Motley Assortment

No real topic, just a post. I am horrendously sick, rendering my mornings intolerable and my workday exhausting. Thankfully my current deals have been a lot less intense than a month ago, and I can leave the office in enough time to get sleep and try to heal. Unfortunately, part of the reason for the drop in intensity is that two of my potential travel opportunities - one to Thailand, the other to DRC, have probably fallen through - although in all honesty you can never make the call either way until you're on the plane. On the plus side, I am now working on a Russian media deal that will likely give me a chance to see Moscow for the first time in the near future.

Apparently, a lot of travelling is on the horizon. Jin (who has been fantastic at making me feel better despite my rotten physical condition - thanks babe!) and I are planning a trip to Canada, probably Montreal and/or Kingston, to get my visa reissued and hopefully visit my brother, who became the first family member outside of my parents to visit me on the east coast since I started living here. Reid and I are aiming for some kind of mega holiday in the early summer, not sure where yet. And I also want to work in seeing Mehal in Seattle, potentially convincing him to climb Rainier with me. Beyond the summer and any other business trips, I also need to make my way out to Vancouver for Matt's wedding. Wedding? Yes, his wedding. You know you're getting old when your friends start proposing. But you still have to call me bro - let's try to catch each other this week. I'll also probably try to visit Whan in Syracuse at some point - he came down a week ago and we had a blast in DC, although unfortunately he could only stay for one night.

The other important thing to mention is that I (finally) got a bike! It's a pretty sweet mountain bike, and although it set me back a bit, I have no doubt it's worth it. It makes getting around the city so much faster, and once it warms up a bit more I expect to hit a lot of the trails around here on weekends. Jin and I are aiming to do the Mount Vernon trail on Saturday. My quads are probably really out of shape - the last time I did any serious mountain biking was back on Javan volcanoes in my scouting days - so I am probably in for a sore time, no matter how small the hills out here might be!

Rogue State

US foreign policy would be funny, if it wasn't so frightening. The complete disrespect that the Bush administration has had for international law, the sovereignty of other peoples and the Universal Declaration of human rights is beyond belief. Appropriately, I am currently reading Rogue States by Noam Chomsky. Although Chomsky's incessantly militant rhetoric can prove a bit extreme after 200 pages, his point stands and is proven by history and current affairs; America, since its inception and virtually without exception, has used force to impose its will on other nations and maintain the World Order as it sees fit. Ironically, domestic public perception somehow clings to the image of America as a purveyor of peace and protector of human rights, while its own record remains abominable and its military actions internationally continue to blatantly offend the respect for humanity that even some present-day dictators find extreme. As much as I disagree with Mr. Bush's foreign policy adjectives, I cannot blame him alone for this practice; America's historical accomplishments in toppling democratically elected leaders and supplying brutal regimes with military hardware has been a constant, bipartisan initiative that Carter embraced as enthusiastically as Bush.

Shoeshine

Shoeshine
Originally uploaded by Sacurus!.

I haven't posted in a while...been busy. In any case, I finally found some time to sign up to this Flickr thing, put some of my photos on the web, and potentially start building a database of cool pics. This is one of the shoeshine guys in Mexico City.

My ID for Flickr is Sacurus - I assume all of you will be able to access my pictures publicly. Unfortunately, the 20MB upload limit per month is quite limiting...although it does force you to pick and choose your best photos. Has anyone signed up for the premium Flickr service? Thoughts?

EHMs

I wanted to post something up here about Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins. It's a book I recently read by stealing time in between work over the weekend, and I found it an interesting introspective from someone who worked in a career aligned with my own. The author basically describes the new form of global empire, and how, as he believes, people working in private industry and development finance contribute to the subjugation and virtual enslavement of impoverished people in the third world. Specifically, Economic Hitmen (EHMs) are supposed to sell exorbitant loans to third world countries, which they know the countries will never be able to afford to pay, and then persaude them to use the funds in construction projects that are undertaken by American and Western firms, thus tying to country to the West's political agenda while creating business for its own companies and entrepreneurs. Ironically, in the culture of globalization, most of the people implementing this foreign policy are unaware that they are doing so, as they have been indoctrinated into the mindset of the North American corporatocracy.

At first glance, the summary of this story makes it out to be another piece of leftist extremism flying in the face of modern economics. But Perkins, who spent much of his life working for the system, and who describes himself as one of the few "EHMs" consciously aware of the "master plan", paints a very real and vivid account of his own experiences working in the third world, which I found very real and, more frighteningly, very compatible with both my life in Indonesia and also my working experience. Of course, the World Bank is named as one of the principal organisations contributing to this new form of empire (what self respecting left-of-center account of global economics could do without some Bank-bashing?)

I am leaving my own personal judgment on the truth and profundity of what Perkins wrote in limbo, as I feel I need time to digest it, and to examine counter arguments. Definitely worth a read though.

Priceless

3 Starbucks "venti" coffees: $5.88
1 Packet Aspirin: $4.29

Occassionally glimpsing sunlight through the shaded windows of my office building while whithering into a baggy-eyed pale skinned pseudo-human: priceless.