Monday, January 27, 2014

Glanfaidh Mé



Mé ag dul in aois arís
ag fás in mo shaol
Léi ag sroicheadh bís arís
ach mise liom féin

Má bhraitheann mé an íseal brí anuas orm arís
glanfaidh mé amach é mar a ghlan mé cheana féin
Má bhraitheann mé an doicheall anuas orm arís
Glanfaidh mé amach é mar atá ar bun agam anois

Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scáth ó mo chroí,
ó, glanfaidh mé amach iad
Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scamaill amach as mo shlí,
glanfaidh mé amach iad

Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scáth ó mo chroí,
ó, glanfaidh mé amach iad
Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scamaill amach as mo shlí
Go amach as mo shlí
as mo chroí

Do bhraith mé an íseal brí ag brú anuas orm arís
— glanfaidh mé amach é —
Bhraith mé doicheall an diabhail ag déanamh lóistín laistigh díom arís
— glanfaidh mé amach é —

Bhraith mé mo mhisneach ag ídiú uaim 's ag dul amú orm arís
— glanfaidh mé amach é —
Do bhraith mé an dorchadas do mo thimpeallú 's ag cur isteach orm arís
— glanfaidh mé amach é —

Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scáth ó mo chroí,
ó, glanfaidh mé amach iad
Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scamaill amach as mo shlí,
glanfaidh mé amach iad

Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scáth ó mo chroí,
ó, glanfaidh mé amach iad
Glanfaidh mé a leithéid de scamaill amach as mo shlí
Go amach as --

Beidh mé réidh, beidh mé romhat, beidh mé úr, beidh mé ullamh,
beidh mé socair ionam féin arís
Beidh mé léi, beidh mé leo, beidh mé leat, beidh mé lán,
beidh mé iomlán folláin arís

Beidh mé saor, beidh mé sona, beidh mé suan, beidh mé slán
ar ais chugam féin arís
Beidh mé clé, dheas, thuaidh, theas
Socair ionaim féin arís, dhé

Glan glan, glan arís, glan glan arís,
glan glan, go dtí go bhfuil mé sona sásta
Glan glan, glan arís, glan glan arís,
glan glan, go dtí go bhfuil mé slán sabháilte

Glan glan, glan arís, glan glan arís,
glan glan, go dtí go bhfuil mé sona sásta
Glan glan, glan arís, glan glan arís,
glan glan, glanfaidh mé amach mo shaol

Dia liom, Dia leat, Dia leis, Dia léi,
Dia leo, Dia libh, Dia linn uilig
Dia dhá réiteach, Dia dhá réiteach
Dia liom, Dia leat, Dia leis, Dia léi,
Dia leo, Dia libh, Dia linn uilig
Dia dhá réiteach, Dia dhá réiteach


Me, aging again
growing in my life
With her reaching peeks
but back by myself

And if I feel the depression back on top of me again
I’ll clean it out as I did before
If I feel the darkness down on me again
I’ll clean it out as I am doing right now

I’ll clean those shadows from my heart,
Oh, I’ll clean them out
I’ll clean those clouds out of my way
I’ll clean them out

I’ll clean those shadows from my heart,
Oh, I’ll clean them out
I’ll clean those clouds out of my way
Out of my way
and from my heart

I felt that down-pressure weighing on me again
— I’ll clean it out —
I felt the demon’s darkness taking up accomodation within me again
— I’ll clean it out —

I felt my courage leeking and going astray from me
— I’ll clean it out —
I felt the black encircling me and disrupting me again
— I’ll clean it out —

I’ll clean those shadows from my heart,
Oh, I’ll clean them out
I’ll clean those clouds out of my way
I’ll clean them out

I’ll clean those shadows from my heart,
Oh, I’ll clean them out
I’ll clean those clouds out of my way
Out of --

I’ll be there, I’ll be ahead, I’ll be fresh I’ll be ready,
I’ll be steady in myself again
I’ll be with her, I’ll be them, I’ll be with you, I’ll be full,
I’ll be totally ripe again

I’ll be free, I’ll be safe, I’ll be bright, I’ll be happy,
back to myself again
I’ll be left, right, North, South
Steady in myself again, yeah

So clean clean, clean again, clean it out again,
clean clean, until I am happy and contented
Clean clean, clean again, clean it out again,
clean clean, until I am safe and sound

So clean clean, clean again, clean it out again,
clean clean, until I am happy and contented
Clean clean, clean again, clean it out again,
clean clean, I’ll clean out my life

God bless me, God bless you, God bless him, God bless her,
God bless them, God bless y’all, God bless all of us
God resolve it, God resolve it
God bless me, God bless you, God bless him, God bless her,
God bless them, God bless y’all, God bless all of us
God resolve it, God resolve it

Friday, January 17, 2014

The Adventures of Roger Casement and Joseph Conrad

"You've deflowered me, Casement," lamented Conrad. "About Leopold II, about the Congo Free State. Perhaps even about life."

And, heaving a great sigh, he turned and was on his way. "Deflowered!" he exclaimed in one dramatic final flourish.

Roger watched as he went. Conrad had no idea what he was saying! Beside his sombre self, Roger tried unsuccessfully to stifle a chuckle. Later in the night, he reached once more for his diary.

Friday, January 10, 2014

A long walk in the Vaud country

 
 Picture from an earlier march
Date: 25 Jun 2013
Start: The Marcolet houses, Crissier, 0745h
End: The shore of Lac de Joux, Le Pont, 1825h
Distance 31.6 km; Elevation span 794m
Highest elevation: Col de Mollendruz 1187m


Elevation profile

Localities: Crissier / Bussigny-près-Lausanne / Bois-Gondou / Vufflens-la-Ville / Gollion / Senarclens / Chavannes-le-Veyron / Cuarnens / Mont-la-Ville / Le Pont (town in L'Abbaye commune)


 Natural landmarks and towns

 The catholic church of Saint-Pierre, Bussigny (earlier march)

From Bussigny looking to Bois-Gondou (earlier march)
Where a passing gramps called me out and said, laughing: "Paris is in the other direction!"
No luck there, gramps.
 The edge of Bois-Gondou
I realised that the Route Cantonale was not pedestrian friendly.
Never mind, I took a detour. The detour was also pretty dangerous and illegal.

 Bois-Gondou inside
A place where you greet everyone you see, the perfect EPFL antidote

 A big slug.

 Crawling out of Bois-Gondou, going to Vufflens

 Got out of Vufflens, going to Gollion.
Organic Farmer's market spotted.

 I had forgotten to take a picture of Vufflens from the inside

Goats coming to bother intruders

You have no idea what it was like to have nothing between you and those cows

Wordless staring

Senarclens.
Not much to do here, also not many people.
Where were all the people? 

A patch of sun.

In the town of Cuarnens.

Going into Bois-Sainte-Marie
Bois-Sainte-Marie also has a pilgrimage route 

Lausanne is by the lake

 Now I was in the mountains
Don't park tanks in the Juras!

The highest point

Almost there

Very handsome slug

Cows near Le Pont.
Here around 4-5 pm, the feeding time
Cows crowding around the paths
I had the nagging feeling that they would charge at me, but they moved aside politely when I came
then stared at me as I moved through the herd
Their bells made a terrible din, like a gamelan apocalypse


Legs on fire at this point, but very happy

A reward for the 32km long walk

Le Pont

This way is home (by train!)

Monday, January 06, 2014

Prof János Pach's Bonus Questions

 
Old Königsberg and its bridges

A compilation of my answers in Graph Theory class:

Question from Session 2: Two people perform a card trick. The first performer takes 5 cards from a 52-card deck (previously shuffled by a member of the audience), looks at them, keeps one of the cards and arranges the remaining four in a row from left to right, face up. The second performer guesses correctly the hidden card. Prove that the performers can agree on a system which always makes this possible, and devise one such system. Answer

Question from Session 3: Baron Münchhausen is very proud: "I chose a huge set of positive integers smaller than 2013, and yet among any four elements there are two such that one is divisible by the other." He went on boasting to his stupefied audience: "I bet no one could ever find such a set with more elements." However, the infamous storyteller was exaggerating again. The set he had found was rather small. Help him find a set that could save his honor. Answer

Question of Session 5: Dwellers of Flatplanet are hostile creatures. Their countries don't even share borders, but are well separated from each other. There are six countries in total, three of them are the Allies, and the other three are, not surprisingly, the Axis. For strategic reasons, each country is topologically connected. An embedded correspondent is informing us that the shortest distance from any of the Allies countries to any of the Axis countries is equal to 1 flatkilometer (a unit of length widely used on Flatplanet). Could she be right? Answer

Question from Session 7: There are 1900 one-Swiss-franc coins lying on an enormous table. Some of them might touch each other, but they don't overlap. Show that you can always choose 475 of them such that no two chosen coins touch each other. Can you always choose 601 such coins? Answer

Problem from Session 10: Prove that if mankind will live forever, then there is a woman alive today who will have a daughter who will have a daughter who will have a daughter... for eternity! Answer

Sunday, January 05, 2014

Criminality

Two months earlier, the makeshift prison near a trading post in the colony had been stormed by a team of seven native men. Women and children, of three villages' worth of wives and children of indentured native labourers, had been interred in the prison as hostages. The five guards on duty that night had had their necks twisted as the inmates were stolen into the night. The local army garrison was called in and within two hours the barges that transported the fugitives were ambushed. In the kerfuffle, five of the conspirators, including the ringleader, were apprehended. The next day, they would be shot.

At the colonial capital, the warden watched the ringleader. The ringleader knew his sentence and that it would be before any trial, but seemed indifferent to his fate. The warden threw him a smirk, unfurled the day's papers that he had tucked away under his arm, and read the headlines out to him.

"From the opinion columns: Jungle prison raid not justifiable by law," he read. "Any threat to the harmony of the society in the Colony must be swiftly and severely dealt with." Thousands of miles away, respectable townspeople read the same columns and nodded to each other in agreement, finding it easy enough to accept an image of unscrupulous, thieving natives before getting on to their daily business.

"This is criminality, pure and simple," interjected the ringleader. "did they remember to put that sentence into it?"

"This is criminality, pure and simple," opined the director of the rubber trading company at the other end of the world, after hearing news of the audacious prison break and pressured to give his comment to the reporters. "It must be punished to serve as a warning to the others, and reasonable policies instituted to prevent its relapse." His audience murmured approvingly, happy that someone is out to speak the truth.

The warden's eyes met the ringleader's, and they laughed. "Yes, they did," replied the warden, as the rubber baron's comments were printed on the adjoining page of the warden's papers. Later in the night, the warden offered to join the ringleader in his last meal. They toasted every criminal: every murderer, insurgent and malingerer that walked under the sun, and proceeded to drown themselves in generous helpings of liquor and sarcasm.