2011 was quick, and it was chaotic. The sound track to Hanna (film) by the Chemical Brothers is appropriate for my 2011. That music encapsulates my experience of it. All in all, it is hard to fathom that I survived the year, or that any work at all got done. It is that time of the year again when I pass review on the past year. There was also something about shoe shopping in Munich, a bit of deconstructionism in Berlin, a bit of fractal musing in Hamburg, a touch of reality in Athens, and the reminder of fiction in Bangkok. I started writing this note yesterday sitting in a train and being late to a party, but then I am the most likely in my class to arrive late at my own funeral. The party was good. 2011 is over.

Yesterday, in a book, I came across an old paper air ticket from ten years ago that made me feel that not only has the year gone by quickly, the last decade has also flown by. It is hard to imagine now that I have been in all the places I was be it in the past year, or the past decade. There is however something comforting about not leaving much of a personal trace while making a few lasting changes here and there. Was it it in 2011 that I lectured in Managua? Yes it was. It was also the year that saw me through more emergency rooms and intensive care units than I care to go into any details about. It was also the year when the overflow, saturation, and overburdening with social media got to me and I recalled how very private I have always been. That on Sylvester there was no text message overflow but that Twitter crashed does indicate the shape of our communication trends. For those of you wondering, Facebook is not a good way of getting in touch with me.

But were there lessons in 2011 that I want to note here? Yes!

First there was family, lots of family, and lots of them showed up at my door between hospital stays, while I showed up at their doors to party, indulge in the culinary arts, and to resume my seclusion at the seaside. But there was not just family, there were friends and colleagues, all of whom held my hand in one way or another when I just had no clue if or how my life was going to continue. I had no clue how things were going to turn out, but I also had no anxiety about it. When I was scared and clueless, I said so. At one point while being wheeled to the ICU I grabbed the hand of a nurse and held it tight; somehow that was what I needed. I needed to feel the connection to another human being. It was a stranger, but it did not matter. Connection is not personal, neither is warmth, and it can happen devoid of history while creating one.

Second, I had to confront my own impertinence towards denial. I denied and ignored the symptoms that my body was showing for over ten years until one day last November when a Spanish fellow touched me with expert  hands, and for once, it hurt like hell, and I finally asked why it hurt. The answer left me livid but speechless.  At that point, I knew that there was no option to surgery. Within a few weeks the Spanish fellow with the expert touch got his chance to do a bit of cut and paste with my innards. Life will never be the same again, it can only be much better.

And there were many more lessons. I have written them down. In due time, you will know.

I wonder what surprises 2012 will bring? I liked the question that a colleague asked last week: What are your dreams for 2012?

After a four week hiatus, I am returning slowly but surely, and most certainly sure that nothing is like it used to be.

Love and hugs to all,

Dannie

These photos were taken a few weeks back at the shop window of the Confiserie Tschirren in Bern.

It is been a while since I wrote anything of much substance. I have been busy, and if I am any good at reading the tea leaves, this is just the tip of the iceberg. I am either going to be even busier in the months ahead, or else I will be six feet under ground or my ashes will be floating down the Aare. Life is being good to me. Politics is keeping me entertained. Last thursday the best show in town was to be had at the Bernese Rathaus with item 13 on the agenda of the city council. I delivered the results of the committee’s deliberation for the majority. I kept it as dry as one can keep it; I left the polemic for my fraction’s head. This is the one item in this town that gets everybody from left to right on the political compass fairly much up in a frenzy. My luck! I volunteered for this. This is the issue of the Reitschule. After the show when the spectators left the tribune at the Rathaus, somebody yelled that we were all out of touch with reality. Whoever yelled out that note of protest was right. I correct that vote, and add that we are all out of touch with reality. The people on the spectator tribune and those of us down on the city council’s chambers, we are all out of touch with reality. The reality on the city council’s floor and the reality of the Reitschule seem far removed from one another. FUBAR. Really, fubar. Somehow not much has changed since the term was coined.

In the past twenty odd years since the Reitschule was brought to life by some left wing political forces, it has been subject to a popular vote five times. It is clear, the majority of Bern’s population wants to keep the place going, It offers a good alternative cultural scene. I am included in this majority, I have always voted for it as a citizen, and as an elected member of the city council I defend its rights. Still, it is not that easy, but it is simple. Trivially simple. The Reitschule has the magic appeal of a mirror. The magic is that in this mirror you only see what you do not want to see about our society.

The extreme right’s insistence of doing away with the Reitschule has only ensured that it is now firmly anchored as an institution. In the last extreme right initiative, the popular vote pronounced itself clearly against a sale of the real estate and its closing. The extreme right has some outlandish ideas that somehow closing the Reitschule would solve all the problems in society, in particular those of violence. But to add insult to injury, the same extreme right is very disturbed by the fact that freedom of expression is not anything to which they have a monopoly. Frankly, I find this all rather deplorable. There is a place and a need for the Reitschule in Bern. The violence and drug problems and the increased feeling of desperation that some citizens of this world feel need to be addressed, but closing the Reitschule is not going to solve any of those problems.

Actually, the more I think of it, the more convinced I am that the Reitschule has a wonderfully comfortable position in any negotiation with the city. Even if all hell breaks loose and no agreement can be found on the subsidies and rent of the localities, even then, in that worst case, the association governing the Reitschule still has a good negotiation position. Please note that this is a position that has been gained through democratic mechanisms, and if it were not for the extreme right’s aversion to it, its position would not be as strong as it is now. If the right wingers have any brains at all they will stop picking on the Reitschule and will try to solve the city’s  violence and problems in more constructive ways. The police do the best that they can, but here too, I think that there is no party in this discourse that could not do a bit better, or try a little harder. Dialogue, in particular constructive dialogue is necessary. As long as each institution involved in negotiating the subsidy contracts remains in their entrenched positions and are not willing to listen and learn, nothing constructive is going to happen.

I just see that government is everybody’s business, and that to resolve conflicts needs a whole lot of good will from everybody, a whole truck load of tolerance, but also a bit of inspiration and respect for those who happen to think differently.

PS: By the way, I really think this is a storm in a glass of water. As I write this protests and police violence have resurged in Cairo. The situation in Syria remains critical, and the suffering through out the world continues. Our city’s little problems seem a bit quaint, if not out right darlingly provincial. This is life in the land of milk and honey.

The details, oh the details. I am not exclaiming, I am observing.

thanks Marc.

I do not know. But when Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria (Arab Spring 2011) started their revolt, the mainstream media were on fire with the news. With OWS, the same mainstream media is reporting rather subdudly. It is a trickle on my twitter stream, and frankly it seems that nobody gives a damn. Have we, the rich westerners, gotten disenfranchised to this point of just not caring about what is going on on our front porch (Wall Street)?

Let’s have a look at what the main headlines are on the hour:

CNN/US: Main headline “Bullies just not preying on the weak:” A new study commissioned by CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360°” found that the stereotype of the schoolyard bully preying on the weak doesn’t reflect reality in schools. Comforting to see is that the second line on the front page and first item on ‘US top stories’ is indeed the announcement of the 24th day of OWS. But then it is all business as usual. Where are the in depth stories about the protests? Should it not be on the front page on the website? But it is on the front page, down at the bottom, in “iReport” as one of nine boxes alongside “Sports Illustrated.” I stand corrected, not!

New York Times: NATO, gulf shrimp, election, budget deficit, and by the way, an headline down the page Protesters Offer Help and Risk for Democrats. The first paragraph is a revelation: “Leading Democratic figures, including party fund-raisers and a top ally of President Obama, are embracing the spread of the anti-Wall Street protests in a clear sign that members of the Democratic establishment see the movement as a way to align disenchanted Americans with their party.” Is anybody out there listening to these people? Am I the only cynic left in this world that only sees self-interested instrumentalist purposes in what is being reported?

The Washington Post: Almost makes it important and dedicates a navigation tab to Occupy Wall Street. However on its front page, Afghan detainees are being tortured according to the UN, and you have to scroll down and really look for it to find the tab and a banner that you can click to find out what is being reported. Meanwhile, the readership also seems much more interested in Demi Moore’s latest romantic foils that anything that has to do with protests and government. To save grace, this newspaper does publish Eugene Robinson’s opinion that albeit on the conservative side, still manages to echo some of the discontent “a nation where the rich have become the mega-rich while the middle class has steadily lost ground, where unemployment is stuck at levels once considered unbearable, and where our political system is too dysfunctional to take the kind of bold action that would make a real difference.”

At Le Monde, the french are preoccupied with their own elections, and a few minor disarrays in the land of centralism and accelerated social decay. In their international section, we learn about a resurgence of cholera in Haiti, that the Liberians are having an election, and Juppé is flirting with the Syrians while the Copts in Egypt are burying their dead. Ouch! Nobody really cares about the troubles on Wall Street.

The Swiss NZZ front page is dedicated to the calamities of the weather, the workings of Ukrainian justice and politics, and of course, what the hell is wrong with the banks. Down at the bottom of the page the Swiss have their own OWS to worry about, “Occupy Paradeplatz.”

But that was a short snapshot of the web versions of some of the mainstream dailies that I occasionally read. However the media landscape is fragmenting at a rate that can only be welcome. Citizen media – a mad name by any measure – is popping up allover, and nobody can really keep up, so their voices are difficult to detect from under all the background noise. Still, if you care to dig, it is there: Livestram,Twitter (suspiciously quiet), John Perry Barlow (awake as ever), Gawker (almost anesthetized towards mainstream), and Lawrence Lessig (as uncomfortable as ever), to name a few off the top.

Good morning America, you are dying in your sleep. Sweet dreams!

PS: The rich westerners are on a drug induced sleep. Democracy has become empty rhetoric, and government a consumable.

I landed in Geneva last Sunday evening, and for a while there considered immediately getting on another plane. Anywhere would have done. One way ticket was the option that I was considering. Then realized that I must have arrived home. Home is that place where a whole lot of unfinished business awaits. I seem to be at home in a lot of geographical locations. Unfinished business here and there. Adventures are everywhere. Last week’s unfinished business started at a restaurant named Sem Palavras.

Last week I had a shoe adventure. I disposed of three pairs for a variety of reasons while at the beach. Saturday morning traded a pair of extremely muddy old running shoes for a pair of flip-flops. That trade was after I had helped myself to breakfast by a fig tree on my cousin’s property. Man, the deals that I make! However the shoe story was not over with the trade for the flip-flops. All I had with me were two pairs of high heels and still another pair of flip-flops. I can not really walk in flip-flops, and do much better with high heels. Still, there are limits to how much walking I am willing to do on stilts. The minute I arrived at the airport in my beautiful black summer pumps I decided that I had to solve the walking problem. I ended up with a not so funky pair of Lacoste sneakers that were on sale and happened to fit.

The scent of the fresh figs and the the moist earth is nothing that one can buy in a bottle. I suspect it is a cure for depression. While on the wild hunt for breakfast besides the figs off the tree and the grapes off the vine I rediscovered the delights of an old brew of coffee. To complete my olfactory adventure, I was lead to the carob storage room… wow! If you never experienced the smell of harvested carob beans, you just have not lived! Remember that I also like natto for breakfast, and then you may have things in perspective.

The academic year is gearing up, and I am curious as to what it has in store for me.

I will be back mid September. Right now there is not all that much to tell. You know, as I told Roger once… what did I really tell him then? Oh! It was something boring.

I will post in quantum symbionts about some of the work in progress, but only sporadically.

Wishing you all a great summer.

After a whole lot of tea drinking, I concluded that either Yemen was not ready for me, or I was not ready for it. It did not make a difference which one. Of course, there was more fish to fry.

Now, Yemen seems to really be going to the dogs. It makes me wonder what is worse, the past oligarchy or the uncertain future. But then the future is always uncertain, and in time, it all comes to pass. Some die, some survive, and the iterations continue.

Isn’t after all, oligarchy the predominant form of government? I concede that sometimes this oligarchy is mixed in with a good dose of democracy, but it is still oligarchy that predominates. One of my colleagues accuses me of making life complicated, and I accuse life of being complicated.

Humans can not and will not deal with simplicity; we are still maladjusted as creatures. If you do not like complicated, try messy. Life is messy, humans are messy, and politics are messy. It would be nice to have the photoshop equivalent for government, however Peter Bieri would tell me that this is not an allowed discourse to have. He is right, it is like comparing apples and oranges. Still, it would be nice to be able to photoshop the world’s government into looking as pretty as the models in the marketing campaigns of the big labels and trademarks.

So, where does this leave me. Oh, I almost forgot. I gave up on trying to visit Yemen long ago. Arabia Felix will live in my fiction, and there we are not alone.

The saga of Rep. Anthony Weiner took several turns Wednesday as a handful of Capitol Hill Democrats called for the lawmaker to resign and news broke that Weiner’s wife was pregnant.

First, you do not send lewd pictures via Twitter. It is a public platform even when you are using private messages. So, Weiner just proved that a geek he is not. The cool kids know better than this. Actually he just demonstrated some form of technological retardation. Anyhow, that does make him a good representative for his constituency.

Second, if you want to behave like a jerk on the web, that is your prerogative. I can consider it a form of entertainment for which social media is very well designed to deliver on. But then, I have hit the point of social media burnout. Seen it, done it, and yes it is useful. The cat is dead, get on with the work.

Third, if some whiny lewd behaviour and having a wife pregnant are grounds to resign, I plainly have failed to understand democracy.

So… I just tried to cheer up a colleague who complained about all the administrative work in research which hardly anybody acknowledges, is tedious, and also essential for research to progress by volunteering that there is something far worse on the satisfaction scale, and that is politics. Really. Just spent two hours in a commission meeting to get in a lousy little request to eliminate a couple of meaningless numbers from the freaking budget. Two hours! Meaningless numbers! Rendered meaningless by the same parliament that has to approve that they be removed… Two hours?

Come to think of it, I am starting to get the point. Politics is the cause of stupidity. People do not go into politics because they are stupid, they became stupid in the course of politicking.

Exploring discord.

It is political, it is not economical. It is not economical to limit one’s thinking within failing models. Politics is not the art of the possible, it is just a game. This is the kind of game that one should not leave to the myopic egoists without a sense of community and global social welfare.

If politics is a game, it has rules. If it has rules, who created the rules?

I am neither courageous nor brilliant. I am not Emile Zola either. Still, I accuse, j’accuse! It was wrong, and it remains wrong to have killed a person who allegedly was Osama bin Laden. There can be no joy in this, there is nothing to celebrate, there is no success, this is no glory, there is no victory. This was a step backward in human evolution, it was cultural devolution. It was wrong. Wrong.

9/11 was wrong too. However there is no way in this world that two wrongs make a right, and much less when the facts are not clear. I really do not care how much purported, circumstantial or physical evidence there is about Al Qaeda as the author of the 9/11 attack. There is no way to justify either. However, America would do itself some good to ask itself a few serious questions about its foreign policy. Why is America so deeply hated in some parts of the world?

Actually, the Pentagon has a few ideas. At least one 2004 report (1) uses plain langugage to state what has been common knowledge in the streets of Cairo – or Islamabad, it is not freedom that the Yankees are exporting, it is hypocrisy, and that too is rather convenient to some of the autocrats in the Middle East.

“American direct intervention in the Muslim World has paradoxically elevated the stature of and support for radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single-digits in some Arab societies. Muslims do not “hate our freedom,” but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the longstanding, even increasing support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan, and the Gulf states.” However the more than hundred page report does not stop there, it continues “Thus when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy. Moreover, saying that “freedom is the future of the Middle East” is seen as patronizing, suggesting that Arabs are like the enslaved peoples of the old Communist World — but Muslims do not feel this way: they feel oppressed, but not enslaved.”

That said, it could be, and there is a shred of hope that this year’s Arab Spring is starting another chapter in the politics of the region. But what happens next? Osama bin Laden was but one man, Al Qaeda was not a one man’s operation, and the Taliban is not Al Qaeda but merely shares with it an ideology of radicalism. That this radicalism is one instrumentalizing Islam as just a footnote. The Fight Goes On – By Anna Badkhen | Foreign Policy: “That anyone should consider bin Laden’s death auspicious to the course of the counterinsurgency is a surprising notion to many in northern Afghanistan, where the Taliban have been gaining rapid momentum over the past 18 months.”

America just lost the war on terrorism. I do not think that god cares all that much about the American dream; it is a nightmare.

(1) http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/dsb/commun.pdf

this earth that we love, this earth that we destroy, this earth that sustains us, this earth that we adapt to, this earth here on earth.

I can not bear to look at the face of suffering that the images present and I do not want to look at those images. I do not want to be entertained by the suffering of others. I do not want to see the suffering and struggle of other humans instrumentalised for goals that serve the ideological vanity of a few comfortable hypocrites.

It is time to mourn the victims of the Sendai earthquake. It is also time to think about your emergency plan. It is time to learn about what life on earth is about. I am upset. There are no news.

Really, there are no news worth mentioning. In Athens, sidewalks are a concept waiting to be born. Fur shops are everywhere. Furs? Wait, furs?

There is a problem with the dimensions of pipes and sewers, it is one of those places where everybody asks you to not dispose of toilet paper in the toilet. No pipe dreams here, just mismatched or underdimensioned pipes.

I am however happy to report that the Acropolis is still there. I look at it every morning when I get up, and I give it a glance before going to sleep; actually I can see it from the bed. The strikes (metro, bus, etc) happen here and there, and the information about them flows… barely flows. But don’t ask me, I just go with the flow. Scaffolding is everywhere, I like it here.

We Are All Egyptians – NYTimes.com: “At Tahrir Square’s field hospital (a mosque in normal times), 150 doctors have volunteered their services, despite the risk to themselves. Maged, a 64-year-old doctor who relies upon a cane to walk, told me that he hadn’t been previously involved in the protests, but that when he heard about the government’s assault on peaceful pro-democracy protesters, something snapped. “

It is good when something snaps and you feel alive and ready to die. Those are the moments that make life the adventure that it is, not the complacent excuse for consuming oxygen and annoying others with silly power struggles that neglect the rights of others. Could you consider that you have an obligation to respect the rights of others? What kind of difference would that make on how you lead your life?

We Are All Egyptians – NYTimes.com: “Unfortunately, usually what determines the fate of such movements is not the courage of the democracy activists but the willingness of the government to massacre its citizens. In that case, the survivors usually retreat in sullen silence, and the movement is finished for a time. “

I hope this time, it does not go the way of retreat in sullen silence. I want to see history written in another way, and that the government is by the people and for the people.

Somewhen in January of 2010 I started a new notebook that  came from Italy. As my first penned entry:

I am not alone, I feel alone. There is a difference. It’s time to deal with the difference.

That, unknowingly turned out to be the motto for the year. I should be careful with what I write down, it creates a reality which I can not escape.

Let me give you a few of the highlights of the past year…

The Summer was great. The son spend eight weeks in Switzerland, and half of those we drove each other up a wall. It was the best of times. He struggled with his crap and I with mine.  We always find each other when we discuss science or philosophy. I have great memories and have drawn loads of inspiration from a visitor now living in Australia, an American without the accent, and one of the brightest minds I have ever encountered.

This same summer, once I casually complemented a student on her very cool flip flops. Before I knew it, she brought me back some from her home country. Now I am the proud owner of a pair of Ugandan flip flops. I am challenged beyond imagination as I am more for boots, but I love those flip flops too. More recently I had an engaging discussion with this generous creature, and it has made me write down some wild ideas that I had not yet bothered to commit to paper (or word-processor). I started writing a paper on that, and after I jotted down the main outline of the idea, got back to all the other items pending. Soon, I will be able to return to the writing of that paper. Inshallah!

The men, where are the male men in my life? Besides the son who is back in Los Angeles, there are the good friends in Paris, Bern, and a few other places. However in November I had the pleasure of a very special visitor in Bern, my little cousin. There is nothing little about this cousin, but given that he is the younger one of the two brothers who are like my own brothers, he is the little one. We share one grandfather. I complained that I would not get to see him at the end of the year, he decided to visit. He and I arrived at the train station in Bern on the same day an hour apart. The next days were spent in family heaven. Together we made a train round trip of Switzerland in one day, but I could not bear the thought of once more going up to Jungfrauhoch and sent him off alone on that one. Together we plotted touring on a motorbike, we drew plans, and he cleaned my Ferrari. Oh, it is a real Ferrari 355 GTS, a model one, red as it should be.

The low point of the year was a saturday in February. I was up in Greifswald (Germany) with one free day to be a tourist, some fun people around, and a hike planned. The only problem was that I could barely walk. I can only guess that during the week I had overdone it, and my body decided that it is not up to such nonsense. Besides my left shoulder giving me hell, I had a rare but painfully nasty case of lumbago. It hurt so much on the left side of me that I could not even feel sorry for myself. I concentrated my efforts on a good lunch, wobbled, and succeed. The next day, before I reached Berlin, the lumbago was gone. The shoulder took a bit longer to get fixed.

This Autumn brought a sobering moment when one of the men in my life visited after he had kept away for the whole time during the summer. Strange was that he showed up when in a creative throw of passion I declared that if I was not such a coward, I would jump off the next bridge. He was concerned. He has stuck through my moods, my crazy liaisons and affairs, when I need him, he materializes. Devotion is hard to accept, he has demonstrated it. I struggle stupefied. He arrived, sat down, and I let out more than a bit of steam, tears, and laughed at myself before asking why he had had surgery. Cancer. I was touched. Deeply. I felt insensitive. However my feelings are not too much of a good guide for anything. Damn! We do take life for granted, but it can be over so quickly! He is alright and the prognosis is encouraging, he is back to playing games with me and not taking life too seriously. I like his games, they do not bore me.

Another glorious moment happened just two days before Christmas when a friend calls about last minute plans. This friend was in a chatty mood, and I was willing to part with a bit of personal information. We talked about one of my liasons that I have, in moments of human frailty, thought to be my nemesis. A sweet nemesis and one of my treasured sources of inspiration. I updated, and I laughed. Really laughed. At some point I got bored with the games, and most adamantly, with unqualified arrogance and egoism stuck to my own priorities. Once in a while I trip, and get seduced by his games. Recovery comes quickly, and all is forgiven when I look at what the result is, fiction. Without the tripping over and the imminent loss of equilibrium I would not appreciate the fact that I regain equilibrium. Emotions are jewels. Like jewels they need craft before they can shine in all glory. It was good to laugh at myself and how I trip, or how very frail and on the edge of equilibrium we all are. We all love to play games, and we all like to know the rules better than the other. We all want to win. We get bored when the rules of the game are too transparent, don’t we?

It was the year that reinforced my convictions that gender fragmentation needs a good reform. I also discovered a bit of the literature on gender economics. I also saw myself pleading in favour of gender considerations in disciplines that at first glance seem to have no direct connection. Of all my intellectual adventures, this one I had not anticipated. That is good. These are the games I play with myself. I need the challenge. Odd, but it is so.

On another note, when I started the public notes on quantum symbionts (uncondition), I jotted down my intentions:

What this will evolve to, I really do not know. My intent is to, in due time, to write… on specific subjects which I have chosen as the substance of my life, and in particular what sustainable innovation and technology might be about.

To begin with, sustainable innovation and technology has to do with intellectual assets leadership development. In this series here, my intent is to convey both what this means to me and to the society, in particular to the community in which I am active.

It is good to be living the dream. It is good to not be alone. Thank you all for sharing the dream. The title of my 2010 Italian notebook is Quick Snow.

Past end of the year messages: 2009, 2008, 2006.

As long as you love

and love as much as you can,

as long as you give your all to your love

and give as much as you can, you are young…

Nazim Hikmet Rubaiyat

(translation: Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk)

the canadian

Just in case that you do not hear from me until next year, you should know that I am not spending the next few weeks in Canada.

Wishing you all the best of times, as always.

Did I already mention that I hate shopping?

I gave this project shopping another go today. Most amusing was being in a food shop, tiny little boutique actually, that was chock-full of goodies and all I could think of was that I hate shopping. Managed to pick up two items that I may or may not wrap up and give away, paid and got out escaping the befuddled  shop keeper who, judging from her kind but puzzled look at me, must have wondered why it was that I understood every single word, but hardly spoke a word. Really, I hate shopping.

I also wanted a pair of red socks. Red socks seem big on my list of priorities, but I am sure that I do not know how to explain this one. Big discovery, red socks are in short supply; I checked out two shops on this one. Lavender, purple, pink, those were on display. It is not a season for red, plain red. I do wonder what has happened to the red dye industry.

But because I hate shopping, I also love shopping. It is relaxing to go into over-full shops around Xmas time when one does not need or want a thing. The people are fascinating, the consumption rush in full display, and I still think that human behaviour, or the theatre stage, still provide the best show in any town.

Now I sit with a coffee in the mid of the afternoon and realize that the daylight part of the day is almost gone, and that there are a few hours of work still ahead.

Update: I forgot that to contribute to all the mayhem of my thoughts on shopping, and their consequent disarray,  was a short foray into Olmo – one of the coolest shops downtown Bern – that had me look at Freitag gizmos for over CHF 60. Sixty francs for an iPhone case? Freitag does have some of the cleverest iPhone covers, but I have gone rogue and have abandoned mine, and I prefer phones and computers to be naked. Wearing rags is my domain, not that of my appliances. I guess that my aversion to cladding gadgets stems from lack of interest as a girl to play with dolls and dress them all up. You have to admit, as far as explanations go, this one is as good as the next one. I hated dolls too, actually still do not like them.

Wie sieht die Zukunft von Müslüm aus?

Letschte Woche hatte ich ein tiefgründiges Telefongespräch mit Mike Shiva. Der sagte immer «Grissi, ich bins Maichel Shiva, du bisch in der Warteschlaufe, su dainer Informasion jede Minute chostet Dich 4.80.-, aber chaine panich weil du willsch ja wissen was Dir deine Zukunf bringt.» Dann hab ich ihn gefragt, «werde ich den Schwaiser Pass bechome Shiva?» Dann hat er mir mit der genau gleichen Stimme geantwortet: «Grissi, ich bins Maichel Shiva, du bisch in der Warteschlaufe su dainer Informasion jede Minute chostet Dich 4.80.-, aber chaine Panich, weil du willsch ja wissen was Dir deine Zukunf bringt.» Das heisst wahrscheinlich bechomme ich bald den Schwaiser Pass über.

via Müslüm: «Der Samichlaus kommt aus der Südtürkei» – News Region: Bern & Region – bernerzeitung.ch.

Sorry, I could not resist. I am a fan of nonsense.