Author: Milan

In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. In the fall of 2005, I began reading for an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford. Outside school, I am very interested in photography, writing, and the outdoors. I am writing this blog to keep in touch with friends and family around the world, provide a more personal view of graduate student life in Oxford, and pass on some lessons I've learned here.

Living alone, thinking about trips

I finally feel as though I am getting a bit of traction on various projects. I’ve finished one of the three papers that have been hanging over me. By the time I meet Andrew Hurrell on Monday afternoon, I am resolved to have the paper on the Arab-Israeli conflict done, also. Thankfully, it is fairly similar to a paper I wrote in Michaelmas term about the interwar period in the Middle East and the causes of subsequent instability. In addition to academic work, I have printed some resumes and begun dropping them off at another batch of places. While I rather like the idea of a book shop, the tempting agencies that have been suggested to me by many people are becoming a possibility that I am distinctly considering. That, plus a few smatterings of academic work, might be able to constitute a reasonable employment path for the summer.

With regard to the planned European trips, it seems increasingly clear that finding other people who want to come along and are free to do so will be very hard. This I find particularly regrettable, as living in this empty house is providing a constant reminder of how much better I generally operate and enjoy myself when surrounded by friends. Regardless of that, I should probably go ahead and book at least one trip while the ticket prices are not as high as they will surely become. I need to find out whether my cousin Jiri in Prague is going to be around there this summer. If I can stay for free with him, I could fairly easily justify spending a couple of weeks there. While it wouldn’t be somewhere new to me – like Dublin or Istanbul would be – it would nonetheless be somewhere that I know to be interesting and enjoyable.

My parents are keen on me visiting Vancouver at some point towards the end of the summer. Naturally, I would be very keen to do so; spending two entire years without seeing my brothers or my friends in Vancouver is not something that I ever wanted to do. At the same time, I am anxious about spending so much on airfare prior to a year for which I have managed to secure no funding. The weight of all those failed scholarship applications is something I feel quite acutely at the moment.

PS. Does anybody know about interesting groups in Oxford that meet regularly over the weekend? With classes over, roommates gone, and friends departing, I am feeling a lack of scheduled activities where it is possible to meet people. Book clubs, photographic societies, walking or hiking clubs, and the like are all appealing possibilities.

Strategy time – time strategies

I have been trying to learn what I can learn during these last few days of the Google Idol contest, in hopes of being able to maximize Mica’s chances. The first potentially relevant fact is that the website hosting the contest is registered in Brisbane, Australia. I had often found it difficult to guess what time the server would be ticking over into the next voting day, allowing all the IP addresses that had already voted to do so again.

This round ends on June 24th, but nowhere does the website specify at what time. As such, the earliest it could possibly end (00:01 Brisbane time) would be 2:01pm Oxford time on the 23rd. The latest it could possibly end (23:59 Brisbane time) would be 1:59pm on the 24th. If someone has figured out at what time of day their server ticks over, it would be very useful information.

Why?

Because the lead has been cyclical:

Chart based on data between 22:00GMT on the 18th and 22:00GMT on the 20th.

As you can see, the distance between the number of the votes for each video rises and falls according to an orderly pattern. I would guess that with ‘Twan, Sjoerd, Manuel en Iwin’ living in Western Europe and Mica coming from the West Coast of North America, there is about an eight hour lag between time equivalencies in the areas where most of their respective voters will be living. Those of Mica’s competitors rise eight hours earlier, vote, and go to sleep eight hours earlier.

The fact that the slope of Mica’s line is more constant may be the product of how I have been cajoling people on the east coast of Canada and the United States – as well as in the UK and elsewhere – to vote for him as much as possible. Alternatively, I may have nothing to do with it and people voting for him just vote at times more distributed across the day for some other reason or collection of reasons.

As such, it would be helpful to work out what time it will be in each place when the contest ends. Ideally, we would probably want it to end around midnight Vancouver time, when it will be about 8:00am in Europe. I think that would be about 6:00pm in Brisbane.

[Update: 22 June 2006] I have created a chart that shows the amount by which Mica has been winning or losing at various times when I have checked on it.

Theorems and conjectures

As strongly evidenced by how I finished it in a few sessions within a single 24-hour period, Simon Singh’s Fermat’s Last Theorem is an exciting book. When you are kept up for a good part of the night, reading a book about mathematics, you can generally tell that some very good writing has taken place. Alongside quick biographies of some of history’s greatest mathematicians – very odd characters, almost to a one – it includes a great deal of the kind of interesting historical and mathematical information that one might relate to an interested friend during a long walk.

xⁿ + yⁿ = zⁿ

The idea that the above equation has no whole number solutions (ie. 1, 2, 3, 4, …) for x, y, and z when n is greater than two is the conjecture that Fermat’s Last Theorem supposedly proved. Of course, since Fermat didn’t actually include his reasoning in the brief marginal comment that made the ‘theorem’ famous, it could only be considered a conjecture until it was proven across the span of 100 pages by American mathematician Andrew Wiles in 1995.

While the above conjecture may not seem incredibly interesting or important on its own, it ties into whole branches of mathematics in ways that Singh describes in terms that even those lacking mathematical experience can appreciate. Even the more technical appendices should be accessible to anyone who has completed high school mathematics, not including calculus or any advanced statistics. A crucial point quite unknown to me before is that a proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem is also automatically a proof of the Taniyama-Shimura conjecture (now called a theorem, also). Since mathematicians had been assuming the latter to be true for decades, Wiles’ proof of both was a really important contribution to the further development of number theory and mathematics in general.

Despite Singh’s ability to convey the importance of math, one overriding lesson of the book is not to become a mathematician: if you manage to live beyond the age of thirty, which seems to be surprisingly rare among the great ones, you will probably do no important work beyond that point. Mathematics, it seems, is a discipline where experience counts for less than the kind of energy and insight that are the territory of the young.

A better idea, for the mathematically interested, might be to read this book.

Nought but narrative

General developments

After having breakfast with Roz this morning and walking to Marston with her – through the University Parks – she gave me the copy of Simon Singh’s Fermat’s Last Theorem, which is to be my next piece of discretionary reading. Naturally, having the chance to spend some time with Roz prior to her departure was excellent.

I suspect the Singh book will prove more in keeping with essay writing than de Botton’s novel did. The complete absence of any pressure from Dr. Hurrell to get the things finished has provided excessive opportunity to focus on other things – from the departure of friends to the kinds of sorting and cataloguing that sometimes threaten to consume all my waking hours. I’ve also been trying to coordinate as extensive a campaign as possible to increase the chances of Mica winning the grand final of the Google Idol video contest.

Job search

An exciting job possibility has arisen, but it’s far too uncertain to discuss right now. That said, I expect to have a firm answer about it within ten days or so. While it does sound like something I could do (two friends specifically indicated that they have such faith) the absurdly high rate of pay being offered makes me certain that I cannot possibly be qualified to the level they expect. That said, they are canvassing for applicants only a few weeks before the job is to be taking place. If there are lots of more qualified people floating around with no plans, I would be somewhat surprised.

Upcoming solitude

By Wednesday, I will be the sole resident of the 2 Church Walk basement flat. Both Kai and Alex are heading off in the next two days, with Kai heading back to Germany for the bulk of the summer. On the first of July, Eriko, the young woman who will be subletting his room, is to move in. I’ve met her very briefly. Apparently, she is an Oxford Analytica employee who will be spending her weekends in London and only weeknights in Oxford. That same evening, I will be having a Canada Day party here – possibly co-sponsored by Emily.

The idea of spending more than a week as the only inhabitant of a place like this is an odd one. I’ve never been singularly entrusted with such a large amount of space at once. Past instances of time spent alone in dorms – such as over the Christmas break here – have generally involved a kind of odd retreat from all the world on my part. As such, I hope that the many, many people to whom I’ve extended invitations to come have tea here will take me up on the offer during that period. A few solid kicks of a sort calculated to encourage essay writing would also not go amiss.

PS. (CR: Somno) Continue reading “Nought but narrative”

Not polyglot

Perhaps the ultimate demonstration of just how low a click-through rate spammers need in order to justify sending emails is the huge number of messages written in Asian scripts that I receive every day. Since my email address is posted in several places on several different websites, it it unsurprising that all manner of spam robots have collected it. Because of my general willingness to give my ‘real’ email address to various websites and companies, I generally get more than 100 spam messages a day. Thankfully, GMail catches nearly all of them.

Given that all the websites from which my email address has been taken are in English, you would think that an even moderately intelligent spam robot would direct English spam towards addresses listed thereon. I now get more than twice as much non-English spam as English spam, and almost all of that in Asian scripts. Not that I mind being the target of Chinese, Japanese, and other sorts of spam – I don’t even need to skim the titles to know that they aren’t for me.

Essays in Love

As a study of human relationships, Alain de Botton’s Essays in Love is insightful, as well as concise in a sense reminiscent of Milan Kundera’s earlier work. Like love itself, it can easily become over-indulgent in the examination of minutiae, but – like love itself – it manages to be charming on the whole, in spite of that.

de Botton’s book documents the falling in love, experience in love, and ultimate betrayal and downfall of what might be considered your classic contemporary western romantic couple. Adult working people, living in London, and interacting against the backdrop of career and city and family in all the familiar ways. (How fitting that the cover shows a young woman in red, reading in the aisle of a room closely resembling the Oxford Social Sciences Library.) What makes the book remarkable is when the narrator expresses an idea that you are sure has been fluttering about in your own mind for years, but which you never quite had the language to pin to a cork board with such definiteness and precision.

The greatest flaw of the book is the way in which the narrator can become hopelessly pedantic and intellectually Narcissistic (especially when making forays into introductory-level philosophy and psychology). Of course, that’s largely a reflection of how the thoughts about love of those in love will always be of limited interest to others – where they confirm what we believe or have experienced, they seem to spark and crackle with the energy of our own passions. When they are tied up in the contemplation of things peripheral to us, they cannot sustain our interest. Writing about love, much like love itself, is a selfish thing.

Written in the form of twenty-four ordered lists – each a succession of numbered paragraphs – the book gives the general sense that it was written in little snatches of notebook examination of recent events. While it does tell a story, it’s more like a study of love based upon a single case study, with the underlying hope of producing generalizable conclusions. Whenever the reader discovers one, there is a sense of having learned, or at least identified, something important and useful. The frequency of such insights makes the book worthwhile reading, though the author is self-referentially critical of them:

Love taught the analytic mind a certain humility, the lesson that however hard it struggled to reach immobile certainties (numbering its conclusions and embedding them in neat series) analysis could never be anything but flawed – and therefore never stray far from the ironic.

The corresponding danger inherent to using a story to provoke awareness of patterns is the inescapable sense that much of what is being read is a cliché. Of course, love is rarely original – though it often feels that way at the time. The book leaves you with a certain sense that love is a fairly well-defined mechanism by which human beings can achieve things that are necessary but generally impossible to find as an individual; to return to an old metaphor of mine, it provides essential amino acids that cannot be synthesized, an idea that is generally too unromantic to maintain while meeting with success.

Socially dedicated days

With so many friends on the cusp of zipping off in all directions, I’ve been doing my best to spend time with people this week. Thus far, it is going even better than might have been anticipated – despite limited academic progress. There will be plenty of time for papers after the exodus, after all.

For a few hours this morning, I was giving a tour of Oxford to Diarmuid Torney: a young man who will be part of next year’s M.Phil in IR class. It was especially gratifying to have the chance to impart a few useful bits of information in a way I wish had been done for me. Essential sandwich shops, pubs, libraries, and individuals were pointed out.

Tonight, there is an end-of-year party for the M.Phil group, followed by the annual lecture for the Global Economic Governance Program. Tomorrow evening, there is a garden party in Wadham. I wish my bike was operable for transport between them, but the seat remains resolutely stolen.

I really need to find people who want to accompany me on my putative European trips; ticket prices are rising quickly.

[Update] Lest I contribute to any confusion, my belief that the IR party was tonight was the product of a bad piece of intel. Sorry. There are also no WMD in the Manor Road Building.

(CR: Somno) Continue reading “Socially dedicated days”

Work cut out for me

As of this afternoon, at least I can say that I have decided on the topics for my last three papers of this year. Together, they should be about 9000 words and based on me reading at least six books, plus articles and individual chapters.

What impact did the ending of the overseas colonial empires have on the nature and conduct of international relations? Have subsequent wars been consequences of decolonisation?
What are the causes of the Arab-Israeli conflict and why has it proved so resistant to resolution?
How has the international trade regime come to encompass ‘beyond the border’ issues – such as human rights and the environment? What does this imply for developed and developing countries?

At present, Dr. Hurrell seems more focused on preparing for a trip and a grant proposal than on pressing me to finish these. That’s both a blessing, because it takes pressure off during the time that will be my last chance to see many friends this year, and a curse, because it draws out this term into what would otherwise be the summer.

A few properly tottering stacks of books around the room should be a good source of motivation.

A mystery

In my mail this morning, I found a roll of Fuji Velvia 100, a voucher for processing, and an invoice for about eleven quid. It’s all from a place called 7dayshop.com, in Guernsey. From the slip, it’s unclear whether the invoice is a bill that demands payment or simply a receipt for payment made.

I am as sure as sure can be that I didn’t order any such thing. I have stopped shooting film entirely in the UK and, if I were to start, I would almost certainly use T-Max or HD400. It seems at least possible that someone sent this as a gift. If so, please let me know before I call them curiously and accuse them of sending unsolicited transparency film. Likewise, if so, thanks for sending me such an excellent variety of film.

Thanks for your help.

[Update: 4:04pm] The mystery is solved; see comments.

In which Milan’s dislike of team sports is discussed

For what I think was the first time in my life, I watched a portion of a televised soccer (football) match tonight: Poland versus Germany, as seen in the Saint Antony’s Bar. As a North American, I associate soccer with dreary mornings where children from ages of about ten to maybe seventeen or eighteen play while parents look on. My own soccer experiences were absolutely miserable – even worse than baseball, which I really despised. My experiences with coaches were all mutually hostile, while the ones with fellow players ranged from hostile to genuinely abusive. Soccer was as bad as the Cub Scouts. This has contributed to my general underlying conviction that team athletes are goons. It’s a conviction well reinforced by my spate of unfortunate incidents involving hockey playing roommates.

My natural response to being an obvious outsider in the team sports environment was to defy the lot of them, rather than try to conform. Of course, that is exactly the strategy that will maximize mutual hatred and cement a lifetime of resentment and barely suppressed anger about the whole experience. While I am absolutely certain most people playing team sports are decent people, I have the same kind of fear of them as I have of dogs, after being bitten several times as a paperboy.

Watching the match was interesting far more on sociological than athletic grounds. There was a small but noisome cadre of Poland fans, surrounded by many more people cheering (very softly) for Germany. By the time of the German victory at the end, they had become overt enough to make me pretty nervous. Since I find the whole concept of sport to be vaguely distasteful and unsettling, I suppose that’s not surprising. Even so, I suspect I will see bits of at least a few more matches before the World Cup has ended. I did manage to learn to enjoy Olympic hockey – at least when Canada was playing – so perhaps I am not entirely hopeless.

PS. With two days left in the semi-final of the video contest, please keep voting for Mica. Of course, once he gets to the final, I will be kicking up the publicity a bit.