Week XIV – XV

Australia – Sydney and Blue Mountains

What started as a rainy and cold affair went rather well in the end. As for Sydney the weather stayed quite changeable but with very nice weather in between, which made all the thunder and lightning worth watching – not, that I wouldn’t have enjoyed it otherwise. The blue mountains were chilly from down to one degrees, but with sunshine and thus the best weather for climbing and tracking. The only dangerous animals I saw so far, were some jellyfish and reptiles in the aquarium and those humans driving around the streets.

Sydney is a nice little town of about 4 mill busy inhabitants. It’s awesome to run around in the parks and to visit some of the museums and libraries. Being quite multicultural with a high percentage of Asians marks it as a nice spot to experience the most different happenings.
The blue mountains, about 100 km west of Sydney, offer a more laid back environment. I was able to meet obliging people, see kangaroos, do some bush walking and climb on some really nice rocks – even though sandstone provides sometimes fragile and crumbly characteristics. Thus speaking.. adrenalin rocks!

In the blue mountains and around Sydney..

And.. I’m right here!

“But you know that when the truth is told
That you can get what you want or you can just get old”

Week XI – XII

New Zealand – North Island

After getting a relocation car to go from Wellington to Auckland, I drove up the west coast of the North Island to New Plymouth. First, I stayed another night in Upper Hutt and helped bringing a tree down – thanks, Owen. In New Plymouth, I stayed at the YHA with a new, crazy-but-funny manager and had the whole camping area for myself. I started running and doing some sports again. Cool thing!
Next day I stopped at the Waitomo caves and decided to take a tour before driving on to Hamilton. Interestingly nobody else was there to take part in the tour at 5 pm. So I got a maori guide all for myself. We talked about stuff and I was allowed to take pictures of the cave and it’s glowing worms. Cool thing!
Afterwards I stayed a night in Hamilton. Unfortunately, I arrived quite late. I couldn’t find a hostel but got suddenly invited to camp in the garden of the security-guy I asked for directions. Thanks Tim ..and cool thing!
Back in Auckland I met Lukas and Nora after we overcame their daylight-saving problems. They took me with them on their special-exciting-due-to-first-time-left-lane-driving trip north to Paihia. On our way we went to a fast food restaurant, a toilet in Kawakawa and had a screw-incident. In Paihia I didn’t go to see Kauri trees. Instead I had a closer look at the Rainbow Warrior. That is more remarkable when you know that the ship is to be found at 27 meters below sea level since 1987 – with a great visibility and awesome fish. I also talked to a mewing Parrot named Rocky. Special cool thing!
I headed on south with the two to Rotorua. I didn’t do much there, but we went out for a steak which was my first meat since some time. Then our ways separated again. They were off to the south and I headed back to Auckland to see The Killers in concert. Sweet as!

Now, that’s where I’m still staying – Auckland. But have a look at the cave, toilet and lake Rotorua yourself..

The only question left is: are we human or are we dancer? Uh, and before I forget.. next stop: Sydney on the 19th.

Natural selection

“Books must follow sciences, and not sciences books.” – Francis Bacon (unsourced)

It’s 1858. It’s a man called Charles Darwin. He did not even attend, cause of the death of his son by scarlet fever. But it was a presentation with this title: On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection, that was meant to shape our perception of this thing called evolution. (read online: The Origin of Species)

There was the theory of evolution and there were the facts and observations to see this theory scientifically plausible and thus officially recognised over time. What I find a kind of interesting is, that there shouldn’t be a question about evolution as there is none about gravity. That means, a human with a body that has a higher density and weight as water will sink. And regardless of all the proofs, some try to defend their theories where worlds are created within days, people walk over water and fish are multiplied by kind words. No going over water – won’t work! It’s simply not going to happen!
And so, they think that they should cement evolution by creating examples, parables and so on. But what they don’t understand is that people who believe in ghosts, afterlifes, hellfires and living in heaven after giving money to a ‘pope’ in a golden robe, won’t really act rational to fundamental research either.

Anyway, it’s the 18-month Darwin-year starting today (150-years since the first-publication) until Darwin’s 200th birthday on the 12th February 2009. Hurray!

How to be objective

Normally, I’d like to say that there are always two ways: the friendly one and the honest one. Nonetheless, when it comes to be factually there seems to be not so much of a choice. In the sense of communication objectivity can only be achieved by knowing how both, transmitter and receiver, are going to understand a specific message. For humans that is hard indeed, cause there are no strict standards for conversations.
If you just think about some factors like speed, tone, word order, facial expression a lot of possible and different statements can be created even with the same words. As for the message itself, always problematic are for example comparisons, clauses and restrictions. The phrase ‘I like you, but..’ has always a kind of a killer effect. One reason may be that the but-part is the exception to which is usually given more weight.

Another problem shows up when people realise something said might be misunderstood. They switch into defensive mode and that just has to seem like you’re wrong for your conversational counterpart. Even with words less is often more. Skip the unnecessary filler words. Objectivity in the understanding within a group of more than two people would be real luck. You’re sometimes better off by not even trying to find a common communication standard. It takes a lot of time, it’s never guaranteed and most people don’t listen to you anyway.
The answer is: ‘what was the question again’!

When the fish stops smelling

You might think it’s bad when fish starts to smell. But it’s usually worse when it stops to. The reason is that we’re used to the odour of ourselves. If something starts to smell, something is wrong ..or you forgot about the biological kitchen waste. When it stops without a reason, like you getting rid of the waste, it means that something happened and you might not realise it because you’re used to the not-smelling of nothing-wrong.
This is where it gets a bit complicated.
The problem is, when something seems right, its most of the time just pretending to be right. Master in this discipline is the modern human. Some even get away by only pretending to be someone else. Actors for example. Some live good by simulating knowledge in time, functions and people. Take some managers. The whole stock market is based on theoretical values.

Whom can you really trust? Maybe shrinks, pretending to know what we’re thinking? This issue goes even deeper. In the end everybody only does what he thinks is best for him. Seems nice if you support freedom of opinion and so on. The troubles start as soon as you want something different as your plumber. So, you pay people to want the same as you do?
Sometimes it’s not the fish that smells!