BAM.  I have clawed my way back into my website.  I don’t remember how to do anything.

Goals for the summer:

1) Redo my resume in LaTeX, which should make it easier to have the display/download version in synch

2) Update my research page so that it actually shows things that I’ve done.

And some other stuff.

No, it’s the most populous city in Rondônia, which is just a few degrees away from the middle.  The city is actually growing on me.  I was here in the fall by myself, and went almost nowhere beyond the few main streets for fear of being assaulted and robbed.  This had recently happened to me in Rio, to be fair, so it was on my mind.

This time I am staying with my friends Tatiane and Paulo, who work at SIPAM (the Amazon Protection System) and who have lent me a hand making contacts and getting my research set up.  I was fortunate to be able to do them a small favor bringing some small electronics over from the US and helping them beat Brazil’s incredible electronics tariffs.  A baby monitor I purchased for them for $100 on Amazon.com would have cost around $R2000 ($US1700) in the real Amazon.

(note – I am uploading lower quality images for now to make the best of my little Amazon connection)

My only regret is not realizing Tati was pregnant, and not bringing colorful toys whose boxes the new baby could play with.  Tati mailed me and I thought she said she would not be able to make our trip to Ji-Paraná because her doctor wouldn’t allow it as she had been sick for 7 months.  She actually said she had been pregnant for 7 months and I should have consulted my dictionary.

I’ve been making contact with local government and rural associations, looking for lists of rural producers and for a better understanding about the kinds of information available here in Rondônia for agricultural actors to make their decisions.  I tried endlessly while in Ann Arbor via email to get in touch with people here, but paradoxically Brazilians seem to prefer that you barge in on them unannounced than that you plan ahead.  So I’ve been making better progress here, and coming a little bit out of my academic shell to talk to people.

Today we took the day off to see some of the history around Porto Velho.  One of the big draws here is the abandoned Madeira-Mamoré Railway, one of the last steam lines in Brazil and the only one in the Amazon.  Here the track disappears into the forest, near the Santo Antônio Waterfall.

The line near Porto Velho is littered with abandoned locomotives.  All in all the building of this railroad around the turn of the 20th century cost more than 6000 lives, many of them foreigners from the US, England, Europe, China, and the Carribbean.

The house below was built around the time the tracks were first being laid, and is a part of the early history of Porto Velho.  In the distance you can make out the Santo Antônio waterfall (yes, it’s the little trickle there by the rocks – keep in mind this is the middle of the dry season) and the city of Porto Velho.

The really tragic thing is that this whole area will soon be submerged within the reservoir of the Santo Antônio dam, whose construction is set to begin in August.  This dam is one of two that will be constructed over the coming years, to be followed by two more upstream along the Madeira River (which will certainly diminish the potential of the original two).  Making the whole project further obscene, most of the energy is to be sent to the south of Brazil, with incredible losses along the way, and will benefit little the local economy (which has little industry to speak of).  I am probably among the last foreign visitors to this site, so I thought I would post a few pictures for you all to see.  For those with deeper interest, visit the the Madeira-Mamoré Railway Society site to learn more.

And I’ll end with a shot of bees eating fish.

Thida and I just had the best vegan meal we have ever had:

deep fried shrimp with shrimp sauce, bbq buffalo wings and asian dumplings to start, followed by caribbean jerk chicken.

No longer does vegetarian food have to look like just oatmeal or a garden. Red Bamboo is 2 blocks from West 4th st. subway station (140 W 4th St.) and has a complete menu of soy- and gluten-meat dishes. We had drinks, 3 appetizers and an entree (which we didn’t have room for) for 48 dollars after tip.

Good deal.

I got a spam comment added to my last post, so I know at least something is noticing my blog.

I’m struggling with the anxiety I’m sure all other PhD students feel as they see all of their peers publishing work.  I haven’t published anything but a book review since I got my master’s work into a journal.

I have a few short papers I built out of simple systems dynamics models of small basins, and I got some interesting results.  I’ve been sitting on them now for months and months though, because:

1. I’m not sure whether it’s better to invest my time in purely dissertation-related work, or whether it’s better to pad my CV with other publications that don’t tie in as closely, and
2. I don’t know whether piddly little papers help or damage your credibility as a researcher.

If you aren’t a grad student, your eyes have probably glazed over at my non-dilemma.  I know.  I’ve been told that things are so difficult for academics only because there is so little at stake.

I think the way out of this is to put a little time into the two results I think are the best, submit them, and then aggressively cite them as much as I can to make them appear really significant.  A point of pride, and at the same time a point of shame, for academia is that you can create your own relevance.

I’d like to use this blog to talk about research, but also a few other things that are important to me.

One of them is cycling. I used to do a lot of it, and had a lot of fun touring around Japan by myself. The following is a self-indulgent post about cycling and why I can’t do much of it right now.

Solo touring is exciting, and Japan is a great place to do it. Great roads, great hills, food and water never more than a half hour’s ride away, and the security to camp out just about anywhere. The first few hours of the day are always the best; the evenings and the rainy days riding into towns where you don’t know anyone are the only lows, but I miss them too.

I haven’t done any real cycling since August 4, 2003. I was leading a team called BEE Japan from the northern tip of Hokkaido through to the southern tip of Kyushu when something went in my knee. I was being a fool, trying to keep our team from falling behind by hauling the heaviest of the gear and pushing long days. One evening I just felt a blast in my knee and could barely walk for weeks. I had to leave the tour and attend the rest of our events by train and bus.

That was 5 years ago and I still haven’t figured out what happened or how to fix it. A lot of my problem is symptomatic of ITBS (Iliotibial Band Syndrome), where the IT band gets inflamed by the repeated rubbing over the knee during the pumping cycle. It isn’t supposed to be too debilitating, but I’ve tried almost everything I’ve read about and never fixed it. I train my abductors and adductors, I cross-train, I stretch the IT band, and I’ve tried my seat at every height I can think of. I still have a hard cap of 15 or 20 miles, and if I overdo it I’m unable to walk for days.

It really sucks and it makes me feel like a fraud among other cyclists. But I’m still trying. I’ve got the goal of going back to ride BEE 2010 in the summer I defend my dissertation, before the real world starts for me, and I want to really focus on finding a fix over the coming months. I’m going to try deep-tissue massage this week, if I get the chance, and I’ve heard people talk about active-release therapy (ART) like it’s a cult. So we shall see.

Anyone else that has figured this problem out, I welcome your input. And hopefully I will have some successes to report as the months progress.

End self-indulgent post. Though really, isn’t that what blogs really are?

I don’t really have time yet for a really thoughtful post. But I wanted to pass along this video.

We’ve all seen the inspirational Obama speeches, but this one is cute. It endeared him to me more than any of the other material I’ve seen. I’m using it to argue to Thida that we need to wait til the girls are ready to get a dog. I don’t do anything Obama doesn’t do.

Obama’s getting a dog

It is, I swear it.  First I’m going to learn how to use WordPress.  Shortly following, I will start thinking of wicked smart things to say.  I’m also going to find other like-minded bloggers and share ideas all the time.  It’ll be awesome.