In the car on the way to a day at the beach in Manatí, Puerto Rico, discussing pirates and lost treasure in the Caribbean:
Olaia: Why did the pirates lose their treasure?
Jaimito: Because they had holes in their pockets?
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Today, I had a frustrating moment with Jaimito. The frustrating moment is one that I live repeatedly in other contexts in Puerto Rico. It is a frustration that I attribute to cultural differences and not some ingrained natural biology.
It seems I was wrong, maybe.
Jaimito came to me with a pad lock I had oiled and left on the table. Javier had reached up and decided that he would play with it. Yuck. Jaimito dutifully took it away from his little brother and brought it to me.
"Daddy, Javier had this."
"Oh, thank you, Jaimito. Could you put it back where he can’t reach it?"
"Yes, Daddy."
What a sweet little boy, Jaimito is.
About five minutes later, I got up from my desk and went to wipe down the lock and put it back on our gate. "Jaimito, where is the lock?" He immediately directed me to his toy box. Then reconsidered and pointed me in other direction. When it wasn’t there, he took me to our bedroom. It wasn’t there.
"Maybe it’s under your bed?" Like, Daddy, let’s go through the standard places to look when something is lost.
"Jaimito, you just had it, like five minutes ago. What did you do with it after you left the room? Remember, you said that Javier had it?"
"Um, I… uh, maybe it’s over here," and he dashed off again.
I was getting frustrated. "Jaimito, the lock is the heavy metal thing that you had in your hands five minutes ago that Javier had grabbed. What did you do with it? Why can’t you tell me what you did with it? Did you forget?"
"I don’t know," he said beginning to cry.
And so it spiraled downward from there. Jaimito bawling, me, if not yelling, being downright grouchy for the lack of a simple direct answer as to what happened to the damn lock.
"Jaimito, the lock is the thing that goes on the gate, that keeps it closed."
And through tear filled eyes, he exclaimed, "Oh, that," and brought it to me.
I was dumbfounded, irritated, and befuddled. It dawned on me, this has happened more times in Puerto Rico than I care to mention. My son, has the manner of indirectness, of not disappointing, of not saying no, not questioning authority, not complaining, not back-talking, just making it happen. My father asked me for something, he seemed to say, and I shall fetch it, even if I don’t know what the hell he’s talking about.
I explained to him, that if he didn’t understand something, he should ask for clarification. I’m not so big and scary that he couldn’t have asked, what’s a lock. He nodded while wiping his tears.
Maybe I am scary.
"Jaimito," I told him, "just say you don’t know what I’m talking about and ask me to give you more information. There’s nothing wrong with asking me a question. Don’t be afraid to ask questions."
"Okay, Daddy." And I gave him a hug.
In Puerto Rico, when asking for directions, many an American can recount with some frustration at never being given a straight answer.
Is it close?
Yes yes, very close.
Is it far?
Ma’am, do you wish it to be far? Well, yes then it is far.
Do you know the area?
Yes, of course, I know a shortcut.
How much is it going to cost?
Not much. It is cheap I assure you.
Is it any good?
Yes, best quality.
What seems like dishonesty, hides a profound deep truth about Puerto Rico and Puerto Ricans of the island. They don’t like delivering bad news to your face, or rather they can’t bear to be the bearers of it. And if humanly possible, they won’t be. They will transfer your phone call until you give up. They will give pathologically optimistic estimates. They will smile as they tell you what you want to hear.
They will work tirelessly in a futile quest all for you, so that you are not disappointed so that you are not unhappy. They earn their reputation for great hospitality, friendliness, and helpfulness, but sometimes, a well-placed question for clarification or a simple "no, I don’t know where such and such is" goes a long way to being helpful, at least to this Gringo’s sensibilities.
So after all of that, the American asks, "Why didn’t you just tell me it was going to take this long in the first place? I could have made other plans."
The Puerto Rican, shrugs, smiles, and undaunted replies, "Ahorita (in a little bit)."
Well, they (my thoughts) are mostly unprintable, but I will strongly express my position on bottom posting.
It sucks.
But first, a bit of history:
The top posting, bottom posting debate has been mostly won by the bottom posting folks, that is, when replying to an email, your response should go after the quoted portion of the original email.
That’s caca – big stinky pungent steaming caca.
First, if the email was lengthy, you must scroll for ages to even get to your response. Second, the assertion that bottom posting "conserves" the flow of the conversation and is more "right" is also caca. The flow of the conversation is contained in your threaded mail reader. You do use a threaded mail reader, right? The threaded mail reader will preserve the flow of the conversation just fine, thank you, without all the fuss and muss of quoted portions above and below and all around.
My reasons for top posting (in email… doing so in Usenet will get you keel-hauled) is that my response is the most relevant portion of the email. My response is the reason I am sending said email. If the recipient is too lazy to look at his last email to discern to what I am replying, I have included a snippet of relevant text after my important response for reference’s sake. It is just a little reminder, not the important portion of the email. Bottom posters just don’t seem to get this, little bottom feeders that they are.
I get it, I really do. You are so humble, so meek, so respectful in your correspondence that your pathetic little response must be relegated to the tail end of the email. You suck. I don’t want to do business with you. I would rather do business with someone who has the balls to believe his words mean something and places them at the top of the email accordingly.
Got it?
I understand that this is a sensitive topic for many programmers and Open Source developers and furthermore that the convention of "bottom posting" or "bending over and taking up the rear" has won the day. I understand that top posting is frowned upon in public discussion forums. I disagree of course. Again, your Usenet reader is threaded, right? If you need to bottom post, I think you are an idiot, but I am outnumbered, so I acquiesce. You shall, however, not have the pleasure of enforcing upon me your flagrant disregard for common sense and decency by encroaching upon my personal email habits.
In my email I will top post. I will defend my top posting. I will throw down with anyone that wants to start a flame war on the subject.
I am prepared to defend myself.
Iran president bans usage of foreign words – Mideast/N. Africa – MSNBC.com
Haha, I almost fell out of my chair laughing when I read this hysterical sky is falling headline. Oh, look at those fascists Iranians. They are xenophobic. They are trying to ban language. This is big. Look how much better we — err, um.
Of course, the comical irony of this "look how whacked they are" story, is that we are trying to do the same thing in the US. Now, I will grant, it is a question of degrees, but I think most Americans support a ban on the use of Spanish in the US. They know it’s probably an impossible task, but we want to make it as hard as possible for those dirty immigrants who cheapen our country as we continue our spiral into isolation.
Make them fill out forms in English. Make the driver test in English. Take away bi-lingual requirements for government. Ban informal or formal use of Spanish within government offices and schools (remember the kid who got suspended for speaking Spanish with a friend at school?).
What the hell are you people afraid of?
Let me answer that for you: the same thing as the Iranians, people who are different from you.
We’re really not so different. Maybe that should be the basis of our next diplomatic talks. Well, Mr. Ahmadinejad, let’s focus on our common ground. One thing we share is our fear of foreigners. Let’s start there, shall we?
P.J. and I discussing some of the confounding requests we get from windows admins as we try to protect them from themselves:
"Yeah, it’s like, ‘I want you to secure it, but I also want be able to do every stupid thing I can think of.’"
And there you have it in a nutshell the security problems with Microsoft users.
Me: Hey Olaia, look my cup is mysteriously moving. It’s magic.
Olaia: *Smiles* Daddy, it’s because there’s some water under it and the fan is blowing.
Me: What a scientific little mind you have.
Olaia: Now let me tell you about why it rains.
Back in 1995, Laura and I were preparing to head to Spain, she for her doctoral research, me because I wanted to tag along. It was a period of uncertainty and I toyed with the idea of staying behind. I put out my resume and started a job hunt for something that paid well. I got a bite from a publishing company called Nano-thinc (IIRC) to be their web editor.
Things started out normally enough. They had an office on Geary Street right off the bay in San Francisco. Pleasantries were exchanged all around. I was to be interviewed by the owner, a large, loud, and agitated man. He had passion and he believed in something. It was clear. But what? I asked them about their company, what they did, what was their vision etc.
"We at Nano-thinc want to become the ZiffDavis publishing empire of nanotechnology (remember, this is 1995). We think that in 5 years nanotechnology will eliminate death, and as a side effect, all religion."
"Okay," I said, blinking. Did I miss the "Beware: Here Be Cult" sign on the way in? Well let’s have a little fun with this, hell what have I got to lose?
"So, you think think that eliminating death will destroy religion? Why the grudge against religion?"
"Religion is responsible for all the worlds ills. It has killed millions, caused untold despair. If we didn’t die, we wouldn’t need it any more." His tirade had gotten to a fever pitch. He liked talking about this, I thought, so I decided to give him a run for his money.
"But it’s not religion that causes hate and despair, it’s humanity’s inherent smallness and fear that brings that on. Let me ask you something: If you eliminate natural death from old age, disease, sickness, then what are you left with? Unnatural death? People will still die. It’s just that now, it’s going to be murder, accident, decapitation, whatever. As you increase lifespan, and eliminate natural death, you are only left with the assurance that when you go, and you WILL go, that it’s gonna be ugly."
"Yes, but," he blustered, "People won’t fear death any more, and as such they won’t need superstitions like religion. We will control everything and religion won’t be necessary any more."
I replied, "That’s assuming religion exists because of death – a logical fallacy. I think it exists because of life. So you live for 2000 years. What are you going to do with yourself? How are you going to live? We can barely eek out 75 years as it is, without getting bored, falling into despair, self destructive behavior, selfishness. You have to ask yourself, why do you want MORE life? What are you doing with this one? Religion attempts to answer these questions by helping us come up with a framework of service to our fellows. I grant that religion goes astray by claims that it SOLVES the riddle, but by and large it’s our petty fears that trip us up. It’s life that trips us up. Give us more, and we will cling to it with even more fervor, only to find that it ends just the same. Give us the illusion of longevity and we will spend our lives consumed with inaction and self-indulgence. Religion doesn’t help us with death, death is inevitable. Religion helps us with life. Nanotechnology will inevitably lead to a greater belief in God/presence/creator/something greater than ourselves."
"Well, I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree," he blustered. It seemed to me that he had not examined his position sufficiently well.
"Good day," I said. Now that was fun. I’m gonna look this crackpot up in five years and see what he’s up to.
I just have to comment on this great little addition to my technology array. The personal music player, Cowon iAudio F1, rocks. I love it, even if the 22 hour advertised battery life only lives up to around 13. But, it plays ogg vorbis, mp3, wma, is super small, does voice recording, has 1 Gigabyte of flash memory, is an FM tuner, records FM radio, and "line in" too all for around $125.00. This little baby rules. I’ve had it for around 6 months now, and I think it’s fabulous, small, and powerful. Highly recommended. No iPods for me, unless I hack it with RockBox… which I might do, btw.
Jaimito, age 4: Daddy, does magic exist?
Me: Oh, I like that question. But I have to ask you another question, Jaimito. It depends, what is magic? Do you know, Jaimito, why things fall to the ground?
Jaimito: Um, cause you dropped them?
Me: Well, yes, that’s right, but the falling part. How come, Jaimito, that you stick to the ground and don’t fly up to the ceiling?
Jaimito: ‘Cause I don’t have a cape?
Me: *Falls out of chair laughing*
Laura, Jaimito, and Olaia were all out last night. Laura was at some cocktail event for the Puerto Rico Chamber of Commerce, and Olaia and Jaimito attended the birthday party of a cousin. They saw "Cars." I wish I could have gone, but no, I got to stay at home and look after Javier, just the two of us, hangin’. What a treat it was, though. I think I got the best deal. He’s such a fiddle-muffin, always in motion, joking, smiling, laughing, getting into stuff. We got into stuff together. He likes that I help him get into stuff. Then we bounced on the bed. He loves that. Of course the only problem with little children, is that they never ever tire of whatever they are doing that is fun. Again. Again. Again. Do it again. And if you don’t do it one thousand million times, they wail. So we have to find something else fun to do.
Next, let’s jump on the couch. Jump jump jump jump.
"Okay, Javier, Daddy’s tired. Can we take a break?" And I plopped down on the couch and flicked on the TV. Let’s see if there are cartoons on. Javier climbed up and slumped down on the couch imitating my male couch-slouching posture. We were a couple of perfect guys, lazing on the couch. Lovely.
Then I made dinner.
"Hey, Javier, are you hungry? Let’s make dinner. What would you like." He understood, and immediately began to wail.
Daddy, I forgot, I’m hungry. You reminded me and now I want food right now – right this instant. No forget that, I want food five minutes ago.
"Okay, little man, hold your horses. I’m on it. Let’s get you some juicy." I took out a cartoon of country style pulpy fresh orange juice. The wail volume went up a notch.
DADDY! I want it NOW.
"All right, Javier, look, you had better stop crying. You will not have ANY juice until you stop crying this instant." Javier knew I meant business. There are no second chances in this house. Daddy demands instant and complete compliance or the consequences come raining down. Javier’s tears instantly shut off while I finished pouring his juice and handed it to him. "I knew you could do it, little boy. Daddy’s proud of you for holding on and being patient." I patted him on the head and gave him a little hug.
Now I must get to our dinner, I thought. "So, Javier, what shall we have? A little Daddy-style Spanish Tortilla? Sounds good. Hmmmm."
I got out the mixed vegetables, the eggs, and a glass bowl. Normally Spanish omelets have potatoes, but Puerto Rico is so damn hot, I can’t eat a lot of carbs for dinner. As soon as I have rice, pasta, or potatoes, my body goes into flop sweat mode. It’s a pain, let me tell you. Dinner, for me, ideally consists of vegetables, fruits, and a bit of meat or beans, or any variation thereof. I dumped in the mixed vegetables, eggs, garlic, and whipped it all together. I popped it in the microwave for four minutes and bam, quicky Spanish omelet. I put some cheddar cheese on top and we were good to go. Javier, however, had different ideas.
Daddy, I’m going to eat all the bread at once, stuff it all in my mouth and then only nibble at my eggs. Oh, but the orange juice was great. Daddy, he smiled and seemed to say with his little teeth full of bread, I love you. And he took a quick drink from his sippy cup for emphasis.