May 13th, 2017

No unifying theme this week, just randomness..   

First up, a screenshot from the temperature app we use from Thursday night. 

Note that the time is 7:31pm, which is a good hour or so after sunset, and the Real Feel is 110 brutally humid degrees.  15 kph winds are no better than a juicy fart, but it's the UV Index being 'Very High' an hour after dark that seems scientifically impossible.  Betty says that the app must have been wrong, but with my mind addled by the heat, it is absolutely believable. 

Question...should I get on Twitter?  I hear a ton of people that talk about it...people I like to listen to on podcasts receive and share info on it and that it is the outlet of choice for policies of all kinds.  But no one sounds happy having to do it.  They go into rabbit holes, obsess over it from the time they wake up till they go to bed, and end up hating a good portion of humanity.  Am I missing something here or should I just take a pass?

One of my longtime/all-time favorite bands is Midnight Oil.  They are touring for the first time in 15 years and have been bummed to be missing them on our travels by a week here or two.  They announced a show in Singapore on August 16th and just snatched up a seat in a beautiful spot and now just have to figure out how to get there.  Frequent flyer miles...do your worst.  I've seen them a bunch and they have never disappointed, The greatest live music show I ever saw was them playing at the long gone Bayou in Georgetown in 1984.  They were touring on their masterpiece 10,9,8... album and the Bayou was a tiny club.  They just tore it up.  Am currently riding a high of anticipation

In a brief follow up to the racism post from a week or so back, we went out to dinner with friends and some of their friends last weekend.   Five couples.  Was funny as one of the ladies was a decently close acquaintance of Bettys from DC and I know that I met her in LA in the early 90's as Betty hooked her up with another friend that I did remember.    As they say in Argentina...el mundo es un panuelo (the world is a handkerchief...never understood that)  Anyhoo, it was a lovely evening, but the racial demographic was that all of the men were whitey white Americans, and all of the women were Asian.  Other than it being a cliché, not sure what I want to/should say about that.

In the latest installment of 'As Seen At Costco'...this guy.

Not only was he totally out, but if you look closely, he brought a book to help him nod off.  And he was snoring like you read about on sleepapnea.com.  To be fair, that chair does look buttery and comfortable.

And then there were these animals.

                                  

All three of them had boxes of kiwis opened and they were handling each one, squeezing them to see which ones they liked and then mixing and matching to get their perfect box.  This is not OK behavior...I gave them the international 'WTF' gesture and walked away in disgust. 

Finally in Costco news, here is a Buzzfeed quiz that asks you to take a trip to Costco and we'll tell you how good you are in bed.  Good luck.  And call me if you order the Supreme pizza.

Here is a photo of my favorite place in our apartment.  We've been collecting magnets from our travels and going to the fridge gives me a run through memory lane every time I need a snack.

Here is a photo from the BBQ of the girls soccer team I helped start and ran for a few years.  Have moved on, but they still invite me out and find it one of the more satisfying accomplishments of our time here.  The girls are so fun (way better than boys) and is a great way to have social time with a great group of adults. 

Another thing that I have time to do here is coordinate the monthly Coffee Morning talks at the Community Center.  Am sure I mentioned them before, but it is great to find a speaker that I not only have interest in, but seeing others get so much benefit from them.  This week, we had Dr. Jerome Keating come in to talk about his book The Mapping of Taiwan.  Am a huge map aficionado/junkie and Jerome has been in Taiwan for 30 years (originally coming to work on the local subway), and has written 8 books on life and politics in Taiwan.  The book tells the story of Taiwan through the maps that were made of it since its discovery by the west in the 1500's.  Something I found interesting was that while the west was aware of Asia, and their spices had become essential, getting them via the sea was not critical.  With the rise of the Ottoman Empire, who could cut off the spice supply at will, the need to be able to go to the Spice Islands, and have bases in the region, became necessary for their survival, which is why the Portuguese were in Macau, Spain in the Philippines and so on.  He had a ton of stuff like that and am excited to read the book.  Betty brought her work team out to attend (three girls all of Taiwan origin) and while they went in thinking it was gonna be boring, their eyes were opened to stories and history that they never learned in school.  The fact that Japan was the first nation to unify the island under one government, something that everyone should know in the discussion of what Taiwan is, really struck them and they are now curious to know more.

Finally, the Boy (aka Smelly) turned 18 on Thursday.  In Taiwan, he can drink, drive and join the army (hopefully not at the same time).  Always found it odd as to why there are three different ages for those in the states.  Anyhoo, he went last weekend to the finals of the IPPF debates.  The final 8 teams (from well over 300 high schools world wide ) get an all expense paid trip to NYC to compete.  His team also went when he was a Freshman, so a return 3 years later is quite an accomplishment, especially since the two girls that were the brains on that team left after Sophomore year. 

They bowed out in the first round, but a fine effort to get that far.  For posterity, here is an article about it from the school newspaper.


Starting early in the school year, TAS’ International Public Policy Forum (IPPF) team wrote and submitted their qualification essay, in which they could choose either to affirm or oppose an official resolution. The team, composed of Aaron Gould (12), Alan Tsai (12), Cherice Tsai (12), Jeremiah Hsu (12), Katie Fong (12), Paul Imbrogulio (12), qualified and was selected to enter the “Round of 64,” where teams are paired up and debate against each other. HOW MANY TEAMS SUBMITTED AND THEN WERE CHOSEN? The TAS IPPF team won in both the rounds of 64 and 32 and advanced to the Sweet Sixteen. Currently the team is waiting for results for entering the “Elite 8.” The teams that make it to the “Elite 8” get to travel to New York, New York to compete in a spoken debate on the same issues.
According to senior team member, Cherice Tsai, “each debate consists of four papers: Affirmative Constructive, Negative Constructive, Affirmative Rebuttal, Negative Rebuttal.” Each Constructive essay is approximately 2800 words and the rebuttal essays are written in a similar process. When the Affirmative finishes their essay, it is sent to the Negative so that they can write their rebuttal essay. There is one week between each of the competition essays; in total, each round of debate takes approximately a month.
This year’s topic is about the refugee crisis: Resolved: The obligation to provide safe haven for refugees should outweigh a government’s right to control its borders. Cherice explains that “the debate is centered around which, between border control and obligation to provide safe haven, takes precedence given considerations for national security, global welfare, ethics, international law, and social, economic and political interests of countries.”
Collaborating on an essay can be “a little messy with six people all working on one document at once,” comments Paul Imbrogulio (12), “but since we have been doing this for three years, we are normally good at dividing workloads so they overlap less”. The TAS team generally assigns three to four writers to work on different arguments. One person is responsible for editing and fixing grammar, another one to two people in charge of fact checking and research. One of the struggles in writing one collaborative essay is maintaining one single voice throughout. “Even though everyone has different tones and styles when writing, we always come back together towards the end to make sure our team has a single voice [in the essay] before it’s submitted,” says Paul. “Dr. Nelson is also hugely helpful in the process: he tirelessly offers us feedback for each of the essays we write,” adds Cherice.
“The lion’s share of the work lies in getting our point across within [the word limit of 2800],” says Katie Fong (12). Paul reveals that their essay’s first draft is usually around 5000 words or more. “Sometimes cutting down our arguments is harder than actually writing them in the first place,” remarks Paul. “Word economizing and being concise” is always difficult when writing,” states Cherice. Katie agrees and adds that “trying to hit a word limit when you already feel like there is nothing more to be cut is like chopping off a limb.”
Katie elaborates that while she does not “look forward to editing [the] essay once a first draft [is] made, she does look forward to their work sessions that “are basically just alternating blocks of silent, frenzied typing and short bursts of joking around”. Paul concurs, “I look forward to hanging with Dr. Nelson and my teammates, [arguing] over which cuisine is the best or just talk about existential questions”. “For our rebuttal essays, we back check our opponent’s sources. We check that the other side’s source actually support what they claim those sources do. A lot of the times, we find that the other side’s sources conclude in opposition to their case, or they use quotes from sources but place them out of context to misconstrue an author’s argument. We point out these inconsistencies in our essays, and take advantage of this to argue in favor of our side,” says Cherice. Despite their strong argumentative skills, “our weakness would have to be spelling words like trafficking [or] using fake words like thalassic,” states Paul. Katie rebuts that “thalassic is a word. Stop roasting me for using fancy words. They make our essays sound smarter and this is literally just how I talk.”
Best of luck to the TAS IPPF team, the last time they went to New York was 3 years ago.