Lesson learned

The cover of this week's Economist shows a protester from the

recent post-election demonstrations going on in Iran right now. The picture is not really a remarkable shot and the story is not exactly notable; news outlets throughout the world are covering this story (as best they can, I guess, given the limits placed on their reporting.) But it's interesting to note that the magazine chose a photo for their cover story of a protester wearing a mask. There could be many reasons for choosing a masked cover subject, including the green cloth which has significance in these protests. But I imagine the choice has to do with keeping the person featured in the photo safe from the authorities.

According to this article, a picture from the magazine's cover during

unrest there in 1999 had serious unintended consequences... The protester featured on that cover was subsequently found by authorities,

arrested, jailed, and tortured.

Obviously protesters in a state such as Iran assume considerable risk just by being in a protest. But it's scary to think that someone who unwittingly becomes the subject of photojournalism would get into so much trouble. And it begs the question how journalists ought to weigh the importance of their story against the safety of their subject.

Also, with the press earlier this month surrounding the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests, it makes me wonder if the subject of that photo was also targeted by his government.

Ice Cream

The Scooper Bowl last week meant unlimited ice cream for just $8. And
the money went to the Jimmy Fund. Even the Cake Sprinkles flavor with
a bright blue frosting swirl was decent. Everything was a win.

Movies and numbers

Alright, this is crazy. I'm sure some film fan out there has already spotted this, but check it out.

A recent visit to the movie trailers section on the Apple site (apple.com/trailers) reveals four different movies pertaining to the number nine. (See the movie posters below for "Nine" "9" "$9.99" and "District 9") One's a musical, one's a cartoony story from Tim Burton, one's a claymation-type thing about the meaning of life, and one's a sci-fi, end of the world thing from Peter Jackson.

I don't know what this means, I don't know anything about numerology or numberology and my math skills are slowly on the wane. But this is huge.

Kenyan Living

After our short safari, we hung out in my sister's camp for several days and visited some of the villages she's working with. This was far and away the highlight of the trip. I loved the chance to see what she has been up to and live a little bit of the life she's had over there. A few pictures:

We visited the home of Kididing, one of my sister's watchmen. This picture shows him, his wife, and kids, including his baby twins, in the blue outfits. They were scared of my sister because she had driven them to the doctor weeks before when they were sick. This is right after we had tea in Kididing's home, which we're standing next to.


We also had tea in the home of James, my sister's translator (though she speaks Swahili pretty well now.) This is James's wife and kids/nieces. The house had a similar construction to the one in the previous picture. Note the branches on the outside, but the smooth dirt on the inside.

Baking a cake for my sister's birthday. We had a recipe, ingredients we bought in town, but no means of measuring anything. The cake came out anyways, and we had enough time to write Happy Birthday.

Another part of the trip that always made me smile was the off-road driving (I'm such a guy). We drove everywhere in my sister's Land Rover. Mostly we stuck to the worn paths, but when there weren't any paths, we drove anywhere. In this video the sun has just come out following a downpour, but the path is still flooded.

Kenyan Safaris

Our trip started off with a safari, visiting two parks where we saw lots of animals. It was great to see all those animals up close, just hanging around. We all agreed that it was nice to take photos, but really, we could just find professional pictures if we wanted to see nice specimens of these animals. Regardless, here's a few from what we saw:

Giraffes. We saw a bunch of these. They're really pretty funny looking when you think about it.


Lions. We saw a couple groups of lions. The only reason this guy is walking around is that I think we interrupted his midday nap.

Rhinos. They're far away, but still pretty impressive looking. Behind them is a lake, with a pink shoreline. It's pink because there are thousands of flamingos hanging out.

Kate and I holding a pair of chameleons. These guys are ferocious. One bit my thumb off.

Back from Kenya

I'm back from my quick trip to Kenya. It was an incredible trip on many levels. Obviously the chance to travel to a country such as Kenya is a unique and special experience. But more importantly for me, it was incredibly rewarding to visit my sister and see what she's been up to over there. I am totally in awe of her and her friends who live there.

Pictures to follow.

To Africa

I'm leaving this evening to visit my sis in Kenya. I'm incredibly excited. I'll be somewhere a few hours from here:

View Larger Map

Sunscreen and camera and malaria meds are packed. I'll see you on the other side.

Strong Talent Pool

Our little party last weekend went great. The whole "job fair" theme was well-received and friends came ready to play along with the theme. Someone even printed up their own trading cards to hand out (they were a baseball player looking for work). A couple people drew their own graphs and this is my favorite...

It's a pie chart of bars and a bar chart of pies.

Awesome. Anyways, lots of fun. And as I said in this post last year, a "pat on the back to all the friends who made for a cool party," since it all really depends on them.

Shipping Containers

The Volvo Ocean Race, a round-the-world sailing race has been in a
stop-over in Boston for the past few weeks. The handful of teams have
set up camp down by the water. This is the Puma team's. It's made of
two dozen shipping containers, with room for a store and a bar. Two
bars, actually. Really cool concept.

Next Party

The next party is happening! It's somewhat related to current events (The screenshot on the right tells you I'm talking about the economy, not the flu.) I'm looking forward to it and hope it's not too much of a costume party. I think the drab colors portray the sense of hopelessness out there.

Here's the link.

Bricks

The Dude is using a robot to build a brick wall for an architecture
school project. The precision is amazing, yet the robot is very
"dumb" and can't cope if things are out of place by a few
centimeters. This fact was actually somewhat comforting because we
imagined the robot dropping the bricks and coming after us. You can
just barely see the slight lean of the wall if you look closely at the
left edge.

Pulled Pork

Trimming 7 pounds of meat for pulled pork. Don't try this at home
(it's not kosher.)