From The Ashes

Maybe somebody noticed I have written very little in the last... several months.

It's a sense a of burning out. I can't claim I'm too busy, either.
I am sick and tired of politics and politicking, and considering that these days I'm not sure even a periodic table of elements is free from accusations of racism, you see how the ennui is pervasive.

I also have shifted focus in my personal priorities. Not a big one, but there is. How can I put it, I am less interested in a world that I see as messed up nearly beyond any redemption and more in my personal development and well-being.

What still piques my interest are of course science and technology, and thankfully those keep going strong. Even so, one of the first question popping up in front a technological breakthrough is "What's its carbon footprint?". Fun, eh?

So... I'm not sure what will happen next. Maybe I will open a new blog, start again with no (or little baggage) and write randomly of this and that.

On the Evasivness of This and That

It's been some time since I last wrote a post in English.

I am a bit burnt out (as somebody said, back in the days blogging was new and fun. For a kind of veteran like me, it's not so fun anymore), and everywhere I look there seems to be some sea of shit rapidly rising in level. Not good for optimism.

Add to that the scarce feedback from my english-speaking readers, and you see why I don't have much enthusiasm.

I prefer to concentrate on Italian posts, and even that is strange because I am living and working abroad and my connection to Italy feels weaker than it was. But there it is, love it or leave it.

What I can tell is that I appreciated The Hobbit. Yes, it is rather overlong and in places overdone, but it left me wanting for more, and that's a sign of a movie that worked for me.
The truth is, I always found the Elven scenes (the ones with Arwen) in LOTR to be quite boring and distracting, while The Hobbit does not have long Elven moments. And being a fan (but not a crazy one) of Tolkien, I only appreciate the inclusion of material from other works of his.

Briefly on Poverty

There is nothing at all noble or dignified in poverty.

There is dirt and bad smells, piles of rubbish and stale food. There is ignorance and corruption. There are people suffering and dying because they cannot afford medical treatment.

There is squalor and misery and backbreaking toil from cradle to grave.

I Am So Tactical

That I had a camo-pattern birthday cake:


Thanks of course to my wife who made it.

Service Communication

If some users experience a redirect to the blogrolling.com domain, that problem has been fixed (by getting rid of that piece of code).

Blogrolling was hot some years ago, then it shut down and now the domain is for sale, even. Sic transit gloria mundi.

Still not much enthusiasm for writing on my side, I have to add.

Indipendece Day 66

66 years of indipendnece for the Republic of Indonesia

This is a video of the Proclamation of Indipendence, 17 August 1945.



Today, the TV is all a flourish of historical and nationalistic programs, and red-and-white (merah putih) flags are all over the place.

Indonesia is a nationalistic country, and that may come as a shock to Europeans especially, where nationalism is regarded at least as unfashionable, if not stupid and evil.

Yet, there is little xenophobia and in fact among the middle class at least foreign fashion and food and culture in general are widely appreciated.

Anyway, my experience as a foreigner in Indonesia tells me that a foreigner will usually be well accepted if he is willing to do some effort to learn the local language and uses, and liking Indonesian food is definitely a plus.

So I roll my eyes when I read things like that Obama is loved by Indonesians because he was - or secretly still is - a Muslim.

Obama has stated time and again - and in good Indonesian, even - that he liked Indonesia, and the food there, very much as a kid: that will surely earn him some approval. Also, my wife says that "star appropriation" is at play: Indonesians want Obama to appear as Indonesian as it can be so that some of his fame and popularity will reflect on Indonesia itself.

I hope this last part is clear.

Out of the Tunnel

It seems that the worst days are over, even if things are still rather hard.

Stay tuned.

Bendera Kuning

In Indonesia is is customary to fly a bright yellow flag as a sign of grievance for a death.

Now there is one such flag flying in front of my in-laws' house.

Those who follow my blog can easily guess whose death it was; those who don't, do not need to spend much time guessing.

I'll be back later.

It Was About Time

That I got back to work, at least a bit.

I have started doing some freelance work for a local chem eng company. Design of wash towers, mainly.

At the moment I am working from home, but I hope soon I can become an employee of the company.

Sure this job beats spending all day taking pH values...

The Face of Corruption

It is known, and it is true, that Indonesia is a country where corruption runs rampant.

But for everyday life what does it mean? How do you run your errands under heavily corrupted institutions?

The face of high-level corruption can be this Gayus fellow with his infamous wig.
But this is an enormous case, it involves police officers and immigration officers and the Direktorat Jenderal Pajak - the taxmen, the equivalent of the IRS for Americans.

Anyway, for the Gayus case you can start from here and reconstruct the whole story.

What about the low-level corruption then? Its face can be the one of the properly veiled lady at the immigration office who asked Rp. 250 000 (roughly 25 USD) to process my visa extension application within the same day rather than in the couple of days it normally takes.

Or it can be the face of the head of some administrative division - there is no equivalent for that in Europe or the States, so don't ask me to explain - who signed a domicily letter for my wife. When asked - by a mediator - why a simple signature costed Rp. 100 000, he replied that he had spent billions to be elected there, and now he has to take back that money somehow, during his five years in office.

So there you go, with bribes and wheel-greasing.

Bigotry For Everyone

I wrote before that my experience with Muslims here in Indonesia has been positive: the months passed since then have only confirmed my opinion.

I know that there are violent extremists here, but so far I have not met one in person. Muslims here are not saints, but their virtues and vices fall well within the normal bounds of human nature.

But this posts is about bigotry. Before I touch that argument, however, I have to provide some backstory.

Around mid-July 2010, my mother-in-law suffered a bad stroke and she has been in a vegetative state ever since. She spent nearly one month at the hospital in critical conditions; during that period of time I and my in-laws took turns to stay with her, and it is only through the generosity of friends and relatives that the bills have been paid. Now she is at home in her own room, attended 24/7 by two nurses; she still requires many medicines and treatments. Hopes for her improvement are, sadly, close to nonexistent.

Many people have prayed a lot for my mother-in-law; catholics and protestants and muslims and the odd buddhist; they prayed to different gods but for the same end.

My in-laws were so stricken that when one nurse said that her boyfriend who is into magic and supernatural can perform rituals to rid my mother-in-law of the evil spirits making her sick and to protect the house from more spirits, they agreed. The sorcerer performed the rituals, got paid good money but nothing much happened – I guess he's just a crook playing on people's grief.

So the family tried another avenue, a protestant minister who claims to able to perform another sort of ritual – I don't know the details of it, but it is said to end with the sick person either recovering or finally passing away. The pastor came and asked many questions, about the family and eventual supernatural events that occurred. But then, instead of going on with the ritual he became incensed at the fact that my relatives display many crosses and images of Jesus and Virgin Mary around the house. He found that very offensive, to the point that he refused to perform the ritual unless those sacred images were not just put away, but disposed of. The unsaid response to his request was that he can stuff it.

The minister's conclusion was that first my parents-in-law attracted evil upon themselves studying pranotherapy (which is a technique for healing people through natural energy) some years ago, and then the sorcerer left even more powerful evil spirits around.

Now, one of the nurses is a Muslim – devoted it seems, because she prays five times a day, but she prefers to wear shorts and t-shirt rather than the veil. Religion has never been an issue in our daily dealings – well, except when I boiled a piece of ham, and she wouldn't use that pot for her own food even after washing. The other Muslim around the house is the maid who comes in a few hours per day to cook food and do the chores; she is a friend of the family to the point she refused another job offer because she thinks that we are more in need of a hand.

Recently, the family invited another minister to come and pray; he did so but he also offered some bizarre suggestions to improve the situation. He said that we should pour lard oil all around the house to neutralize the sorcerer's spell (apparently those supernatural beings survive on a strictly halal diet). Also, he said that the sorcerer's girlfriend has evil spirits in herself, so we should secretly rub the patient with lard oil to act as a barrier and to make the nurse uncomfortable until she'd eventually leave. Moreover, he said, there should be no Muslims in the house.

Now, however you slice it, tainting a Muslim with haram products is a lowly trick and the suggestion of a muslim-free house smacks of bigotry – especially when the persons that should be excluded have in fact been loyal hard-workers.

I told my story, now you decide how to place it in your universe.

Merry New Year

Ah, I've been away for quite a while.

2011 is here; I celebrated New Year's Eve with a BBQ and enough drinks to be definitely tipsy - which I count as a small success.

This new year would have to work damn hard to be as crappy as the past one, so I keep my hopes up.

Not Gone Yet

Hey folks, missed me much?

I would be an understatement to say that I haven't blogged much lately.

I cannot even say that my days have been very busy - except some, but one way or another I found myself at bedtime with no time to dedicate to this site.

And I have pretty much lost steam, I have to add. Only few arguments stimulate me enough to post about them, and I do not want this blog to become too personal posting a lot about my private life.

So there you go, wait hoping for another post.

Here I Am Again

In Cikarang, east of Jakarta. Suitcases are (almost) unpacked and I am settling down in this new situation.

One thing I can never get used to is the heat, tho. As hot and humid as all except the very worst days of summer in Northern Italy.

Goodbye Miss Tanfoglio

She's gone, hopefully taken by someone who will take good care of her. I haven't been armed for a long time, but I had gotten used to the idea. But now keeping a gun, with more restricitve licensing laws & rules looming at the horizon, is becoming too difficult*.

It's only a small parte of the preparations I did before leaving for Indonesia. Yes, because life has turneed this way, and in a few days I will leave. Not forever, no, but for a quite long time; I may even have a job lined up there.

But if you think it's all over, you're wrong. I'm not going away from the blogosphere!

*I suppose the anti-gunners have achieved a small victory in this case, damn.

Contempt and Loathing

We all know that MTV nowadays devotes more airtime to various, more or less braindead and adolescent-oriented shows than to music videos.

And we know that most of the music there is of the mass-production type. And that metal is almost completely absent (not that MTV would give much airtime to the likes of Funker Vogt either).

But only recently. I realized how horribly fragmented the however pitiful musical experience is. One can see two, maybe three videos in a row, and then it's advertisements - quite a few minutes of it, and mostly self-referential stuff, ads for other MTV events ad shows.

So just when one starts getting itno the music, it stops to be replaced by something annoying and boring.

I guess it's true that MTV is made for adolescents with the attention span of 15 minutes.

Republik Indonesia ke-65

Finally, I can put my hands on an USB modem and post something more substantial!

Today is the 65^th anniversary of the independence of Indonesia, which was proclaimed on August 17 of 1945.For days, it has been a triumph of red-and-white flags everywhere: big ones attached to buildings and flagpoles; small ones flying from trucks and cars; patriotic ads on TV. The national sentiment is quite strong here. I know, it may come as a surprise for those who think that nationalism is only a relic of a western-centric past.

This year, the Independence Day (hari merdeka) occurs during the Ramadan month. Not much changes here except for the fact that of the countless food stalls only a few remain open during the day – from sunrise to sunset. Most of them sell freshly prepared food or drinks, and it does not make much sense to remain open during the fasting. A good fraction of the small restaurants close during the day as well, but the ones in malls remain open. The main change is that workplaces have shorter lunch breaks and close at 17 so that people can reach home or some food joint by sunset – which is always around 18: traffic becomes even more maddening than usual these days.

My wife tells me that the observance of the fasting is pretty high here, although I have seen Muslims eating and drinking during the day.

Ramadan is also a big business occasion, I would say. Everywhere it's Ramadan sale, Ramadan special, Ramadan this and that. Special offers on morning and evening meals; special 2-liter bottles of isotonic drinks for the rehydration of the whole family after fasting; special handphone price plans; what I'd call prayer karaoke – Arabic script with scrolling Indonesian translation – for your Blackberry and so on. In these aspects, Ramadan is a secular holiday like Christmas has become in the West.

As a side, I can note that three prominent Indonesian Ulama* have stated that Jihad must be intended as a struggle for individual improvement and must not include acts of violence. I hope you'll be lenient if at the moment I cannot produce precise references to this story.

*I am not sure of what the definition of Ulama is. They are not clerics, but more like lawyer-type bureaucrats. For exemple, it is the Ulama Council that deals with halal certificates for food and drinks.

Jakarta Report #3

Very slow and small improvements. My sick family member has been out of ICU for some time, but she's quite far from being ready to be discharged from hospital.

Internet access and thus posting ability remains limited.

Jakarta Report #2

Deep shit all around, deepening.

Jakarta Report #1

That situation we have here seems to be improving but at a glacial pace.

I have little time for blogging now; later I hope I'll be able to write about what I'm learning from this.

In the meantime, here's a little funny piece of news - which could even be a vindication...

OK, let's not be shy about this. Swedish archeologists have uncovered a prehistoric artifact made out of antler bone that looks like a modern dildo.

Those primitive, innocent cavemen indeed. Thi story also shows how bad certain modern theories can be for people, because a person talking like this:

If it is actually a pressure-flaker for fine flint knapping, then this would tell us something about how such work was conceptualized in terms of gender.

must be seriously damaged.