Longing for Lisbon

As it would happen, I was asked to come down to Portugal to help out in a project. I protested that I was a bit busy and my current workload didn't quite allow me to take on other work, but, to cut a long story and several phone-calls short, in the end we settled on me doing a short two-day visit during which I would try to help out with current issues, do a sort of audit on the systems and basically consult with the local engineers where I could.

Now, last time I was here, during the summer of 2009 (See my older post "Weekend Late-Lunches"), the work was difficult, and hard, and hours long. But since I was here for about three months, I still managed to have a look around the city. To feel it's vibe and appreciate the sociable peoples here, who will chat with you over coffee even though you try to explain you don't understand Portuguese.

Coming back and visiting some of the places of that summer again, I couldn't help but think of the phrase

"it was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."

While that summer was full of difficulty and extremely hard work, it also brought colleagues closer to being friends and the strong bonding experience of a common goal under stress. I can think of worse places to have an experience like that than Lisbon...

Now, packing up the few things I brought on the short trip, I feel a little bit sad for having to leave so soon. But also hopeful for the prospect of perhaps coming back here in the future. Would that constitute a mild case of what the Portuguese call "saudade"?



P.S.
I still didn't find the entrance to the castle.

Sometimes you just know what's going to happen next...

It's monday-morning, and I find myself preparing to go to work. I'm working on a project in a neighbouring country, so my commute is, shall we say, significant. Usually I leave on sunday night, when there's light traffic and less stress. But this sunday, I had other, better, things to do, so I'm driving on monday.

I had packed my bags, my laptop, any related project paperwork, clothes, shoes, corporate badge, jacket, wallets, keys, everything's there and I hobble, packed like a mule, with two backpacks and assorted items, towards the car. Where, as I am fishing for the keys to the car, I can feel the key-chain of my house keys slipping off of my fingers. The keys drop. I look down. Just in time to notice them hit the storm drain.

In a brilliant flash of insight, I could see my day expand, deterministically, in my mind.

The keys slip through the grate and with a fittingly undramatic splash hit the water at the bottom and disappear into the murky depths of the storm drain's catch-bucket.

The key-chain is important. Apart from the physical importance (in it's capacity of opening the doors to my domicile), keys are somewhat symbolic in the "key to the city", "key to my heart" and "key to my life" kind of way. So, regardless of the consideration that you don't want to have any key to your front door ending up in potentially irresponsible hands, there's the psychology of the matter. And the certain knowledge that I cannot, will not, have my mind at ease as long as I don't hold those keys in my hands again.

Storm drains in the Netherlands are made out of cast-iron. Or some other suitable heavy material that isn't too overly expensive and not as toxic as lead. There's no way to lift one by myself. I could move it with a long enough and strong enough lever, but that would possibly put me in trouble with the local municipal works-department. Worse, if I lever it out of there and it tips over and down the chute on it's side I might be charged with vandalism, destruction of public property, or such.

Alright. Alternative approach. Ummm... A fishing rod? With a magnet? Bit of a cliche perhaps... Then again, I don't know how deep the catch-bucket goes and the water is too murky to see my keys in. A stick? Again, no idea how long it should be and I might just push it down the real drain, not just the catch-bucket beneath the grate.

So, back to the municipal works-department... Calling them will take some time, especially on monday. And, knowing bureaucracy, it will probably take even longer than that before the crew arrives with tools. So I'll end up waiting for them for some time, but lacking keys, I can't do so inside my house.

Not retrieving the keys and simply going to work isn't exactly an option either. While I will be staying in a hotel, I can't really wait with this for a week. The keys will be gone for sure. And after that, if the house hasn't been emptied yet, I'd have to replace all the locks. Which, as the locks are an integral system, would be both expensive and time-consuming.

While these possibilities and implications are still fractalling in my mind, some process intervenes and indicates that the "undesired expenditure of the day" flag has long since been raised.

My foot moves. I put my bags in the car.

And I kneel down to retrieve my keys. Which were narrowly trapped against one of the drain's sidebars by my foot.

That was a close call.

Now I can rest comfortably in the knowledge that I will not know what the rest of the day might bring.


Keychain image is (c) 2008, toxel.com

USD 20B is a lot of money to make "real change".

BP today agreed to put aside an enormous amount of money to begin to meet with claims for damages resulting from the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Claims and Damages.

Well, the damage has been done, and no doubt that a lot of good people are struggling to get by as a result of the disaster. Whether it be because the government is now forbidding them from drilling more wells, or from oil-damage to fisheries and wildlife, or from tourists staying away from tar-stained beaches, your pain and struggle is real and it is justified to look towards your government for help and to point the finger at the company that seems to be the immediate cause of the pain.

But... What if your government would come to your beaches and inspect your fisheries and it would say that, yes, the damage is done and it is irreversible and effects will be lasting for decades to come.

What if they would say that, given this conclusion and such impact, which is scientifically verifiable, and economically calculable, it is no longer feasible for you to expect to continue to work in fishing, tourism, or the oil industry here?

What if, rather than calculate your expected wage for the next several decades (which is unlikely in itself to last that long, given job security in these times), put a multiplier to that as a form of civil liability compensation, and deposit the resulting amount in your bank account, the government would pay said wage for a year, maybe two, and in addition invest in the creation of new industries and fund education required for these?

Would you accept such a conclusion? And would you support such a policy of redevelopment, rather than direct compensation?


Who knows, maybe the Gulf Coast can become, rather than the US's region with the youngest general retirement age, the region with the highest environmental awareness, and it's "silicon valley" of alternative energy research? As far as I can tell it has plenty of sunshine, plenty of coastline, and they seem to have an excess in wind. Though that last may be seasonal and/or partly caused by a recent upsurge in political rhetoric.

How about creating a new National Park? Preferably in a previously thriving nature area, which is now hit the worst with oil. Name it the Natural Crude Recovery National Park. Or perhaps the Thad Allen National Park, as his work is undoubtedly tireless, frustrating and ungrateful, and a monument to nature's long-lasting recovery in his name would definitely not be an insult.

Do not clean up the oil in this set-aside region, but allow it to recover naturally. Let scientists and National Park Service manage the area like they do the Mt. St. Helens National Vulcanic Monument, as a testament and case study into how long it takes for nature to recover from a cataclysm, though this one be of man's own hand.

Both the park and the redeveloped regional industry would be a lasting monument to our folly. And to America's ability to deal with adversity in a constructive manner.


How about funding a real, hands-on, estimate of what it will take to clean up the mess? Then fund a study in what it will cost to re-develop the region's industrial sector. I fear that such studies, realistic studies, will show that a "clean-up", i.e. a return to how things were before, cannot be bought with any amount of money, simply due to the irreversible nature of some of the damage done. An egg, once boiled, will never again hatch a chick.

I fear that a balance sheet like that will show that, financially, it will be more feasible to re-invent the region's major industry.

But I also fear that the focus on individual gains of the American People at large and a culture of liability and lawsuits will prevent this money to be turned into "real change".

BP, who would probably never have chosen voluntarily to invest this kind of money in sustainability on such a short notice (their website claims they had invested USD 4B in sustainable energy since 2005 and aim to have invested USD 8B by 2015 [1]), will now find itself chucking this enormous wad of cash down the proverbial well of civil liability in an attempt at a societal Top-Kill of the gusher of damage-claims. They had some encouraging results with that approach to the real leak as well...



But unlike the purely, deterministically, physics-driven upward pressure of the oil-well, this gusher has a choice in whether it will blow-out or not...



[1] BP's page on "Our low-carbon business"
http://www.bp.com/sectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9032669&contentId=7059924
[2] "BP Ultimate" image retrieved from BP's website's press kit
http://www.bp.com/browsebytheme.do?contentId=7002593&categoryId=9001237&currentPage=2