I was waiting for a train with my grandfather the other day, and he saw a guy in dress uniform for the Swiss military. Swiss soldiers travel free in uniform. He then turned to me and told me how, as a former military man himself, he always had great respect for soldiers.

The thing is that the Swiss military is a standing militia. All men are required to do extensive basic training and then refresh it every year or two. Swiss soldiers mostly only get involved in peacekeeping or development work.

So the very American socialization that soldiers deserve respect for defending democracy or making sacrifices to defend a way of life just doesn’t apply. It’s a tradition here, more than anything else.

I caught up a little with an old work colleague the other day. I hadn’t talked to him in a while. He was a nice enough person but tended to exaggerate his life to comical proportions, so it was hard to know what to believe whenever he updated me about his life. It wasn’t all that long ago that he told me keenly about Navy Officer School, and I’d known him as a Concierge, so… With that pinch of salt, we progress. 

He says that now he’s working as a linesman (is that the term?). He climbs telephone poles and does repairwork and such. I’m pretty sure he’s not that physically fit, he never was when I knew him better, but it’s been 2 years. I allow for the possibility. 

In any case, he says it’s a much better job. Higher wages, greater job security because of unionization, and he has more days off. Considering that we both came from the hotel industry… I kind of do believe that assessment. 

In developed economies we have more and more people trying to get into office jobs, because there’s the old adage that the more paperwork you do, the more important and better your job is. Less manual labour is better, right? 

But I was thinking about that internship video. Lots of paperwork jobs require internships now, and internships are increasingly done for little to no pay. This is due to the philosophy that the better your future prospects, the more early sacrifices you have to make. And then you have to work your way through corporate hierarchy. 

Manual labour jobs are a bit different. Those in the service industry don’t count, since those are the most easily abused. Restaurant workers and so on usually work hourly wages without formal contracts, in America the hourly wage being below the minimum because the rest is supposedly made up by tips. 

But say, something like a specialist job, like a mechanic, plumber or electrician? Here in Switzerland those kinds of jobs are paid ridiculously well, and have the support of labour unions. There are fewer of these jobs around for everyone, but if you land one you’re reasonably secure in terms of employment. 

So it’s a little ironic that the traditionally desired jobs, those involving a desk and paperwork, tend to demand more and a longer period of sacrifice with less pay, than some traditional labour jobs. 

This isn’t the case in developing countries, because labour tends to be cheaper and the economy still in a state of building its infrastructure, but it might move towards it. 

Generally speaking I consider myself an open-minded person. But I was Skyping with a couple of American friends yesterday, and despite that they’re lovely people and I value their long friendship… sometimes you get reminded of the different worlds you come from. 

They both don’t like mushrooms, for example. Generally speaking, like I said, I tell people “Try it, if you don’t like it, fine, at least you tried it.” But MUSHROOMS? You’re not allowed to not like mushrooms. 

Or at least, that’s how I felt when they said so. I suspect that if I were talking to someone in Asia and offered them something European, I’d be more understanding if it wasn’t to their taste, and vice versa. As long as you try it, it’s fine.” 

The same goes for travel. I don’t expect most of my friends to travel often. Even I don’t travel all that often. It’s expensive and time consuming.  But for some reason it hurts me more when Americans are ignorant about things of the world. If I met someone in Singapore who confused the Red Cross flag with the Swiss flag I wouldn’t mind as much as I would if an American did it. Which happened. 

You can’t expect people to know everything or even to want to know everything. You can’t expect them to be like you, and I generally respect that with people… but less so with Americans. 

So why do I hold my American peers to a different standard from others? Possibly I’m just biased. All in all, it just bothers me a lot more and I don’t have a good reason why. 

Sometimes I see people in the street who are as good looking as the movie stars that Tumblr fangirls and gushes about. Which is more to say that movie stars are mostly celebrated purely because they’re on a large stage of public attention. 

I don’t know why they’re treated like completely exceptional human beings, whose perfection would never be repeated in our humdrum daily lives. 

I don’t think I’d ever seen the original movie, but I was motivated by more recent epiphanies as to the actual filmmaking process of Paul Verhoeven. 

So I saw Total Recall as a kid, and I just saw it mostly as an Arnold action movie, though with the interesting mystery of whether it’s all in the protagonist’s head or actually happening. 

I saw Starship Troopers in the cinema, and mostly I just went to see it as a sci-fi action movie but was completely bewildered by all the themes that Verhoeven put into it. It’s only much later that I started to recognize the satirical message he had, which was surprisingly misunderstood considering his earlier work. 

Verhoeven’s style is noted for his over the top violence and gore, while having a humourous undertone. He commonly uses his films to critique media propaganda, corporate manipulation, fascism, stuff like that. As a kid I just saw his stuff as action movies, but there’s a lot more going on. Robocop, Total Recall and Starship Troopers all involve excessivly cheerful TV journalists and advertisements which completely fail to match the darker reality around them. 

Anyway, I enjoyed this movie. I was delighted to recognize many of the actors, as it happens. Peter Weller, who is Robocop, was in Star Trek Into Darkness as Admiral Marcus. Ray Wise is one of the gangsters who killed Robocop before he became Robocop, and I know him more for playing a villain on Chuck and in more recent seasons of HIMYM as Robin’s dad (he shares that show with Neil Patrick Harris, who was in another Verhoeven film, Starship Troopers). Miguel Ferrer was in Iron Man 3 as the Vice-President. 

Like Total Recall, apparently they’re making a remake of this movie for 2014, and I really don’t think it’s necessary. The movie’s special effects hold up surprisingly well, with the only exception being the stop motion effects (which, to me, add to the charm of the film). More importantly, it’s almost certain to miss out on Verhoeven’s sarcastic and satirical message. 

What’s interesting about Verhoeven’s movies is that Robocop became wildly popular, spawning video games, action figures, and two sequels. So despite that Verhoeven criticizes capitalism and commercialism, he benefits off of it too. Most of that popularity just comes from Robocop being cool, not from the (only slightly) more subtle criticisms he makes through his movies. 

You ever get the feeling like someone is judging you as not being interesting enough? I honestly don’t come across this often anymore. I think as you get older most people get wise as to the false spectra by which we judge people. 

High school concepts about cool or uncool, or what you’re supposed to like about people, kind of fall apart when faced with real life. 

Still, it takes a while, sometimes, to learn this, because you don’t leave school until your early 20s, usually. You go straight from school to university and it’s possible to stay in this cozy academic institutionalism for quite a while. I think it’s when you work full time, or are looking for jobs, and all the things in-between that you really see how much matters in your life, and how much doesn’t. 

So I got this feeling today that I was being judged as not being cool enough. I can’t say I was actually being judged but I got the feeling. And it’s odd to be 28 and to get this feeling from a 20 year old kid. 

My friend who works at Starbucks in Zug talked a little about her experience with international school kids in Zug. It’s something I see too. There’s this air of self-confidence they carry, with their privileged lifestyle that they take for granted. 

It’s something I’m familiar with. I’ve noticed it from Zug International School kids I’ve seen too, but it’s also something I see in some of my friends who still have that privileged lifestyle, and something I saw in the Hong Kong expat kids I met. It’s a little less annoying in Asia though, because expats really do have a privileged lifestyle compared to the locals. It’s strange here, because the Swiss have a high standard of living and yet the expats tend to walk around like they own the place. 

It’s nice to meet such people who wear the world so comfortably around them, but at the same time it’s not so nice to see people take it so easily for granted. 

John Green is a human being, in his mid-30s  He has a wife, a small child, and one more on the way. As a younger man he wrote a book called “Looking For Alaska” which was quite popular and famous within its genre, and since then he’s written three other books and co-wrote another. His books tend to be closely related to inspirations in his life. 

Possibly more importantly, he and his brother Hank have a channel on YouTube where they basically talk to each other about things. 

John and Hank are popular on the Internet for essentially being entertaining, but that’s not what appeals me to them. For me, it’s more that they’re thoughtful about what they want to do. They see their YouTube popularity as an opportunity for fundraising, spreading awareness about things they care about, and being informative. The ways in which they do so are surprisingly thoughtful, and mindful of their own faults, possible biases and privileges, and also they try to take a rounded perspective. 

So why do people on this website hate them? Well, to be fair, the Internet is the focal point of all bonding over hating things, and Tumblr is no exception. Tumblr is particularly home to Social Justice bloggers and people who hate Social Justice bloggers. 

Social Justice bloggers are people who see social problems and try to raise awareness about them. The basic principle is good and well meant, but somehow the activity sometimes just ends up being calling other people out on the Internet for “not doing it right.” Anti-SJ bloggers respond by calling out SJ bloggers for “not doing it right.” 

So is John a Social Justice guy? John supports Kiva.org, which is a website to loan money to startup businesses in the developing world. Once a year he and Hank host a Project4Awesome to take donations to contribute towards charity causes proposed by anyone who wants to promote a cause they support. Hank and John also do educational videos on YouTube, though Hank does science-related topics and John is more in the social sciences of History and Literature. John’s approach to History has generally been to take in the larger picture and to look at history from a variety of perspectives and not just as a series of dates and wars. 

So… why do they hate him? Because they try and help things? Because they have enough optimism about the world to want to help things? 

So I’m trying out Homeland. 

I noticed that Damian Lewis is in the show, and he was last famous (as far as I know) for playing Richard Winters on “Band of Brothers.”

That show, Band of Brothers, did a good job portraying him as a capable combat commander. There’s one particular incident which is apparently still taught at West Point as an example of excellent small unit tactics. 

Anyway, I think it was Newt Gingrich who claimed that Richard Winters was some kind of combat genius. I might be wrong, though I’m trying to confirm. I think it’s Newt since he is a bit of an historian and it’s the kind of thing he would say, but I’m trying to confirm. 

Newt, when he’s not being a politician, likes writing history and sometimes science-fiction. His history, like many American politicians interested in history, tends to be focused on World War 2 and how awesome America was. 

Not to discount Richard Winters; he seemed, by all appearances, like a charmingly straightforward man who accomplished remarkable things and then went home to a simpler life, but I can’t help wondering that the entire reason Newt claimed that he was a genius was because he watched the TV show. 

Winters was one of many American combat officers, part of many countries with combat officers of varying competence themselves. Winters gets singled out somewhat because he was showcased on a popular TV show. He doesn’t sound like he would have liked that kind of worship or recognition but it’s a consequence of that fame that suddenly hobbyist historian politicians now add him to their evidence that America was the best at everything during WW2. 

What gets me about the Abercrombie & Fitch thing that’s making its circles around Tumblr is just that all he needed to say was “Yes, we have a target market.” 

All that judgmental and self-justifying crap just ruins that basic business principle. Why even bring it into your thought process, much less tell it to the public? 

Possible spoilers below the read more. I read the books and some of my thoughts come from having read them, so spoilers on that point too. 

Read More

Today’s globalization class focused on migration. We talked about the various major waves of migration: to the Americas from Europe, from the global south to the global north, how Europe was once an exporter of people and then became an importer of people. 

Xenophobia is one of the reactions to this. The Irish and southern Germans who migrated to north America faced problems of a largely Protestant anglo-saxon population that was already there. 

This discussion just resparked the thought in my mind that racism really isn’t the problem. It’s just xenophobia. Racism as many Americans define it is about the power of white people over People of Colour. But even in America you had horribly xenophobic reactions to other people of European origin purely because of religion, and therefore just “being different.” 

So it’s all really just fear of others. I think it’s missing the bigger picture (and not approaching the actual problem) if you single out “white people.”

My ex and I have some pictures together. We weren’t a public couple, so it wasn’t something for everyone to see, just us. I was reminded of them earlier and… 

I don’t miss her in that way. But the pictures just remind me of how nice it felt to love and be loved. I miss that general feeling. It’s been a while. 

I have an unconventional love life experience, but it doesn’t bother me as much as it did a few years ago. If there’s anything I’ve discovered, it’s that everyone has different kinds of romantic experiences. 

I haven’t had a long, serious relationship with a person with me physically in the same place, and sometimes I feel its lack when I look at my friends or other peers, even my ex with her current (much healthier) relationship. I’m in my late 20s, after all. But I’ve been through other things that they haven’t, just as this is something they have that I haven’t.

So life experience is varied and broad and we should celebrate its manic chaotic variety. 

People keep reblogging this Asian girl giving a speech about how the Cho Chang was an Asian stereotype character in Harry Potter. 

The first time I saw it, actually had a refute in the commentary. I haven’t read all the HP books so I can’t comment in terms of the actual character, but I do have a tidbit for thought. 

The original Star Trek show had a multicultural set of characters: an Asian, a Soviet Russian, a Scot, an African-American, an American southerner. None of the characters beyond the golden trinity (Spock, Kirk and McCoy) really had a lot going on in terms of depth. They were all basically caricatures of the cultures they supposedly represented. 

But the purpose of them being there was to show Roddenberry’s vision of a peaceful future in which the world cooperated and racism was a thing of the past. Granted, in the 60s we asked less of these shows than we do now. 

But I get the feeling that Rowling’s characters in HP, aside from the central ones, are really just there to represent the diversity of Britain, which has high populations of immigrants of Chinese or Indian/Pakistani descent. 

It’s not about the character, it’s more just fluffing up the setting. Sure, you could ask for a more central non-white character, but is that important for the story or just representative of an overall problem in Western media which tends to have white main characters? 

Just thinking out loud. 

Among the things I found in that box today out of storage was my Extended Essay that I wrote for my IB. I got an A for it, though looking back even just after graduating I wonder why. But hey, I guess for an 18 year old it was good. 

I also uncovered all these pieces of paper with photos from my trip to Russia stuck to them. 

I wondered at first “What the hell are these?” but then I remembered. 

My last year or two of high school, my IB years, were like most other American high schoolers: permeated with the stress of university applications. 

The thing about American universities that sets them apart from those in other countries is the way they value your extra-curricular activities. So everyone is under pressure to make themselves sound like more interesting people than just the numbers on their grades. 

When I got back from Russia, I was encouraged by my parents to write an email to my extended family describing it. My parents, particularly my mother, was so impressed by how it was written that she suggested, strongly, that I include it in my applications. 

Even at the time I was skeptical, but she was insistent. And I did many things just to make my parents happy so they’d stop bugging me. 

As with all applications for anything, I can’t say how much it did or didn’t weigh in my favour. But I still think it was a dumb idea.