I'm sure you will all have heard about Aung San Suu Kyi's (further) imprisonment by now, but if not, here's the basic story: Aung San Suu Kyi is basically the legitimate ruler of Burma, but the Junta have kept her out of power and also kept her in detention for 13 of the last 19 years. She has just been sentenced to another 18 months in detention (conveniently leaving her unable to participate in elections next year) for "violating the conditions of her house arrest", i.e. an idiot American swam to her home.

The verdict is grossly unfair. Aung San Suu Kyi has been under house arrest since 2003, and enough is enough. Please email the Burmese authorities and call on them to release Aung San Suu Kyi here: http://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=343

discuzzin ur arms treid treety



This is from when I went to the FCO last Monday. It's actually a pretty rubbish video overall, so feel free to skip to 2:30. ;)

(Link: http://www.bsn.org.uk/BSNJournalist/SearchResults.aspx?searchtext=arms%20trade&fromDate=&toDate=&sortType=-1&locale=en-GB&SiteId=Lw1T9rVFHwY%3d)

Life has been as wonderful as Oxford always is of late.

1) Colin Pillinger
2) Ambassador from Albanian
3) Sunday
4) Today

1) Colin Pillinger. He's a British physicist who more or less organised the (failed) Beagle 2 project to Mars. I went to an interesting talk by him. He seems convinced that there is life on Mars, and I guess he's kind of convinced me on a question I was reasonably ambivalent about before. I so hope the question gets settled relatively soon - and it won't be hard to settle, as long as we can get the appropriate equipment to Mars.

2) Albanian Ambassador. He convinced me that Albania is full of shiny happy people having fun. My friend, who has been to Albani, confirmed this. There are Orthodox and Catholic christians in Albania as well as a majority of Muslims, but they all seem to get along really, really well. This is encouraging and adorable.

3) Sunday was beautiful. I went with a friend to get ice cream (FREE!) from the Oxford Union. This deliciousness was followed by a phone call in which it was decided that we would have an impromptu barbeque. So we went to Sainsbury's, bought meat and a disposable barbeque, and went to the parks by the riverbank to have a small barbeque of four. It was beautiful. I chased a moorhen. Many friends from college came up and two of them fell into the river; one, meanwhile, voluntarily took a dip therein, although this is largely because he is mad. After this I hosted a mead-tasting event in which people tried some of the mead I brewed. Responses were overwhelming positive, which was great; I feel vindicated in my mead-brewing, and will definitely do so again in future. After this, pub quizzing occurred and my time came second.

4) Today, more mead was tasted by a different set of friends (the Amnesty lot). At 5pm, we held a commemoration march for the Tiananmen Square massacre which was exactly 20 years ago today. I always feel in two minds about these kinds of events. I love letter-writing because I feel like I've achieved something, whereas commemoration doesn't seem to actually do much. However, I came out of the event profoundly moved. While we were there with our large "Remember Tiananmen!" and "Human Rights for China!" banners, two huge groups of (I think) Taiwanese tourists separately came upon us. They were incredibly, incredibly supportive of us - they took photos, came and stood with us to have their photos taken, told us to continue the good work and even corrected some of the faulty Chinese on our banners. The response we got from them - and from a small number of people from the PRC - was really heartwarming; it was so nice to know that these Chinese people knew and, more importantly, cared about Tiananmen.

Today, one of the colleges also decided to give out free pizza and alcohol to gays, lesbians and bisexuals. I took advantage of the offer, but also invited my straight friend, which was nicely subversive - I don't approve of segregation of gays, just as I disapprove of segregation of women (who get their own chocolate and strawberry parties in my college, infuriatingly) or ethnic minorities.

Finally, today was also the day of European elections. Europe tends to evoke strange feelings in the British, who tend not to appreciate what it has done, and does, for us. I voted Lib Dem on the basis that Tories are intrinsically evil (not to mention their fucking nasty Euro-allies), Labour are authoritarian gits, the Greens are ridiculous, and everybody else is mad, Eurosceptic or racist. I was sorely tempted to vote for the Roman Party though - Ave!

In other news, I fixed a bike puncture ALL BY MYSELF* a couple of days ago.

Work is going well - high 2:1s have occurred, and my tutor accidentally told me I was good at linguistics. Diderot is turning out to be far more interesting than he at first seemed.

As for my year abroad, I am definitely going to the Centre region, hopefully to Orléans or Tours, although I wont find out where I am - city or village - for a while yet.

Plans to work at Vauxhall appear to have gone down the shitter. Alas.

*Well, one person helped slightly.

Well, as ever I have been rubbish at LJing while in Oxford, but I've finally found some time to blog a little. Or a lot, as there's quite a bit to cover; unfortunately I wont be able to go into as much depth as I'd have wanted.

Contents:
Picnic
Chinese ambassador
April 30th
Linguistics Pub Crawl
Cinema Paradiso
Age of Empires
Punting
Staying awake
AI - asylum seekers
Sushi
Headington
Eurovision
General

Picnic - This will sound more exciting when photos happen, but after our tests upon getting back, we went picnicking in a park about 5 minutes from where I live which I knew nothing about. It was good, and there were strange trees.

Chinese Ambassador - I went to see the Chinese ambassador in first week; she's more or less the only good person to come to the Union this term. She talked on whether China is a power, and it was interesting to listen to her. Obviously what she said had to be taken with a pinch of salt - she claimed that China wouldn't be a hegemon, but couldn't quite explain why - and there was one point where I knew she was lying (she claimed the Dalai Lama wanted independence for Tibet - he wants autonomy). All in all, though, I am becoming increasingly sinophilic in all ways of life. Although human rights are a serious issue, I think the level of state control has been helpful in improving the lives of the average Chinese citizen when compared with India. I particularly approve of the one child policy, which has been a significant factor in improving the lives of the Chinese; India, on the other hand, continues to have massive problems with poverty (not to mention associated issues of illiteracy, disease etc). At the end of the talk, I was given some free propaganda - a "China Encyclopedia, supervised by the State Council Information Office, P.R.C." in CDROM form. I haven't explored it in much debt yet, but it seems both informative and amusing so far.

April 30th - In Oxford, there's a tradition of staying up all night so as to go to Magdalen Tower at 6am on May 1st, whence some kind of prayer is sung and festivities ensue. I went last year and found it fairly dull, so instead we went to Port Meadow, a common meadow to the North of Oxford, where there was a bonfire and happiness. It was pretty cool - there was a guy who had a stick and firedanced with it and general amazingness. Then we went off and stayed awake til 5am for no real reason, going to bed just before the festivities that are the whole point of the day. We also drank a bottle of the mead I brewed on this day; it was delicious. There are two left now.

Linguistics Pub Crawl - As a Linguistics Society committee member, I had to organise all this. It was pretty fun, considering linguists rock.

Cinema Paradiso - As part of an Arts Festival, this was screened outdoors. If you have seen it, you will know why this is amazing; if not, go watch it. I was freezing throughout, but well worth it.

Age of Empires - My friend Kristian from Norway figured out how to make it work on my laptop. This has slightly ruined my life, and I am obsessively playing campaigns as opposed to, you know, socialising or working. Apparently the college chaplain plays, so we're considering inviting her to a multiplayer game - it would be interesting to say the least.

Punting - i.e. pushing oneself along a shallow river by means of a pole, the most counterintuitive form of river transport imaginable. But an Oxford tradition, and good fun - there were goslings, some good graffiti (I hope it comes out on my rubbish camera phone) and a pleasant pub at the end of it all. Definitely worth the effort.

Staying awake - Since May night, I couldn't really sleep at night because I'd gone to bed so late and my circadian rhythm got fucked up. Until the 10th of May I went to bed between 4 and 5:30am each night. To get my body back in order, I stayed awake through the night on the 10th. I felt fine as well, so perhaps I should do this more often...

Amnesty International: Asylum Seekers - Amnesty stuff goes on as ever. We had a really interesting workshop on Asylum seekers which got me so angry that it deserves its own post as some point, possibly on facebook. Sometimes I really can't believe this country... bring on Norway.

Sushi - My friend can make it. I can eat it. This happens frequently enough for me to be happy.

Headington - I had a fairly exciting day yesterday. I got 4 and a half hours sleep, woke up at 8:20 and went cycling to the outskirts of Oxford, where there are numerous charity shops and a SHARK, which I took photos of. We also posted a note through the letterbox thanking the creator for his shark's existence, and taping a small plastic narwhal to it in tribute. We went through loads of charity shops, whence I bought an Atlas from 1934. It's interesting looking at the pre-war, imperial years; also, I lolled at the Anglo-centricness of it. Then we went to a Chinese shop, whence I bought plum wine (mmm) and chopsticks. My friend and I simultaneously and independently had the idea of using chopsticks more often in non-Chinese settings (although I will of course use them for Chinese food). I find a knife and fork can be annoying and ineffectual; stab and slash are not very useful when consuming, for example, salad. Grabbing, however, is possible with most things. My friend also argues that they are more elegant, which is also true. After this I climbed my first tree in several weeks, which involved scooting along a branch upside down. :D Curse that tree.

Eurovision - I have never followed Eurovision before, but we had a party this time in the TV room, which was delicious and awesome. I do not understand why the UK received any points at all, nor why Ukraine received so few.

General - I am happy. This is meant to be the best term of my University life (no exams, summer, not too much work) and I think I am making the most of it. Spanish has foundered a little as I suddenly find myself lacking time to do half an hour of study a day, but I bought a Teach Yourself Norwegian book, which seems pretty good. Tonight we're celebrating the National Day of Norway with traditional Norwegian cuisine (and less traditional plum wine...) which should be fun.

Despite my best intentions, I failed at updating regularly while in Oxford... sigh... In my defence, it was a manically busy term. Here's what I was up to:

I brewed mead in my room. I found a recipe on the net and kind of had to do it... so when I get back, I'll have 3 litres of mead ready to drink. I've sampled some and it's not bad. Also, it's really easy to do, so I encourage you to experiment with brewing.

I went to see the following people speak: Romano Prodi (ex-PM of Italy), Vuk Jeremic (Serbian Foreign Minister) and Ko Aung (former political prisoner in Burma). Prodi was too quiet to hear properly, Jeremic seemed like a reasonable guy, Ko Aung is amazing.

Amnestywise, Letter Writing Week went awesomely well. Also, we had another week of action shortly after, focusing on political prisoners in Burma ( which is why Ko Aung came to speak at the Union). I'm on the committee again next term as Liaisons Officer, should be good.

Last weekend I went to a kind of Amnesty activism/training event in London, basically teaching us how to run a better group and all that. Ko Aung was there and I got to speak to him. He told me how, when he was in solitary confinement in prison, the actions people committed and the letters they sent from far flung countries really had an effect on his situation - not only did they give him hope (which is important in itself), but after receiving several hundred letters, the junta ordered the prison guards to stop torturing him. That was incredibly inspiring, seeing in the flesh somebody whose life had been changed by the simple writing of letters.

I am now learning Spanish and, Rune might be interested to know, Norwegian! Unlike former broken promises to learn Quenya/German, I will actually do these because I have audio courses. That means my lessons are structured for me, w00t! Spanish is going well, Norwegian I will only develop to a basic standard and seems alright at the moment.

Woah, I haven't updated in ages! Uni always seems to do this, and I always feel guilty for neglecting internet friends and home friends who rely on the internet to communicate with me afterwards. So here is an update!

Life at Oxford is always busy, but this term has been more so than usual. I feel like I'm doing a crazy amount of things, but I also feel I'm making better use of my time than last month. I tried sushi for the first time at a local restaurant (verdict: tasty but expensive). I also had sake and plum wine for the first time. I suppose sake is okay, but plum wine is absolutely gorgeous - like mead - so I'm hoping to find some soon. I have also decided to brew my own mead because the internet tells me this is easy - I'll go ingredient hunting tomorrow!

I also went to college live night for the first time, which is amazing. It's just people from the college playing instruments and singing, but it's amazing how talented people are; it really makes me regret not having learnt an instrument. I have received some very good music from various friends, including the Pocahontas soundtrack, some Hebrew rock and some cool post-modern shiz.

I went to a chapel service for the first time ever because my friend (and college wife) was getting baptised. It was very weird - I hadn't been to a church service since primary school. It was Anglo-Catholic, so from a sensory perspective it was nice enough - beautiful singing and candles. But during the service itself I often found myself unable to participate because I found the whole thing so ridiculous and authoritarian (as I suppose any monotheistic religion must by necessity be). I've continued watching Around the World in 80 Faiths; I think I will add Jainism to the set of religions I actually respect.

I am now on the Amnesty International Committee at Oxford and was theoretically meant to help organise Letter Writing Week, which is next week. I was so bogged down with work (one essay for Wednesday, one for today) that in reality the other Letter Writing Week Coordinator did almost all the work, but I'll contribute some more once it gets under way. It feels so good being on the committee and actually doing something good.

Spanish classes are hard. I should not have joined as a Lower Intermediate when I had never learnt Spanish before. However, my comprehension is surprisingly good due to similarities with French; my speaking is slowly getting up to scratch, I think.

I had two fancy dinners this week, which is surprising as I rarely do fancy dinners (they are quite expensive). Monday night was Scholars' Dinner, paid for by the college. All the scholars, people who got a first in their first year exams, were invited as were their tutors. It was pretty good. Then, on Tuesday, we had "Halfway Hall" - so named because it marks the halfway point of our university careers. It feels so strange that one and a half years have gone by. It was very enjoyable anyway (except I couldn't go down the bar afterwards due to my essays); here are two photos. One is of me with my Norwegian friend; we had to wear black tie, which is somewhat foolish but makes photos look nice, and we had candles, which I absolutely love.


Here is what our hall looks like:


It gets a lot of light in the daytime as it's up a flight of stairs with windows on both sides. At night, when it's a formal affair, I love the candlelight. Also, notice the hart's head (somewhat blurry) between the doors!

On the subject of halls, I'm still not entirely comfortable with being waited on. I suppose it's no different from what happens in a restaurant, really, but the socialist inside always feels uncomfortable about it.

I think that is all for now, really. I'll end with something that really amused me. I have to go to Jesus college for tutorials this term. This is one of their toilets:


Yes. That is a fireplace. That is an armchair. That is a table, what looks like a footrest, and two more chairs. Madness! Only in Oxford...

I made this card to send to a prisoner of conscience for Amnesty International today. Well, actually, two prisoners of conscience in China, a married couple, one of whom is in prison and the other, with her infant daughter, under house arrest.

It's not brilliant because I'm not terribly artistic, but I do creative stuff like this so infrequently I thought I may as well share it.

In 2006, 153 countries of the UN voted in support of the creation of an Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) to curb the irresponsible trade and transfer of weapons and ammunition. This would prevent weapons reaching the hands of terrorists, insurgents and human rights abusers. Only one contemptible government voted against - that of the United States of America.

In the words of Barbara Stocking, Director of Oxfam, "No one but a criminal would knowingly sell a gun to a murderer, yet governments can sell weapons to regimes with a history of human rights violations or to countries where weapons will go to war criminals." That is what the ATT will seek to bring to an end.

The ATT is due to be debated again at the United Nations General Assembly in October 2008, i.e next month. At this meeting, we need governments to commit to start formal negotiations for the ATT and for them to ensure that it is delivered within the shortest possible time frame necessary to help bring an end the current arms crisis. 1000 people a day die as a result of armed violence caused by small arms alone (speaking of which, the UN also approved a draft on the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons in all its aspects by a vote of 172 in favour to 1 against (United States), with no abstentions. The US really makes my blood boil... "Why do they hate us?").

Organisations such as Amnesty and Oxfam believe it is imperative that the ATT does not slip off the international agenda. If it goes ahead successfully we could see an internationally regulated arms trade, greatly reducing the potential for mass human rights abuses such as genocide and deplacement.

Please take five minutes of your time to take action. If you're from the UK, email David Miliband: http://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=480

Join the Facebook Group (actually a "supporter" thing), wherever you're from: http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Control-Arms/12082541987

More details on the ATT: http://www.controlarms.org/en

And, most importantly, spread the message!

Thanks guys.


PS: The UK government has actually been central to the ATT. In December 2006, the UK and 6 other countries (Australia, Argentina, Costa Rica, Finland, Kenya and Japan) introduced a UN Resolution calling for work towards a global ATT. This is the first thing to make me proud to be British in a good long time.

PPS: In unrelated Amnesty news, Argentina has abolished the death penalty! 137 countries now which have abolished it in law or practice.

I've almost finished reading La Peste for the second time, and like the first time, I feel really inspired. I feel I understand what Camus was saying, and the difference between him and Sartre, much better now - largely thanks to a random book attacking atheism which I found and flicked through in a bookshop. Sartre holds the view that man can, in some way, replace God. That's the classic humanism/communism which I adhered to a couple of years ago.

Camus, on the other hand, doesn't try to replace God. His view is a lot more pessimistic - that we can never build up a utopia. I came to agree with this pessimistic view a while back, and I kind of let it get to me in that, despite holding my beliefs, I never did anything about them. The characters in La Peste are inspiring because, despite acknowledging their smallness in the world, they never stop trying to improve it in their own small way. The carry on even though they know that ultimately, what they achieve is going to be tiny, and then we're all going to die anyway.

That is exactly the kind of inspiration I needed to get off my arse. Last year, at sixth form, I pretty much single-handedly ran the Amnesty International Club (3 members...) but I decided against joining at uni because I didn't agree with their view on the death penalty (and am still unable to decide. It's a difficult question, and I think ultimately it's more rational to support it, and more humane not to. As some Frenchy once said, there are two great errors one can commit in thinking: relying too much, or too little, on reason. I can't decide where this one falls). I've realised now how silly that was - even if I do disagree with one aspect of what they aim for, I agree with all the rest. I also stopped because I felt that I couldn't make a difference - but of course I can. It's just a tiny, tiny one in the grand scheme of things. You have to be happy to save people one at a time - you can't save them all at once.

One of Gandhi's more famous quotes is "you must be the change you wish to see in the world," which resonates nicely with La Peste. Another example of my own complacency and despondency in the face of the world is the use of plastic bags. So many millions are being used, I felt I couldn't make a difference. All it took to change my mind a few months ago was going shopping with Mike (friend at Oxford), and seeing that he took his own bags. He didn't say anything about it, or tell me to change my evil ways. But seeing him, I realised that the change I wanted to see couldn't come about if I didn't participate - a revelation that I suppose I'm generalizing now - and started declining bags at supermarkets.

I suppose the worst thing I've done (from my point of view) is give up on the whole socialism thing. It's sad that, of the handful of organisations surviving on the far left, almost all are weird, Marxist-Leninist commies. That kind of thinking just doesn't apply any more, I think, so I was put off. But I can be anti-corporate without belonging to a formal group. Corporations do hideous things in the world, and we learn to ignore them because of the low prices and also because those being oppressed are out of sight, out of mind (not to mention out-groups...) And even though a one man boycott wont bring down Primark, it will make a slight - ever so slight - dent in their profits, and possibly set a precedent.

So there we go. I'll take things one at a time - it's difficult to maintain resolutions if you take too many on at once. I already don't use plastic bags, this term I'll join Amnesty, over summer I'll implement my boycotts and next year, if I find a good group, I'll join some leftist organisation. It's all down in writing, so I can't go back on it.

How fitting that this should happen at the beginning of Spring.

You may remember that I won this CD (actually 2 CDs) recently from Amnesty International, as long as I posted a review about it on my blog. So here it is.

I should first of all mention that all the songs on this CD are covers by different bands of John Lennon's songs. Unfortunately, I don't know much of John Lennon's discography outside of the Beatles, so this review considers the songs as songs in their own right, not covers.

Overall, I think this was quite a good album, with moments of brilliance. The whole album seems to have undercurrents of hippyness and humanism, which I relate to. It makes me regret missing the 60s and 70s really; it's too late to be a hippy these days...

There were several big names on this CD, some that I approved of (U2, REM, Aerosmith), some that I didn't (Christina Aguilera, Corinne Bailey Rae, Black Eye Peas) as well as a few bands I'd only vaguely heard of (Postal Service, Youssou N'Dour) and some artists I didn't know of at all (Regina Spektor, Big & Rich).

The big names definitely did not disappoint. Instant Karma by U2 and #9 Dream by REM were both great to listen to, and Snow Patrol's Isolation was haunting. Aerosmith's Give Peace A Chance featured Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars, which I thing was a brilliant touch politically and for the song. Their chorus was incredibly cheery and lovely to listen to, making the song one of my favourites. Politically, these kind of music-politics mergers are often criticized for not having many African artists, so it was good to involve the All Stars as well as Youssou N'Dour (who you may remember from Live 8).

Green Day's cover of Working Class Hero was truly spectacular; not only a powerful song, but also a strong message about class that reverberates even stronger in today's society. In fact, among the big names, only The Cure's cover of love disappointed me slightly for being a little dull.

A pleasant surprise for me was that not all the artists I dislike were actually that bad. Black Eyed Pea's power to the people was okay, and Corinne Bailey Rae's I'm Losing You was, well, different but not terrible. Only Christina Aguilera's screechy rendition of Mother made me wish to skip tracks.

Perhaps the best part of the CD was that most of the artists I hadn't heard of were fantastic. For instance, Lenny Kravitz's Cold Turkey is simple but powerful, and his voice really fits the song.

One of the criticisms of the album is that there are multiple versions of some songs. There are 3 Instant Karmas, 2 Imagines and 2 #9 Dreams. However, I found it quite nice to get a few different versions of each song; only Duran Duran's version of Instant Karma seemed a bit excessive and pointless. Tokio Hotel, meanwhile, managed to introduce heavier guitars to Instant Karma, which I found wonderful.

Imagine by Avril Lavigne was a little high-pitched for me, but John Jackson's version more than made up for this. His voice was perfect for the song, and it not only made my skin tingle, but also almost made me cry thinking about the contrast between the words and humanity today - particularly Darfur. That song was the highlight of the album for me.

Overall, the album is very hearable. A few let downs - Christina Aguilera should not have been involved, and Regina Spektor finishes with a sickeningly Disney-like cover of Real Love - are much more than made up for by the assortment of good tracks, and the several outstanding songs that you can't help but love. And, of course, proceeds go to ending the suffering in Darfur, so it's good for your Karma too.

Firstly, I won an Amnesty International competition recently and got a free CD - Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. I was obviously very glad about this. :D The only condition is that I blog a review about it, so I'll be getting that to you guys some time in the near future. This has also given me a chance to use my spiffy Amnesty avatar - I've been shamefully neglectful of Amnesty recently.

In other news, Oxford sent me a letter today, which is cool because I haven't had any news from them for ages. It's full of official looking forms which I should probably see to soon...

Went jobhunting once again today, and plan to go again tomorrow. It felt so good to get out of the house and see people, especially since I met quite a few people I hadn't planned on meeting, like my grandma's cousin's granddaughter. :D I am really very bad at being introverted. While in town I also indulged my nerdier side and bought 4 history books (99p each at the works - hardbacks! incredible) about world war 1, world war 2 in Europe, Vietnam and Palestine. They have lots of detailed maps too.

EDIT: Ooh, I also got a German grammar guide from the library, so prepare for my sentences to become logical, Germandowners!

So, the combination of a free CD, being vaguely altruistic, cheap history books, getting out the house, meeting friends and sunny weather make me very happy. :D