Back to a different Oxford

I spent most of last week in The Netherlands doing some research for my next book and writing articles for Gadling. I had a great time and managed to see the grand opening of the Amsterdam branch of the Hermitage. I'll be posting more articles on Gadling next week, including a feature on Delft and one on Dutch castles.

Now I'm back in Oxford, but it's not the same as when I left. Two weeks ago the students were in the throes of exams. Now they're finished and most have left, to be replaced by ever-increasing hordes of tourists. I'll miss not having the students around; they are a big part of the atmosphere in any university town, and now that term has ended there will be fewer functions at the university. The best lecture I saw was by archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson about his Stonehenge Riverside Project. There won't be any more of those until September. Now I'll have to deal with big crowds of people walking agonizingly slowly through the center of town.

So far it hasn't been so bad. I suspect the economic downturn has slowed things down. Amsterdam had noticeably fewer people than when I last visited, and my traveling companion who was there last November said it was even slower than before, strange considering he was last there in winter and now it's summer. Maybe bad economic times will give me some respite from the tourist hordes this summer.

Support Your Local Bookstore This Christmas!

A message from the Author's Guild.

I've been talking to booksellers lately who report that times are hard. And local booksellers aren't known for vast reserves of capital, so a serious dip in sales can be devastating. Booksellers don't lose enough money, however, to receive congressional attention. A government bailout isn't in the cards.

We don't want bookstores to die. Authors need them, and so do neighborhoods. So let's mount a book-buying splurge. Get your friends together, go to your local bookstore and have a book-buying party. Buy the rest of your Christmas presents, but that's just for starters. Clear out the mysteries, wrap up the histories, beam up the science fiction! Round up the westerns, go crazy for self-help, say yes to the university press books! Get a load of those coffee-table books, fatten up on slim volumes of verse, and take a chance on romance!

There will be birthdays in the next twelve months; books keep well; they're easy to wrap: buy those books now. Buy replacements for any books looking raggedy on your shelves. Stockpile children's books as gifts for friends who look like they may eventually give birth. Hold off on the flat-screen TV and the GPS (they'll be cheaper after Christmas) and buy many, many books. Then tell the grateful booksellers, who by this time will be hanging onto your legs begging you to stay and live with their cat in the stockroom: "Got to move on, folks. Got some books to write now. You see...we're the Authors Guild."

Enjoy the holidays.

Roy Blount Jr.

President

Authors Guild

The Guild's staff informs me that many of you are writing to ask whether you can forward and post my holiday message encouraging orgiastic book-buying. Yes! Forward! Yes! Post! Sound the clarion call to every corner of the Internet: Hang in there, bookstores! We're coming! And we're coming to buy! To buy what? To buy books! Gimme a B! B! Gimme an O! O! Gimme another O! Another O! Gimme a K! K! Gimme an S! F! No, not an F, an S. We're spelling BOOKS!

Yours,

Roy

War On The Poor, Madrid Style

Our beloved mayor has just announced that he's banning sandwich boards. You know, those old-style boards strapped to people's fronts and backs, making a walking advertisement for a restaurant or nightclub. There aren't very many of those guys in Madrid, but apparantly the rich who run the city don't want them around. They also want to ban the people who stand on sidewalks handing out fliers for English courses, computer repair, all-you-can-eat lunch buffets, etc.

Why? These people don't bother me, and I've never heard anyone complaining about them. These are terrible jobs that pay crap, and the people who do them obviously have no other choice. Many are immigrants who are probably doing this to get grocery money until something better comes along. Why persecute people for being poor and powerless? Aren't there more important issues facing madrileños such as domestic violence, pollution, and traffic congestion? Why doesn't the mayor tackle those?

Oh wait, silly me. Because solving those problems costs money. He might have to raise taxes on the rich or something.

Some things are the same the world over.

Computer Woes

While I was in the U.S. for the past few weeks I considered buying a new laptop since they're so much cheaper over there. I decided against it because my Inspiron 1100, which has been giving good service for almost five years, showed no signs of slowing down and therefore I couldn't justify the expense. The day after getting back to Madrid it started to die on me! Luckily my wife has lent me her old work laptop that she doesn't use anymore, but the timing is really annoying.

The problem seems to be overheating. Even when it's not running hot it will shut off, saying the system was getting too hot to remain safe for the components. It's lasted so long I guess it doesn't really owe me anything, but as a writer I need my computer.

Buying a laptop here is out of the question. Like many consumer items, computers are far more expensive in Europe than in the U.S., for no real logic I care to follow. Prices are even higher in England. Buying one over the Internet and having it shipped here won't work either, because the import duty will simply jack up the price. Looks like I'll just have to make do with what I can scrounge until I get back to the States. I'll try to get it fixed, but being so old I can't see it being worth much of an expense. If cleaning out the fan (which seems to be working properly) doesn't solve the problem, then it's goodbye old friend. . .

International Year of Sanitation

If you've been reading my blog for a while you know I'm planning a big trip to Ethiopia, although I won't be able to go for more than a year since we're researching in Oxford for most of 2009. I always keep a close eye on East African news to learn a bit before I go, and I came across a depressing article in BBC's Focus on Africa Magazine about the main river in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, having become an open sewer. The reporter interviewed a family living in the slum right next to the sewer/river, who have to haul water from a pipe a kilometer away. While their drinking water may (or may not) be clean, they still have to deal with the stench.

This is all too common in the developing world, and "First World" water is none too clean what with all the chemicals in our water table. In Varanasi I saw people bathing in the Ganges not a hundred meters downriver from where bodies were being burned. In Nepal I saw hillsides covered in human filth, with pigs rooting around in it and the village water supply flowing nearby.

That's why the UN declared 2008 to be the International Year of Sanitation. No, I didn't know that until today either. Basically they want to teach people how to keep their water sources clean. Not a bad idea, but a little leveling out of wealth might help too. How about fewer wars and more water treatment plants? Or fewer billionaires and more jobs with living wages? Nah, no government would ever go for that.

Gas Protests and Food Shortages in Madrid

We are now in the second day of a strike by truck drivers here in Spain protesting over the high price of gas. While I'm all for industrial action, I think this particular strike, in which drivers are refusing to deliver basics such as food, is misdirected. The strikers know the government can't do anything about global energy prices, but they're using it as an excuse to get concessions. Already the Spanish government is offering cash payments for early retirement and emergency credit, but the truckers want a minimum haulage rate so they can be assured a living wage.

Some truckers are staging "go slow" protests around the city, blocking traffic. Lines at gas stations are running for blocks, and when I went to the supermarket today I noticed a definite shortage of some foods. I bought extra, marking the first time in my First World life that I've hoarded food.

This strike will be resolved, but the problem is not about to go away. Eventually we will reach peak oil, if we haven't already, and as consumption increases due to rising population and industrialization, the problem will only get more acute. This won't be the last time in my life I'll be hoarding food. And if you haven't yet, your turn may well be next.

Third World Children 1, Obnoxious Backpackers 0

Speaking of class warfare, I saw a great example of the worst that backpacking culture has to offer when I was in Nepal back in 1994. I had just come back from trekking the Annapurna circuit and base camp, this being back when you slept in village homes and there weren't any internet cafes along the route.

I came back to Pokhara, a small city that acts as a launching off point for many of the best Himalayan treks. I'd rented some gear and needed to return it. When I got to the store, I found the owner was out and his nine year-old daughter was running the shop, and deep in an argument with three burly Israeli guys.

Israeli backpackers have a bad name overseas, and it's because many of them have just gotten out of the army and are a bit high-strung. Perfectly understandable after spending a couple of years dodging terrorist snipers and car bombers, but can't they go through post traumatic stress disorder in their own country?

Anyway, these three heroes were shouting at this kid because they didn't want to pay for their last day of equipment rental. They said that since they hadn't kept the stuff for an entire day they shouldn't have to pay, but it was evening, closing time, and any sane person could see they were in the wrong. The little girl was obviously sane. She held her ground, demanding the ten rupees they owed her (a grand total of 30 cents) while they towered over her in an aggressive semicircle, shouting at her and moving closer and closer, fists clenched.

It was beginning to look like they were going to hit her and I would have to come to the "rescue". I started calculating just how thoroughly they would kick my ass before the whole market piled into the store and lynched these guys.

But the little girl saved me from having to save her.

She stomped her foot on the dirt floor, shot out a little hand towards the biggest of the three and shouted "No! You give me ten rupee!"

They backed down, tossing a ten-rupee note on the ground and stomped off, muttering things in Hebrew that were probably not fit for adults to hear, let alone nine year-old girls.

I paid my bill without even checking it.

Lesson learned: nine years in a Third World country makes you tougher than two years in a First World army.

May Day in Madrid

It's May Day, the international day of workers' solidarity, and to celebrate various unions and leftist political parties here in Madrid have organized four different marches since they can't agree enough to all march as one, proving yet again that the workers have anything but solidarity. Most madrileños aren't going to the marches; they're off on daytrips or hanging out at home or going to one of the few cafés that are open.

Spain has a lot of new money, so they are beginning to fall into the American myth of a classless society, or shall we say a society where everyone is middle class. There are lots more cars on the streets than ten years ago, lots more people going on vacation, and most of the manual labor is done by Moroccans, West Africans, and Eastern Europeans.

Of course, the idea of a classless society is nonsense. There are still the rich (walk through the shopping district in Calle Serrano and try to find something a schoolteacher can afford) and still the poor and blue collar workers (the immigrant labor mentioned above) and while the middle class is swelling in numbers, it's on very rocky ground. Borrowing is up, the real estate bubble has burst, and with a lower quality of graduates coming from the schools, employers are complaining about having difficulty finding qualified employees.

That was Spain I was talking about, not the U.S. As Almudena likes to say, Europe is about ten years behind the U.S. Looks like we're catching up!