Canada – Page 99 – a sibilant intake of breath

CF2 concluded

As expected, Cabin Fever 2 was a great success. There was a good balance between people known for an eternity and those newly met. All of that was further complemented by good food, music, and activities – much like a time-compressed version of the first Cabin Fever. The best part may have been the boating, both on Friday night under the nearly full moon and admist much exciting water skiing and tubing on Saturday and Sunday morning.

Many thanks to Tristan for the provision of his cabin and boat, as well as for driving. Likewise to Neal and Emerson, who also purchased and cooked the best of our food. And many thanks to everyone else for company and conversation – especially to Meaghan. Best of luck to Jonathan during his long bike ride home. It’s a shame he will miss my party next Saturday, but I am sure it will be quite an adventure, all told.

Normally, I would be uploading the hundreds of photos I took, but I am unable to locate my own computer at present, so that will have to wait until tomorrow. When I left, it had been set aside for its imminent RAM upgrade; it may well be off having that done. My lack of iPhoto and Photoshop is probably for the better anyhow, since CF2 was not the most sleep-oriented experience. Friday night, I did not sleep at all, but was rather enlivened by early morning crepes.

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[Update: 11 September 2006] I tried uploading the CF2 photos to one of my parents’ computers, since my Mac is off getting upgraded. Firstly, it got them completely out of order. Secondly, because the colour and contrast are both so badly off on this monitor, I don’t want to adjust any for the blog or Photo.net. People will just need to wait until Wednesday for such things. Some raw image files are on Facebook, where the image quality doesn’t really matter.

Super generic CF2 post

I am not going to write much, because there are more interesting things to be done. The food and company here have been excellent so far: likewise, the boating and general ambiance. Seeing friends who have long been across the world is likewise very welcome. Many photos will find their way online in some form or location eventually.

PS. We are really roughing it out here – this post had to be made over a dial-up internet connection.

Cabin Fever II departure

I shall be off at Barrier Lake until Sunday. I hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend.

Newly impermeable

The weather in Vancouver is stunning. So much so, and for so long, that there is a kind of thin haze obscuring the view of the mountains. Thankfully, there can be little doubt that the city will get a blast or two of cleansing rain before I depart.

Considerable progress is being made on the tasks that I resolved to complete while in Vancouver. A trip to Mountain Equipment Co-Op (MEC) with my mother, this afternoon, yielded a replacement to my venerable but now far-from-waterproof Gore-Tex coat. The successor is a really superb three-ply Gore-tex shell, which should be suitable both for general Oxford wintertime wandering and for more daring activities in the outdoors. The bright red colour should make me easier to spot. In addition, I got a few other things: a fleece vest, some shirts, and another pair of liner socks for hiking. I am now hoping for a proper Vancouver downpour: that will let me see the city in its natural state, test out my new jacket, and clear the haze that is obscuring the view of the Coast Mountains to the north.

This afternoon also involved pizza, coffee, and the taking in of ambience on Commercial Drive: a famously bohemian part of the city. It is a place to which I have to return, ideally with Sarah Pemberton or Sasha Wiley.

With my UBC accounts now expired, I have no effective means of accessing the internet for free in downtown Vancouver – which is annoying. There are a good twenty wireless networks operating around this little park beside Robson Court, but they all require WEP keys or some other form of authentication. Also irksome is the fact that the Lens and Shutter location in Pacific Centre is closed. Perhaps I will be able to make a stop at the Park Royal location later tonight, amidst the assembling of food and gear for Cabin Fever.

Having just realized how prudent it would be to bring bathing trunks to an event where water skiing is probable, I have another item to track down.

Up for two days, on the ground running

Soft water! Phone numbers with the right number of digits! Friends and family members long unseen. The visit has been going very well so far. I spent a few hours with Nick, Jonathan, Topher, and Emerson – engaging in our endless habitual pursuits of conversation and the consumption of food and drink around his most welcoming house. I have also begun ticking my way down the list of essential tasks that I set out before leaving.

I expect that blogging while here will largely consist of short posts accompanied by an unusually large number of photos including people.

PS. Forgive me, but my keeping track of other people’s blogs will be somewhat lax during the time of my stay in Vancouver. I am sure people will understand. 236 posts have come online among the various blogs I read, just since I left Oxford.

PPS. I was quite astonished by how nice the international arrivals area of the Vancouver International Airport is. After leaving Gatwick, it is like stepping into another world. As such, it is a really excellent introduction to our city, for those arriving the first time.

Back in view of the Coast Mountains

After a long but favourable trip, I am back in North Vancouver. Returning to Vancouver after a year feels like putting on a properly tailored coat that you haven’t worn for a while: it makes sense immediately, and there is considerable pleasure to be derived from that fact.

I am off to explore the neighbourhood. Vancouverite friends, please call me. Temporary cell phone information pending.

Homeward bound

Thinking back over this year spent in Oxford, the most valuable aspect of it has definitely been those who I met. That is a definite continuity with Vancouver, as it is the people there who are the reason this return trip is so exciting and desirable. Having the opportunity to spend two weeks with Vancouver family and friends, followed hard upon by a return to Oxford at the same time as so many people will be returning for the resumption of classes, is an appealing social cascade.

While it may exaggerate my studiousness of late just a bit, it still seems apt to think about this trip as the temporary abandonment of the Tree of Knowledge in favour of the Tree of Life. Barring any serious delays, I will be in Vancouver by about 9:00am Pacific Standard Time.

People in Vancouver who want to get in touch with me should email me or call my parents’ house. I will try and sort out a cell phone for while I am there, but the feasibility of that plan will be determined by how well the cost matches the benefit over my relatively brief time in the city.

Dangerous Afghan skies

I was talking with Edwina today about the possibility that the British Hawker-Siddeley Nimrod MR2 reconnaissance aircraft that crashed in Afghanistan recently was shot down by a FIM-92 Stinger missile, as Taliban representatives claimed. Fourteen British airmen were killed in the crash: the largest single day loss of British military personnel since the Falklands War. Given the ongoing presence of the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan and the famous provision of about 500 of these surface-to-air missiles to the Mujaheddin by the CIA during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, it is a question with contemporary relevance for Canadians.

Under construction since 1981 by the Raytheon Corporation (which also makes the washers and dryers used in residences at the University of British Columbia), the Stinger missile has a range of about 4800 metres and a maximum altitude of about 3800 – well below the cruising altitude of commercial aircraft. The Stinger seeks targets using an infrared homing system and is propelled using a two-stage chemical rocket. The homing system is thus vulnerable to flares used as decoy heat signatures, as well as to the reduction of an aircraft’s thermal profile through mechanisms like the internally mounted turbofan engines on vehicles like the B-2 Spirit Bomber, not that the Canadian Forces will or should get any of those.

Most of the reporting on the crash says that it was the result of a technical fault. This is the position that has been taken officially by NATO and the RAF, while the Taliban has claimed that it shot the plane down. There were Taliban fighters in the area, as evidenced by the rapidity with which the British Special Air Service (SAS) commandos were dispatched to destroy any secret electronic equipment that survived the malfunction and subsequent crash. Of course, it would be especially embarrassing to have a £100 million plane shot down and fourteen British soldiers killed by a $26,000 missile that was given to your enemies by the country with whom the Blair government is so loyally and controversially allied. As with the earlier discussion on conspiracy theories, we are left with little means for analyzing the official reports aside from our own intuition about which sources are trustworthy and which explanations are credible.

Whether the crash was an accident (as seems most plausible) or the result of enemy action, the dangers of continued military operations in Afghanistan are demonstrated. Even with complete air superiority, powerful allies, and all the other advantages of being in a superpower coalition, Canadian, British, and American soldiers will continue to die in Afghanistan until such a time as we decide to leave that country to the government and warlords who effectively control it today.

Leaving Oxford in 36 hours; reaching Vancouver in 53

My flight to Vancouver leaves Gatwick at 5:55am GMT on Wednesday, which is actually 9:55pm of Tuesday in Vancouver. Assigning three hours to the bus ride and three more to be sure of clearing security on time, I will be leaving Oxford – suitcases in tow – at midnight local time tomorrow. While that is setting up England-Tuesday / Canada-Wednesday to be a kind of uber-day, such is the character of the flight plan. I just hope that my brain is back on its bearings by the time we will be leaving for Tristan’s cabin on Friday morning.

Everything from now until Tuesday night is likely to be about consolidation. Packing, organizing, and otherwise preparing. The prospect of the forthcoming journey is an exciting one, indeed.

[Unrelated, but unfortunate] Steve Irwin, the self-styled ‘Crocodile Hunter,’ was killed by a stingray in Queensland today. He was frequently a model for characters generated by the Handsworth Improv Team, in which both of my brothers performed for years, and generally struck me as a decent sort of fellow. My sympathies to his family, friends, and two young children.

Vancouver’s safe injection site

I was glad to read today that the safe injection site for heroin in Vancouver has received approval from the federal minister of health, Tony Clement, to remain open until December 2007. Safe injection sites represent what I see as the most intelligent approach to dealing with addictive drugs, namely that of harm reduction. Given the enormous amount of harm that arises from activities peripheral to drug use, this is an approach with real promise.

By providing clean facilities and sterile needles, such sites reduce the probabilities of the transmission of infectious disease through intravenous drug use. Given the ever-rising numbers of people with AIDS and Hepatitis C, this is an incontrovertible benefit. Dr. Julio Montaner, director of the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS has said, of this facility:

The supervised injection site has saved lives, has optimized the use of medical services by entrenched addicts who are sick because of their addiction, has decreased risky behaviors that promote HIV spread, hepatitis C and others, has diminished the inappropriate use of medical resources, has not had a negative impact attracting news users, promoting drug use.

More generally, safe injection sites provide a window for public health authorities into lives that would generally be concealed from them: a glimpse that can only be afforded on the basis that those being helped can be sure they will not be turned over to the police.

Those sites that actually provide addicts with heroin generate additional benefits. Firstly, doing so eliminates the need on the part of addicts to generate funds to sustain a drug habit. Since those funds are likely to be generated in illegal ways, this reduces the amount of crime associated with drug use. Secondly, since distributional channels are often controlled by organized crime, giving addicts means of circumventing them reduces the income and influence of these groups. Given the enormous corrupting power organized crime groups have on governments and police forces, this is most welcome. Such groups are also notoriously violent, and prone to engaging in bloody competition with one another, as well as perpetuating other criminal activities related to the practice or profits of the distribution of illegal drugs. The fact that the Vancouver Police Department has repeatedly expressed support for the safe injection site demonstrates that the arguments about crime reduction have merit. On Clement’s politically risky decision, they supported him “for making a very difficult decision on a complex issue, and for the care with which it has approached it.”

In the end, criminalizing drug use is a strategy where the intuitive appeal falters on the shoals of practical considerations. Countries that have vigorously pursued the enforcement of drug laws – especially the United States – have increased their prison populations while doing little to deal with the underlying issues. Given the reduced life prospects for anyone who has been convicted, as well as the toxic and criminally encouraging environment inside many prisons, such policies generate further harmful knock-on effects.

I am glad that drug policy is an area where Canada has generally been able to steer its own course, subject to the occasional frantic denouncement from across the border. It shows that Canadian values like compassion and pragmatism can be applied successfully even in policy areas that are frequently the source of vitriol and extreme polarization.