Discovering Civilisation

[Unpublished] Wow, you look so intelligent in that low cut top...

2011-12-10T22:16:00.000-08:00

[Edit: I wrote this post ages ago - I thought since I'm pulling posts, I should put one up. Enjoy.]

Something has been bugging me lately.

Okay, let's rephrase that - something has been bugging me for a very long time and I have only just recently found a way to express it in words. There are several other things that are bugging me, of course, since I am Sarai and am rarely completely at peace with the world (people's insistence on watching television, my Kurosawa deprivation, bigotry, people making me repeat myself... like really, sometimes it's a wonder that I still love the world AND my life).

Obviously there are some issues in how I was socialised. To name but a few, there's the fact that my parents never taught me how to speak either of their languages - my dad could speak like 5 and my mum could probably speak the same. Both of them had struggled with English at school so they decided to just teach us English since we were probably going to end up living in a country where English was the predominant language (when we were in Zim, it was a foregone conclusion that we were going to University in the UK - all well brought up Zim kids do...). As such, I never learnt any of the cultural aspects of either of my parents' backgrounds, so I got to choose my own culture. I also pretty much got free reign over what to believe personally and what values to adopt since my parents were massive liars about everything... no, really, if you think I'm exaggerating, I'm an expert liar - who the hell do you think taught me? My parents never told me not to lie, they always said "Don't get caught." In fact, I remember my mother having this convo with us back in '94 when my dad supposedly had "cancer" telling us that if anyone asked why he was ill we were allowed to just make shit up. Seriously. The cancer thing was a lie, btw. Now imagine what it's like being let loose into a world full of people who don't think that lying is ok... I mean, it's been a frightfully difficult adjustment...

Anyway, that aside, being socialised differently, I never learned why girls went to so much effort to make themselves look pretty. I honestly didn't get it - why waste all that time worrying about how you look when you could spend your time improving your mind or your abilities - you know? No, you probably don't know, you probably have no idea because if you are a guy, you didn't have to go through that and if you're a girl, somehow you absorbed the message from somewhere.

It's taken a very long time to understand but I finally get it - girls do it so that they can get attention from guys. Simple. There's no other reason. Forget this bollocks about "I do it to make myself feel good" - that's just random BS that women spew so that you don't think they are vain. The primary reason women doll themselves up is so that guys will pay attention to them.

Bearing in mind that although we have reached a stage where women don't have to get married to make a living for themselves, one would think that this might have changed. I mean, if you're not out to get guys' attention, then you can dress however you want, right? Except things haven't changed - the measure of femininity is very much still whether or not you can bag a dude. If you can't do that, people who have never seen it tend to question whether or not you actually have a vagina. Trust me, I've had an inordinate amount of conversations over the past few months about why I haven't been in more relationships and why I refuse to be in one now, ranging from "Have you seen a psychiatrist?" to "But how do you cope without having sex?" to "Are you sure you're not lesbian?"

(Oh for those who are wondering - yes, I have seen psychiatrists, I would never talk to them about something as trivial as relationships, honestly... they charge a goddamn fortune, I have bigger issues to discuss with them than dudes. Sex isn't that important to me - since I first had sex I generally have worked on cycles of having sex once every three to five years, and this does not coincide with me feeling a need to have sex or wanting to have sex, it usually coincides with me getting stupidly and motherlessly drunk - thank goodness for the Buddhist precept of no mind-altering substances. No, I'm not a lesbian, I am not attracted to breasts or vaginas and I do think that penises are awesome.)

Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo basically, I think there is a pre-established code out there whereby women who are trying to bag a dude make themselves look pretty so that dudes will look at them. I have nothing against this. Ha! LIE. I have everything against this. I believe it is cheating.

It is cheating in the same way wearing a low cut top (I have awesome boobs) when you want to get people to keep quiet during a meeting (because in IT there is still a predominance of men, I mean hello... if I was running a meeting it was cleavage city! We were always out of there in less than 20mins, and I managed to cover everything. Except my heaving breasts.). It is cheating in the same way that waving a chocolate in front of a woman pretty much guarantees that she will do whatever you want. It is cheating in the same way that giving a kid ice cream makes them your best friend until they find someone who buys them a better one.

Except that when you actually talk to guys and ask them what they like about women, they will ramble off some BS about a woman's character or how smart she is, or this or that or the next thing. Hate to break it to you all, but I have cracked it. It's... wait for it... a LIE. Guys who claim that they are attracted to girls whom they don't find pretty are probably lying. I've done a bit of thinking about it from an evolutionary sense, and I think there are a few messages that might get sent. For starters, a girl who looks after herself well might be sending the message to guys that she would extend the same care to them - I look after myself well, so if you provide me with food and shelter, I'll look after you well. It might also be that women who make an effort to look pretty send the message that they are worth spending money on. Or maybe guys are just magpies and get attracted to shiny stuff? It's the same thing with women being skinny sending the message that you don't have to spend as much money feeding them and can therefore take them out to dinner at expensive restaurants to impress them knowing that they won't break the bank... and it's easier to get them drunk - that's been my conclusion as to why dudes like skinny chicks :D

Okay, okay, am I bashing here? No. I'm simply saying that there are clearly predefined parameters and regulations that I was ill aware of until painfully recently. It's a good thing that men and women have found a way to communicate. I mean, do you want to know how guys try to impress girls? You don't know? *Come closer, it's a secret.... MONEY!*

It's quite sad, really - all I'd really like to find is a guy with even two thirds of the general knowledge that I have. I'm even willing to go down that low - I started off with my standards at "He should be more intelligent than me" but apparently those guys don't exist... and while you may arrogantly assume that you might fit the bill, let's just recap to fifth grade when my IQ was measured at 160 and university when it was measured at... oh yeah, I remember now, I'm not supposed to tell people that because it freaks them out... hee hee! Well, just know that it's insanely huge. Much like my ego.

I really think it's time for bed now - I'm writing this at quarter to one on a Monday because I'm waiting for damn files to upload.... minor annoyances of life :)

Bye bye!

2011-12-06T07:01:00.001-08:00

I'm grateful to everyone who has ever and will ever read this blog, but I've decided to call it quits.

Over the course of time, I will remove certain articles and maybe do some cleaning up of the labels, but only for the important stuff and popular posts.

Cheers,
Sarai

P.S. Don't worry, I'm not committing suicide or anything - I'm off to find new places to settle in cyberspace.

Just the One Relationship, Thanks!

2011-11-29T07:17:00.001-08:00

Yesterday, someone pointed out to me yet again that I seem very happy on the outside, so they couldn't understand why I was depressed. "You seem to be such a happy person." Firstly, depression is an illness, not a state of mind, but I get that people don't really get that... and my response quite simply was "It's because of the messed up stuff that happened during my childhood."

Let's clarify what that means, shall we?

My mother and father didn't really seem to love each other from the word go - never mind how they felt towards us. For starters, and once again - one of my earliest memories is climbing up the gutters and drain pipes to get into our little flat (before my sister was born) because my dad had pounded on my mother, locked her in the flat and left, having totally forgotten about me who needed to get inside.

But never mind that - think about what used to happen when he used to beat her in a house situation. Sure, we had one house where we were far enough away not to hear the screaming at each other and then her panicked shrieking, to which nobody obviously responded. Sheesh, can you imagine having to sleep in the same bed as someone who had just pounded on you?

Still, when I was a youngster lying in bed, I remember crying myself to sleep night after night for YEARS. Sometimes not on consecutive nights, since it was fairly frequent but sometimes not on consecutive nights. I used to tell myself that I hated them and the only reason I was staying there was because it was better than staying out on the streets, not because I loved them or wanted to - and I really feel like it was true, to this day. I hated them with a passion, with all the force of my being and I swore that when I grew up I was going to have nothing to do with them because they were both horrible, horrible people - my father for being an abusive bastard with no excuse other than his own temper and poor upbringing and my mother for being a victim of abuse with too little courage to leave.

"I'll never be anything like them!" I used to swear. In fact, it was around about age 8 or so that I decided I was never going to have children - primarily because I was like why did these people have to have me? They were stupid, cruel and selfish and didn't even love each other and yet they made a baby because... well, who knows really?

Then instead of getting better, things got worse. Dramatically worse. My mother had to visit an orthopod because he beat her so badly that one of her vertebrae shifted out of place. There were hospital visits in secret. All this time I continued to fume with hatred towards them both. I was ashamed of them both and ashamed that they were my parents. Both of them, on the other hand, only really started targeting me after we were quite settled in South Africa - and by targeting I mean the continual "You're so fat - you're ugly - I'm not going outside with you if you look like that." or "Nobody will ever like you - no wonder you don't have any friends." or "You're an embarrasment." and stuff like this... things your parents should never, ever say to you and I had to hear them over and over again on repeat for YEARS.

And you know what my response was? FUCK you guys.

Then there was the incident that I forgot had changed my opinion of guys forever.

The day I watched my father stab my mother.

It had been a weird day all round, even by our standards. My father had apparently accused the maid of stealing from him, when it turned out that actually my little sister had taken the money. I think she was about 9 at the time? His response was to lift her up by her ears! Like, feet off the ground, suspended in the air. I didn't see this, she told me afterwards and her ears weren't lying... trust me. Still, some time later my mother said something and then started storming out of the house. I was in the kitchen washing the dishes (cause I love washing dishes - soapy bubbles) and I saw my mother marching off towards the gate of the house, walking up the driveway. Then I saw my father come dashing after her - holding something in his hand. Before I even knew what was happening, he started striking her from the back and she started screaming absolute death.

I stood there completely paralysed - unable to think. Unable to move. Blood was by now pouring from her head and I think that is what made him stop, although I don't really know - or care at this stage, to be honest. The point is that he was a fucking coward to attack her from behind. I am disgusted that we even share such close genetics.

Then I remember thinking "I'm never going to let that happen to me."

After that, my whole attitude towards him and men in general changed. Before, I hadn't really been aware of it, but I didn't engage well with guys. Now, however, I was completely hostile towards them. From when I was in primary school, I used to bully the boys - I actually got called to the principal's office for smashing a rock into this dude's head... that was quite funny - because it was a convent school and the nuns were like "This is not how little girls behave!" and I was like "Well then I'll have a sex change and become a boy." In fact, come to think of it, until I was about 12 I was determined to have a sex change - weird hey? I've only just remembered that now - I said I would change my name to 'Saran' because that sounded more like a boy's name. Simply because I never wanted to end up a pathetic, weeping, screaming, scared victim stuck in some stupid relationship, ostensibly because she didn't want her children to want for material things.

So when people ask from now on why I have never been in any relationship other than just that one (and trust me, it looks like it will only ever be just that one relationship), I'm going to tell them that to me, marriage means being beaten and attacked on an almost daily basis. To me, marriage means being stabbed in the head till you're covered in blood. To me, marriage means being utterly and completely miserable, and making everyone around you completely miserable. Relationships are the same thing - they just make you miserable. You are just constantly unhappy ALL the time. Men generally don't have respect for woman, it's pretty kak having to be around one at the best of times, worse still when you're supposedly supposed to trust the person who shows zero signs of having any affection or warm feelings towards you whatsoever other than wanting to have sex. Mind you, let's just throw in here that whenever my father threatened to beat me as punishment, from that time on (as in from the stabbing incident), I was like "If you do that, I will punch you." In other words, I made it very clear that if he were to attack me, I would attack right back. To this day, I haven't changed my belief. If a guy attacks me in any way, I would rather fight to the death and be killed than ever let them get away without a scratch. I'm lucky though, I've had a chance to test this theory and I throw pretty mean punches - also I'm pretty big and also fat, so I have a nice layer of protection between me and my critical organs. Also I would have bitten to draw blood, or pulled one of the display cabinets down onto him or hit him with a lamp or pretty much anything in the vicinity. I'm never going to be a fucking useless, pathetic girly-girl who needs men to do shit for her, fuck that six ways from Sunday - I would rather die than be at the mercy of a guy.

In case you're wondering, I've never even been to my father's grave since the funeral - I don't even know where he is buried since I only went there once. I don't think my mother or my sister have either. In fact, I didn't shed a tear at the funeral. Firstly, he apparently started asking for me to come home when I was in varsity and he knew he was going to die and I was like hell no. I didn't even give him the time of day. Couldn't be bothered. He deserved every ounce of suffering. Then when my mother told me he had actually died, everyone expected me to cry or react sadly and I didn't shed a damn tear, not one. In fact, secretly in my heart when my mother said that I was like "WOOOOHOOOOOOOO! Finally, some cosmic justice! Finally I can believe there is a greater good at work here!"

And you know what else? Then I got stuck in a world full of people who apparently have never been through ANY of this stuff. The thing is, women who grow up in abusive households usually don't amount to much because the cycle of abuse is repetitive. Women who grow up in abusive homes end up in abusive relationships. Case in point - my mother. Her mother was incredibly abusive, burning them with irons, beating them every day for no reason... and look where she ended up. So of course, the only way to escape that fate is to swear off men totally, because then you break the cycle. However, most women don't escape, they get stuck there - they never learn to be independent, or they get pressured by society or whatever, I don't know.

The bottom line is that in medical school, people generally didn't grow up like that. In society, most people generally did not grow up like this. Especially not most of the achievers. In fact, what kept my marks so high during this time was the dissociation from them - I hated them and I had to make sure I did everything I could to get out of that house and make sure I would never come back. Most children who sympathise with their parents in these situations have really bad marks and do really badly - in fact, most children from abusive homes don't do very well in life overall!

So I'm lucky enough to have escaped a massive pitfall, and I intend to keep it that way. And now you know that if YOU are stupid enough to end up in a situation like that as a parent or as a non-parent, I'll turn around and call you pathetic.

Final Thoughts on GRAW 2

2011-11-28T16:33:00.000-08:00

Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 for those who aren't familiar - I did a post when I started playing the game back in June when I had time to play games.

The reason it took so long to finish the game was simply because I was freaking out - first about pension, then about having enough assignments, culminating in me taking on the textbook, which then chowed all my available time. Naturally, since the textbook ended, I have been hoping to resume the game and finally finish it - which I have now done over the past three days.

I usually play only one type of game - first person shooters - and more often than not, they involve supernatural creatures. Call of Duty was the first actual battle simulation game that I think I played - I don't count Wolfenstein because there were loads of monsters there - and I fell in love instantly. So when I saw GRAW and thought back to the many NAG reviews that I remember of the game well before I had played it, I figured it was worth a go.

This was all in April or May or somwhere there after I'd just finished playing Halo and was shocked at how short a game it was. I started playing the game, but I found it hard to concentrate - any time I spent doing anything other than figuring out what the hell I was going to do made me anxious. I couldn't even get engaged with the game, so I put it away while I did other things and decided I would come back to it at a later stage.

Actually, I was already on the second-last mission of the game, without having realised it. So when I popped it back in on Friday, it was the final sprint to the finish.

Let's make this clear - I'm not good at the game. I learned how to take cover thanks to this game - simply running up to a wall and pressing yourself against it secures you behind cover so you don't go darting out into the field of combat inadvertently. But a lot of the time, I would err on the side of being over-exposed to try and get a shot. This is because the first person shooters I normally play don't rely on cover that much - or at least a combination of jumping around and remaining in motion keep you alive long enough to kill most enemies. This was not always the best strategy.

This time, however, I was much more prone to send out my goons as scouts and I finally managed to master sending commands. The battles are pretty formulaic except for the very end of the game - there is a set amount of cover, there are usually snipers that you have to beware of first and only towards the end of the game do the enemies really become inaccessible using gun-cams and such. The rest of the time, they are true rebels. They do take cover, which helps with timing your shots. Come to think of it, there's very little blood in the game... I give them a minus point on that account :)

Generally, when fighting with a team, I chose to have two riflemen and a markswoman unless there was very close combat in which case I would choose a grenadier. I would usually be the anti-tank gunner if one was required. I don't like choosing the medic because he's really quite useless - he might keep you alive, but in these battles, what you need is firepower. Well, perhaps when I get better after a few more playthroughs (because obviously I can't buy any new games for a while... I mean hello they are still expensive) then I'll see his value, but as far as I was concerned, it was brute force until proven otherwise.

The last few missions of the game were pretty intense - the checkpoints were totally ass. They would drop you off into a hail storm of bullets. Guiding your team up and down stairs and through narrow passageways was a very cool challenge though, especially since I keep friendly fire on (although it might have been on by default). Let me tell you, now that I'm playing CoD again, friendly fire has decimated my teammates repeatedly.

I have to say, this game has changed my perspective completely - I have had a great time playing it. I definitely want to play it again, and I think for those who have the option, it is an excellent co-op game! I like having so much control over the conflict as a whole, rather than just being responsible for my two cents of the action. I really enjoy having multiple teams at my disposal - switching between them and knowing which to use when, and basically micromanaging the conflict was usually the most frustrating and yet also the most exciting part. Definitely not enough blood in this game at ALL - although maybe they were trying to be sensitive.

Still, having got over my gamers block, I have now restarted Call of Duty: Black Ops again. I don't like to leave games that I have paid for unfinished, unless they are games like Soul Calibur which is really just a game that you buy for the times when you have to be a social gamer.... I digress - the point I wanted to make was that I started this game before I hooked up sound but played GRAW instead because it was more novel. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love my CoD, but you know it's just going to be blood, guts, death, too many enemies to count and action action ACTION all the way from start to finish. I am already finding that the change of pace is quite a relief, because GRAW is quite a slow and deliberate game, whereas CoD feels more fluid and relaxed - more like the shooters I'm used to, really.

Shooo although I think I should try to hit the gaming shelves in January so that I can stock up on a few more good titles for the next few months - I'm not taking on any heavy projects for the next few months. There are so many awesome games that I have missed out on this year - Deus Ex, Duke Nukem Forever... I missed Halo: Reach - need to get that... well, at least I bought Rainbow Vegas in anticipation of finishing GRAW, I have Black Ops and can still finish Red Dead (although I'm not keen at the moment)... I can stave off boredom for another month while studying...

Future Focused

2011-11-26T05:46:00.001-08:00

Finally - now the bloggers block has given way to something I can actually write about.

I had finished all my work yesterday evening and decided to get some shut-eye at 10PM. This, on a Friday night, living in a complex with a lot of people roughly my own age... I was highly unamused to find that there was blaring going on up to a few minutes past midnight, at which time, no doubt one of the older residents who is closer to my *mental* age probably told them to stuff off. Well, that's what I hope. Maybe they did it of their own accord which makes it much less impressive to report.

Still, this required two hours of laying in bed staring at the ceiling. This is something I am all to familiar with since I suffer from depression. Sometimes I am incapacitated in this fashion for hours at a time without even realising it... just staring up into space. My aversion to dealing with the outside world is well balanced by the uncanny ability to recreate a tangible reality in my own head - when I think sad things, even if they are not true, I will cry... although I suppose that line of thought just means I dwell on being sad but I decided to try applying the opposite principle.

I figured that if I had to lie there and listen to Abba on high volume when I wanted to sleep, I could either determine the source of the disturbance and go and wave my walking cane at the bastards or I could try to forget about it and think about something else instead. Granted, I shut the window so I was somewhat oxygen deprived so maybe that helped - who knows.

One of the current paradoxes in my life is that while I feel my life is actually the best it has ever been, I am still miserable and feeling depressed. Depression goes away with medication, so this isn't really surprising for me since I'm not on medication, so I asked myself if I was at least happy with where I am in life. It was like there were two voices, one yelling HELL YES and one whimpering NO. On the one hand, I'm thrilled that I no longer have to go to an office or deal with people - it's great, honestly. True, work was my predominant form of social contact, so now I've gone back to being a hermit, but that's something that I am very familiar with since this is what it was like for most of my varsity life... in fact, I distinctly remember that one of the things that scared me about starting in the working world was that I would have to now adhere to other people's schedule... the fact that I had to consider being on call was a mind-f-k and scared the crap out of me. Incidentally, I stayed awake by chugging caffeine of all sorts and overdosing on my antidepressants. Yes, I have abused prescription medication. Don't act like you're surprised.

People are definitely the major source of anxiety - but there is also the fact that I don't have to do anything to impress anyone but myself. That is also a huge bonus. There is no expectation of performance other than my own, and trust me, my own is bad enough. I'm slowly learning to take things easy from time to time, but it feels so unfulfilling - I mean I think you need a break when you have been doing stuff, not when you haven't been doing stuff. When you lie around all day staring at the ceiling, the last thing you need to do is spend more time slacking off doing nothing... I mean, honestly.

On the other hand, I thought, I could look at this differently. Maybe the fact is that I'm actually not happy... if that were the case, why would that be? Aside from the fact that I'm ugly, fat, lazy, antisocial, an addict, not on meds, less physical than usual, hot, tired, angry with the world, angry with myself and er... yeah, the list was longer than that, but I went through a few of them and realised I was getting nowhere because it just made me feel more miserable. I tried another approach...

.. do I feel like I am on the right path?

Immediately, the answer was a yes, for the first time during the session. It slowly dawned on me that part of the problem is that I've taken a lot of positive steps (getting off meds does not count as one of them) but I haven't really seen any reward. My situation is better, but as a person, I feel much worse. Instead of feeling like I have overcome something, I feel like the situation is good because of what is to come instead.

So I spent some time visualising what I would like my life to be like - to see what I should be focusing on. Firstly, I want a bloody projector. I love my dual screen set-up but it's limitations are starting to become painfully obvious. I was hoping to get one with the money I got paid for the textbook, but I haven't been paid so don't know when that will happen. Secondly, I'd like to get rid of all the furniture that I've just finished acquiring. Aside from my giant wooden bookshelf, I find most of it useless and impractical. I don't even like having visitors over - I even banned my own mother from visiting my home - it's my office, it just feels like an intrusion and I haven't been honest about it before, but I was sort of forced at this stage. I'm hoping I can offload some of it on my sister - particularly since we can swap and I can get her beanbag couch which would be PERFECT for gaming... PERFECT. I'd like to get more shelves, and build a work bench instead - something I can sit in front of with a stool but that is at my correct height. I want ergonomically designed chairs, or at least the option to have a standing desk as well. In fact, I'd like a proper bloody desk thank you very much - at the moment I'm working off a dining room table... which for all intents and purposes is desk-like, but it is nowhere near large enough, it is the wrong height and it has no shelves. I need shelves man - the more storage space the better. I'd definitely like a maid - I haven't done any real cleaning for about three weeks now, other than maybe sweeping and dishes, but nothing truly committed.

On the whole, the more I imagined, *even if I thought the thought was garbage and discarded it afterward*, I felt somewhat better. In fact, I started feeling more motivated to get started with the next phase. Sure, I haven't acted on that motivation just yet (but I think today will be the day since I have just woken up from a four hour nap and I have ZERO other work to do) but the bottom line is that I felt that pushing, driving feeling moving me in the right direction. That's what keeps me going, actually - most depressed people don't become overachievers. I am fortunate to have what can only be considered a compulsion to achieve certain things - otherwise I would spend all my time staring at the ceiling... which is usually what I did for about 4 months of the semester - then I prepared to write tests/exams for two months. It's funny, people somehow got the impression that I was a social person simply from the fact that when I was in social situations I could get along with lots of people - nobody ever seemed to notice how I used to just disappear for months at a time. I would try to be social for a few weeks of the semester and then people would piss me off (as usual, because they always do) and I wouldn't answer the door or go anywhere for months and months on end.

I guess people really only see what they want to see because there is no other explanation for that.

Still, it ought to be pointed out that what I thought was an annoying intrusion by my youthful neighbours actually turned out to be quite a useful pointer towards moving forward... so in effect... I should be grateful. :)

Back to Getting Started

2011-11-22T07:00:00.001-08:00

So - while watching movies, and now while finishing off a series of House, I feel rather like I've wasted a large amount of time.

It always tends to feel like this during the part of the month when thing start to go a bit slower... mainly because going slower usually means you're ignoring things that you should be doing in order to take time off. People who really live their lives are always moving from one activity to the next, never really sitting still. Although I sit still a LOT, I like having lots of different things to do.

It's quite hard to explain where I am at the moment, because I'm done with one thing but I haven't started on the other... so I'm in an "in-between" stage. I feel completely drained from having to stay motivated even on the days when I really didn't feel like working and not having any kind of reward to show for it yet is highly frustrating... it almost feels like it wasn't worth it at all. On the whole, however, everything is pointless and we're all going to die, so when viewed from that perspective, I did get something out of it at least...

I mean, at the very least I've learned how to say "No" more effectively, and not feel guilty about it. I've learned the most efficient way of managing my time, even though at the same time the thought of having to go back to scheduling every half hour of my day makes me feel somewhat stifled. I have learned how to factor various aspects into the day realistically, like cooking or showering (which I never factored in before, they are obviously optional activities!). Oh, wait, so maybe some people think "Ew... gross... of course you have to shower every day!" Well, hate to break it to you, no you don't. You do it because everyone else does it - there is no hygiene risk from showering less than other people other than the fact that you will stink to high heaven and people might not want to be around you. I feel that I can overlook this minor caveat since I don't spend time around other people, but more importantly because apparently it's not all that uncommon among depressed people. In fact, most people who are depressed don't give a damn about their appearance at all, and as the numerous trips to the shops in my pyjamas will attest to - neither do I. I am yet to drop dead of some sort of supposed sepsis... good bit of alliteration there...

Still, what were we talking about again? Oh yes - that's right - why I should be grateful that I spent so much time busting my chops for something that's taking so long to pay out... hmm... I don't feel UN-grateful, which I suppose is a good start.

Ultimately, although motivation is at an all time low at this point in time, it will inevitably bounce back up to pre-exertion levels. I'm not a particularly patient person - or rather, I don't like having to wait for things in life to get better. So I guess I'll have to spend some time during this week bonding with how I'm going to approach the next phase? That seems like the best thing to do at this stage. Maybe spend some time making a schedule on how to approach the new phase of work, which should keep me busy for about the next year or so... it'll be that long before I feel like working on someone else's stuff, that's for damn sure.

Right, now to sort out this video thing, then take them back, then I have to get some more buckets of yoghurt (it's all I've been eating for two days - I have run out, I need more) then... let's see - then there are two assignments for tomorrow... hmmm...

Kurosawa's Seven Samurai

2011-11-20T20:18:00.001-08:00

Finally - I have ingested this masterpiece.

There was an anime series that came out a while ago that was a tribute to (or based on) this movie, but it was set some time in the future - and although I thought it was very pretty to look at, I watched the first episode and that was it. So when I got the chance to watch the movie, I figured it would be a great way to celebrate.

As usual, the camera work was amazing - I can only imagine how much time this must have taken to set up back in the day - like in the 50s? The opening shot is of the bandits riding up onto the hills to look down at the village - deciding when they would come back to raid it. They make reference to their previous raid of the same village to determine how much time they have left until it would be most profitable to raid the village again. A wood cutter happens to be lying beneath the mountain road on which they were doing this surveying - and he runs down to warn the rest of the village. The opening scene, however, is shot from so many different angles - you can see it from above, from close up, from beneath... it's crazy how much information is transmitted visually just from changing the angle of the camera in his movies. Everything is framed the same way you would frame a photograph - and he moves the camera very intelligently as well... the camera is usually still during conversations, but during action or movement shots, it tends to perform these beautifully timed panoramas of the whole scene - it is really entertaining.

I mean, if that doesn't tell you how much I enjoyed this movie, I don't know what will...

There is an awesome shot from within a sheltered spot - possibly the patio of a traditional japanese village dwelling (made from thatching) - where the camera is perched just inside a cobbled ledge, presumably from the viewpoint of one of the villagers who was hiding there for safety, and who had not yet leapt from his hiding place too.

The story is quite nice - it is really about the noble values of samurai and how people so rarely stick to them unless they really have nothing to lose. The lives of the samurai in this film are desolate and peppered with death - the closing scene says it all. The people that these guys get close to and get to know - the ones whose secrets they learn and who open up to them are the very same people who end up dead at the end of the day in the service of others. They themselves have to be content with rejoicing in survival - which is a pretty bleak prospect if all your best friends are dead and you have to move on to the next job which will probably involve killing people... or being killed... while the villagers are celebrating the harvest, the samurai have death on their minds. Apparently that is one of the practices that is considered favourable by samurai - keeping death always on one's mind. It helps put things in perspective - you learn what is really valuable because instead of being a foreign concept, it permeates your existence.

Still, going back to the movie - a group of villagers decide to hire a bunch of samurai to protect them from bandits, but they have no money and they have nothing to offer them but shelter and food. They have nothing to offer but rice and are willing to live on millet to starve themselves in order to feed the samurai. They can either do this or submit to the bandits, who would no doubt starve them to death. Samurai, on the other hand, are very proud - they have the skills to fight, and they don't share that knowledge... they use it to kill people. Being paid with shelter and food is pretty much in the realm of asking them to beg.

Still, they find a kindly old samurai with absolutely nothing to lose and he helps them to pull a band of samurai together. Actually, one is not really a samurai, but he's special.

And then, as per all Japanese movies I've ever seen, they kick ass.

Most of them die in the process, each going through their own personal process of realisation and development - I mean we all know how it goes - people have their various issues and some of them get explored and what have you... but ultimately they kick ass and most of them die.

My favourite scene was the one with the master swordsman who takes on a challenge to fight another samurai with bamboo sticks. When they fight, the opponent says the fight was a draw, but the swordsman says it was not. He says he would have won if they were fighting with real swords. The opponent is furious and demands that he draw his sword and they fight it out. The swordsman hesitantly agrees. I love their fight - it is so brief and yet I rewound and watched it over and over and over again just to see it again and again and again. The swordsman is simply travelling to perfect his art, and obviously, if you want to fight, there will always be opponents, so he has gained considerable skill. The blow is struck from close to the body, with the axis of rotation of the blade being the wrists, with minimal movement of the arms, but using the muscles of the upper body to create the force necessary to slice through the upper body muscles of the opponent. It's beautiful. It works well when you're being charged because it is very fast and relies solely on your timing, irrespective of what move your opponent is going to make, right... because basically, if you're charging with a sword, and the sword is above your head, you're generally going to use a sweeping motion to try and generate the same force to slice through your opponent... so a swift but compact countermeasure is a pretty sweet way of doing things.

Hmmmm... so now I'm going to watch Persepolis. Again. :) Yes, I love it *that* much... how often do people do movies about being an immigrant in your own culture and your own surroundings.

Movie Review: Persepolis

2011-11-19T10:21:00.001-08:00

So many things I was supposed to do this weekend and I haven't been able to do most of them thanks to a running tummy.

Anyway, I finally saw Persepolis on the shelves. This movie is based on a graphic novel by the protagonist Marjane Satrapi. She is a native Iranian, whom for various reasons lives first in Vienna and later in France.

Now, I don't know a great deal of the history of Iran, but I do know that there were revolutionary and counter-revolutionary movements. This comes across clearly in the film. Marjane is brought up with the understanding that things are not as they seem - and is taught the truth rather than to believe what she is told at school. In fact, her uncle is killed for his revolutionary activities and Marjane herself is compelled to leave Iran for Vienna because her own revolutionary ideals are too openly expressed.

What comes across more in the film, however, is Marjane's own cultural schizophrenia. The film is in French, which Marjane learnt while at school in Iran, and subsequently studied in Vienna. It is assumed that most of the conversations would have been in Persian in the beginning, so hearing it all in French is a bit jarring. Still, she has Iranian ideals and still preserves her revolutionary spirit, but she still embraces modernity and the Viennese way of living. She seems to want to fit in, but can't seem to find a place - her native Iranians are not unfamiliar to her, but they are not all as openly spirited as she is. Her friends in Vienna come and go as friends do. Then on her return to Iran, she has another group of friends who are Iranian women.

Her observations regarding sexism are also quite directly portrayed. In general and all over the world, gender issues tend to cause a lot of repressed frustration and resentment amongst women - if you don't believe me, listen to a bunch of women who have been married talk to each other about their lives for a half an hour. Still, when you have a family who has cultivated the ability to be more equitable with regards to gender, you still have to face everyone else's criticism, stereotyping or labelling.

The movie seems to deal with a number of themes. Firstly, there is the fact that she is considered an un-Iranian Iranian - she loves her country passionately and is extremely militant from a very young age, but she does not behave or think as Iranians "ought" to. Secondly, there are the experiences that she has while abroad. These include being deceived by guys and ending up depressed and homeless, wandering the streets of Vienna, and developing pneumonia while sleeping out on the streets. Her experiences are quite different from those of other students because even by her own admission, she does not "fit in", she merely tries to (and don't we all know that feeling!). Thirdly, there is her adjustment to being "back home" in Iran - she has now been so strengthened by her experiences living alone in Europe that she is not prepared for the level of repression required by Iranian society, nor is she prepared for how sexist the treatment is of women.

Interestingly, she swears off men after being screwed over (and many women should know that feeling as well) although when she gets back to Iran and meets a guy that she likes, they are not allowed to simply "hang out" when they are away from home - it is considered indecent. So he suggests that they get married and they do - and instead of being overjoyed, her mother is horribly dissapointed - she says she wanted her daughter to be educated and independent and instead she's getting married at 21. She gets divorced fairly quickly - her grandmother is probably my favourite character in the series, who says, "Oh? Just a divorce? I thought someone had died. Don't do that to me at my age..." After this, she leaves for France and before parting her mother says, "Today's Iran is not for you, I forbid you to come back." and one presumes that she has not done so, in the "living in Iran" sense of the word.

The animation is excellent and I frequently got the feeling of paging through a graphic novel and watching it come to life rather than watching a movie. A very good watch if you're up for something broody and dark.

More Google Maps

2011-11-18T10:46:00.001-08:00

Yeah - strangely I think I've developed a new mini-obsession with looking at artificial structures from space - I collected a few more pics, although this time I honed in on things that I really liked or thought were impressive as opposed to doing a general sweep like yesterday.

Narita Airport... let me tell you, from the inside, it definitely doesn't "feel" that big, but looking at it in the picture, it looks HUGE. Maybe that's because all the people were bite-sized... still, I like the way they have "parking bays" for the planes

Tokyo Bay.

Kansai Airport near Osaka in Japan... I remember the drive from the city to the airport all too vividly...

Atlanta Airport - it was the busiest by number of passengers - and look at all those runways!

Shanghai international airport - look at those "docking bays" - the whole building looks so incredibly futuristic! And I like the system of runways.

Tokyo's Haneda Airport - at the edge of Tokyo Bay - I mean it just doesn't get cooler, does it?

Google Maps Geography Features

2011-11-17T14:07:00.001-08:00

Another image heavy post - although completely impromptu because I was having fun making comparisons and I thought I would share.

I've been listening to a lot of the history of England and the general area lately. Since I'm not familiar with the places they are talking about, and since I'm listening to some of the books for the second or third (in the case of some chapters, I have listened to them so often that I can recite parts of them), I decided to check places out on the map.

I didn't get very far with that because they make too many reference to terrain that no longer exists in the early chapters. I'll try again with other chapters.

What ended up happening, however, was that I started looking at the natural and artificial means of transportation across a few cities in the world. It is actually pretty interesting - I'd love to know what impact the different technologies have had on the development of science and industry in those countries. Based on what you know about them, you might want to come to your own conclusions! You can click on the images to enlarge them - I didn't actually realise how large the images were when I was snapping the screen shots!

Amsterdam - look at that stunning harbour.... oh, just realised I didn't take a snap of their airport... oh well.

This is a pic of London - I never realised that London actually can't possibly have a harbour because it lies along a river and does not actually open into the sea - honestly never knew that before...

London again, but without the labels... can you imagine how much food they have to import into the city to feed all of those people??!!

Heathrow Airport! London might not have a harbour, but they certainly have quite a sexy looking airport - which is the busiest airport in the world

Antwerp Airport - comparatively, I think it is fairly obvious that air travel is not the predominant means by which people travel in and out of Antwerp. Actually, my experience was that they come and go by train.

That's Antwerp over there where all the labels are... in fact I think I might just have zoomed out from the airport. What a prime spot - it is far enough from the sea (which as you can see by the delta to the left is close at hand) to be safe from marauders, but with sufficient access to allow them to sail quite far out... loads of fertile land... what an amazing spot for a city!

New York Harbour! Wow - very nice - they really built on the old world technology and thinking... the whole area is basically one massive harbour. A is JFK.

A close up of JFK International Airport.

Then I decided to come closer to home and check out ORT by comparison - looks more like Antwerp Airport, eh?

I decided to switch to terrain view instead here for various reasons - not least because the comparative size was somewhat disheartening. There's Durban harbour - our largest harbour - I think?

Now, for interesting geographical features - have a look at the Pilansberg over there... what on earth is that thing? I was thinking it might be a magma intrusion through stratified rock, since I know the rock is stratified from my dad's giant metallurgy maps... And the gold rich mountains of the Witwatersrand are visible towards the lower right corner over there...

The harbour of Cape Town - which interestingly is super, super tiny by comparison. I actually got slightly sickened by the changes in scale at this stage.

Still, Cape Town is quite a marvel from the air since it lies snugly between the Table Mountain range over there on the left and the Hex river mountains on the right. In fact, you can't really even see the Hex yet.

An aerial shot of Cape Town, lying between the mountains. This should clearly indicate why Cape Town will never become larger than what it is in terms of overall size - although there is actually plenty of scope to increase the population density.

Still more uninspired to write about sex....

2011-11-17T01:42:00.001-08:00

Update: Phone conversation with my mother yesterday really surprised me so much that I had to share... we were talking about this girl we both know who got married and how, and turns out her marriage was completely arranged - i.e. her parents said "It's time for you to get married" and she doesn't seem to have resisted at all... anyway, so I said:
S: Well, you know maybe it's a good thing because she's really very shy... I mean she would have struggled to get together with a guy in any other way
M: Yes, it must be difficult for girls like you and person x who are very shy...
S: Mummy! I'm not SHY!
M: Well, how would you know if it is shyness - you don't even spend time around guys to find out.
S: I do spend time around guys, Mummy, I just generally don't like them!! Most of them are stupid, they are annoying - seriously Mummy, if you guys had to introduce me to someone, I probably wouldn't like them... I generally don't like people!!
M: So don't you think you'll ever find someone that you DO like?
S: Not really - judging by the current track record...

Okay, this is going to be a quick post because I am on my way to my favourite part of the day - my nap.

So, I just want to state for the record here that I haven't done any more sex posts because I actually don't have anything to say. All the interesting things I had to say about sex were prompted by a desire to have some, or a reflection on sex I had previously had.

Two things now prevent me from doing that. One - I haven't wanted to have sex now for a good three or four months. Like I have said before, the thought of even being touched at this point repulses me so much that I avoid all possible human contact and keep it down to the bare minimum. This is why I love the internet - one can still maintain connections with people without having to be in their actual presence. Two - I think I've said all I already have to say on the subject, which is pretty dismal in my opinion.

One may wonder if I masturbate and no, I do not - not since I stopped working anyway - I simply haven't felt that way inclined. It's been over a year now since I last had sex and honestly, I don't feel like I'm missing out on much - I'm sure it hasn't changed... it's still the same-old same-old routine crap with no real embellishments or untoward excitement. Now here I'm sure others would not agree, since I would hope that other people are actually having *good* sex rather than just routine sex. I mean, otherwise what is the point.

Still, it was really loads of fun to write about and I feel like I had some good insights. It's a shame that part of me has died its usual death. Some people say that antidepressants kill their libido but I never had a problem with that - in fact it is during the times that I am not on antidepressants that I generally feel disinclined to participate in sexual activity. So like, yeah.

Over and above that, I haven't written about relationships either because I'm starting to think that they are just stupid and pointless. Not "starting to", I already do. In fact, it's starting to be a recurring theme in my intrusive thought pattern now that the ex-boyfriend intrusive thoughts are almost totally gone (finally and thanks in part to some narcotic intervention)... I keep thinking about people asking me why I am not in a relationship or don't seem inclined to social activity and usually I'm like (out loud, mind you), "Because they are fucking stupid." Then it's a quick spiral of why they are stupid - like the fact that if you want to be in a relationship you have to have been correctly socialised - in other words, if you're a boy, you have to think that women like shopping and if you're a girl, you have to think that guys are smart or stupid stuff like this. That's not a very good description but I'm hot and it's tired. I mean it's hot and I'm tired.

Screw this crap - it's nap time baby - I'm outtie. More on psych patients to follow, they are more interesting than this nonsense... I sign off with the intention that I shall henceforth write no longer on this subject and am informing readership to adjust themselves accordingly.

Psychiatric Wards

2011-11-15T11:20:00.001-08:00

The previous post actually started me thinking about psychiatric wards again.

I've been admitted to hospital four times for psychiatric illness, although it's quite hard to talk to people about it because obviously most people don't openly acknowledge having a mental or psychiatric illness, much less discuss the experience of what it is like to be admitted to hospital for it.

The first two times were when I was doing medicine, the third was after a trip to Europe and the fourth was just over a year ago.

Practicing medicine was possibly the worst decision I ever made. It's primarily the reason why I don't even want people to know that I am a doctor - I always lie or omit this fact and people find out from other people usually and not from me. I already suspected from my 3rd year that I wasn't going to be a doctor for the rest of my life, but I figured I would give it a try and see how it went.

It went terribly. During internship, I had a complete and very public breakdown - I remember because I was in HR at the time... oh funny, usually I end up in psych hospitals around my birthday... another reason why I hate celebrating my birthday (aside from the fact that I don't see the point of celebrating having been born in the first place when I hate my life so much... know what I mean? No? Lucky you). So I was in HR at the time - can't remember why - but it was during Obs and Gynae, the block that I hate the most of all... and one of the doctors phoned from the ward and started yelling at me. It was the last straw. Aside from having to do something I hated for a living, stay up for nights upon end because we had a shitty rotation system and have to deal with abuse from both the patients AND the other staff (long story, but if you're black in SA and you don't speak an African language, you're pretty screwed), now I was getting screamed at on the phone for something that wasn't even any of my business... I started crying and yelling back at the person on the phone and then hung up, and I just kept babbling on through the tears to the woman in HR, who called one of the other interns. When she saw me, she grabbed some IV valium and gave me a shot.

Oh. My. Word. Intravenous valium is the SHIT! Supposedly it gives you anterograde amnesia, but I didn't get any. I didn't even feel any sedation - I went from bawling my eyes out and babbling incoherently to whimpering and crying more silently. Then I got admitted to hospital. It was a pretty boring hospital stay - the doctor put me on sleeping tablets, and since then I've never taken a sleeping tablet... they are the most awful things ever. Because I had a massive dose of IV valium before admission, they really didn't do much, and after two days they stopped working altogether, and then the doctor was like "No we need to up the dosage" and I was like "Why, I sleep all day anyway?!" I've never taken them again.

The next time was even worse - it was during my community service year in medicine. There was a massive strike on at the hospital where I was working and all the hospitals in the district were completely shut down. There was no healthcare in the entire province. The other doctors were talking about how they were going to switch off their phones so that if there were any emergencies, they would not be available. Doing night shift consisted of sitting around in casualty signing death certificates... and mind you, we didn't have any actual staff - they called in the army - so dudes with AKs on their backs in camo were dragging dead bodies in and out of the casualty to be certified all night long. We didn't have equipment, we didn't have help, we had nothing. The wards were also completely shut down - if anyone came in with serious injuries, they died and there was NOTHING you could do about it. NOTHING. You had to stand there and watch them die. Over and over again.

It's too long a story to recount but to summarise, there was a weekend when I wasn't working. I didn't have friends nor did I have much of a life, so I decided I would take my computer to the hospital and start capturing the records that were not filed because I figured it would at least help them somehow. I also distributed pamphlets to the local pharmacies, informing them of the strike and what to expect, as well as what medications to give and how to prepare rehydration fluids - as well as what vitamins to give and stuff like that... well, basically, the hospital admin found out and would you believe it, they were highly upset (?!). So upset, in fact, that they said I was psychotic and barred me from the hospital, refusing to let me work again until I had a letter from a psychiatrist.

Well, of course, the psychiatrist was a bit confused by all this, but she wouldn't write me a letter until I had spent a few days in observation and counselling in a psych hospital and so off I went again. This time, however, it was pretty ass because they took me off antidepressants. As far as they were concerned, I didn't need them. I remember spending my entire day in the smoking room (because then I smoked cigarettes) and that was the first time in my life I smoked more than a pack a day every day... I used to sit there with this 60 year old guy who was an accountant with anxiety disorder and we used to talk shit about everything and anything and smoke and smoke and smoke and smoke... I didn't even talk to anyone else. The women I was sharing a room with moved out because they said I was too antisocial. The nurses thought I was a snob (I am, in case you're wondering). The psychiatrist saw me for that initial interview and then didn't see me again until she had to write the letter, and the psychologist found me absolutely fascinating because, as he put it, "I've never met a girl who is so immune to herd mentality!" We had the most amazing conversations - I honestly don't recall us ever having therapeutic sessions!

Anyway, then I had to go for almost two years without antidepressants... ugh. It was ass. It culminated in a trip to Europe, during which time I thought I was going to have the time of my life, but actually ended up having the shittiest time imaginable. I remember standing in a hotel room looking down over Rembrandt square (I went to the Low Countries - Holland and Belgium) and thinking "I don't feel anything." I remember walking through the beautiful streets in Amsterdam, past the canals, in spring and thinking "I don't feel anything." I remember standing in Antwerp central station with all it's marble and gilding and thinking "I don't feel anything." I was so incredibly unhappy - and I tried to think back to the last time I had been happy and it was like... um... varsity?! When I got back, I got hold of a psychiatrist the very next day and was admitted immediately.

Now this time I got to go to South Africa's version of The Priory - a rehab and psych hospital for the super-wealthy and successful. It was the most entertaining experience ever, except for one thing... people wanted to make friends. I wasn't there to make friends, I wasn't there for a social experience, I was there to just sort out my issues and get back on antidepressants. I stayed for 3 weeks, and during that time, my psychiatrist was shocked at how well I could pretend to be OK on the outside even when I felt like shit on the inside. He was amazed. Obviously it's not a good thing, but whatever. Personally, the medication changes were fantastic - instead of being cautious about upping the dosage, the dude was like "You are still showing severe psychomotor retardation - let's up the dosage." Psychomotor retardation is the slowness of being depressed.... you think slower, you talk slower, you move slower... everything is just slow. I see it as aiming for the grave, really. This, incidentally, was the second time I saw a cardiologist who told me that my heart muscle was weak (low ejection fraction). This was also the visit during which I got busted for having weed in a rehab centre... now that deserves a post on its own though... but suffice it to say there were no ill consequences, but again, the staff were like "How can you pretend so well? You should act in Hollywood." and kak like this... it was kinda funny actually.

Then there was the admission last year. Last year's admission was really primarily because I had no other way of getting away from work and my life consisted of nothing else. Let me paint a picture. All I did every day for about four months non-stop was wake up, go to work, come home, sleep and wake up. I didn't think about anything else, I didn't do anything else, I didn't talk to anyone... nothing. This was the first time in my life I lived with a flatmate (an experience NEVER to be repeated, let me assure you) and that was equally draining because this chick was so flipping girly it was annoying... e.g. when she moved in she was like "Do you have a boyfriend?" and I was like "No." and she was like "So whose Playstation is that?" and I was like "Mine?!" She somehow found this incomprehensible. This annoyed me no end. Be that as it may, eventually this cycle of all work and no play and constant stress and general tension and unhappiness eventually reached the point where I just stopped going to work.

This time, I asked not to be taken to the social psych hospital - I just wanted to be allowed to lie in a hospital bed for days on end and not have to talk to anyone or do anything. I think I watched anime for two weeks straight, when I wasn't sleeping or in sessions. It was much, much better - although that could also be because I was put on new medication too. This was, however, the visit during which I realised that I was going to make no progress with a male psychologist and psychiatrist - there was just nothing more they could do for me. I'm not even going into why that's an issue, it's not important.

*sigh* Again... I really, really miss being on medication. I hope the day comes sooner rather than later when I get to start being a confirmed (but happy) pill popper yet again...

On Tension

2011-11-14T22:21:00.001-08:00

Well, I might as well as warn you that I'm nursing a tension headache. I say "tension headache" because the source of the pain in my head and neck is muscular - I can feel the tense muscles pulling as we speak. Can't seem to do anything about it though - I've tried taking painkillers.... one would imagine that since diclofenac (voltaren) and aspirin are both NSAIDs of the same family (non-steroidal anti-inflammatories), and since studies have shown that other NSAIDs are pretty much on par with aspirin, a big fat jug of dispirin would have brought some relief...

... sadly NO is the response to that statement. I guess I could try taking double the recommended dosage though - that's always a good option. When in doubt, attempt suicide by overdose? Methinks this is a solid plan. If you think otherwise, you clearly have no idea how much pain I am in and how grumpy it is making me. All I want is a nice fat intramuscular jab of voltaren. I've tried deep heating and muscle rubbing myself ad nauseum - the only effect seems to be to draw more attention to the area and thus make me feel infinitely more grumpy as I am in infinitely more pain. This is not how a person is supposed to live!

And why, you might ask, do I have a tension headache? Well, alcohol may have something to do with it - I had about three bottles of wine over the weekend. The alcohol itself has no effect on the tension of the muscles - I'm thinking actually that it is more of a paradoxical effect - when I was drunk, I was very relaxed (in terms of my muscles, that is) and when I was then subsequently un-drunk, the tension returned six-fold because I felt it worse than ever the morning after. But that's really actually just saying that I am noticing it better now than before, which is also strictly speaking true. Another reason is a lack of exercise, I'm sure - last week there was a ridiculous heatwave and I couldn't think clearly, much less go for walks and stuff.

Still, it made me think about relaxation. I mean, I don't think I lead a particularly stressful life right now, but I am a severely anxious person. SEVERELY. For example, a friend of mine asked yesterday if I wanted to join him for a movie. Most people apparently seem to consider going to the movies an enjoyable activity. Personally - I see it as being trapped watching something unrealistic and generally not very stimulating for 3 hours, during which time it will be repeatedly highlighted that you are different to everyone around you because when they are lauhging, you are thinking "How can people be this stupid and still live?!"... not to mention the fact that it involves leaving the house, which involves doing something to my apperance, which involves effort that I'm really not willing to expend on going to have an experience that will ultimately make me miserable. So when someone says "Do you want to go and watch a movie?", my heart rate goes up, I get tense and agitated and the worst part of it all is trying to explain to someone that it's not a pleasant experience for me! Just thinking about going made my muscles so tense that my shoulders were uneven. Obviously I didn't go, let's not be ridiculous here...

In general, I need medication to relax. I don't ever feel calm or grounded unless I'm either on medication or I'm in isolation.

People. Don't. Get. That.

In fact, I'm fairly certain a dose of lamictin would soothe me right down.... ooh, no wait, there was this awesome medication called Stresam, which is a non-benzodiazepine relaxant! I don't take benzodiazepines (valium, dormicum, etc.) because your body builds up tolerance to them. This would initially not seem like a problem, but what is the point of taking a prescription medication if you are guaranteed that it will not work on you after a few weeks? I mean really, you might as well buy narcotics then, that's my view on the subject. Funny, psychiatry is the only field that acknowledges that taking narcotics is an attempt at self-medication. It very much is - because quite honestly, there are drugs out there that are vastly better at making you feel better than prescription medication. I personally feel prescription medication is better because you can place much greater reliance on the professed concentrations of the substances. Also they don't give you the "high-un-high" feeling... the formulations that I generally take are slow release - so that the levels in your bloodstream go up slowly, but they also remain stable throughout the course of the time that you take medication.

God, I really miss medication. Every time in my life that I'm not on medication, life feels like it goes to shit. On the other hand, I have to be making a grand more every single month just to make sure I have enough money to go back on what I was on before. In order to do that, I would have to a psychiatrist, and they charge well over a grand for a consultation. Really, I just need to get back on medical aid. I hate not being on medical aid. But you know what's going to get me back on medical aid?

TIME!

I have to be patient - for about another six months to a year. By that time, one of the loans will get paid off and I will be able to pump that money into a decent medical aid. Until then, however, it's tension headaches and bailing on friends on the agenda so I'll just have to learn to live with it.

Japanese Fashion

2011-11-13T10:37:00.001-08:00

I keep mentioning that I check out Japanese Fashion to people online but I very rarely ever show people what I look at. I knew I had to spend time saving some pictures and then putting them up online myself, but all props to Tokyo Fashion - that's where I got all the photos! I've spent days there in total over the past few weeks.

This is a severely image-heavy post - if you haven't already noticed. Most of the stuff that I picked was photos that stood out for me in some way - although quite honestly, I do quite literally gasp at some of the outfits... or laugh. I would never wear any of these things myself (check how tiny these chicks are - seriously....) - I don't even like going shopping for clothes - but I love looking at these pics and appreciating the effort that went into some of these outfits!!

Right, I've seen sporadic pictures of Lady Gaga - I don't listen to her music or have any of her songs - these pics were all from a Lady Gaga concert - pics of the fans going into the venue, I think?

Those are "drop crotch" pants, which is are very popular in every colour and style. I think they look weird. Matching outfits and bows from the girls.

I think my only question is are they a couple or are they friends?

Interesting stockings - they add a bit of punch. This is almost "Gothic Lolita" style, but jazzed up and modern.

This dude actually did his makeup perfectly... but I had to squeeze this pic in here.

Awesome stockings.

Her hair colour matches her petticoat... did she do that herself or did she hunt around for the matching petticoat by chance?

I feel like this is what happens to me when I try and dress extreme... and no, I don't want to look like that.

Matching hairbows... I think the bow thing is a Lady Gaga thing?

I love the one pair of shoes thing

That hair is pretty awesome - I want to do that to my hair...

They just looked so cute. I dunno man, they both look like dolls and then they dressed the same?

Again more matching. I like the way the girls do that. Check the guys pants.

Blue contacts and blonde hair - this girl looks so un-Japanese that it's actually a bit scary. I wonder is she's trying to look American or European... red stripes?

I would totally wear that hair and the lipstick.

More random matching stuff.

Those giant bows are awesome - I love them.

Ah, I just chose this pic because they look so anti-Japanese.

Learning a New Skill

2011-11-12T00:11:00.000-08:00

So, since finishing the textbook, I have been trying like mad to catch up with all the other things I have wanted to do. I've already got a list of activities, tasks, projects and "things I'd like to do for fun" all waiting in a queue behind it and the first on the list was....

... beading! Yes, the making of shiny stuffs. I decided to redefine my entire approach. First, I spent a lot of time thinking about my financial goals, how I would do marketing, how to manage my inventory and things like this. Then, I went through a bit of a personal revolution because I didn't want to start a little "pink collar" start-up - that's not how I want to be remembered. For those of you who don't know, "pink collar" refers to female orientated small businesses - selling handbags, shoes, jewellery, make-up tips, style advice and other items of predominantly feminine interest. Lastly, I came full circle and remembered the four-pronged approach.

This approach is the one that I decided to take in the very beginning. I don't know a lot about business, and I honestly hate reading about it! Economics puts me to sleep. Meanwhile, if you want to have a business - any business - you need to know these things, whether you like them or not. My sister gave me some of her textbooks, and they are great from a theory perspective, but they don't deal with internet small businesses at all. As such, before I can spend time doing what I really want to do, there are things that need to be learnt along the way. The four pronged approach is a way for me to let these things flow naturally into each other - and this was one of the original prongs.

So here's how I attacked the thing:

Right Angle Weave

Right Angle Weave Too :D

I took some beads whose colour I wasn't particularly thrilled with, or which I didn't like for various reasons and started practicing techniques.

Brick Stitch

Brick Stitch Too :)

I did this over and over again until I had done many different types of stitches.

Apache Leaf Stitch

Ndebele/herringbone stittch

Square stitch... tyte!

Wow - OK then.

After that I started mixing things up and making patterns which I thought were appropriate for the stitches.

Two smiley faces. The one at the bottom is obscured by my failed attempt at "making an interesting pattern"

Actually, I drew the design for the smiley face, right, then I started this, but I had started it wrong for square stitch (you start differently for all of them) and so I tried to do it, but the stitch was not compatible with the pattern. Or the beader was inexperienced and therefore the pattern descended into chaos...

A combination of square stitch, peyote stitch and right angle weave

Oh wait, actually THIS was the original smiley face design... the design was wrong, I dropped a stitch during the making of it and things just went horribly wrong... hence I quit while I was ahead.

Then I used colours I actually liked but did the same experimentation as previous...

Right angle weave with a bit of colour fading in there... and a white blob...

Some herringboning

Mixed bead sizes to add some... er... I dunno, effect??

Tried to do circular brick stitch here but ended up messed up because the tension of the thread was too variable!

Then, I spent a lot of time simply looking up techniques, stitches and embellishments that I can use to make these things more interesting. I also looked at other people's work to see if I could figure out which stitches they used. It was kinda fun.

So by this morning, when I sat down to work, I didn't even bother planning what to make - I just grabbed some colours that I thought worked well together, chose nice big beads so that this venture does not take forever, and picked a style and technique to try and actually came out with something pretty sweet IMHO:

Kudos to you if you can spot the multiple mistakes I made during actual execution. No, that's not the complete item. I'm going to make another attempt after working on two assignments and hitting the shops - then we'll see if I can make it into something a bit more symmetrical and complete. On the other hand, for something that I didn't draw a design for or practice beforehand, I think it worked out pretty well... Onward ho, I suppose?

AS ALWAYS!

Deficient Thermoregulation

2011-11-10T00:28:00.000-08:00

Between learning Japanese and listening to books from back in the day, I think my command of the English language has improved dramatically over the past few months. In SA, though, you don't get to use English properly most of the time because most people don't use particularly advanced forms of English - you know, the type where the sentences roll on forever? Read any Tolstoy book that's been translated from Russian and you'll know exactly what I mean.

In terms of words, medical words are always the most entertaining. Tensor fasciae lata, quadratus lumborum, flexor carpi ulnaris, transversus abdominis, pterygoideus and buccinator are all names of muscles. They are such beautiful words - particularly if you draw out the vowels and allow the words to be enunciated clearly. Names of bacteria are also pretty amazing - Salmonella typhi, actinomycetes, clostridium difficile, campylobacter, staphylococcus aureus.

By far the most complex are the words used to describe the complex nano-level molecular processes that go on between the various parts of your body. Let's take the process of thermoregulation, since it recently came to my attention that our family really has quite a severe deficiency in this area. Thermoregulation is the adjustments that your body makes to cope with changes in temperature. Gauteng is apparently experiencing a heatwave, this is true, but my sister, my mother and I are particularly susceptible to changes in temperature. I started thinking about why.

When the temperature rises, your body responds by trying to send more of your blood closer to your skin so that more temperature exchange can take place. Conduction in the body is not an efficient process, everything is gated off from everything else, which is why it works so well. For instance, your blood takes part in the exchange of minerals, nutrients, foods, water and gases - yet when you breathe in and out, blood doesn't suddenly pop out of nowhere and go "Oops, wrong place!" No. That's the sign of disease or some disruption in the normal gating mechanisms that keep everything in their correct place. The transfer of temperature from one organ to another, or from one system to another is a highly and intensely controlled process, since the body temperature has to remain regulated between quite a narrow range.

The body has responses on many different levels - some come about because the nervous system is in control of them. For example, when it is hot, your heart is forced to pump harder because the nervous system picks up that something in the body is not quite right. Some come about because of the action of hormones, and some come about from direct environmental exposure. When heat comes into contact with an area of your skin, it is very different to when it comes into contact with your whole body. If your leg is hot, your body isn't going to react the same way as if your head and shoulders are hot, or if it is a generalized process.

First, the blood vessels in the skin are different to blood vessels everywhere else in the body. Each area of the body has specialised adaptations in everything. The blood vessels in the skin contract when it is cold, and expand when it is warm. I'm not even going to try and explain how it happens, it's far too complicated. All that is required for us to say here is that this is what happens. They don't all expand and contract at once, however - they do it in "percentages". The higher the "percentage" of blood vessels that are expanded close to the skin, the more blood there is close to the skin. The total amount of blood in your body is approximately 5l. Less for little people, more for bigger people. The body keeps track of where the blood is and why at all times.

So when the body notices, "Oi, where's that extra blood volume going?", it is very difficult for the body to do anything about it if the blood is chilling close to the skin. It's very far away from everything else - right? I mean, hormones will get there because hormones travel via the blood stream... but there are no organs there, there is just skin, so who is going to do anything about it? As I mentioned before, the complex mechanism of why the blood vessels have expanded means that those blood vessels are occupied with responding to a signal to do something - hormones may be released, but their messages will simply be ignored. There are a lot of nerves in the skin, but these are mostly sensory nerves, since your skin is a sensory organ - so there aren't "action" nerves to be able to make anything happen.

The body thinks about it and realises there isn't much it can do with the state of things and decides, after releasing some hormones and getting no feedback, to switch to plan B. "Okay," it says to itself, "so we can't recover that blood volume and we need to keep the body functioning as normal because this human doesn't seem to want to remedy the situation. What are the backup measures in situations like these?" The back up measure is usually to make sure that enough blood is getting to the brain - in fact, that is your body's basic default setting. Maintain blood flow to the brain. When people pass out from having low blood pressure, this is what is happening - their body realises that they don't have enough power to send their blood everywhere, so there is a trip-switch in the body that goes off saying "Maintain blood flow to the brain" and the person shuts down. This makes them lie horizontally (hopefully, like if they don't fall of a cliff or something), which causes redistribution of blood flow, which means they get more blood flow to the brain.

How the body does this is it makes the heart pump harder. The nervous system that follows the cardiovascular system and keeps track of what is going on there is able to pick up when the blood volume is decreased. The body, after realising that plan A is futile, gets back to the nervous system and says "Look, I can't get the blood back for you, so I think you should up the heart rate and fix the low blood pressure as much as you can to compensate for the missing volume of blood. Can you do that?" and the cardiovascular system says "Sure."

Now, how does all of this relate to my family? Well, take my sister. She has hyperthyroidism - Grave's disease, to be precise, in which her own antibodies attack her thyroid tissue because they no longer recognise it as part of her body. Her heart rate is already up, since hyperthyroidism (or an overactive thyroid) puts your cardiovascular system on full blast at normal times... which means when the heat comes along and a normal person's cardiovascular system would say "Sure", my sister's goes "What?! Are you flipping crazy? No, we're flipping the damn trip-switch!" - she goes "Maintain blood flow to the brain" and passes out. For me, on the other hand, I have been to a few cardiologists who have said that I have a low ejection fraction because my heart muscle is weak. In other words, my heart has the opposite problem - it just doesn't have the same capacity as a normal heart does. Some of them said it was because I didn't exercise as a kid, so the more exercise I do, the stronger the muscle will get, but it will never be like a normal person. Some said it was because I was so severely depressed at times when it was really bad. So when it gets hot, and other people's circulatory systems go "Sure", mine goes "Up yours, I'm chilling... I'll go at my own damn pace" and flips the bird. I drink a lot of water though, so even when the blood volume is reduced, I compensate for it with ingestion, whereas my sister doesn't. I feel miserable and unhappy doing anything in the heat though, I tend to generally stay indoors as much as possible.

My mother - I'm not really sure. She does fall asleep in the heat though but I think it might just be because she's getting older and older people have trouble with their thermoregulation. Her heart muscle is okay as far as we know although she's pretty hefty so maybe her heart is affected, who knows... she seems fine though and has no peripheral signs of cardiac disease. Either way, I'm really hoping that the heat wave passes soon - although last night I stayed up until very late simply because it was so cool.

Non-specific Update

2011-11-08T11:13:00.000-08:00

My brain is fudge - FUDGE, I tell you. The blistering heat has turned me from a living, thinking, breathing entity into a mass of slow-growing vegetation.

I have nothing meaningful, useful, inspirational or of any consequence whatsoever to report today - not because there is nothing worth saying - but rather because spending too much time in the heat has rendered me literarily incompetent.

See - apparently according to spell check I'm even making up words.

No worries, this state of things shall not continue for too long. In the meantime, check out some mean panorama shots of random two random clearings in Sunninghill.

Possibly my shortest post ever?

Historical Matrimonials

2011-11-06T23:12:00.000-08:00

I'm on the clock for this post, as it were... actually I really need to go and have a serious pee, so I'm using that as motivation to keep this short, sweet, to the point and basically ensure that I don't waffle on about nonsense like being on the clock or needing to go and pee... hmmm... already failed... oh well! (^_^) <-- totally looks like me too.

So I've now moved on to Richard III, who apparently was the biggest bastard that ever lived. I'm now quite well acquainted with the War of the Roses after reading both this and the history of Margaret of Anjou, which I'd like to review at some stage since this chick was a badass of NOTE. Still, she wasn't as badass as Elizabeth, so it's not like I'm in a hurry.

What struck me, however, during these two stories in particular was the perception and intentions of marriage in those crazy and heady times.

Marriage was basically intended to strengthen political alliances and ensure financial gains - there was no love involved whatsoever. Some people think that love was reserved for affairs and such things, and while I don't doubt that there were people who did engage in affairs on the basis of some sort of attraction, I highly doubt that they were as common as people make them out to be. I could go into the reasons for this, but let's just say that a large part of the reason why people are so obsessed with sex these days is a) inundation of sexual images by the media and b) boredom and a lack of mandatory constructive activity to engage in.

Still, let's get back to the marriage thing, because it's rather interesting. Women were generally married off relatively young - like in their late teens - unless they were previously betrothed. As a result, their beauty played a big role in their personal attraction, although to be honest, that was never a limiting factor - it was more of a bonus. In other words, if a rich or noble family had an 18 year old daughter, who in keeping with the times had been raised to manage someone's household, negotiations were put in place by the head of the family to marry her off to whoever would most benefit their interests. The girl had some say in the matter, but generally, she was quite happy to move into a new family that would enable her to maintain her current standard of living and very rarely was there open objection to the match chosen... particularly where large sums of money were involved. Notable exceptions were the future wives of William the Conqueror and Richard III.

I think this is often lost in translation - marriage isn't a state that you achieve, it's an occupation that you undertake, and it was the only avenue of occupation open to women during those times, unless they decided to become a nun. Don't be fooled into thinking this is because women weren't capable - remember that these were times in which any occupation other than waging war was considered suitable only for the most menial of labourers. Scientists and inventors generally did not come from the noble classes - brains were considered useful only if they were military - and Margaret of Anjou had such brains, so she excelled on the battlefield.

Ha ha - you know what has happened now is that the neurons to the "Go and PEE" center in my brain have fired for so long that the signals are now being ignored and I no longer feel the urge. Still, I think I've said what I need to say and I have other things I want to do now so enjoy pondering how YOU could influence world politics simply by marrying into the right family...

Midnight Musings

2011-11-03T15:12:00.000-07:00

Bleh.

That's the onomatopoeia I have chosen to describe the fact that my back aches, and my head aches and I am tired :)

I've managed to finish working on the textbook. My first thought was - "Oh my! I'm going to be able to have free time again!"

Except in reality, that's not what happened. In reality, what happened was I've simply shifted down a gear, but am still going in the same direction with the same objectives and pit stops along the way. In other words, I thought there would be chunks of time available at my disposal to do with whatever I wanted, when actually, that is a romantic childhood fantasy that should die a horrible death.

Having said that, I spent a whole heap of time checking out www,tokyofashion.com instead of being on Facebook or doing grown-up stuff like laundry. It was *awesome*! I looked through everything and found something to love about everything.

Good grief - there are actually birds that are awake at this ungodly hour.

Something reminds me of what it was like working at the hospital at those weird hours of night when it's no longer night anymore. You always know when it is no longer night because the drunk people start going to sleep. Patients who were screaming abuse at you a few hours prior for being a lousy doctor and/or trying to kill them are curled up in fetal position on the benches in the waiting area. Calling patient's names requires you to rouse them from slumber. In the middle of all of this is you... wondering why... just.... why...

I didn't go for a walk today so my body feels all icky... I don't know how else to describe it. Weird things hurt, it's harder to sit up straight and I feel like I should have gone. On the other hand, I have no socks since I haven't done laundry, and my flip-flops will need to be washed before I can walk in those again.

All highly interesting and entertaining stuff.

A Day in the Life....

2011-10-31T21:21:00.000-07:00

So for today's post, I'll try and do a blow-by-blow update (obviously not as regularly as all that) might be fun... It actually is fun - but unfortunately it starts off quite depro cause I was having a bad morning... on the other hand, like I said below, that's how my life goes sometimes. Part of the journey. Enjoy taking a ride with me!

06:14am

Woke up at 5:30. Greeted the cat. Checked mail. Got an email about an assignment I worked on, need to work on that in a bit. Facebooked for a bit. Read 10 things you should Quit, among others.
Random memories and intrusive thoughts about ex-boyfriend - started crying. Then decided that if the day starts off like this, I'd better go for a walk. Went to bedroom to find clothes - loads of laundry, can't find all the clothes I want to wear - more crying. Finally decided to just grab things and go, then decided to sit down and start this blog post. Still crying.

07:16am

Back from walking, feeling less like crying and more like procuring narcotics or drinking the beer that is currently sitting unopened in my fridge. Found some chocolate in the fridge - score! Sugar boost. Having a grapefruit with honey for b-fast. Have 3 pharma assignments to finish, and a 2500 word dentistry assignment to check, then I really have to try to do as much as I can on this last textbook chapter... although let's see how that goes.

08:05am

Pharma assignments done while on the phone with my mother explaining to her how to write a file to disk manually - she had asked some kid to help her with it yesterday, and he had apparently left instructions, but they assumed that the user has Win 7 and the base home computer (because both my mother and sister have their own laptops) are Win XP.
Asked a question on FB: "So again, aside from drugs, alcohol and eating - what do people do when they need to cheer up? Maybe I should ask Google."
I asked Google, and she has responded with a number of articles which seem to all to assume you are already a happy person or trying to go diet or are that you are suffering from or looking for information on depression. Not very helpful or interesting.
Now to get cracking on the dentistry assignment.

09:17am

Desperately want to go back to bed... just want to be asleep. Today is a particularly depro day and therefore possibly the worst day to do a "showcase of my life" post, but you know what? This is totally me - 100% unadulterated. Ability to concentrate - zero. Am going to finish this assignment and then going back to sleep for an hour or two.

15:18

Good grief. When I said I wanted to sleep, I wasn't expecting to pass out for half of the day. On the other hand, it was quite a dreary morning by all accounts so I'm glad to see things are picking up! Now I feel like a million bucks. Okay, Chapter 5, you and I have some business to attend to.

16:20

Thank you Project Gutenberg.

"A man named Felton... and had found how universal was the detestation for him in England, resolved to rid the country of such a curse at once... Buckingham pulled out the knife, fell down and died... "I am the man, you are to arrest me. Let no-one suffer who is innocent." He was taken. They found a paper in his hat that said that he was going to destroy the Duke, and that he could not sacrifice his life in a nobler cause than by delivering his country from so great an Enemy.

King Charles was four miles off at this time. They carried him the news. He did not appear at all concerned or troubled, but only directed that the murderer—he ought to have said, perhaps, the executioner—should be secured, and that the fleet should proceed to sail. He also ordered the treasurer to make arrangements for a splendid funeral.

The treasurer said, in reply, that a funeral would only be a temporary show, and that he could hereafter erect a monument at half the cost, which would be a much more lasting memorial. Charles acceded. Afterward, when Charles spoke to him about the monument, the treasurer replied, "What would the world say if your majesty were to build a monument to the Duke before you erect one for your father?" So the plan was abandoned, and Buckingham had no other monument than the universal detestation of his countrymen."

19:46

Chapter 5 is going much better than I had expected or hoped! It's not particularly interesting stuff - in fact, it is the chapter on the history of education in the United States... but it is definitely going better than I could have expected. I actually think I might be able to legally hit that beer a bit later if I can keep up the current rate of progress... sounds like much yumminess.

Also sounds like it's going to rain outside - lots of wind and weirdness going on - but I hear no thunder and smell no raindrops. No time for smelling raindrops now, though, I need to keep Chapter 5 in check!

20:26

Bleh - no fair! My amazing progress, stymied by my client using the online library at the same time as me! Now I don't have access to the correct resources anymore. What a bummer. And I was doing so well. Okay, well, there are some new pharmaceutical assignments, I guess I could do those. There's also a question translation assignment - I finished an assignment for a client who has now written back with some questions and comments, which I also have to translate so that when it gets back to quality control, they know what the query was about, and then also sort out whatever needs sorting out. At least I've managed to make a good start - I'll check if the client is online a bit later, but otherwise I'll wait and finish off the rest of the chapter first thing in the morning.

20:39

I decided to Facebook instead "quickly" and ended up reading an awesome Tiny Buddha article on a girl who didn't like to get hugged! Makes me think about how I feel about opening up to people... eeeeeeeuuuugh! God, I think I should just forget about all the other life goals I have and prepare to spend the rest of my life in therapy... don't like guys hitting on me, don't like opening up to people, struggle to cope with leaving the house, get depro on a fairly regularly basis... sometimes I think I have a severely over developed intellect at the expense of every other faculty of existance... Okay but now really now - time to get back to work. There are only about 5 hours left of the day and we don't want to waste them, now do we?

22:26

Did two of the pharmaceutical assignments and now working on translating the questions. It's quite amusing actually, because the translator seems to be backing me up on the changes that I have made with some really good linguistic arguments here... I'm rather chuffed and impressed. I'm adding in my own comments as well. Basically the client doesn't like the grammar that we have used, but it is actually correct, so I feel like it is quite a preferential thing and perhaps a way to get their money's worth. On the other hand, having to work off three documents is now no longer much fun. Over and above that, I actually wanted to make some supper around about half 8 and look at the time now... I definitely want to finish this before chowing though, don't care if I have to eat around midnight... screw it. We push boldly forward like Sir Francis Drake!

23:00

The damn thing is due at midday tomorrow! Whoop whoop! You know what this means, right? It's time to make some roti to go with my curry and enjoy listening to something... hmmm... I wonder what... I've settled on Chapter 9 of Charles I, titled "Civil War".

00:01

Sheesh - okay - that was delicious. I made a curry with potjie mix veg so pattipans, sweet potatoes, carrot and potatoes, and I added in broccoli. This was first fried in chilli powder, turmeric and cardamom, and coriander seeds, a bit of salt and pepper then I added coconut milk and slow cooked it for like an hour - I set this all up a while ago though, now it was just reheating and eating. And roti. Oh my sitz bath! On the other hand, I am listening to the end of Charles I and a story indicates that people used to die of septicemia from their battle wounds. That's like... the slowest, most painful way to go EVER. At least the fever and infection make you a bit delirious, but even then you know... you still feel the wound pain and the pain of inflammation in your entire circulatory system... can you imagine what people used to do before the was morphine and anaesthesia?! These are the weird things I think about before bed, on a full stomach, at the end of one of my weird-ass days man...

FYI - it was actually fun - but maybe I should have taken pictures instead... hmmm...

Work-Life Balance

2011-10-31T10:40:00.000-07:00

I'm absolutely and completely the last person who should be writing about this since I have never been able to achieve it - honestly. On the other hand, maybe I'm just the right person to write about it for that same reason!

I'm not even sure what work-life balance even means, to be honest. How do you define having a balance between "work" and "life"? Surely "life" is "work" - I mean, there's always things to arrange, prepare for, do in advance... then of course there are the times when you go "Ah screw it" and then you have to play catch up.

I think the idea is that you are supposed to have a life outside of what you do for a living. Your work isn't supposed to become everything that you do and are. You should have activities that you do to keep fit, things that you do to stimulate your mind in other ways, perhaps ways to indulge your creativity, and time to be social. I'm still reading about isolation and research really does make it out that you show improved function in all areas of life simply by being more social.

Still, I obviously don't have any - work-life balance, that is. I never have. Life at work is very much under your control - you can stop and start activities as you like, you can become absorbed in things, and you have motivation and drive that are both external and internal. Life outside of work is very much NOT under your control - you have to factor in things like other people's feelings or shop opening and closing times. Life away from what you do for work is inevitably harder in my opinion - it involves factoring in variables that aren't necessarily important to you and therefore takes a lot more work. The biggest problem I have with working is intrusive thoughts - and honestly, I'd rather deal with intrusive thoughts than have to tell someone what I really think about them.

On the other hand, someone pointed out how little of a life I actually have outside of what I do for a living very indirectly. I hadn't really given it much thought until the comparison was made between myself and someone who does not work at all... that was a bit of a mind-f*ck. On the one hand, there really aren't very many things that I enjoy doing outside of working or learning. There is a neurobiological reason for this, of course, depression is generally associated with anhedonia, which is the lack of capacity to feel pleasure. In order to feel pleasure, therefore, generally I first have to get my serotonin levels up and *then* do something pleasurable - and obviously the choices on how to do so are limited by how much money I have, and in order to get more money, I have to work more. That's the financial reason, I suppose. Of course, there are nice cheats that you can use like alcohol, for example, which makes things appear more enjoyable for a period of time and at the time, things really do tend to feel more enjoyable. On the other hand, when the alcohol is gone, you have the double whammy of realising that a) you weren't *really* enjoying yourself, you were just drunk and b) alcohol withdrawal symptoms, aka hangover.

Having said all that, it's pretty crappy being indoors working on a Saturday night when other people are partying around you (and music is blaring and all I'm thinking is "Geez people, do you have to party at HOME?!). Not because I'd rather be partying, but because it reminds me that, if given the option... if someone said, "What would you *like* to do, other than work?", I'd really struggle to come up with an answer.

I mean, I really enjoyed getting to know the JHB art scene, and don't get me wrong, I'd love to spend more time travelling around and visiting galleries! In fact, the option of doing so during the week is pretty tempting. Walking around the city (before there are people there) and checking out the buildings and things is also loads of fun. I'd really love to be able to take a massive time-out and leave the city... like go to the Drakensberg for a weekend and just generally not have to be glued to my desk. I'm pretty keen on getting back into playing computer games too!

I guess the biggest hurdle to work-life balance in my case is just the lack of a definition of "life" - I think other people find it very easy to think of and do things other than work. I totally see it the other way around - it is *way* easier to do work than other things. Other things take planning, psyching oneself up for having people stare at you and money. Funny, after having read up on workaholism, I definitely think I'm a candidate, but that was what prompted me to read up on social isolation... because every definition of workaholism (which is decent) refers to the fact that the person has trouble with relationships (inter-human, not inter-gender). In fact, my inability to maintain relationships is a much bigger problem than my relationship with work. The trouble is that the answer is therapy - and therapy involves opening up to your shrink and I'm not good at opening up to people. In fact I regard it with intense detestation unless I'm doing it in writing... in which case I don't mind it at all because, as is the case right now, the degree of separation is high enough for me to feel comfortable with "sharing". But person-to-person? Nope, not a fan.

Anyway, at the end of the day, something must be done. I'm not yet sure what. I'll have a think about it and get back to you. Right now I have to go to the shops though - I've managed to miss the post-work mad rush of people... and now I'm fairly certain I won't get stared at *constantly*. :)

Ethnicity and Babies

2011-10-28T21:48:00.000-07:00

What an ever pervasive theme... okay, but this I thought I had to share!

Now, I've said this many, many times before, but I'm not having children. I didn't want to be born myself, I think it's unfair that I had no say in the matter but instead had to be subjected to a life which has been mostly misery, upset, being an outcast, learning to cope with being different and generally being regarded as "a freak". Add that to the fact that I'm obese, according to my BMI classification (i.e. not simply my own opinion), prone to depression (it *must* be hereditary, and unfortunately both my parents had issues), got bullied quite severely on account of my language, intelligence, and the fact that I stand out (don't worry, I used to bully kids before being bullied myself because they used to tease me about being fat)... I mean, I wouldn't inflict life on my worst enemy, nevermind someone I supposedly loved!

It's true that I much prefer being alive now (i.e. I don't generally wish I was dead or had never been born as much as I did before - but I'd say I still think about it a few times in a week), but that's taken nearly 30 years - and honestly, I'd like to spend the next 30 enjoying what life I have left. Also, having a child is both hard work and very expensive - if that's what you want to do with your life, great! Go right ahead, I will confine myself to silently judging you much the same way you silently judge me.

Except people don't judge me so silently.

Being a native African who grew up without a culture, in my opinion, was a bonus - I've been able to take the elements of various other cultures that I find most useful and beneficial to myself and fashion them into my own set of world beliefs. Obviously, children are completely excluded. In South Africa, from working at hospitals, most Afro women have children by the time they are in their early twenties, predominantly because

a) Most of them do not go to University, or had no intention of going to University. Studying at Uni with a child is probably not impossible in terms of managing your time, but can you imagine the expense? Unless you're being supported by someone else (which during Uni should be your parents or yourself and therefore you see my confusion), you are probably going to have quite a kak time.

b) Fertility is considered a mark of distinction in Afro culture. In fact, most families want a dude's girlfriend to prove that she is fertile before they can get married. Hence, having an illegitimate child is not actually considered a bad thing, since it proves your fertility.

c) Children are apparently considered a blessing. I don't consider something that shits and pees on me, cries all the time, saps my energy, saps my time and eventually grows up to hate me "a blessing", I consider that a curse! But then again, maybe there are people out there who are actually good parents whose parents never grow up hating them... I salute you, although trust me, I would not be you.

So when asked whether or not I have children, the first reaction from other Afro women (and this includes women of mixed race) is generally "WHAT?! NO YOU MUST HAVE CHILDREN! THAT IS DISGUSTING! HOW CAN YOU NOT HAVE CHILDREN?! YOU *MUST* HAVE A CHILD!!!" Obviously, I am generally forced to burst out laughing. I have tried all the various arguments that I reserve for the outside world (I don't generally go around telling everyone I never wanted to be born or I wish I was dead because people are seriously very sensitive about this whole "death" thing) but to no avail. These include "Having a baby is a choice, I've made mine." or "It's better for people who want children to have children."

No, instead I get berated and yelled at for not having allowed myself to be impregnated. I have a vagina and uterus and therefore apparently I should be using them in the way society demands, not as I see fit.

The lady who came to do the census interview asked me again and again if I didn't have any children until I was compelled to say "Do you SEE any children here?!" and she said, "No, but they could be living with your parents." and I'm like "Yeah but then I would have answered yes the first time!" I was so annoyed.

Don't get me wrong, on Mother's day, I'm old enough to be the mother of a child so I always lie and say that I am so that I can get chocolates and goodies. In fact, with my giant belly, I could easily pull of the "I'm pregnant" look if I was in maternity clothing... I should try that one day for funzoes.

Ultimately, people think I am incredibly selfish, and my response to that is *DUH!* I am selfish. In fact, never mind selfish - that's the least of my worries - I am incredibly self-focused and self-centred... I literally have struggled to meet anyone who dwells on themselves as much as I dwell on myself! Does that make my experience invalid? Should I strive to fit in and be what everyone says I should be? Absolutely not, it's not even a question. I am a unique expression of the Universe - I am the way I am for a reason. I believe strongly that we are all different and should be allowed to embrace our differences - not live formulaic lives because other people say we should. Sure, it's easier for me to think like this because of my very obvious disconnection from society, but everyone should learn to realise that we are not born to be what society says we should be - we are born to be ourselves - embrace all aspects of our existance, love ourselves for who we truly are, regardless of whether other people agree or not.

The Invincible Armada, Queen Elizabeth - Jacob Abbott

2011-10-27T11:55:00.000-07:00

This is my favourite chapter in the whole audiobook!

Whenever I'm in between tasks or while cleaning or tidying or cooking, I listen to these stories. I didn't make any formal choices in downloading these books - a friend had downloaded them and I thought they might be interesting so I downloaded them from him. He's also got a lot of downloads on the Roman Empire, its administration and decline and downfall, but I am quite happy to listen to those at a later stage. Incidentally, there are also stories on the medieval period in general, throughout Europe. It is in this way that I am slowly making myself a formindable source of knowledge regarding the distribution of power in Europe, but particularly in England.

So - the reason this is my favourite chapter is because it tells the story of an amazing battle - the battle of the Spanish versus the English and Catholicism versus Protestantism.

As much as we may mock or deride religion, it shaped the course of human history. The reason I speak English is because of religion, though indirectly - the 1800s were known in England for period the period during which the "Race for Africa" took place, and few people tracked as far into the dark continent as the missionaries did. The Livingstone's and Moffat's of this world. They laid the groundwork for the colonists, who simply followed in their footsteps - enter CJ Rhodes - and thence Rhodesia which became Zimbabwe which is where I was born.

In this case, however, Henry the 8th had caused the reformation in England by breaking away from the Catholic church to marry Elizabeth's mother, Anne Boleyn. He had thus founded the Anglican church, which was now independent of the churches in Rome. After the unfortunate Bloody Mary, Elizabeth took the throne. She was the child of the leader of the Protestant movement - it can hardly be expected that she would, as they express it, "espouse the Catholic cause". She wanted to keep the country Protestant, for many reasons - one of which was the fact that her power was vested in the support of her many Protestant subjects.

So she told her privy council to ensure that the men were always able to take up arms if the need arose - in other words - in addition to being able to carry on trade and live like normal people, several of the citizens were also required to have formal military training and stay prepared if warfare should break out. This was a "wise and sagacious" policy. England was much smaller than her continental Catholic enemies, and accordingly, you couldn't keep the country running if you kept an army in waiting on the off chance that the Catholics would decide that they missed their lucrative little province. So the citizens went about their business and kept in shape by remaining in readiness for an invasion, which eventually did come.

It happened in this way: the "Low Countries", which are currently Holland and Belgium were part of the kingdom of Spain. Yeah - I was also pretty impressed. Furthermore, King Phillip, who reigned in Spain at the time, was also emperor of Germany, no less. See why this stuff is interesting? These countries had actually been torn apart by the religious wars of the times - one of the cities I visited in Belgium, Ghent, was at one time the richest city in the world (of course, the rest of the world didn't really have money, so take that into consideration - it was the richest city in Western Europe, probably!) and this wealth was decimated by in-fighting. Eventually, however, the countries became overwhelmingly Protestant and they appealed to Elizabeth for assistance. She was a Protestant monarch, a rare thing in Europe at the time, and could have the sovereignty of the country in return for protecting them against Phillip of Spain. She chose not to accept, but signed a treaty with them, which basically brought on the war.

There is no room for me to go into how vastly superior the Spanish fleet was to the English fleet at that time. The country didn't even have its own Navy - whereas the Spanish had the formidable "Armada", armed "squadrons" of ships which were used to convey gold and silver from the Spanish colonies back to Spain. What the book fails to mention, however, is that these naval squadrons were well trained at fighting enemies in the open sea, but probably not that great at defending themselves from land-based attacks at close quarters...

... "during which the enormous naval structures of the Armada were followed and fired upon and harrassed by the smaller and lighter are more active vessels of their English foes... like hawks driven by kingfishers through the sky." That is how the battle is described. The English had tiny ships, the Spainards had the Armada, and yet the training, dedication, patriotism and general good leadership of the English fleet - which, may I just add, had been called together within the space of about a year - decimated the so-called "Invincible" Armada, and they limped home with their tails between their legs.

The story of the battle itself also involves an address given by Elizabeth to her troops, where she says that if the Armada manage to land, she would take up arms against them herself - which is said to have motivated them even more. It apparently took 10 days for the ships to pass by the shores of the English channel and less than half of the great fleet of Armada made their way home. You have to love a story that makes you swell with pride, even though it has nothing to do with you :)

Can Open, Worms Everywhere: More on Gender Issues

2011-10-26T11:58:00.000-07:00

Some eye-openers are amusing, some are a bit distressing but some are just downright frightening.

I'm starting, albeit slowly, to realise that maybe the fact that I have gender issues has a bigger impact on my life than I previously imagined.

So it turns out that apparently there really are some women who genuinely wouldn't be able to survive without having a man to do things for them. I have to say this bluntly because if I sugarcoat it, I don't think people will realise my disbelief.

There are women who, when presented with a situation that they cannot surmount, would genuinely not take the initiative to solve the situation themselves, or simply COULD not. In fact, I made comments about things like girls having guys write macros for them and someone just told me a story about a girl who couldn't successfully buy an adapter between two different sizes of pipe... that's a bit much, surely.

(Incidentally, that phrase comes with a very posh pseudo-South African post-colonial British Accent and a glance over the edge of my glasses that makes me look quite the prim and proper madam)

And hence, I felt it prudent to think about it a little - particularly during my walk, reference to which allows me to make space for these:

I'll split them up a little with text and make them the illustrations. In the intervening period while I was sorting out the photos and doing a bit of light reading, I sent my first "networking" email. More on that another day, but I thought it such a juicy titbit that I simply had to share.

Anyway, back to gender issues (she says, having strewn the article with flowers). Is it OK that there are other women out there in my position who wouldn't be able to manage the situation without the help of a member of the opposite sex? Is it OK that there are women who aren't in relationships because they *want* to be, they are in them because they *have* to be? Furthermore, is it OK that they don't even realise it - because let's face it, most women aren't even aware that this is ever going to be an issue. They *never* live alone - ever. They go straight from their parent's home to their husbands home and never have to do anything for themselves. They have had boyfriends since primary school :) Okay no, maybe they haven't, but generally speaking, they don't realise that living by themselves would have produced an effect on them that would have tended to potentially render them more "masculine".

On the other hand, am I perhaps simply only realising something that everyone else already knows yet again, simply because I haven't spent that much time around people? I'm currently of the opinion that my time is much better spent in the *absence* of other people. I get more things done. Vastly more things done. If I look at the work schedule I've been keeping up over the past few months, it wouldn't have been possible if I had to keep up social engagements and do things with other people.

So maybe I read it and gasp in horror... as the same friend put it "What can you do without a man?"

Sometimes I wonder what guys who know me think, because I've never really opened up to a guy. Oh wait, no - there was one time when I lost it and yelled at my ex-boyfriend on the phone, but other than that I try to make sure I don't ever reveal my true emotions at any time. In fact, people have told me that they find it quite confusing. Well, so be it - that's how I am. Still, I generally don't tell guys what I actually think - I might keep quiet, avoid the question, talk about something else, make a joke... or my favourite defence mechanism - give the other person a compliment. If you ever want to change the topic with someone or deflect a question, give the other person a compliment, it totally throws them off course... hee hee! Okay, then you sit with the eternal problem of people thinking that you think the *world* of them, when actually you're sitting there going "I spend time with you because I *have* to, not because I *want* to". Come to think of it, it's been a very long time since I've actually had to do that... awesome.

Regardless of what they would say, I think it sort of irks me that women don't have sufficient confidence in their own abilities to do something. Or maybe I wish they would get up and try instead of simply letting someone else do things for them. I don't understand how we're ever going to bridge the gender gap and get rid of stereotypes if women don't do something about it. Except I'm not sure what it is I think they are supposed to be doing.

Which leads me to question what I think it is that *I* am doing that is different. Firstly, I don't own a TV. I don't watch TV series on my computer, I don't watch YouTube videos, I rarely if ever watch movies and then only Japanese movies because I feel it is culturally informative. I don't keep up with fashion. I don't go to the mall and walk around looking at stuff. I don't hang out with my friends. I actually don't keep any entertainment at home whatsoever other than an Xbox which I now never have time to play. Oh good god and I went and bought Rainbow Vegas... I'm being optimistic, dammit.

It's not that I'm talking about how I live now, I've generally always lived like this. When I was in University, I didn't go to lectures, I didn't tend to hang out with friends... I didn't play sport, I did Brownies for like a month and I was like "I'm so over this shite".

So at the moment, I spend a lot of time working on translations - I'd say about 8 or 9 hours of every day. It used to be about 12 but working on the textbook forced me to do less. There have been days where I have managed to bath and make a quick meal and that's it - the rest of the time I've been switching between working on translations, working on the textbook and reading stuff on Facebook. By "stuff" I mean scholarly articles, news and debates, not stuff about people's lives. Not that I don't read stuff about people's lives, but honestly - most people don't spend that much time on Facebook sharing *meaningful* stuff. I have either disabled or disconnected from all chat clients other than Skype and that's only for work, so I don't talk to people. Blogging actually takes up a defined portion of time. I've recently started to exercise like I've said with the walking and stuff... incidentally, these photos killed me - I was actually swearing out loud and cursing the fact that it was hot and I was outside. I was literally annoyed.

I can hear Diwali fireworks! YAY!

What else... I read a lot, I try to find new things to study all the time. I enjoy learning and memorising things. I don't read fiction, only non-fiction. For "relaxation" I listen to audiobooks - I am working my way through great personages in history and I've just finished Charles I. I think his story is definitely my favourite because it is the story of the power of the House of Commons :D Alexander the Great is also an awesome story, but I had to skip two chapters because I was dying to hear about what brought him to the grave and he didn't die by the sword, no - he died because of too much "reveling and carousing" as the language of the time expresses it. Apparently at one stage he had a harem of 360 women and drank himself sick on a regular basis during his "deterioration". Somewhere amongst all this there has to be obligatory time spent bathing, cleaning... knitting... planning what to do next...

Ultimately, I have to thank my parents for whatever they did that didn't let me turn into a normal girl. I can honestly look around me and say that I appreciate the fact that they did whatever they did that made me think the way I think. For a large part of my life I haven't even questioned the fact that men and women have different beliefs about their sexuality - I honestly believed that there was (and to some extent, I believe this more strongly now) some happy medium that we *all* aspire to - whether male or female. Things like being good with technology, for starters, or being able to manage a garden. Having said that, some people feel that having fun in life is more important than being "good" at stuff. I can't say I agree - I generally don't do things that I'm not good at - ha ha - like cooking and cleaning :D

Working Solo - The Great Debate

2011-10-23T23:02:00.000-07:00

Right, there's something that has been bugging me for quite some time now.

Here's the thing - the more I read on entrepreneurship, the more they talk about networking and working with other people. Of course, conversely, I just told my mother and members of my extended family that they are henceforth banned from visiting me until such time as I feel it prudent to reinstate visiting privileges. I hope I've moved by that stage. Some of the research I have been reading makes it seem like there is "pathological" dislike of being around people, but there are also plenty of people who simply choose to be alone a lot of the time with no apparent maladaptation. This is usually due to life circumstances or things like that. I'm yet to do a full-scale analysis and determine which I am (since obviously, as you can imagine, this absolutely fascintates me). Be that as it may, the option of working with other people fell away soon after I started working for myself.

I've only tried to work with one person, and it just caused me immense irritation. I don't like people who work with technology who can't use email. I don't mind if you are bad at it because you don't *have* email, or because nothing that you do brings you into contact with a computer on a daily basis. On the other hand, I spend easily 14 - 18 hours a day in front of my computer - the easiest way to get hold of me is to send an email. This also highlights why it grates me that people brag about smartphones when they never use them for email - if it's just a phone, what's the point of it doing anything other than receiving and making phone calls and receiving and sending sms?

So naturally, during planning everything that I want to do, I have assumed myself as the only participant in all gainful activities. I have made no plans to expand or outsource anything as yet, and I definitely have no plans of co-opting anyone to assist. In fact, what this seems to have done is simply stretch out my goals over a longer period of time. Where I thought I might be able to build stuff in a week or a few days, I now have to consider doing it over a few weeks or perhaps even months. Since I have a relatively steady stream of freelance work coming in, that helps to pay the bills, but given the fluctuation that occurred, this is not something to rely on too fixedly, particularly if I take any time off, because that seems to have damaged my income more than anything.

On the other hand, it is much harder working on your own than it is working with people. There is no-one to bounce ideas off or get feedback from - and I have to say, all research says that people have a "social" part of their brain which, when deprived, is as bad for the body as actual disease. The less time you spend working with people, the worse it is for your health. This isn't to say I'm not going to do it, for that would be ridiculous. I believe it has a lot to do with whether or not you're used to spending long periods of time alone, quite honestly. If I had to dump someone who spends all their time around or in communication with other people into my environment overnight, they would probably freak out a little bit, sure. Think about what it would be like for me, now, to have to work in an environment that is noisy, with people who inevitably feel slighted if you weren't at least cordial, doing stuff that I don't even want to be doing... I mean, I'd go flipping insane. I am already, but I mean I would act out.

So - bearing these things in mind, I have resolved to postpone that decision for the next 5 years. I'm not even going to worry about whether or not to work with another person for 5 years. After that time, I'll reassess and see where I am at and how I feel. I am definitely inclined to work with digital natives, and some of them will be varsity students looking for an internship when I'm ready to start making decisions. Networking? I have to be a bit more lenient on this one - I'm thinking of giving it about another 2 years before I put any serious stock in networking, simply because since I already know I want to do this all myself, I need sufficient time and energy to get everything done over the next 2 - 3 years. I mean, up until now, I've mostly been doing research and reading into how business works, how small business works, how online business works and now recently, supply and demand. I have no choice here, because I have to learn all of these things before I'm in a position to embark upon anything. The education textbook was to give me insight into what is required in education, and how I could potentially get technology to do this for me. I'm on the last two chapters... w00t! It has taught me a lot, but there is still so much to learn. I could go on about this stuff, but suffice it to say that I haven't even started determining what content I am going to be developing, what platform I intend on using to launch it or what visual direction I want to take.

Still, having said all this, I feel that I'm quite confident that, although this approach will have its ups and downs, I know I'll come out of the other end a total winner. It is highly tempting, in fact, to visualise dipping into the cookie jar for overseas trips within the next 7 or 8 years... I still have to visit Armenia! Oooh and I'm on the story of Alexander the Great! *ahem* That's not what I was trying to say. Still while I'm digressing, this goal setting process that I went through over the weekend also required me to state some "family and relationship" goals and I said that I should at least go on one date within the next 5 years. My aversion to interaction with the opposite sex has reached psychological damage proportions. Whenever I even think about dating or getting to know guys, I cringe, pull a face and get a weird feeling in my stomach. No seriously, I even realised I have a stereotypical air of discomfiture assigned to it which puts me in a foul humour and renders me momentarily impenetrable to thoughts conducive to initiating proceedings in this regard. Ha ha - I'm sure I mentioned in a previous post how hard it is for me to unclench... Tee hickles!

More JHB Garden Pics

2011-10-23T13:12:00.000-07:00

While me taking walks is becoming a relatively regular event (and while I'm feeling all the better for it), I thought I'd take my cam along again and take more snaps. Okay, I actually started in the garden, but I was on my way out.

Now I'm actually enjoying walking because I can saunter along and enjoy the scenery in an attempt to find something interesting to photograph... plus I am quite chuffed about all the flowers, since I've been spending lots of time looking at this year's art from the Northern Hemisphere, which of course has all been spring, summer and flowers... so I think that's influenced me quite a lot. Anyway, here goes!

Hmm... so this is what was at the end of an onion I planted... it originated from Fruit and Veg city I think. I just finished working on a textbook that said onions reproduce without flowers, but that looks like a flower to me....

This is Jimmy Potato - the first potato plant I planted in the garden. Look at how handsome and sexy he is getting. I want to eat your fruit... hurry up and grow.

These flowers came out so over-exposed the last time that I had to have another shot at it... I think they have come out better. They make good ground cover and appear to be succulents.

These totally look like little puffballs. I just thought they were cute.

Some overexposure here, however, made for an interesting photo of some geraniums. Passers by started staring at me at this point is disbelief that I would want to be taking photographs of flowers ( presumably because I wasn't interested in taking photos of them)

An appropriately exposed geranium

This was interesting - wild garlic (?), roses and geraniums... interesting combination of plants to place together, but equally diverse flower arrangement...

It was blushing :D

This is what our storm water drain looks like just before the start of the rainy season... and speaking of rain, frikkin hell I think we're owed some now.

Oh, and this is what the storm water drain looks like when you can still walk over it. This is not generally possible in summer unless someone constructs a make-shift bridge...

Random passer by

I thought this was a pretty exotic looking wildflower...

... which turned out to have been perched over the top of the storm water drain. Incidentally, physics says this situation is the reason why the storm water drains fail in summer...

Embracing the weirdness of Gender Issues

2011-10-21T22:11:00.000-07:00

So as not have anyone under any divisive illusions here, I have some serious gender issues.

Let's describe the problem thus. I am female. I am impartial about my gender - I wouldn't say that I "love" being female, but I also wouldn't "love" to be male... I do, however, "love" being ME. I don't firmly recall my mother and father saying things like "Good little girls should do this" or "Boys are supposed to do that", because, quite honestly, we weren't raised like that. Until very recently, I actually thought that this was on purpose, but now I see that it might simply have been because my parents were very wrapped up in their own stuff and assumed we would learn to be socialised from some other source. I do remember my grandmother constantly berating me for never wearing dresses because she said all girls should wear dresses every day and I said I thought that was stupid. Obviously, this does not go down well - apparently you're not supposed to tell your grandmother that what she thinks is stupid. I think *that* is stupid - if you won't do it, who will?

So - it is likely that, if I actually had more social interaction during my formative years, that I might not be reacting with bewilderment when girls in IT have to ask guys to help them with Pivot tables (I mean for crying out loud - HAVE YOU NO SHAME?!) or when women are offended that they should change the bloody lightbulb themselves. Maybe I would have learned by example. Who knows - this is completely hypothetical... the fact is that it didn't happen. In University, I studied a course that really and quite truly does not differentiate in terms of gender. Sure, some specialties are considered more "masculine" (like Orthopedic Surgery) and some more "feminine" (like Obs and Gynae) but there are non-sexual reasons for this as well. For instance, Ortho Surgery requires a lot of drilling, hammering and breaking of bones. You have to be physically strong to do those things. If you're a woman and you plan on being an Ortho Surg, you have to get quite buff. Now, let's insert here that I wasn't aware that women don't consider that an attractive trait... being muscular and physically strong. So while I say the reasons are "non-sexual", I suppose it could be argued that they are definitely "gender-based". Let's just chuck in here that there is more rivalry between Surgery and Internal Medicine than there will every be between men and women of medicine.

Anyway, still, at University, there was not that much socialising, although this was when I started to get exposed to how other girls behave around guys. I think I behave pretty much the same way around anyone - I assume that I must behave differently around guys that I like, but that involves non-sexual things like making eye-contact with them... note, I have to already like someone to make eye-contact with them, yet apparently for guys to find you more approacheable, you have to make eye-contact. Weird. Still, the bottom line is that this was the first time that I noticed that there were, in fact, girls who pretended to be more stupid than they were around guys.

This annoys me immensely. If you're smart, and a guy is not as smart as you are, you don't have to do a damn thing. In fact, the onus is on the guy to either piss off and go learn something meaningful or work on his bloody self-esteem and not attach his sense of importance to whether or not a girl knows more than him about something. On the other hand, this is something that so many girls do that maybe someone actually *told* them that they should do it. Maybe this is part of socialisation that I missed out on - maybe girls really are taught that they should make men feel like they know more. Personally, I think that's stupid - if you want to know more than me, work at it, dammit! Read, for god's sake - don't just sit there expecting information to come to you via osmosis!

That was varsity - then I entered the working world. We shall skip over medicine entirely in this discussion - not because my f-ed up gender issues were not a problem - but because they are comparatively non-existant in the world of medicine when compared to the world of IT.

Oh no wait, there is one thing I should probably slot in here and that is that just after medicine, and during my first year in IT, I was in a relationship. Aside from the fact that I didn't have a good basis for gender interactions, and added to that the fact that I have overt gender issues, there were certain things which made perfect sense to me which I think may have left the other party confused. I've written about this sole relationship more than enough - suffice it to say that my aim in a relationship is not to become a replacement for someone's mother. I don't want to be a mother, ever. I don't want to be YOUR mother. You can cook and clean for yourself, you have hands. I can barely cook and clean for myself, let alone having to consider doing it for the benefit of someone who is NOT me... I mean, I honestly cannot understand what possesses women to sacrifice their personal free time to do meaningless stuff like cleaning up AFTER ANOTHER PERSON. I will *never* understand this. Cleaning SUCKS. I do it because I have to and at my own pace and I still think it sucks! To have to do it for another person who could provide nothing that was adequate compensation... I mean, I just don't get it. Gender issues.

But in IT, my ability to sympathise with members of the same sex was ultimately and finally quelled for all eternity. Consider that there are women who are CS graduates who would still ask guys for help when building a macro. The interesting thing was this - if a girl asks a guy for help with something that is difficult, the girl gets to get away with doing nothing, while the guy gets an ego boost because he thinks the woman thinks he is smart. So both parties walk away from the situation having achieved some measure of satisfaction from the interaction. On the other hand, I believe that I'm smarter than most human beings (oh, also I only learnt from reading a book two years ago that arrogance is apparently not a feminine trait. Long Live Queen Elizabeth) so therefore irrespective of your gender, when I build my macro in half the time and with a third the amount of code, I will inevitably do a victory dance around you and rub your face in it.

This has nothing to do with being male or female. I enjoy doing things which are difficult. If I do things that are easy, I generally feel like I've been wasting my time. Some people think this means that I don't ever relax or do fun things, and to some extent, that is very true - I wouldn't consider myself a fun person unless you pump me full of alcohol and drugs, whether legal or illegal, and even then that's because both of those substances fundamentally change what you consider priorities. Also, achievement is my biggest motivator. I generally don't care if I can make someone else feel better about themselves, I have to worry about how I feel about *MY*self, it's your job to worry about how you feel about *YOUR*self. If I did better than you, I'm going to say so. Loudly. Because I know just how much blood, sweat, effort and general pain went into achieving the desired result (and having done it on my own, I feel an extra sense of pride) and I know that

a) You had the option available to you to do the same thing and you didn't. Therefore, you must accept that I am better than you, regardless of whether or not you have a penis, because my method and outcome were rampantly superior.

b) I won't have people having false impressions regarding their own abilities in relation to my own, it simply leads to later confusion.

I guess I am shocked at how many women think it is more important to get married than be an amazing human being. My sister actually gave me an excellent explanation of why women are generally more submissive - she says that when someone becomes a wife or mother, they get to be CEO of their husband's/child's life. They are finally given an area over which they have complete control. They become CEO of their own households, effectively. Personally, I don't consider that a position in life worth aspiring to - that's like saying you can be the smartest person on your street... or the smartest person in your neighbourhood. No - I want to be one of the smartest people in the WORLD. Then again, I have authority issues, psychiatric issues, physical issues, financial issues... is it really a wonder that I would struggle with gender issues? I don't think so. But I do think it's fun to think about them from time to time since clearly I missed a lot of memos along the way.

Will I change how I behave or approach the world? Who knows, I plan on being alive for a long time to come. 10 years from now I may have learned to see the sense in clinging defiantly to gender stereotypes, although I really hope that's not the case. Instead, I hope the world catches up and stops perpetuating ridiculous nonsense. We must evolve as a society and it is generally better to do it together, rather than me surging ahead of the rest of you. :D That was said in good humour. Take it or leave it.

Managing Email Communication

2011-10-20T20:57:00.000-07:00

Something funny occurred to me while listening to some of the WorkAwesome podcasts. I generally don't follow WorkAwesome - I got the podcasts as a download from a friend but I actually find most of the stuff on the site very basic - it's aimed at people who just aren't good at managing their time. I find I'm quite good at managing my time - although I am probably considered incredibly selfish because I do every single thing that I want to do and only a tiny, meticulous fraction of things that other people want to do. I personally think it is important for me at this stage of my life to focus on what I want to do and what direction I want to take because having a good foundation is imperative. There will be other phases of my life where I will be more outgoing and engaging.

It appears that there are people who don't manage to get their inbox unread emails down to zero. There were usually questions or comments surrounding the concept of "Inbox Zero", meaning having no unread emails in your inbox. For me, that's not a concept, that's a lifestyle. I would hate to have an inbox packed to the brim full of things that I haven't read... but which I still keep "Just In Case" there is something important in them.

Firstly, there is absolutely no reason why you should link social networking sites to your email. Just visit the social networking site and use the features available *there* to see if people have sent you stuff - it does actually work. Eliminate all notification emails that relate to things that you're not actively working on. If you want to subscribe to sites because you like to keep up with them, don't use your email for that - go to the sites themselves. You can use your favourites folder to keep track of sites you visit often, but honestly, I go mostly on memory or with what I'm using at the time. Oooh - or you can use Google Reader - RSS feeds are your friend! Okay, I don't actually use Google Reader, but I know it would be perfect for that sort of thing.

Why don't I use Google Reader, you ask? Because there is a lot of stuff out there to read and I have too much to do - I'm not bored enough to make tracking things that other people are doing - I need to track what *I* am doing. Neatly into point two. Choose a maximum of 5 things that you should be reading. You can revise the list as often as you want, but no more than 5 categories. Any more than that, and you're not categorising, you're listing. There is information that you're just not going to read or ingest, and effectively, that means that keeping it is not worth it. It's just data taking up space. If you need to show another person that you have read the email and still want to keep it, set up a rule to autorespond to the sender that the email has been automatically archived, and that if required, you will refer to the email... and actually do it, of course. But honestly, I simply delete if it's not important enough.

Interestingly, I get virtually no "social" (i.e. non-work) email from people that is actually direct communication - occasionally a friend from overseas will send me an email, but generally it is a stop-gap measure to bridge time in between a phone call or chat. On the other hand, I'm not sure if family members and friends send emails that are substantially viable - do people actually hold conversations via email? I used to do it with my mother before I had a landline, and my sister and I send very academic emails to each other... peppered with silliness, of course, but concerning very academic things nonetheless. Basically, it seems like one would generally talk to the people one is close to on the phone or perhaps even in person more often, and wouldn't require the intermediary of writing-based technology to interact with them. I think email should simply function as a way for you to receive text-based information, not as a way to interact with other people or information in a meaningful way. I suppose you could be sending documents around, but again, if you're not reading them, and you don't intend on reading them, either be honest upfront and delete them or set up a rule to autoarchive them immediately.

In terms of "work" communication, emails have to be short, sweet and to the point. If you can't say it in less than a few lines, email is probably not the best tool and you should be attaching a document, or directing someone to a website or something. When you say you're going to do something, try to do it immediately - although I suppose for people with lives, that might be a bit difficult. By "lives", I mean if you're being stimulated by other things - like the TV, other people, distractions, etc. I generally keep my environment completely quiet other than having classical music playing in the background, and I ignore the cat when I have work to do or am in front of the computer... funny, I made a comment that I love my computer more than I love my cat and people seem to forget that I love my technology more than *anything*. Yes, even more than food, probably just as much as air. Definitely more than people. Shame, poor KH - and he's squarely on the losing end of that bargain. His qualities as a hunter are becoming drastically more admirable, but he still spends a lot of his day sleeping and lying around in the sun.

Anyway, I have a system where I have three labels that I use to classify what I am working on. Two relate to translations - one denoting "Active" translation work and the other denoting "Completed". There is another label called "Business" that I use for anything "official" or that involves being a grown-up. Otherwise, I have my 5 categories and have used those to set up email alerts on Google. Entrepreneur and various combinations of entrepreneurial aspects is one category, so I have an alert that pools various articles from around the web to show me. I very rarely read any of them unless the headline grabs me, but perhaps it is a good idea to explain what that means.

When looking "for" or "at" information, there are certain characteristics about the way the information is presented that can give you clues as to whether or not it will be useful for not. I suppose you could look at it as reviewing snippets of information for key words. Sure, sure - sometimes you either get lucky, or sometimes you stumble upon some random gems, but on the whole, the internet is pretty packed with garbage. Unless you learn to tell very quickly what is garbage and what is not garbage (this is provided, of course, that you're not paying someone else to tell you what is garbage and what is not garbage), you will waste a lot of time clicking on things you actually don't need to or even want to see. Again, Evernote is a wonderful thing here because when I see things that I actually do find interesting and would like to keep, I zap them into Evernote. I don't necessarily read everything immediately. I suppose you could consider that my way of autoarchiving for later digestion. The thing is, you also have to make a defined period of time to go and review stuff, if you really have to.

Whew... I'm sure everyone has their own way of managing email that works for them. I'm not even going to discuss email "forwards" because I think that they require a post on their own - whether or not I will ever write it is another question entirely. I just had a super productive morning and am off to pick up a copy of MS Office and some other software. I promised the people I was working for that I would and now I can make good on my promise because I got paid!

Johannesburg, Our Garden

2011-10-20T01:56:00.000-07:00

To give the flip side of my hatred of exercise, there are some up-sides to being outside during the day. Last night we had some non-comittal rainfall (which a few weeks from now will be fearsome thunderstorm!) and so I took my camera along when I went for a walk. Personally, I think it was worth it.

Fire and The Plague, The Two Terrors of London

2011-10-19T14:50:00.000-07:00

I always love a good history book session and lately, I've been taking time out of my day to start listening to The History of London by Walter Besant (from librivox.org, of course).

Listening to historical books is a lovely thing at the best of times. Reading about what your predecessors have done or accomplished and how long it has taken them gives you a sense of reverence for how easy life is today. We're generally much less violent than we were during previous times in history, as the other chapters relating tales of people being hung for a bit, then dragged down and cut open will attest to. Mind you, in those days, there was neither anesthesia nor sterilization, so not only would everyone go home spattered in a bit of the lad's blood (because inevitably, crowds would gather if this was done in public - we decry sitcoms when we forget the alternative), they would also probably not wash their hands before eating. Yes, let's take stock of how far we've come as a species.

Still, reading a historical book that was written in what I consider "history" is equally entertaining. The writer reflects upon ancient London from the perspective of someone who, for example, does not consider electricity or technology a commonplace part of life - being written in the Victorian era. Having said that, I have a book on The Victorians which references so much of this series of history that I get to enjoy reading it all over again! Excitement much?

The fact that the plague devastated ancient London to the extent that it did shows how far we have advanced. Back then, before the microscope was even invented, people didn't know that microscopic organisms carried disease or that hygiene was important. For instance, the people who carried away deceased plague victims are said to have smoked tobacco as a disinfectant(!). People tried to curb its spread by isolating themselves, but not by simple things like washing their hands. Apparently they also killed all the dogs and cats in the city, and tried to kill all the rats too. But ultimately, all of this was to no avail. What is interesting is seeing how what actually saved a lot of people was the nasty London weather - the plague flourishes in the languid heat of summer but cannot thrive in the frosty cold winters. Ultimately, it was eradicated from the city by the great fire of 1666 - after which time Anton von Leewenhoek was probably checking out his cork cells... mind you, take a moment to consider what surgery was like in those days. Aside from no anesthesia, no sterilization and a rudimentary understanding of neuroendocrine processes, there were no antibiotics. Antibiotics were only developed circa WWII - before that, people simply died of infection or lived with chronic infections more often, sometimes becoming grossly disfigured.

Still, that's not the topic at hand here - what made the chapters on the plague enjoyable were the descriptions of how and why it spread and lasted, and how it was finally eradicated. Historical medical perspectives are also quite interesting.

Fire, on the other hand, seems like such a foreign concept to those of us who have never grown up with wooden houses. Okay, let me take that back - in South Africa, if you work in a hospital, you realise the ravages of shack fires. Think about this a little - a shack is an informal dwelling constructed primarily from corrugated iron. There are no safety exits - in fact, there is usually only one exit and it is usually near the most flammable substances - ergo when shacks catch fire, if you're inside, you're likely to get toasted. Add in the fact that the people who live in them are undereducated and have bigger problems to deal with than prevention of fire hazards, along with the fact that there is no city planning in an informal settlement, and there is no conceivable way for the people to receive adequate rescue and emergency support should a fire arise. I've seen people with all their skin burned off - grandmothers who were overcome by the flames, children who were too frightened (some of whom were locked in the house for safety)... it's pretty gruesome stuff. No doubt this is the same situation the Londoners had to deal with at some stage.

The streets of ancient London (and modern London - good grief) are narrow and oppressive - so much so that transporting water in amounts large enough to stop a raging fire would have been impossible. It also made it much easier for fire to spread between buildings. Up until the time of James the... er... II (the son of Mary, Queen of Scots... the dude who reigned after Queen Elizabeth), most houses were made from wood and not from brick. Concrete hadn't even been invented. Fires were not only impossible to control, they destroyed livelihoods. Urban dwellers were often merchants or tradespeople who worked from their homes or at least stored their tools there. In the event of a fire, there is only so much you can carry off. It is interesting how the destruction of records is noted as being something that you simply don't discuss during or immediately after the fire - the first thing to do is rebuild. Obviously there were none of the sophisticated document management systems we are privileged enough to enjoy today.

What made me laugh the hardest, however, was that the fire was only stopped by bombing houses to stop it spread. Can you imagine the desperation of the citizens who, with no fire extinguishers or organised municipal structures (because these simply hadn't been devised) turned to bombing buildings simply so that the fire had nothing more to burn? I mean the mental image alone is really funny... "Okay, we've done all we can, and we're defeated AND exhausted. What can we do to save what is left of the city? I know... let's blow a few houses to bits."

Again, taking time out to examine how more primitive societies (who concomitantly recorded their history and who had others who took time out to read it and provide their contemporary commentary makes one feel a sense of reverence for just how far mankind has come. I've listened to this book again and again over the past few days, but these two topics are by far my favourite!

Daily Exercise

2011-10-18T10:37:00.000-07:00

Now that I've decided to embrace the various facets of life and not only accept, but also act upon my physical need for activity, I find myself having an awesome laugh at the general state of the morning ritual.

Firstly, I've finally managed to get back into a sleep routine to the point where I can wake up at 06:00 going "Boing! Ready for another day!" This shows dramatic improvement from a few weeks ago. Secondly, I have now tried to make exercise a non-negotiable part of my daily life.

This, however, does not stop me from bitching and moaning about it. You see, most people don't understand that I never played as a child. I never ran around or rode on a bike - I never played tag or any of that stuff. I was a flipping techie from a very young age. On the other hand, I also never really played with *people*, so hence I tend to get annoyed with them as well and bitch and moan about them a lot as well, come to think of it... Be that as it may: the point remains that during my life, very rarely have I done much exercise.

Over and above that, there is no mental impetus to do exercise that doesn't involve me quoting studies that I've translated to myself and recalling tumor necrosis factor alpha and adipokines and their effects on the body. Basically, every motivation session is a revision session and vice versa. I don't naturally get up thinking "Wow, you know what I'd really like to do? EXERCISE!" unless I've been doing it for a few weeks AND I am trying to work avoid. Being made to exercise (or do any form of cleaning) by other people is what I imagine it must be like to have your teeth pulled... I'd still rather do it than touch spiders (arachnophobe) but when given the choice, death is a comparatively more attractive option. You think I'm being dramatic, don't you? You have NO idea.

However, given that I must maintain a certain level of sanity to allow me to continue my incubatory seclusion, exercise is part of the game plan. In fact, after starting to listen to Gray's Anatomy from librivox, I am appalled at my general lack of physical awareness (since I revise by actually doing all the movements and checking with myself). The earlier I can get started the better, so when I wake up in the morning, the first thing I do is obviously sit in front of my PC for an hour and sometimes I do some work (although I prefer not to be working when I'm fresh out of the sack), but then, I put on my sneakers and grumble about having to get out there and move my body.

The first thing that has to happen is my heart has to now adjust to beating at a faster rate than baseline. It's amazing how little non-medics know about the human body. This isn't simply a case of the heart pumping faster - this involves a cascade of endocrine and chemical messengers and a delicate rebalancing of the internal circulation. Blood is shunted away from your digestive system and towards your skeletal muscles for example - and this in itself is a complex process involving both local and distant chemical messengers. Crucially, however, it involves *maintaining* the chosen state for a given period of time for adjustments to fully take place. As such, it generally takes me about half an hour on ordinary terrain and an hour on hilly terrain for my body to make the adjustment.

Fortunately, blood flow to the brain is never compromised. In fact, in all states, blood flow to the brain is preserved unless you're in shock - very easy to tell when a person is in shock - they are either lying in a pool of blood or they are a pool of blood (internal haemorrhaging) and they are generally unconscious. None of this "Reservoir Dogs" BS... oooh, and I really should make a point of watching that movie again at some point... apparently there is a nice little PC friendly game for it too.

Still, during the adjustment period, I honestly feel like death woken up. My muscles and joints don't complain as much as my brain does, this is certainly true. My brain doesn't like all the additional stimulation - for people who feel their bodies every day, here's a simple analogy: studying. See, when you first start to study something, especially if you are doing it on your own, it is a large amount of new information. Sometimes there are words you don't know and since you can't ask anyone, you have to look them up. Same with concepts you don't understand or additional information you need. As a result, when you embark upon a new course of study, in the beginning, it is painful... you spend half your time just bloody trying to understand what is going on or being bored stiff with the basics just so you can get through it. [Funny, here I am working on the assumption that everyone has at some point tried to study something themselves. It has just occurred to me that there might not be many people who have, but I'm sure the same goes for being taught stuff to some extent].

On the other hand, once you start to master the subject matter and are able to use it, it feels great. That's the place I'm hoping to get to - the place where I can achieve some mastery and start to use exercise to my own benefit. In other words, instead of just being able to get up and walk up to 5kms every morning, I'd like to one day have goals. I'd like to build more muscle in my legs so that rerouting blood flow is quicker (I don't have fat arms and legs, I'm shaped like an orange with toothpicks and a head... so although my muscles are long and indeed, torque and my epic bone mass allow me to pack a good wallop, I would like more muscle mass in my extremeties).

*sigh* Okay now I've been avoiding going to the shops by writing this blog post... my usual aversion to forays outside the humble abode. I bought a giant and most awesome D.I.Y. warehouse style shelf which I plan on assembling after finishing some work for the night!

The Final Stretch

2011-10-17T00:46:00.000-07:00

Truly - I don't enjoy these bits. The bits where you're supposed to dig in your heels and remain focused. The bits where you're supposed to grit your teeth and see the thing through to the end.

In fact, as someone who likes to do a lot of different things, I get quite attached to something and try to prolong the experience as much as possible at the best of times. Working on a project, though - methinks I would have the good sense to be able to differentiate and not let something like this drag on, but no - the last four chapters are crawling.

Having said that, I've worked two jobs full and solid for over two months now. It was hell. Absolute hell. I remember getting up on Sunday mornings and thinking "Gosh, it would be so nice to take a break today... okay, now to get rid of that thought, push it completely aside, bury it and forget where it is hidden for the next few months." Day in and day out, pushing, hitting that grind... making magic happen.

All in all I'm really super keen on getting back into other things - although I now have the advantage of knowing how to manage my time better and get more done in a given period of time. I've learnt a lot about myself and my environment. It's been a pain in the ass, but as always - totally worth it and I wouldn't rather have been doing anything else.

In fact, I find myself thinking back to where I could have done better - where I could have eliminated unecessary distractions and buried myself in more work. It might, on the whole, have been better for my ability to self-govern, but it certainly wasn't better for my sanity.

I think things are going to be a lot more painless over the next two months. I hope work picks up this week, but given that I am struggling with these last four chapters, I should probably take advantage of the time that I have... urgh... and I'm so not feeling it anymore - I just want to be finished! I work avoided by spring cleaning and now the place looks totally different to what it did before. I still want to head down and get some shelves from Builder's Warehouse - I am sick to death of not having sufficient space available to simply store my crap on shelves. Furthermore - may I just say that a) I have finally finished paying off my meager furniture and b) absolutely NOT worth owning any - I would rather have nothing than crap that just sits around taking up space and attracting spiders! Yeeeeuuuuuuugh.

Don't worry though, this year I have some awesome bug sprays, powders and general "life" killers of many descriptions.

Thoughts on Getting High

2011-10-16T06:33:00.000-07:00

Well, what an interesting few days.

Basically, I was freaking out about not having enough work to do. Wait, I suppose that isn't the beginning of the story, is it... let's try that again.

Firstly, I have started, in a broad sense, to try and spend more time figuring out my own relationship with the world. There are many things in life that I do simply because I am following the path of least resistance and I'd like to change that. It's part of an overarching process to attempt to foster some self-integration on my part... I want to be the person I am on the inside but on the outside. That being the case, when I realised that I am not a fan of social contact, I decided to do some research and inform myself more fully on the subject - am I a workaholic who is simply avoiding interpersonal relationships because I am hiding from my true emotions? Am I a hikikomori who has effectively had a societal nervous breakdown? Do I have social phobia or social anxiety disorder? What is the inherent value of having relationships in your life?

All these things were then anteceded by a visit with my family. Firstly, when my sister told me that we were going, I immediately did not want to go... I got the feeling right away when she said "Would you like to come during this time and this time" and my initial answer should have been "No." Before leaving for the visit, I felt a bit ill so I took a day off work, with the result that while I was off during the time that I was at home, work slowed down considerably. I had now, however, recovered somewhat from feeling so under the weather and was more eager to get stuck back into work now because that's just what I do to keep my mind occupied... I mean if not work, then what?

Yeah - I don't exactly lead a very "balanced" life.

So there I was, freaking out about not having enough work to do. So I decided to do something that I have not done for quite some time and get high. High as in stoned. High as in smoked up some decent marijuana.

Before moving on, it is very important to cover some psychiatric ground here. I haven't had antidepressants for about 4 or 5 months now, and I'm definitely not the same person when I am off antidepressants and when I am on antidepressants. I'm very different. I personally *feel* very different. When I'm on antidepressants, I feel like "Good god, life is awesome, people are awesome, everything is just awesome... like wow, I'm actually glad I woke up this morning." When I'm not on antidepressants, unless I brainwash myself with those thoughts on purpose, I generally tend to feel like I wish I'd never been born... the world sucks, people suck, life sucks and I just want to crawl into bed and forget about the world. In fact, screw the world, we're all going to die, I wish I was dead... oh god I'm not even courageous enough to kill myself... I'm such a coward... blah blah blah ad infinitum. So even if I'm smiling and shit on the outside, inside I'm ending everything you say with "...which would be better/improved if we were all just dead." In fact I think about death a LOT. I'm a little bit obsessed with it.

Getting high is like being on antidepressants for two hours. Well, unless you get to the stage where you're smoking every day all day because in that case it's pretty much like having a cigarette - by the time you're finished with the first joint, you're already wondering when it's going to be time for the next one. Okay, but we're now talking about not having smoked for a while - the effect is pretty awesome - I definitely felt a lot happier. I was insanely less productive, but at the same time I didn't think the purpose of my life revolved solely around work - generally speaking life was more enjoyable and thoughts of death decreased dramatically. In fact, when I did eventually sit down to do some work, the high was sort of over and I was in the phase where you're "coming down" from the high - I felt kinda sleepy and lethargic, and it was uncomfortable, but I just sort of took it in my stride and took things easy. I think it helped (of course) that there was no doubt going to be some more getting high at the other end of the equation, because without that, I would probably simply have gone to sleep! And good grief, it has really helped my ability to sleep - no more upset nights for me!

So obviously, it was actually loads of fun. I finally got to relax a bit, listened to the story of Queen Elizabeth of England on repeat a bit and decided that I quite admire her. I listened to The Secret Garden a lot and found some Kurosawa movies on my PC! I have about six, I think... can you believe it... just sitting there unwatched and unharassed! I haven't watched any yet, though.

On the other hand, tying this back into what I read before, social isolation seems to be very strongly linked with addictive disorders (don't make me have the whole marijuana is actually addictive rant now - it is addictive). Then again, one could argue that taking antidepressants is also a form of controlled addiction, since you get similar "withdrawl" symptoms from quitting them suddenly... it's not fun, I can tell you - I always try to wean. Is this a symptom of my imminent collapse or am I just having a bit of fun? Should I be more vigilant and strict with myself? I'm not sure.

Meanderings

2011-10-13T01:01:00.000-07:00

So I've had quite the little break recently and I think I've been putting it to good use. I haven't been working quite as hard as usual, so I now have time to do a bit of thinking and planning. On the whole, this isn't really a good thing - it means that I will have less money later on in the year - but if all works out for the best with the textbook, this could work out very well for me in the long run. In other words, I feel like it's a bit of a gamble taking it a bit slower, but then again I'm very uptight and it's quite hard for me to unwind... ask anyone who knows me. When I'm relaxed, I'm totally relaxed, but when I'm uptight, you can't get me to unclench for shit. Honestly. I have to force myself to relax and tell myself to loosen my shoulders because I tense up so much - in fact, I burnt myself with a hot water bottle during the week that I wasn't feeling well in an attempt to loosen my muscles because all I do is sit in front of the computer, but my muscles get sore.

Yesterday, on the other hand, I took a really long walk after a very long time of going without any exercise, and it was delightful. I felt the blood pumping in my arteries and forced myself to walk two blocks - it's about 2kms. I don't know what that is for other people, but for me - I don't get hot and sweaty walking that far, I tend to breathe a bit harder and when I haven't been walking for a long time, it takes a long time to do it... like about an hour. After a few weeks of walking every day, I get bored and start running, but I've never really ever had enough time to walk every day, because all I've done for most of my life is sit in front of a computer, and my muscles are weak - so when I exercise, I get tired very easily. There's nothing physically wrong with my body other than the fact that I don't use it often enough - I'm like Colin in The Secret Garden.

When I do take the time to do some exercise, however, it helps me be more aware of what is going on around me. When I can't afford to take an afternoon nap, I skip so that I can stay awake and it's honestly the best thing to do - it's just that now it's getting hot and the sun and I are also not great friends... Still, given my aversion to the outside world, it makes the blood flow, and I generally feel a lot better after having done it. My mind works a little better, my body works a little better and I generally tend to feel better all round. I like to take it easy, too - regardless of whether it is my mind or my body hindering me from moving around a lot - I don't like doing it at first. Today, however, I think I'll do some stretching since the walk yesterday has me feeling a bit stiff, but in a good way.

I think I need to start making an "idea wall" now to movitate myself towards my goals. I've never done stuff like that before so I'm not sure how to approach it - and some might find that strange. I generally try to turn everything into some sort of artwork to put on my wall.

But making an idea wall involves a lot more effort - because I don't simply want to take someone else's pictures or print out pictures that I've taken from nature - because it's just not original enough. On the other hand, I usually need lots of time because I like to put a lot of effort into things and I like having nice, free chunks of time.

Looking at this schedule now, I realise I never used to follow it in the slightest, other than the sleep time and the email time. I can't work off plans that require me to adhere to times - I have to have a general purpose and direction, or general priorities. How on earth do you depict priorities graphically?! For example, I have to improve my Japanese because there's a test I'd like to take. It's not something that I can do over a short period of time - I have to do little bits every single day. How do I represent that graphically, within the boundaries on an A4 or A3 size page with only line AND still make it look interesting and colourful enough to look at for a long period of time (because let's face it, if you write it, you stop reading it after a while if you have to look at it for long enough). These are the challenges that I must face and attempt to conquer each day, while sitting in front of a computer with my muscles in spasm!! It's a hard life, I tell you...

Anyway, I have to get off this chair and get out into the sunshine for a bit - I think the workers are gone. There have been people outside during the day recently fixing the thatching. I think I'll try and do a bit of spring cleaning as well - I realise this is how we prevent spiders, people - we spring clean and leave chemicals in all the spots where they are likely to accumulate so that they have nowhere to hide or accumulate without you knowing about it!!

Oooh - and my friend sent me some Ghirardelli Hazelnut Hot Chocolate. It tastes amazing! I was like "If you want to bring me a present, send me Diabetes-in-a-can." This is actually pretty low in sugar and general carbohydrates, but extremely delicious. Yum.

On Working From Home

2011-10-08T22:27:00.000-07:00

Not sure if you're considering doing it, but I can assure you - working from home is potentially one of the best things that could ever happen to your life.

Now, take a moment to forget everything anyone has ever told you about working from home and let this be the first thought that comes to your mind when you think of it henceforth: self-discipline. I cannot state this clearly enough. If you're going to work from home, or if you know someone who works from home and is actually making a success of it, know that this is the one thing that occupies the vast majority of their time and day.

Self-discipline means being your own manager. It means giving yourself praise when you have done a good job so that you feel encouraged to do it the next time. It also means reprimanding yourself when you haven't done well enough, without breaking down your own self-esteem. It involves providing yourself with adequate motivation to do a multitude of tasks within a given period of time - even during those times when you don't feel like things are going the way you would like. It means putting aside all emotional reactions to petty things and getting focused on the job in hand, whatever that is. It is NOT easy, but it is totally worth it!

My observations of different people and how they work at home have shown a number of things. To give you my perspective on it, my home is my office. There is no division between my living area and my working area and if you come into my house, you are coming into my office. I don't have an area in which to entertain people because I simply don't entertain - it's my office. I have a chair set up in my office so that when I want to bead or take it easy, I can shift position without having to leave the office area. On the other hand, I know someone whose office is pretty much in the most social area of the house. She has her working area immediately adjacent to the living area and everyone walks through her office constantly. She has people over all the time, lives with other people and generally doesn't have defined working hours or a strict schedule. I know yet another person who has made their bedroom their office. The advantage is that since they live with other people, they can shut the door and get work done whenever they like without people disturbing them. They have actually got a great setup in there - a desk for working on, a massage chair for relaxation, the bed for quick snoozes... and best of all, when people do knock, they answer the door on their own terms.

It boils down to what works for you. If you're the kind of person who feeds off the energy of others, you would probably shrivel up and go crazy if you had your office set up like mine. On the other hand, if you're the kind of person who likes quiet and solitude, having people walking in and out of your office the whole time would drive you absolutely insane! In all this, what is most important is the element of self-discipline - you have to know how much you have to get done and how you're going to get it done, and not let other people distract you. I personally think some sort of personal schedule is a must - if you can plan it weeks in advance, lucky you - but even sitting down to make a daily plan at the end of the previous day for the following day makes all the difference. If you don't, the danger is less that you won't do work and more that you won't know how *much* work you should do - flexibility is important, but meeting targets, deadlines and goals is much more important than being flexible.

Self-discipline is also involved in two other important areas of working from home - exercise and tidiness. Maybe it's just me, but my need to leave the house shrank drastically when the home became the office and not just some place where I unwind after a hectic day at the office. Exercise is so important - simply moving your body around and getting in touch with yourself physically should be a very standard part of life. Of course, as someone who has never understood this before, it requires huge amounts of self-discipline to make sure that I do something physical at least every day - whether it is a simple as taking 30mins to do a proper stretch session, some Pilates, skipping or going for a walk.

Being tidy is another of those things that I didn't really see the need for before working from home. If you can afford it, get a maid. Especially if your home is your office. Seriously. If you have the money, delegate cleaning to someone else. Sacrifice a bit of personal enjoyment if you have to. If you don't have the money, be prepared to sacrifice some time every day making your place look tidy. This doesn't just mean putting things in order and making them look neat, it means making sure that there is sense and order to your surroundings - continually evaluating on a daily basis whether or not there are things that you can discard to make your space more open and your life less cluttered. This can be a nightmare when you're swamped with work, but no matter how busy you are, always make time to clear your environment - the process of cleaning and clearing in itself is vital to the improvement of the way your mind works. Cleaning out the clutter in your life metaphorically allows you to clear out the clutter in your mind, and mind-clutter accumulates faster than life-clutter!

Some people consider work-life balance to be of greater importance when you work from home and I have mixed feelings about this - obviously. The beauty of working from home is that it allows you full control over what you do during the course of your waking hours. For me, this means that when I have a lot of work to do, I have the freedom to block out the entire day and do nothing but focus on work (during productive hours, of course, there are some obligatory activities like napping to remember). For others, they have a fixed period of hours that they are willing to work per day and don't exceed that, even when the workload is heavier. I think the rule should be that if you're making the hourly rate required for you to pay for everything you need to pay for and you can stick to a fixed number of hours per day, do it, by all means. On the other hand, even if you're making more than you need to, it is - generally speaking - better to be active than idle in any given circumstance. Again I feel it boils down to having your own personal routine and schedule, which are absolutely vital to working from home.

Lastly, a quick word on social interaction. Regardless of whether you are a social butterfly or a bit of a hikikomori like me, your social interaction is going to decrease when you work from home. You will no longer have the social contact that you have at the office unless you go out looking for it and actively work at it. In fact, perhaps this sounds strange to people who are not like me because they are like "Work at social interaction? What are you talking about, it just happens!" Well, in my case it certainly doesn't "just happen", it's something I have to generally be impelled to do by force. On the other hand, what makes social interaction important (for OTHER people) is that it provides a sense of motivation, connectedness and other touchy-feely stuff that I can't recall now. The point is this - if you're social, stay social because it is good for you. If you're not social, make sure you have enough resources available to keep you feeling your best at all times. Audiobook downloads work well because you have the advantage of hearing another voice without having to engage in conversation. I also have a ton of motivation talks and podcasts, which make me feel good about myself and remind me to take positive steps in my life. Do NOT fall into the trap of social networking - time of Facebook is leisure time, not social time - never confuse the two.

Phew - and I feel like there is so much more that I could say, but if you remember one thing about what I've said, working from home is about self-discipline - be sensitive towards that when you deal with people working from home.

Miki K and the Comrades

2011-10-07T00:04:00.000-07:00

So many things have happened during the time that I've been on an online hiatus! Nobel Prize for COSMOLOGY no less and the demise of Steve Jobs - among other notables.

So this weekend I was reminded of a Polish family friend. We have lots of those, having been Catholic church attendees at some point and being immigrants... I guess.

Miki K was always one of my favourite "kids". When I grew up, I was generally the oldest child among my parent's friends - and so everyone younger than me was generally designated a "kid" :) But Miki was one of my favourites. Before we go any further, the fact that his mother makes the most awesome baked goods of all time and understands a healthy love of cream may play a role in this.

Anyway, I'd totally forgotten about him until I asked about him yesterday. I have a vivid recollection of him standing in his room explaining, at about age 11 maybe... how he was going to start training to run the Comrades. He had a whole 5 year plan on how he was going to make it happen - at least, I think it was 5 years because he said he wasn't old enough to run the Comrades until a certain point. I casually asked if he had done it and it turns out, in fact, he had!

That's some pretty determined goal-setting right there - I think he got some great practice in life on how to set goals and stick to them. I'm going through a whole "redefinition of goals" phase at the moment (broadly speaking - I think I have them ironed out conceptually) so I'm considering writing down goals and setting time frames and that kind of thing. Thinking back to this was therefore rather motivating. :)

Struggling to Post

2011-10-01T04:41:00.000-07:00

Hasn't even been all that long since my last post but I'm really struggling to get into writing again, and thought I'd scribble a quick note about why but every time I write anything, I end up losing motivation about two thirds of the way through. In fact there are about three unpublished posts each saying more or less the same things, so here's the summary:

1. The thought of visiting my mum and sis again is driving me mad. I can't believe I have to pack up my crap and move over there for two whole days - it's absurd. I'm an incredibly selfish person and we don't do interpersonal sacrifices well. Thank goodness there are two very selfish reasons I am going otherwise I would have bailed a long time ago. I haven't felt this stressed out in ages.

2. I'm really, really missing antidepressants at the moment - when I get a chance to get back on them, I'm going to bloody go for it. My heart skips a beat every single time the phone rings or there is a knock at the door (and in both cases I generally don't answer) and I'm sick of psyching myself up to go to the shops... also the intrusive thoughts are driving me a bit crazy and I'm always pissed off with someone... I mean aside from the obvious fact that I'm hating the outside world at the moment. And on that note, I've got one social committment to stick to and that is it - I'm going on total hiatus for at least three months. Am planning on taking a holiday from social networking too... can't wait! Have already started planning.

3. GRUMPY PANTS FEELS UNDER THE WEATHER! I don't know if it's the monthlies or because I feel more stressed out than I do before a big move but I am really not feeling well. The chi is not in balance. The forces are not aligned. I am simply not happy. Therefore, I have my giant grumpy pants on and I'm about to try and hit the sack AGAIN in the hopes that I can have a few hours of decent sleep (haven't been sleeping well lately, see point 1).

Phew. I think that's about it. In stark, blunt summary. I'm hoping to get inspiration for a new post but am really struggling to think about anything that doesn't involve the above three... oh wait, that and the fact that the lack of sex drive is really starting to worry me... It's not that I go out and have sex or anything, but I have zero sex drive to even... well, you know... what single women do... which is apparently what happens to people who are on antidepressants and I'm not antidepressants which means I *must* be depressed. Like ZERO sex drive. I can't even fantasize if I FORCE myself. And I've tried to force myself a lot over the past three weeks and NOTHING. NOTHING. NOTHING. :) TMI? You should be reading my alter-ego's blog - her name is happy-sunshine-face. That makes no sense. I'm going to snooze. Goodbye for now, world.

School Outings... to the Airport!

2011-09-29T11:06:00.000-07:00

Hooray! Got to make a mission to the airport and visit a good friend of mine - this is the same person who was my roomate in my first year of university and anyone who thinks I have ever been a miserable sod honestly has no IDEA what this chick had to put up with. I was a total bitch. I hated everyone and everything and I was grumpy and unhappy about everything all the time. Yet somehow, she managed to work her way into my heart and you know what? We had our ups and downs over the first two years and after that we've literally been firm friends... I went to her wedding in India almost two years ago and was her bridesmaid, I mean... considering how our friendship started off, I honestly never thought it would have continued (since even *I* wouldn't have wanted to be friends with me).

[In case you're wondering, it was just after I found out my dad had "the disease" and he had pounded the crap out of my mother because she had supported me in studying medicine when he wanted me to do engineering, AND he refused to pay for my studies or for anything and wasn't talking to me at all. It was a very messed up time in my life. If you've ever had your mother beaten up because you were the one to stand up to your father and she happened to be the one within firing range, you'll know what I mean. Otherwise, sit down and zip it. Much appreciated.]

So moving on - this post actually has nothing to do with either of the above.

This has to do with the numerous school kids whom we saw at the airport.

These were kids who clearly were not from the most affluent of schools - I mean they weren't even physically very clean looking (like they were all dusty, I just sort of wanted to brush them off or hose them down or something). Yet they were fortunate enough to have come on a school trip/outing to the airport. Being that all of us present had been to University, it could not be said that we were from underprivileged homes, which then had to be explained to my friend's American husband. In fact, thinking about it, the first time I went overseas was before I was even two years old (to live in the UK) and the first time I went on a flight on my own was when I was 7 years old. I've never even had to question the fact that airports are a commonplace part of life.

Yet here were these kids who were going to the airport as a school outing. Not because they were going to fly anywhere, not because they could afford to go past the check-in counter (unless the airport regulations would allow it) but so that they could see what an airport is like. The mixture of feelings was intense. On the one had, I'm really happy that educators now have the foresight to take kids to the airport. Maybe it will open their mind a little to the possibility that travel is something that they should engage in. On the other hand, it makes me understand why the kids that I grew up with during the time that I was at school here were so closed-minded - most of them had probably never even left their own home town, let alone their province or their country. They had no idea that people from other parts of the world behaved or thought differently to the way they did, nor did they think it was even possible, in most cases.

This is why it really gets on my nerves when people complain about the state of education in the country and then do nothing to change it. You can't expect people who have been brought up to think that they will amount to nothing to suddenly take an interest in different world cultures or travelling to different countries unless you encourage them to. Aside from that, how do you convince people who think selfishness is a negative trait that saving up to travel is a worthy goal? Or better yet, how do you inspire an interest in travelling in people who don't even know where their next meal is going to come from? It's a very painful, frustrating state of affairs, but I don't think that complaining about it is going to do much good.

What has caused equivalent irritation over the past few days, however, is people who are "under-educated". These are people who think that they are intelligent and run around talking about how intelligent they think they are and how stupid they think everyone else is. The trouble with these folk is that they think they know more about things than they actually do and I don't know who said it but a little bit of knowledge IS a dangerous thing - especially when you were unfortunate enough to grab hold of the wrong little bit! The trouble, I have realised, is that it is more about ego than actually knowing the correct answer - there are people who would rather consider themselves smart than actually *learn* things - which baffles me. A personal pet peeve of mine is "But I've spent hours reading through Wikipedia! Of course I know what I'm talking about!" When Wikipedia has an official and credible peer-review system and the information found on there is reliable and correct consistently, then yeah, maybe I'll think you know something because you read Wikipedia for hours. I'm not saying that you shouldn't do it or that it doesn't have its benefits (great for looking up definitions) but if you didn't get it from either a textbook or a journal, I have a lot of trouble believing that your knowledge comes from a credible source. I will, however, accept a graduate (and a recent one at that, or someone who stays in touch with their field) as a reliable source.

A friend's husband put it very well when he pointed out that people in South Africa who walk around thinking they are intelligent (myself included) are honestly not showing off about all that much, since few people in the country are or have been encouraged to develop their intellect and therefore smart people stick out like sort thumbs. Smart women even more so. We're sitting around here thinking "Oh my I'm so very smart" but if we were in a country where everyone had the same opportunities we'd probably be just average... and the reason that scares us is because being smart is so intricately tied to our sense of self, identity and ego. We'd rather sit around SA and bitch and moan about people being dumb and keep them dumb than give them a chance to try to reach our level and be shown that actually, we're not all that special after all. So who is a bigger part of the problem - the people who not smart enough or the people who complain about other people not being smart but do nothing to change the status quo?

I keep wanting to write down thoughts and ideas about what I have planned for my education start-up, but unfortunately I always lose faith in mankind at the last minute. So I've decided I'm not going to write anything and will simply start up a blog once I have a site up and running. It's probably going to take another six months to a year, so don't hold your breath - I have a whole lot of good stuff going on at the moment and I want to taste every single piece of this multi-flavoured pie...

Love is a Choice? I think I get it...

2011-09-27T11:26:00.000-07:00

Today's post inspired by the ever-inspirational Tiny Buddha, who have honestly provided me with so much to think about and keep my mind clutter free that I should probably pay them the fees that I would ordinarily be paying to a psychiatrist and/or psychologist.

Okay, so let's start of with the atypical family history story here so you have adequate contrast with with to contextualise why this article made me think. My mother is a widow and she swore off men even before my dad was 6 foot under. Literally. One day she asked us if we would swap our single beds with her so that her and my father could sleep on separate beds (and this was while I was still in high school but before we found out that he was diagnosed with "the disease" as we like to call it in my family). I said I wouldn't because it was my bed, but my dad offered my sister a four-poster bed and she readily accepted. Not sure where they got the other bed. Still, when asked why, my mother simply said "Your father and I will no longer be sleeping with each other." Most kids apparently get grossed out when their parents discuss sex with them, but since this was not new to me, I was sort of like "Expected." As another digression, bear in mind that my mother was the one who, at my father's funeral, refused to wear black and refused to force us to wear black because, and I quote "We are NOT in mourning." Granted, sure, my father did a lot of great things for my life, but good, loving memories of him are few and far between...

So reading this post made me think about what it must have been like to grow up in a family where love was a part of the family fabric. I mean, I was the one who had to teach my mother a few years ago to actually say "I love you" at the end of a phone conversation... not so much teach her, but I had to say it over and over again until she did it too. Not because of some deep sentiment that I have, but simply because I know for a fact that unless it becomes a habit, people in my family will NEVER say it to each other. So what would it have been like to hear my parents tell me that they loved me, or that I was special to them or whatever?

Also, it made me think about people in relationships and how they really do get to a point where they take their relationships for granted. For heaven's sake, I have an ex-friend whose sole topic of conversation other than fashion, TV and tabloid gossip is bitching about her relationship. You can understand why she is an "ex", we had to break up because I simply wasn't feeling it anymore... I couldn't handle the fact that she couldn't see what a good thing she had going for her. I think you take a relationship for granted when you assume that the other person will always be around, no matter what you do - whether you put in effort or not, whether you treat them with respect or not... I don't know, I always think I had the opposite problem - I used to lie about how good my relationship was when it was actually pretty shitty... so instead of taking it for granted, I over-estimated its relative importance and worth.

I suppose on some level it boils down to how much you value interpersonal relationships too, right? Interestingly, I know some people who live in what can only be referred to as a "collaborative alliance" - the social group is generally focused around a couple and they live with friends, and generally have friends come over and visit. In fact, now that I think about it, I know quite a few people like this, who inevitably think they have co-opted me into their little gathering until I decide I've had enough of being social (it usually takes about 3 months of sustained contact to drain me of all enthusiasm about a friendship, so if you don't see me often, know that I truly value you as a friend).... hee hee hee - what can I say, I'm a sneaky little bugger... But why I bring them up is because these are the kind of people who will make enormous compromises for the sake of keeping people within their social circles. They will tolerate all sorts of nonsense! Okay, granted, you can't overlook the benefits of being able to put up with other people's crap... when you want or need company, people will be there and when you need help, you have a wide network of people whom to ask, so your chances of getting it are definitely higher. On the other hand, you generally have to be prepared to tell them the truth, and being who I am, I have found that the truth and sustained friendships are somewhat incompatible... the statement of the former usually precedes the loss of the latter. Fortunately this rule does have its exceptions though!

So when I think about love being a choice, I think that makes more sense to me than love being a so-called "emotion", because emotions are pretty fleeting. You have to base your interactions with people in general on something more concrete than simply how you feel about them. When times get tough, and times will inevitably get tough, you have to have something to base your commitment on other than "Yeah but six months ago you made butterflies appear in my stomach" or "Six months ago you didn't look like a heifer".

Interestingly, when asked, my mother says the only reason she stayed with my father was because she wanted us to grow up and have a privileged life... which we did, don't get me wrong. When I look around at other "kids" my age, I definitely had a whole lot of material stuff that they didn't have. On the other hand, look at how my sibling and I have turned out. I don't blame her for making that choice, but I can't help wondering what life would have been like if she had chosen differently....

Let's talk a bit about robotics....

2011-09-24T13:45:00.000-07:00

Okay, okay... slowly people are starting to realise the implications of the superluminal neutrinos, and I for one am with CERN - let's not make any theoretical or phenomenological predictions or changes just yet... let's first settle down a bit, have some tea... you know, maybe read the paper, review the experiement, have it independently tested... there is now some talk of extra dimensions in the works, which will no doubt have my string theorist friends having nerdgasms of epic proportions.

So I decided, since I didn't want to write another whiny post about... well, you know... I thought I'd showcase two very awesome developments in the world of robotics.

I'm fascinated by robotics. To quote something I said to animal rights activists on a friend's facebook page "Should people campaign for animal rights? I don't know, I'm personally indifferent - I'm more fascinated by inanimate objects - I mean, I love my laptop more than I'll ever love my cat." Aside from the fact that this effectively terminated the discussion (thank god - nothing worse than people trying to argue with me on the basis of sentiments that I'm *supposed* to have), it highlighted the fact that if you really want to touch my heart, the way to do it is definitely not through the use of puppies and sunshine. I mean you're talking to someone who has only once ever shed a tear over anyone dying (and mind you, that one person wasn't even someone in my own family!) and who practically burst into tears at the sight of the International Space Station.

First, let's give it up for the swarmanoids. This video blew me a away. Essentially, swarmanoids are a robot community that work in unison to achieve a set objective - in this case, the retrieval of a book. Flying eye-bots are able to locate the object and then guide the foot-bots (which faciliate movement) and hand-bots (which faciliate complex fine-motor-like movements) to the correct location for retrieval of the target. Contrast this with the humanoid robots that are being developed in a flurry in Japan by every major heavy industries corporation - personally, I think the swarmanoids are much more useful and effective.

Humanoid robots are touted as being the next best thing to home care nurses for the rapidly ageing population in Japan. When they say rapidly ageing, they are not kidding - their birth rate has plummeted because fewer people consider having children, but their level of medical care and medical research is so far ahead of the rest of the world (not to mention their lifestyle habits, diet and general outlook on life) that they tend to be fully functional individuals well into their early 90s. Now, being that they no longer have the same social structure where the elderly live with their married children and take care of the grandchildren (since, of course, there are no grandchildren and who wants to live with their parents?!), the elderly tend to get a bit lonely and sometimes even a bit helpless. Having a friendly robot around to chit chat with and pick up after them is a charming idea, provided that they can make them appealing to live with.

Swarmanoids, on the other hand, would be my idea of a cool robot helper. These are the kind of robots that I would use to ensure that my morning cup of tea is ready and waiting by the time I wake up and sit down all bleary eyed in front of Nagi (my laptop - of course she has a name...) because they would be able to do it regardless of what time I chose to wake up. If there was an eyebot in my bedroom that knew how to tell when I was waking up by monitoring the rate of my breathing, it could alert the other bots in time for them to have me sipping on honey and lemon rooibos before my eyes are fully open (which is about the time I'm checking gmail). Also, an eyebot could quantitatively detect the levels of tension in my shoulder muscles and organise for some handbots to give me a decent massage before I even realised I needed one. Forget humanoids, I want swarmanoids!

Another pretty cool set of robot kiddies are the Panasonic Evolta robots, which are pretty much just a promo for how long their batteries can last. What's cool about these robots is that they have designed them to take part in the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon.

For those of you able to take part in Triathlon's, I'm sure you've seen the requirements of Ironman - it's crazy. Even for a human being. These little mini-dudes are aiming to have it done within a week. What makes them supercool is their design. They are not necessarily humanoid in shape, but they have definite humanoid appeal, with their funky heads, and rudimentary arms and legs as the case may be. The swimming robot is well balanced, the runner robot is the coolest thing I've seen for a very long time and the cyclist robot is just plain cute. Here's hoping they don't break down :)

Last but not least there is MABEL, apparently the world's first running robot. She has no body or head and is in no way ready to shake anyone's hand, but she can run... and fast. I was pretty impressed with the way the motion has mimicked that of human running - right down to imitating the muscular and weight distribution that accompanies the transition that humans make from walking to running. Pretty impressive stuff. Also it was a nice LOUD sound clip and the neighbour was singing atrociously so I put it up nice and loud.

Eventually though, I just walked over and asked her to keep it down.

Faster than the speed of light

2011-09-22T13:49:00.000-07:00

No, I'm not kidding. No, it's not just a title to try and grab your attention. If you know anything about physics, you'll know just how bizarre that statement is.

Before I begin, now that the paper has been released, here's the link to download the paper from arXiv.

Well, thanks to following Adam Frank, I just read this little snippet over at the Associated Press and simply had to squeeze a word in edgeways. Oh, and also in the spirit of all things physics, a quick word on the fact-checker for the Big Bang Theory. [Edit: Adam wrote his own post on it here, and I'm still officially a non-believer until results have been confirmed by at least two other labs - Fermi's working on it already and I'm sure KEK will have a finger or two in there soon. Let's see.]

[Further Edit: when the Quantum Diarists start weighing in, you know people mean business... am enjoying being part of a buzz on the blogosphere - always fun. Especially when everyone could be horribly wrong but is still just a teensy bit excited.]

Now, not being a physicist myself, I obviously am not going to do the story justice, but as an enthusiast, I feel something must be said.

"CERN says a neutrino beam fired from a particle accelerator near Geneva to a lab 454 miles (730 kilometers) away in Italy traveled 60 nanoseconds faster than the speed of light. Scientists calculated the margin of error at just 10 nanoseconds, making the difference statistically significant. But given the enormous implications of the find, they still spent months checking and rechecking their results to make sure there was no flaws in the experiment."

So according to the Standard Model, neutrinos are uncharged particles that very rarely interact with anything. They were discovered by Wolfgang Pauli of Pauli's exclusion principle fame. They fall under a group of elementary particles or fundamental particles called leptons - which includes their better known charged cousins, electrons. Interestingly, they were discovered in the same way that CERN is observing particles today - by smashing particles together, measuring momentum before the smash, measuring momentum after the smash and examining any differences. Gross oversimplification, but if you think that people are actually sitting there with super-powerful microscopes looking for these things visually, forget it. They are sitting there with petabytes of data going "Now, what looks *strange* here...?? Where are things not adding up?"

Neutrinos are so weakly interacting that there are currently billions of them flying right through you as we speak. They are generated by the sun, when they are not being fired from one lab to another by particle physicists. The reason they can do that is because they don't interact via the strong force (one of the four fundamental forces), but are subject to the other three - gravity, electromagnetism and the weak force.

Up until now, we (and by we, I mean society who cared) thought that photons, which carry the electromagnetic force and which are responsible for, among other things, our ability to see the world around us, were the fastest things in the universe. They were said to travel at the speed of light - and I read a bloody interesting article on how the speed of light was actually measured - it involves Jupiter and it's moons, which incidentally I was checking out the other day with my binocs... I'm sure I have it on Evernote somewhere....

... I don't know if I have mentioned this recently but Evernote is the shit...

The point, however, is that this is exciting because it violates Einstein's special theory of relativity, the famous "E" equals "m" multiplied by "c" squared. E in the equation is energy, m is mass and c is a constant, the speed of light. This fundamental little equation is what so much of our understanding of the cosmos is based on. It implies a fixed relationship between energy and matter. Interestingly, during my meanderings through physics, a pretty awesome thing to think about is that the universe started out simply as energy. It was infinitely hot and infinitely bright, but it was the unification of both light and mass. Somewhere along the timeline, a few billionths of a second into the universe's existence, the Higgs field is supposed to have come into being, giving mass to some of the particles of the nascent universe and allowing light, which is massless, to separate from mass. The two can never, and will never, be so closely confined as long as the universe exists.

So essentially, this is big stuff. Really big stuff. The whole physics-verse is abuzz and aflutter with the news, and now I have to work my little butt off trying to find out what kind of impact this will have and why it really is such a big deal. I know it will have an impact on cosmology, not to mention things like what I just described - the age and origin of the universe... it's size... the distance of celestial objects, our understanding of matter and how it interacts with space-time... but obviously I have no understanding of the real nitty-gritty aspects. Aside from that, however, it's all Greek and Hebrew to me.

Another thing I've just remembered which is incredibly significant is that time is said not to pass for photons because they travel at the speed of light. I'm not 100% why that is, but if Brian Cox said it, it must be true (is he sexy because he's a physicist or is he a physicist because he's sexy, you decide). Given that it's relatively close to my bed-time, I'm not going to investigate into that too heavily just yet, but suffice it to say that if that is the case, then these neutrinos are effectively time travelling. Either that or we have to redefine our idea of time AGAIN. Not that we have a particularly fixed concept of what time really is, but up until now, it has relied pretty heavily on the concomitant idea of the speed of light.

Still, how awesome will it be if the investigations are confirmed... that will definitely be by far and away the most exciting news to affect my life personally. In fact, I'll have a personal day of celebration. Fascinating stuff.

"Fuck Off, Facebook!" [Edit:... and how to cope...]

2011-09-21T12:59:00.000-07:00

Wow, I've been keeping up quite a good schedule of daily posts these past few weeks... partly due to the nocturnal thing but partly also because I am simply managing to find more to talk about than "OMG I'm an emo chick". Well, is that really true? I don't know, you tell me.

So today, Facebook, after giving subtle hints that they were going to make some major layout changes dropped the bombshell and simply made them. There had been subtle rumblings on the Facebook forum previously about what they were doing and what they weren't doing, and the feedback was overwhelmingly negative. So of course, today, when they finally did the "No choice" roll-out, my Facebook feed is literally weeping with insults about how dreadfully unhappy users are and to sum up, several people have used the phrase I have chosen as an emphatic title.

Firstly, as someone who has worked in IT and has had to deal with roll-outs from a bottom-up perspective - um DUH. Of course users aren't going to like changes that are dramatically imposed on them. Facebook knows this. Anyone who has ever rolled-out an IT solution, however, also knows that after about 3 - 6 weeks of bitching, everyone has eventually adjusted and sees the benefit in the new changes and from then on never is heard a discouraging word. Facebook probably also knows this. Most importantly of all, however, is that Facebook are actually good at what they do. I don't mean they are good at rolling out new functionality, good god - they suck at that - I mean they are good at providing a no-cost social networking solution that is flexible and reliable. I can't say much for their security, but honestly, what on earth would you be putting on your social network of choice that you aren't prepared to share with the rest of the world? Let me clarify. There have been instances of people being judged negatively in social and work situations based on things that have been said and done on Facebook. I hate to break it to you, but there have been more instances of that happening *in the real world*.

Secondly, no, I don't appreciate the changes, but I did know they were coming. One reason was because of the launch of Google+. It's sleek, it's sexy and Facebook had to do something to curb users ditching them. From a psychological perspective, I think they have done a damn good job, even though I wasn't planning to leave in the first place. What I don't agree with is that Facebook necessarily copied Google+. Let's take the biggest and most obvious example - Facebook lists and Google+ circles. Google+ launched with the explicit premise of enabling you to classify the people in your life - Friends, Work Colleagues, Small Penis Ex-Boyfriends, etc. The idea here was that you could decide what information to share with who - potentially preventing you from posting pictures of your skinny-dipping adventures to your boss, for example. Facebook has long since offered the option to customise who you share your posts with - I've only had to make use of it once and that was when I was slagging off a dude :D Not that I don't love publicly slagging dudes off (I mean hello, this is me we're talking about here - it should be listed as one of my hobbies - "Every few months I enjoy alienating myself from yet another member of the male sub-species by publicly slagging him off and calling him out for having a pea-sized penis which, incidentally, is smaller than mine." Yeah, I said it. Re-read it. It'll say the same thing. Bitches.)

Good god... what was I talking about again?

OH YEAH - FB allowed you to customise who saw your posts to a very high level of detail but nobody made use of the feature - largely because I think people were too lazy to learn how or didn't see the need. Yet when Google+ circles became a topic of discussion, it was like they were the first to ever think of such a concept. Facebook, instead of pointing out that the feature already existed, went ahead and "enhanced" the Lists feature - supposedly creating an algorithm to allow you to see the things you most wanted to see.

Now, that is a massive fail on the part of Facebook. An algorithm? *Really?!*

I like my Astronomy and Physics posts, but Facebook's algorithm never seems to pick that up, despite the fact that I click on those links more often. No, what ends up at the top of my "Top Picks" (or whatever it was called - I always browsed by "Most Recent" anyway) was some bullshit about "OMG I just got my nipple pierced and my boyfriend had to stick ice in his mouth and suck it so it wasn't so painful anymore". Ha ha - no but seriously, it's always some social BS that has the most comments by other people - NEVER what I actually want to see. Enhanced "Lists" has done no better, in my opinion - apparently they now think I want to follow people whom I went to University with (ahem - please!) or people who live in Johannesburg (yes, because proximity definitely increases my interest in them as a subgroup of the population). Oh, and it can apparently tell who my "Close Friends" are... and funny, none of the people I actually consider close friends are actually on that list!

There's now an annoying little frame that shows you when anyone on your friends list does anything with anyone - whether you know the other person or not. Suggestions are made to me about people I should subscribe to and again, they are all either journalists or in the media - and I follow Astrophysicists and Astrophotographers and Artists and... oooh, they all start with "A"! Oh, and how can I forget my personal favourite - Astronauts! And your algorithm thinks I'm going to get excited about Journos? They are so far down the alphabet it's not even funny.

So no, I'm not a fan of the new changes. I don't like them and I would like Facebook to go back to the way it was.

However.

Once I get over my initial rebellion against having something imposed on me against my will, I will recall how I have been doing the cost benefit analysis in my head as all of this has been happening. I have never been part of such a massive network of intellectuals as I currently am. Sure I still have to keep some dumb people on my friend's list because they are pretty... you never know when you might need someone to jerk off to (this goes back to my comment about having a penis - which is a joke but if you want to take it literally, please feel free NOT to sleep with me if you're a dude. You wouldn't want to feel all inferior now since mine IS still bigger than yours).

Sheesh - there must have been something in the Thai soup I had earlier. The point is that I love the network. The interface is meaningless as long as I have found people I can share awesome stuff with. Maybe I should do a blog post with "A Day in the Facebook Life of Sarai" and show you guys some of the cool stuff that goes around... like A Turing Test of Free Will. Aurora piclets and NASA vids of coronal mass ejections. A comparison of Archimedes and Euclid. Perceptional paradoxes. Evolva Robots taking part in the Hawaii Iron Man triatholon. Swarmanoids. Humanoids. Sorry, I have realised robotics fascinates me so I've been sharing a lot of that stuff these days. But I got papers from the Lepton-Photon conference, useful arXiv links, the chance to actually communicate with Satoshi Furukawa... oh, and that's not even mentioning the art and photography stuff because let's face it, you need to visually appreciate some of that stuff. Yeah - that might be fun. I'll see if I can chuck that in somewhere.

[Update: 22 September 2011:

Well, that certainly didn't take long. Here are a few tips on how to accelerate your adjustment to the new changes (aka CHANGE MANAGEMENT)

1. Use the Ticker. A friend made a joke that she calls it the Tickler, and I'm inclined to do the same - it tickles your damn eyeballs everytime you open the page. Basically, the Ticker is your one stop shop - you can like, comment and review what your friends are seeing all in one go. If you are one of those people who hasn't yet grown a pair and learned to defriend people you are not actually friends with, well, that's your damn problem... you're going to see what they are doing ALL the time. Before using the Ticker, may I suggest you grow a pair. It's helped me see what my arty friends are looking at (which led me to more arty friends) and what my sciencey friends are reading (which made me more popular).

2. Lists, people, lists. If you want your feeds in reverse chronological order and don't need the Eyeball Tickler, use lists. If you have 600+ friends, I can assure you, it's going to take some time to organise them, which is why having such a large number is a bad idea. In fact, you can't possibly be actual friends with all of those people. Grow a pair, defriend the one's that you are not friends with and then organise the rest into lists. I am sticking to no more than 3 - Science, Art and People. Science for Physics, Astronomy and Mathematics; Art for Fine Arts, Graphic Design and people who share Positive Stuff and People for everyone else. Keep it short and sweet. You could also simply add all your friends to a List to have the old Facebook news feed layout. And stop filling my screen with your bitching.

3. Stop whining and take some time out to make the damn network work for you. If you're feeling uncomfortable with change, it's because you've simply gotten old. Next you'll be complaining that the kids play their music too loud and need to get the hell off your lawn. Start packing because we'll be shipping you off to the old age home in no time... :) Where is all this rudeness coming from, I wonder??]

Obese Perspectives on Exercise and Nutrition

2011-09-20T14:35:00.000-07:00

Ha ha - brilliant title. Okay, this is totally my second blog post of the same evening, but I'm staggering publishing. It's a nice little pre-bedtime post so I'm about to boil the kettle and make my cup of chamomile to allow my poor, Japanese-exhausted brain to take it easy for a few hours (potentially 5 whole ones at this stage).

Now, I've been fortunate enough to have been through many phases when it comes to food. At the moment, I'm not sure how much I weigh, but I'd guess somewhere just over 100kgs. That's actually pretty average for me - I've been up to about 150kg or more (gasp!) and the last time I was below 80kg was when I weighed 75kg at the end of matric. I've fluctuated pretty much constantly between about 85kg and 120kg since then, and before that, the fluctuations were even wilder - before finishing school, I would easily weigh in the 60s during a term, only to gain enough weight to be up in the low hundreds over the holidays.

So I do know a thing or two about how to gain and lose weight.

Something, or rather some things, have recently changed my perspectives in this regard, so I'd like to take this opportunity to share with you some correct, wise and realistic advice regarding physical shape, fitness and nutrition.

Firstly, it is, in fact, good to target a healthy weight and stick to it. Only this year did I realise that the reason some people don't like fluctuating in weight is because it necessitates a change in wardrobe - I actually have never owned a wardrobe full of clothes that are one size, and in fact hate going shopping for clothes because I hate having to get changed, but yet it is the only way for me to know what size I actually am at that time. But that's not the reason. :)

The reason, in my medical opinion, is that it will prolong your ability to remain active for as long as possible. Sure, sure - atherosclerosis and what have you - but in my experience, what made people get "old" in the "decrepit" sense was inactivity... when old people stopped doing stuff, their bodies started to break down, and FAST, whether they were 50 or 80. Studies have supported this view. 30 mins of exercise a day is cited as the baseline - and that doesn't mean 6 hours over the weekend and nothing during the week, that means 30mins every single day of doing something active. Active pretty much refers to the fact that your heart rate should rise to above 100 beats per minute, and all of you can bloody Google how to check your pulse, it's easy.

Secondly, nutrition is a pain in the ass unless you were fortunate enough to have parents who didn't stuff you with food as a substitute for giving you actual affection, or generally if you have other reasons for having developed an inability to respond to your body's actual needs early in life. Also, for future reference, please for the love of all that is pleasant in life, just give your children affection (if you're planning on having children) and don't give them video games or mountains of cookies and chocolates [Edit: You know, I'm sure other kids would have LOVED to have had my parents instead - spoilt brats always complain] because you think it will have the same effect - it won't! Good nutrition means eating as much as you use up during the day - plain and simple. In the modern world, that's a bloody difficult thing to do.

Why? Well, for one thing, we sit. A LOT. I spend my entire day sitting unless I get up to make food. Literally. I'm trying to work the exercise thing into my life too, mind, but it takes time - in fact, changing things like your level of activity and eating habits will take you a couple of years to get right, even if you make a consistent effort (unless you're uber-chi-master-of-discipline in which case you can get it right in about 6 months and still keep it up for the rest of your life). The key with nutrition is that you can't simply change what you eat and when you eat it, you have to change how you choose what to eat. You have to change your preferences, you have to change your entire attitude to food. It's a fundamental overhaul that takes dedicated and consistent time and effort, and quite frankly, while I have recently started making better choices, I know it's going to be a good few years of accepting that I have cravings and satisfying them (more sensibly over time, mind) before I have it down pat.

The quickest way to ensure successful nutrition is to look up tables on optimal nutrition and buy yourself a kitchen scale. Sit down and spend an afternoon or two working out how much you need to consume, how you're going to get that into yourself and what measurements that entails. You'll find that a portion of rice is about what will fit into the palm of your hand, and that pasta should be eaten far more sparingly than the servings offered at any restaurant. If you've been filling up your plate since you were knee high to a grasshopper, let me tell you, it AIN'T going to be easy. FORGET about the concept of being "full". Feeling "full" has nothing to do with nutrition, it's totally a psychological thing. I personally think this is probably the hardest part of changing any eating pattern because without the "full" feeling after a meal, you tend to feel... well, "empty". The challenge there is to find things other than food to "fill" you up - and when I figure out good ways of doing that, rest assured, I'll be the first to blog about it. It's definitely an emotional/psychological "emptiness" though, not a physical "emptiness".

Thirdly, forget damn BMI measurements and if at all possible, don't use a scale more than once or twice a year. Unless you have access to a machine that will accurately measure your BMI, you're either over- or under-estimating it horribly (okay, unless you're under 5% body fat in which case you obviously have a personal trainer or an eating disorder). Rather use a tape measure, if you really feel the need to be motivated by progress, but ultimately, it doesn't matter what figures your body is as long as you are getting the correct exercise and nutrition. Why? Because if you take care of the pennies, as the German proverb goes, the pounds will take care of themselves. If you spend more time freaking out about what digits you're at instead of figuring out what the hell to eat that will be tasty enough to satisfy you but still be within your calorie allowance, you WILL fail. Dismally, even.

Fourthly, and I cannot stress this enough... "diets" are pointless. Temporarily changing your eating habits is about as good as temporarily quitting smoking to avoid emphysema. You have to think long-term from the outset. Even if you don't get it right for a while, that's ok - it's better to commit to eating better for the rest of your life than to follow someone's idea of what is good to eat for a few weeks in the hopes of being in a thong bikini for the next 6 years. [Edit: you're most welcome to wear a thong bikini if you weight 100kg, I'm not one for stopping the flaunting, but I personally wouldn't do it unless I had a butt worth showing off] There are "diet" products that supposedly suppress appetite but if you're going that route, may I suggest you take narcotics such as cocaine or amphetamines since they will do exactly the same thing but at least give you some euphoria and probably do less damage to your kidneys and liver? Cheating is for kids in high school. Furthermore, chicks on diet ads usually have eating disorders - they used to recruit them from the mental hospitals in Cape Town while we were working there.

Lastly, since I've already labelled this a "5 things" post - the whole weight loss/fitness thing requires you to be brutally honest with yourself, so you might as well as get used to the fact that you're going to find out things about yourself that you don't like. I'll give you some examples. I binge on cream. If I buy a container of cream, I can't leave the damn thing alone until it is finished and I will eat it with everything. I read the calorie content (45% fat) and I still slather it onto everything - you name it: muesli, berries, coffee... anything. One day I was so desperate just to keep at it that I made sweet roti's with macadamia nuts JUST so that I could slather them with cream and pig out, because I wanted to finish it.

Another thing is that I am incapable of going long periods of time without something sickly sweet. Not because I'm hungry, not because I need it, but I get cravings and I honestly have no idea how to bypass them. I'm not talking "two teaspoons of sugar" sweet, I'm talking a slab of Cadbury's sweet... an entire Malva pudding sweet... chocolate mousse sweet... you get the idea, right? Two years ago I wouldn't have been able to just have ONE slab of chocolate, that would have been like punishment. I would have HAD to have had two. Now I manage with a half a slab... it's taken a while, but I think I'm getting there. The thing is, I've noticed that people find the most absurd justifications for this stuff like "Oh but you know the body needs these things from time to time." No, the body doesn't - just be honest - you want it and you can't control the craving. It's better to just admit it and be honest and find ways to work on it. It's not easy, but it is totally doable. Another favourite is "Everyone should have one cheat day." Again, that's like saying if you're going to quit smoking, you should have at least one day of the week where you binge smoke and piss it all up a tree... chance are, allowing yourself a chance to cheat will just remind you of your old eating habits and you'll be more tempted in future. Not. A good. Idea.

Anyway, for people who already have good lifestyle habits, all of this is likely nothing new. For the rest, I hope it's at least given you something to think about - I don't advocate people rushing out and going to gym after reading this because I can tell you that you have completely the wrong motivation. As for me, I'm working on skipping at the moment. I was walking every day while in my nocturnal phase but sadly once that ended, so did the walking... it was great exercise for making me sleepy but I can't take walks at 1am in the morning before going to bed. :)

Comparing India and China - TED Talk by Yasheng Huang

2011-09-19T11:45:00.000-07:00

Let's start off with the TED talk that inspires this blog post: a talk by Yasheng Huang on whether or not democracy stifles economic growth. I had to find out who he actually was, and it turns out he is a professor of political economy and international management at Sloan School of Managment, MIT and does a lot of writing for loads of mags like The Guardian and Forbes - although this just makes me think he's someone whom my economist/investment management studying sibling would rather meet than I would.

Still, the man raised some points that I personally was not aware of at all - so I figured I would share for those who don't know. I mean, if you really want to keep me quiet, the best way is to start talking about business - anything about economics or finance has me completely stymied. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I can converse at or better than at average level about pretty much anything OTHER than business. My aversion is deep-seated - I grew up with money and I personally think having more money does not make you a better or worse person. On the other hand, sibling dearest is a walking investment management textbook - the kid is scoring in the 90s for her tests (and wondering why she isn't doing better, mind). Her philosophy is that she wants to know as much about money as possible to be aware of how the system is screwing her over. I quite like that thinking. I would, however, personally prefer to spend my energies trying to grips with modern physics, which I have now realised *necessitates* a study of mathematics, so now I friggin have to spend the next two years or so teaching myself.

Anyway, Yasheng and his talk. So over the last 30 years, China has surged ahead where India has sort of limped and crawled along, and he goes into a number of reasons for this. It is true to a certain extent that having a one-party political system has helped the Chinese government implement changes. It's easier, as he points out, to consider the eviction of hundreds of thousands of people from Shanghai a minor technicality if you aren't the kind of government who listens to your people.

But that's not what shocked me. What shocked me was how they treat their women. China has become famous for instituting their one-child policy, mainly because the rest of the world thinks that being able to spawn and respawn infinitely is a right, not a privilege, and therefore have attached some unecessary sentiments to it. There are so many stories of parents either abandoning their female children or having them put to death, that when I was a youngster and decided I wasn't going to have kids, one of my dreams was to adopt two Chinese girls (1. They were going to be named Nicola and Michelle. 2. When I learned Japanese, I realised I could raise them as Japanese little girls. 3. I have long since given up on this and all adoption unless I get to sponsor a whole orphanage... how can you go in there and just choose ONE kid?).

India, on the other hand, has never really been singled out overtly for their treatment of women, even though the literacy and life expectancy tables shown in this talk tell a horrific story! Okay sure, we all know that Indian women are known for their excessive submissiveness - that's a given. Wait, let me rephrase that even more strongly - to find an Indian woman who is intelligent, independent and strong in character is an anomaly. They rarely exist. I mean, as the talk puts it, literacy among women in India up until comparatively recently was 33.7% and the working definition of literacy is being able to write your own name in your home language... what?! This makes certain things all the more obvious now that I take time out to think about it. Don't get me wrong, I had a conversation with ze Germans about how SAP never seems to send female consultants from Germany and they told me it is because even in Germany, women tend to become home-makers and stay at home to look after kids. They even get a stipend from the government to do it - and not like the child care grants we get here (*cough* R700 *cough*), like they basically get paid a salary. We debated about women not wanting to travel and all sorts of things as well. Basically to sum it up, my conclusion has been that most women are chickenshits. :)

But the life expectancy thing? That really blew me away. To have a country where women have lower life expectancy than men is literally unheard of. There are more diseases that kill men than women, other than the great equaliser - childbirth. That's the only reason that I can honestly think of that women would have a lower life expectancy - frequent... nay, RAMPANT death in childbirth. Given that they now have the second highest population in the world, one has to wonder how that actually happened. An amusing memory was the ex asking me why a friend of mine didn't have children, like he had never been exposed to women who choose not to have children... that too really baffled me - it never crossed my mind that having children was ever THAT much of given status of being female in any culture! But the difference in life expectancy - I mean, yikes. Yikes yikes yikes. If I had ever had to practice medicine in India I would have committed suicide. Simple. Thank god the worst I had to deal with was the high rate of rape cases and physical abuse. I'd much rather have that on my hands than additional mass maternal mortality (because lets face it, rape and physical abuse MUST happen in India more than anywhere else on the planet with the attitude they have towards women) thank you very much.

Anyhoo, it's worth a watch since the bottom line is that in the short-term, authoritarian governments CAN do much better, but in the long term, democracy will probably prevail. I heard a lot of people about three or four years ago mumbling about how the whole world was going to become communist because China was going to become more powerful. That shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how global politics work in my opinion but having said that, I've also realised that people actually prefer to consider the worst possible outcome because it justifies them getting away with doing really stupid shit in the present. It's a weird psychological trait of the population.

Right, that's enough work avoidance for one night. I had actually written an awesome post titled "Wow you look really intelligent in that low cut top" in which I talked about how the real reason girls get dressed up is to attract attention from guys... i.e. any arguments regarding "It boosts my self-esteem" and "I dress up for me" are actually rubbish. When I re-read it however, I realised that I'm probably the only person who is just realising this now and also that I [almost] mentioned my IQ. One would think that someone who goes around bragging about being smart would have figured out simple shit like that a loooooooooooooooong time ago. But I didn't. So I'll have to do some rewriting.

Avoiding Interpersonal Blowouts

2011-09-17T08:59:00.000-07:00

Hee hee - I have to say, this is one of the things that I am particularly bad at... letting people know when they have pissed me off a little bit, instead of bottling it all up and then spewing ten varieties of pure molten shit all over them. I'm the kind of person who prefers to gloss over the minor irritations (and often the major one's as well), hoping that somehow the other person will figure out that they have annoyed me and therefore stop doing the behaviour. I even sometimes avoid them or am mean to them indirectly without actually saying why. As you can imagine, this does not usually have the desired results since, let's face it, when you hide your true feelings from people, people on the whole tend to suck at interpreting your feelings.

Funny enough, when my sister mentioned how she hates it when her flatmate doesn't put the loo roll on the loo-roll-holder (and I NEVER do), my first piece of advice was "Tell her now, before you get upset with her over something silly and then you blow up over how she never puts the toilet roll on the holder". I even postulated that I could understand why she was upset about it - you sit down, do your business, look over at the loo-roll-holder and lo and behold, no loo roll! It might be behind you on the back of the toilet or on the window sill above you, but your immediate thought it "The other person finished the loo paper and neglected to refill the loo roll... they are inconsiderate and selfish and I hope they burn in hell. Now to plot my revenge on how to piss them off equally as much as they have pissed me off."

I've done this with things far less innocuous than not putting loo roll on the holder, but it will serve as a good enough example. The thing is, when you finally flip out and spew all over the other person, it's highly unlikely to have much of an effect because they will be thinking "But just now everything was fine and now this? It must be just a mood swing." Meanwhile, you are sitting there knowing full well that everything prior was NOT fine. It was the opposite of fine - you were just pretending everything was fine to either keep the peace or avoid confronting the person about it because you were probably afraid that the blowout (which you know is inevitable if you have had one before) was going to happen then and there. Sometimes it was circumstantial, like you didn't want to piss someone off because you were dependant on them for something - let's go a step further and assume they were the only person in the world with any loo roll... it's unlikely that you would want to upset them because from then on you would never know where your next loo roll was going to come from!

While the antidote is simple, it isn't exactly easy. It involves moving from being the kind of person who avoids confronting anything to being the kind of person who confronts everything. It means opening your mouth every time someone pisses you off and saying "Please don't do that, it really pisses me off" in a polite and calm manner, something a person who is prone to blowouts thinks is impossible! It also means risking having other people not listen to you and having to repeat yourself, which in and of itself (especially in my case) may prompt a blowout of its own. It means not shoving down the emotion but allowing it to come to the surface and just being honest about it. It also means accepting that the other person may not be able to see things from your point of view.

I can cite so many real-life examples of this in my own life that I don't even want to - I just want to change. I want to be able to tell people immediately when they do things that annoy me so that either the person gets out of my life or the behaviour does. So that's what I've started doing - I've just started laying it out there in black and white and saying "You know what, I don't appreciate that you did ABC, either shape up or ship out." One classic example is the fact that I work 7 days a week. At the moment I've got a lot on my plate and have taken on a lot, and the only way to get through it all for now is to just push through for the next month and a half. I tried to get this idea across in a non-personal way by posting it on Facebook, and then when people still asked me to come and do stuff or tried to get hold of me, I would remind them that this was the way it was going to be (this started a month and a half ago when I had to start really getting into the whole working 7 day weeks thing). Some people got it, but some people didn't. I even reminded people that if they gave me sufficient notice, I would be able to do stuff with them, or if they sent me emails instead of chat requests, I would be more likely to respond. Now I have a three strikes approach. I'll say so the first time, I'll remind you a second time and I'll block you the third time. Simple. If you insist on trying to make my life more difficult than it already is, I'll warrant I'll be better off without you in it.

Now, what happens when you start doing stuff like this is that your list of friends starts diminishing, often quite drastically. After giving it some thought, if you think about it, the chances are that the people who actually matter and who really care about you are the ones who are likely to stick around. There don't even have to be that many of them - two or three are fine. In fact, at this stage, if it really came down to it, I'd rather have just one person - just one - who was a genuine friend than 30 whom I have to pretend and repeat myself in front of.

Still, it's important to remember that getting rid of dead-weight friendships is actually a good thing. It is allowing you to open yourself up to new friendships. The thing is, with the new friendships, you have to make sure that you are yourself from the word go. That means that even if you're just getting to know the person, if they do something that pisses you off - say so immediately. Politely and calmly, but immediately. If they don't appreciate your honesty or don't agree with you and decide they no longer want to be around you, GREAT! You save yourself the trouble of investing in a friendship that will ultimately make you unhappy. If they are willing to apologise and avoid the behaviour in future, GREAT! You have found a friend who will allow you to be yourself and who will make an effort to try to keep you happy. Obviously those are two extremes, sometimes you get the person who will apologise, but who might not agree with you and who still want to be around you. I'm not sure what to do in those situations, I've only just managed to get to this point after all, but I'd hazard a guess that it's probably better to have a bit of a natter about it and decide what you both think is best. After all, the person is open to talking about it, so maybe you can come to some sort of compromise - one that doesn't involve you pretending everything is ok.

I'll say this though - it's not easy - but it's totally worth it. In fact, here's to a new life of being open and speaking up, no matter what the circumstances, and hoping for things to work out as they should. In fact, in my life, they already are.

On Career Switching

2011-09-14T14:04:00.000-07:00

As a professional career tourist, I think it's high time for this post.

Before beginning, as always, it's best to throw in some unrelated information with which to impress you all - I saw the ISS today! It whizzed across the sky and I actually got a pretty good look at it through my binocs - refraction helped a little as it neared the horizon and the "fins" came into better view. Now, what I found strange about this was that as I was watching it, my eyes filled with tears and I got all completely choked up - I felt really emotional! Not in a sad way - in a totally awe-filled, amazed and delighted way - I can't explain it... I struggle to recall anything else that has made me feel that way... it was very strange for me but I totally loved it. There are two more chances to spot it tomorrow and on Friday, but they will both be more difficult.

Anyhoo - time to segue into the main body of the post.

So let's do a quick recap - I studied medicine, worked as a doctor for two years, switched to IT and then worked there for three years and now I'm an entrepreneur. Well, at the moment I'm more of a freelancer, really, but don't you worry, there is entrepreneurship going on. Given these drastic changes, I think it's safe to say that I have a fair bit to say about switching careers.

Firstly, people will always try to discourage you. Personally, given that I have done this twice, I can tell you openly and honestly that it has nothing to do with you or your abilities and everything to do with the other person's insecurities. Sometimes other people don't want you to suffer, but trust me, this motivation is very, very rare - or rather, people are more worried about you coming to ask them for money later than whether or not you're doing ok. People also cannot help but transfer their own fears onto you - because they are afraid of what would happen if they tried to change careers, they tell YOU not to change careers. Some people don't want to see you succeed where they have failed because it will make them feel inferior - they may not consciously realise this, and worst of all, they may never have even tried but they just don't want to see other people do it because it reminds them that they feel like a failure for never having tried.

When I was leaving medicine, my surgeon didn't want me to leave because he really valued my help. Despite normally being my pillar of support, he would say the most horrible things when I brought up leaving. He really tried to discourage me. (Note, this was the same man who when I said "OMG I have a boyfriend for the first time ever!" said "Don't worry, you'll get over the excitement when you realise that all men are shitheads.") It was really hard not to take what he said to heart, but I'm lucky because I generally tend to be a rebel, so I am used to not listening to what other people think.

When I was leaving Accenture, it was even more drastic - people would give me pop-quizzes on what I was going to do, and when I said "I don't know", they would berate me for not having planned my life better. Either that, or they would assure me that I would either end up back at Accenture or in another similar environment where I was earning less for doing the same thing. The funniest thing, though, was a conversation with the German boys, who were both horrified that I did not have adequate savings to support myself - Re seriously got very agitated about this because he thought it was outright stupid not to have enough money to be comfortable ALL the time. Hilarious. I simply said "Thanks for your input guys, but I'm not letting YOUR insecurities about not having money influence MY life."

Secondly, on the topic of money, there will likely be a drop in income between career A and career B. This is normal, but the only person who will appreciate it will be you. Nobody else will care. Everyone will expect you to be making the same amount of money and therefore still be available to do the same things. Saying "I don't have money" will be received badly. There's nothing you can do about it. People who aren't (or who haven't) gone through what you are going through will simply not understand how you have to adjust your finances in order to cope with the transition. As far as other people are concerned, their happiness comes first, and if you can't ensure that, you will be considered a bad friend. Plain and simple. If you're lucky, you might have one or two people who are understanding about it, but they are again very, very rare (I'm lucky to have two - and both have either fed me or provided me with goodies in times of great need). Don't say I didn't warn you.

Thirdly, if you care what other people think about your abilities to perform a task, don't change careers. If you need a lot of affirmation from other people, don't change careers. If you like being considered an expert in your field and your ego is tied to "being the best", don't change careers. Every time you make a change, you go from climbing the rungs of the ladder to being a bottom feeder all over again. It's pretty crap, if your sense of identity is tied to either praise from others or the feeling of mastery of a task. On the other hand, it is incredibly valuable to be able to start all over again at something, because only by doing this can you ever know the true extent of your potential. We are all capable of doing a lot more than we think we are, but because we are never pushed, we never try. Congrats for you if you continue to start new projects in your life that have nothing to do with your career - you are probably experiencing the same thing.

Fourthly, people have told me time and again that they think I am very brave for making all the dives that I have made. I think bravery has nothing to do with it - or rather, my definition of bravery involves very different parameters. I find that what other people consider bravery is what I consider the ability to cope with vulnerabilty. People spend a lot of time protecting themselves from being vulnerable because they are afraid - and hence they equate someone who copes with vulnerability with a brave person. For me, bravery is something totally different - it is the ability to face fear head on and push through. I'm not afraid of vulnerabilty - so for me it doesn't feel like bravery. If anything, I feel like I have been incredibly impulsive, which has served me far better than either bravery or the acceptance of vulnerability.

Lastly, you have to be willing and able to accept the consequences of your choices. I'm not a great believer in giving up, this is true, but it goes further than that. If I make a choice, I make every effort to stick with it. Making a choice is really one of the fundamental human rights - something that nobody can take away from you. Conversely, making a choice is meaningless unless you actually commit to making that choice work for you. Sometimes there will be hardships - it goes without saying - but if you chose to be where you are, accept that the hardship is part of the process. Thinking back to my first year at Accenture, the only way I managed to work my way up the ladder was by taking every task I was given and making the most of it - because even when I was given shitty work to do, I remembered that I had chosen that job. Granted, I tried to apply the same principle to the relationship that I was in and that did not work out quite as well - mainly because that was a very bad choice on my part... :) In fact, having said that, I think while it is good to stick with your choices, it is also good to know when the jig is up and when to call it quits... it helps to make good choices from the get-go, but it's impossible to make good choices ALL the time if you are impulsive!

I am the kind of person who believes that I can do anything - literally. I've always thought that. I think life is about the freedom to do what you want to do, without having to be tied down to what anyone else thinks. If you think that way, I honestly don't know what your excuse is for not career hopping, it's the greatest feeling ever. On the other hand, if you're a great big chicken, please continue to enjoy the confines of the coop and for god's sake stop complaining about it. :)

ISS Unmanned and Japan's Nuclear Weaning

2011-09-13T20:01:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of hype around two topics in my world recently, which I thought I'd share.

Before sharing, however, take a moment to consider how infinitessimal the influence of this single post is going to be. You might be a regular reader of this blog (and for that, I thank you, and praise you for your excellent taste), but you might be someone who happened to stumble upon the blog either via Google, another blog, or via a comment I have left on your, or someone else's, blog. Irrespective, you'll read this, perhaps digest a little, and go about your day. I will long since have gone to bed. This post will simply be another item of data in the ocean of data that we now call the interwebz. Fleeting.

[Edit: This is the post that has saved you from a potentially very whiny post about some personal BS. Be glad]

Still, let's get down to business. ISS - the International Space Station. Recently, the Russian cargo ship Progress crashed after some launch issues. Slightly amusingly (considering the Americans and their penchant for over-dramatisation) this was very soon after the retirement of the space shuttle program, with Atlantis making it's final landing only a few weeks prior.

Two things happened. Firstly, the American media blew the crash grossly out of proportion - you would have thought there were children on board the damn cargo ship the way they lambasted the Russians. Sure, they had some issues, but their track record all-in-all is pretty damn good. Secondly, the American media claimed that they were considering leaving the ISS unmanned because of "doubts" around the "safety" of the Russian vehicles.

Now I don't know enough about how the ISS works, but I think grounding Americans is always a good thing. In fact, keeping them within their own borders usually works out exceptionally well for the rest of the world. The fact that they behaved like they didn't have not one, but TWO shuttles EXPLODE, killing their entire crews is pathetic - they have fried more astronauts that the Russians have and simply want to make them look bad now that the spotlight is no longer on them. It very much feels like a spoilt brat whose father suddenly gets retreched making fun of the poor kids in the playground.

I think it's safe to say that no American media have deigned to report on why the shuttle program, and most other NASA initiatives, have been shut down. Yes, yes, we all know it's because of funding, but that's very superficial... Needless to say, the ISS is an international project. Russia is sending a crew back up there in November. 3 astro's are coming down on the 18th of September. I'm all for Americans not being involved.

Japan's nuclear disaster which accompanied their great quake 6 months ago is next on the agenda. I've started following blogs that discuss the political situation in Japan, mainly because they have just chucked their second PM in 2 years and have voted in a man who describes himself as a loach (bottom-feeder). Dammit and now I can't remember his name off the top of my head... this is what pre-bedtime posting does to a person...

Y'all probably don't care and he's not why I'm writing. The nuclear disaster largely stemmed from the fact that Japan was using outdated nuclear technology which was insufficiently protected to prevent exposure in the face of a national disaster. Given that the island lies at the confluence of two tectonic plates, the fact that people were shocked about the earthquake still baffles me - and on the other hand, the fact that they didn't think to quake-proof the damn nuclear power stations the way they have quake-proofed every damn building in the country baffles me just as equally. Of course, the former speaks to the general public's lack of understanding vis-a-vis tectonic plate theory, but the latter is obviously some convoluted financial thing that I'll never stoop to trying to understand.

Be that as it may, the country was up in arms about nuclear power and why Japan is so dependent on it. An interesting point. If I think back to about 15 years ago, I remember learning about how the world was scrambling to get their hands on nuclear power - for various reasons - aside from the high start-up costs and potential for a repeat of Chernobyl. Countries who didn't go nuclear were lagging behind and doomed to perish when the world's coal resources ran out in the year 2000 (I actually still have the encyclopedias I used to read as a kid that show that oil and coal should have run out long ago). Now Japan is pushing for more renewable energy sources.

Firstly, may I just slot in here that the radiation damage from Hiroshima is still a very prevalent issue? Working in the thyroid surgery department, it is still a baffling thing to doctors that cases of thyroid cancer are on the increase, rather than dying out. Its quite the same with other forms of cancer (cancer is big business in Japan). Secondly, I am very pro this renewable energy drive, because if anyone can do it, Japan can. I'm realistic in that I believe they won't simply switch off their nuclear reactors, but I do think that they will excel at developing and implementing some really interesting stuff.

Time to watch this space, I guess.

There's no Internet in Space

2011-09-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

Let's start off by sending you off to the page where the inspiration for this blog post came from.

Let's then continue on to say that it is now very nearly 4am in the morning - which is the late night of my nocturnal day. I'm struggling a bit today - far more tired than usual - which may have something to do with the fact that I carbo-loaded [read: stuffed myself with about 8 roti] before my marathon [read: nightmare of an assignment which I was optimistically hoping to finish but am really just under halfway and can now no longer even stomach to look at].

Still, this little gem is a share by Jun Okushi on FB (Facebook, for those of you inept enough not to know what that abbreviation means. Yes, I do insult my readers when I am tired). Jun is one of the many people whom I've never actually met, but whose shares I enjoy - we never communicate directly, he just shares articles and I just enjoy them. Occasionally I comment. As I did in this case. Good grief, I had to check if I was still wearing my glasses because the text has gone all blurry... diagnosis: mild dehydration thank to coffee drunk to try and keep me awake during a day when clearly my brain would rather be 6 feet under.

Where was I again? OH RIGHT! No internet in space.

So - I read the article - these dudes are simulating a trip to Mars. Mars is pretty much just around the corner in cosmic terms, so therefore 15 months is a short trip. Yet these guys are apparently cracking after 15 months. My first reaction was "How can they be bored if they have the internet?" It was then that it dawned on me - ME, who would be the first to volunteer for a space flight into the great unknown (if I wasn't a giant lard-ass) - what the reality of that would entail.

Firstly, I would be stuck in a highly confined environment with other people for a very, very long period of time. This was the same situation that had me popping tranquilisers like they were daily snacks when I first started working for Accenture. Incidentally, I got some really bad side effects like tics and weird stuff like this, and after a glass of wine one night had an accident in the rental car and then forgot where I had left the car. Total amnesia. I don't think I'd be functioning well enough to participate in the operation of a space craft in any capacity if I had to do the same thing.

Secondly, there would be no internet. There would be no news of the world, there would likely be only sporadic direct communication with earth. Well - that might not be true - I mean if Hubble can see 13 billion years into the past and counting, perhaps we could have satellite internet onboard the spaceship? No way of getting in touch with people I actually *want* to talk to and being stuck with a bunch of people who will no doubt already have pissed me off by the mere fact that their presence in my space is non-negotiable (because really, I am a polymath but I have no desire to be the ship engineer... anything but the engineer...).

[Eating lots of cream clogs up your lynphatic system and gives you pimples and collections of pus in weird places. You have been warned.]

Thirdly, I think I would have learned the fine art of meditation and used the time onboard the ship to perfect this fine art. Imagine how little you would be allowed to take onboard - there would be very little room to bring along anything to do or read - and even if you stored your stuff electronically, you would be risking wasting valuable, likely irreplaceable battery power. In fact, I would be highly pissed if someone brought along their boombox (fine, their iPod) and expected to charge it off the same power that kept the lights on, or the oxygen level monitors working, onboard the ship. Really now, I can just see myself flipping out about it.

Damn.

So basically, much as I have placed isolation from humankind way up there on my list of life priorities, I feel I might not be able to cope with the total isolation. Because it wouldn't be isolation. It would simply be segregation. Send me up there in that spaceship alone and I think I would be just fine. Or I'd go crazy but there would be nobody around to witness it happen or care. Except maybe the people who were paying for my trip because they might be a bit pissed.

I dunno I keep feeling like mentioning something about sex here because I'm currently completely averse to having any and I feel this would work in my favour. Sorry to all the male readers out there, it's not that I hate men or anything, it's that I think y'all are just pointless and useless. Oh shit, did I just say that out loud? IN SLEEP DEPRIVATION VINO VERITAS, BITCHES!

Internet Boyfriends and Online Personas

2011-09-10T09:48:00.000-07:00

I'm writing this while sitting at Doppio Zero - I came out to treat myself while reading the next chapter of the textbook in advance... this whole nocturnal thing has greatly advanced productivity! On the other hand, I'm feeling slightly bummed for no particular reason - I think it might be the lack of sunlight. Or cortisol. I should buy a UV light bulb for my desk lamp!

What I find amusing about the topic is that I spent so much time hiding this from the world that I would have been mortified if anyone had ever found out. Now, however, that I have reached a heightened state of self-acceptance, I think it's worth shouting from the rooftops.

While I never had had actual in-real-life relationships, it came to my attention during a previous post that I actually had a few online relationships. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concept, it's pretty simple - it's everything that an in-real-life (hereafter IRL) relationship is but without any physical contact and with loads of imagination. So there are all the awkward periods where you're getting to know each other after which you spend loads of time talking and find you have lots in common... then you go through that whole flirty period where you are sort of trying to hint that you like the person, but you don't want to make it too obvious in case they don't feel the same way... it was all very cute, really.

Obviously, for me, this was incredible. Firstly, I used to visit quite a few chat programs and spend time talking to people, and as you can imagine, back in the day there weren't many girls online... so we used to get all the attention! IRL I was this unpopular fat chick but when I was online I was the star of the show - no wonder I would rather spend time talking to other people online!! Obviously there were some guys who got more attention than others, and over time those would be the guys who got my email address and were allowed to establish more lasting contact. It was primarily through the exchange of email that the whole "online relationship" was started.

The interesting thing about said "relationships" was that there were romantic elements but not necessarily sexual elements. I do remember having sexual conversations with guys online from time to time - first you start chatting about sex and then what you would like to do in bed and that kind of thing... oooh, just remembered the "cybersex" craze! So guys would ask "Do you want to cyber?" and then you would have a conversation where you wrote out what you would do to each other sexually if you were together... Ah - that was hilarious! Firstly, since I hadn't had sex, I didn't actually know what the hell you were supposed to do to or for a guy, so I very usually said nothing, and secondly, there was very little arousal involved in the whole thing since I wasn't very involved. But still a very funny memory!!

There was, however, one major issue I recall as I think back. This was the issue of having an "online persona". Firstly, most of the people online at the time were caucasian - it was very rare to find non-caucasian people online. Believe it or not, most of them would openly drop the conversation if they found out that you were not caucasian. So I was very rarely honest about it. When people asked me what I looked like, I plain and simply made stuff up - and I got pretty good at it as well. Secondly, I could be a lot more aggressive or forward online than I ever was in real life - we all can. When I started chatting to people whom I actually eventually got to know in real life, they thought my online persona was the real me and were surprised when I was more reserved or less aggressive IRL.

In some ways I think this served to give me very good insight into how guys minds work. In fact, I find that when I actually started making friends IRL, it was much easier to make friends with guys than girls. Conversely, however, the ability to create an online persona made it more difficult for me to connect with people either online or IRL. Having the ability to change who you are to suit the individual makes you more conscious of what you're supposed to hide about yourself - so even though people may respond well to you, it's not because you're being who you really are, it's because you know how to play them like instruments. That's not a good thing, because then when you really open and act like yourself, they don't like it. So you either end the friendship or you continue to play the fiddle. It's not a nice position to be in.

I think having the internet really did cripple my social development - when I look at my life now, I feel like I'm only just starting to deal with certain things that other people went through in their adolescence or young adult life. I'm not sure I'll ever really catch up to people my own age. Still, it's a very good sign that I've managed to be able to get this stuff out there, because it shows that I'm also starting to find ways to integrate the person I was online into who I am now without being ashamed of it :)

Purpose of Social Networking Revisited

2011-09-09T07:56:00.000-07:00

Just woke up from a wonderful sleep - this nocturnal thing is working out beautifully for me. Massive shout out to BlueRecurve, who aside from actually adhering to the whole "Gimme x days notice rule" also came over at the appointed time, did not fret over the state of my humble abode, took me out to dinner and gave me not one, but TWO amazing presents - a Tibetan singing bowl and a packet of Twinings Lady Grey Tea! Speaking of which, I believe this would be an amazing time to have that first cuppa...

So the social networking thing - I'm a tried and tested Facebooker. It took me many years to join the social networking bandwagon because I assumed that in order to do so, I would be obliged to give up my privacy - and I certainly don't want to be reconnecting with people I went to high school with - I hated those people :D Still, social networking mimics real-life - if you don't want to speak to people or be friends with people, just don't be friends with them - have some balls and just say "No thanks, I'd rather not have you as a part of my life" or, if you're still developing your self-esteem, just ignore them. I did make some in appropriate adds, but I have 6 monthly purges where I go through my entire friend list and delete people I no longer want to be friends with - much as I tend to do in real life.

The thing is, though, that I've learned that you don't have to use social networking simply to connect with people you know. I live in South Africa, where people see technology as something that augments their lives rather than the medium through which they live their lives. I live my life through technology - particularly the internet and computers, not so much mobile technology like phones - technology is one of the layers of my existence which you have to penetrate in order to have any kind of relationship with me. This has always been the case to varying degrees, but now it's pretty much the only way. I've even had people try to argue with me on this one and tell me that this is the "wrong" way to live - and to all those people, to put is succintly, there is NO "wrong" way to live - as long as your life is working for you, making you happy, keeping a roof over your head and some grub in your tummy... well, you're likely on the right path for you.

Based on this, once I left formal employment, I saw Facebook as a way to keep other people informed about what was going on in my life - what I was up to while sitting in front of my computer screen all day. On the other hand, I also started to see it as an opportunity to fill my Facebook feed with things that I no longer had the time to go out and look for myself, like articles on physics and astronomy. Sure, sometimes I still have time to hit physorg.com and check out symmetrybreaking magazine, but often it's not very much. I've also taken to looking after my own psychological health, and as such need to read a lot on positive thinking, maintaining balance in my life and things like that - so that's another important aspect to consider.

What a surprise! Not only did I find a whole new bunch of people to connect with whom I am now in no way obligated to speak to or get to know, but they share my interests, and share things that are interesting to me! In fact, many of them speak different languages, such that even if we did want to get to know each other, we would likely struggling without Google Translate acting as intermediary. Many of them are also on different continents. Some share my love of science, some my love of art and others my love of Japan and all things Japanese.

Make no mistake, this is not a substitute for real human relationships - in fact, this has nothing to do with building relationships whatsoever, it has to do with sharing. Sharing has become the basis of my interactions via Facebook - sharing information, art, experiences, good advice, positive statements. There's no one-on-one interaction, it is by definition many-to-many - nothing is posted for anyone in particular, we can all just scroll through the feed and choose what we enjoy and show our appreciation simply by hitting the Like button, with no obligation to comment or interact with the person.

Yesterday I actually decided to try this out and "network" to find other people who appreciated design as much as I do, largely thanks to a share by one of my community friends who enjoys art and science. I simply looked for pages that contained the word "design", looked through a couple of them and looked at how regularly they posted or shared. I found one or two, but it wasn't a particularly successful adventure given that I was doing it during a 30 min break. It was different with astronomy and physics - I had "friended" people based on their patronage of certain sites and then Facebook had pretty much done the rest by suggesting other people for me to be friends with based on the fact that we now had common friends. Now I follow astronauts, scientists, enthusiasts, hobbyists, astrophotographers... all based on mutual interest.

It's nice to have a sense of community and belonging. :D

Personal Daily Schedule shows Nocturnal Efficiency

2011-09-07T11:33:00.000-07:00

I've decided to do the whole nocturnal thing again - sleep during the day and wake up and work during the night. Interestingly, when I work through the night, I don't get the urge to nap - which I've always found interesting. I know this because I used to live nocturally most of the time while I was at University - usually when everyone else was just getting back from a long day of lectures, I was just preparing to get out of bed (on the days when I got out of bed ;) )

When I first started working from home, I would just wake up and sleep whenever I felt like it - with no regard for routine in any way. It was only about two months ago, when I started receiving assignments regularly, that I thought I ought to have a defined schedule. After all, I had indicated to the company when I would be available and thought it would be a good idea to try and stick to that. This worked well for a while, but I have found myself getting more and more annoyed with the world at large for a number of reasons, which I won't go into because they are both personal and boring.

Then I started using a personal daily schedule.

This has dramatically changed my opinion of how I spend my time.

Now I have a record of exactly what I should be doing every 30mins of the day, which then gets reworked to show what I actually did during each 30mins slot during the day. At first it was just useful in helping me see what needed to get done and how long I had to do it in - and there was one very hectic weekend where it helped me keep track of what I was supposed to be working on and when. I think I had about 6 assignments to finish in four days - it was madness - I was jumping from one task to another the entire time. In fact, if I think back, there were another four assignments that came through during the course of the weekend itself as well... not to mention the project we are working on for a pharmaceutical company... sheesh...

Now, I'm working on the education textbook, but since I'm only going to get paid on completion of the project, I can't afford to NOT do other work. It's pushed back the launch of the jewellery, which makes me a bit sad, but if all goes as planned, this should give me a nice savings buffer to work with, since I've continued with other assignments as normal and have made monthly targets. It feels like every second counts.

Because of various issues that arose last week, I had to spend one morning working until 3am, which made me break my no-coffee vow. On the other hand, it showed me that without the distractions of the average day, I work much better during the night hours than I do during the day. It was actually very pleasant indeed. The following day I returned to my regular pattern somewhat, but the day after that I pulled another late night... I think I was up until about the same time.

I like working at night because it is quieter - you don't have people walking in and out of doors, children running around and shouting, cats fighting with each other or people intruding your privacy to mow your lawn. You sleep through all of that stuff. It doesn't get too hot, and soon it will stop being particularly cold, and you can't see the weather so you can't get affected by whether it is sunny, overcast or rainy. Plus it will give me a chance to take breaks to go star-gazing - something I love to do but simply haven't been doing.

So let's see how the next few weeks go with the change in schedule... I can't wait to finish working on the textbook (even though at this stage we're looking at finishing by the end of October - I mean honestly!). I've really been missing watching foreign films - particularly my Asian beauties, but foreign films in general - and I just don't have a solid 2 hour slot to use to watch one. So I'm going to celebrate the end of the textbook project by treating myself to a day out at the movies... or perhaps a night out, since by that stage one would imagine I would be part vampire.

Now the real challenge is going to be how I aim to fit exercise into all of this... I'm thinking I'll wait until about 6am in the morning every morning and take a walk before going to bed, but skipping is out since I can't do that in the death of night and wake the neighbours... lets see how it all works out :)

Royally Uninspired to Write About Sex

2011-09-06T10:17:00.000-07:00

Ironically, I have still put the label of this post down as "Sex".

It's true though - I was really enjoying my new-found ability to write candidly about it. In fact, I was even thinking about writing a whole book at some stage - probably something aimed at teens though - something along the lines of "This is what you should know about sex and boys". My life is basically a collection of stories about what NOT to do with or to members of the opposite sex, and most people laugh their asses off when I tell them stories of what has happened between me and guys - so I think I make even the most painful memories sound really funny. I think it would have been pretty lucrative, personally.

Except that now I have absolutely zero new stuff to say.

Firstly, I'm completely put off by the idea of getting to know members of the opposite sex. One has to wonder, because I would have expected that my many years of antidepressants would have put me off sex and they didn't, but now that I am off them, I am completely like "Don't even want a dude to touch me." Literally. The thought of even having to have a conversation with a member of the opposite sex in person totally puts me off, never mind getting to know them or engaging in physical contact with them.

Secondly, I am struggling to understand why people are so fixated with sex in the first place. I am inclined to believe it is a form of external validation. Or maybe it is because it stimulates the dopamine pathways so it's what other people do instead of taking drugs (which, just by the way, are cheaper, more effective and less hassle - I would choose taking drugs over sex any day of the week). I feel like it's also a basis for comparison - like the more successful you are with members of the opposite sex, the more "whole" or "complete" you are as a person.

On the one hand, it's pretty handy feeling this way - for one thing, I don't feel inadequate or like there is something wrong with me. I don't waste time trying to be something I'm not to make a certain impression on another person... I mean it's overall been a positive thing in the sense that I feel like it gives me a lot more time to focus on things that are *actually* important to my life and survival. When asked, I have made it very clear that in terms of members of the opposite sex, I won't be making any effort whatsoever for a good number of years - for heaven's sake, it's about time I started enjoying what I actually have instead of wishing I had something I didn't and ending up in situations that serve to put me off guys totally. I also still get aroused, but vastly less frequently than previously - like maybe once or twice in a month? I know for a fact that I won't be working on my poor social interaction skills until I have an excess of free time to spend on it, and who knows, I could die well before then. If I even get to working on it, it would only be after the next three to four years. Maybe five. Let's round it up to five then.

On the other hand, I ask myself if I should be more concerned. If this is a psychological reaction and not simply a matter of circumstances, then it would be better to deal with it now and develop a more healthy perception of the opposite sex, instead of developing a growing feeling of repulsion towards them. They are, after all, simply human beings. Sadly, that would require a psychologist, and without medical aid, I'm most certainly not going to be able to afford one. If there were readily available self-help books on the issue, I would be the first to go out and buy them, but while there are a plethora for people who want to be in relationships but are not in them, there are none for people who don't want to be in them to begin with.

Then again, maybe I am just completely over-thinking this and should simply enjoy the journey that life is providing for me to take. Objectively, it would be best to learn to appreciate the value of having time to make the most of my life as it is, and appreciate not feeling bitter or resentful about anything.

I'm not really sure. All I know is that I can't find it within me to write about sex, and I would actually really enjoy doing it. Sex is a fun topic, even if I don't think it is necessarily a fun activity to go out and do.

I don't recall you offering to pay my rent...

2011-09-03T06:51:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to stay awake long enough to spend an hour or so with my mother and sister who said they would both be home at least an hour ago. Trying to schedule "family time" is actually quite a pain in the ass - but on the other hand, it's also challenging me to use the time when they are not here or sleeping effectively. Personally, I was sort of aiming to do some sleeping myself... now I'm doing some waiting. This is not complaining, btw, this is just me saying I actually want to sleep but will wait for my fam to make sure they don't feel like I don't care about them. Ergo - this is a good thing.

Still, the post title already indicates that I'm going to do *some* complaining so I might as well as dive right in. To sum up - I'm bloody sick and tired of people telling me what they think about how I spend my damn time and telling me I work too hard.

Firstly, I don't work "too hard" - I work. Some people seem to have this impression that because I don't go into an office all day that it's all slack and joy - wake up in the morning, do whatever I feel like and sleep. I feel like calling those people morons. How on earth would I be able to sustain my current lifestyle if I did that all day long? Does anyone (and please, raise your hand even though I can't see you) know ANYONE who has ever been able to sustain a lifestyle by working like that? Please - it's ridiculous.

I simply took the amount of work I have to do and divided it by the amount of time in a day, giving allowance for bathing, shitting, sleeping, exercise and cleaning. Do you see something missing there? Yes - *YOU*. I'm not factoring anyone else into my planning time because unfortunately, at the moment, that's just not a priority. Regular readers will recall me making noises about selling my bike - I'd friggin' love to - but guess what? I won't make enough from the sale to cover the capital payment - so you know what? I'm just going to have to plug away for another year until I have repayed one of my loans and then I'll be able to take on less work.

Actually, I probably won't do that. I'll have become accustomed to this level of productivity and activity, and although I may choose to fill my time with other things, I'll probably just enjoy being able to save for my "retirement". Or being able to pay for medical aid - medical aid would be nice, people!

Second point - regardless of how hard I work - my question is this, quite simply - why, if I have free time to do whatever I want (i.e. nothing mentioned on the above list) would I choose to rush off and spend time with someone else doing what *they* want to do? It makes zero sense. I too have a list of things that I'd like to do with my free time - when there is more of it - and previous attempts at getting people to come along with me on these adventures have proved fruitless... leaving me with zero residual guilt with regards my participation in activities of others.

I'll have to wrap up here because I'm involved in a very interesting discussion with my sister about rational thinking. I feel like people commenting on my work habits is unjustified because they have no clue how I work. More importantly, they have zero insight into how much I earn or how much my expenses are and can therefore not tell me that I'm "working too hard" just because they feel I'm not spending enough time with them. It's ridiculous and offensive. My goal here is not spend time with you, my goal is to be self-sufficient - I can't ask my mother to lend my money if I don't make my monthly targets, I can't ask the bank for money, I have been living off my savings so now they are completely depleted. I have to make all the money I need to live off for the month within a certain timeframe. There is no guarantee that I will get good assignments during the month, there's not guarantee that I will meet my targets for the month, so I'm currently taking each day as it comes.

[I have continued at a later stage]

Also, I certainly don't work all day long. In fact, my posts on productivity attest to the fact that sitting down and getting down to business is something I actively have to keep working at in order to remain on track. I work at many different tasks, so there is usually very little opportunity to get bored or feel like what I am doing is tedious.

After some introspection, however, I think the bottom line here is that I hate having repeat myself. It's a pain in the butt taking the time to warn and tell people that I won't have a lot of time for them, and then still having to have the time-wasting conversation of "Why aren't you spending enough time with me?" which is often thinly veiled as "You work too hard." It's painful because they try and put it across as "I'm worried about your well-being" when in reality it's plainly clear that this has nothing to do with my well-being and everything to do with their entertainment or whatever it is, I don't really know.

So I've come up with an excellent retort as well as an innovative new scheme. I've got a nice little bank account fit for this purpose, complete with ridiculously high interest rates. The next time someone tells me that I work too hard, I'm going to invite them to make a donation into my account. Seeing as how having a roof over my head is pretty important, we'll start with asking for a rent payment. The logic is as follows: If your true concern is how much time I spend working, and you'd like to ensure that I have time available for you in particular, and since a significant portion of time I spend working is to cover expenses, then surely in order to free up my time, you will be willing to free up some money to allow me to do this. IF your true concern is the amount of time I spend working, that is. If, however, your concern just happens to be the fact that you need whatever form of external validation, may I humbly recommend that you visit www.thubtenchodron.org and download and listen to some of the podcasts on attachment? I doubt you will be aware but it is something one seeks to eradicate on the eight-fold path.

Phew - I do actually feel considerably better. The sad thing is that of my group of friends, there are a mere handful who actually feel this way - the rest have been completely supportive of me earning a living in the manner I see fit - or perhaps they just tend to keep it to themselves. Either way, they never make me feel bad about the quantity of work I do, they just let me get on with what I need to do. The friends I consider best, however, are those who openly congratulate me for mastering the 7-day-work-week.... I should probably do a post on that at some stage because it's an interesting approach to life. I think people get psychologically freaked out by the thought of not having a weekend, but basically I have spread the weekend throughout the course of the week, injecting enough time during each day to feel rested and revitalised, so that I'm simply not missing out on having two days "free". After all, can we please take a moment to realise that I work in my PJs every single day? Y'all have no idea how liberating that is - if only you did...

Defining Productivity and Goal Reviews

2011-08-24T13:52:00.000-07:00

So I've spent quite some time over the past few days just listening to WorkAwesome podcasts - very interesting if you're into using tech to make your life more productive.

Still, it forced me to ask the question - what is productivity to me? How do I define "being productive"? The follow-on question to that was obviously whether or not I feel I am being productive and what I'd like to do about that - logically followed by another general review of my greater plan in life, work and everything else.

Being productive, to me personally, means getting through the tasks that I want to get through in one day. That means knowing what has to be done and doing it before I have to call it a day and hit the sack. On a smaller scale, it means being able to focus on a task long and consistently enough to make progress. An interesting observation is that some people think it also involves getting more done in less time, or managing a huge amount of varied tasks in an efficient way, or even being able to have a defined split between work and life so that there is time to do things other than work.

I'm not too fussed about doing things other than work - what I do currently is incredibly stimulating and fulfilling, which is what I'm generally looking for when I want to do things other than work - things that will keep me highly stimulated and engaged. I'm also not one for managing many different tasks quite yet, which is leading to a massive re-evaluation of what I want to get out of life and where I am going because of the four pronged approach I have taken to fulfilling my "career" goals, only one seems to be constantly on the up. Getting more done in less time is something I am currently working on - not on an overall level, but on a more task-by-task level - I've been through a period of mild burnout where I just couldn't look at work anymore, so I'd like to have adequate time to allow myself to experience enjoyment enough for this to all feel "worth it".

So am I being productive? I don't think so, and here's why. I am great at being able to allocate time to finishing tasks and sticking to those times, which is a great bonus. I can say "I'll sit down and do this and then do this" and I know both tasks will be done simply on the basis of having said I will do them. I don't, however, have the organisational ability to determine how long I have for either task or how long it will take overall.

For example, if I have six assignments to do and my deadline is tomorrow morning, I'll say "I'll do 30mins or 1 now, then 30mins of 2, then 30 mins of 3, take a break and do that all over again until I finish." While that is great and usually works out pretty well in the general case, sometimes I end up realising that 4 is due first when I'm about 3 iterations in, and then I panic trying to finish 4. Post-panic, I realise that now 2 is due, so I don't get back into the routine. Ideally, what I should be doing is sitting down to determine which task needs to be completed first and timing according to what is due when.

Another shortcoming of mine is knowing when to say no. At the moment, I can't really describe myself as an entrepreneur, because the entrepreneurial part of my work is taking a back-seat for a number of reasons. One is that I'm gathering required information, skills and information to make things work. Another more vital point is that I am one solitary person. The reason this is a drawback is that I spend so much of my time earning enough money to pay the bills that there is very little time left over - I mean, between cooking and cleaning, doing laundry, managing two freelance jobs which are both highly demanding, squeezing in exercise and keeping in touch with people... I get to the end of the day feeling guilty about spending time writing a blog post. For a few weeks I totally cut out communication with other human beings and avoided social networks completely, which was great in some ways, but left me feeling rather empty. I didn't have time to go to Physorg.com and nobody was posting great pictures of awesome art for me to check out. I didn't see anything but my gmail inbox and associated interfaces. I lamented not being in touch with what was going on in the world of physics, I missed important events in the world because I just didn't have a clue what was going on in the world around me.

So basically, listening to the podcasts has made me feel a bit despondent. I feel like I'm sitting here listening to people who are accomplishing so much in so little time and here's me just trying to get started.

Then I took a step back and thought about it a bit more carefully. In all fairness, my priorities have changed dramatically. I am living a completely different life to what I was living three or four months ago - I've just made a major life transition and have actually done a pretty good job of it. Sure, there are some hiccups, and sure, I could have done some things differently, but on the whole, well done me! For someone who hadn't adequate savings to make the switch to freelance, who has been trying to drop expenses and has failed and who has had to rely on yours truly alone for emotional and psychological support while going through withdrawls, I think I should bloody well be impressed that it hasn't all fallen to pieces!

So considering that I'm not a failure - where to from here? It's obvious - all my psyche is saying is that I need to improve my organisation skills. I need to get better at planning and managing multiple tasks. I need to develop greater vision in terms of where I'm going so that I know which tasks are important *right now*. I have been given an amazing opportunity to gain insight that will help me build great working habits early, at a time when I need it the most.

So here's to a fresh start among all the other fresh starts - and here's to greater productivity.

Japanese Language Part II

2011-08-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

Today I'd like to emulate my new great literary hero, Mark Twain, in writing about a few points that cause the Japanese Language to threaten to bring tears to my eyes on a daily basis. While this post is amusing, the symptoms are no laughing matter - my brain frequently goes on strike, blatantly refusing to incorporate the meaning of the characters, words AND sentences into my mind, forcing me to "take a break", which is simply a euphemism for "preventing impending suicide".

Firstly, let's discuss the fact that the verb lies at the end of the sentence. To an English speaking brain, this is completely counterintuitive because it implies that you will only derive meaning from the sentence at the very end, which is in fact not always the case. Japanese sentences also have conjunctions, and verbs can be conjugated into a conjunctive form, but the fact remains that each clause will be ended by a conjunctive verb.

At first glance this might not sound awkward, so let me give you examples of why it actually is. Let's use the stereotypical example of going to the shops. I am going to the shops in Japanese is "Mise ni iku" (Actually, the full sentence is "Watashi wa mise ni iku" but omissions are another bitching point of mine in Japanese) - I'm not going to translate everything here, I'm just going to bastardise the English language and write it like Japanese but I think for the root phrase, I'll leave it Japanese.

Where are the shops? The shops are in Shinjuku. You can't just tack "in Shinjuku" to the end of the sentence, you have to modify the noun - in Shinjuku mise ni iku. What are you going to buy? Hmmm... I'm going to buy a camera and some books. Tack that onto the beginning - Camera and some books in Shinjuku mise ni iku. When are you going? Later today camera and some books in Shinjuku mise ni iku. Is anyone going with you? With my brother later today camera and some books in Shinjuku mise ni iku.

What if you planned on doing something before hand? Well, in that case, you're going to have to use a verb, which means changing the verb (you have a choice of 3 or 4 different ways of doing this) to a conjunctive form. Let's say you were going to eat ice cream before heading off to the shops later today, where eating ice cream is "ice cream (aisu-kureemu - literally) wo taberu). That makes it ice cream wo taberu (conjunctive form) with my brother later today camera and some books in Shinjuku mise ni iku. If you want to describe the ice cream, where you ate it, who you were with, why you were eating it, you have to tack all of that on to the beginning of the sentence: because I had a craving with my mother close to town ice cream wo taberu (temporal conjunctive form to indicate that this happened first) with my brother later today camera and some books in Shinjuku mise ni iku. Dude.

The English brain is looking for the meaning at the beginning of the sentence.

So my brain has had to learn to retain all of this information to make sense of it all at the very END of the Japanese sentence. That's a simple example about eating ice cream and going to the shops - you should see how my brain revolts when I am trying to read about some complicated study method regarding how someone purified crystals of an enzyme or some similar mindboggling activity, which involves causing a response, halting the process at a certain point, isolating the cellular materials, breaking it down to break open the cells, purifying that material.... Sometimes entire paragraphs form one sentence and I end up having to re-read them six or seven times just to make sure I have got the message right.

I mean at this stage, my kanji knowledge and recognition is cruising ahead like a cheetah on steroids - but it's not quite as straightforward as all that. Japanese kanji have two types of readings - the On-yomi ("Chinese reading") and the Kun-yomi ("Japanese Reading"). One kanji may have one or two On-yomi in regular usage, not counting how it might be read in a name. Name-readings are known as Na-nori, by the way. A useful generalisation is that when you see a string of characters together, they are probably read with their On-yomi.

However, when a character appears as the beginning part of a word, it is read with its Kun-yomi. It's hard to give an example without busting out some kanji and I don't want to do that... hmmm... okay, the kanji for "Look" has the On-yomi "Ken". When you see the kanji as part of a word, you read it as ken. However, when you are referring to the verb "To look" and the kanji is only a part of the word, where the rest is written in hiragana (which is the original, basic true Japanese alphabet) it is written as "Mi-ru" - the Kun-yomi of the character is mi and the ru part is written in hiragana. Oooh, I know, lemme take a screenshot...

Here's a stunning example - doku.

Leaving aside the meaning for a moment, because trying to explain the meaning of a kanji to an Indo-European language speaker is an exercise in extreme futility. In fact, I only understand it because I focused on learning the kanji when I learnt the language - I didn't care how well I could speak it, I wanted to learn to read.

So you see, the On-yomi of this character could be either doku or toku - and here they are written in Katakana, alphabet number 1.

The Kun-yomi is hito as part of the word hitori, which is all written in Hiragana, alphabet number 2.

The potential Na-nori are doitsu or do-. That little character after the do- means that whatever consonant comes after this reading will be doubled... so if the next character is ka, then the word will be dokka, or if the next character is ma, it will be domma.

Yeah.

The thing is though, what is nice about kanji is that the more complicated the kanji is to write, the fewer readings it will have - generally it is more specific. The easier it is to read, the more readings it will have and the more fluid its meaning will be. Gross generalisation, of course, but I'm yet to find notable exceptions to this.

Still, it's not like I have any regrets - I'm glad I learnt the language primarily because it presents me with such numerous challenges. I mean I studied medicine because I thought it would be difficult, for heaven's sake. I had no desire to help or be around people whatsoever, I just thought the degree itself would be challenging. In my opinion, I would have been better off doing some pure or applied science - medicine was pretty easy. It's just hard to get into because apparently getting high marks makes you a better person (like, wtf are these people thinking, honestly...).

That's all for today folks! Must get back to some assignments... girlfriend needs to ensure she gets paid!

Relationships with Food

2011-08-22T09:23:00.000-07:00

Before I begin, amusing anecdote about a dream I had. I have been having super-weird dreams lately, and honestly, I'm absolutely loving them. They are incredibly entertaining and give me something to chew on during the day. Still, today's was funny in so many ways. I dreamt that my ex boyfriend had mentioned me in a blog post, citing examples of things that I had said and done. However, this whole post was on the backdrop of a Flash animation I had sent him featuring Wil. E. Coyote doing all sorts of amusing things in hell - one was him fighting the devil, another was him being burned in a pit - and I mean the animation was awesome - so much so that I was like "Wow, you mean *I* did that?" The only thing that really caught my attention in terms of what was written was "Dude, I mean why did you date Sarai man, you know that chick is CRAZY!" :D That really made me laugh.

Anyway, let's get onto the topic of food. In fact, let's jump in by posting a picture of what I had for lunch today.... that's always a good idea:

Now that's yumminess right there - and it wasn't even a very large pizza, I am just blowing up the illustration. All vegetarian - it was basically just the mushrooms, some chopped chilli and garlic, dhania powder, ginger powder... yeah, a base of cheese and tomato and those gorgeous roasted avos... yummmmminess.

Let's take a step back though. The reason I feel the need to write about food is because I have noticed that a lot of women spend a great deal of their lives worrying about what they eat. Let me restate that with the obvious correction. A lot of women spend a great deal of their lives worrying about what they eat in the wrong way.

I've never been one to fuss over what I'm eating - if it tastes good, I'm there. If it's got butter, cheese or cream, I'm there. If it is stodgy like pudding or better yet, is pudding itself, I'm there. I have a sweet tooth, a savoury tooth, a sushi tooth - basically, I love food. In fact, I've spent most of my life not just loving food, but being obsessed with food.

How is this the case, you ask? Historical recap is necessary to explain this. Firstly, my parents never gave physical affection - they never hugged or kissed unless you asked them to in front of other people and even then it was totally awkward - they gave me food or money. In fact, when we used to go travelling to other people's homes, before my sister was born, they would always carry enough snacks to feed three children and whenever I was sleepy, grumpy, overly talkative, annoying, bored or pretty much anything that a two or three year old child is, they would reach in and give me a snack. Obviously I never shared with anyone because it was mine, hello.

Secondly, my sister was born with pyloric stenosis - which means the valve leading from her stomach to her intestines was almost closed. There were no surgeons in Zim who could do the operation on her, so nobody knew if she would even make it through the first few weeks of life - it was very touch and go. But she was a fighter from day one - even projectile vomiting did not put her off. However, it did make her unable to eat normal quantities of food. She even used to start crying when my mother said "It's time to feed the baby" when she was like... less than a year old? Every photo of her as a baby when my mother was trying to feed her was punctuated by tears and trying to escape the feeding chair. My mother, on the other hand, felt like she was a bad mother because my sister had classic failure to thrive - her growth was stunted because she just didn't have the ability to eat as much as normal kids.

Now you might ask why that is relevant to my relationship with food, and let me tell you - it basically forms the crux. You see, when my sister refused to eat, I was always there, willing as ever, to be a people pleaser and finish up the discarded or left-over food. As my sister got older, she would BEG me to eat her portions of food just so that my mother would think that she had eaten and I willingly obliged. Whenever we went out to eat, the rule was you can order whatever you want no matter what the cost as long as you clean your plate. The addendum to this stipulation was that if you do not clean your plate, not to worry, Sarai will do it for you.

So I ended up stuffing myself for most of my life - I ate and ate and ate for no reason whatsoever other than that the food was there. Okay, granted, my mother was a terrible cook - and OCD if I haven't already mentioned this - so she made the exact same meal in the exact same plate, served in the exact same way for 12 years until I refused to eat anything until she cooked something different. Her response was that if I didn't eat what she cooked, I wouldn't eat. From then on, I had to literally scrounge for food in my own home - I became even more of a food vaccum cleaner - I swear if anyone left anything in the fridge I was on it the second they put it down.... they didn't even waste time asking where it had gone. On the other hand, sometimes this didn't happen, and I had to go without food for days.

When I realised I could go without food for days, I wondered how long I could go without food so decided to experiment. The longest I have not eaten a single item of food is about two weeks. Even then, it took about two or three weeks for me to go back to eating "normal" amounts of food.

Now, let's fast forward, skipping the interim and jumping straight to the positive present. The thing I have realised about food is that the pleasure is not solely in eating the food. You have to take pleasure in preparing the food as well. You have to see the joy in shopping for food, or better yet (and in my case) growing your own food. Knowing where your food comes from and how long it takes to grow makes a massive difference. You also have to learn how to make food taste good - I have often eaten a loaf of bread over the course of a few hours and then wondered why I don't feel full or satisfied - when the only flavouring was either butter or margarine and the same topping over and over again.

I've learnt that you have to take your time to eat your food slowly and not inhale your food. I've also learnt that the worst thing you can do is let yourself get hungry - it's better to have small snacks throughout the course of the day to stave off that "OMG I MUST EAT SOMETHING ANYTHING NOW NOW NOW!!" feeling that you get when you let your blood sugar levels plummet to almost zero. I've learnt that it is hard work planning what you're going to eat and even harder work incorporating variety into your diet, but that it is totally worth it.

But most of all, I have learnt that your relationship with food is ultimately your relationship with yourself. If you see food as a means to happiness, you probably see your body and your life as your means to happiness. If you see food as your means to satisfaction, chances are you see your body the same way. If you treat your food respectfully and handle it with care and reverence, you tend to do the same with your body.

Food is not the enemy.

It's funny, over the past two years I have learnt to love my body exactly the way it is - whether I weight 130kg or 60kg (okay, I haven't even looked at a scale these past few years, and I haven't bought new clothes for the past year and a half so I have no way of objectively measuring so that's just an exaggeration). I've learnt to get to know all the bits of my body, the rolls at the back, the rolls in the front... oooh, here's a picture of some stretch marks too...

Yep - they are my pride and joy to the point that I wish to immortalise them in photographic form.

At the end of the day, I'm happy that I've learnt to appreciate food as something that allows me to be creative and spontaneous, as well as planned and organised. I enjoy the whole process - from thinking about what to eat and researching new things to cook to actually going out there, stocking the cupboards and allowing myself to go crazy in the kitchen.

Lastly, I have this idea that since I am eating less and exercising more (because I sit in front of my PC all day long - my cardiovascular system isn't going to be very happy with me in a few years if I keep doing that) that I'll probably end up losing weight naturally. I have a joke running on facebook about how if I carry on moving along the current path, I'll be bikini ready by 2012 - and you know what? Bikini body or not, it's my *actual* 30th birthday next year and I will wear a damn bikini - because I've friggin' gotten over all my hang-ups about my body and if you don't think I look good in one, close your damn eyes then. I love my body, screw y'all. :D