distance – an amazing volcanic shape, straight out of a Tolkien book.

I stop at Uki on the and walk around a bit, nice town. Then go on and take a small diversion to lake xxx – where I used to take dad , and he used to lie on a recliner . Amazing views of pines, lake and Mt Warning in the background.
I have lunch there.

Then I drive on, past the turnoff to Nimbin, on the long hilly road to Kyogle. Great vistas but hard driving. Finally reach plains area of Kyogle, and then easy driving to Casino, and Tenterfield (with a big mountain pass before the latter). At Tenterfield , I turn South onto the very easy to drive New England Highway. Very little traffic, huge vistas of slightly rolling plains – great farming country.
Just after turning of, I go thru some amazing hills strewn with large boulders. The more plains. I sing songs, feel joy at being on the road, a free spirit in a Vast Great Southern Land.

I stop for the night in a rest area just after Glen Innes , now in “Celtic lands” with scottish names – Glencoe etc.

Sat 6 dec

Go past Moonbi – just nth of Tamworth. Hills with nice boulders.
Walk around Tamworth – home of a major country music festival. Guys with big cowboy hats , swank main street with shade trees , a bit like the south of France.

Drive on , past Huge horse agistment centers - “Emirates” agistments. Thru town of Scone – australia’s premier thoroughbred breeding center.

Then past 2 huge power stations and a whole area of enormous open cut coal minefields. Then Singleton, fairly uninspired town. I take “Putty road” – through wollemi nat park – conical hills with pockmarked boulders like wild west. Very windy, narrow gorge. Then long stretches of straighter road. Camp jst Nth of town of Colo. I see I am next to Blue mountains area, and just 60km or so from western Sydney.

450 km today

Sun 7 Dec. 08

I know Gil the Quebecois is in the blue mountains, so I call, and it turns out he’s climbing near Katoomba. So I decide to make a small diversion to see him and his girlfriend Marie-Eve. I take route 40 (Bell rd) from Windsor. At Windsor, I stop briefly as there is some sort of celebration. It’s for the 198th anniversary of Founding of the the “5 towns” (Windsor, ..) by governor Macquarie.

Clydesdale horses, lots of families. A re-enactement of British soldiers with muskets. They know their stuff – I am shown how a 1800s musket is loaded. They fire them (no bullets) and also a small canon, which sends a shockwave over you like a wave…
Very pleasant.

Then drive past RAAF base with Hercules transport planes, along Bell rd – steep sections, then amazing views of the canyons of the blue mnts. I was here with my parents in 1989 or so, but I am spellbound by the huge cliff faces and wild valleys.

Arrive in Blackheath (near Katoomba) early afternoon, browse and see amazing view into Grose valley from Govett’s leap . then Meet Gil and Marie-Eve at a pub. Marie-Eve has just spent 1 month climbing (trad style) at Arapiles, nr Grampians. Now plans to climb and work with Gil in this area.
While we are there, Stefan and Rowan (S&R) turn up. Small climbing world – Marie met them climbing at Arapiles (vic). Stefan is from Germany and Rowan from NZ.

They are camped “ wild” in a tent just above a crag, in the bush down the road, live very cheaply, have the best outdoor gear and are excellent climbers, as I see Tuesday.

Mist and chill in the evening – strange to feel chilly after Queensland’s barminess.
Camp at Govett’s leap parking and look at photos on my laptop with G & M.

Kerouac Jules’ Road Diary

2008-12-09T22:16:00.000-08:00

1: waterfall near Binna burra lodge

2: Lookout

3: secretly, Jules is a Melbourne Maoist, posing as a CIA-funded neo-con warmongrel.

4: one of the huge fig trees

5: On a 16km walk with river crossings

6: waterfall

Jules:
Poet, Warrior, Lover, Magician/ Technician, Travel writer, Court Jester and general pain in the butt. Drink less Coffee and read more Jules. The Hippie Conservative Libertarian with a climbing harness and an M16.

The outdoor instructor season is finished for 2 months, so Jules has set of southward with his mobile office, gear loft, kitchen and dorm (van). Many adventures and meetings are to be expected.

Thurs 4 dec 08

I have just had 3 great days at Binna Burra, Lamington Nat Park – at 700m altitude.
Hosted by Caz, a fellow outdoor instructor whom I met on a camp. She also guides adults on walks from Binna Burra lodge, a great old-style lodge that has been there since the 1930s. The jungle valleys and steep sides are covered with a network of tracks short and long , and she knows most of them, as well as the Geology, History and Botany of the site. It’s great to have a knowledgeable guide.

It’s a garden of Eden, with Crimson Rosellas (red), large Skinks, Woompoo birds that echo in the jungle, and huge fig trees with buttressed roots and matrixes of roots, big waterfalls , creeks with pools… The area is often covered with mist or rain, and can be up to 10 degrees colder than the lowlands. Just inland from the Gold coast and all it’s skyscrapers and feral animals. The road is long and windy enough to dissuade those who are not committed to walk in the jungle.

It lies on the “Scenic Rim” – a rim of jungly mountains 1000 m or so high which divides Queensland and NSW. With a few passes where roads get over.

I drive down to Nerang in the lowlands and load up my eski with food for my trip down south. I go to a net café where I catch up with my emails and send replies. Also look at my bank account online.
Then I drive the scenic way south, past the “Natural Arch” up to a very obvious mountain pass where the view opens up to a huge vista of the Northern Rivers area of NSW – my old stamping grounds when I was taking care of Dad in 2005.

I talk to a local who has stopped with his bike – it turns out he has cycled around the world, in about 4 years, staying with tribes etc. his website:

http://www.brinkadventures.org/

philosophy bit follows:

We talk a lot about various issues- dictators and how to deal with them etc, and finish up with Evil – I reckon Evil is inherent in all of us and we can choose or not to tap into “demonic forces” , and there is a continual battle between Good and Evil – as all cultures from Buddhists to Hinduism to Christianity to Pagan ones have believed. As well as writers such as Tolkien and CS Lewis. He has this post-modern idea that if only we could get to the “root causes” – better parenting/education in young years etc, we would not have to deal with the likes of Saddam or Milosevic or serial killers, and go to war.
Mmm yeah, and how is that going to happen ?… even if we has everything provided as in the sci-fi movie “Logan’s Run”, there would still be evil, though less. The sci-fi movie “Serenity” also postulates that when you try to anaesthetize people to much, you end up with a portion of the population becoming crazed killers, as a reaction, or side effect.

The main problem with his idea is that it denies the reality of the imperfect present, and the need to deal with an imperfect world and protect our loved ones, and democratic western civilization, via warfare and law enforcement, which itself is imperfect.
It’s a bit like saying to a cancer patient that we won’t be treating this cancer because it’s too messy and has too many side effects, and better luck in the next life when we will have this wonderful Utopian Brave New World where everyone is nice nice and no-one gets cancer. And pigs will fly…

Had Belgrade infrastructure not been bombed (circa 1998) for 6 weeks by Clinton and Blair, Milosevic would be dictator of greater Serbia and probably hundreds more thousands would have died in Serb ethnic cleansing…..
Some people object that a school bus, a passenger train were hit (by mistake) during this bombing amongst other civilian casualties, so “War is not the Answer”. Bollocks – what’s your alternative – watching ethnic cleansing go on undisturbed ?
As Margaret Thatcher would have said “There is no alternative”.

As it was, due to the lateness of the Anglo-US intervention, 200 000 civilians died in that civil war… and the toothless UN forces watched on as Serb snipers around Sarajevo shot old ladies and 14 yr old girls going out to collect water... I’ve talked to Serbs whining about how they were set upon by the anglo-US forces… whine away guys, I have very little sympathy – next time you have a maniac like Milosevic, form an armed militia and get rid of him instead of sitting passively.

All the unspeakable civilian tortures and mass killings of unarmed civilians by Serb death squads (Arkan and company) and regular forces happened 2 hours flight away from Paris, where I was at the time. Also ,I had visited the country in 1989, and knew several of the areas where fighting was occurring. It made me mad and sickened me, and even gave me nightmares. Mad at that clown Chirac for being all talk and no action. It was a turning point for many Europeans in the realisation that Europe could not even stop ethnic cleansing in it’s own backyard… and basically stood for nothing but empty talk (Blair being an exception to this).

Bah.. back to my road diary … had to get that off my chest tho.

I jog then eat some canned food and salad. Then sleep.

The SAS in 1942 and now in Afghanistan

2008-11-22T02:55:00.000-08:00

1. Aus SAS unit resting in Afghanistan , on self-reliant patrols up to 3 weeks long.
2. Aus. SAS Vehicle in Afghanistan .

3. British SAS Chevy in North Africa 1942 .
4. Restored 1942 Chevy , in Western Aus, and...

5. The 6 wheeler Australian SAS LandRover in Afghanistan now...

I’ve been reading an account based on an interesting memoir, of Chapman, a guy who was in the pioneering 1942 unit that went deep behind German lines in North Africa, 1942 onwards. They were in jeeps, mounted with big machine-guns, with enough fuel, food and water to last a month…
They destroyed German aircraft in airfields, and at one stage attempted to assassinate Rommel (aka the “Desert Fox”), the great and Noble German general who was responsible for so much if the German success. It was unsuccessful, and Rommel later was convicted as one of the plotters who attempted to kill Hitler with a suitcase bomb.

These small raiding units were the first “SAS” units, which are now so well know in anti-terrorism and “deep reconnaissance” missions. The Australian SAS was specifically mentioned by G.W. Bush after the initial stages of the 2001 Afghan campaign as being “the best special forces in the world” . They had a large area in which they patrolled and had significant successes for such a small number of men.

More recently, the Aus. SAS have killed or captured key Taliban leaders:

www.theage.com.au/world/aussies-capture-taliban-leader-20080810-3t29.html

Back in 1942, The German command said that these small raiding jeeps had a major disruptive effect on the German battle plans.
The same can be said now, as regards the Taliban.
It’s funny how similar the jeeps are – then and now, and how similar the tactics are as well. The enemy, however, is quite different – in North Africa in 1942, both sides treated the wounded of the other side, took prisoners and had a good esteem of each other etc. But the Taliban shoot their prisoners (if they are lucky).

There are also some interesting philosophical thoughts in the book, and analysis of what gave the British the edge over the far better equipped and more battle-hardened Germans.

Some extracts from the book:

Killing Rommel
by Steven pressfield

a Historical novel, based on memoirs of an SAS patrol soldier
North africa, 1942
LRDG Long Range Desert Group

To stand on a razor-back ridge with a plume of sand blowing off it sideways, squinting into eternity at the ranks of endless, rolling combers, each coloured a different shade of pastel (…) must be like what George Leigh Mallory felt at the summit of Everest if he ever got there.

[Mallory’s almost successful attempt was in 1924 (!) ]

(…)
You understand why holy men seek out desert places. The great dunes seem to collect and concentrate some immense cosmic energy and focus it on to the boulevard down which you glide (with your vehicle) it mesmerises you.

‘Now take Mr Chapman here, content as a clam he is, out in the tall sand ain’t you sir, away from all the bumf back in the regular army – fatigues and drills, parades every time you turn around and always some lofty bugger jumping down your neck ‘cause you’ve got the wrong button or the seams of your drill shorts don’t match. I was with Second New Zealand Operation Battleaxe before I got away to here, thank heaven. The desert was like Piccadilly at rush hour – lorries and guns, tanks and carriers. Not out here ! This is the life ! ‘ Punch gestures to the endless dunes and sky. ‘No officers – or only decent ones who know the score.’

Stein’s theory on Man’s archetypes

P144
One of the characters is Stein, a British homosexual Jew, who enrols in the army and ends up being a good leader of men.

Stein has a theory on inner evolution. A man matures, he believes, from archetype to archetype: From Son to Wanderer to Warrior to and from there, if he’s lucky, to Lover, Husband, Father; King, Sage and Mystic.

(Jules: I couldn't agree more- Archetype theory should be taught at school. I guess I’m at the wanderer/warrior stage, with some of the other stages thrown in.)

Talking to Chapman, who is in the armoured corps (and the author of the memoirs we are reading) , Stein says:

You’re “in armor” now aren't you ? And he laughs. What could come next but Ascetic, Anchorite, Renunciant ? Stein predicts I’ll be drawn to the inner desert, another metaphor. Now, I think, here I am.
Is there anything to this stuff ? is the soul really governed by such inner architecture, and if so, to what end ?

Re British culture v German Culture, and British Public Schools:

P23
Comment of a German captured by a LRDG patrol:

We Germans could never pull of this trick as you do, wandering about on your own, miles from anywhere. We lack the individual initiative. We prefer to run in a pack.

What appeared as unendurable hardship to soldiers of other nationalities produced a species of exhilaration in our lads, raised on a diet of Kipling and institutional porridge.

At Winchester when I was 13, (…) in winter, water froze in our drinking pitchers. (..) we read in Greek Xenophon's March of the Ten thousand, and in Latin Livy's History of Rome, not to mention all of Chaucer, Milton and Shakespeare, the main of Coleridge, Hardy, Tennyson, Dickens and Conrad, while participating in all weathers in football, rugby, cricket, rowing, riding and track and field, as well as attending religious services 5 times a week.

Many boys saw their parents at holidays only, some not even then. They raised each other like feral beasts with all the outrages and excesses that such an upbringing implies. For most, it worked.

(...) the system produced the kind of individual who frequently displayed boredom or feckless complacency in times of prosperity, but shone in times of trial.

Yikes ! when I think of how today's schoolchildren are wrapped in cotton wool, taught almost nothing of any practical use and then released into the workforce at an advanced age like lambs to the slaughter....

The reading list above is awesome - if only a fraction of that was taught to kids these days, we might have more a more confident and self-directed public , and less easily led by the media or politicians, the latest greenie fad, more capable of critical thought and historical comparison.

Kids are constantly underestimated, overprotected from hard physical work and under-educated, in my opinion. Gil, the Quebecois guy I climbed with, met "Zebulon", or "Zeb" in Thailand. A guy on whom I read an article in the 1980s - a photo essay which showed him at 12, climbing "the nose" - a hard slab climb of 900m in Yosemite National Park, with his father. his father had started him climbing at 8...

6 hour climb to top of Tibrogargan

2008-10-29T00:06:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ag o, Gil and I teamed up with Alex and his brother, and climbed the 8 lengths up to the top of tibrogargan (glasshouse mnts). It was quite slow going , and involved "trad" climbing - where there are no bolts to clip carabiners into, and instead you place metal wedges and expanding devices into cracks in the rock. There were also bolted sections. it's the first time I've done so much trad climbing, with the grade of the climb fairly high. Used some of Alex's rack (see above) of jamming devices.

we arrived at the top thirsty and then had to walk down the very steep track to the base.

satistfying. A bit scary at times...

My thoughts on Obama and Socialism

2008-10-02T07:11:00.000-07:00

Obama's Neo-soviet poster lampooned...

my little satire on Socialism:

Our Father who is in the democrat party,

Protect us from the great Ecopalypse of the prophet Gore (he who hath a private jet and many mansions).

And stop the rising of the seas with your charm and presence,

Cleanse us of our sins of Wealth and Success

of Clean streets and Mc Donalds

of low infant mortality

and opportunity to improve ourselves and rise from the gutter

Pray, let us all be equal in mediocrity and low pay

in underachievement and simmering resentment of those who remain still richer,

continued in my political blog.

One explanation re US Financial crisis

2008-10-02T06:37:00.000-07:00

From what I can understand, it's very much to do with subprime mortgages being a weak point for big banks, which has led to a snowballing of consequences.
It turns out banks were pressured into large amounts of sub-prime mortgages by the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), sponsored by Bill Clinton and pushed by groups such as ACORN (where Obama worked as a community activist) amongst others. This strong-armed banks into commiting a lot of funds into sub-prime loans, putting them at risk in case of mass defaults.

See article

I read elsewhere that despite poor credit history checks etc for sub-prime loans, most of these are in fact being paid off. Hence the US govmt is going to make the problem worse by acting as if they aren't viable loans.

Expeditions with Kids, Dolphins at Noosa

2008-10-02T05:34:00.000-07:00

Just been on 2 weeks off, which I needed after several weeks of camps, with several expedition-style ones (15 hour days). It gets a bit wearing on expeditions sometimes, being with clueless and noisy kids (as regards camping etc) after a while. Oh to be with experienced scouts or similar...
Aussie kids are disturbingly urbanized for the most part, although there are always a few (girls and boys) who stand out as having some experience of camping and walking, or at least some initiative.
I remember in particular a 12 year old girl on my lake Tinarro 5 day exped (near Cairns), who had a real poise, fitness and was always helping out. It turned out she was a school athlete, and had been to NZ several times, doing 3-5 day treks with her parents. She was streets ahead of the others in self-confidence, maturity. Streets ahead of a lot of 15 year olds, actually.

On one expedition I did near Mt Barney area again (which I nicknamed Tour de Moogerah 08, as we were riding bikes half the time, around Lake Moogerah), the 14 yr old kids had to carry packs, in which many brought super-heavy big no-no stuff like nutella jars, custard pots, 80 wet ones (yes 80) and other items which had me jumping up and down, asking them to eat or offload stuff before we did our mega-uphill hike up to 1000 m altitude, on pain of several of them collapsing with exhaustion.

They did offload a lot of stuff, with me fishing interesting things out of the garbage bag - such as custard pots, nut and sultana packets etc, which I eat or kept for later.
Another coming the opposite way to us got lost and had to spend a night out on a ridge, without water... It turned out most of us had been given very sparse route instructions, and even incorrect ones on occasion...

The day before last we arrived early at our campsite at 350 m altitude and rapidly set up the tents as it was raining. After a bit of a break and a hot chocolate, I set about reconnoitering the route for the next day, as i did not want to get lost on the last day. I spent 3 hours running up and downhill on 4WD tracks, finally finding a very steep faint track up a ridge and almost getting up to the 1000m mark we were to get up to the next day. I only just found the track, and ran back in the rain and dark with my headtorch.
The next day the kids performed well, and the weaker ones held out well with no complaining. They cheered as we saw the parking where the bus was to pick us up.

Temporarily Lost in the bush:

On the latest 5 day expedition, on a huge property with ridges at 500m altitude near Mt Barney, we spent 8 hours walking on tracks and on steep untracked terrain. I went down an incorrect ridge and as I worked out where we likely to be from the steep terrain around me and the map, I decided we needed to traverse across to another, visible ridge. it was 4pm (it gets dark at 530) and the kids were dead tired. I did mention we might have to spend the night in the bush (with little water and no tents, but sleeping bags). However we did our traverse on rocky and steep terrain, arrived the correct ridge and finally arrived at the tents, water, food drop just as dark was falling.

Other groups had similar problems. It moments like that when you wish you had a small GPS, so as to get an exact fix on your current location. I was lucky to have a fit and understanding teacher - Gil the Canadian, who was also on that camp, was less fortunate.

The day after the end of this exped, Gil and I hiked 7 hours return up to the summit of Mt Barney (1300m). it was very pretty, with many wildflowers, mist. But also very steep, and we should have given ourselves a day off. I ended up with a sore throat for several days.

Dolphins at Noosa:

I had a real Noosa moment recently. Walked along the beautiful coastal track, past Pandanus, wildflowers, paperbark, Goanas, incredible beaches and national park. Got around the point, and was hit by a strong wind. Walked down a semi-cliffy area to watch the big swells coming in. Just as I stopped to look, I saw a pod of dolphins riding a swell. Once in a while one of them jumped out as the swell pushed them past me. In a few minutes they had disappeared. Wow ! I felt they had put on the show just for me.

I often go to the Nat Park (7 minutes by bike) to Run , or swim 1 km or more at sea. I come back invigorated by the exercise and beauty.

Glasshouse Climbing photos

2008-09-07T06:41:00.000-07:00

1: Gil at a belay ledge

2: Myself at belay

3: Gil abseiling down

4: Myself at a "hanging" belay - where there is no or little ledge, and one must hang off the anchor points.

A short while ago, Gil and I redid the 5 pitch route. This time, we swapped pitches - I did the passages that he had done last time. And we abseiled the way we came up, avoiding the nasty problem of last time.

We were both more profficient and relaxed than the first time. Also I brought a small pack with water, snacks and a mobile phone.

Europe the Sinking Titanic V. Putin the Poisoner

2008-08-23T05:46:00.000-07:00

After every Russian shove Europe backs down. Worse than that, it let itself to be bought off. The worst example is our friend former Chancellor Herr Gerhardt Schroeder, who got himself a top job with Russia's Gazprom energy company right after he passed a sell-out energy treaty through the German parliament. That'll teach Putin how to deal with Europe. ( I thought it was Bush who was after money - silly me).

more in my political blog

Renowned French climber Video

2008-08-21T04:04:00.000-07:00

Patrick Edlinger made films which popularised sports climbing in the 80s. This video shows him lead climbing in the Verdon Gorge. And then climbing..... ropeless...

His control is amazing. I don't climb anywhere near this level... but I have some idea of the satisfaction of a good lead climb.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvsgHWKJOUA&feature=related

also his classic film - "Opera Vertical":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQs3XMYDucs&feature=related

Camps And a Climbing Adventure

2008-08-17T00:00:00.000-07:00

photos:

-2: Mt Barney (not my photo)

-1: ditto
1: A co-worker setting up abseils at Kangaroo Point

2: Brisbane by night from K point.

3: Glasshouse mountains from a viewpoint

4. French climber on Tibrogargan

5. Another viewpoint

6. The main climbing mountain - Tibrogargan

7. Gypsy Jules in his hobbit hole

Camps, Mt Barney discovery, a Climbing epic and thoughts on Man’s need for Adventure.

Been to quite a variety of camps in the last month or so…

In July – Near Mt Barney , which is a great scenic area on the Qld/NSW border, Just inland from the gold coast. Mt barney at 1300m is tall for Australia, and sticks out majestically. I went to a 3 day camp, had a 4 day break, the another 3 days at the same place. There Are stacks of outdoor centers in the area – most of them around the lakes , surrounded by mountains, and some challenging bushwalks.

I took the opportunity to discover Mt Barney National park .. which was a bushwalking mecca in the 60s and 70s. Went up a steep and strenuous ridge walk, involving some climbing up slabs on the way up. Got up to the saddle at 1000m. Great gorges full of jungle trees and whooping birds. The mountain was lit up with it’s red rocks glowing at 7am when I started the walk. Also discovered the town of Boonah - real country town with long-bearded farmers walking around, an old pub and so on. Lots of horse breeders in the area.
Also hard crack-climbing (Yosemite style but 20m high) in nearby Mt French.
At one nat park rest area, I ran 10km to a gorge and back, then enjoyed the afternoon sun.

Lived out of my van, in rest areas and a campsite … great to be a gypsy again ! that lifestyle really suits me. Discovering scenic areas, Watching the sun set as I eat dinner from my small gas cooker, reading books in the evening with my headtorch, in my sleeping bag. Then drifting off to sleep with my MP3 player. All I need is my laptop with a wireless broadband modem… then I can update my blog on the move, and use the net for email etc.

I was telling a friend about my parents, going to Europe etc, the fact that my mother and I both have vans and live in them occasionally… And I said we were “gypsies with degrees” well almost… we are educated working gypsies anyway..

A day of work at kangaroo point… a great climbing spot on the south bank of Brisbane city river (see photo above). Got 15 yr old girls abseiling. Then climbed a bit with some Mexican climbers I met. Spent the nite at mt Cootha (a viewpoint mountain right next to the city), and came back to boulder at K point the next day. I was impressed by the flotillas of road bikes, runners at 6am in Brisbane city…

Then drove up to the Glasshouse Mountains (1 hr north of Brisbane, 1hr south of Noosa)… A fabulous Tolkien-like set of volcanic plugs surrounded by forest, both natural and plantation.
And I discovered, to my delight, some great long bolted climbs on Mt Tibrogargan.
Came back with my climbing gear, and met a French couple (living in Brisbane) with whom I did some routes. Led 2 climbs – 45 m lengths – with some challenging moves. It felt really good to be doing some “real” climbing – ie in a great setting, with amazing views, on long routes.
A bit later, I got a call out of the blue from Gil, the french-canadian I shared a flat with in Malaysia. After climbing in Thailand, he was a deckhand on a yacht for 2 weeks in Thai, during which he learnt quite a bit about navigation and such. Then travelled in India and Nepal, and then Australia, where he travelled with his parents in a rental van.

He had just bought a neat campervan – toyota pop-top, with table, seats , cupboards, a good size fridge, etc.. (much more luxurious than my spartan carpet floor where I sit and eat, and sleep with my futon ). For 6000 $ and a years guarantee. A good buy.
Has a working visa and just got work in a poultry factory in the glasshouse area.

Jules and Gil have a small rock-climbing epic.

So we went climbing an afternoon, slept in our vans, and then did a serious climb the next day – 5 lengths up, and a tricky 100m abseil…
I led some hardish pitches on the way up, getting some of my proficiency back. I’ve hardly climbed seriously since I left France in 2005. Did a 5 day course on lead climbing back in 2000 in Orpierre (south of France) , which taught me to push myself, to commit once above the bolt. I once fell 10m.. but on bolted “sports” climbs, there is little risk apart from scratches.
At the end of the course I could lead 6c-grade climbs (french grade) I can now lead 5b/c, but that’s normal with the lack of practice. At any rate I still consider rock climbing as training for my true love – Mountaineering – which I also haven’t done since 2005.

We abseiled down a different way, using a fixed anchor that was in place. Going down my doubled 50m ropes, I realized the cliff was overhanging, and ended up about 3m horizontally from the next anchor point… 15 m above the end of the ropes suspended in mid air, a bit stressed. Fortunately, I had a prussik cord attached to the rope – which meant I could use both hands and the cord would squeeze the rope, so I didnt’s slide down it.
I considered my options – attaching a leg prussik and going back up the rope (tedious and tiring) , abseiling down a bit further and finding a single bolt on which I could anchor myself (not good practice), or somehow swinging into the cliff.

I decided to try the latter, and pulled up one of my ropes to use as a lasso. For the next rather stressing minutes, I tried to lasso a boulder at the the anchor ledge, so as to pull myself into the cliff. I had to wait for my body to spin around to face the cliff, and then lasso. After 4 or so goes, I finally caught the bolder, and pulled myself in gingerly, and with relief, grabbed the anchor and clipped myself onto it. I made sure I held onto the ropes, so that Gil would not be faced with the same problem when he abseiled down.
Our troubles were not over, however, Gil came down and clipped himself to the anchor. We then proceeded to pull on one of the ropes, so that the rope would slide thru the anchor above us and later fall down on top of us. Mountain Abseils are known to be fraught with problems– ropes get stuck, people drop the ropes and so on. To my horror, the rope would not come… We were only 40m above the ground, but with no warm clothes , no headtorch… it would have been unpleasant to wait there for a rescue. So near , but so far..
I remembered the v-like crack that I had noticed on the edge of the abseil, and we assumed the ropes were stuck in it, on top of each other, stopping a good sliding occurring. So Gil volunteered to prussik back up, to my relief. It looked long and tedious and involved hanging in mid air, which I find a bit stressful.
20 minutes or so later, he was up, tired, and moved the ropes out of the crack. He came back down carefully and we pulled the rope successfully, and breathed a sigh of relief. We had been going 5 hours or so without water, which didn’t help either.

We did the last abseil , and then walked the short distance back to the vans.

Rather tired but exhilarated, I then drove more than 3 hours north to get to a camp near Bundaberg, where I started work the next day, and for 3 days.

I was excited like I haven’t been for a while. It’s funny the way we benefit from adventure, from a bit of constructive suffering once in a while. There was the feeling of achievement, of having conquered my fear of falling on some pitches, and snarling with aggression, gone up to the next bolt. The beauty of the view across the plain, the physical pleasure of having used every cell in my body. I lay that night relaxing with my MP3 player, feeling every cell in my body vibrating with the day’s use.
Adventure like this awakens me – makes me more dynamic, more joyful. And I felt it made me a better person also – tougher and more noble. A bit like sword fighting I guess, except the Samurai of old risked their life while they focused on their art. A controlled dance with death is useful in getting the full savor from life.

I felt I needed more of this – more beating of the sword over the anvil by the blacksmith of adventure. I think everybody needs this; in our overcontrolled air-conditioned world between our cars and the shopping mall, where we watch others striving to survive on TV in natural disasters, wars and outdoor adventure; with all the really hard and dangerous tasks such as police work, fighting wars against our enemies, firefighting, rescue - outsourced to full-time third parties; so that we can continue to go to shopping malls and enjoy our opulence in safety, go to guitar lessons, sing, dance, have children and live in hope for the future.

This Saturday afternoon, I was back for more climbing with Gil… although not as demanding as that little epic of ours.
I would be in New Zealand right now, working as a cross-country skiing instructor, were it not for the fact that I was waiting for a major Australian job application to come through.

Global Warming as Mass Neurosis

2008-07-07T06:25:00.000-07:00

The Arctic ice cap may be thinning, but the extent of Antarctic sea ice has been expanding for years. At least as of February, last winter was the Northern Hemisphere's coldest in decades. In May, German climate modelers reported in the journal Nature that global warming is due for a decade-long vacation. But be not not-afraid, added the modelers: The inexorable march to apocalypse resumes in 2020.

This last item is, of course, a forecast, not an empirical observation. But it raises a useful question: If even slight global cooling remains evidence of global warming, what isn't evidence of global warming? What we have here is a nonfalsifiable hypothesis, logically indistinguishable from claims for the existence of God. This doesn't mean God doesn't exist, or that global warming isn't happening. It does mean it isn't science.

source here

Chinese Quake teaching Compassion ?

2008-06-10T05:05:00.000-07:00

If the Sichuan earthquake happened in Japan or USA, there would have been many more survivors," he said with agitation. "Our rescue rate of less than 1 in 10 was very low."In China some matters are strictly for the government. Politics is for the Communist party-state. Ordinary folk may pursue private goals. Beijing trusts the people with their money, but not with their minds. But the Sichuan earthquake, throwing everyone naked into the air, momentarily bridged the divide.

more here.

More Noosa photos

2008-06-06T19:59:00.000-07:00

1. Noosa Main beach on a busy day.
2. sunlight noosa Nat. park
3. Noosa nat park sea edge

Photos from "The Great Walk" - Sunshine Coast

2008-06-06T18:57:00.000-07:00

0.maps of the walk . (red dot shows location)

1. Mapleton Falls
2. Gherulla creek
3. my setup at Ubajee Campsite
4. Gherulla Falls

5. Fallen tree

6. Gherulla creek

(click on a picture for a larger version)

At the beginning of this year, I went on a 2 day solo. walk in the hinterland. Finally have the photos developed, so here they are.

It's a very scenic walk, with nice campsites made by the Nat parks authorities.
I tested out my new "Luxe mini-peak" Pyramid tent, which weighs about 1700 kg with inner mesh tent and pegs, and cost much less than Macpac tents and other well-known brands.

uses a trekking pole in the center.. and is rather like the Black Diamond "mega mid" pyramid tent.

when you do multiple-day walks, every gram counts... so I look for ultra-light solutions.

There's a whole movement out there, called "ultra-light backpacking", with websites, gear...

Anyways, the jungle was very pretty - awesome trees . and all this quite close to awesome beaches - it's a good part of the world to live in.

http://www.epa.qld.gov.au/parks_and_forests/great_walks/sunshine_coast_hinterland/

Olivier Follmi Photographs

2008-06-05T06:48:00.000-07:00

I saw Follmi's photographs a few years ago and was awed. He captures the grandeur and spirituality of the Himalayas. Is French, lives in Haute Savoie, has adopted Tibetan kids. Has lived in Zanskar, Tibet.... mountaineered in the Himalayas quite a fellow.

See his best photos on his website:

http://www.follmi.com/en/portfolios-follmi/portfolio.html

Flannery is a Fool on Global Warming

2008-05-24T13:22:00.001-07:00

Well... this is political, but also connected with the outdoors. mmmm.
Andrew Bolt writes on global warming madness, and environmentalist Tim Flannery making a complete fool of himself.

Flannery lied People died !
Well ... they will loose some of their standard of living and jobs, anyway, if oz persists in this ecological masturbation which will have absolutely zero effect on GW (which has not occured since 1998). Given India + china = more than 2 billion people and oz = 20 million.

How Flannery gets away with such flummery has been a mystery to me, but I blame in part our extraordinary groupthink (see this report). For instance, while 31,000 scientists were happy this week to sign a petition in the United States denying there was convincing evidence that man's gases caused catastrophic global warming, I can't think of more than a dozen in Australia who'd dare do the same.

And I can think of even fewer journalists who'd back them if they did. That's why Flannery is still treated as a hero of the ABC and The Age, despite a string of predictions that should have made him a laughing stock, not 2007 Australian of the Year.
Here's a condensed list.

Three years ago he warned global warming could leave Sydney's dam's dry by 2007. They are two thirds full.

Perth would be so devastated by drought that it would be a "ghost city" in decades. In fact, the city has just recorded its wettest April on record.

The ice caps would melt so fast that the seas would lap the roofs of "an eight-storey building". In fact, the United Nations' influential IPCC, itself accused of alarmism, says at worst the seas will rise this century by 59cm.

Hurricanes would become more frequent. In fact, the long-term trend of hurricanes and cyclones is highly disputed, as is any link to warming.

The hype pushing the global warming scare is the most sustained assault on reason in my lifetime. While Flannery remains a prophet, the rational should tremble, even before he starts firing sulphur into our sky,

See also Jules' extensive cut and paste, with graphs, facts, quotes from environmentalists and scientists who are skeptical or believe man-made GW is a sham:

Global warming or Global Wanking

What Islamic Terrorists Want

2008-05-24T06:00:00.000-07:00

See my political blog to find out, as quoted by a Swedish Muslim in Sweden, what islam terrorists really want. click here.

Nature in Education and general Education ideas

2008-05-19T23:03:00.000-07:00

I was at a camp near Woodford (where they hold an annual festival of music, arts etc), in the sunshine coast hinterland a few weeks ago.
Nicely setup, with minimal facilities on a large property with ridgelines and bush. Instructors stayed in our own tents and pupils stayed in tents provided by the company. The toilet block was very ecological - low water use by using canvas buckets hung above you in the showers, providing 3 minutes of continuous flow (or more if interrupted) of water. They were filled up from plastic buckets, filled with hot water from a boiler connected to a wood stove, lit up in the evening only.

The food we were served was catered, and excellent. Under a large awning, where students sat on logs. At night there was a large campfire, which was excellent (rare these days of puritanical NAt. Parks regulations, and centers with dorm. accommodation).
Also the stars were easily visible. One of the instructors - jarad, gave talks on the stars, and I learnt some new facts - eg that Alpha Centauri is one of the stars in the "pointers" for the Southern Cross. And that it is the closest star - 4 light yrs away.
I looked it up on wikipedia, and it is also reckoned via computer modelling to have a strong chance of "livable" planets in it's vicinity. Maybe humans will travel to it, maybe in the next century, via some new warp speed travel method ?

The activities were as standard - high ropes, low ropes, Team inititiatives, but all set in bushland, which was nice, plus there was raft-building on a small dam, and a bushwalk.

I picked up a very interesting book the owner had:

The author identified a phenomenon we all knew existed but couldn't quite articulate: nature-deficit disorder. Since its initial publication, his book Last Child in the Woods has created a national conversation about the disconnection between children and nature.

In this influential work about the staggering divide between children and the outdoors, child advocacy expert Richard Louv directly links the lack of nature in the lives of today's wired generation—he calls it nature-deficit—to some of the most disturbing childhood trends, such as the rises in obesity, attention disorders, and depression.

This brings to mind John Marsden’s new school in Victoria: candlebark, which has a huge area for kids to play in, where young children use power tools, take care of animals and plant vegetables:

In October 2006 an article in the Times Educational Supplement said "Many in Britain believe that childhood is in danger of being poisoned by a cocktail of junk food, electronic entertainment and high-pressure education..."

http://www.candlebark.info/

http://www.theage.com.au/news/education-news/the-school-that-john-built/2006/02/03/1138958909988.html

It reminded me of reading “Swallows and Amazons” – about kids playing with small sailing boats around the lake district (where I worked for a year). I was lucky enough to grow up on a houseboat, and see sunrises, ducks, swans, floods, change of seasons… and go on outdoor holidays every year in the caravan with my parents.

When I think of the culture of drugs, sex and violence that too many kids 11 yrs old onwards face these days, particularly in the UK and too much of Australia, I am quite saddened.
Looking at “swallows and amazons”, such hardened-before-their-time kids would be tempted to scoff, initially. But they might think of what it was too have been able to have carefree friendships, to play around in the wild unsupervised… and long for it.

The author goes into this subject, reporting that “stranger-danger” is massively overestimated, and leads to kids being kept away from nature a lot of the time. Certainly, danger to kids has gone up in the last few decades, but statistically not as much as one might think. [ I certainly believe that tougher laws (death penalty for murder ?) – would curtail this in a very short time. the UK is a prime example of the lost insouciance of a whole generation, so violent and nasty the urban env. Has become for adults and kids alike (see the article in my political blog on how a guy from Kent, UK moved to New Jersey , USA , citing it as more family-friendly). ]

Finland's Educational system - one of the world's best:

He also cites the Finnish education system, as producing the highest literacy and numeracy rates in the world …. With one of the lowest money expenditures per student in the western world. Despite this kind of evidence, govmts (such as the Rudd one in aus) keep on upping funding to schools, expecting that this will improve quality. US teachers now have one of the highest salaries in the US professional world, and quality has not improved….
Finland:

Educational spending is a very modest US$5,000 per student per year.
Class sizes often approach 30 (high).
So long as schools stick to the core national curriculum, which lays out goals and subject areas, they are free to teach the way they want. They can choose their textbooks or ditch them altogether, teach indoors or outdoors, cluster children in small or large groups

http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2004/04/education_in_fi.html

Finland topped a respected international survey last year, coming in first in literacy and placing in the top five in math and science. Ever since, educators from all over the world have thronged to this self-restrained country to deconstruct its school system -- ''educational pilgrims,'' the locals call them -- and, with luck, take home a sliver of wisdom.
''We are a little bit embarrassed about our success,'' said Simo Juva, a special government adviser to the Ministry of Education, summing up the typical reaction in Finland, where boasting over accomplishments does not come easily. Perhaps next year, he said, wishfully, Finland will place second or third.

NY Times article:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D03E3DE1238F93AA35757C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

One thing that would improve quality would be pay rates based on performance… or better still, privatising education completely and issuing school vouchers which could be used by parents. The voucher system has actually been tried in some US states, with good results. Changing teachers from bureaucrats to motivated educators is quite a task though, with beaucoup resistance from those sitting comfortably on mediocre performances, backed by the massive Teacher Unions that exist in most parts of the world.
Thank God Woolworths, Dell computers and my Mobile phone company aren’t run by union workers…. It’s a recipe for sloth, overstaffing and “it’s not my problem, and I don’t care anyway how long you’ve been waiting”.
I think some teachers should be doing another job, but that quite a few (particularly the young ones not yet shackled to the system) would be surprised at the joy of teaching in a free and competitive environment, where they can try out new methods unshackled by education authorities, and be recognised financially if their methods succeed.

Anyway, back to Nature – schools in Finland also have a very strong outdoor education component… Which the author believes is one reason for their successes.

There’s certainly a lot of room for improvement in secondary ed. I reckon that at least 60 % of the time I spent at at school between 11 and 17 was a waste of time – it taught me nothing of value, or that I used in a practical way subsequently….

Schools shouldn't exist to give teachers jobs... they should exist to impart things that will help students succeed, manage life, be aware of their innate skills, and be able to work use them at work : literacy, numeracy, scientific knowledge, critical thinking, opening up new vistas and awaken the imagination (eg by reading the classics of literature), self-confidence via practical outdoor activities, and a knowledge of modern history (WWII, Communism etc) , of modern civilization and its fragility. Very few of these objectives are reached in schools today...

And an incredible amount of left-wing brainwashing /political content enters the curriculum un some schools these days. Not to mention post-modern nihilism which says that there is no such thing as Quality and thus states that Madonna and Bach are equivalent (I like Madonna's music, but I'm not quite so thick or University brainwashed as to deny the timelesss beauty, beautiful complexity and transcendent in-spired beauty in Bach's music). mmm... inspire comes from In-spirited: having the spirit in one.., ie being in contact with the transcendent order. Let's do a test and play Madonna and Bach to an Amazon tribesman or an Afghan kid who has never or hardly heard western music and see which one makes him wistful and entranced....

My comment to teachers: if you want to change the world: vote or join a political party (or if you have the guts, got to Irak and fight on the side of freedom, choice and democracy; or totalitarianism and nihilism, depending on which side you support), and leave your kids alone. They will have plenty of time to make up their own minds re politics when they have left high school and have experience in the real world.

Some ideas: Teaching geography by actually having kids orienteering in the bush, rather than memorising map symbols in a classroom. Would give real knowledge of what a map is, plus real practical knowledge, plus self-confidence and endurance.

Teaching English lit by having kids watch live plays by Shakespeare, or the more modern comical playrights. Then discussing, reading passages, having essays written etc.

Teaching basic anatomy, medecine and nutrition…. I didn’t even know where my small intestine was until last year…

Jules' New Political Blog

2008-05-13T05:23:00.000-07:00

I have created a new blog, "Jules' Juicy Viewpoints", as I find I am doing rather a lot of opinion pieces in this blog, originally set up to report on my outdoor experiences...
It doesn't help that my cheap digital camera has stopped working . Also a lot of the camps I do are fairly unremarkable, compared to the Malaysian ones.

So I will be reporting on outdoor experiences, tourism, sport, maybe philosophy etc on this blog - trying to keep it apolitical , but there will be occasional crosslinks to the other blog - small snippets of opinion pieces, followed by a "click here" which will jump to the other blog.

You will be able to jump from one blog to the other via the links at the top right of the page.
"Jules' Outdoor blog" and "Jules' Political Blog" .

It feels more honest this way, as I don't want to force feed readers who just want to read up on my latest adventures to read political stuff the may have no interest in, or with which they disagree. I would be too much like the teachers who force feed their captive audience of kids in left-wing propaganda.... (greenism, social justice studies and other crap that displaces real learning, stunts critical thinking skills and results in massive illiteracy and innumeracy rates and almost zero knowledge of modern history) woops getting political again...

So if you're interested in fresh opinion and can take my Chef Ramsay-like no-holds-barred "this is bullshit" approach, read my opinion blog as well. otherwise don't.
Note also that I won't get into email jousting re politics - too time consuming. If you have something worth saying, post it in the comments section , as my brother Marcus has already one several occasions. I may or may not reply in the comments section. But I will leave up any comments, even :"that's a load of bollocks", so long as it doesn't get too obnoxious.
Try to be constructive and give hyperlinks to articles, or facts and figures, rather than merely smear, which is a habit of the left. I do believe in democracy and free speech (unlike many left-wingers, I notice - so I wont delete comments that contradict me, unlike lefty blogs like dailyKos which regularly censor comments out).

So enjoy.

Decreasing crime: the US model

2008-05-11T04:17:00.000-07:00

Crime victim rates - International Crime Victims survey 2000

click on image to get large version.

Australia and the UK could do well to learn from the US in tackling crime. It's appalling in the UK, and not good in Aus either (allthough it seems to be more avoidable here, having lived in both countries). The idea that rising crime rates are unavoidable is bollocks (see New York as a case study).

click here to go to my other (political only) blog. And read about how places like NY are now much safer than European cities such as London (higher murder and assault rate).

a quote from a web article:

A British man I met in Colorado recently told me he used to live in Kent but he moved to the American state of New Jersey and will not go home because it is, as he put it, "a gentler environment for bringing the kids up."

Pacifism enables thugs

2008-04-20T06:05:00.000-07:00

thuglist: Hitler, Stalin, Saddam, The current Chinese communist party, Hezbollah....
The Mafia, your neighbourhood thug.

A good article about the illusory nature of pacifism:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/04/imagine_a_free_tibet.html

extract:

To all those out there with the "Free Tibet!" stickers, here are a few facts that will help the world make sense:

There will always be bad people.
Bad people don't care about hurting good people. Appeals to shame, empathy and guilt don't work on them. That's why they're bad people.
Bad people respond to force. They don't like it and will change their behavior to avoid it.
Good people need to use force to stop the bad people from hurting other good people.
It's not the same when a good person uses force to stop a bad person as when the bad person uses it to harm a good person.
Not letting good people use force against bad people encourages more bad behavior.
Good people using force against bad people should be encouraged. This will make the world a better place.

To all the pacifists out there who think guns are the problem, all the moral lightweights harping about the "cycle of violence", please remember:
Guns liberated Auschwitz and violence ended slavery. The world you "imagine" is not here on Earth but in the next life, and you're really gumming things up for the rest of us by confusing the two.

Free Tibet - Hell yes! But to whom do we send the weapons?

Misery in Rural China: The Emperor has no clothes

2008-04-03T03:45:00.000-07:00

I just came across a very detailed account of the miseries of millions of chinese people, and the not-so-hot economy, by a real journalist: the Frenchman Guy Sorman.

I remember saying a month or so ago, that I had the feeling that the arrogant Chinese authorities would have their come-upance in the Olympics.
They have already had some due to the Tibet protests, and I have a feeling all will not be well during the Olympics, what with incredible smog levels and such.
China has the most polluted cities in the world… an atrocious human rights record, and massive poverty in the countryside. There are regularly riots against corrupt or abusive local officials in the countryside; the locking out of 100 000s of AIDS sufferers due to blood transfusions; the 3000 killed in Tianamen square in the 90s; the concentration camps in the north with Falun Gong members and others tortured horribly; the cracking down on Tibet protests in the 90s (led by the current Chinese leader), which involved torturing of nuns using electric shock and beatings…
Not to mention the forced mass forced abortions and murder of new-borns due to the one-child policy.
Systematic censorship of internet forums, allowing no criticism of the govmt ;attempted blocking of websites such as BBC and CNN; students put in prison for 10 yrs for the crime of posting an opinion on an internet forum; a huge array of radio jamming towers to stop foreign radios being listened to…

What a shit place…what a shit government.

Quite illuminating. It’s hard for us spoilt westerners to imagine a country where you need a permit to work in another state, and where you can’t send your kids to schools outside your district….

From the stories I read, corruption on a local scale is endemic, as are arbitrary beatings (sometimes to death) by local police, for offences such as not paying taxes. Reporters without borders and amnesty intl. Websites have hundreds of detailed and depressing accounts of such events.

Full article:

The Empire of Lies
by Guy Sorman
The twenty-first century will not belong to China:

http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_2_china.html

Extracts:

But China’s success is, at least in part, a mirage. True, 200 million of her subjects, fortunate to be working for an expanding global market, increasingly enjoy a middle-class standard of living. The remaining 1 billion, however, remain among the poorest and most exploited people in the world, lacking even minimal rights and public services. Popular discontent simmers, especially in the countryside, where it often flares into violent confrontation with Communist Party authorities. China’s economic “miracle” is rotting from within.

Riots against local authorities and such:

The government puts the number of what it calls these “illegal” or “mass” incidents—and they’re occurring in the industrial suburbs, too—at 60,000 a year, doubtless underreporting them. Some experts think that the true figure is upward of 150,000 a year, and increasing.
The uprisings are really mutinies, sporadic and unpremeditated. They express peasant families’ despair over the bleak future that awaits them and their children. Emigration from the countryside might be a way out, but it’s not easy to find a permanent job in the city. All kinds of permits are necessary, and the only way to get them is to bribe bureaucrats. The lot of the peasant migrant—and China now has 200 million of them—is to move from work site to work site, earning a pittance when payment is forthcoming at all. The migrants usually don’t receive permission to bring their families with them, and even if they could, obtaining accommodation and schooling for their children would be virtually impossible.
The Party’s primary concern is not improving the lives of the downtrodden; it seeks power more than it seeks social development. It expends extraordinary energy in suppressing Chinese freedoms—

(…)
The boy had gone, out of curiosity, to Tiananmen Square to watch pro-democracy student demonstrators seek a dialogue with the authorities. The world knows how Deng Xiaoping reacted: he ordered a massacre that cost 3,000 their lives, many of them barely adults. Ding Zilin was one of the few parents to recover the body of a child lost at Tiananmen. Most disappeared without a trace, their families never learning for sure whether they were dead or alive.

In 2004, the internationally esteemed economist sent a polite petition, signed by 100 fellow intellectuals, to the Chinese government, asking it to apologize for Tiananmen and thereby help bury the tragic past. He, too, lost his university position and wound up under house arrest.

Massive Aids infection due to contaminated blood:

having the blood, sans plasma but pooled with that of other donors, reinfused, absent HIV tests—a recipe for massive contamination. The AIDS sufferers of Henan are now dying in the hundreds of thousands, trapped in their impoverished villages with no one to care for them.
The government’s initial reaction was to deny any problem, isolate AIDS-affected areas, and let the sick die (a pattern that initially repeated itself when SARS broke out in the country).

Nazi-like forced abortions:

Villagers often told me that it wasn’t the local Party secretary whom they most hated but rather the family-planning agents. To ensure the proper implementation of China’s single-child policy (in some provinces, the limit is two children, if the first is a girl), the agents keep close watch on childbearing women, often subjecting them to horrific violence. In 2005, a family-planning squad targeted the city of Linyi and its surrounding rural area, in the Shandong Province, because the population had far exceeded the Party’s child quota. The agents kidnapped 17,000 women, forcing abortions on those who were pregnant—in some cases, immersing seven- to eight-month-old fetuses in boiling water—and sterilizing those who weren’t. The agents tortured the Linyi men until they revealed the hiding places of their daughters and wives.

Unemployement and mass inefficiency, nepotism

Many goods that China produces are worthless, Mao Yushi reminds me—especially those made by public companies. About 100,000 such Chinese enterprises continue to run in the old Maoist style, churning out substandard products because they’ve got to hit the targets that the Party sets and provide employment to those the Party cannot dismiss, not because they’re responding to any market demand. Most public-sector firms don’t even have real accounting procedures, so there’s no way of ascertaining profitability. “China is not a market economy,” Mao says bluntly.

The Party gives the banks lists of people to whom loans should go, and the rationale is frequently political or personal, not economic. Indeed, in many cases, banks are not to ask for repayment. That investment decisions obey political considerations and not the law of the market is the Chinese economy’s central flaw, responsible at least in part, Mao Yushi believes, for the large number of empty office buildings and infrequently used new airports and an unemployment rate likely closer to 20 percent than to the officially acknowledged 3.5 percent.

“Do you dare deny China’s success story, her social stability, economic growth, cultural renaissance, and international restraint?” Yan Yfan (a pseudonym) asks me, back in Paris. A scholar on the payroll of a Beijing foundation, an extension of the Party, he has the assignment to handle my case. I respond that political and religious oppression, censorship, entrenched rural poverty, family-planning excesses, and rampant corruption are just as real as economic growth in today’s China. “What you are saying is true, but affects only a minority yet to benefit from reforms,” he asserts.

Yet nothing guarantees that this so-called minority—1 billion people!—will integrate with modern China. It is just as possible that the “minority” will remain poor, since it has no say in determining its fate, even as Party members get richer. Yan Yfan underscores my fundamental error: “You don’t have any confidence in the Party’s ability to resolve the pertinent issues you have raised.” He’s right; I don’t.

In the House of Pain Again

2008-04-01T02:59:00.000-07:00

Mon 31 March and half of tuesday:

Hopefully the final chapter on my ruptured Appendix (see Jan 08 of this blog for the first one). Had keyhole surgery – 3 holes, they fill your lower abdomen with gas, stick in cameras, cutters, and snip off the appendix.

All went easily – they were concerned the appendix might be hard to get at, as the body tends to wall it off when it ruptures. Was out of hospital quickly, thank God

Guy opposite, ex-fisherman from Caloundra, came in about 11pm, was up a lot with pain – inflamed testicle area due to abcess, which would be drained today. Had a hard history – caught HepC via blood transfusion in 1989, before screening was properly put in place. Had quite a bit of character – working class battler. We talked of the silliness of no-smoking regulations( the 4m rule etc), I brought up the fact that 2nd hand smoking is now known to be harmless (latest research) , over-regulation in Australia: “the do-gooders have to find ways of justifying their jobs” as he says. Cars are probably the most dangerous weapons in Australia – but no-one has suggested they be banned. There is quite a bit of misunderstanding re risk: there is
What we call in the outdoor industry: “perceived risk” and “real risk”.
As an example: you are statistically safer climbing bolted sport-climbing routes than driving a car (much safer).

Always a bit of a soap going to hospital. Getting more used to having things stuck into me, but still not to happy about it. The staff was really good – doctors, nurses. Nurses have to keep up a cheerful working spirit to maintain competence and to counter the natural tendency to despair/depression/self-pity in hospitals. And they do a good job of it. I probably would be a fairly good nurse – might prefer the paramedic side of things. I know I’m good when the shit hits the fan during mountaineering situations, and have several times got myself and my climber partner(s) out of trouble.

It was good to be reminded about the house of pain. Always a humbling, earthing experience. And I can get into very procrastinating/lazy modes, when I’m not working on a specific task, such as on a kids camp. So it kind of jolts me out of that. And it certainly jolts you out of taking life for granted and putting things off for tomorrow.

For something to do, I picked up some Cleo magazines in the ward and read them.I Like reading Women’s magazines once in a while, because it gives me an insight into women’s minds and desires.. as do girly novels and films.

Also, I get to look at lots of classy girls in nice clothes, and get business tips from savvy entrepreneuresses. In another life, I am a designer or model manager like Yves St Laurent- I dress up beautiful women, nix bad designs and have models with their arms around me. I really liked “The devil Wears Prada” – a film with several levels – comedy, but also a message re getting ahead.

Jessica Alba is a yummy girly.
Read that Billie Ray Cyrus and family get articles on Britney Spears , Lindsay Lohan to show their daughter what to avoid. As I mentioned in an earlier post – I think that’s Britney’s divine mission (!) – to live a life of drugs, sex, hedonism with a multi-million dollar fortune, and be obviously very unhappy, for all the world to see, as a counter-example. It’s sad to see the former fit and sexy girl looking so trashy and ordinary.

Cyrus’s daughter plays the part of “Hannah Montana” -
Which I’ve seen briefly on TV. Quite a dynamic and healthy teen show
After so many trashy teens , boring and uncouth “neighbours” teens, and swearing 15 yr old girls in the street here in Aus, some US teen shows are a breath of fresh air. Pretty, pleasant and savvy – the girls have “quelque-chose” :“something”, sparkle, whereas a trashy teen/ girl in her 20s who swears and binge drinks has zero appeal. Take note, ladies, if you want to attract my attention….. and of other boys out there. Stand out of the crowd by having a bit of class and personality, even though it might be “cool” to be trashy.

Madonna, Christina Aguilera (victim of abuse) are good models of entrepreneurial female spunk. I remember listening to Madonna’s songs at parties, on the radio and TV when I grew up as a teenager in the 1980s… and thinking – “this is really good, this will be a hit in 10 years” (and they still are, 20years on). There’s so much dynamic energy in her songs – fitting for a girl who started of as a dancer and singer living out of a grimy apartment with rats in New York. Such a “New York” rags to riches story- beautiful. That’s one of the things I admire about the US – the whole atmosphere, remarks to you by people poor and rich, encouraged you to be the best you can be, rather settle for routine, or less – which is the European attitude.

My pulse varies from 54 to 63. Am told I have an athlete’s pulse – good to hear.

If you don't agree with my views

2008-03-28T04:40:00.000-07:00

If you don’t agree with my political views, feel free to use the comments section to call me a Nationalsozialist (Nazi),
A Reaganite, a Thatcherite, a Blairtite or a Sodomite,

OR have me assassinated, sent to to a gulag, have a grand piano dropped on me from a height,

OR, alternatively, agree to disagree, and enjoy the non-political postings....

Wilson's Prom Camp

2008-03-28T03:30:00.000-07:00

last photo:

OEG HQ at Eildon, Vic.

Been pretty busy since Feb, doing camps one after another, mostly center-based ones (little or no walking and no camping).

I was flown down to Victoria a few weeks ago for an OEG program of 5 days for PLC (Presbyterian Girls College). Flown out the day after the end of prog. – so sorry guys in Melb, couldn’t visit you…

Anyway it was quite a novel experience working for OEG which is huge and has 80% of the Vic. Private school market. There were 130 OEG instructors working that week, in several different parts of Vic. Including several flown down from Coefficient in Brisbane.
The Base camp of OEG is at Eildon, and there’s quite an atmosphere with a huge warehouse full of food and gear, staff accommodation nearby, and staff from overseas. On the last day, everyone is driven back to Eildon, u unpack and there is a free BBQ and beer.
I happened to bump into Selena, with whom I had worked with in Malaysia, which was nice.

The start of the program was a bit exhausting – getting used to all the gear and procedures that OEG uses. And the girls were rich girls – extremely, and annoyingly, chatty. And some were very silly or spoilt. I improved as the days went on, but things would have gone smoother if I had divided the large group up into small groups of kids and rotated them every day between:
Cooking, Cleaning, Leaders.
This method was used in Malaysia, but I thought I’d let the group organise themselves – which usually meant the same people did most of the work....

So I’ll know for next time. Avoids calling for volunteers to clean up – it’s just the cleaning group of the day’s responsibility.

There were times when I thought: “I’m not meant for this job”….
Thanks to the difficulty of getting the group moving, the silliness of the girls, and not a very cooperative or fit teacher.
Certainly, I would prefer true wilderness camping – something like mt Barney in August 07, or wilder again – 20 days in Alaska, with a fit and cooperative teacher…mmmm
We were in camping grounds and Nat.park campgrounds … easier to organize for OEG, but much less of a learning exp. For the kids.

We did have lovely debreifs under the stars on the beach, and sunsets.
I have pasted some of my debrief notes – which I write for myself after camps, below:

OEG wilson’s prom

3-7 march
12 girls, 13 yrs
1 teacher, 50s

5 days. Campsites at campgrounds,
half day walk
surf session
two medium walks along beach

teacher acting a bit like client on paid tour
difficult to be tour guide to teacher and taskmaster to kids…
argumentative re start times – while I gave briefs..
: oh, cant we get up later….

A bit “lordy” , physically not fit.
Bad of hearing ? saying: what ?? in a shockish manner when I spoke
Annoying behaviour sometimes – eg taking shower late and being 45 min late for debrief …

Teacher Interviewed by David (standard procedure);
She had some –ge feedback on me, re my relation with her, being too hard on the girls… (mmm - I’m not here to be their bestest friend, as she was trying to be).
But also some positive – my astronomy session was good.
She lied a bit,… saying debriefs on beach cold… when she had said: “lets go to the beach” on the last nite….
David: Good that I did debriefs – essential part of camp

Girls annoyingly chatty – rich kids thing. Annoying to have to remind them often to work, not chat.

Group management:
1 Leaders
2 Cooking
3 Cleaning dishes and area
4 Hygiene- digging toilet, placing signs, setting up hand wash station ( if necessary)

brief leaders nite before/ morning and get them to brief group.
Write list of names&groups on day1 then Rotate . keep list secure !

eg 12/4 = 3 people per group – ok

OEG programs:
Bring:

Dishes net (buy)
Plastic ladle
Rubbish bags 2

Do trangia demo for whole group ?

Felt this was not my cup of tea on day1…. Girls too noisy, late dinner, difficult to get canoes back on trailer…
Got better after.

Up at 550, put on hot water for group milo on last day… good idea
My fitness- good : could run to get info and not be out of breath.
Back – lower sore to begin, got better with pack massage.
Worse was – trapezius tension, neck pain. – tension…. Other guy Julian also gets trapezius pain.

Altered state of concsiouness. When listen to MP3 player fri nite – tired… so that brain slow, and normal parasitcal thoughts not there… feel almost disembodied as I listen to randomly selected tunes. Listen late into the nite.

Come back to Noosa, like an old friend - go to beach Sunday. Feel a bit tired, but in a good way – better than after center-based stuff – I have burnt myself completely in the work – so there is nothing left to burn. This is a good feeling.

Would be good to do several OEG progs, and become master at it… like in Malaysia. Hardest part – group manage. Helped by making groups with: leader,cooking etc. also teacher manage.

My nav was good on last day – copied topo map from penny. And used initiative to go around beach and not use inland track.

Very interesting to be at OEG HQ and meet people from USA, etc..
And to talk to Jenny – very outdoorsy woman re NZ mountaineering, nepal daulaghiri .
She said – just go to NZ, don’t put it off.

Staff quarters – surrounded by small climbing walls, etc… good place to be amongst outdoor leaders.

Victoria – like foreign country – cutesy towns with 1900s signage, small shops, old buildings. Very different to Queensland with it’s very modern buildings, huge signage… prefer frontier mentality and easy-goingness of Queensland. But like beautiful forests and mountains in Vic, and presence of snow.

Several people talked of NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School, , Wyoming USA) … and the greatness of having 30 or 40 day programs in true wilderness… length of time means you see real change occurring in kids.
Darren doing instructor course at NOLS.

I remember looking at their website back in 1998 and considering flying over to do a course of some kind.
Like Their whole attitude of being in wilderness – away from showers, roads… for extended period.
3 week program costly – but parents less taxed than in aus – can afford it. Very American situation – you pay the true cost, get good quality, and with some work, you can afford to get good quality, as you can make money by taking on as much work as you want and keep most of the earnings. The US scouts and others organize no-cost camps.

The Consequences of Europe’s Ostrich posture

2008-03-26T07:14:00.000-07:00

(Ostrich as in: Head in the sand, denial).

Got this from a feb 07 article in the SMH. I have long been an admirer of Ayaan Hirsi Ali:

"Europe's media, when confronted with events or statements that vividly illuminate the goals of Muslim leaders and agitators, either don't report on them or edit out key facts," Bawer wrote recently on his website. "Few media accounts of the 2005 Paris riots, for example, mentioned participants' cries of 'Allahu Akbar'. A 2006 [London] Telegraph poll found that 40 per cent of British Muslims want Britain to become a sharia state, yet politicians still respond to every new riot, rape, honour killing or foiled terrorist plot by reassuring the public that the overwhelming majority of European Muslims are law-abiding, peace-loving supporters of democracy."

It's a bleak view, but Western Europe's 15 million Muslims today will be 30 million in 10 years. A similar argument is made in another book, Infidel, published last week by a former Dutch member of parliament and former Muslim, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who is fluent in Arabic and Somali, has lived in Saudi Arabia, and worked for 10 years as a translator with the Muslims of Holland. Since criticising Islam and the oppression of Muslim women, she has been subject to so many threats and murder attempts she now lives in the US.

In an interview last week I asked her why there was such censorship, denial and silence from so many European liberals in the face of so many attacks on liberalism.

"There is a combination of imperial guilt, and the civil rights movement," she said. "It created an attitude that all cultures are equal, that Western culture is not superior, that Christianity is not superior. This is especially so in the intellectual elite, the media, the education systems, in politics. But for the intellectual elite this belief is only theoretical.

"It is the working-class communities who were the first to experience the realities of immigration and cultural differences. When there were the first protests in these communities about problems with immigration, and about problems with how immigrant women were being treated, the elite immediately turned on them by calling them 'racists'.

"Instead of facing up to this new face of misogyny, the elites pretended it was because of discrimination. The immigrants became the new working class. The proletariat was reinvented …
"Holland's multiculturalism has deprived many Muslim women and children of their rights. It is tolerance for the sake of consensus, but the consensus is empty. Many Muslims never learn Dutch and reject Dutch values of tolerance and personal liberty. I read rants about Islamophobia, but none of this pseudo-intellectualising had anything to do with reality.

"Until I came on the scene, no one wanted to say that the criminal behaviour of so many young Muslim men had anything to do with culture. There is such a resistance to quantifying, to statistics, because everybody knows where the statistics will lead. And if you publish that Muslims commit most violent crimes, there will be violence from the Muslims, and they will be supported by the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Socialist Party, which will explain away this behaviour as 'poverty'."

From:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/appeasement-takes-hold-again-in-europe/2007/02/04/1170523957031.html?page=2

The pseudo-intellectuals

2008-03-23T08:33:00.000-07:00

(click on cartoon for a larger view).
I like this cartoon from Promethean Antagonist

and his comment:

I've posted it here again because I think one picture -- and a few words -- "is worth a thousand words." When I hear or read the remarks of Chomsky and other classic leftist "thinkers" or debate someone from this predictable crowd of intellectual charlatans, this is what I see.

It's hard to take someone seriously when they claim to be coming from a position of deep insight and honesty, yet can only see good in the most horrid of political systems. Such partisan sympathy for genuine devils is what elites in academia call, "skepticism." I prefer to call it arrogance and insincerity.

How Kids are dis-educated

2008-03-23T08:20:00.000-07:00

This blogger teaches English and Japan, and offers some scathing comment on the bland politicised rubbish and disrespect of knowledge that goes on in Education schools in the US (and elsewhere), and the non-education of kids as a result. the satire below is from his blog.

Read his full dissection of Ed-schools:

http://promethean_antagonist.blogspot.com/2005/12/ed-land-follies.html

The History of Math Teaching since 1950:

1. Teaching Math In 1950 A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. What is his profit?

2. Teaching Math In 1960 A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price, or $80. What is his profit?

3. Teaching Math In 1970 A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80. Did he make a profit?

4. Teaching Math In 1980 A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80 and his profit is $20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20.

5. Teaching Math In 1990 A logger cuts down a beautiful forest because he is selfish and inconsiderate and cares nothing for the habitat of animals or the preservation of our woodlands. He does this so he can make a profit of $20. What do you think of this way of making a living? Topic for class participation after answering the question: How did the birds and squirrels feel as the logger cut down their homes? (There are no wrong answers.)

6. Teaching Math In 2005 Un hachero vende una carretada de madera para $100. El costo de la producciones es $80.

# posted by Promethean Antagonist @ 10:00 PM

Irak Boohoohoo on SBS

2008-03-22T20:47:00.000-07:00

last 2 images:

1. Saddam's mass graves near Milla, Irak

2. Japanese Hostage with Michael fat pig Moore's friendly freedom fighters.

Watched SBS’s short round up after 5 years of US presence in Irak. Pathetically bad journalism and reflexive anti-americanism. Interview of one or two women who’lost loved ones (this happened all the time under Saddam, but you couldn’t interview the women), Inference that all the killing since the invasion has been the US’s fault (ever heard of Al-quaeda’s attempted take over of Irak, with mass public bombings, journos ?). All very cursory and dismissive- I think many Irakis would be pretty disgusted at watching their new nation being dissed of as “a mistake”.

check this article out if you think the US Abu Graib scandal was "torture" (rather than maltreatment), and for an idea of what went on under Saddam on a weekly basis, including on teenagers

Among the most horrific objects retrieved by Mr Badawi and his team from the notorious torture rooms of the mukhabarat, and now included in the museum, is a wooden table covered in a worn strip of leather and with a domestic iron placed at one end.
"This is an electrocution table," he said.
"The naked prisoner was bound to the table with a steel bar strapped to his shoulder to ensure maximum immobility as his torturers electrocuted him or used the iron to inflict burns.
"Electric shocks were delivered via electrodes attached to a plastic syringe, the needle of which was inserted into the urethra of the victim's sexual organ. The pain was atrocious.

source:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/28/2201384.htm

East Timor is still unstable, 10 yrs after the Australian intervention to stop the Indonesian Genocide, so I guess that’s a mistake as well…

If saddam had not been removed, we would have more mass graves, mass torture and misery in Irak, and outside – Civilians and soldiers being blown up in terrorist bombings, funded by Saddam (he was funding terrorist orgs. In Somalia, the Palestinian territories, and elsewhere). Also Iraks’ 5 million refugees and dissidents living overseas would still be living in fear of murder or worse by the Mukhabarat, (Saddam’s secret service).
Not to mention the global emboldening of al-quaeda versus the civilized world: “look the US can’t face up to Saddam”. And even the emboldening of tyrants worldwide from Syria to Serbia and Russia…
Would we then have newspapers running headlines and body counts: “the cost of NOT going to war in Irak” ?
Don’t count on it. Much easier for the small brains and resentful minds of journos to zero in on the casualties due to the war, than the more subtle and complex job of counting casualties due to NOT facing up to tyrants like him.
Let’s get beyond: “War Bad” , “UN Good”:
mmmm. Ask the Kosovars or the Irakis or the Tibetans what the UN ever did for them. Sending in Observers or so-called “Peace”-keeping forces to watch old ladies and teenagers being shot by serb snipers in Sarajevo and then issuing “strong condemnations” of Milosevic. Words are Not gonna work guys… It takes Military action or the threat of it to make tyrants take notice.

What about this Lebanese fellow on Irak:

Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt explained to David Ignatius of the Washington Post. "I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting three weeks ago, 8 million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world. The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it."

And a true comment, valid also for Tibet right now:

Those now waxing rhapsodic about the courage of the natives and the beauty of people power need to ask themselves the obvious question: Why now? It is easy to get sentimental about people power. But people power does not always prevail. Indeed, it rarely prevails. It was crushed in Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968, Tiananmen Square 1989--and Iraq 1991. Matched against tyranny at its point of maximum cruelty, people power is useless.
In the 1991 uprising, tens of thousands of Shi'ites and Kurds were killed by the raw power of Saddam's helicopters and tanks and secret police. What was different this time (recent Irak elections) ? No Saddam.

from:
http://www.time.com/time/columnist/krauthammer/article/0,9565,1035052,00.html

And what do the Irakis think ?:
A teacher in Basra put it well:

life under Saddam was a living- death.

Oct 2006:

Iraqi Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani yesterday predicted on a visit to Australia that Iraqi forces would be able to look after their own security within 12-18 months. But he expected the international community to stay the course with Iraq in the struggle against terrorism. “The Iraqi people are committed to win this battle, but they do need help,” he said. “They do need time to build their own forces.” Dr Shahristani, a nuclear scientist, was tortured by Saddam Hussein’s security forces and spent 11 years in prison for refusing to work on a nuclear weapons program for Saddam.

Iraq’s deputy prime minister Barham Saleh speaks out against the Beazleys and other defeatists:

It has become traditional, apparently, in Washington to start any speech on Iraq with an acknowledgement of mistakes made and regrets for errors past. Apparently, we live in a world of perfection, and Iraq is required to be the perfect forum. Democracies do make mistakes, and their mistakes are visible. There are mistakes that have been made in that difficult venture of the liberation of Iraq that need to be commented on. It is true, and I have said this before as well, missteps and many missteps have taken place, some of them with disastrous consequences, by the Coalition as well as by the Iraqis.
What we must aim for, however, is far less imperfection that has been the case in these tough years of transition. Unlike dictatorships, however, we must learn from our mistakes because we have open debate. We can also put them in a context. No error in Iraq should detract from our progress. Quibble the rationale for our liberation as much as some people may, nobody who has seen the mass graves, and as we discover more of them almost every month, nobody who has met the victims, nobody who knows of our decades of suffering can look the Iraqis in the eye and tell us that we would have been better off with Saddam Hussein still in power.

Journos: Uh-duh ? ever heard of al-quadea trying to take over the country, kidnapping aid workers such as CARE’s Margaret Hassan, journalists, including French ones, bombing crowded public places such as Mosques, and disgusting even the sunnis who were trying to re-instate a Batthist regime. So much so that they are now fighting al-q with militias of their own.
US forces are “part of the problem” UHH? That’s like saying the Sicilian mafia in the 80s was killing and intimidating solelly because of the presence of tough Italian judges. So I guess Al-quaeda will just melt away and leave the Irakis alone if the US leaves ? what kind of western-self-flagellating bullshit it that ?

Remember the elation on the faces of men and women cheering on the US tanks in the first weeks of the war ? uh – memory gap maybe ? How could they be cheering if life was “OK” under Saddam ? And a country of 30 million that had 5 million refugees overseas must have been pretty awful to live in.

Journalists seem to get lobotomised at journo school – their knowledge of history and thinking skills are so poor. Ever heard of WW2 ? – 400 000 US deaths – getting rid of a nazi regime and an imperialist Japan came at a high price.
Do they remember what Irak was before 2003 ? with Saddam’s minions killing, abducting and torturing horribly, eg feeding people feet first into shredders.
And Saddam’s sons cynically reselling the pharmaceuticals destined for Irak’s millions (in the oil-for-food program) to Jordan… or Saddam cynically throwing apples at starving young kids ? All of this was changed with american deaths equal to one month in 1968 Vietnam.

The cost of action is visible – what about the cost of not acting in Irak – life was so horrendous there that Bernard Kouchner, head of Doctors without Borders, was pro-armed intervention (he got fired from the Socialist party for his heresy).
Before 2003, Kurds to the North and Shiites to the south protected by Anglo-US no-fly zones, which had to engage the Irakis weekly – it was already a war zone before the war. How long was that supposed to go on for, and at what cost ? How long could the sanctions have gone on, when Saddam clearly didn’t give a fuck about the suffering of his people ?

So people are killed in wars and when terrorists try to take over (as the FIS did in Algeria in the 90s) ??? noooo really ? so if terrorists try to take over Sydney, we should just wave the white flag then ?
Hello ? welcome to the real world guys – fighting terrorists who have no limits or scruples , kidnap, torture, mutilate, bomb crowded public places – is hard and bloody. And letting them win results in a hell on earth wherever they are (just read accounts of life under the Taliban) – so neither choice is “Peaceful”. Peace doesn’t exist unless thugs are warded off on a regular basis.
All the finger waving at the US ignores the consequences of the alternative – leaving Saddam in power would have sent many 10 of thousands of people to mass graves and torture rooms, as he did in his years leading up to the war – killing 100 000 Shiites when they tried to topple him.
Quite apart from the emboldening effect on terrorists and tyrants all over the world if the US had not taken on Saddam and his army of psychopaths.

Positive outcomes of the Iraki war:

Libya was so scared, it gave up its quite advanced program of WMD over to UN inspections.
Ukraine successfully held up against Russian intervention (maybe they wouldn’t have if the US was perceived as weak)
Kosovo had the confidence to declare their independence despite neibouring Serbia.(as above. Note the profusion of “thank you America” signs and USA flags in Kosovo, shown on SBS, but interestingly no such images on German TV we get on SBS….too embarassing for the Euros to acknowledge that people know the US means business and the EU means waffle.)

Municipal elections in Saudi Arabia, men only, but still a first. In Egypt, demonstrations for democracy--unheard of in decades--prompting the dictator to announce free contested presidential elections, a historic first.
The Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, in which unarmed civilians, Christian and Muslim alike, brought down the puppet government installed by Syria. There is even the beginning of a breeze in Damascus. More than 140 Syrian intellectuals have signed a public statement defying their government by opposing its occupation of Lebanon.
The Middle East witnessed the first free elections in that region, and the first fair public trial with prosecutor and defence [Saddam] (both of these, revolutionary for arabs, used to the rule of tyrants.)
The Irakis came out of a circus of horrors under Saddam, with no end in sight, to a sel-determined future, admittedly made tough by al-quaeda’s attempted takeover

In a long list of living standards improvements, Iraki schools now have toilets (!), Irakis own more cars and appliances than ever before, and salaries have gone up several fold.
But the most important thing is that Irakis now have hope and the possibility of improvement– something journos seem to stupid and ignornant about what life is like under a bloody tyranny to understand.

The Iraki blog “irak the model” explained it all quite well, from a Iraki's point of view. And a cursory read of books on Saddam’s reign is enough to make you have nightmares.
Freedom is not free… that is so very true.

History will show Irak’s democratisation to have been a major pivot point in getting the middle east out of it’s no-hope sordid tyrannies. Irak may even have real Uni-verse-ities where people actually debate ideas and truly think, in the near future (contrary to the extreme-left group-think/dictatorship campuses we have now in the West). As with countries like Slovakia, Irak has actually known tyranny and is unlikely to be seduced by some crackpot nihilist or marxist European philosopher into the virtues of tyrannies or terrorists (as French educated mass murderer Pol pot and scores of others were). I may even end up teaching outdoor ed there…

Mark Steyn wrote a good article on the subject in 2006:

In Donald Rumsfeld's words, weakness is a provocation. So the immediate objective was to show neighboring thugs that the price of catching America's eye was too high. The long term strategic goal was to begin the difficult but necessary transformation of the region that the British funked when they cobbled together the modern Middle East in 1922.

The jury will be out on that for a decade or three yet. But in Iraq today the glass is seven-ninths full. That's to say, in 14 out of 18 provinces life is better than it's been in living memory. In December, 70% of Iraqis said that "life is good" and 69% were optimistic it would get even better in the next year. (Comparable figures in a similar poll of French and Germans: 29% and 15%.)

http://www.steynonline.com/content/view/1099/30/

And from jcdurbant.blog.lemonde.fr/.../

Il faut lire et relire l’un des rares esprits libres de ce côté-ci de l’Atlantique, Guy Millière:

Nous sommes dans une guerre planétaire déclarée au monde libre par l’islam radical. Le commencement de cette guerre (qui dépasse l’Irak), se situe bien plus tôt. Certains font remonter les choses au premier attentat contre les Twin Towers en 1993, d’autres vont jusqu’à la prise du pouvoir par Khomeyni en 1979.

Cette guerre marquera le xxie siècle. Si (ce que je n’ose imaginer), elle ne devait pas se solder par la victoire de la liberté, cela signifierait la fin de la civilisation dans laquelle nous vivons. Les dirigeants américains le discernent, tout comme les penseurs les plus éclairés des contrées musulmanes. La gauche américaine, en proie aux fantasmes venus du temps du Vietnam, ne discerne rien. La gauche, les gaullistes et l’extrême-droite en Europe ne discernent rien non plus, cachent leur mépris pour les populations arabes derrière des propos veules, dissimulent leur lâcheté derrière l’illusion que l’apaisement peut fonctionner, et préparent, en fait, consciemment ou non, une soumission globale à l’islam radical qu’ils semblent trouver préférable à une victoire d’un monde libre conduit par les États-Unis.

On sait depuis longtemps que l’alternative à la libération de l’Irak eût été le maintien d’une situation intenable de sanctions, de charniers et de corruptions qu’il n’était possible de lever, hors recours à la guerre, qu’en permettant au régime irakien de redevenir pleinement nuisible. Et on sait aussi que la « décision sage » de Chirac devait tout aux corruptions et à la peur.

(partial translation:

the left, Chirac etc hide their contempt for the arabs, hide their cowardice behind the illusion that appeasment can work, and prepare, consciously or not, a global submission to Radical Islam which they seem to think is preferable to the victory of a free world led by the USA).

Man’s Destiny is Inter-Stellar travel

2008-03-22T10:21:00.000-07:00

Photos from:

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/index.

And
http://www.solarviews.com/

(Has a great selection of pictures of the solar system. Eg check out Saturn, it has pictures from different missions, including Voyager 1.)

and an easy to use website:

http://www.nineplanets.org/

Yikes ! there’s so much awe-inspiring stuff on the net. Brushing up on black holes so as to be able to do accurate Star-sessions with kids, and for my own interest. Found the NASA website – full of information, lessons about nebula etc, and great photos.

I remember looking at the “Figaro magazine’s” full page spreads of the amazing photos sent back by the “Voyager” space probe in 1979… Saturn and it’s rings, huge Jupiter and it’s red spot (itself several times bigger than the earth). At 9, I was enthralled by the size of these beasts in our solar system, and the awe-inspiring colour beauty of the planets. I stared at the swirls of the red spot and imagined the earth fitting into it several times. Later in physics, I learnt about the tremendous gravitational forces near planet like Jupiter, so much more massive than the earth.

It’s worth remembering that for all man’s technology, nuclear power and so on, it’s all piddlingingy small compared to the forces in suns, on planets. And the natural resources and energy out there is infinite, and will be mined, most likely in this century.
Man’s destiny is in the stars, with interstellar travel, advanced levels of consciousness and out-of-body experiences brought about by meditation taught at schools, 12 yr olds with a knowledge of Physics equivalent to a Bach. In Physics today….

It’s so much more than the Greens will ever imagine in their narrow dislike of technological progress and economic progress.

I envy those who will be able to do interstellar travel – looking at such scales and beauty must have a permanent effect on people.

Why Old Europe is Stunted

2008-02-01T04:23:00.000-08:00

One of the reasons I got out of France, and Europe in general, despite the fabulous Alps where I mountaineered and walked, rustic old villages and other positive aspects - is the general hopelessness that abounded. From the executive to the factory worker, French people are depressed and pessimistic for their futures. With good reason – govmt after govmt has failed to implement any significant reforms. So the country just slides into mass unemployment, depression, violence, mass child abuse on some housing estates… and outmigration.

There’s more cultural creation in tiny French Canadian Quebec, with 6 million people, than there is in the whole of France… with it’s 60 million.
It’s sad, but not inevitable. President Sarkozy is trying to implement change, but there’s a lot of ignorance and inertia to work against.

From the website of a US female shrink – called “neo-neo-con”:

http://neoneocon.com/

Jan 31 /08 entry:

It’s the law that French sales are limited to two times a year, January and June or July. And all stores must have them at the same time. This makes competition fair, according to French thinking (yes, the French are different from you and me).

But France is not alone. Many European countries—Belgium, Italy, Spain, and Greece—have the same sort of bans. What’s more, even during a sale they usually can’t sell below cost, or advertise in advance.

France and many other countries in Europe aren’t called nanny states for nothing. There’s an attitude that, without government control over even the smallest elements of life, human nature would be so red in tooth and claw that we’d tear each other apart, even in Bon Marche.

Comments from readers:

1. From an old Steven DenBeste article:

“…European rules which strongly impede the ability of companies to lay off workers have the result of lowering overall economic growth. There are two reasons why: it decreases the benefit of new investment, and it prevents new industries from forming…”

[That’s what you call a perverse law – a regulation that is supposed to help workers, but that creates unemployment in the medium-run, cause it dissuades people from hiring. Unfair dismissal in Aus. will have the same effect if it is brought back. - Jules]

Danny Lemieux Says:

By supporting the power of producers, I suppose they believe that they are protecting jobs (although their high joblessness rates certainly question that assumption). Personally, I think that it is more to protect their elites and aristocratic classes (the owners of companies).

Note that in the U.S., the names on the top-100 companies roster are always changing. In Europe, they pretty much stay the same (they are protected).

Ymarsakar Says:

Because businesses have learned that with such strong government controls, you must either be in government or have the government in your pocket. And that is what many of the largest corporations in Europe does. They have the government in their pockets.

For all that the Europeans tend to accuse Americans of being controlled by Big Business, it was European companies that made the gross majority of profits off UN contracts to Saddam in Oil for Food. Why? Because that is how they usually do business. Find a loophole in the government, like the UN, and then exploit it for advantage. If they try something else, like honest competition, they would be incapable of surviving in Europe’s socialist utopia.

----

Jules:

Note also that starting your business in a garage is forbidden in germany.

Hence, Apple and Hewlett Packard would have never gotten of the ground had the founders lived in Germany ….
Is it any wonder so many thousands of young entrepreneurs and scientists, immigrate from Germany, France, Italy to the USA ?

That “let them eat cake – anybody who can’t afford a proper office shouldn't be allowed to do business” .

Is typical of old Europe, and is hugely stunting of human potential. And a major cause of social and economic poverty and underachievement. It’s tragic and inhuman…. I gave up trying to start a translation business… there was just too much red tape and complicated rules.

Europe’s richest countries have the same standard of living as the USA’s poorest states: Mississippi and Alabama. (source: Timbro – A Scandinavian economic research institute).
And you see it straightaway when you visit the US… A French friend of mine said:

When I return to France, I feel like I’m entering a third world country…

And don’t tell me about the USA’s poor. I’ve seen the poverty in France and in the USA. And in France it’s far,far worse, because the poor have so little hope of ever getting out of it, due to the wonderful Euro laws, regulations and taxes.

60% (of France’s unemployed) have been unemployed for more than a year.
In the US, the figure is 6% (of the USA's unemployed).