Well, consequence of sheer peer pressure, I will now rectify the tone of my last - rather gloomy - post and sing this, which I borrow from Bob Marley:

« Singin: Don’t worry about a thing,
Cause every little thing gonna be all right! »

And

« Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Have no fear for atomic energy,
cause none of them can stop the time. »

« Tout le monde il est beau, tout le monde il est gentil. »
Jean Yanne

I am sitting in a Yaletown coffee shop. Today, I went to see Sharkwater. I had to, of course. The movie had been calling me ever since I’d heard about it. I’m not sure what exactly I had expected it to be. Another documentary with extraordinary images; a trip down the memory lane; a politically correct version of Deep Sea 3D; a few well spent dollars. I had assumed I’d walk out of the theatre with a grin on my face and a renewed urge to dive, with maybe a glimpse of a tear in my eye for all the wonderful memories awakened.

Instead I was morose. I felt sad and depressed. I looked around me with tired eyes as I walked back across town. Reality was trying to get a grip on me, and part of me wanted to let it. But deep inside I knew that right there and then, I had my back against a wall. It wouldn’t last, of course; our worse doubts and problems are self-soothing. We excel at healing our own suffering by avoiding to face the facts and submerging into the matrix-like mesh of the world constructed around us in order for people to function and contribute to the global momentum.

For the moment, however, I stood on the edge of a sharp precipice with a granite wall behind me and nowhere to go but down. The movie had opened a door into a reality that seldom irrupts into our artificial life. It documented the fact that as a species, we might be technologically advanced but we are the dumbest thing to ever walk the face of the Earth. It reminded me that the human race is frantically working towards its own extinction.

And here I am, drinking coffee and attempting to sort out my thoughts and feelings by writing them away.

The girl across from me, curled up on her chair, is speaking in Serbo-Croatian to a distant friend on the phone. Her smile is warm and tolerant. Later, she points a finger at the Google Maps on my screen and says: « There. » Bosnia. « But, » she adds, « I am Serbian. I just happened to be born in Bosnia. Are you familiar with the war? » « A little... » I say, uneasily. How does one admit not to know much about another’s painful reality, about distant wars fought beyond the horizon of our willing vision of the world?

It sometimes seems the only way to make our lives bearable is to ignore the carnage going on around us. So as I walked out of the cinema today, I was once again faced with a difficult decision: let the feelings brought by the movie fade away slowly as do all things painful, or keep them in focus and be forced to act upon them. As I contemplated my options, I came up with four alternatives which seem to apply to all areas of our lives.

One, we can choose not to believe the wake up calls, the warnings and the bad news. We can decide that facts are being exaggerated, that global warming isn’t as big a deal as it is painted to be, that wars are isolated incidents and that overall, our world is safe and in no immediate danger. It sure makes sense, after all, since what we seek is happiness and no worries.

Two, we can understand that the threat is real, but on a remote level that remains out of our reach and control, and decide to willingly ignore it because worrying will not make it easier to live with. That ostrich-like attitude might be hard to justify but in the end, sticking our head in the sand and pretending that nothing’s wrong or that we can’t do anything about what is, could be the only way to achieve inner peace in a world where everything seems to be leading towards chaos. It would be like trying to make the world a better place from the inside.

Three, and that’s the trendy way these days, we can become aware of the growing problem and decide to incorporate it in our daily lives, to tame it and turn it into a manageable thing. It cannot become overwhelming because that would threaten our so-important quality of life, so we cut it up into small isolated pieces and do a little here and there for the planet and for the cause. We learn to recycle, we eat organic food, we donate a few dollars to an environment-related cause and hope to be able to deduct it from our taxes. Everybody is happy, it’s a feel-good way of life, we will save the world by compounding millions of tiny efforts. The ostrich is still there.

And four, we can let reality hit us in the face. It hurts. It’s scary. It forces us to re-evaluate our entire paradigm. It’s a huge plunge to take, one from which there is no going back. It means total commitment to the cause, it means immense sacrifices, it means leaving a lot behind. It means accepting that, less we do something radical about it and do it now, we, as a species, are doomed.

But is it really that bad? Yes it is. The only weapon we have to fight our battle right now, is hope. Hope and the efforts of a few individuals and organizations who are bravely opposing the rest of the world and attempting to reverse the final countdown. But the fact is that hope alone is not enough. We are not winning the battle. We are only sometimes slowing down the rate at which we loose. Small victories are won, of course, isolated moments of triumph for the few who believe in saving the environment, and thus, ourselves.

But in the end, for every battle won, a thousand new threats arise. And in no area of the global madness that is pushing mankind to furiously consume its planet without consideration for the consequences, can we account for any real improvement. No reef anywhere is actually thriving or growing. No threatened or endangered animal species can be said to be recovering unless that recovery has been artificially crafted by causing an imbalance somewhere else. The ozone layer is not regenerating itself. Forests are not regaining space unto urbanized areas. Fossil fuels are not burning any less then they have been. Pollution of the ocean hasn’t been controlled nor has it decreased.

So it would be fantastic if people like Rod Stewart and Paul Watson could put an end to shark fining, or even reduce it somehow, since sharks are so important to the marine ecosystem which in turn supports life on Earth, including our own. But it seems that while they are battling to do so, others are coming up every day with new and improved ways to abuse our world and the rate at which that abuse increases is infinitely superior to the rate of our small victories.

So what do I do? Shall I keep on recycling my plastic containers, favoring public transit, writing my letters on recycled paper, drinking fair trade coffee, and telling people to go see Sharkwater because it’s really good? Maybe. Yet sometimes it feels like unless I join the battle and go stand between a whalers’ harpoon and the whale, I will never be able to sleep in peace. But I don’t think that peaceful sleep is one of the benefits of joining such a fight. What a dark and gloomy perspective, fighting a battle that seems lost in advance against a race that has obviously forgotten everything about self-preservation. What a sad life to live, when everyday you are reminded of the stupidity and the greed that control our world. What a lonely place to be, where you stand guard with only a few braves against millions of ignorant fools.

Some days the sand in my eyes and mouth becomes unbearable. How can ostriches do it? A lot of practice, I guess. Ignorance is indeed bliss.

« We’re nothing but a bunch of primates out of control »
Captain Paul Watson, Sea Shepherd.

My good old « HAL the pal » has finally retired, after a long and distinguished career. In comes « SAL the gal », because I’ve decided that computers should definitely have feminine names (don’t get me to explain why!) For those wonderful curious minds out there, my HAL was of course named after Arthur C. Clark’s original HAL 9000 (Heuristically programmed ALgorithm computer); SAL is my own acronym and stands for Superpowerful And Lightweight computer. She’s got 2 Gigs of RAM, a Core 2 Duo processor, burns double-layer DVDs for breakfast and is happily running under the whip of the new Windows Vista OS, which as any new Windows release is totally full of bugs. And I happen to hate ticks. But armed with patience, I will prevail.

It should be noted that by advancing each letter in HAL by one, we get IBM, a coincidence that was duly noted by many but never confirmed by the author. So in the same fashion, I’ve designed SAL so that by adding a letter to each, we get TBM, short for Transferable Belief Model. The TBM is a mathematical model tackling the laws of probability with the support of the open-world assumption which advances that, as the Wikipedia puts it, « When tossing a coin one usually assumes that Head or Tail will occur. The open-world assumption is that the coin can be stolen in mid-air, disappear, break apart or otherwise fall sideways so that neither Head nor Tail occurs. » A great example of maths morphing into philosophy.

Ha!

Now, I will leave you all with a little quiz. Here is a photo; can you guess what it represents?

Ok, that wasn’t so hard, it’s a giraffe. Right, but where was is taken from, a tower, a mountain? Noooo. It was shot from... Space. You’re looking at a giraffe seen by a satellite looking down at the Vincennes Zoo in Paris. The actual animal is the thin bottom line and what you are seeing is its shadow. Don’t believe me? Here’s the original Google Maps view. Zoom out to see Paris. How cool is that? Now for sure, Martians know we have giraffes. It must have radically changed their idea of the blue planet and I believe they designed the Tripods to resemble the animal...

The rainy season has been painfully long and persistent this year. Nerves are raw and moral is low. There is, however, usually a good side to all bad things. In this case, it’s the amazing lushness of our forests. On my last two outings to Lynn Canyon Park, the paths were covered with moss and for a change, the thundering nearby river lost the focus of both my attention and camera...

Vancouver is the 3rd largest Canadian city. All right. That being said, it also in many ways feels like little more then a large village. With an extremely dense downtown core such as ours, everything one could possibly need happens to be so close it’s almost too easy. So on a rather quiet night, I sat down in front of my very sick computer and with invaluable help from the Gmaps Pedometer, I decided to plot a set of straight-line distances from home. Here are the results. It’s quite impressive when you look at it from a global perspective. Ours is such a small world, and this city makes it feel even smaller. In a good way.

Nearest:
Coffee shop: 0.2 km
Grocery store: 0.2 km
Fresh bread: 0.2 km
Bank machine: 0.2 km
Drugstore: 0.2 km
Bus stop: 0.2 km
Liquor store: 0.2 km
Corner store: 0.2 km
Pub: 0.3 km
Ethnic food: 0.4 km
Decent bakery (for morning croissants, a must): 0.6 km
Totem pole (not so often used by me but dogs like them): 2.1 km
Stadium (Go Canucks!): 2.2 km
Train station: 3.3 km
Marina: 1.1 km

Nearest (geography):
Summit above 1100 m: 11 km
Summit above 1600 m: 19 km
Island: 13 km
Snow (winter time): 11 km
Coastal mountain fjord: 15 km
Volcano (active): 110 km
Country: 76 km

Distance to various places:
Waterfront/beach: 130 m
Stanley Park: 0.9 km
Aquatic Center: 0.9 km
Granville Island Market: 1.4 km
False Creek Ferries landing: 0.9 km
Paramount Cinemas: 1.2 km
Cruise ship terminal/Imax: 2 km
Public library (main branch): 1.9 km
Chapters bookstore: 1.5 km
Art Gallery: 1.5 km
Museum of Anthropology: 8.5 km
Maritime Museum: 0.8 km
Science Center/planetarium: 0.9 km
Costco: 2.4 km
Future Shop: 1.6 km
Best Buy: 2.8 km
Work: 2.1 km
Chinatown: 3 km
Seabus terminal: 2.3 km
Lions Gate Bridge: 3.2 km

A Little further out:
Cypress Mountain: 13 km
Grouse Mountain: 10 km
Seymour Mountain: 16 km
Lynn Canyon Park/suspension bridge: 10 km

Closest sighting (in the wild):
Bald eagle: 1.4 km
White swan: 1.3 km
Sea lion: 5.6 km
Harbour seal (mother and cub): 1.5 km
Harbour seal colony: 25 km
Bear: 11 km
Deer: 11 km
Killer whale pod: 59 km
Raccoon: 200 m
Skunk: way too close

Estimated number of coffee shops within 10 km radius: 100+
Number of bridges within 20 km radius: 15+
Distance to fireworks competition barge (summer): 1.5 km
Distance to uninterrupted 30 km biking/running/roller blading/walking waterfront path: 130 m

Chamonix: 8389 km
Sea of Tranquility: 384400 km

And finally, since distances are relative and subject to interpretation, here’s a cool anecdote, food for thoughts. I was once flying over the Caribbean on a commercial plane, probably from St. Lucia to Miami. At some point during the flight, the Captain came on the PA system to do his usual announcement about the flight. He began as per the usual routine by mentioning that we were established at our cruising altitude, something close to 30,000 feet. Then he stunned everybody by adding:

« We are presently overflying the Porto Rico Trench, deepest zone in the Caribbean Sea. Try to imagine, if you can, that there is as much distance between the aircraft you’re sitting in and the ocean’s surface, as there is between that surface and the bottom... » I just wanted to cheer for him. What a mesmerizing concept. My coffee shop is indeed so close to home...

It was April 1993. I think I wrote:

I am in Bangkok at night having dinner with a group of Germans in a restaurant serving sauerkraut, driven around by a chauffeur in a luxurious car, and going back to sleep in a fancy tower, with this girl I’m not sure to really know after all, in a bed surrounded by African sculptures. The evening flows by slowly without letting me get a grip on it. I can’t clearly grasp where I am or why. Thailand has moved back to a remote corner of my conscience and I am absent-mindedly watching my own skid off of reality...

A few nights ago, these words came back to my mind, Vancouver having simply replaced Bangkok. Some things have changed. Some remain. Bis repetita placent. Always. Life is a long slide sideways. In the end, accepting that I am perpetually out of control might be the only empowering solution.

 [Written and posted via my IPaq and Wi-Fi.]

My computer HAL says that it’s just picked up a fault in the AE35 unit. It’s going to go 100% failure in 72 hours. That means the blog is going to be rather silent for a while. I’ll be forced to rely less on HAL and to explore a different space. I hope it’ll be full of stars.

On a dull, bleak winter day, West Vancouver’s Lighthouse Park is quiet and the trails leading to Point Atkinson are almost empty. Once standing on the rocks by the ocean, at the very edge of the park, the city is forgotten as the entrance to Howe Sound reveals itself, dotted with islands and lined with snow-capped mountains. It’s a world that seems to belong to the eagles circling overhead.

It could be said that tourism is based on a combination of factors such as efficient advertising, convenient transportation, a hospitality infrastructure, local attractions, interesting geography and contrasting cultures. The higher these factors are rated, the better our potential as a tourist venue or destination. The product is then supported by outgoing, friendly and knowledgeable staff – thus actually fitting tourism in the service industry – and we usually leave it at that, without looking any deeper into the equation.

Were we to do so, and had we addressed the issue with a curious mind, we’d come to realize that the above definition of tourism is only its official public label, the Cartesian envelope allowing us to approach it as any other business, looking at facts, crunching numbers, analyzing attendance and computing revenue.

The true nature of tourism, however, remains hidden until we are willing to remember the fact that we are all tourists in our own time, and begin looking inside of ourselves to find out exactly what our visits and travels bring us that is so important we’ll spend those formidable amounts of money and time getting it. Yet the answer is simple: we are seeking and collecting memories. Suddenly, tourism emerges as the trade of emotions….

Strangely enough, that facet of our industry is rarely acknowledged, as if we resisted relinquishing control of a vacation to our weak emotional side. Whether we are in the visitor’s role or in the host’s, we tend to quantify our tourism in practical terms such as duration, cost, distance, luxury, services, accessibility, informational value, organization, signage, language, health, currency and so on. There are also the slightly less practical criteria of beauty, architecture, nature, urbanism, culture, festivals, celebrations. But in the end, every single point above serves only one purpose: it will, to a certain degree, contribute to forging memories that will last a lifetime.

Successful tourism would then be one that creates the longer lasting, most vivid memories, which in turn generate word of mouth, return business, flowing ink and melancholy. From a tourism point of view, the most successful trip is one we come back from only to feel nostalgic and have difficulty readjusting to daily routine. The more emotions are experienced during a vacation, the more money will be spent and the more likely we are to want to stay longer or come back again.

These emotions might be linked to breathtaking scenery, heart-warming welcome, exciting adventures, romantic dinners, cultural shock, a better understanding of our world, helping the poor and needy, fantasy-like luxury, impeccable service, chance encounters, remarkable weather, pristine waters and warm sandy beaches, nature at its wildest and urbanism at its craziest… Either way, they define a trip, solidifying the huge expectations placed on a vacation and justifying the tremendous associated expenses. The memories should last forever, serving their purpose long after the event has taken place.

So from an industry angle, the challenge seems simple: the more of these emotions we provide, the better our destination becomes.  To achieve this, a little adjustment might be necessary in the way we traditionally look at our tourism business. Focus might have to shift slightly from facts to perception. For example, the most extraordinary wilderness area serviced by rare grumpy rangers and lacking informative displays might not generate the same intense memories as would a less stunning area staffed by friendly people who make visitors feel like they are privileged for being there, can contribute to the protection of the site and will be part of the few who made it « this far » or « this high ». Similarly, the shear luxury of an expensive 5 star hotel staffed by invisible employees who, when they finally appear, make sure you understand that your tipping was not up to standards, probably won’t trigger the same emotions as a mid-range establishment where you felt welcome and were treated like family, with respect, discretion and complicity.

It turns out it’s not about the facts – number of stars, seating capacity, price range, size, duration, cost, etc., it’s about the way these will be presented, and perceived. It’s not about the shear beauty of scenery, it’s about how that beauty integrates with the human experience.

Because in the end, the response is not financial or factual, it’s psychological.

Tourism is an emotional industry. We should be selling memories, not tickets.