Let it snow!

When your guardian angel sings out, it happens!



I was supposed to fly to the EUSSR yesterday to see Mum! (Please, no quips about being able to walk thither from Geneva. ;) Thanks to the weather, that so didn't happen. Geneva airport was closed all day and there are no available convenient flights - i.e. daytime, not late at night - until Monday.

Shuffling back to Lausanne for a couple of days eliminates the Geneva accommodation crunch but after all the stresses of rebooking etc. and travelling after rush hour wound up arriving late(ish) at night. Getting accosted by weird druggie types downtown after 10pm is the last thing you need on days like these, although bad though that is, it still beats getting mugged. I speak from experience - isn't life interesting? No, I didn't get mugged in Switzerland. Do we have muggings in Switzerland? Sadly yes but thankfully it's still quite rare. Not as safe as, say, Singapore, but Swiss cities are generally fairly navigable at night if you use some common sense. Juvenile delinquency is probably worse than it was 20 years ago. Switzerland may be undergoing some of the social changes which affected Britain in the 1960s, it's a bit hard to say. I do say that Western societies are far too soft on crime, especially violent offenders. This won't change, however, without serious political gravitas and conviction. The Swiss people voted in a recent referendum for automatic deportation with no right of appeal for foreign criminals, but this won't affect soft sentencing in general. The Swiss yobs who went on a violent drunken rampage in Munich last year and almost murdered one of their victims were eligible for up to ten years in a jerry jail (the highest sentence given was seven, however), whereas the maximum sentence in Switzerland for them would be four years. Not good enough. Prisons are too soft as well, looking after the "human rights" of the crims over and above those of their victims. Not good enough. Even Switzerland is affected by this PC rubbish too. How does being kind to criminals control crime?

Basel and Geneva really are the EUSSR's near abroad - walking distance! The stark contrast between the political systems of these countries is thereby made the more astonishing: the stifling EU dictatorship versus Swiss direct democracy (referendums).

Just ‘Cause (camera geekery included)

Now, this blog has been neglected for a bit. There just didn’t seem to be much worth inputting hitherin which could not be just as effectively, and more succinctly, fed through Twitter and/or Facebook. That remains the case IMO so I’m writing this blog entry « just ‘cause ».

Back in Switzerland, milling about the beautiful scenery and having met a wonderful Bookcrosser face to face recently, things are looking up a bit. The Swiss are seriously so lucky to have retained their sovereignty and democracy. The rest of Europe - and increasingly, most of the world - is becoming in dire need of liberation. I saw the writing on the wall many years ago.

Shooting video with a bonsai camcorder is a lot of fun sometimes. The discretion of this small device allows for naughty possibilities should one feel so inclined theretoward. It offers value for money and I was inspired by this model because of a YouTube video I saw by some guy driving through Switzerland filmed with a similar model. At this price point, there are a few limitations:

• The zoom lens and stabilizer functions cannot be used in 1080p (not a major issue for me).
• While the camera memorizes the previous resolution used, the stabilizer has to be reactivated manually every time the camera is switched on. Somewhat annoying, since virtually all my on-the-move filming is done in 720p often using both zoom lens and stabilizer.
• 480p widescreen filming is available only at 60fps so offers no economy benefits. Plus, no zoom/stabilize at 480p widescreen.
• The refocus speed in high-contrast situations is slow. The general performance of the lens is remarkably good for this price point; it’s much better than a cell phone camera, that goes without saying. I would gladly sacrifice 1080p resolution in exchange for a better lens and sharper refocusing, but in reality that is not an equal tradeoff. HD processing is much cheaper than high lens/focus quality, but the lack of the latter devalues the former.
• Relatively poor performance in low-light situations, though my model has a mini night light fitted, which does help.

Heaven on earth - the perfect country

The perfect country has:

the architecture of SPAIN
the banks of LIECHTENSTEIN
the bazaars of MOROCCO
the bullet trains of CHINA
the casinos of MONACO
the castles of WALES
the charm of LUXEMBOURG
the chili beans of MEXICO
the chocolate of BELGIUM
the churches of RUSSIA
the classical music of AUSTRIA
the coffee of COLOMBIA
the coffeemakers of ITALY
the crime rate of SINGAPORE
the engineering of GERMANY
the faux-souvenir shops of TURKEY
the fjords of NORWAY
the food portions of AMERICA
the fruit trees of JAMAICA
the heritage of EGYPT
the honey of NEW ZEALAND
the islands of GREECE
the jungle life of MALAYSIA
the landscape of IRELAND
the language of ENGLAND
the maple syrup of CANADA
the microtechnology of JAPAN
the milk of JERSEY
the panoramas of SAN MARINO
the politics of SWITZERLAND
the restaurants of INDIA
the samba of BRAZIL
the saunas of FINLAND
the springs of ICELAND
the wilderness of ANTARCTICA

and last but not least, in fact most of all...

the women of AUSTRALIA!

:) Now, any takers for rearranging the above countries to try to create Dystopia?

Thoughts on Sovereignty

A recent visit to the beautiful little principality of Liechtenstein - an antithesis to the notion that biggest is best - has evoked some fresh thoughts on the importance of (national/state) sovereignty, and what it really fundamentally means. What is the importance of a state? How does one define a nation, nation state, nationality, foreignness and so forth?

Let's go back to Liechtenstein and start with this basic, universally accepted fact. Liechtenstein is a sovereign nation. She is sandwiched in a valley of the upper Rhine between Swiss and Austrian alpine and nether regions. She is a small country, even in comparison to some other tiddlers such as the EU's Luxembourg (which is about fifteen times larger in both land area and population). One can drive right through Liechtenstein in a few minutes on surface streets - there are no motorways! Eveywhere you turn, around the next block is a sign advising you you're about to leave the country, whether over the unmarked Border into the Swiss canton of St Gallen, or through the Swiss-administered Customs post into Austria.

OK, so the reader is now informed that Switzerland looks after Liechtenstein's Customs affairs. This was mutually agreed between the two countries in 1919. Since Customs & excise duties are considered by some to be an important bastion of national sovereignty, this is worth contemplating. Logically, this agreement may make a lot of sense and indeed seems to have worked well, with seemingly few complaints. More puzzling, however, is the fact that Liechtenstein uses Swiss road signs: identical font and colour conventions to her western neighbour. One would think that a small country might want to assert her independent identity aggressively in these visible, cost-free and harmless ways.

Liechtenstein does exhibit other important facets of statehood: police, flag, anthem (same tune as God Save The Queen!) and of course the Post Office (a favourite among philatelists). So what does this all mean? Clearly, you don't have to be a big country to be sovereign, neutralizing similar claims by EU fanatics about needing the EU to be significant on the global stage. Sovereignty concerns a state or its people governing their own affairs without accounting to any higher authority. To that end, EU states have lost sovereignty because they are bound by the instructions from the "man in Brussels". Contradictory fudges by the German Constitutional Court make matters worse, not better, IMO. The only vestige left is that they could probably still dissolve the EU (cherish the thought!) without said man being able to do too much about it, at least not without assistance of Eurogendfor plc (just watch out). The Swiss-Liechtensteinish unmanned Border proves that friendship, co-operation and freedom of travel are perfectly possible without needing to build transnational empires. The corollary is that even in an empire or former empire (such as the British one), freedom of movement is not guaranteed. Many dependent territories impose immigration restrictions even upon their mother country's nationals to this day.

Even as recently as the 1950s and '60s Britain was a sovereign nation state called the United Kingdom. The world has never been remotely close to perfect (we're all a bunch of miserable, evil sinners after all), but weren't those better days?

In Sickness and in Health

A slightly belated Happy New Year to all blogosphere readers, from snowy Brighton, East Sussex, UK(-raine), EU(SSR)! I've been here for two weeks now, one thing after the next preventing me from leaving, the most recent of all being a Norovirus-style severe stomach bug that left me reeling in agony for a couple of days. It's still a problem but a few pills have at least sorted out the excruciating pains. And eating (sensibly!) is still possible, thankfully.

The sometimes heavy snow has slowed down the pace of things somewhat, so there are still more family visits to be made - and these might as well be made since I have the time.

PS the subject title is nothing to do with marriage prospects at the present time, alas.