Knowledge Brings Fear

Strange days

The world has now been for a long time in a state where you are inclined to think that things could not get possibly more bizarre. Nonetheless things are getting more bizarre by the day. Politics has declined to a helpless struggle to keep the masses quiet while the economic foundations of the world shift with breathtaking speed, nullifying any and all fixed political system of believe. We are running out of oil in the not-to-distant future, wars are fought about access to oil and water, the climate is shifting into Heavy Weather mode and all the while the zealots of scary monotheistic desert religions try convert by force or terrorism those who would rather be left alone and focus on getting things done.

Somehow I am not very sad about every hurricane that hits the USA. In the end, it is the American Way of Life of just 290 million people that needlessly eats up 25% of the worlds energy resources. When they say they want to defend the American Way of Life, they actually say the literal truth. You need the worlds biggest military machine to be able to keep the world record in energy waste. As cynical as it may sound: when the collateral damage of climate change hits hardest where the most can be done about it, it might actually change things for the better in the long run.

Re-insurance companies that see the storms and flash floods as biggest business risk have begun to silently get rid of insurance policies covering high-risk areas. Their internal climate modeling seems to be even more pessimistic then the published stuff. Predictive climate modeling has become a hot topic in several circles where it counts to plan decades ahead. To know when it is time to sell of coastal real estate, or property in cities that will be no longer inhabitable after the sea level raises or the gulf stream (aka. north atlantic thermohaline) stops can yield substantial profits, or at least limit losses to a sustainable level for investors who think ahead.

And: the summer here in Berlin currently is not up to spec. Fortunately I am too busy to not really get depressive yet about the weather. I still hope that climate change not ends up with Berlin hibernating in a permanent state of gray clouds and rain, but chances are slim. On monday in Amsterdam it rained so heavily that the street was filled up to the sidewalks within minutes and the car alarms were going off everywhere from the sheer impact of rain and hail. So, lets hope that we get a decent sunny september before its back to Bladerunner-style Berlin winter...

EuroFoo

I was invited to Tim O'Reillys EuroFoo conference, taking place at the University of Twente in the Netherlands. Not really knowing what to expect, I arrived unfortunately only on saturday evening, missing nearly one complete day. (Due to work related stress, induced by a bunch of morons that do not realize what they are doing...)

Tim was so nice to pick me up at the Enschede train station, so after a quick detour to check in at the hotel, I arrived at the conference saturday early afternoon.

The whole EuroFoo thing was stunning. About 100 people were invited. Rop summarized the overall feeling on the participants very precisely: "The scary thing is that you need to explain things here about 0.7 times.". That said it all. I have never experienced a more intelligent, alert, skilled, friendly and knowledgeable crowd on a conference. The conference agenda was created on the first day within 15 minutes by people just grabbing a one-hour slot and announcing their talk on the schedule-board. Lightning Talks sessions (where people say something interesting for 5 minutes, not more) provided a very high density of content. I met so many interesting people in about one day that my head still whirls a bit.

After trying to help Tim to solve the problem of his lost car key (he has it back meanwhile), I am now in Amsterdam, probably staying here for two more days. Weather in the Netherlands is (as was to be expected, but shocking nonetheless) cold and rainy. I hope the next weeks in Berlin turn out to be better...

Apple deserves a beating

This time again with the long and heavy stick. They did not bother to remove the Password-ends-up-in-swapfile bug in the OS X 10.3.5 update and the latest security fix. I know that they need to set their priorities, and fixing remote exploit possibilities clearly comes first. But that such a trivial bug (making the password entry function non-swapping should not be a problem) survives a security update weeks later could lead me to suspect an intentional backdoor to make up for their file vault encryption...

Strange Virus

Thursday I wanted to escape the serious summerheat in Berlin (which I love!) by going for a swim, but I didn't come very far. After narrowly making the stairs to the S-Bahn station, I was so seriously out of breath and felt so seriously sick that the only possible decission was to grab a taxi and get home, fast. Not long later, fortunatelly in my bed, my body temperature rose to 40.5 degress celsius within half an hour, pulse racing at 125. I was shocked, shocked I say...

Lots of Vitamin C, Schwedenkraeuter, Aspirin and Angocin plus cold ankle wraps, applied and frequently changed by expert hands, in the end did their magic and reduced the fever after a few hours. Next morning I was practically symptom-free. Now I am still a bit shaky on my legs. Going out for shopping today ammounted to a expedition that required carefull planing. So I resort to reading books that were on the stack for a while (like Steve Coll, "Ghost Wars", a very detailed, if a bit one-sided critical history of the CIA involvement in Afghanistan and with Bin Laden during the soviet occupation and afterwards) and hope that the brilliant weather continues next week.

Since my WLAN link is still down, I only have GPRS here, so no high-res pictures from Bulgaria yet uploaded.

Zurueck in Berlin

Nach dem üblichen zeremoniellen Herumwarten, Reisepassgestempele und noch ein bischen Gewarte flog uns dann Bulgarian Airlines wieder nach Berlin. Der Flug war wieder mal etwas anstrengend, aber 2:15h gingen dann auch vorbei. In Schoenefeld wartet dann auch schon unser Abholer mit unserem Auto in das der Gepäckberg spielend hereinpasst und so waren wir dann in ziemlich genau acht Stunden Tür zu Tür Plovdiv - Pankow.

Die Luft in Berlin ist im Vergleich zu den Rodhopen wirklich elend schlecht. Es wird wohl wieder ein paar Tage dauern bis ich mich daran gewöhnt habe. Ansonsten lauern 14738 mails auf Filterung und Gelesenwerden und jede Menge Arbeit auf gearbeitet werden.

Zum Flughafen

Nunmehr zum letzten mal in dieser Verpackungsform zu bewundern: unser Gepaeckberg auf dem Taxi verzurrt. "No problem. We go slowly!" sagte der Fahrer immer und hatte Recht, trotz 130 km/h. Grad sitzen wir am Flughafen, der Berg ist eingecheckt, in 90 Minuten gehts dann los Richtung Heimat.

Equipment Review

Several people who know that it is difficult to out-gadget me have asked for a summary of equipment that I deemed really necessary to carry outdoors. This is the summary of experiences with the equipment that supported me through the last three weeks outside civilization. I will only cover the highlights, feel free to mail me if you want to know more about a specific piece. I will not go into sleeping bags, tents etc. as the developments there are too fast.

Katadyn Water Cleaning Pump

Pros:
This is by far the most important thing to carry when staying in areas with doubtfull water supplies. The basic principle is a ceramic filter that is so fine that it filters out bacteria, salmonella, virii and algae to a degree that makes even a puddle on the wayside drinkable. A hand-operated pump sucks in the water and presses it through the filter cartridge on the way down. The Combi version I used has also an optional active carcoal filter stage against chemical polution, which we did not use as the water came from a spring and had only potential biological problems. The filter system is far superrior to the usual chemical treatment, as it leaves no residue (like the silver-ion based Micropur stuff does), works instantly (you get your clean drinking water immediately when you are thirsty, no waiting for the chemical to work) and is extremly easy to operate. Katadyn has a variety of different sizes available, I would recommend one of the larger ones as they get you done with the pumping job more quickly. The Combi comes with an adaptor for Nalgene / Sigg bottles, so you screw the bottle below the pump, put the input hose into the water source and pump until your bottle is full. Depending on the dirt in the water the filter needs to be brushed clean from time to time, but this is effortless and easy. The design ist very Swiss, solid, ergonomic and reliable.

Cons:
The plastic casing of the sieve on the input pipe is just too big to fit into an Ortlieb water bag (which would mandate an extra entry, just that they are so simple and reliable that there is no alternative to them). Also the adaptor to screw the pump onto PE bottles does not work as advertised, it just does not fit the usual 1,5l mineral water bottle. Of course it weights more then Micropur or other chemical treatments do, but this was no objection this time.

Helle Norway Knife

Helle Norway just makes the best knifes for outdoor use. I have a very nice, lightweight knife with a kork handle made by them, now for 10 years, and I still have to see a better one. The blade is still very sharp and flexible and the low weight does not bother you when carrying it around. Look for their fishing series, these are the ones made for real everyday use.

Cons: the leather holster has a strap for the belt that has a nice-looking and traditional, but not very robust fastening mechanism. Always need to make an extra knot.

Meindl boots

Still, there is no alternative to Meindl boots. They make the best, most robust walking machines. Expensive, but unbeatable when it comes to spending weeks in rough, sometimes wet terrain. They need to be cared for, but will not let you down if you apply a bit of proper treatment from time to time.

Solar Panel

Unfortunately I don't know the original manufacturer of the panel that I used to recharge the XDA2 and the Thuraya phone, it is sold by IDG Europe from Sweden. It is approximately DIN A3 size, has a aluminium backplate and a car cigarette lighter receptable. You can plug in anything that is satisfied with 17,9V and 20W peak power. The panel is robust and reliable, it delivers even under cloudy skies or inside a tent (on a sunny day) enough power to charge equipment. You need to choose the charging adaptor carefully though, I had a charger for the XDA2 that actually drained the battery when the panel gave too little power (like when the sun was going down). Overall I was extremly happy with living off solar power, it gives you a certain rhythm for the technology related activities. First thing in the morning is to put the panel outside to catch the morning sun, then watch how much power you consume during the day and put in a second charging session in the late afternoon to get enough power for the night.

Cons: still hellishly expensive. Time will fix this.

Thuraya Satellite Phone

Best means of voice communication when you are outside GSM range and inside their coverage zone. Calling home is cheaper with the Thuraya then roaming with GSM. The phone is small, lightweight, quickly charges from the solar panel without problems. Feels and smells like GSM, just a bit more delay cause of the satellite distance. Prepaid service gives you cost control, especially outdoors the reachabillity is superb. In cities it is difficult to operate as you need free horizon in south-east direction.

Cons:
SMS does not work reliably all the time to and from many networks, O2 seems to be the only one working more or less reliable. Thuraya seriously needs to fix their SMSC connectivity. Phone service had an gateway problem once, but that vanished quickly. Internet dialup is too expensive (data call surcharge is a bad idea). They should built in a small compass to easier find the satellite direction and they should fix the incoming data call handling bug in the phones firmware. Writing SMS with the Hughes Thuraya phone is crappy, no T9 is a serious drawback.

Petzl Head Light

A head mounted light source is a very convinient thing. You have your hands free, the light is always in your viewing direction. Petzl makes very reilable, bright and convinient head lights. The model I choose has both a 5 LED mode and a concentional halogen lamp. You select the mode with the lockable main switch. Halogen can also be focused. The battery pack is belt-worn and has sufficient power for four weeks of nightly medium-heavy use.

Cons:
Cable from lamp to battery pack is sometimes in the way. Carrying the batteries on the head would be too heavy though. An additional mode with only two LEDs would be nice, as the LEDs are extremly bright and tend to blind other people. You need to be carefull not to shine them directly into the face.

Pelicase Equipment Storage

Extremly rugged plastic suitcase. So watertight that it swimms if required. Can be used as a seat and locked with padlocks. I used it to store everything electronic that should not get wet. Performed as expected, no equipment damage despite serious rainfall and water in the tent.

Cons:
A bit heavy.

Garmin eMap GPS

I have it now for several years and it is still reliable and extremly usefull. Big display, simple user interface, good receiption. Vector-maps can be loaded into the device.

Cons:
only two batteries, and eats them for breakfast. Best use high-capacity NiMh-rechargeables. Not as watertight as other Garmin units, don?t rely on it when you go on a boat trip or into the rainforest.

Plovdiv Altstadt

Grill

Auf dem Weg in die Altstadt, einen steilen Huegel hinauf, kamen wir geradewegs zu einem exzellenten Freiluft-Grill-Restaurant. Endlich genug Fleisch nach all dem Vegetarismus. I?m Schatten unter Baemen laesst es sich recht angenehm speisen. Das lokale Bier (Kamenitza) ist auch nicht schlecht, es erinnert entfernt an Radeberger. Die Stimmung ist sommerlich-entspannt, die Preise fuer Essen und Trinken mehr als entspannt.

Grill

Auf dem Weg in die Altstadt, einen steilen Huegel hinauf, kamen wir geradewegs zu einem exzellenten Freiluft-Grill-Restaurant. Endlich genug Fleisch nach all dem Vegetarismus. I?m Schatten unter Baemen laesst es sich recht angenehm speisen. Das lokale Bier (Kamenitza) ist auch nicht schlecht, es erinnert entfernt an Radeberger. Die Stimmung ist sommerlich-entspannt, die Preise fuer Essen und Trinken mehr als entspannt.

Verfall

Moschee

Eines der wenigen verbliebenen islamischen Gotteshaeuser in Plovdiv.

Osteuropa-Sommer

In Plovdiv ist es sehr sommerlich. Genauer gesagt ist der Sommer hier so wie er irgendwie nur weit I?m Osten sein kann. Die Stadt ist gut dafuer eingerichtet. Schattige Parks, Buecherbuden, ueberall Eis-Staende und dieser leichte Verfall von Strassen und Haeusern der dazugehoert. Schwer zu beschreibende Atmosphaere.