For more about me, please read this.
I’ve had experienced countless of sunrises and all of them gave this sorf of yeay!-it’s-a-brand-new-day feeling.
But one particular sunrise is certainly the best sunrise I’ve had ever experienced yet.
And effect of the Sun on the her. Isn’t she’s lovely?
All this happened at the Badlands National Park in South Dakota around late December of 2003.
The latest report by WWF stated that one of the most recognizable mammals in the world, the orangutan faces extinction within the short time frame of 20 years.
With the fast pace deforestation due to excessive and illegal logging in both Malaysian and Indonesian jungle, the orangutan’s habitat is seriously threatened. Both Southeast Asian governments need to halt logging and increase forest patrol in Borneo and Sumatra. It is utterly imperative for both governments to get their act together if they could be called responsible for their own wildlife future.
Apart from deforestation, shockingly to me, poaching activity also exists. I’ve always thought poaching was a problem exclusive to Africa and other poor nations. Sadly, this is not the case.
Maybe it is here where environmentalists and libertarians could reconcile – the Big Brother cannot be trusted on the issues that matter.
In my opinion, environmental law in Malaysia is not sufficiently strong to prevent environmental wrongdoings. For instance, in Malaysian Forestry Act, the punishment for illegal logging is jail term between one and twenty years and a fine of RM 500 000, an equivalent of approximately USD 131 000.
First of all, though the jail term sounds bad with the maximum of 20 years, the minimum is too low. It needs to be increased to, say 5 years. That would teach the violators something. And most importantly, the monetary fine is most definately way too down below. A manager of a logging company easily makes millions of dollars. The industry itself is measured in billions. The fine of USD 131 000 is merely a minute fraction of their corrupted income. It’s not even a respectable dent. The level of penalty should be increased to a level that it really hurts both the foul company and its owner. Better, instead of a constant monetary term penalty, the fine should be proportional to its or his or her income.
The key to punishment is to prevent further violation and the penalty should be made larger than the logger expected income when he or she doesn’t suffer any setback, not merely to fine just for the sake of it.
And who did this law anyway? The lawmakers of the said Act are probably the ones of those political science graduates of which know nothing of economics or even rational mathematics. God! Please save my soul if those fools and stupids are running my country.
If ever the younger generation asks me what is an orangutan and if I won’t be able to show them a free living primate of that species, I swear to God, I will dedicate my life to hunt all the ones that are responsible of such extinction. I will make it a personal crusade, by gold, by blood or by God’s name I will if that day comes.
But I pray sincerely, whole hearted, for that time to never come, whether it’s within my lifetime or farther.
p/s – don’t you love unexpected humor?
“Not to make a pun, but I think it’s shedding a light on serious regulatory and safety issues that are not getting much attention” – Art Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania on genetically modified pets, specifically the fluorescent fish. Report by the Chicago Tribune Online Edition, Jan 12th 2004.
The Asian economic crisis ended almost five years ago. Before it ended, the crisis spread throughout the whole world albeit less severe. Thankfully, all of that are nothing but history for now, until the next business cycle. However, the US, of which also didn’t escape the economic recession like the others, seems still suffering the recession, or at least it is not yet on the expansion curve.
From my perspective, though admittedly I lack full economics knowledge to draw an academically sound conclusion, the US has been in a prolonged economics recession.
Southeast Asian and Latin countries suffered major depression in 1997 and 1998. Japan deteriorating economy made the situation worse. Then the world major economies followed suit. After some political upheavals and regime change, things started to look good. In Malaysia, a few national projects suspended during the economic recession started to get off the ground again. In neighboring Indonesia, voices of discontent went low and thus allowing the rebuilding of its ruined economy. Half way across the world, Argentina abandoned its currency and embraced the US dollar.
Despite the recovery made by various countries, meanwhile the US was just started to go into what is now dubbed as the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Later, the event of September 11th proved to be decisively bad for consumer confidence. If I remember correctly, the airfare from Detroit to Los Angeles and back again was merely around USD 100. Perhaps it was cheaper but it was something the airlines companies did to combat the falling consumer confidence.
As the US economy continued its free fall, firms had to cut back cost in order to survive. In the newspaper, it was reported that Boeing had to retrench approximately 30 000 jobs. That was just one firm. Just imagine what the US total job loss was. Furthermore, the Enron scandal certainly didn’t help and worse, the newspeak lovers spent $87 billion on a foreign country due to bad political maneuvering.
Regardless of reports on economic recession, I didn’t see the effects early through my own eyes since things were going great in Michigan. No cuts whatsoever. Yet in the early mid 2003, Governor Granholm announced cut back on education funding of Michigan public universities. University of Michigan was not excluded and thus, many desperate measures are taken. Some of them are reducing the libraries operating hours and the increase of its tuition fee. All the sudden, everything was affected directly.
And now in the face of few positive trends, somehow things are not so convincing. The unemployment rate fell point two percent to 5.7% and yet, merely 1 000 jobs were created. In fact, the current paradox to the US economic issue is the unemployment rate. In spite of falling rate, there are simply not enough jobs being created and up to now, total job loss in the past few years is yet to be balanced out by total job creation. Some economists are calling this phenomenon as ghost employment – robots are taking over human but I suspect there is too much sci-fi element behind that reasoning.
p/s – more blog on the unemployment rate paradox at David Smith’s EconomicsUK.com
International field hockey opens 2004 with its first tournament, the 13th Sultan Azlan Shah Cup in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Germany is the current favorite to win the tournament and they beat Malaysia 4 to 2. To further strengthen Germany’s superiority, they fought off India’s challenge by outscoring India 3 – 1 yesterday. Earlier, Malaysia managed to hold off Spain with the scoreline of 3 – 3.
Spain, despite having trouble taming Malaysia, shocked Australia by winning the match 3 – 2. In battle of South Asia, Pakistan managed to defeat its arch rival, India 3 – 2.
Please read part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8 and part 9.
The night was cold, the wind was strong and it was dark.
I was only grateful when the morning Sun rose against the mountains. It was almost 0900 hours by the time my weary eyes were opened. I quickly brushed my teeth, changed to my hiking gears and packed up the tent. The tent had two parts, one was the tent itself and the other part was sort of roof for the tent. The wind was so strong last night that I found the roof a few meters away from the place where it was supposed to be.
It was nearly 1000 hours when I finally moved out from my camping spot. It was disheartening to know that I still had to climb. However, the climb wasn’t too bad unlike yesterday. Later, I had to cross the river after the gradient lessened out. On the bridge and looking eastward, the river was as calm as a bayou but westward, the water plunged fiercely toward Glen Aulin.
After awhile of flat terrain, climbing was again needed but thank God hardcore climbing was not a necessity. Unfortunately for me, there was one problem; the trail was not well marked as the ground was hard rock. At one time, I thought I was walking toward the right direction but ended up just a few feet away from a hundred feet drop. Funnily enough, I was facing toward Glen Aulin instead of the other direction. Immediately, I realized I had gone off trail. So, I turned around and voila! I had no idea where the trail was. Meanwhile, the rattling sound was omnipresent and hell yeah it was scary. I am not a snake fan especially after sitting right beside a rattle snake a few days ago.
Not long after, I saw a few hikers from far. Knowing they were my ticket, I quickly ran toward them. A few puffing later, I caught up with them and found the trail. I just couldn’t believe how I missed the trail. There were a few signs indicating the trail but like I said earlier, it was not well marked. One of the signs that usually used is the stacking of two or three round stones. In my case, the sign was hard to be seen because it seemed to bland with the rocky topography almost perfectly.
I went on the trail, I continued on and human traffic suddenly increased. This made me to conclude that I was approaching the Tuolumne Meadows. Eager to end my misery, I quickened my pace.
After an hour of hiking, it was almost 9000 feet and the peaks still rose without fail though the landscape appeared to flatten out. Optimistically, I convinced myself that the Tuolumne Meadows was within a day worth of hiking.
And then, the forest opened up and thus leaving a spectacular open space. Utopian as it was, the Tuolumne River flowed against the backdrop of Sierra Nevada. Suddenly birds were singing and the sky was clear and blue. Of course, it was clear and blue and the birds were singing all the way. It was just that the surrealness of Sierra Nevada induced the sight and sound of nature, bringing the sound of heavy breathing and the pain of the scorching heat into the far background of the mind.
It was as if the whole scenery was drawn by an artist. It was as if I was living inside an Adam Ansel’s painting. If I wouldn’t know any better, I would have thought it was the Garden of Eden.
I went to the side, off the trail, closer to the river and sat down. One part of me wanted to catch my breath, another part wanted to savor the moment. Only God knows how long I marvelled at the scenery quietly. And when it was time to go, part of me didn’t want to leave and the other part urged me to go on. Oh how I wish I would have followed my heart instead of my mind.
But then, I went on knowing I needed to go on, leaving behind a place I didn’t want to pass into the depth of time.
p/s – Joke of the day by Prof. Hamermesh: That girl is pretty 3 S.D. above the mean.
pp/s – The Great Lakes Zephyr describes The __earthinc as “an interesting weBlog of a nature lover and envir(o)nmentalist at heart”. I’m flattered.
errata – Somebody pointed out that the statement “It was as if I was living inside an Adam Ansel’s painting” is wrong. It should be “It was as if I was living inside an Albert Bierstadt’s painting.” The two of them were related to Yosemite and I had gotten them mixed up.