same shit, different country

On the left side, Jean Charles de Menezes, a 29-year old Brazilian citizen who lost his life two and half years ago in the London Metro. On the right, Osman Hussain, the supposed terrorist, after whom the Metropolitan Police of London were after in the aftermath of the July 2006 attacks. The striking (???) similarity between the two men, tragically misled two Scotland Yard firearms officers who gunned down de Menezes inside the train at Stockwell Station before he could even say a word...

The jury initially rejected the two officers' recount of the "incident" and a significant amount of doubt is still remaining on whether the killing could by any means be justified.

Despite of all that, I read on today's news that Scotland Yard is about to allow the two officers to return to frontline duties.

And I can only think that for as long as governments keep drifting away from the majorities that have elected them, for as long as the establishment keeps turning its back at the people who are supposed to sustain it, and for as long as the "law enforcers" think more on the enforcement than the actual laws, then tear-gas cannisters are about to be going out of stock more and more often. 

today

Κάποτε θα 'ρθουν να σου πουν
πως σε πιστεύουν σ' αγαπούν
και πως σε θένε
Εχε το νου σου στο παιδί
κλείσε την πόρτα με κλειδί
ψέματα λένε

Κάποτε θα 'ρθουν γνωστικοί
λογάδες και γραμματικοί
για να σε πείσουν
Εχε το νου σου στο παιδί
κλείσε την πόρτα με κλειδί
θα σε πουλήσουν

Και όταν θα 'ρθουν οι καιροί
που θα 'χει σβύσει το κερί
στην καταιγίδα
Υπερασπίσου το παιδί
γιατί αν γλιτώσει το παιδί
υπάρχει ελπίδα

Λευτέρης Παπαδόπουλος
Κάποτε θα 'ρθουν

on the sunny side of the street

Walking back home late last night, alone through the streets around Arc de Triomfe and la Ribera, as my two most beloved cities stood at the opposite coasts of the same sea.

Athens in flames, finally facing its mostly underestimated contradictions, while Barcelona was serenely cruising into the uncompromising limbo of an enduring prosperity.

Going down carrer del Commerc with Interpol singing through my headphones:

"sleep tight, grim rite, we have two thousand couches when you can sleep tonight"

I passed by the front of a bank, one such as those burning in the Athenian major avenues, when I saw a homeless guy -one more of the many- who, unable to spot one of the couches Interpol were singing about, had found refuge in the little space, cramped between to ATM machines.

I wondered what he might think if I told him about my angry compatriots' bank-burning back in my home town. And whether he would even care knowing. Equally unaware of his thoughts, his dreams or nightmares, indifferent to the sufferings of Athens, Barcelona carried on her gaudy, sleepless night.

Tomorrow, this homeless guy will wake up. And maybe one day, he too will stand up between two burning ATMs.

...but seriously

On the bus today, going to work, re-reading my favourite parts of Marcuse's "One dimensional man"...

Next to me I saw a young mother with a baby carriage. Inside it her baby daughter was sleeping, her tiny little hand holding tightly to her mom's mobile phone.

It must have been the saddest thing I have seen in a long time. And the saddest confirmation of what I was reading.

a one-dimensional man

I happened to re-read the "One-dimensional man" by Herbert Marcuse a few months ago. I was hoping to get a better grasp on it being older and -supposedly- more mature than when I first read it during my early university years. But although I did not, I got a pretty good reminder of a number of concepts related to this so disturbing uni-dimensionality, which Marcuse puts at the center of his attention. Most of all, after re-reading the book I regained part of my revolutionary reflexes, which I seemed to have lost after a hectic summer full of useless work. Today, after a full 36 hours of increasing pressure and with a terribly busy rest of the week ahead of me, I realized I am about to lose them again.

I find myself in the rather unpleasant situation to have to produce, interpret and present a significant amount of work in a very short period. The way my boss put it -in a rather stressful way- yesterday night I have "a lot of work and too little time". This stems from a number of things.
One: I am not the finest example of a hard-working scientist. Always too easily distracted, always getting my hands on too many things just because of curiosity, most of the times leaving unfinished business behind me. Well, this business needs to be finished now.
Two: The business to be finished looks quite stubborn to remain unfinished. Numbers don't exactly fall into place but rather need to be "massaged" into it. It's something I am supposed to do, but more and more I find I am quite reluctant to do so.
Three: The business remains unfinished because my bosses thought it could go on forever. Now that they know that I am about to leave soon, they find this to be a comfortable way to put some extra pressure. A pressure not exactly that comfortable to me though.

Still, my laziness and increased sense of inertia notwithstanding, I have put myself to the test. How about getting up earlier and leaving from work later than usual? I can save two more hours of work this way. How about a bit less of reading before going to bed? That would help me wake up earlier. How about skipping climbing on weekends while trying to put some of my results on paper? That will compensate for the fact that nobody feels like writing the papers his name will be on. How about a bit less blogging, a bit less of reading the newspapers, a little less (meaning almost null) of practicing with my trumpet? This way I can run three or four different analyses at the same time, while preparing slides for my upcoming presentations.

Well, guess what! It works!

Now don't get excited, this doesn't mean science is progressing at a fast pace, nor that major breakthroughs are being accomplished. Nonetheless it means that I am being more productive. I program faster, I design the analysis pipelines more efficiently, I optimize my time in such a way that I am getting an unprecedented amount of things done and I manage to put them into slides or on paper in a sort of fashion that resembles a factory's production line. In brief I have convinced myself that I can be what I thought myself completely incapable of. Work like there is nothing else in life. No music other than the one that helps me program (Rage against the machine mostly). No books other than science-related ones. No leisure activities other than the necessary rest to keep me going. Even this post is to be seen as a major distraction but it's just because all my CPUs are working to burning temperature.

At last, after three years of being a post-doc, I have managed to become the one-dimensional man. And you cannot imagine how utterly boring it is.