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 Lundoxia Presents (1 of 10): A video about stoicism A 5-minute video about the ancient Greek philosophy of stoicism, which also bears similarities with ancient Chinese taoism. |
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Lundoxia Presents (2 of 10) : Facial recognition and the future of nanotechnology A fascinating 6,5-minute report by The Economist about facial recognition. Eventually, nanotechnology will become so advanced, combined with x-ray camera technology and powerful telescopes in outer space, literally each and every single living person on the planet (even humans living deep in caves) will be identified, on one single database, all 7 billion or more people. People are obsessed with privacy. You can draw a diametrical analogy with the Dutch Calvinist psyche centuries ago that if one had curtains in the window then he or she was obviously trying to hide something. Recently I tried explaining this to some young English women in their 20s. They responded saying: "that sounds suspicious". In their mindsets, you would only NOT have curtains if you were an exhibitionist. But what if the ones looking are Peeping Toms? Aren't the lookers the ones causing someone to be called an exhibitionist? Eventually it is nanotechnology that will erase terrorism. The technology will become so advanced that it will detect such people long before they can commit their misdeeds, similar to the Hollywood film MINORITY REPORT (2002) starring Tom Cruise. But they won't even need psychics, massive amounts of data and x-ray pictures, right down to the nanometer of any object on Earth (including caves and the bottom of an ocean floor) captured from as far away as a telescope in space, will be sufficient evidence. And the state? Even centuries before today's technology, this was a subject of continued debate. Yes it can be a slippery slope to an Orwellian totalitarian nightmare, or a benign one foretold by H.G. Wells in his prophetic satire THE TIME MACHINE (1895) in which humans in future societies are profoundly apathetic, have no opinions nor intellect as everything is done for them by super-advanced technology. Eventually technology will become molecular and indifferentiable from organic life so this prediction is a possible future reality. As the Dutch axiom goes: "wij zijn niet zo ver vandaan" (we are halfway there already.) |
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Lundoxia Presents: (3 of 10) Liechtenstein''s 300th anniversary as a sovereign state (an excellent microcosm for any country in the world) 2019 is Liechtenstein's 300th anniversary as an independent country, or sovereign state. Of course there are many micro-states in the world, but Liechtenstein truly demonstrates the artificiality of an independent country. A cynic would call Liechtenstein a parasite state or satellite state, but if anything it is the exact opposite. One must look at facts relatively; in that case the Hermit Kingdom of North Korea is also a satellite state. On Earth we are long past the age of truly independent or isolationist countries, we are all deeply inter-dependent and intertwined by now. In fact, Liechtenstein is the most industrialized country on Earth, if looked at relatively by either area and/or per capita; Hilti (the hardware manufacturer) and false teeth are perhaps the most famous Liechtenstein industries, alongside banking, which has been severely restricted in recent years and consequently Liechtenstein was taken off the list of uncooperative tax havens by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.) How was Liechtenstein born? The name "Liechtenstein" is actually the surname of its ruling family, Liechtenstein from neighboring Austria. Liechtenstein had a castle in Austria and was a land owner, bought himself a title and eventually the current land that he named after his own self. I can't think of any other country named after a person*, other than Amerigo Vespucci but then again America is not the name of a country but the name of a continent. I always recall when I made the grave error of calling a USA American simply "American" to my Chilean professor and his immediate response was: "as a Chilean I am also an American!" Since then I always call them USAns, USA-ers, US citizens or US Americans or even Yankees/Yanks for the northern segment; after all there is a baseball team called the New York Yankees, therefore the term Yankees can only be a glowing compliment (just like the popular war song "The Yanks are Coming.") But getting back to Liechtenstein; it took over 200 years before a Prince of Liechtenstein bothered to go live in his own country, and then it was only because he wanted to avoid the Nazis during World War II. Up until then, Liechtenstein had been aligned with Austria and then when Switzerland became noticeably richer, Liechtenstein took up the Swiss franc as its currency. After World War I, the Austrian westernmost state of Voralberg asked Switzerland if it could become a Swiss canton and exit Austria, but Switzerland declined; had it accepted, Liechtenstein would have become an enclave of Switzerland; instead it now borders Switzerland to the west with the Rhine river as its natural frontier, and Austria's mountainous state of Voralberg to the east. Unlike the other microstates of Europe (not counting Malta which is smaller than Andorra in area but with a much large population, and an EU member state), Monaco, San Marino, Andorra and Vatican City (if Vatican City can be considered a sovereign state as it is not a UN member, throwing doubt on its exact legal status if UN membership is a basic criterion to qualify as a country), at least Liechtenstein joined the European Economic Area (EEA) alongside Iceland and Norway. Luxembourg is a founding EU member state and not a micro state, but simply a small country. The "Games of the Small States of Europe" defines "small country" as a country having fewer than 1 million inhabitants, and that event includes athletes from these ten countries: Andorra, Cyprus, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino and Vatican City. What is a sovereign state? Essentially it is a slice of turf on Earth with a human population, and if you can let its human inhabitants truly believe they are that nationality as the man Liechtenstein indeed did, then you are a great con man, the world's greatest magic trick (everything is mental.) During a recent referendum in Liechtenstein whereby the Prince threatened to leave his land and go live in Vienna if his people did not vote in his favor and increase his powers (he can sack any government or Prime Minister at will), the people of Liechtenstein voted firmly in favor of the Prince. Yet the case of Liechtenstein can be seen as a microcosm for any sovereign state, using Liechtenstein as a reductionist model. The Prince of Liechtenstein is usually in Vienna anyway; the Dutch royal family is of German lineage. The Netherlands was not a monarchy until a couple of centuries ago, before that it was called The Dutch Republic since 1581. The commonality of the super-rich and super-powerful is that they are supranational in their mindsets. They transcend the artificial concept of patriotism which is a process of indoctrination to make the populace loyal to the top of the pyramid. Yet when you utter such ideas to people it angers them, like the kid in his sandbox holding on to his dear toy, a freudian paradigm. Culture and language is a regional phenomenon unrelated to sovereign states which is a capitalist, organisational agenda. Linked is the Californian (or "USAn"!) Rick Steve's 3-minute piece on Liechtenstein; there are no good videos that do Liechtenstein proper justice, but Rick Steves does his utmost to synthesize Liechtenstein with excellent visuals and explanations. Yet notice how Steves neglects to name Belgium as one of the German-speaking nation states; this is an often forgotten fact. German is indeed an official language of Belgium, even though only 1% of its population are native German-speaking Belgians. German is also listed as one of the three official languages of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, not to be confused with the adjacent Walloon province also called Luxembourg in Belgium. Of course they are numerous minority German speaking pockets of populace spread throughout Europe such as South Tyrol in Italy (Bolzano) or Sudetenland in Czechia. *Of course there are many countries named after persons, such as San Marino, named after the Croatian stone cutter Marinus of the 4th century (301 AD), but San Marino's early origins are much more vague compared to Liechtenstein due to San Marino being ancient, meaning its earliest written history is comparatively less exact. Wikipedia lists 42 countries named after persons or legends. However, Liechtenstein is the only country in Europe in which a man consciously named it after himself; Saint Marinus was a Croatian stonemason and it is not known for certain if he was legend or real person; legend holds he fled religious persecution, earning him the title of Saint. Yet he could not know the place he fled to in order to live as a hermit (namely Monte Titano) would eventually become a sovereign state named after him. This fact makes Liechtenstein a totally unique geopolitical anomaly. What do most of these micro-states and other countries such as Bhutan, Austria, Oman and the United Arab Emirates all have in common? Their naturalization laws are the strictest on Earth. Generally you will have had to have resided there between 20 to 30 consecutive years, before you are eligible to apply for that country's citizenship. In the case of Monaco it is only 10 years, but obtaining residence there is extremely costly as the country recently ranked as the most expensive real estate on Earth, surpassing even Manhattan New York (and make sure you are physically residing in Monaco for at least 6 months per calendar year otherwise you will run into problems.) In the case of Liechtenstein, your residence must have been in one singular commune (there are 11 communes) and the citizenry of that commune vote on your citizenship application; you can be voted down simply because they don't like your face. It is similar in Switzerland, where I knew a U.S. professor who had resided there for over 30 years and kept getting refused on his Swiss citizenship applications. "Lekker pech" as the apt axiom goes in Dutch! Paradoxically, foreign women marrying Swiss men acquire the Swiss nationality comparatively quicker (pop icon Tina Turner famously became Swiss; her marriage to a German-turned Swiss man helped the process go faster); Switzerland is a patriarchal nation, the so-called Vaterland, as is Germany, germane to Germanic socio-cultural collective mindsets stretching back millenia to tribal times. Vatican citizenship may be the strangest one on Earth, as it is the only country (if it can be called a country due its lack of membership to organisations like the UN; observer status of the religious body The Holy See does not count as a member state) that does not grant citizenship based on the traditional jus soli (by birth on the turf or soil of that nation state) nor jus sanguinis (by blood; ie. your parents.) Instead, Vatican passports are granted to people who need to reside inside Vatican City for their work, similar to UN workers. Personally, I think Vatican City should become part of the Italian republic, or, it should make an effort to join the UN as a full member state as well as the Council of Europe. The case of Vatican city bears many similarities with Monaco, which only recently joined those bodies and had to undergo major judicial reforms in order to join the latter organisation. Yet generously, in case a Vatican citizen loses his or her Vatican citizenship and is thence rendered stateless, he or she automatically gains Italian citizenship, which ordinarily takes ten years to acquire. Comparatively, a person can apply for Dutch citizenship after only 3 or 5 consecutive years** of residence in The Netherlands, the so-called inburgeringscursus (citizenship course of 1 year) is waived if the applicant passes a state language exam. **3 years if the non-EU applicant is in a common law relationship or marriage with another EU citizen (or even a non-EU person possessing a permanent EU residence card), 5 years if he/she is not; notice how people in relationships are favored. Why not the reverse? Half of marriages end in divorce and many relationships can be ruinous! Excessive requirements for obtaining the citizenship of a nation state are on the surface silly. Peel beneath it and you will find the real reason is preserving the wealth of the nation, limiting and restricting access to avoid excessive dilution. The bigger the population, the more unwieldy it becomes, generally. Yet even a tiny nation like Nauru is now impoverished, with the highest obesity rates; its economy was mono-cultural, solely relying on phosphate which has run out. Walking on the street in public in the modern Dutch multicultural society you would not know just by looking who was a Dutch citizen and who was not. Passing a Dutch language test and earning an income or being independently wealthy should be sufficient for being eligible for citizenship. Eventually if the globalism evolves and technology advances significantly, nation states will dissolve as we know it and the world will be sectioned off into sectors by computer technology. At its zenith, computers will morph into organic molecules and be ubiquitous, self-regulating. There will be no more need for nation states. But the sperm count will peter out (it already is) and there will be less need for human reproduction. Current forecasts predict the human population will start to fade out in about 500 years from now, and that there will be no more humans by the year 3000 (this is the science of demographics.) Computers and robots will be better suited to clean up the planet Earth and space debris. |
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Lundoxia Presents (4 of 10): All the world's passports (great video for design lovers) Do you love design? Then this YouTube video will intrigue you. Have you ever wondered what all the world's passports look like? For years I did and there was no way to know unless you worked at an airport and had access to such information. Now on the internet you can see all the passport designs. This one lists 199 passports including those of Palestine, Kosovo, Macao, Vatican City, Hong Kong and Taiwan. But those six are not United Nations (UN) member states and not real sovereign states for one reason or another; they are territories or special jurisdictions. Many people still think Switzerland is not a UN member, but in fact it joined in 2002, the straggler of all stragglers. Since then all independent countries are UN members (except for the occasional secession such as Montenegro in 2006 and South Sudan in 2011), the "de facto club" affirming mutual recognition for each other's sovereign nation states. As the Mexican José Ángel Gurría (Secretary-General of the OECD) said: "everybody who's somebody is a member" (speaking about OECD membership, which could also symbolically be applied to UN membership; sovereign states are also called "persons" in legal jargon, hence this anthropomorphism or personification.) Any designer or design aficionado will know a good design must not be too busy-looking. The immediate visual impact must be clear and symmetrical, which is the essence of beauty. Bright and happy, as a writer once said of the ideal appearance of his longhand. The image must communicate the message in the blink of an eye and most passport designs fail miserably at this. Probably, people will think passport design is unimportant, but I think nothing is unimportant. This is Taoism; each thought, deed or written word is important. As long as you're doing anything, do it mindfully, a hard yet noble goal to achieve. The Japanese call it ikigai. Most passport designs are too busy, brash, dull or stiff-looking. Also there are too many identical recurring visual themes such as stars, eagles, lions and other animals (Australia has a kangaroo and ostrich on its passport but when I mention this to Australians, they don't know which is an indication the design has left little or no mental imprint) or overly intricate coats of arms. Many designs are too blurry or faded, especially if the contrast between the logo, lettering and the passport color is poorly thought out. Also, lines cannot all be only squares or rectangles; balance out the angles and shapes, adding in circles or ovals. There are many bad fonts and boring or unoriginal "rubber-stamp" type logos. A logo must be totally unique and stand out at first sight, making it instantly memorable or even iconic, like the Swiss passport. Another negative facet of most passports is: too many words or text. The wording should simply read the name of the country. Ideally, a country should have a name, instead of a definition. For instance, France is a name. "United Kingdom" is not a name but a definition and could easily refer to any number of countries such as Denmark or Norway, which are also united kingdoms. "United States of America" could easily refer to Brazil, which is also a united states in America and Latin Americans outside USA indeed rightly call themselves Americans as America is a singular continent composed of 35 sovereign states, or independent countries (there are 20 more territories in the Americas such as Greenland or Bermuda but they are not sovereign states/independent countries.) Do you have favorites among all these passport designs? Here is my Top 10, not in any order of preference: 1. Morocco: beautiful, clear and crisp contrast of colors (blue and gold.) Nice font too. Not too busy, nice immediate visual impact. 2. Zambia: nice simple design with a human theme, logo-wise. 3. Bahrain: beautiful choice of color tones in the gold and red with a clear logo, not too busy in appearance. 4. Croatia (Hrvatska): Clean and simple. Notice that Croatia became an EU member in 2013 but managed to persuade the EU to retain its dark blue passport color, instead of adopting the mandatory EU burgundy red as all other EU passports. I wonder how this was achieved? 5. Andorra: beautiful rich mahogany brown tone, a most unique color choice and a super clean logo with a super clean font. 6. Monaco: beautiful human theme and coat of arms. Only I wish they would use a vivid red instead of burgundy, bearing excessive resemblance to the European Union (EU) passport color of which Monaco is not a member. 7. Liechtenstein: nice choice of color and font, with what is probably the most gorgeous coat of arms in the world. 8. Ireland: how can you not love that harp? Is this the only country with a musical instrument as its logo? How unique! 9. Switzerland: arguably the most iconic passport ever conceived. Awesome embossed designs in this one, of the cross. Also, even inside the passport (if you've ever inspected a Swiss passport close-up), each page features intricate art work of iconic Swiss landscape and historical persons. A fantastic attention to detail in this work of art, with some of the most advanced security features. 10. Norway: nice color and clean coat of arms. What a "short and sweet" name in Norse for the name Norway: Norge |
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Lundoxia Presents (5 of 10): NaaktopStraat.nl pamflet video Het 5e Element De nieuwste video voor mijn petitie (naakt in het openbaar) gericht naar de tweede kamer.2 minuten. Ga na www.NaaktopStraat.nl en teken de petitie als u mee eens bent dat andere mensen mogen zelf bepalen of ze gekleed of ongekleed op straat gaan! |
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Lundoxia Presents (6 of 10): Deutsche Welle (DW) report on YouTube about nude sauna culture in Germany Another excellent, super-rare report about nude sauna practice in Germany, by a British woman, for Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany's public international broadcaster. This item is a gem for lovers of all things esoteric and eclectic. When I was a travel writer publishing pieces in mainstream magazines, if my submitted piece contained a passage about the super-exceptional unisex nudity of German, Austrian or Dutch public saunas then the editor would delete it before publishing; either the editor thought I was inventing this plain true fact, or automatically linked up the non-sexual nudity with lewdness, worried about potential complaints from the readership. Hence this "nude fact" remains one of the best-kept secrets on Earth. And yet wearing a swimsuit inside a sauna is severely unhealthy (inhaling its bacteria in the extreme heat of the sauna potentially causing legionnaire's disease), not to mention the foul odor of the wet swimsuit in the sauna. 30 years ago my father filed reports as television journalist for Deutsche Welle (DW), which had a large studio in Cologne (some reports still exist on YouTube as recent uploads*; search under " Neil Lundy / European Journal".) We initially lived in an apartment by the Rhine, a section of Cologne called Rodenkirchen. Nearby there was a local sauna I frequented. I could not believe the diametrical juxtaposition of being in the company and conversation of young nude Germany women as a then 16-year old in 1988, compared to the previous two years at an all-boys school in Toronto wearing a uniform with shirt and tie on a property where girls were forbidden. Night and day. Hallelujah to the German Freikörperkultur, the sign of an enlightened civil society. It was 30 years ago that I drove up to Amsterdam from Cologne in a vintage 1972 silver Mercedes Benz, assisting on reports about the homeless, soft drugs, prostitution, same-sex marriage and euthanasia, the latter three issues not then yet legalized (2000, 2001 and 2002 respectively); what a journey for any lad! *Probably the most popular of which is the 1987 report on Poteen, Irish Moonshine; a segment of which will be aired on Irish television as part of a sitcom in 2019 (!) |
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Lundoxia Presents (7 of 10): Europe in Africa, Spain's Ceuta and Melilla (Democracy, money and culture are interrelated) Have you ever seen the 2013 apocalyptic movie WORLD WAR Z starring Brad Pitt? This fascinating 15-minute report by The Guardian recalls elements of that narrative. Or the film ELYSIUM, also of 2013. Seeing this report (about Ceuta and Melilla, the Spanish enclaves on the north coast of Morocco) will shatter any delusional belief that the European Union (EU) has no value. On the contrary, millions of people are continuously struggling to enter the EU and even anywhere inside Europe. Without a doubt, the EU passport is very much a coveted document and Europe is still a prize for many millions trying to escape so-called basket case countries with junk economies, war or conflict zones or dictatorships, which is most of the world. In fact, The Economist publishes a ranking of democratic countries (democracies to dictatorships) and in the 2018 ranking, only 20 out of a total of 193 countries are considered to be "full democracies" (see "democracy index 2018" on wikipedia); many EU countries such as Italy, Estonia, Portugal, Greece, Belgium, Czechia, Slovakia, Cyprus, France and Slovenia are ranked as "flawed democracies". Some will read this and exclaim: "Euro Snob", but snobbery has nothing to do with this subject. Maintaining democracies is incredibly complex and costly. As Churchill uttered (paraphrasing): "democracy is the worst form of government except all others." Another quote I love is the one acted out by Jack Palance in Godard's 1963 film LE MERPRIS (CONTEMPT): "each time I hear the word culture I need to take my cheque book out". Culture, money/wealth and power are interwoven; Cultuur Fonds? The science of culture is enjoyment, hedonism or entertainment. Creating for its own sake, otherwise we might as well be animals or robots. Art and technology or scientific invention may blend together as the Rinascimento demonstrated (the French word Reneaissance is used, but it started in Italy.) It's about money after all. Many EU countries such as Malta, Ireland, Bulgaria and Cyprus even offer legal citizenship (passports) in exchange for investment. Malta was asking just under a million euros most recently, in exchange for a Maltese passport, and has attracted rich Russians and Arabians who never even set foot inside Malta. Greek Cyprus has an astonishing number of Russians in it. As soon as the Baltic states gained independence and the USSR dissolved, those countries made it extra difficult for Russian inhabitants to gain citizenship; the case of Narva in Estonia is a good example of this, with thousands there stateless. Levels of wealth distribution, happiness, culture and democracy are interrelated. The world happiness index top countries are also democratic countries. One could synthesize it as pluralism. Contrary to popular belief, Switzerland does not sell its passports or nationality. In fact it makes the acquisition of its nationality next to impossible. One must have the "bourgeoisie", having resided in the same municipality for a long continuous period. Switzerland has comparative low income tax, but the rate varies from canton to canton, being a severely decentralized country. But making citizenship hard to acquire can also create social problems. How can you "have the bourgeoisie" if its government does its best to make its citizenship so difficult to acquire? It is a paradox. A dynamic country must continually be refreshing its populace and citizenry with new blood from all corners of the Earth. Poor become rich and rich become poor. This is the magic of life and mystery of existence. |
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Lundoxia Presents (8 of 10): The emergence of electric cars in 2018 A 6-minute video about the emergence of electric cars in 2018, with some cities such as Paris, Athens, Madrid and Mexico partially only allowing electric cars into their city centers by the year 2025 (The Economist.) The end of fossil fuel cars by the year 2040? |
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Lundoxia Presents (9 of 10): An illustrated instructional video to proper sauna ethos (do it nude!) Updated 19 September 2019 At long last, a 3,5-minute illustrated instructional video to proper sauna ethos (namely, use the sauna nude, not with a swim suit!) This video is by ARTE (French and German language cultural television based in Strasbourg) and this link is on YouTube; the video's audio is in German but has an auto-text translation: left-click on the settings icon (round nut icon beside the CC icon, lower right side INSIDE the video screen), then click on "subtitles", then "auto-translate" and select the language you desire to read from the drop-down menu, even though it will be a word-by-word literal translation from the originating German. Note: this text-translation feature may only appear when logged into YouTube. Question: how many countries in the world sport sauna culture and practice correct sauna ethos in abundant unisex public facilities: namely, fully nude? There is the "black and white" A list and the "wishy washy/unclear" B list. All are located in Europe sadly. The A list is only 3 countries: Germany, The Netherlands and Austria. Are the Dutch losing their sauna ethos? Now Spa Zuiver in Amsterdam has "badkleding dagen" (swimsuit days) on Tuesdays and Thursdays, a gross violation of sauna ethos, like pouring a vat of hot chocolate on Italian pasta. Also, there used to be more small-scale saunas in Amsterdam such as Oibibio, Sauna Fenomeen (frequented by Brad Pitt when he spent some months in Amsterdam during his breakthrough moment, Thelma & Louise, 1991) and Sauna de Keizer; they have all closed down. Also, Wellness 1926 in Zeeburg (Amsterdam Oost), formerly Viking Sauna, basically also closed as of July 1st, when it transitioned into a women-only sauna and is now called MOON. Once gender-segregated, like the gay sauna NZ for men-only, those spots strictly speaking are no longer saunas but meeting places for the direct purpose of sex (not that I am against that, just saying.) The closing down of a small-scale sauna is a profound tragedy as it indicates an erosion of sauna practice. Correct sauna practice cleanses and refreshes the human body and mind; Mens sana in corpore sano. Finns are dead against the large commercialization of large sauna establishments. On the other hand, too many bad apples come to small-scale saunas in The Netherlands and disrespect sauna ethos: you're not to supposed to babble in saunas, the temperature is extreme and it is not meant for conversation, especially if there are third parties present who don't want to hear your babble. In Germany it is the contrary (perhaps due to the Prussian preoccupation with order); upon arriving at a small-scale sauna the German owner will admonish you. The Finnish sauna society publishes the bible of correct sauna use and describes the sauna as a formal environment, like a church. Even though you are nude, you make no issue of it, it's a non-sexual environment, quiet, clean and formal, sit upright (you are not meant to lay down and take up needless additional space) and no sighing nor slouching, and coming in and out of the sauna every few minutes. And most importantly: you are supposed to have done your bowel movement before or after the sauna, not during or in between sauna sittings and your anal region is supposed to be cleansed (no anal leakage allowed!) Then there is the issue of staring/looking. As humans (those who are not blind) we are blessed with the sense of sight, so we can see. Once I was at a local sauna in Amsterdam and a USA-American woman exclaimed angrily to her boyfriend: "he looked at me!"; no, I only saw her. The difference between looking and seeing will vary from culture to culture; in some countries one must avoid eye contact. As to body shame or body prudery (two different mental states, the first feels bad about being human while the second seeks to avoid social embarrassment but not necessarily a sufferer of the shame complex), I quote the response of a relative of mine who is a gynecologist/obstetrician: we are all naked underneath our clothing. As humans we are draped bodies (you have to approach it scientifically.) I always say the acid test is seeing your parents naked and not minding, if you do then you have a body complex. On the other hand you have very commercial mega-sauna spas such as Elysium, about 20 km north of Rotterdam. Elysium is overloaded with various sauna cabins, dozens of them in fact. And maybe only one is a proper sauna. The Finnish sauna society describes a sauna as having a minimum temperature of +80 degrees Celsius. At Elysium most of the saunas are below that; personally I prefer 100 or more; some of my most pleasurable sauna experiences were in Finnish savusaunas (authentic Finnish smoke sauna) at 120 degrees! Heat generated by fire instead of electricity is infinitely more pleasant. To be sure, the authentic Finnish savusauna (smoke sauna, that is, heat generated by fire, not electricity) by a lake in Finland is still by far the best sauna experience. Rustic, simple yet magnificent, finished off with some Finnish Vodka or cold beers afterwards, and remember the aromatic birch tree branches, whipped against your body and dunked in a copper vat of water. Most other saunas are electric and can make you sick; heat is not just heat, there are many different forms of heat and the savusauna form is the most organic and thus soul-soothing. The B list is "hit or miss" and includes, but is not limited to the following European countries (Finland, Estonia and Russia - especially Karelia which was formerly Finland prior to World War II - sport sauna cultures but most have access to their own free private saunas so there is little need for paid public facilities, which are gender-segregated there anyway, tragic as up to World War II in Finland there used to be public unisex nude sauna bath houses on every block; these vanished as the per capita income increased and more people built or bought their own private saunas): The other Germanic states or regions of Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Belgium, Luxembourg and some countries of the former Yugoslavia such as Slovenia (a sort of Slavic version of Austria if you will) have some too but it truly is unclear and in no way abundant nor universal as there is not a strong sauna culture base. I have also found and been to decent saunas in Ukraine, Poland, Czechia and Slovakia but again it is like finding a needle in a haystack. Once I was about to go into a sauna in Kiev with a woman, and the male owner calmly asked me in Russian: "are you going to fuck her in the sauna?" so we went away. In Copenhagen in Denmark the saunas are gender-segregated with the exception of Christiania but its use is excluded to Christiania residents only; having said that a naturist group reserves a public spa for unisex nude hours once weekly but then this counts as a club membership activity. People are stunned that there is no real sauna culture in the nordic states except Finland; you have to go to naturist resorts to find them such as the lakeside savusauna (smoke sauna) located in Nora in the middle of Sweden, a place called Gustavsberg. Again, club membership-based or private ownership-based sauna practice is esoteric (secretive, or exclusively known to few), so not exoteric; this is to say universal, unisex nude, instant-access abundant sauna facilities. Yet esoteric can be equally blissful if the participants are sauna-savvy; in Vancouver a group of us rented out an old bath house periodically; in Toronto a professor held sauna parties to a closed group. Similar esoteric groups also exist in New York, San Francisco, Budapest and many other places but you need to be "in the know". Very, very few countries of the world sport authentic Finnish sauna ethos. I have a guidebook from the Finnish sauna society which outlines the basic tenets. One of these tenets is, one is supposed to be respectful and quiet and mentally clean* (and physically clean, meaning all orifices) in the sauna, similar to the behavior in a church. People who try to make the nudity sexual or kinky spoil the ethos; you separate the sex from the nudity, otherwise you are not mentally clean. Boxes don't touch. Seeing without looking, knowing without thinking (Taoism.) It may sound preachy but try to engineer such sauna ethos in other countries where there is no sauna ethos; it is next to impossible. You can't engineer the core of a collective psyche: I know, I banged my head against a brick wall for a decade trying. Either a given society is geared up for it or it is not. Perhaps most of humanity will never manage to accept its own body, which is ironical because the moment no issue is made of it, there is no more issue. It is just mental. "Maak geen punt van" as the Dutch axiom goes. *I term this "The Art of non-Judgment", a hard stoic and Taoist art to master. A simple technique to try is, as you sense your mind about to form a judgment or even comment on someone or anything, pause and abstain from judging or commenting. Then notice the blissful sensation of non-judgment. Humans are fixated on judgment. Kant wrote about the deep mental physics of human judgment in his 1790 book Critique of Judgment (Kritik der Urteilskraft), a book you could spend the rest of your life reading. |
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Lundoxia Presents (10 of 10): Mining Space A fascinating 22-minute illustrated video with interviews about mining the moon and asteroids in outer space. A must-see for any space lover! |
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Lundoxia Presents (Addendum/Elf): Brexit video (dissolving the UK is not a bad thing) Linked: one of my Brexit videos on YouTube. It would not be a bad thing if the UK dissolved. The most efficient way would be to hold a referendum within England only concerning independence for England. If it passed, England would simply declare independence and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland would be dissolved and the other nations would be forced to become separate sovereign states. Scotland and Wales would secede and these new countries would get more out of EU membership as new EU members with small populations if they joined compared to the current UK EU membership model as a net contributor (meaning they pay more into the EU club than they get back.) The Isle of Man is slightly larger than Andorra so would be better off outside the EU as a tax haven microstate. However, Luxembourg is an EU member and also a financial domicile center, and because The Isle of Man has a minority language (Manx), it could get lots of EU funding to protect its Manx culture, so joining the EU as a new country might also have merit. Could Cornwall also become a country? You can read about it on Wikipedia. There are indeed Cornish nationalists and there is a modern revival of the Cornish language and culture. Its small population of half a million and area slightly larger than Luxembourg make this option highly manageable, especially given Cornwall's natural beauty (tourism.) Then the UK would cease to exist and it would simply be known as The Kingdom of England. It could retain its monarchy. The term British would also be dropped from use and remaining British overseas territories such as Gibraltar, the Falkland and Cayman islands would either be called English Overseas Territories or they would also secede and gain independence, much the same way Tuvalu or Nauru did in the pacific ocean. Simply being The Kingdom of England, now this new state could put all its focus on making each county as perfect as possible, not having to worry about bailing out the other nations of the old UK (at least, this is what one often hears the English say, that England pays more for the other nations than what England gets for itself.) Deep down this is what any economics-minded statesperson thinks, and the incumbent Boris Johnson has even spoken frankly about Scotland becoming independent, adopting a pragmatic approach. And there is much support amidst the English for an independent England (it was covered by BBC Newsnight on November 12, 2019 and may be seen on YouTube under this title: Will Brexit lead to the break-up of the union?); Boris Johnson is acutely aware of this growing sentiment, so who knows? It seems impossible until it's done as Nelson Mandela said. To realize such a serious new reality, it would be critical to perform each step with the utmost of stoicism, minus any negative jingoistic or hooligan nationalism and animosity, much the same way Norway seceded from Sweden peacefully in 1905. Such an intricate operation should strictly be seen as chiefly administrative, for optimal socioeconomic fluidity and general benefit for all sections of society. Northern Ireland would then no longer be able to keep calling itself British as the UK would no longer exist. It stuns me to oblivion that you hear or read so little about a decentralized, loose Irish Confederation of that island's four provinces (Connacht, Leinster, Munster and Ulster), similar to the Confederation of Canada or Switzerland. In case Lundy island (in the Bristol Channel) is up for grabs (Lundy island is twice the size of Monaco, but with only 27 inhabitants*, my year of birth reversed, 72), I'll gladly go there and crown myself King of Lundy, but for now I won't hold my breath. Did you know Lundy is an old Scandinavian name from the Viking age? Lund means grove in Swedish, Norse and Danish. "By" means town or village in the latter three languages and "øy" means island in Norwegian. Do you know the origin of your surname? *See this 1 August 2019 BBC news article about Lundy island: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-devon-49163316 (copy and paste link in your URL address bar) |
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Lundoxia Presents (The Dirty Dozen): The End of Rickshaws in 2020 Linked: New (20 December 2019) YouTube video (3:18 in duration) concerning the ban on rickshaws in Amsterdam effective April Fools' Day 2020, with English and Dutch subtitles (press CC then settings, lower right button inside YouTube screen.) In April 2018 the city of Amsterdam publicized its decision to terminate all rickshaw (pedicab or Trike taxi in US/Canada, or Fietstaxi in Dutch, VeloTaxi in French and German) licences effective 1 April 2019. Then this termination was postponed to 1 April 2020 but appeals were filed to overturn it, or at least suspend it for those few who filed appeals. The court appeal hearing of we half-dozen plaintiffs will take place at Rechtbank Amsterdam at Parnassusweg 220 on Tuesday morning 18 February 2020 at 09:00. The ruling (uitspraak) is expected to be issued and published on the court's website (rechtspraak.nl) on or before 31 March 2020, unless it is postponed. |
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