CURRENT MISSION

Have an interesting and enjoyable life and try to avoid putting too much effort into things that some people try to make seem important but aren't really

ABOUT ME

I suppose I'm the kind of person that finds it difficult to give a brief self-description and feel satisfied that it paints an reasonably accurate picture of who I am. Actually, the whole question of how one defines oneself is one I find both fascinating and perplexing. Perhaps I should be saving some of this stuff for the personal philosophy section. Anyway, at the very least I can say I'm interested in history, politics, languages, and traveling. I like to go up on the roof and watch the clouds go by.

PHILOSOPHY

O Mort, vieux capitaine, il est temps! levons l'ancre!
Ce pays nous ennuie, ô Mort! Appareillons!
Si le ciel et la mer sont noirs comme de l'encre
Nos coeurs que tu connais sont remplis de rayons!

Verse-nous ton poison pour qu'il nous réconforte!
Nous voulons, tant ce feu nous brûle le cerveau,
Plonger au fond du gouffre, Enfer ou Ciel, qu'importe?
Au fond de l'Inconnu pour trouver du nouveau!

--from Le Voyage, by Charles Baudelaire

While I'm not ready quite yet to take the ultimate voyage, somehow there is something about the unknown and the new that is so intriguing.

"Qui aimes-tu le mieux, homme énigmatique, dis?
ton père, ta mère, ta soeur ou ton frère?
--Je n'ai ni père, ni mère, ni soeur, ni frère.
--Tes amis?
--Vous vous servez là d'une parole dont le sens
m'est resté jusqu'à ce jour inconnu.
--Ta patrie?
--J'ignore sous quelle latitude elle est située.
--La beauté?
--Je l'aimerais volontiers, déesse et immortelle.
--L'or?
--Je le haïs comme vous haïssez Dieu.
--Eh! qu'aimes-tu donc, extraordinaire étranger?
--J'aime les nuages... les nuages qui passent... là-
bas... là-bas... les merveilleux nuages!"

--L'Etranger, by Charles Baudelaire

Interests

Generally speaking I'm interested in how "the world" works. How social and economic frameworks come into being, sustain themselves, or are changed; the media's role in shaping how we perceive ourselves and society; what is going on at the most fundamental levels of matter and energy; how a bunch of atoms bind themselves into cells which bind themselves together to make a self-aware brain.

I also enjoy most things that have alcohol in them and like to think myself a capable badminton player.

• politics
• traveling
• badminton
• communications
• history
• languages

Music, Movies, and Books

Nirvana; Pink Floyd; Chopin; Everclear; Audioslave; Tool; Son Volt; Mono; Georges Brassens; Stereophonics; Cake.

Bad Santa; Apocalypse Now; Dr. Stranglove; The Unbearable Lightness of Being; Bernie; Y Tu Mama Tambien; Little Miss Sunshine; The Simpsons (the middle years); documentaries in general.

The Private Life of Chairman Mao; Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader; Ho Chi Minh; A Brief History of Time; Relativity Visualized; The Sex Lives of Cannibals; The Story of Art; 1984; Les Fleurs du mal; Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive; The Dark Side of Camelot.

Countries I’ve Visited

Botswana, Cambodia, Canada, China, Egypt, France, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kenya, Laos, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mauritius, Myanmar, Nepal, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, United Kingdom, Viet Nam, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Countries I’ve Lived In

Japan, Réunion, Switzerland, Thailand, United States

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