[extropy-chat] A nonZen story (was: A Zen Garden)

[Amara Graps]

(originally I gave:
http://www.cea2.mdx.ac.uk/lceaSite/gallery/zengarden/index.htm  )

kevin at kevinfreels.com wrote:
>Way overrated.

Maybe, but I do think it was sweet.

>I think the bigger question is why Amara is having such a difficult
>time finding things to smile about.

See below

>Amara, life is both beautiful and ugly.

Yes... I know. I said something similar on another list some weeks back
("Of course the world is a lousy mess, but it's a beautiful lousy
mess.")

>When you find yourself feeling like this, you have been spending far
>too much time looking at the ugly. Take some time out and look at the
>beauty and try not to think about the ugly for a bit. :-)

For the last two months, I could do very little of my science work (with
impact on colleagues) because I was without my main working computer
from January 17 until March 9.

In some sense since January 17, I experienced a collusion of the worst
parts of United States Postal Service, Poste Italiane, CNR (Italian
research) science funding, and more ... well you decide.

When my main work computer broke (my ancient Mac G3 laptop), there was
no money at my institute to buy me a computer, so I borrowed money, got
on ebay,  won my auction for a very nice one-year-old Mac laptop from a
"Power Seller" vendor in California, I paid for fast mail, and it was
put in the mail USPS Global Express ("3-5 days to Europe") January 30.
For the next three weeks the box disappeared. United Postal Service says
it entered Europe February 2, but their web tracking system says it
entered February 17. My computer either partied in the Caribbean or in
Sardinia, and from its drunken stupor I suppose, it emerged on the 19th
of February in the Milano dogono (Customs) of the Poste Italiano, where
it had another holiday.

Since the vendor of my computer didn't write my phone or fax number on
the box, the usual procedure with customs in Italy is for the customer
to receive a card in the mail in a few days listing their questions,
which one should answer and fax back to them, and then you receive your
package. I never received a card (still) and so after one week, I
started asking my Italian friends to find me the fax number of the
Customs in Milano. They succeeded first with office numbers; of which
they got ten numbers, eight phone number were never picked up, and two
were always busy, so if you try for a few hours, you might get through,
which they did. The first couple of Customs people were angry for me
trying to speed up their normal procedure and refused to give us the fax
number and 'how did I know that my box was in their office?'. They said
that it was a 'secret' fax number that one cannot get unless one sees it
on the card/fax that one has  received from them. The last Poste
Italiano person was a friendly guy, who willingly gave the number when
he heard the story of the american astronomer who doesn't have her
computer to do her job because it is sitting in his Customs office. And
he gave this story to try to explain the situation in his office:

The US Postal Service since January has been (over)shipping many tens of
thousands of packages into the Italian postal system. They alerted the
Poste Italiano system last winter saying they would have an 'increase'
in packages of a few hundred extra per day, and instead it was a few
thousand extra per day. The Poste Italiano system opened up another
(private) department to try to handle it, but it was not enough and they
are buried in boxes. Why the sudden extra shipping? Because I'm
intrigued with this exotic twist to my box story, I asked my more
knowledgeable friends in foreign matters about this situation, who
hypothesize that the US military has rerouted their shipping to MidEast
troops, away from Germany and now through Italy.  In any case, I suggest
not to send packages through the United States Postal Service to Italy,
if you must, use DHL or UPS or another courier.

Six days after I faxed to the Milano Customs the information that they
wanted, my computer arrived. I needed to make a leap in operating
systems to one seven years after the one I was using previously, but
after a day of transferring many Gb of files and data and trying my most
valuable programs, I'm delighted to discover that 95% of my software
works, even alot of software that dates back to my first Macintosh in
1986. That's amazing to me. This story _does_ have a happy ending, even
though I'm now very *late* with all my commitments....

Amara



P.S. I would willing give ten computers for the missing box of Christmas
gifts from my family ("a box of love"). I suppose I should feel happy if
it arrives in time for my birthday/easter late March.......
-- 

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Amara Graps, PhD          email: amara at amara.com
Computational Physics     vita:  ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt
Multiplex Answers         URL:   http://www.amara.com/
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"Sometimes it takes a few more days due to customs clearance"
-- computer vendor to Amara