Sabbath Year... what a pain. How do we get around it?

This BBC News article talks about an interesting dilemma for Israeli Jews this year. This is the Sabbath year, in which the land is supposed to lie fallow to give the earth a rest. I see it as an amazing test of faith -- you trust the Lord for His providence during that year -- as well as good environmental practice.

However, people have managed to find ways around the Sabbath year, as expected. During this year, many farmers sign their land over to rabbis, who then proceed to "sell" the land at really cheap prices to non-Jews. This apparently allows the farmers to still grow crops on the land, and observe the Sabbath year. (How the non-Jews come into this and lets this work out, I don't understand. I just take the article at face value.)

Interesting what sort of loopholes people can come up with, when there's money to be made!

All good things must come to an end...

Those people who know me well know that one of my favorite book series is the *Wheel of Time* series, written by Robert Jordan. I started reading that series when I was a senior at Brown, and then continued to chase the entire series, hungrily grabbing up each book as it was written and devouring it voraciously.

As the series was not finished, I often found it unbearable to have to wait for the next book coming up while the author finished it. And I was also annoyed by the way the author drew out the series (probably under pressure from the publisher), and slowed down the plot to a point where it was pretty much a crawl at points. However, since I had gotten attached to the characters by that point (I am a big sucker for getting attached to fictional characters), I couldn't bring myself to stop reading the books. I did swear, however, that I would never start reading an unfinished fictional series unless I knew that the author had already passed on. That's also the reason why I have never picked up the Harry Potter series, though now that it's been finished, maybe I can start reading them finally.

The author of the WoT series, Robert Jordan, announced in 2006 that the upcoming book would be his last, and I know I wasn't the only one who breathed a sigh of relief. The entire series had spanned over 17 years. Imagine our shock, therefore, when shortly after that announcement, he was diagnosed with a rare blood disease and had to be treated at the Mayo Clinic. For a while it looked as if he was beating the disease, so it was a HUGE shock when a news article announced his passing. I was in disbelief when I saw this article, only about 20 minutes ago -- I went and hunted down every piece of news I could on this, just to make sure that it wasn't some cruel joke. Alas, it isn't -- the author has passed on.

It seems to selfish to think of this now, but my first thought was that we would never get to see the last novel. From numerous fansites on the web, I know now that he has been dictating notes to a veritable army of friends and fellow authors, just so that if he happened to not beat the disease, at least somebody could finish the series from his notes. I am extremely grateful to him for that (and I have to say, that really shows how much he cares about his readers). However, it won't be *him* anymore. Sigh. I guess all good things must come to an end, though I wish they wouldn't end prematurely!

RIP, Mr. Jordan. You will be sorely missed by all of us.

Technology for Real Life

Check out this heartwarming article from CNN.com today. It's about how technology can literally save the lives of people.

The background of the article is this: in the refugee camps in Chad, Darfurian refugees who reach the safety of these camps must still leave the camp and forage far and wide for firewood, thus incurring the risk of running into Janjaweed fighters and getting raped or killed or kidnapped.

An NGO heard about their plight and thought up this idea of using solar power to cook food, thus saving on the need for firewood. They made up a design for a cooker that is easily and cheaply constructed, and convinced an NGO who was doing actual groundwork in the camps to give the idea a trial. They have now successfully taught the women in two camps to use solar power to cook, and this project will likely be extended to a third camp in the future.

This is the sort of thing which I think really puts technology to good use. It is like D-Lab project at MIT, which seeks to develop cheap technologies to make life better for impoverished people. Examples are things like a plastic backpack, so that women in Africa can bring home water more comfortably and easily, or a bicycle-powered generator for electricity. The focus isn't on cutting-edge tech, but rather on workable tech -- things that could really change the lives of people, rather than simply making it better -- things that people really need, rather than things that people simply want but don't need.

I wish we could have a course or something like that here. Some sort of a project-based elective, maybe. Something that would *really* open the eyes of our students and give them more exposure, as well as truly benefiting others.

Are we too conservative?

This BBC article caught my eye. It talks about a school on a quiet little island off the coast of Scotland which decided to go all-digital. ICT (Internet and Computer Technology) was introduced into the curriculum at all levels and all subjects, and UMPCs and laptops were issued to all students and teachers.

This is a little like a project that we have been involved in here in Hong Kong, with one of the local schools. The school board and funders were very supportive, but the teachers and principals were much more conservative. And I regret to say that our team, when asked for our opinions, also tended to be more conservative, recommending a very gradual digitalization rather than the full-blown approach that has been taken in Scotland.

Now, reading these articles, I wonder: are we being too conservative and cautious? I know that we have to be good stewards of our resources and not be wasteful, but sometimes, I do wonder whether this "look-for-blame" and "accountable" culture in Hong Kong has changed us all into fraidy-cats, contented with incremental, baby steps, and afraid to dream big and think about the impossible?

It's a sobering thought.

In-class Musical

This shot was taken from a real life lecture somewhere in the US, I believe. What happens is that a bunch of students made up this musical act to perform in the middle of a lecture. And by "performing", I mean literally, they interrupted the teacher and started singing and dancing in class. Listen to the words, they're hilarious.

It's a pity that more of our students can't think of creative things like these to do, and instead they spend their energy thinking up new and creative ways of complaining.

Interesting Tidbit

From the Wikipedia entry on "river" (don't ask why I was looking at it, I don't remember, i think I was following links and landed onto that page), comes this trivia:

It has been noted that on average, the air distance (euclidean distance) from the beginning to the end of most rivers is about one third their actual length. For rivers that flow in plain areas, this number is very close to Pi.

I think that's so absolutely COOL.

Partial Triumph

Okay, so I had to break the 4th commandment to do this, but I finally have 6 weeks of course material for my new course prepared. YAY!!!!!!!

It's impossible to describe how absolutely relieved I am about this. This coming semester is going to be insanely tough, and for the last few weeks, I have been stressing out about how slow my lecture prep was going. A wedding reception and a missions meeting scheduled for the two days before the first day of classes also didn't help. I was actually so stressed out this afternoon that I pulled out of the missions meeting to come back and prepare for class (and that's how I broke the 4th commandment).

So... one midterm, that'll take up one week, and then 7 more weeks of slides to go! YES!

Just for celebration, here's a youtube video of "I will survive" -- one of my favorite songs. I think that I will seriously need to be singing this to myself over the next 15 weeks!

(Clark, if you're reading this, check out the graphic for "you think I'd crumble" -- I think you'll love it.)