Alcator C-Mod is handily the largest single experiment on the MIT campus.  It is a world-wide leader in magnetically-confined fusion plasma research, a small machine which nonetheless makes giant strides forward in the science, especially the science relevant to a successful launch of the large international tokamak, ITER, now under construction in France (www.iter.org).  And with 120 full-time-equivalent employees working at the facility, and a broader footprint supporting over 300 people, it is a vital component of the local economy.

C-Mod is an interdisciplinary research center, the workplace of about 30 graduate students (of which I am one) from the Physics, Nuclear Science and Engineering, and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science departments.  And it is the kind of place where that diversity of skills is put to good use - where brilliance and creativity and hard work combine to achieve extremes.  Let me be more concrete: a typical day of operation will see 50 million degree Celsius plasma temperatures (about three times hotter than the core of the sun), magnetic fields 100 000 times stronger than the earth’s, x-ray tomographic reconstruction, complex optics through nonlinear and nonisotropic media, terrabytes of data - the list goes on.  It’s a place where an idea rapidly turns into reality through engineering and scientific analysis at the highest level.  Amazing might be an apt word.

Now, let me widen the context.  Fusion power should not be conceived of as a “wouldn’t-that-be-nice” technology, permanently a fixture of the future and not of the present.  Rather, it should be thought of as a vital piece of an energy portfolio, offering clean, safe, sustainable energy.  Our civilization depends on nothing less than the provision of this very resource - clean, safe, sustainable energy.  We must give fusion research the support it needs to make this technology a reality sooner, rather than later or too late.  It is no exaggeration to say that Alcator C-Mod is a vital part of this fusion research.

If these issues matter to you, then please help us convince our leaders to preserve MIT’s Alcator C-Mod tokamak, as well as the strength of the larger domestic and international fusion programs.  To learn more about what’s at stake and how you can take action, please visit the following website:

www.fusionfuture.org

And please come visit us at Alcator C-Mod during our Open House next Wednesday, 7 March.  Tours are available between 1:00 PM and 3:00 PM, departing every 30 minutes.

But the present surge in international aid is a short-term response to a long-term problem in a region which has seen terrible famines before.  The drought, which has precipitated this most recent episode, is not the only enemy.  Indeed, the refugee camps set up in Kenya, Ethiopia, and elsewhere, now overflowing, were already filled even before the current crisis.  There are basic challenges in the Horn of Africa, related to infrastructure, education, health, and regional politics, which must be addressed if a lasting solution is to be found.

Here at MIT, we pride ourselves on being problem-solvers.  No doubt readers of this blog are also problem solvers, probably with an idealistic bent.  For those who are interested in turning empathy into action, here is a bit more information about the situation, since the first step in treating the disease is identifying the cause:

A recent article from the BBC reporting from a refugee camp in Kenya:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14481103

An excellent interview with Harvard Professor Robert Paarlberg describing the decline in US contribution to long-term development projects in Africa, and particularly in the Horn of Africa
http://www.npr.org/2011/08/14/139620268/helping-africa-grow-its-own-food-a-declining-effort

MIT students interesting in learning techniques to contribute to development efforts in the region might find helpful courses offered by the Department of Urban Studies and Planning (Course 11), including 11.701: Introduction to International Development and Planning (OCW: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/urban-studies-and-planning/11-701-introduction-to-international-development-planning-fall-2010/index.htm).

Another excellent academic resource at MIT is D-Lab - read more about the wonderful work done by this group, and ways to get involved, at their website here: http://d-lab.mit.edu/

And for those interested in contributing to (or seeking employment with) aid organizations:

1. Mercy Corps is one organization which addresses both short- and long-term issues, particularly those relevant to small-scale farmers in the region.  Here is a description of some of their work:

http://www.mercycorps.org/countries/ethiopia

http://www.mercycorps.org/hornofafricahungercrisis

http://www.mercycorps.org/countries/somalia

2. Another group is ACDI/VOCA (Agricultural Cooperative Development International/Volunteers in Overseas Cooperative Assistance) - they list their projects in Africa here

http://www.acdivoca.org/852571DC00681414/ID/ourwork_africa

There are many other excellent institutions seeking to help people in the Horn succeed - if you would like to write about them, please add a comment below.

I’d also like to plug the excellent work of a graduate student currently in Norway, on the subject of machine translation of the Somali language - check out his blog here http://donchaknow.com/blog/tags/somali/ (If you’re interested in contributing to machine translation efforts, then drop a line via a comment below.)

This blog has a small voice, but it joins a large chorus shouting for responsible action.  Remembering, of course, as the cliche goes, actions speak louder than words.

Babar is raised an only child by a single mother.  But he is praised among all of the other young elephants as being among the best.  He is a happy child with a comfortable life.

And then tragedy strikes.  Out for a stroll one day, he and his mother are attacked by a hunter.  The hunter guns down Babar’s mother, but Babar escapes.

He flees to the city, where he is taken in by an elderly, very rich woman, Camilla, who provides for him a luxurious lifestyle.

He remains in exile in the city until his cousins appear one day.  He reunites with them.  But his cousins’ absence in the forest raises alarms.  Bird scouts are sent out to discover the whereabouts of the young elephants.  One spies them in the city and relays their location to their family members.

While this is happening, the elephant king is poisoned by a mushroom.  We are led to believe that this is an accident - the king is simply out in the forest, on a stroll, eats the wrong mushroom, gets sick, and dies.

And so when Babar, together with his cousins and a small army of elephants consisting of the cousins’ mothers, return in force to the forest, bringing with them an automobile - a piece of technology hitherto unseen in the jungle - there is a power vacuum.

The elephant council deliberates, and the wise, aged councilman, Cornelius, proposes to crown Babar.  The council eagerly agrees!  And at this point, Babar announces that he will marry his own cousin, Celeste, and that she will be queen.  And everyone rejoices, we are told.  Again, the birds are used to deliver information, “inviting” all of the animals of the forest to the huge wedding and coronation ceremonies.  Babar and Celeste are crowned and become rulers of the forest.

Now, let us analyze what we have heard.  As a child, Babar seems to live in a very comfortable household - probably one of wealth - but where is Babar’s father?  Did he also meet a hunter in the forest?  And of what parentage is Babar?  Is there blue in his blood?

And the hunter - does he represent an unlucky role of the dice in the game of life, or an assassin sent to remove a possible challenge to the sole monarch?

As for Camilla’s generosity toward the orphan elephant, her actions are noble, but I nonetheless question the accidental nature of her meeting with Babar.  First, Babar is almost gunned down by a hidden assailant, and then, in exile, he is immediately discovered by a rich and powerful person who provides for him.  This from a human being, where we were to believe that humans posed the only danger to the elephants’ rule in the forest.  Is there something else to this story?  Does Camilla really have no idea that she is to become a regional power broker?

Babar lives luxuriously in the city, while his cousins stay in the forest.  Some years later, he happens upon them in the city (another suspicious chance encounter).  He finds them on the streets, completely naked.  It may be elephant custom to go through the world “au natural”.  Still, their state could also be read as speaking to their very dire circumstances - the proud family of Babar reduced to poverty, and seeking refuge in the city, where a now-wealthy Babar takes them in.

If this were not so, why did it take so long for anyone to come find Babar in the city?  Maybe they thought he was dead.  But there ought to have been witnesses when Babar’s mother was killed (if not, the murder really does look more like an assassination), and these witnesses should have reported that Babar escaped.  Clearly, in the birds, the elephants have a powerful means of determining the news and whereabouts of their subjects, both within their forest realm and beyond.  And these birds had no trouble discovering the ostentatious elephants, when told to do so.  Why were they not dispatched before?

And then there is the matter of the king’s death.  Poisoned by a mushroom.  Poison being the preferred weapon of the assassin since the institution of the wicked art.

And Babar, making a regal homecoming in the forest in his automobile, accompanied by a small force of elephants, just after the power vacuum is created, and aged Cornelius fortuitously having the epiphany that Babar is the logical choice for the king’s successor.  Cornelius, who, incidentally, is instantly made the king’s general and close advisor, because, as Babar remarks, he has “good ideas.”

But where are the former king’s own progeny?  And how is it that the elephant council so readily agrees to Babar’s ascending to the throne?  Perhaps our wise Cornelius was busy in preparing for Babar’s return?

And then Babar announces that he will marry…his cousin!  Yes, folks, that’s right: Celeste is Babar’s cousin!  Incest, befitting a story of old-style royal machinations.  Now, all power rests within (or is returned to?) Babar’s once-great family.

And a glorious wedding and coronation - a public display of the might and glory of the new elephant regime.  With Camilla presiding and proud.  With Cornelius, trusted advisor and head of internal affairs, smiling.  And the birds, singing happy tunes, circling overhead, spreading and gathering news.

All conjecture of course, and just for fun.  But whether we believe Babar’s rise to power is the result of a series of chance events, or of coups and counter-coups - whether Babar is the subject of destiny, or its master - we must remember the old adage that history is told by the victors.

[There is another tale about hunger - this one very sad - unfolding right now in Somalia - see a news article here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14175443 Any creative people, at MIT or elsewhere, who are interested in helping out, leave a comment below.  Or write one in solidarity.]
—
The Jackal’s Division

Once, Lion, Jackal, Hyena and some other animals went hunting together.  They killed a young male camel and Lion entrusted Hyena to divide up their prey.  Hyena liked boasting about things and although he was unsure about the responsibility that the king had placed on him, he announced the division, saying: “Half the camel belongs to the king and the other half will be shared by me, Jackal and the other animals.”
Lion lost his temper at this unfair decision and mauled the eye and cheekbone of the hyena with his claw.  He turned to Jackal and, salivating and with his eyes turning red with anger, said: “You divide the camel!”  Jackal, who was very astute, understood Lion’s intentions and resolved that the misfortune which Hyena suffered would not happen to her.  So then, settling down in front of Lion, she said to him: “Half the camel is for your lunch, a quarter is for your dinner, and an eighth is for your breakfast; the remaining portion can be shared by the other animals.”
When she finished the division she took two steps back and sat down among the companions whom she had condemned to hunger. Lion, smiling with pleasure, then said: “Who taught you such a good way of dividing it up?”
So she replied, “the mangled jaw of the hyena taught it to me.”  In this way Jackal and all the other animals chose hunger rather than a mangled jaw.
—
In the original Somali, which is written in a Latin script orthography, it goes like this
—
Qaybtii Dawaco

Beri baa waxaa wada ugaarsaday libaax, dawaco, dhurwaa iyo dugaag kale.  Waxay heleen qaalin baarqab ah, dhurwaa ayaana libaax u xilsaaray inuu qaalinka qaybiyo.  Waraabe wax ka faan jecele isagoo xilkii boqorku saaray la dawaqsan, buu qaybtii ku dhawaaqay oo yiri: “Qaalinka bar boqorka ayaa leh, barka kalana aniga, dawaco iyo dugaagga kale ayaa qaybsaneyna.”

Libaax gartaas gurracan uma dulqaadan karine, inta dharbaaxo il iyo goon fujiyay, buu isagoo indhihii cara la guduuteen oo calyeynaya dawo ku jeestay oo ku yiri: “Adigu qaybi qaalinka.”  Wax ka fiira dheere, dawo wey garatay danta libaax leeyahay; inaan masiibadii dhurwaa qabsatay oo kale ku dhicin beyna goosatay. Dabadeedna inta libaax hor kadaloobsatay bey ku tiri: “Qaalinka bar waad ku qadeyn, waaxi waa cashadaadii fallarna waad ku quraacan; inta soo hartana dugaagga kale ayaa qaybsanaya.”

Kolkay qaybti dhammeysay bey laba tallaabo qaadday oo qoladii ay qadoodiga badday dhex tu’atay.  Libaax oo farax la dhoola caddeynaya baa dabadeed yiri: “Yaa ku baray, qaybta sidaan u wanaagsan?”
Seyte: “Daanki waraabe oo dunsanaa baa i baray.”  Sidaas baana dawo iyo dugaaggii kalaba daan dunsan, qadoodi uga doorteen.
—
Here is a little Somali-English glossary for fun:

libaax=lion
dawaco=jackal
dhurwaa=hyena
quraacan=breakfast
qadeyn=lunch
cashadaadii=dinner-the-your
barka=half the
beri=time
dugaag=animals
kale=other
iyo=and
laba=two
baa i baray=taught me
dawaqsan=confused
waan ku jecelahay=i love you

Not long ago, a friend of mine - right here at MIT - stated to me, matter-of-factly and unemotionally, that I am not white, though she had an accurate knowledge of my ethnic background.  This is quite unlikely, unless she knows something about my family history that I don’t.  But while I found the mistake to reveal a surprising ignorance, I was certainly not insulted.  Maybe a little proud.  I got to be associated with the rich culture of another race without suffering the pain of discrimination and inequality, direct or indirect, within my society, or, indeed, the global civilization.

There is a poem by George Seferis - “Interlude of Joy” - in which he writes, “I don’t understand people: / no matter how much they play with colors / they are all black.”

I believe he wrote this while in exile in Africa from occupied Greece during the second world war.  I am reminded of it now.

I have no expert knowledge of the state of racial equality in this nation, or in our world, beyond that provided to me by my non-expert eyes and my non-expert ears and my intuition.  And my feelings.  It seems to me that there is progress to be made.  Still, think how far our minds can take us with just a few seconds walking (or running, in this case) in the other person’s shoes?

On Living
by Nazim Hikmet

I.
Living is no laughing matter:
you must live with great seriousness
like a squirrel, for example-
I mean without looking for something beyond and above living,
I mean living must be your whole occupation.
Living is no laughing matter:
you must take it seriously,
so much so and to such a degree
that, for example, your hands tied behind your back,
your back to the wall,
or else in a laboratory
in your white coat and safety glasses,
you can die for people-
even for people whose faces you’ve never seen,
even though you know living
is the most real, most beautiful thing.
I mean, you must take living so seriously
that even at seventy, for example, you’ll plant olive trees-
and not for your children, either,
but because although you fear death you don’t believe it,
because living, I mean, weighs heavier.

II.
Let’s say we’re seriously ill, need surgery-
which is to say we might not get up
from the white table.
Even though it’s impossible not to feel sad
about going a little too soon,
we’ll still laugh at the jokes being told,
we’ll look out the window to see if it’s raining,
or still wait anxiously
for the latest newscast…
Let’s say we’re at the front-
for something worth fighting for, say,
There, in the first offensive, on that very day,
we might fall on our face, dead.
We’ll know this with a curious anger,
but we’ll still worry ourselves to death
about the outcome of the war, which could last years.
Let’s say we’re in prison
and close to fifty,
and we have eighteen more years, say,
before the iron doors will open.
We’ll still live with the outside,
with its people and animals, struggle and wind-
I mean with the outside beyond the walls.
I mean, however and wherever we are,
we must live as if we will never die.

III.
This earth will grow cold,
a star among stars
and one of the smallest,
a gilded mote on blue velvet-
I mean this, our great earth.
This earth will grow cold one day,
not like a block of ice
or a dead cloud even
but like an empty walnut it will roll along
in pitch-black space…

You must grieve for this right now
-you have to feel the sorrow now-
for the world must be loved this much
if you’re going to say “I’ve lived”…

Readers at MIT: you may take out “The Short Reign of Pippin the IV” (and other excellent reading) from the Hayden Library (be sure to check the library’s hours, though - the library is not open as much as it used to be - (What an old fart I sound like!  But it’s true, what can I say?)).  Look for it in the basement.

—

Chill Mornings came, with heartening sunshine in the midday.  The leaves fell from chestnuts and plane trees, and the street-sweepers’ brooms were busy.

The king went back to his original disguise, which was himself.  Dressed in his corduroy jacket and espadrilles, he took to riding a motor scooter about the country.  After two falls he added a crash helmet to his costume.

One day he scooted to the little town of Gambais, famous for its perfect if partly ruined Chateau de Neuville.  Pippin ate his lunch beside the overgrown moat of the chateau.  He watched an elderly man feeling about in the reedy water of the moat with a long-tined rake.

The old man made contact with a hard and heavy object, and dragged it up the bank.  It was a mossy bust of Pan, horned and garlanded.  Only when the ancient struggled to lift Pan to a granite pedestal on the moat’s edge did the king get up and move to help him.  The two of them heaved the heavy statue up on its base, and then they stood back and regarded it, wiping their green and slippery fingers on their trousers.

“I like it facing a little more east,” the old man said.  The two of them edged it around.  Pippin with his handkerchief wiped the crusted Panic face until the feral lips and the sly, lecherous eyes were visible.

“How did he get in the moat?” the king asked.

“Oh, someone pushed him in.  They always do, sometimes two or three times a year.”

“But why?”

The old man raised his shoulders and spread his hands.  “Who knows?” he said.  “There’s people that push things in the moat.  Pretty hard work too.  There’s just people that push things in the moat.  See those other stands along there?  There’s a marble vase and a baby with a shell and a Leda in the water down there.”

“I wonder why they do it - angry, do you think?”

“Who knows?  It’s what they do - creep in at night.”

“And you always pull them out?”

“I’m late this year.  I’ve had too much to do, and rheumatism.”

“Why don’t you anchor the statues to the bases?”

“Why, don’t you see,” the old man explained patiently, “then they’d push the base in too.  I don’t know if I could manage to get them out then.”

The king asked gently, “Are you the owner here?”

“No, I’m not.  I live hereabouts.”

“Then why do you pull them out?”

The old man looked puzzled - searched for an answer.  “Why - I don’t know.  I guess there’s people that pull things out - that’s what they do.  I guess I’m one of that kind.”

The king stared at the green, slimy Pan.

The old man said helplessly, “I guess there’s people that do different things, and,” he added as though he had just discovered it, “I guess that’s how things get done.”

“Good or bad?” the king asked.

“I don’t understand,” said the old man helplessly.  “There’s just people - just what people do.”

Some of you may already know the “really” I mean.  It is stated in a monotone upper register, following a statement or action which the speaker finds to be bogus.  It is sometimes repeated for added umph.  I tend to perceive a nasal character to the voicing, but that may just be me.  The usage is especially frequent among younger speakers in their teens, twenties, and thirties, and has likely become widespread within the last five years, displacing the mid-to-low register glide formerly used for dismissing another’s argument.

The effect of the statement is to convey an air of incredulity, extreme disapproval, and sarcasm - to harshly attack and bash with a minimum effort.  Its terseness is its strength.  The asymmetry of a single-word disapproval contrasted with nearly anything else is significant; it does not acknowledge even the effort involved in the competing point-of-view, refusing further discussion.  It is an uncompromising statement, assuming that superiority of the counter-argument is obvious - as if to say, “I won’t even bother to argue why what you have said or done is wrong, because it is so glaringly obvious that it is just a waste of time, and by the way, you should be ashamed of yourself - I called your mom and she already told me she was ashamed of you, so bear that in mind.”

I think the reader has surmised that I am perturbed by the rising usage of the “really?” response.  I find it rude - excusable, at best, in response to other blatant rudeness as social punishment (though this is an infraction of the Golden Rule, and what may be a corrolary,  ;).  I submit that this usage of “really” could be entirely removed from the American lexical/inflexical vocabulary, with the potential result of improving overall mood without reducing the functionality of our communication.

Many would argue with me that this usage is not rude, or (more convincingly) that the average modern American English speaker is desensitized to levels of rudeness formerly unacceptable in common discourse.  Yet you will seldom (if ever) hear this statement uttered by a graduate student toward his or her supervisor in response to something the supervisor has said (though the converse of this observation may not be true).  The age gap may be a partial explanation for this.  But among peers, “really?” would not typically be tossed about between those who are not acquaintances, unless the disapproval is directed toward some distant, mutually-disliked third party, such as a recognizably unsavory political entity or a particular web browser.  Instead, it is a speech pattern communicated between friends who are too cool to care about one another, or who have perhaps become so close that the idea of insults meant for malice is, itself, a kind of inside joke.

Yes, this is all opinion, but you’re telling me that you’re bothered by seeing opinions stated as facts in a blog?  Really?

If I say the word, “Roma”, what comes to mind?  The capital of Italy?  Maybe “Romania”?  Or perhaps the Roma people.  (That is the proper name for the people known variously as the Travelers, Ciganies, Sintis, and Gypsies.)  What comes to your mind when you think of them?  Ask someone who grew up in the U.S. and he or she may paint a romantic picture of a Bohemian lifestyle, of passion, of finding peace in the long trek along the road of life.  The stuff of colorful dreams and reels of 35 mm widescreen, with the flamenco beat or the Balkan brass blaring in the background.

Ask a European and you will hear something very different.

Let’s see what Roma have to say about themselves - fast forward to some 35 mm (or its descendant).  Here’s a very entertaining video tour of the Balkan Roma settlement of Shutka, made by a resident of the town (with just the right sense of humor to tell his story).  (It’s a bit long - industrious graduate students might want to watch it in installments.)

Here’s an English-language documentary describing the situation of Roma living in the Balkans.

And here’s something special for any Greek-speaking readers of this blog (and something which touches my own experiences with the Roma).  It is a Greek-language video series entitled “The Greek Roma of Today” on the conditions of the more than 200 000 Roma people living in Greece:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YtE0L6pqKc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gjKK2HzrL8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xI2p_-QxLO4

The video was made by Savvas Argyrou in 2009-2010 for the Panteio University as part of a graduate program in political management.  It describes the history of the Roma migration, the economic hardships faced by the Roma community (for example, 60 % unemployment, according to the film), and the reasons for the cycle of poverty in which many Roma are trapped.  It describes the success of a novel community project built for Roma in the town of Sofades in the Karditsa praefecture of North-Central Greece, while exposing the failure of many other community projects.

(And here is a great YouTube channel filled with Greek-language mini-documentaries made by Gypsies in Greece - http://www.youtube.com/user/MetamorphosesProject which I just found 12 March 2012.)

Many Greeks, along with a large fraction of the rest of Europe, view Roma as good-for-nothings, ignorant, knowing only to beg and steal.  Others take a more sympathetic stance, but ultimately see a solution in absorbing, or dissolving, the Roma community into the local mainstream ethnicity.  The film exposes both of these views, and puts forward another thesis, especially in the context of education for Roma children: that Greece must acknowledge and embrace the multicultural reality of its modern population, and build a Greek state in which an identity besides “Greek” is also acceptable.

(My inner optimist forces me to write that this video is evidence of an awakening of this very idea in the Greek populace.)

I think that part of this process is to learn that these identities are not so different - that we have a lot in common.  So, dear readers, I invite you to watch with me this video of Roma high-schoolers from Hungary masterfully singing a nice tune (happens to be the Roma anthem).  I can’t imagine any community not wanting kids like these.  (Read about their school, the Gandhi School, here.)

Maybe I’ll tell you in another blog entry about some Roma youngsters I met this summer while visiting my family in Greece - I’d sure have liked for them to have just such an opportunity to show what they can do.

Plus if you don’t know what MEET is, this entry might not make sense to you, but not to worry!  Visit MEET’s website and read the blog entry referenced below!)

In 2008, I wrote this entry in my blog.  In it, I described, among other things, two little MEET stars, Aalaa and Aviv, and their quest to achieve equality and justice by adding the color, pink, to their lab activity in computer graphics à la Java.

This year, Aalaa and Aviv graduated from MEET, along with 24 of their classmates (the original class had 39).  As fortune would have it, I found myself sitting across from both of them in a cafeteria in Jerusalem this summer.  Granted, not a totally random coincidence, but the seating arrangement certainly wasn’t staged.  And the encounter looked like this and this and this.

“Hear no evil” in the last picture is instructor, Ben Chun, who, along with four other instructors, worked with Aviv and Aalaa and the rest of Year 3 this summer.

And here’s what they’re capable of after a few years at MEET: check out their pretty Pringles, totally tubular (that’s MEET lingo) final project:

http://www.okolico.com/

Don’t be shy!  Log in!

It’s a multicultural question-and-answer website, built by the this year’s MEET graduates.  I could explain it, but I think the students would do a better job.  So I’ll let them do it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nkwhptNxuk

The first student speaker is Lama; Liel speaks during the demo.

And here’s a video of the students talking about their experiences in MEET:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LM1SnMkFCdk

First, Melkar speaks, and then Yahia.  They then answer a few additional questions about the project.  (The fellow in the beginning who asks them about their experiences is me, and the girl to my right is Lamia, who graduated from MEET in 2009.)

And, uh, much as I like to keep the students in the lab all day… check out the dance performance at the Y3 students’ graduation ceremony - choreographed by Aviv and Nadine (and introduced by Aalaa and Yahia)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7SqmnfcCAc

MEET’s got talent!

Smiling faces; wonderful, smart, bright kids.  Such a pleasure for me to be with them.  A pleasure not without a little melancholy mixed in.  Because they have to grow up and I will be far from them and see them very occasionally, if at all.  And for other reasons, too, which are larger and uglier and unfair - unfair to them, to these kids.

I must be careful what I write because my MEET students will see.  At least, I hope they will.

(Yeah, guys, I know you only came here to see the picture of me with my mustache so you can stick it up on your (Facebook) wall!  Anyway, MEET students: write me if you see this, and write me if you don’t.)