Wan Ruminations

Trying to wrap up

2010-06-28T23:28:00.000-07:00

Sitting at home in Bakersfield, trying to wrap up the last of the applications (JJF), but since my mind has been really distracted, I'm trying to at least be distracted by doing something useful, namely, the accounting for expenditures done in Haiti.

Of the 3 kids, I've now sent out AV and MJ's applications by Fedex, and emailed the pdf's to someone who'll send them on to the appropriate government office. JJF's application is the last of the 3, and I must admit, one that has been hard to focus on. Distraction is my ever present enemy.

My sister called me the other day and asked how AV was doing, and I have to admit that I don't know. Since that scary voicemail a week and a half ago, I haven't heard anything good or bad. I hope that means he's doing ok.

Hopefully in the next day or two, I'll finish JJF's application, and turn in the accounting, and get on with preparing for an entirely different kind of work in Boston for the next 6 weeks, which will be consuming in its own way.

Still, I've stayed in touch with By, and I hope to be able to help or advise him with anything that comes up while I'm there.

Related to this, it turns out that I've escaped two burglaries. When I got back to Bakersfield, my roommates mentioned to me that the house we're renting was burgled (is that the right word?) recently, and that my roommate's laptop was taken. They didn't know if anything was taken from my room, but they did notice that the door was open, and they told me they'd left it closed the whole time I was in Haiti. I haven't noticed anything missing yet. (I left my room in a rather chaotic mess when I left for Haiti, so I have to kind of wonder if the burglars opened my door, looked inside, and realized that finding anything of value in all the mess wouldn't be worth the time.)

Anyway, it also turns out that a week ago, By came to the house and worked there during the day, along with the house staff. They left in the afternoon and locked everything, including the doors to the house and the gates to enter the premises. When By returned Tues morning, the house had been burgled. The office laptop, the house electrical inverter, and a container of gasoline were taken. Fortunately, they didn't find the other valuables that were there.

The security guard we hired works 6 nights a week, but he has Mondays off. It kind of makes us wonder whether folks in the neighborhood have been watching our comings and goings and knew that that evening was the time to break in. Or maybe it was an inside job. Hard to know.

Alright, need to get back to the work. I do intend to write more stories and observations from Haiti in the next couple of weeks, if for no other reason than to preserve my memories of the trip, and to think through them.

Please do keep praying for the 3 kids: AV, MJ, and JJF, that I'd finish JJF's application, and that the powers-that-be would look favorably and quickly on their applications, and that God would preserve their bodies, especially in the next few weeks.

Prayer request for a heart

2010-06-18T07:17:00.000-07:00

I wasn't able to finish the applications to the US government to allow 3 kids with medical issues to enter the US. But I'm really close, and I think I can assemble everything in the next few days and send them out by email.

I arrived last night in LAX. Even going inside the airport in Port-Au-Prince was like entering another world. Large open space, clean airport lounge to wait for those waiting for flights, restrooms available to any inside that had working toilets and handsoap.

Anyway, I was picked up by S (who had flown to LA a few weeks before), and a little while into the drive, she let me listen to a voicemail she'd gotten about 1 of the 3 kids, AV, the same baby mentioned in the previous post.

AV has a serious heart valve issue and needs surgery badly. Because of his condition, his heart works a lot harder than normal, and any added strain could cause him to die. He's also severely underweight, which is apparent from his numbers (at 6 months old he weighs 7 lbs 12 oz), but also visually apparent by comparing him with his twin brother, who doesn't have any health issues and has been growing steadily.

The voicemail said that AV's condition has gotten a lot worse very recently. He really needs to get surgery soon. He's started to have rapid breathing because of fluid buildup in his lungs. If you're reading this today, Fri 6/18, or within a week of today, please pray that God would preserve his life, his heart, his body.

His application is really close to being done, but there may also be another way to get him to the US, which others are working on. Also, we'll need permission from the Haitian government to allow him to leave Haiti. So pray as well that we can get permission from both countries for him to travel very soon.

Thanks for your prayers.

Final push

2010-06-16T04:21:00.000-07:00

My time in Haiti is drawing to a close, and there's still lots to do, some of which I hope to do in CA by email. But much of it really ought to get done today.

Please pray that I'd be able to finish well here. There's a lot on my plate, and I'm starting to become forgetful of details, little things here and there. And feeling a little anxious. And you never know in Haiti how much circumstances will allow you to get done in a day.

One little incident I had last Fri. There's a baby AV, who has a congenital heart defect, and needs an operation to fix it. He's 1 of 2 twin brothers, and his twin has been growing and is healthy, while he is severely underweight and needs a lot of care.

So his mom went to a particular orphanage to ask for help, and the directors decided to help. There's a nurse from UCLA who's been living at the orphanage for a number of months, and she's been helping to care for him. Still, as far as I know, there's been no legal documentation to show that AV is in the orphanage's care. He's living there, and his mom comes by every once in a while to see him.

They asked us to help with arranging Haitian and US permission to go to the US for heart surgery. Most of the application is done--a hospital and doctor in PA agreed to treat him for free, and there was a host family found that agreed to care for him during his stay in the US (most likely a few months).

For various reasons, I wanted AV's mom to sign a Power of Attorney (POA) form. I couldn't have the orphanage director do it, because he didn't have legal custody of AV in Haiti.

Through various conversations and questions and emails, I heard that a PA hospital would probably need a notarized signature on a POA form. I also heard (turned out I misunderstood) that a particular type of national ID card (there are 2) for AV's mom would be needed for a notary.

I'd received a 3 page POA form in English from another orphanage director, but also wanted a French translation, because any official business in Haiti is done in French. And I wanted her to understand what she was signing.

So I emailed someone at the orphanage to see if they had a French version. About a week later, I got an email with 2 jpeg images of 2 pages in French. Looking at the formatting, I figured out that I didn't have a French translation of the 1st page.

So, I used Google Translate on the first page of the English version to get a loose translation into French, and asked By, our Haitian staff worker, to revise it. And also arranged a day for us to meet AV's mom, so that we could take her to a notary.

That done, I realized that AV's mom might not be able to read French. Or might not be able to read at all (remember, about 80-90% don't finish high school). So I prepared a Creole translation, again with Google Translate, so that someone could at least read out loud the Creole version to her.

So, with English, French, and Creole versions of the 3 page POA form, I drove to the orphanage. Turns out AV's mom had a CIN, one type of ID card, but not a NIF, which was the type of ID I believed would be necessary for a notary.

Well, the reasons I had for wanting her to sign didn't absolutely require notarization. So we decided to go ahead with just a signature, along with a witness signature.

We decided to go over the form at the orphanage, at the kitchen table. The nurse was there, and a 17 year old Haitian guy (one of the orphanage kids) was there to translate for us.

I had to leave to take care of something else, and came back about 45 minutes after they'd started. The nurse had explained the basics of the medical procedure to AV's mom through the interpreter, and when I arrived, she had started on the beginning of the POA form.

Remember this is a 3 page form, single spaced, detailing all the bad things that might happen, and saying that the person signing wouldn't hold the person who was granted the Power of Attorney responsible for the bad results of any medical decisions he or she made.

So a little bit into it, we get to the word "sue", and the translator talks to her in Creole, and she replies, and the translator asks, "What is 'sue'?"

Hmm, something that was never explicitly covered in law school (or at least if it was, I didn't remember).

So I explain: "it means you won't ask a court to force these people to give you money if something goes wrong with AV."

Her response: "I trust in God's hands. Whatever He wants will happen to AV."

A little while later, we get to the end of the form, and we ask her to sign. She doesn't know how to sign her name. So I ask her to put an "X" on the signature line. She's not so sure about that. So we show her on another piece of paper how to draw an X, and she copies that slowly on the English form. Then does it again for the French form.

Clash of cultures: American medical liability forms and an illiterate Haitian woman's faith in God's hands for her son.

Anyway, please pray for me, especially for today (Wed).

First contact and celebrity gossip

2010-06-06T20:32:00.000-07:00

My last post triggered a number of responses expressing concern for my safety. I very much appreciate the sentiment, and safety and health are certainly things for which we appreciate your prayers.

But let me hasten to add that really, much of the Port-Au-Prince area is safe. Like any big city, there are "good" parts of town, upscale neighborhoods and such and there are bad parts of town. Also, there are areas that aren't safe at night, but that are fine during the day. We've been greatly blessed in having good staff/translators who have advised and directed us on safety issues. Without them, we probably would've gotten into a lot of trouble.

Another factor also is just the large number of expats around. The UN has a very strong presence here. And all sorts of NGO's are around, including the Red Cross (from various countries), USAID, and a host of others.

Side note: a lot of them have put their logo on the tarps and tents they've distributed, so as we drive by a tent city, you can see which NGO's have been particularly well represented on any stretch of road. There's also lots of tarps without any logo. So the logo on the tarp is kind of like corporate branding, but in the disaster relief context.

Anyway, I suspect that for some of the neighborhoods we've gone to, we're the first white people ("blancs") they've ever seen. And yes, for them, Asians are blancs, just like Europeans. And from a safety perspective, this makes them curious (rather than hostile or such. This tends to be more the case in the rural areas rather than the urban ones, though there are also many urban areas where this holds.

And we try to wave and smile as we pass by, especially when we go past kids. It's kind of heartwarming to see how often they respond by waving back at us, though it's also something I've become desensitized to.

Asians are far rarer than Europeans, and while they're both in the same "blanc" category, Haitians do recognize the differences. And, judging from the depth of the curiosity I see in some faces, I suspect I may be the first Asian face they've seen in person.

Though of course, they've watched tv and movies, and sometimes they point at me and say (either to themselves or others): "Jackie Chan!" If you've ever met me in person, you'll know that I look nothing like Jackie Chan aside from us both being East Asian. (Notwithstanding any wishes on my part for anything approaching his athleticism.)

For some reason, when S and R were here before me, they'd point at R (who is Asian), and kind of wonder about her. And somebody (don't know if it was Bl, or S or someone else), started the rumor that R was the sister of Jackie Chan. And so S, especially in the past few weeks, has furthered the rumors and misconceptions by telling people that I'm the brother of Jackie Chan.

It's kind of funny, but it's also a little strange that I might be the only Asian person they'll ever see in person in their entire lives.

I suspect R got back at S by telling some Haitian kids at MOH that S was "Madame Brad Pitt". Some at MOH realized that S wasn't married, so then they thought she was Brad Pitt's girlfriend. Or other girlfriend. Or "other other" girlfriend. (Indeed, the teens here keep up with American celebrity gossip to a surprising extent.)

And apparently, she was asked by one of them why he hadn't married her. ("S, if I was Brad Pitt, I'd marry you!") S replied by saying that she'd been asked, but she wasn't sure he was the right guy for her. This provoked surprise and amazement--the concept that a woman might choose to reject an offer of marriage from Brad Pitt was a shock. And from other conversations, it seems that in Haitian culture, once a woman accepts a guy as her boyfriend, she's already almost implicitly agreed to marry him if he ever asks. So it would be somewhat surprising for her to reject a marriage proposal from any boyfriend, let alone one from Brad Pitt.

Kind of funny, but the fact that it was kinda sorta believed by these kids indicates how little contact they've had with Americans/blancs:

"You're from America--do you know ______ (insert name of celebrity)?"

What not to do in Haiti

2010-06-03T21:34:00.000-07:00

S, By, and I visited a sort of medical halfway house for kids today. It's neither an orphanage nor a creche, but rather a place that's trying to help families in the community take care of their kids. We've been there before on several occasions, but today we heard a story. Before I tell that story here, a bit of background on the house.

They operate on a really good model. The first step is that parents who have kids with medical needs visit.

Their first response is to help the parents take care of their own kids. They do so by providing medications, driving the family to a clinic or hospital, helping them cover costs. They'll also provide education and training to the parents in how to administer drugs or such, as needed.

If the parents (or usually, just the mom) can't handle it (or if the kid's health deteriorates), then she's allowed to stay at the house with her sick kid, and the staff help the kid get the treatments needed.

If this isn't possible or isn't working out, then the parent leaves the kid at the house with an understanding that they need to make periodic visits and the kid will be returned once their medical condition no longer requires the care provided by the house.

Most of the time it works out, and often the stays are a couple of months or so. However, in some cases, the parents agree to this, say that they'll visit, and then walk away and never return. These are the sadder cases. For a handful of cases, this may have been related to the social stigma of HIV/AIDS. (Parents who have an HIV positive child don't want their neighbors and community to find out. And the needed drugs often have to be administered at particular time intervals, in particular dosages. So the mom often decides to simply abandon her child). For other situations, there are all sorts of other reasons why they do so.

But in any case, it's a good model. Stands somewhat in contrast to orphanages in that the goal is to empower parents to take care of their kids, rather than providing a place for parents to give up some or all of their responsibility for their children.

Anyway, unrelated to the above is the story I meant to tell. It's a story we heard from a guy who was there at the house. Within 20 minutes of meeting him, we hear this story from him.

He tells us that a pastor left a bank to go to the Nissan car dealership to buy a car. He was with a bodyguard. Group of guys stopped him on the street just outside the dealership, killed him and the bodyguard, took the money and left.

We're all a little shocked. The guy was a pastor. And he had a bodyguard. And he was robbed and killed just outside the place where he was going to buy a car, which is a busy open public street that all of us have been on many times in the past.

Later, in the car, By (our Haitian staff, who also translates when needed) tells us that he'd heard the story before from others. And he was familiar with this type of story, because it's happened a number of times. What he thought had happened was this:

The pastor had gone to the bank to withdraw the money to buy the car (don't know how many thousands of dollars it was). What almost certainly happened was that an unscrupulous bank employees saw the amount of the withdrawal, and made a call on his cell phone to someone outside, gave him a description of the pastor, and told him that this guy had a lot of cash on him. The person who received the call gathered some friends or gangsters or such, took their guns, and followed after the pastor and the bodyguard. They probably killed the bodyguard first, then killed the pastor, took the money, and got away.

The 3 expats in the car had different responses. Dr. M, who was with us at the time, remarked that it sounded like something the mob in a particular country would do. She's from a country geographically close to that country, and has traveled much around the world. Still, it was a little bit surprising to S and I that this was her reaction.

S thought about how it sort of showed that there was good reason for the fear and suspicion that she's been told about by locals, and that she's seen in different ways herself. This is a big underlying component of the culture.

She also commented that the Lord seems to have put in her in different cultures where she's had to actively resist different cultural currents. In the city she's from, she feels that materialism is a huge thing, and shI e saw it, and really felt she had to actively work at not becoming the same way. And perhaps here, she'll need to work at not becoming fearful, suspicious, distrustful of others (while at the same time trying to learn to live as others do, including taking appropriate precautions).

It also reminded her that there's some amount of money that people would be willing to kill for. I asked By whether he knew whether or not the bodyguard had a gun. By didn't know, but thought it wouldn't have made a difference even if he did. The people who killed the pastor and the bodyguard wouldn't have been deterred by a bodyguard with a gun--they would've killed him first, to eliminate the threat and to make it harder for the pastor to communicate with others, then probably demanded the money from the pastor.

I thought of how the problem came from the failure of a good consumer financial system. The banks, which you can see every once in a while on the street, always have huge long lines. There's no checking system that I've seen, and there's not many places that take credit cards (restaurants and stores for expats being the exception). Wire transfers are possible, though (don't know whether the percentage they take for the transfer is a reasonable rate or not). Still, this pastor wanted to buy a car, and decided (and apparently, from By, isn't the only one who has done so) that he'd withdraw cash from a bank to buy the car.

I thought a bit about why credit cards and checks aren't used here. One of the contributing factors, I'd guess, is the lack of street addresses. You can't really send bills to people here, because there's no postal system, no mailboxes.

Anyway, I thought the takeaway message from the story is that carrying large amounts of cash with you is really not a good idea in Haiti. Letting untrustworthy people know that you're carrying large amounts of cash is an even worse idea.

Update excerpt

2010-05-26T18:18:00.000-07:00

A quick note: this past Saturday, I went to the airport to pick up S (who had been gone for about 2 weeks), and her sister Z. It's been really good to have other people around, fellow expats and most importantly, fellow believers. It's also good because they're early risers, which has helped restore my earlier sleep schedule. I'd been drifting toward sleeping later and waking later, which had contributed to some general laziness.

Z will stay the rest of the week, then go back to the US. She's never been to Haiti before, so it's interesting to hear her perspective as she gets introduced to various facets of life here. And I'm no longer the person here who's been in Haiti for the shortest time.

I sent an email the other day to someone who asked for an update, and I thought I'd include it here, with some minor editing:

It's been a little more than a month since I've arrived in Haiti, and I've got a little less than a month to go. In some ways I think I've adjusted well: I've learned to drive on Haitian roads, speak some very basic Creole, and relate to my coworkers, both American and Haitian. My living conditions are fairly good relative to life in California, which is very very good in Haiti.

Still, I earnestly hope you'll keep me and my coworkers in your prayers--we're still trying to figure out our role as we learn new things and figure out how to relate to a particular government agency which for certain reasons has been making things difficult. And getting anything done in Haiti can often be really slow, which can be a little discouraging.

Please pray for Spirit-led living, divine wisdom, and encouragement for us. Lift us up before the throne, especially as we try to lift up various things before Him. Many thanks for your prayers.

More pics from Haiti

2010-05-24T21:25:00.001-07:00

That one above is me standing under an air conditioner. There's a wall unit in one room in the house, and it only works when city power is on. I'm not sure I ever thought before of how glorious God is for giving us the gift of air conditioning.

Some of the pics above are from the countryside. I've heard it said that there are 2 Haitis: 1 is the Haiti of the cities, and the other is the Haiti of the countryside. There's a pretty big difference between the two in terms of how people live and think, and what opportunities they have.

Rebel Against the Status Quo

2010-05-21T19:08:00.000-07:00

Apologies for not having written sooner. It's been a difficult couple of weeks.

As I mentioned in the last post, R left on a Thursday, and Bn and S left a few days later. Which left me as the only expat in the house. And the only one sleeping in the house, other than the dog, Spikey.

A few comments on the living situation. Apparently, Bn, S, and R had been staying at MOH from Jan to the end of March, but they were paying a rather considerable amount for rent. So around the end of March, they found a house in the city to rent.

The owners of the house are a Haitian couple, a doctor and lawyer, upper middle class. They have 3 staff/servants: a cook, a housekeeper, and a gardener. They also have a semi-wild dog, Spikey. Apparently, when the lease started, the organization I'm working for got the staff and the dog, too.

That's all to say that during the day, I've had all 3 of the house staff and By around as company. And many days, I had By with me in the car as we went around town meeting people or running errands. By and the house staff are all Haitian, and By is the only one fluent in English.

At night, on the other hand, it's been just me, Spikey, and Jesus around. It was a little scary, especially the first few nights.

Before they left, R asked whether I'd be ok by myself at the house. I'd confidently said sure, thinking about the 2 years I lived in a single apartment unit by myself. But thinking back now, that was in an apartment complex, with a nighttime security guy for the apartment. And if there'd been any serious issues, I could have called 911, or gone to my neighbors.

Here, it's a different feeling. Especially with the warnings that different Haitians have told me, warnings of how there's a huge divide between rich and poor in Haiti that leads to some real resentment by the poor. My coworker S has commented on this, that she feels one of the huge spiritual influences in Haitian society is a spirit of fear and suspicion.

Related to the idea of class struggle, I met some guys who work for a fairly big NGO that specializes in disaster relief and development work.

I asked them what they thought the biggest problems in Haiti are. They mentioned two. The first is that Haitians are having too many kids and aren't able to take care of them. The economy and educational system aren't able to support so many (the percentages of those unemployed and of those uneducated have varied a little depending on who I've asked, but all the numbers I've heard are sky high). And at a family level, rather than a government or systemic level, it's a big cultural difference that here, a parent's obligations to his or her kids are quite different than in many other places. I'll explain that later in this post, but for now, I don't wish to digress too much.

But I'll digress slightly here. I asked a Haitian guy later about this, and he commented that it's part of the culture to have lots of kids. There's a Haitian proverb: "Children are a cane to lean on in one's old age." In other words, while Americans have social security and retirement accounts, in Haiti (and many parts of the world), you have kids because you expect them to take care of you later when you're old.

Anyway, the second big problem they mentioned is corruption. And the weakness of the rule of law. They commented that there's corruption in every country, anywhere you go. But in places that have a strong rule of law, corruption is limited. (I think of the internal affairs of a police department, internal auditors, corporate whistleblowers, and such.) But in places without a strong rule of law, it's more about who are the people with power, and how they can be influenced, persuaded, bribed. And in Haiti, it's so pervasive that it's just accepted--knowing people, making connections, giving money to contacts so that they'll help you, it's just how things are done.

They made this fascinating comment that in Haiti, as in a lot of countries, there's a very small, very rich, and very powerful minority. They control the wealth, and they control all the institutions in the country. In other words, they own the system. And on the other hand, there's a huge majority of the population that's very very poor. And in many other countries, when capitalism, free markets and such are introduced, the vast majority who are poor becomes somewhat better off, and the rich minority become richer. Way, way, richer.

So at some level, those who are rich are sometimes presented with a choice. Ok, you're rich now, but if you want real wealth, change the system so that everyone can benefit. In a number of countries, they choose to go for the vast wealth. But in Haiti, the answer has always been no. They don't want things to change because although they might become vastly more wealthy, they would lose control of the system. And they'd rather keep that.

Anyway, I'll add some comments on that first problem (the digression I previously avoided), which relates to family structure and the cultural obligations of parents to their kids in Haiti. In the US, parents either keep their kids (care for them, provide for them, etc), or give them up (either by giving them up for adoption or abandoning them). And we've got adoptions, foster care, and orphanages for kids whose parents are dead. (Question, if a kid's parents are unknown, does anyone know if they go to foster care or to an orphanage?)

In Haiti, things are structured differently. Unemployment here, by most accounts is somewhere on the order of 70%. So parents are often unable to provide. Biological parents (in most cases, just the biological mom) are willing to let their kids stay for extended periods of time (maybe even permanently) at "orphelinat." Orphelinat are orphanages, institutions where large groups of kids are raised, sheltered, fed, sometimes schooled. But these kids may or may not have living parents. They may or may not have been abandoned. Parents may just feel that they can't provide for their kid for the next few months, or year, or whatever, and so they place them at the orphelinat, but maybe they'll come and visit once in a while. And at any time they want, they can come back to the orphelinat and take their kids back.

There's also another institution for kids: creches. When a kid is sent to a creche, everyone knows it's for the purpose of adoption (which is pretty much always an international adoption in Haiti). So the kids at a creche are those who were completely abandoned by their parents and found on the street, or are the ones where mom (and maybe dad) gave a legal statement before a judge saying they understood they were giving up all parental rights over their kid.

These are the institutions that care for kids. Societally, there's also a lot of noninstitutional care of kids. There's some stuff with extended families, and lots of stuff with a sort of informal adoption, which almost always takes places with girls, not boys. And the dark side, restaviks, poor girls taken by well off families to be house servants/slaves in a pretty exploitative relationship. (I don't want to digress too much here, so perhaps I'll explain why later, or ask me if you're really curious.) I haven't heard a lot about how widespread prostitution is, so I don't know how often that happens, but I've certainly heard some anecdotes that have me shudder.

But I digress yet again. What came to mind while I was writing this post (and what led to the title) is an article I once read, part of the reading for the Perspectives course. The article is titled: "Prayer: Rebelling Against the Status Quo" (It's a really great article, and I just googled and found it

here:

It's 3 pages. By all means, if you at all have the time, read it first, before reading on below.

It describes petitionary prayer in a new light. When the persistent widow comes to the unjust judge and pleads for justice, she's refusing to accept her current situation.

And the article relates that to us, when we're confronted with the fallen state of the world. Do we come to terms with things as they are, or do we refuse to accept what is wrong, unjust, that which is opposed to God?

All too often, for me it's the former, and not the latter.

I guess the use of the word "rebelling" in that context has such an interesting twist. I normally think of someone who's lawless, a kind of anti-authoritarian, maybe an anarchist or something. Satan was the first rebel: "better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven" from Milton's Paradise Lost.

But those who pray, who petition God to change things, who refuse to accept the injustice of things--they're rebels of another sort. Rebels against the world, the system set up by that first rebel.

Kind of turns things on their head, no?

He's with the guy with the white beard

2010-05-14T19:17:00.000-07:00

It's been a different week this past week. And the week before, in a different way.

I'll start with last last week, which is when Bn, who's the president of the foundation, came to Haiti. He's also S's dad. And both S and R anticipated his coming with a mixture of 1) gladness, since S wanted to see her dad, and R really likes and respects him, 2) relief, since there were some big things going on that he needed to be apprised of and make decisions about, and 3) expectation that we would be going at a much faster pace, since they expected him to be a mover, a shaker, someone who gets a lot done and pushes those around him to get a lot done.

And yes, it was. Bn's trip was a week, and it was an intense week. He's a big guy, in his 50's or 60's, with a large white beard. (R said that at some orphanages, kids will just start calling him "Papa Noel" which is Father Christmas, or Santa Claus.)

Bn has been to Haiti many times before the earthquake, and shortly after it, he was here for something on the order of 6 weeks. So he knew almost everyone that I'd been meeting and getting to know during the time I've been here, and he knew them far better than I did.

A few days before he arrived, S had been feeling sick with some gastro-intestinal malady. So that Sun morning, R got a list of her symptoms, and we drove to MOH to see if we could ask Dr. M about her condition, and see if she could give us something to help her. We got there, found Dr. M, and she was willing to do even more than we asked: she wanted to come and see S and examine her personally (basically, she wanted to make a housecall). And MOH, remember, is more than an hour away from the house.

But Bn's flight was arriving that afternoon. So she gathered some medicines, then came with R and me to the airport to pick up Bn. We got there, and he was waiting by the side of the road with a single carry-on. R greeted him, gave him a hug, and then asked "Do you want to drive?"

Now mind you, we knew that Bn had left his house around 5 or 6 am that morning, been on something like 3 different flights to get to Port Au Prince, and it was around 4 pm when we saw him. So I thought it was a joke.

But no. We put his carry-on in the back, he takes the keys, and the rest of us climb in and he drives to the house. (Through the streets of Port Au Prince, which are slightly less crazy than usual because it's Sunday afternoon.)

We get to the house, we all see S, who's in bed, greetings are exchanged, Dr. M examines S and tells her which pills to take, and then Bn puts his stuff in one of the rooms. Bn enters the room, and says, "let's add prayer to the treatment here." He kneels by the side of the bed where his daughter is lying, and we all pray for a bit.

We then talk for a little longer, then Bn and I drive Dr. M back, while R stays with S. It's about 5 or 6 in the evening.

The entire hour plus trip to MOH, Bn and Dr. M talk about what's been happening since he left, and how people are doing, and who's doing what. We get there, and BJ, the president of MOH is around and says hi. Conversation ensues between Bn and BJ. They arrange to talk at greater length on Tues. I follow Bn as he checks on D and J, to see if they're around and awake, but they're not. Then Bn wants to check on a fence that he's helping to put up on MOH's campus. We drive around MOH checking on the fence. Then Bn wants to check on C and S, 2 guys that Bn sent to Haiti to help MOH put up the fence and some buildings. We find people who know where they're staying, so we drive there, and Bn talks with C and S for a while.

It's around 10 pm, and I'm fairly tired at this point. But Bn is indeed a dynamo, and talks most of the way back to the house.

Side note: during the drive, we're on National 1, the main freeway in Haiti that connects the northern parts with Port Au Prince and the southern parts, presumably. Bn tells me that he heard that when we drive that road at night (and really most roads in Haiti at night), we should not stop for anyone. The reason is that there are stories that some Haitians deliberately pretend to be in distress on the road, try to flag down expat drivers passing by, and then kidnap them and/or rob them. Realize, too, that it's a lot easier to try to flag a passing motorist here because of the many large and deep potholes in the roads here, and the many many unpaved roads here.

Anyway, we get home around 11 or so, and then Bn helps pour some gasoline in the generator, and checks it out, starts the generator, and we all go to sleep.

So that's kind of what Bn is like. Lots of energy, is very comfortable speaking his mind, and also listening to what others say, prays over a lot of things that I would take for granted. Willing to extend an already long day to reconnect and renew relationships with people he hasn't seen in a month.

Later that week, we do a bunch of stuff.

Bn meets various people at MOH to talk about a possible project to build homes for folks who lost their homes in the earthquake. We check out a similar sort of project that Habitat for Humanity has been doing for some time in Haiti.

We check out a possible site for the homes. Bn also explores a small river that flows out of the mountains to the sea (possible hydroelectric project?)

We visit 2 orphanages, one really poor (basically, some tarps set up in a clearing, some benches and chairs, a cooking area, some tents, and one woman who runs it). The other is pretty well off--this one run by expats, with Haitian staff and expat volunteers. They mananged to get about half their kids abroad after the earthquake, into the homes of adoptive parents in the U.S., Canada, France, and some other countries.

It's also determined during the week that S will go with her dad back to the U.S. R was already scheduled to go (she'd already planned a trip to Asia on business for somoe time). So that left me as the only expat, here to hold the fort and get stuff done with the Haitian staff.

And so, that's been this past week. The plan is for Bn and S to come back after 2 weeks in the U.S., so we'll see how I hold up.

More on this past week in the next post. But for now, one of the funny things that happened the week after Bn left was that I drove to MOH with By (a Haitian staff worker who translates, among other things, for us).

The MOH campus is surrounded by a wall on the side facing the road. Within the wall are two gates (1 is a side gates manned only until 3:30 each afternoon). Each gate has security guys with big guns (either rifles or shotguns, don't remember). This is not unusual at all, as I mentioned in a previous post.

In any case, I drove up in a gray rental car (regular, 4 doors, sedan type). Usually when we've gone in the past, someone's driving the blue Nissan X-Terra (SUV). But that car is a manual transmission vehicle, and I don't know how to drive stick. So the gray rental for me.

The guard at the gate doesn't recognize the car, and apparently doesn't recognize me. So instead of opening the gate, he walks up to the car. I lower the window, and By leans over and says something in Haitian to the guy. The guard recognizes By, says a quick reply, then walks back to the gate to open it.

As we drive in, By tells me that what he said to the guard was: "He's with the guy with the white beard."

And that was enough to get me in. By explains that the guard probably doesn't know the name of the foundation I'm working for, probably doesn't know the names of any of my coworkers. But he knows that the guy with the white beard has been approved by the management. And now that he's told them that I'm with that guy, I'm ok, too.

Inching forward with the main thing, along with some side projects

2010-04-27T21:40:00.000-07:00

So, I thought I'd write a bit about the work we're doing, or about the progress we're making on it.

R, the attorney who came to Haiti shortly after the earthquake, was here for 2 months, then went back to the U.S. for a few weeks, then came back at around the same time I came, is pretty amazing. She knows a lot about US immigration law and procedures and forms, the kind of book knowledge that I think I can eventually acquire without too much trouble (hopefully). But she also knows a lot about the different positions that UNICEF and various NGO's (nongovernmental organizations) take on international adoption and related matters. She's met a ton of people who work for these NGO's and for various governments. And she also has this big picture grasp of what the different players' concerns are, and who is pressuring who for what reasons.

She also has a really good memory about all the aspects of the 2 cases of the 2 kids we've gotten into the U.S. (I'm still having trouble remembering who talked to who and when, and what each person's job is, and what they've actually done. It's complicated.)

What she doesn't know that much about is the internal workings of the Haitian government and specifically, the Haitian social services department (this is one of the most important entities in the adoption of Haitian kids). Various forms and various permissions are needed from them in order for kids to leave the country, whether orphans or not. So a lot of our legal or quasi-legal related work has been in making contacts with people here who are familiar with Haitian social services, and trying to learn what we can from them. And then discussing what we've learned and how that information affects those 2 kids, and how it might affect other kids in the future. And gathering various documents or formulating questions that we need (or would really really like) the answers to, from someone.

So that's sort of the main work. And R will be leaving Haiti next week, because she needs to do a bunch of work related to orphans in certain Asian countries. So I'm supposed to step into her shoes for the remainder of my time in Haiti when she's gone. These are big shoes. And I feel it.

But then there's also a lot of other stuff that's not directly part of the main work. One thing has been basic housekeeping or logistics stuff (buying drinking water, getting gasoline, getting other household supplies, and such). We're hoping to rent or buy a diesel powered automatic transmission vehicle, which is also part of this category of tasks we've had (these are hard to come by in Haiti). And there's some issues with license plates and driver's licenses and such.

And there's also maintaining relationships with different people. We rely heavily on MOH, a partner organization that has been in Haiti for many years. So there's a lot of communication with them, which often means driving out to visit them to talk with certain people, or dropping things off, or picking them up, or borrowing one of their people for an overnight stay to help us. Unfortunately, it's about a 1 hr drive, with good traffic. So every time we go out there, that's at least 2 hrs of the day on the road. Often, it's more.

As an aside, most Haitian established businesses close up shop somewhere between 3 and 5 pm. Traffic gets to be pretty bad from about 3:30 pm to pretty late. I think a lot of the street vendors keep selling until later, so traffic can be bad even at 7 or 8 pm. Also, we've tried to avoid driving at night for a number of reasons:
1) potholes are harder to see (and there are many potholes and sections of road that are gravel or pebbles)
2) the fact that lanes are optional, and the many people walking along or within the traffic makes it rather easy (in our minds at least) for us to hit one of them accidentally), and
3) we've been warned that there's considerably more crime in certain parts of town at night.

As an aside to 3) above (an aside to an aside, or "a twig off the branch," as my brother and sister might call it), we met some people working for Oxfam last Sunday. Both are white (European), and they're apparently not allowed to go out of their housing complex after 6 pm, since a few months ago, there were some kidnappings of some of their employees. Apparently, if you work for a big name organization, and if you can be easily identified on the street, there are some people who are willing to kidnap you and demand a ransom from the organization you work for.

(I think this is not as big a concern for us because the organization we work for is tiny. Still, we do stand out in a crowd. S is white, and R and I are both Asian, and Asians are very rare in Haiti. Many of the kids we see have apparently asked or believed or formed the impression that R is Jackie Chan's sister. And by extension, then, I must be his brother. Never been mistaken for that before.)

As a further aside, it's amazing how people (myself included) get used to the things we see every day. At most of the car dealership we've visited, and many of the stores and restaurants and even orphanages and schools, there's a security guy at the entrance. He's not wearing a uniform, but you know he's security because he's holding a shotgun or a rifle, and he usually has a little bit of a suspicious look on his face as you walk through the entrance. But it's something I've gotten used to.

Alright, enough of my asides. I wanted to say that with all my ignorance of Creole and French (the languages spoken here), and of Haitian culture, and with all my efforts to learn about the Haitian social services department, I haven't felt terribly useful so far. Which I know (in the opinion of at least one missionary who commented on this) reflects an American cultural value: Americans prize effectiveness and efficiency, to a far greater extent than many other cultures (which are often more relational). That whole question of: "what have you accomplished?" is one that we ask ourselves, and when we ask others, we phrase it as "so, what did you do?"

Still, chalk it up to the almost impossible task of escaping your own cultural values, but a few other side projects I've done have alleviated some of my vague dissatisfaction with my lack of accomplishment. What side projects, you might ask? (Or not.) Well, I'll tell you:

Side project 1: I helped MOH with a request they had. MOH (the organization we're working with), runs an orphanage, a school, a medical clinic, and a church and also hosts various volunteer teams (from the US or Canada). Many of their staff who are expats are Canadians.

One of their staff doctors asked for some help with getting an adult patient a B2 visa to go to the U.S. to receive medical treatment that isn't available in Haiti. Now our organization works with orphans or abandoned kids, but we were eager to help because it's possible we might apply for B2 visas for some kids in the future, and we wanted to learn about the process. So MOH prepared all the paperwork, but they felt it would be better to have an American citizen go to the embassy with her to apply for the visa. And if said American citizen also was a lawyer, wouldn't that be even better? So that was me.

I'd never visited an American embassy before, so there was a lot of observation and learning for me. The first day, we didn't have an appointment for that day (we had one for the following week, but her medical condition was rapidly worsening), so we were stopped at a counter by a military guy. And we found out the only way to reschedule an appointment was by email. We talked to a woman on the phone, and asked if there was any way to reschedule in person or by phone, but were denied.

An email was sent, an appointment for the next day was granted, and we went back. Once we got past the lines and the guards at the various security checkpoints, it really turned out to be an experience that reminded me of going to the DMV.

"Go to window 6." (Wait at the line for window 6.) Then,
"Go to window 12." (Wait at window 12, then submit papers, get asked some basic questions by a woman at a counter with a glass partition and a microphone.)
"Wait until your name is called." (Wait for a while, then name is called.)
(more questions)
"Go to window 4 to get your fingerprints taken" (go there, wait, help my "client" get her fingerprints taken.)
"Go to window 14" (more waiting, more questions)

Fortunately, the women behind the counters at these windows seemed like somewhat bored bureaucratic types. In other words, there seemed to be a good chance that no one would be doing any tough grilling as to why this woman needed a visa, or whether she would overstay her visa, or such. We had answers for these, but it's always a little dicier if you're actively trying to persuade someone that your client is not going to break the law.

At the end, at window 14, a woman told us that while these applications normally take a few days, because of her medical condition, we could come back that afternoon to pick up the visa. She didn't need to be there, so I went back, picked up the visa, and got it to her.

While I didn't really do that much, various folks at MOH (all of them Canadians, as it turned out) thanked me at various times throughout the day, which felt good. I suppose my being there helped reassure them that if any problems had arisen, I could've maybe helped. And as far as I know, the woman left Haiti on a plane to the U.S. (Hope to confirm this soon.)

Side project 2: While waiting at the embassy, we met a guy who, as it turned out, is a doctor doing some traveling medical clinics in the area. Now the "we" I've been talking about included the woman with the medical condition, in a wheelchair, and a nurse from MOH who pushed the wheelchair, and helped the woman out, and had some pain meds in case she needed them, and who was also there to answer any medical related questions in case we were grilled by someone deciding whether or not to grant the visa.

So this doctor sees the woman in the wheelchair, and asks the nurse about her condition, and we start a little conversation while waiting. It turns out that the doctor is going back to the U.S. later that week, and brought some extra medical supplies that he hasn't used. He says he doesn't want to take them back to the U.S., but would rather donate them. And he describes the stuff to the nurse, and asks if MOH could use them. She says sure.

Since MOH is a little ways away from the city towards the north, and since he's been living and working in an area west of the city, and since the house that my organization is renting is in the city pretty close to a motel he'll be staying at before he flies back to the U.S., I offer to hold the supplies and pass them on to MOH.

And so it goes. I tell my coworkers about the doctor, and later that week, I call, find out where the hotel is, and pick up the supplies from him. Some of them have gone to MOH, and we'll probably take the rest of them sometime soon. So that was a good thing.

Side project 3: wheelchair modification.

I don't have a great aptitude for things mechanical. I do kind of enjoy assembling IKEA furniture, when I have the time, but there's plenty of folks out there who understand tools and parts and how to fix things far better than I.

The other day, we visited an orphanage that cares primarily for kids with developmental disabilities. It's a little heartbreaking to be around them, especially because many of them are beautiful kids, and quite young, and a little starved for attention, since some tugged on my arm, or just patted me, or wanted a hug. And alas, the orphanage is in fairly bad shape (by US standards). There's a good number of kids, and in the area outside the residence, there's a tarp that's been stretched out to give some shade (a needed thing in Haiti).

Many of the kids are outside, but some are too disabled to be brought outside. And there's a lot of flies buzzing around both inside and out. And some of them land on the faces of some of the kids who are in bad shape. And they physically can't wave them away (or perhaps mentally aren't able to register the idea of doing so). And so it's sad.

And the staff of the orphanage just have their hands full, washing the kids, changing their clothes, feeding them, making sure they don't get into trouble. There's just too many for the staff to give much attention to any one kid for very long.

So we visit, and it turns out that they've recently received some wheelchairs from an international organization that distributes them. The ones that can be used are used, which allows some of the kids who are in pretty bad shape to at least get outside, and see a little sun, and feel the breeze, and see stuff, and hear the sounds of the city. Which is a good thing.

But some wheelchairs aren't able to be used. Some don't have foot pedals, which the director of the orphanage tells us causes the kid in them to just have their feet and legs go numb eventually. It's just really uncomfortable.

The other problem is that some of the wheelchairs don't have seatbelts, which is a pretty important thing for these kids because the orphanage staff really don't want any kids to fall out, or try to get out of the wheelchair while it's being pushed somewhere, or such.

But then, in looking at the four wheelchairs that are unusable for one or both of the above reasons, I realize that one wheelchair has no seatbelts, but has foot pedals. And the other has no foot pedals but has seatbelts. The seatbelts in the second could, with the right tool (namely, a hex wrench, aka Allen wrench, of the right size) be removed and attached to the first.

This looks very doable to me, since plenty of that IKEA furniture that I've had experience with uses just the same kind of hexagonal wrenches and screws and bolts. I've seen plenty of the hex wrench sets in Bakersfield at the dollar stores there, and I imagine that it's really just a matter of finding one, or finding a store here that sells them.

So, with a certain amount of optimism, I mention this to my coworkers and one of the translators. For the next few days, as we drive around town, I look for hardware stores on the street. And we find one on a certain day when there's nothing too urgent going on. I look inside but alas, no hex wrenches.

Now previously, during some of our travails with the electrical system in the house, I'd heard that there might be some tools in a shed near the house. And so I look later that day, hoping that there might be some hex wrenches. After a little searching, I find one, a small rusty one in a corner. And a few other wrenches for different nuts and bolts, which I think might work. And some pliers.

So I gather these tools in a bundle, hoping that at least one would be useful.

Now by this time, I've also picked up the medical supplies mentioned above. And these supplies include a whole bunch of hemostats, surgical tools that are normally used to hold gauze in a surgical incision, or to hold things open or closed. (Any of you medical types, feel free to correct me in the comments, here.)

So I also grab one of these, and add it to the bundle. And the next time we visit that orphanage, I bring the bundle, hoping that somehow we'll be able to do it. And amazingly, yes, that one small rusty hex wrench from the shed in the house is in fact just the right size for the screws holding these seatbelts in place.

Elated, I start to loosen one of the screws, and then one of the orphanage staff workers sees what I'm doing, and gets the idea. He speaks no English at all, but I quickly figure out that he's one of those many guys with a far greater aptitude for things mechanical than I have. After a few minutes of him and I working together, one of our translators sees what we're doing and also starts to help out. He, too, is gifted in the mechanically arts.

There's a little labor involved, and much sweating on my part (because of the heat rather than the difficulty of the work), and soon the seatbelts get transferred to the wheelchair that has foot pedals. And our translator and the orphanage staff worker also work on one of the other wheelchairs and essentially repair a big problem in one of the other previously unused wheelchairs. That one isn't completely fixed, but it's a lot closer to being usable when we leave. And the other one with foot pedals and seatbelts is being used by a kid as we walk out the entrance.

I feel really good about this. Partly because I felt like the Lord had been really gracious in providing exactly the right size small rusty tool in the shed.

And also because our visit helped allow a pair of Haitian guys with mechanical skills to work together to repair some wheelchairs for some Haitian orphans.

And those wheelchairs are now used to let some disabled kids get out of the house, into the sun, and feel the breeze, and see stuff outside, and hear the sounds of the city.

Good stuff.

The Lord provides

2010-04-23T22:00:00.000-07:00

Looking at my last post, I realize we've made some progress in terms of the basics that I've largely taken for granted before coming to Haiti. So I'll give some updates there.

Internet: our provider sent a technician to the house, who fixed the wireless router, so that's been good. The range is not quite as far as I'd like, but I'm definitely thankful for web access for more than one person, and in rooms other than the office, which during the day is one of the hottest rooms in the house. Sometimes at night, too.

Electricity: city power is still sporadic, but we bought some more batteries (they're basically the size and shape of car batteries, though they're 6 volts, rather than 12). Also, our big generator was fixed and returned to us, which is good, though it burns gasoline at a much faster rate than the small generator. The advantage of the big generator is that it provides more power--we can run the fridge and lights and fans and the modem and router, and recharge the batteries all at the same time. The same guy who brought it back also changed some of the settings on the inverter, which has helped, too. The next paragraph involves some electrical stuff, which if you're not into, you needn't worry about, though it's been a bit of an education for me.

So an inverter typically changes direct current (DC, typically from batteries) to alternating current (AC, which is what wall outlets provide). The big fancy ones that you mount on a wall (or at least the one we have) can convert a lot of electricity (measured in watts, or kilowatts), but there's a limit. Also, ours is also supposed to do the reverse of what inverters normally do: it can change AC into DC so that the batteries can get recharged. This is supposed to happen when we're getting city power, or when the generator is running. Our 6 old batteries were getting depleted rather quickly, so we bought 12 new ones, and a friend helped set them up (in a pattern of both series and parallel connections so that they supply 12 volt power to the inverter). We thought our problem was solved. But no. Our house was still running out of electricity rather quickly. So we were always very happy (and still are) when a certain light bulb on the bottom floor of the house turns out, indicating that the city is providing electricity. This meant that we could plug in the fridge, appliances, run the water pump (which meant we wouldn't have to take bucket showers or brush our teeth with bucket water), and recharge the batteries. But in any case, we were still puzzled, and thought there must be something wrong with the inverter--it wasn't charging the batteries, or wasn't doing it fast enough. During the day, we were running out of electricity rather quickly. Compounding our confusion was the fact that we had a voltmeter--an instrument to measure how charged a battery is--but it wasn't until recently that we figured out that it was completely inaccurate. But now that we figured that out, and now that the generator guy has changed some of the settings on the inverter, we think things are running fairly well. Whenever we're running on batteries, though, we're still a little uncertain as to how long they'll go before giving out. The other information that we fortuitously discovered was that if both the big generator and the small generator are plugged into the house, and if we're running the small generator and the big one is not running, the small one will not provide steady reliable power to the house. Once we unplug the big generator (which isn't even running), though, the small one will power the house. Good stuff to know.

R, who will be going to some fairly remote areas of China soon, has been saying that it's been good to learn about these kinds of things now, so that she can hopefully apply it in Asia. And I think it's generally a good thing to be familiar with this kind of stuff if you're either going to a less developed country or going somewhere in the US (maybe a cabin or something) that's not connected to an electrical grid. And if you're going to really need electricity. Which as lawyers working for a foundation that's headquartered in the US has been a real need for us.

Gasoline: So the Port Au Prince area still seems to have a rather severe gas shortage. I just did some googling and found some news articles from 4/21 to 4/23 saying that 2 oil tankers have arrived, but that apparently the Haitian government has not allowed the oil to be released yet (also saying this may be an example of some government corruption in allowing the oil distributors here to continue to profit from the continuation of greatly inflated gas prices). As an aside, wikipedia states:

In 2006, Haiti was ranked as the most corrupt nation out of the 163 that were surveyed for the Index.[4] The International Red Cross reported that Haiti was 155th out of 159 countries in a similar survey of corrupt countries[5]

And there's citations for each sentence.

One of our translators said that if you know someone at a gas station, you might be able to get them to sell you a barrel of gas. Then you take it to the side of the street (which might be your home on the side of the street), and set out a 1 gallon cooking oil container filled with gas on a table or an overturned stool or such. Desperate drivers will then stop at your "shop" and buy gasoline from you at the going rate for street gas. Which lately apparently is a bit more than $8/gallon. Which means you can make some pretty good money. We've bought some gasoline a number of times in the past 2 weeks at this rate. It's all pretty makeshift/inventive. The cooking oil containers are like the ones you see at the supermarket for corn oil or such, 1 gallon containers. The woman we've usually bought from is selling from her house by the side of the road. She's got a big metal funnel, with various joints and pieces welded together, which her customers can borrow to pour the oil from these cooking oil containers into their cars. She's got a bunch of these cooking oil containers filled with either gasoline or diesel (she's expanded her product offering). And a big barrel, with a length of rubber tubing, so she can transfer the gas into a bucket. From the bucket, she pours gas into each 1 gallon cooking oil container. And when I helped buy some and refueled our car, and returned the containers to her, she also had a basin with some water and soap, so that her customers could wash their hands.

Last week, we were fortunate enough while driving around to find a gas station that was selling gas. It's a good feeling when you find one, since we'll drive by a gas station that has vehicles fueling from the pumps, and we'll hope, but often find that they're only selling diesel. Still, somehow our translators are often able to tell just by looking at the gas station whether they're also selling gas or not. Anyway, we found one, and Sd, our translator who was with us, walked up and confirmed that they were selling gas. However, maneuvering our vehicle in would be hard. We did have a gas container, but no funnel. So Sd asked for a water bottle, and someone had a pocket knife, and we cut around the bottom of the water bottle to create a makeshift funnel. We bought the gas, pumping it into the container, walked the 20 yards to where the car was parked, and used the funnel to refuel the car.

Another little anecdote relating to gas stations was on one of the last days that B was with us. (He flew back to the US last week.) We were at a gas station (I think we were refueling our diesel vehicle, so no hassles there). A guy walked up to us carrying a plastic storage container, a bit bigger than a shoebox. It had a bunch of pieces of fried squid inside. He also had a gallon jug of some red sauce. B, deciding he wanted the experience, decided to buy. The guy had a bunch of styrofoam cups, and took one out, filled it with fried squid, and produced a toothpick, which he put into the cup, and sold it to B. (Don't remember whether B decided to get some of that red sauce, too).

B's comment: "I'm eating squid from a box".
My reply: "You're eating squid from a box from a guy at a gas station"

And my other gas station incident was less funny (in case you didn't pick up on it, we laughed a bit after the exchange above). I was in a car with Bl, another translator, trying to get some errands done. We thought a gas station might have been selling gas, but found out it was only selling diesel. But it was around lunchtime, so we decided to eat lunch there. Now I've been to plenty of combination gas station/fast food places in the U.S., but usually they were in sort of less populated places. This was on a pretty major road, and the clientele involved a good number of folks wearing pretty nice clothes. So it just felt a little odd, ordering sandwiches, and eating at a gas station, with a fair number of people around in dress shirts and slacks, along with others not as nicely dressed.

Some pics from Haiti

2010-04-20T22:31:00.000-07:00

Most of these were taken from the back window of a car.

Appreciating the little things

2010-04-18T22:15:00.000-07:00

So we were short for much of the last few days. Short on various things.

Internet:
We paid for an upgrade from 500 MB/day to 1250 MB/day, but the actual upgrade didn't completely work. Some of the problem may have been addressed, but in the process, our wireless router has been rendered useless. So only 1 person at a time now can be online (hardwired into the modem).

Electricity:
City supplied power has been available most evenings from about 6 pm until sometime at night. Sometimes, it's even until early morning, and at other times, it'll only be on for an hour or two.

The house is set up to receive power through a gasoline generator, but that has been at a repair shop since before I got here. We're hoping to get it back Monday afternoon. We also have a smaller gasoline generator, but there's also a gasoline shortage in Port Au Prince. More on this in a bit.

The house also apparently has a solar power supply hooked up to some solar panels, but we're not sure if it's actually working or not. It may be, and perhaps we're just using up that electricity fairly quickly.

Also, the house has a set of batteries that supply electricity. They look just like car batteries--about that size and shape. There were 6, which helped, but was apparently not enough for a comfortable reserve. (When the city power is on, we've been told that it will not only supply power to the house, but that it will also recharge the batteries.)

So, we had to really conserve electricity. Related to this is the fact that water is pumped to the top of the house through an electric pump. This allows us to have water available through the facets and toilets and showers in the house. So for a little while, we used buckets of fairly clean water for that kind of stuff.

Gasoline:
So Sd, our translator, told us that he heard that Port-Au-Prince (perhaps all of Haiti?) won't get more unleaded gasoline until April 23. However, diesell is still available, and that's what many of the vehicles and such use.

Unfortunately, the generators mentioned above run on gasoline (I guess there are also diesel generators, but that's not the kind we have). Also, the 2 cars we had for most of the week also run on regular gasoline. I found out that we're renting both cars, and that there's a car the foundation owns, an SUV Nissan X-terra that runs on diesel but that was in an accident, and was in the shop.

Given the gasoline shortage, we were pretty concerned. The lines at the gas stations were really long, and we noticed that the cars at the gas station weren't pumping gas. Sd explained that the gas stations knew that there wouldn't be more gas for a while, and so they had kept some in reserve. But they would only sell during certain very limited hours. So people were there waiting and hoping that they'd get a chance to buy gas later that evening.

More to come later, but that's all for now.

First Day

2010-04-13T20:58:00.000-07:00

Before we slept last night, we said we'd convene as a group at 7:30 am. (And we all would've taken care of our morning routines, had breakfast if we'd wanted it, and quiet times, and be ready to share and organize the things we needed to do that day.) Then I stayed up later than the others and posted to the blog, settled in my room, read a little, and finally fell asleep.

Hours passed (of sleep). Oblivion.

Then, a rooster crowing. I half-awoke, saw it was getting to be a litte light outside, thought I'd sleep more.

But then--another rooster (or maybe the same one?) crowing. And then another. And more and more crowing.

Ok, so maybe no more sleep. I looked at my cell phone, saw it was almost 7 am, and rushed to the bathroom. Too tired to remember if we said 7 or 7:30. Rushed downstairs, saw B, asked what time we said we'd be meeting, and he said 7:30.

"Great! Time enough for a shower then" (and I rushed back to the bathroom). Did so, and went back--and everyone didn't seem to be convening. And I found out why.

I'd had the impression (maybe from talking with R or S before?) that Haiti was on the same time as the Pacific time zone. And it turns out they were, but they don't observe Daylight Savings Time. So now they were on the same time as US Central Time. So in fact it was about 6:30am. Ok.

Leisurely morning quiet time, enjoying a view of the city and the morning breeze. Then at 7:30, spent a little time as a group (5 of us, R, S, B, Sd our Haitian translator/helper, and myself) sharing, then talking about logistics for the day. Some things needed to be done at the house/office (one of the upper rooms is being used as an office). Others needed to get done at various places in Port-Au-Prince.

Initial plan made. Then what was thought to be a short task (at the house) turned out to be a long one. And other phone calls made. New plans made.

I went with B and Sd to the company giving us Internet service. Now R had commented that with the work she had been doing, Internet was absolutely necessary. Documents and photos had to be scanned and sent to others (often in Texas, the headquarters of the foundation, or to Washington D.C., or to others). And also received from others. And lots of legal stuff that wouldn't be available to us in any other way than the web.

We wanted a higher allocation of access. The company installed and provided service for satellite internet access. We were getting 500 MB/day, and we needed more, a lot more. That 500 was total for the sum of all downloads and uploads. After this capacity was reached, we'd still have access, but a lot lot slower. And it's reset at midnight each day (so blogging here doesn't affect any of the allotment).

So we drove there, waited a little bit, talked to a guy there (who spoke English! yes!), and asked what higher allocations were available. 1250 MB/day. B then called R on the phone, then asked if an unlimited access plan was available. The guy hemmed and hawed a little, then said he could tell us the following week.

Well, ok, we'd upgrade today to 1250, and then talk next week. Then he took us to another room, with 2 women at a desk, and the next 30-45 minutes were then spent largely waiting for them to type up a modified contract and bill us. And credit card authorization. And then us asking that the modified contract state somewhere that it was for 1250. And questions on the phone. And then we were done.

In the midst of this, I leaned over to B, and asked whether those numbers (330/month) were in Haitian dollars or US or goud.

A few quick comments re Haitian money. $1 USD is about 7-8 Haitian dollars. Seems simple enough. But in fact, almost all normal business is done in goud (I'm guessing at the spelling). 1 Haitian dollar is 5 goud. So $1 USD is about 35 goud. Most prices are quoted in Haitian dollars, but actually paid for in goud currency. Why, you might ask? (as I did). S or R said, (and I think it was a little speculative), so that prices seem like low numbers. And all Haitians do their 5 to 1 conversions in their head. Ok.

So I asked what our monthly fees were, and B said, US dollars. Gulp. Wow, satellite internet is really expensive. But again, I guess we really need it, and I guess affordable Internet access isn't much of a priority for the Haitian marketplace. And B had called other companies, and it was either unavailable in our area or even more expensive at other places.

After our business was done, we went to get food. Sd and B saw a woman cooking on a sidewalk, with some big pots, and various utensils, and a small covered shelter nearby with a table and chairs. They said it looked good, so we bought food there. Which involved waiting about 10-15 minutes (we ordered for 6), and getting a bunch of styrofoam containers in white plastic shopping bag type bags.

Sd explained that the woman probably paid 50 goud a month to rent the space, likely owned a restaurant before the earthquake (since she had all the cooking stuff and other restaurant type stuff around), and now was undercutting the prices of a nearby "real" restaurant. But he also explained to B and I that if you were going to take a girl on a date, you wouldn't eat there, you'd go to the real restaurant and pay a lot more for the food, which would be probably of about the same quality, but would be in a nicer place.

B and I nodded. Yes, we understood.

And so, Sd explained, most of the customers would be single men, or maybe, just maybe, some certain girls might be willing to eat here. Or men might eat here for lunch by themselves.

And he was completely right. In the time we waited, various men came up, talked to the woman cooking, and joined us in waiting for food. No women.

We got our food and drove back to the house. Our conversation was fascinating to me. B is a guy from Los Angeles who's part of the same church S goes to. Sd, our Haitian translator/helper is about 21, was a college student (majoring in chemistry, nice!) before the earthquake. He made the comment that the educational system in Haiti is corrupt, very corrupt. (Later, I found out that there's about 50% illiteracy in Haiti). And so we were 3 guys in a car, which I think made Sd more comfortable in talking about girls, and how a guy can be romantic to a girl. Though their concept of dating is really not very analogous to the American one.

Anyway, we drove back, had lunch, which really was very good, and cleaned up. Then we needed to get to MOH, an established organization in Haiti that had helped our foundation tremendously for the last few months (and was where R and S had stayed before this house was rented). There were some legal documents that we needed to get, and also some people that needed to be visited.

The drive from the house to MOH was a very different one from the others I'd been on. MOH is located a bit outside the city, and we passed a few large areas of tents set up, and blue tarps. And the US military, which had established an area nearby. We didn't see many people there, which left my imagination to visualize what it's like for those living under the tarps/tents.

The weather is pretty humid, and feels hot to me, though I see that the men on the street are about 90% wearing long pants or jeans. Many wear long sleeved shirts. I wonder if that will change as the summer draws closer.

The folks in the tents probably aren't having it so good. And it's probably going to be worse.

Anyway, we draw close to MOH, and B and Sd decide to buy some drinks. We mostly get some sodas (B and Sd and I each get a "Ragaman" sort of like a carbonated biggger Bacchus-D, if you know what that is).

We get to MOH, and R introduces me to various important people: "he's an attorney who'll be here for 2 months". (The idea of living here for the next 2 months, now verbalized, impresses itself a little deeper in my consciousness.) We get paperwork, and I definitely get the sense that the relationships are very important. As they say, it's who you know, not what you know. Though I definitely feel (as does R) that we also do need to find out a lot more of that "what you know" as it relates to Haitian law. Still, lots of friends of R and S and B say hello and talk, some in simple English, and others in simple Creole.

S is by far the most advanced of all of us ex-pats (expatriates, those not from Haiti) in Creole. R also knows quite a bit. I struggle to catch words, phrases, the flavor/rhythm of the language, anything. The fact that R and S have learned as much as they have in the last few months gives me some hope.

We also meet a bunch of MOH ex-pat staff, and others who are staying at MOH temporarily (I think). It's nice to see more people than the handful of us at the house.

The plan is also for us to catch part of a worship service at MOH, then leave before it gets dark, since driving in the dark in this area is not fun, as B says. The worship service is beautiful. Lots of kids, teens, young adults. Lots of energy. A really full worship band, bunch of singers on stage, guitarist, drummer, trumpeter, keyboardist. R leans over and points out the keyboardist, and tells me that he and his brother (leading the music with a microphone only) switch off on leading, and that they've written many of the worship songs we're singing. Lots of energy, and enthusiasm. Also as some of the younger kids are bored or distracted, they wander away to the back of the shelter. (I feel that in the U.S., if kids of the same were bored or distracted in a comparable music set of a worship service, they'd fidget more, or feel compelled to stay in place, but then be more willing to make trouble. Here, they wandered to the back, but didn't talk, and mostly didn't leave the shelter entirely, but just walked around the empty aisles in the back while respecting everyone else singing or praying).

A few of the songs are familiar melodies. Which is nice, because we can sing along in English. Everyone else is singing and/or praying in Creole.

We leave a bit later than we'd planned, and I find out that R and S, in talking with various MOH staff, have found out a lot of really useful stuff, and gotten some important things done. My initial understanding of why we went to MOH has been revised.

We drive back home, which is I think made slower by the fact that darkness falls while we're driving, and the streets are clogged again with traffic. More young boys begging. More crazy traffic (optional lanes, U-turns, pedestrians everywhere). And at home--hurray, the city's electrical power is on. Which is great, since it means we don't need to run the generator (we're out of gas, so we couldn't have done so for very long anyway). And we can use lights and fans to cool ourselves, and not worry that the food in the fridge or freezer will go bad. B had been looking the whole day for a gas station selling gasoline, not diesel, and we haven't seen any. So we need to get some tomorrow, to run the generator when the city power goes out. Which B tells us could be 3 minutes from now, or 8 hours from now, or whenever.

But for tonight, no immediate worries, since the city electricity is running.

By the way, Sd will sleep tonight at MOH (apparently, he sleeps about 3 nights/week at the house), so it's the 4 of us ex-pats together for dinner and some conversation. With luxuries of lights, fans, the microwave oven running and the fridge/freezer all working at the same time. Praise God!

Arrival

2010-04-12T20:36:00.000-07:00

I arrived in Miami at about 7 am, and the flight to Port-Au-Prince left at 2:30 pm. But I was saved from many hours of sitting on an airport chair by a friend of mine who lives in Miami, and who had some time available to pick me up, drive me to the beach in Miami, and have lunch with me before dropping me off at the airport.

It was especially nice because I haven't been in touch very much with her since last fall. We had lunch at a restaurant where Gianni Versace ate shortly before he died.

It's almost a cliche, but the contrast between the images of the stores and cruise ships in Miami, and the scene in Haiti is pretty immense as I think about my day today.

The flight to Haiti from Miami was absolutely packed. There were rows, with each having 7 seats (2, then 3 in the middle, then 2). I'd guess about 10 to 20% seemed to be Haitian, many of them pretty well dressed, quiet, serious. The rest of us were from various churches and other organizations trying to "do good". The atmosphere was a good one. I also hoped that of those of us on the plane, myself included, we would be able to do more good than harm. And hopefully, some real and lasting good. Historically, there's been so much that Christians have done that have had such huge unintended negative consequences. And yet, when you're in the middle of a plane full of folks with good intentions, there's a certain hope, and charity, and gentleness in the air that feels pretty good. As they say, the road to hell is paved ...

The airport in Port-Au-Prince was chaotic. We landed, waited while we all grabbed various carry-ons, then boarded a shuttle bus that took us to a structure about 5 minutes away. After seeing the images in the media, and reading about the earthquake, I almost expected to see a city where few structures were left standing. But that wasn't the case. I could see buildings and peeling paint, and a general sense of things run down.

We went to the immigrations and customs area, which was essentially a big warehouse. A guy in a uniform looked at my passport and customs declaration. I was a little apprehensive, because the foundation I'm working with didn't send me the address of the house where I'd be staying. So I filled out the paperwork simply saying that I'd be in Port-Au-Prince during my stay. I was expecting someone to ask: you mean you don't know where you'll be? Are you staying in one of the tent cities or something? You really don't know?

To which I would reply: no, there's a house somewhere that someone from this foundation is going to take me to. I don't know where it is, though, and I really hope that someone is out there waiting for me.

But instead the official stamped my passport and waved me through.

Claiming your checked luggage in a semi-makeshift airport where almost everyone around you is some type of aid or relief worker trying to help--try imagining it. Everyone's got the huge checked luggage bags. The conveyor belt (and they had one that was working) was a bit short, so things occasionally cycled by. Mobs of people are all around trying to edge their way in: "that one's mine!". Then they'd grab it, and often stay standing at the edge to get another.

I thought that if luggage thieves ever wanted a good target, this was probably it. Lots of chaos, lots of luggage lying around. Fortunately, after a bit of waiting (with a little growing anxiety), mine came out, and I managed to grab it.

Then a short walk to the building's exit, and outside into ... more chaos. Haitians all around, offering to help travelers with their bags. Young boys begging. The street, with cars and people walking by. Again, fortunately, one of the staff members I'd met a week ago (exactly), S, was there, along with SD, a Haitian translator and helper. The two helped me with my luggage, walked me out a few blocks, and got it all into the car.

By now it was about 4:30 or 5 pm, local time. S drove the car into that kind of crazy traffic I'd always heard about in other less developed countries. The kind where lanes are optional, sudden merging cars can come at any second, people walk out into the street within a hairs' breadth of getting run over, cars going in either direction sometimes just want to U-turn in the middle of the street, there's no traffic lights...you get the idea.

S said it normally took about 45 minutes to get from the house to the airport, without traffic. It ended up taking us about 2.5 hours. As we got out of the busier areas, there was less craziness, but the slowness was just because all the cars ahead of us were slow. And there were a lot of cars.

There were a good number of buildings that looked fine, but here and there some were in shambles. Lots of men and women were walking on the sidewalks or in the streets, going about their business. Lots more run down buildings, and some sad faces, but also a certain vibrancy underneath the surface, too.

Lots and lots of graffiti, much of it telling passersby to "Vote ___ (various names here)" I asked Sd if the people were very into politics, and he said yes, yes. But also, no one cleans up the graffiti, so what we saw was from lots of political campaigns from elections past.

On several occasions, while we were stuck in traffic, small Haitian boys ran up to S's window (she was driving), and asked for money, or said "hungry" and pointed at their bellies. Which was sad on several levels. That they were asking, and that we weren't giving them money was sad. That they had probably learned to do this over the past few months (maybe even years), and had learned they had some small chance of getting something was also sad, since they probably had nothing better to do.

They only approached the non-Haitians, never any of the Haitian teenagers or adults on the streets, at least as far as I could see. And I didn't see any girls begging, just young boys.

The roads at times were rough--broken asphalt, potholes, gravel in the street. Along the sidewalks were lots and lots of people, some of them walking about their business, many selling things from a box or blanket or table in front of them. Many were packing things up for the day.

Finally, we got home. A gated home, where R and B were waiting for us. (I had met R, the attorney, along with S in Valencia a week before.) It turned out to be a really really nice home. Four bedrooms, an electric generator in the back, well-furnished. It's owned by a couple that is away for a few years, and so we're renting it for a year. After a good dinner, we had a phone call with one of the U.S. staff, and then I got a quick crash overview of the legal issues R and I will be trying to handle or anticipate or avoid.

Anyway, that was my day, and I think the only reason I've stayed up so late is that my body is still used to Pacific time. I doubt I'll post at such length and in such detail, but I'll do what I can. Sorry if the above are ramblings and disjointed.

I'd appreciate your prayers for me, for the foundation, for the lives of Haitian orphans, and for this country.

Bye.

On the way to Haiti

2010-04-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

I write this from the Miami, FL airport, on a layover to Port-Au-Prince.

It's been a pretty crazy past week and a half. Last last Fri, I got a phone call from R, the attorney who's been in Haiti for the past 2 months. She asked if I'd be able to come in about a week and a half.

So, the past week was filled with trying to wrap things up with work (haven't completely finished with that, but hope to do so through email and the web), shopping for supplies, scheduling vaccinations, and meeting with friends. Wonderful, yes. Exhilirating, that too. Tiring--extremely.

Tues, Wed, Thurs, I drove to Fresno for some teaching and tutoring, Fri morning I was in Pasadena for a study group, Sat there was a wedding I attended, and then back to my Bakersfield home for frantic packing, and then the drive to OC.

Sun, I was at my church in OC, and told many of them about the trip
("when are you leaving?"
"about 9:30 tonight"
[surprised reaction]).

And now it's Mon morning, and I'll hopefully be on a plane to Port-Au-Prince in a few hours.

I have the feeling I've once again packed too much stuff. R sent me a link of an organization that had suggestions for its volunteer workers, and it was a pretty long list. And she also suggested I bring 5-7 business casual work outfits (she'd mentioned that sometimes Haitian government officials just happened to drop in, and of course it was on days when she was wearing her most casual clothes). And she also suggested some books, since things can get a little boring sometimes at night, with no reliable electricity. All this is justification, of course, because I tend to have the habit of bringing too much stuff when I go on a trip of more than a night and a day. So almost all I brought was personal: a large checked baggage case, a stuffed carry-on, and a very stuffed backpack.

I wonder if R and S, veteran travelers that they are, had just brought a carry on for personal stuff, and checked in luggage that was purely work related. I rather suspect that to be close to the truth.

Anyway, I'm a little surprised that I'm still functioning with as much activity as I've had (and as little sleep), and also very excited to get there.

As always, I greatly appreciate your prayers. Please pray that I'd keep a good attitude in all circumstances. And that I stay spiritually focused in the next few months.

Thanks.

Reflections on Seeking the Lost (Dog)

2009-01-27T16:54:00.000-08:00

I suppose there's a danger of overspiritualizing the events in our lives, looking for meaning where there is none. Still, I can't help but be reminded of Jesus' parables regarding the shepherd leaving the 99 to find the one lost sheep.

Luke 15:1-5

I'm also reminded of the parable of the woman and the lost coin: she had 10 coins, but lost one, and so she searched through every corner of her house to find the one lost coin. When she found it, she rejoiced and told all her neighbors to rejoice with her.

Luke 15:8-10

I guess I'd never appreciated before the state of mind of the shepherd looking for the one lost sheep. We know that when David, the king, was a shepherd boy, he'd fought off a lion and a bear. And Jesus mentions predatory wolves attacking flocks of sheep in his analogies. So there were some dangers involved in the shepherd seeking the one lost sheep in the wilderness. Dangers for both the shepherd and for the lost sheep.

And the real possibility that the shepherd would never find the lost sheep. Maybe it would get lost in the wilderness somewhere and the shepherd would never find it. Or it would wander off and join another flock, and be claimed, knowingly or unknowingly, by another shepherd.

And with each passing hour, the shepherd's chances of finding the sheep would diminish.

So in some ways, it's kind of irrational to leave 99 sheep that are safe in a pen somewhere, and leave the safety and comfort of wherever the shepherd was staying, and go off to try to seek and save the one lost sheep. And yet, this is what Jesus says he is like.

And when he finds the one lost sheep, his rejoicing is great.

Adventures in Dogsitting

2009-01-27T11:00:00.001-08:00

So, a quick recap of the previous entry: I was taking care of a dog, T, for a few days while T's owners were in Taiwan. They entrusted T to the care of our friend L, but for various reasons, it's difficult for L to take care of T during weekdays. I had T at my place Sun night and Mon during the day. The plan was for me to get the couple's apartment key from L on Mon evening. Also at my place was M, my roommate's parents' dog, who would be picked up Mon afternoon/evening.

My Monday plans were sparse: no work, and only one errand that needed to finish by Wed evening but that needed to be started that day.

So, Mon morning, I gave T a walk, then came home and gave M a walk. Both M and T are the only pets in their respective families, so they're used to getting a lot of attention, and aren't used to having other dogs around. So when I got back with M, I eased the two of them into getting to know each other. I separated them with a partition that would let them see and smell each other. Then I had each of them on leashes and removed the partition. Then I sat on the couch and held one with my right hand and the other with my left hand. And eventually they seemed to more or less get along. But this took the better part of the morning and the early afternoon, and I still had that one errand I needed to start.

Around 4 pm, not having heard from my roommate or his parents, and knowing that I was supposed to meet L sometime after 6 pm to get the apartment key, I left both T and M at my place and went out.

6 o'clock rolls around, and I get back to my place, and see my roommate's brother walking out the door with a big flashlight. Hmm, I wonder, what's that about? A few minutes later, I see my roommate and hear the story. My roommate's mom came by around 5:30 to pick up M from my place. She has a key, so she let herself in. Not knowing that there was another dog around, she saw M, gathered some stuff for M, and then saw for just a couple of seconds, T running out the door of our place.

And so my roommate, his brother, his dad, and his mom were either walking or driving around the block, hoping to find T. His dad suggested that I stay outside my place, in case T found her way back. And so, there I was, standing on the sidewalk, hoping against hope that one of them would find T.

The evening grew darker, and every 10-15 minutes, my roommate, his brother, or his mom or dad would come around the block, holding flashlights and shining them into neighbors' yards or bushes. Each time they'd come around, I'd hope that one of them would be carrying T, with her long white fur. And each time I'd be a little disappointed. Every so often I'd walk around the condo, and look into the bushes myself, and call out T's name. My roommate's mom came around, and explained the details of what had happened, and I could tell she was pretty anxious about it. But it wasn't her fault. She wasn't expecting a second dog, and I'd never done any dogsitting before, so there was no way for her to have expected T at our place.

6 turned into 6:30, and L called me, saying she was done with work, and asking if I was ready to take T to the apartment. Then I had to tell her that I'd lost T, and that my roommate's family and I were trying to find her. She asked if she should come to my place, and I said yes, hoping that T would recognize her voice better than mine or my roommate's family (who have never seen T before, as far as I know).

Then I continued waiting, hoping, fearing. All kinds of thoughts whirled in my head as I waited. Perhaps T would be hit by a car, perhaps she'd get into a fight with another dog (I've noticed that a lot of small dogs seem to be particularly aggressive), perhaps she'd run out into the fields beyond my block and never be seen again. What would I say to the couple, who are pretty attached to T? What would I say to L, who had trusted me with T after T had been put in her care?

A little after 7, it was getting dark and cold. My roommate's family gathered on the sidewalk with me, and decided that there wasn't much chance of finding her that night. They'd been around the local streets many many times, had asked various people if they'd seen T (to the point that one guy got angry because he'd been asked 3 times), and found various other stray dogs and a cat. But since they hadn't seen her at this point, they probably weren't going to. They told me that if I could get a flyer with T's picture, they'd be happy to make copies and post them on the light poles around. There was a good chance that T had been picked up by some family. Hopefully, they'd see that she was cared for and had a collar, and would call the number on it. And that that was our best hope. Then they left.

Not certain whether L would find my place, I stayed outside, and a few minutes later, L, her boyfriend, and 2 other friends (Y and S) from church who live near L drove up. We knew that T had a collar and a tag, but we didn't know if it had the owners' current telephone number (they'd moved a few weeks before) or if it had the cell phone number of either the husband or the wife. L sent her boyfriend and S to the apartment to check if there were messages and to get any cell phones there.

My roommate explained that his family had been looking for the last 2 hours, so our chances were slim. Nevertheless, he, L, Y, and I gave it another go around the block. I hoped that L's voice would be more familiar to T, and might coax her out from under a bush or from someone's yard.

L and I went one way around the block, and the other two went the other way. We called out T's name, shone our flashlights under cars and into bushes, and ventured into quasi private property (apartment and condo common areas and such). L was very careful in her search, not leaving any area unexamined. After a while, we met up with my roommate and Y, and my roommate repeated the things his family had said earlier, and recommended we go back to our place. He led the way, but Y, L, and I went slowly, still searching, since we hadn't spend the last 2 hours doing so.

We came across a slightly scruffy looking guys near a garbage dumpster, who had a walking stick, a flashlight, and a large trash bag with stuff inside. L asked if he'd seen a small white dog, and he said he had, around 5:30 that evening, over by the river beyond the bike trail (as he pointed towards a particular direction). Not knowing where these places were, I asked him how to get there, and he explained that in another direction, beyond the houses and yards, was a fence. In one corner, there was a gap that would allow one to pass. Then we should head in another direction and we'd run into a bike trail that would take us to the river. He'd seen this small white groomed dog over by the river running back and forth, and he'd thought that it looked out of place.

We'd lost my roommate, but Y, L, and I headed to the fence. We found it, then found a gap, and went through. I began to wonder whether T was the same dog that this guy had seen, since it seemed a bit far for T to have run after leaving my place around 5:30. Still, it was our best unexplored lead so far, so we walked through these wild fields with long grass, shining our flashlights into the bushes and scrub near the fence.

We then saw the same guy, who explained that he thought we might not find it, so he was going to lead us there himself. We walked, he and I side by side, with L and Y behind us. More dark thoughts went through my head. We were a considerable distance away from any homes or yards or other people. The guy was a little taller than me, but leaner, and I thought that if he were to attack me with his stick, I might have a chance against him, but that he'd likely take me. On the other hand, I could probably hold him off long enough that L and Y, though they're both relatively small Asian girls, would have enough time to join the fight, and that 3 on 1 weren't good odds for him, even if he did have a stout walking stick. On the other hand again, maybe he had another weapon on him. Still, he'd done nothing bad so far, and we might find T and spare ourselves much unpleasantness.

Anyway, we kept walking and walking on a trail that he said would take us to the river. We got to an area of paved road, and I saw a sign saying that we were entering the Kern River Parkway. I felt a shiver of dismay at the sight. When I had been handling criminal cases, I had a fair number of cases against folks who'd broken the local municipal code by camping there. And I also knew that some of the folks who camped there were hiding from the law, since they had open arrest warrants against them.

Still, we'd come this far, and the guy said it wasn't much farther. So I kept with him, while L and Y began to lag behind. Not a good feeling.

Then the paved area ended, and the guy was leading me through a walking trail in the midst of the long grass and scrub and trees. I didn't see where L and Y were anymore. I looked at myself and tried to remember if there were any signs of conspicuous consumption--wasn't wearing a watch, my cell phone was primitive, and my jacket had some signs of dirt and wear. Maybe the guy was sincere and didn't mean to rob or injure any of us.

We walked on for a bit and he pointed out where he'd seen the white dog. He mentioned that some dogs like that are sold for $500, and the suspicious part of me wondered if he expected some reward money if and when we found the dog. Which I'd be happy to give him if it was T.

L called me on my cell, and I told her I was up ahead, but that she and Y should stay near the lightpole I'd passed earlier. I'd only go on for a few more minutes, then turn back if I didn't see T.

We went on into the brush, calling for T, while I also kept a nervous eye on the guy's walking stick. The guy said that in this area, sometimes there are guys who walk through these fields, and that many of them are the kind that you shouldn't trust. I thought, but did not say aloud, "and what about you?"

Eventually the guy with me went on ahead, calling T's name, and I lost sight of him around a bend in the trail. Then I was even more worried. Even if my companion was a good hearted man, there was a chance I'd meet someone else who wasn't. Especially because I was calling T's name and shining a flashlight around, attracting attention to myself.

Another phone call came from L, who said she and Y were worried about me, and that I should go back, and that her boyfriend and S had driven to where they were. I told her that I would. Then, as I began to follow the trail, I heard my companion of a few minutes before, calling for T. I rejoined him, thanked him profusely, and told him I needed to get back to my friends. I left my cell number with him in case he found T, wished him a good night, and headed back.

I walked along the trail, shining my flashlight, hoping I'd meet my friends before I met any unsavory characters. Fortunately, I saw the group of flashlights from L, Y, L's boyfriend, S, and my roommate walking towards me on the trail.

We drove back to my place, a distance of somewhere between half a mile and a mile. We regrouped there, and agreed that we should call the couple in Taiwan, and see if they remembered what phone number they put on T's tag, and ask if there were pictures of T we could use for a flyer.

I led L up to my extremely disorganized and cluttered room, and she got the couple's number in Taiwan as well as her international calling card number. I then overheard her having what must have been a very difficult conversation with the wife, explaining what happened. While I don't understand Chinese, I could hear the tone of voice, and the pauses, and a word or two of English here and there. Then the husband got on the phone, and L passed her phone to me, and he and I talked for a bit. I explained what happened and apologized, and found out from him that the number on T's tag was the number of the husband's cell phone, which he had with him. The pics of T I could find on Facebook. And I thought I could hear the wife in the background crying.

We went downstairs and L and I told all we knew to the rest of the group. I told them I'd make flyers and post them tomorrow. We then had a short prayer for T, who we trusted to God's hands because we were just unable to do anything for her. And they left.

I went back to my room, and started the disheartening task of making a "Have you seen me?" lost dog flyer. Looked at the wife's Facebook albums, and saw various pics of T, many from when she was a puppy. I selected two pics, and tried to start typing the text.

Then my phone rang. It was the husband, who said he'd checked his voicemail, and that someone had picked up T earlier that evening. Could we go and pick him up? Absolutely, I said, elated.

My roommate and I put on our jackets, I grabbed T's leash, and we walked to the address I'd gotten, about a 5 minute walk down the same street as our place. We met a guy at the front door, invited us in and said he would go upstairs to get the dog. A few minutes later, we had T, and the guy said he'd picked her up around 6 pm, and that his daughter had given T a bath.

My roommate and I were absolutely thrilled as we walked back to our place. T was happy and oblivious to all the efforts that had been made that evening on her behalf.
I called L, and told her to call the couple in Taiwan as well as the others who had joined us in our search to let them all know that T was back.

Adventures in Dogsitting (preface & intro)

2009-01-27T10:11:00.000-08:00

Recently, a rather dramatic story happened. I get the impression that my life has had more than its usual share of drama in the last few weeks, but those stories are for another time. I'm going to give some probably unnecessary context here for Part II.

Some friends of mine (a married couple from church) own a small dog, (I'll call her T here) but are traveling in Taiwan for a few weeks. They asked another friend, L, to take care of her, and she's done so for the last week or so. However, it's a bit of an inconvenience for her: since her apartment doesn't allow dogs, she's been staying at the couple's apartment, taking the dog for a morning walk, then commuting a good bit longer to work, all of which requires her to wake up considerably earlier than she normally does.

Since my work has been rather slow lately, I offered to either to have T stay at my place (my roommate, who owns the condo I'm in, is fine with dogs), or stay at the couple's apartment myself, which is a bit closer to my work, and, I thought, might give me a chance to get some work done in a different environment.

I didn't know at the time that I made this offer that my roommate's parents were going to be out of town last week until yesterday, and that their dog, M, would also be at the condo until Mon afternoon/evening.

In any case, I planned to be out of town from Thurs to Sat of last week. And L, who was taking care of T, said she'd email the couple and see if that would be ok with them. So, we planned for me to take care of T this week, with the couple's permission.

(As a bit of an aside as to the extent of my experience with pets, I've never owned a dog before, and the only pets my family has ever had or taken care of were some goldfish. Still, one of my good friends since junior high has some dogs and a cat, and I'd always gotten along ok with them. And in grad school, a very good friend of mine had a dog and a cat, and for some reason, his dog, also a rather small dog, really bonded with me. To this day, she always gets really excited to see me when I visit, to the point that my friend jokes that she likes me better than she likes him.

Sat evening I came home, saw my roommate, saw his parents' dog M, and went to dinner with a friend. After dinner, we came to my place, and started watching a movie. M made some whimpering noises, which we understood to mean that she wanted something, but we couldn't figure it out. I made sure M's water and food bowls were stocked, we tried her squeaky toys, and I opened the front door (leading to a small patio, enclosed by a gate), but she didn't seem interested. So we gave up and basically ignored her whimpering. When my roommate came home, he took M out for a real walk, and she almost immediately relieved herself. Goes to show how well I can tell what's really going on with dogs.)

In any case, I talked with L and agreed that I'd take care of T from Sun night to Thurs. I picked up T from L's apartment Sun night (she and her boyfriend had snuck T into their complex over the weekend). Also got T's food, bowls, treats of various kinds, cage, bed, leash, and a small gate for enclosing T when I'd be out. And L passed on to me various instructions regarding dog care. We also arranged that I'd get the key to the couple's apartment Mon evening, after L got off from work. So for Sun night and Mon during the day, T would stay at my place, along with M (my roommate's dog).

I drove home, unpacked the various dog paraphernalia I'd acquired, and realized L hadn't told me what T is used to with regard to sleeping arrangements. I had found out that when T stayed at L's boyfriend's apartment, she'd peed on his floor, so I figured I should keep T in a place with tile. Since my kitchen didn't work, this meant it was my bathroom. Not wanting her to pee in there, either, and guessing that this behavior might have something to do with anxiety about being in a new place, I stayed up with her in my bathroom with her, trying to reassure her. I also didn't know how much light T was used to sleeping with, so I left a flashlight on so that it wasn't too dark. Eventually, I snuck out of the bathroom, closed the door, and went to my room. Then a few minutes later, I heard her whining. So I went back to the bathroom, stayed with her a while, hoped she'd fallen asleep, then snuck out again. This cycle repeated itself numerous times, and I think the reason why it perpetuated itself was that in closing the bathroom door, I made enough sound that it caused her to waken. And maybe she also felt or smelled my absence.

Eventually, I went to my room, and she either stopped whining, or I was too tired to hear or care, and I fell asleep. And then woke up the next morning to attend to her. My roommate's comment was that I looked like I'd had a rough night.

Anyway, Part II, the more interesting story, comes in the next post.

Summertime in Boston

2008-08-12T08:05:00.001-07:00

I'm hoping all in CA are doing well. Especially those in Bakersfield--I'm hoping the heat hasn't been too bad there.

I've been working a lot in Boston, but also having a lot of fun, and learning a lot as well. Life has been pretty different, for lots of different reasons:
-not having a car, thus walking and taking public transportation, which has been good
-college cafeteria food, so no cooking, cleaning, and very little shopping (and healthier eating, too, though I haven't lost as much weight as I'd hoped to)
-in the first roughly 2 weeks, some heat and a lot of humidity, due to nearby Charles River
-in all the rest of the time, lots of rain, much of it sudden and unexpected.
-learning a ton from the other teachers about the test, about handling student types, about teaching, etc.
-visiting various churches, and being a visitor at them

I've done a bit of sightseeing while here, seeing Boston Commons, the graveyard where Paul Revere and Sam Adams and other colonials are, and a bit of the financial district, as well as the train station (South Station).

Also went for a weekend to visit an old friend from high school, who's now at Yale. Visited, and accompanied her, her husband, 3 kids, her friends (another couple) and their 2 kids to New York, for my second visit there. The oldest was 7, and the others were all 4 or younger. It was alternately exciting and exhausting, and often times both simultaneously.

And, I've been praying for my students, partly because most of them haven't had really substantial score increases yet. I was warned of this by the teachers who were part of the program last year--that for many, the increases during the program would be followed by further increases in the time after the program. I'm hoping that will be true. And praying for them also because they are "harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd." At least as far as I can see. I've been open about having been pre-med in college, and about med school rejections, and the fact that "I believe I am where I'm supposed to be" (a bit like John Locke in the tv show Lost). Students' reactions are usually a bit discouraged--you mean with your scores, you didn't get in to med school? Yes, but that was several lifetimes ago. And I'm glad to be where I'm at.

Preparations for Boston

2008-08-12T07:17:00.000-07:00

So, a while ago, my company announced that they were looking for people to teach in Boston for 6 weeks this summer. I applied, went through various screening processes, and a few phone conversations, and was accepted to be one of the 5 teachers who would remain the whole time.

In June, my company had all of us teachers (from various parts of the country) fly to New York to the national offices for an all day meeting. The trip was my first time to New York, which went well. I flew in a day early, visited a friend from college, and did a little sightseeing before the meeting the next day. Then I stayed an extra afternoon before flying back. Got to see Central Park, Fifth Avenue, Times Square, Rockefeller Plaza, the Museum of Modern Art, Columbia University, and the subway system.

A quick aside regarding air travel. On the flight there, I sat in the window seat, in a three seat row. To my right there was an older couple who had come prepared--they had multiple bags of chips, sandwiches, water, nuts, and other food. I had brought no food. The flight attendants announced that we could buy food--at rather steep prices--but that there wouldn't be any free meals. I did get a small bag of pretzels, which I ate slowly. After the couple next to me had their appetizers, main courses, and were on their desserts, the husband offered me a bag of nuts, which I gratefully received. I made a mental note to myself to always bring food on flights of at least medium length. On the flight back from New York, we had an hour layover somewhere. Having learned my lesson, I had bought some not-so-tasty cereal grain bars in New York. After having one, I decided to try to get some better food in the airport. Walked to 4-5 fast food type restaurants, but all were closed. Went to McDonald's, waited in line for way too long, and missed the flight. So, I ended up catching another one about 3 hours later. Made another mental note: do not miss flights because of food. Got to LA really late at night, as a result. Had forgotten where in the long term parking lot I had parked my car. Spent another 2-3 hours walking up and down the rows searching (partway through, decided it would be better for me to leave my luggage in one spot, then retrieve it once I got the car). Another mental note to self: take note of where car is parked, especially when in a big parking lot. Indeed, a veritable comedy of errors.

Anyway, once back in CA, slowly began to prepare for the summer. I decided to move out of my apartment, and, when I returned, move in with a friend of mine in town, who has been staying in a condo. Leaving my 920 sq. ft 1 bedroom apartment meant I'd have less space, but this was, I decided, a good thing, since I'd be less tempted to acquire material possessions. And, more importantly, I'd gain the fellowship and accountability of a fellow believer. And a considerably lower rent.

So, aside from wrapping up some things with my day job and evening job, the primary preparation was moving out. I chose to rent some storage space, throw my stuff in there, then move in to the new place at my leisure once I returned from Boston. The moving was largely by myself, which was necessary since I had to decide what needed to be thrown out and what I'd put into storage or take with me. I was rather slow about this, and various other circumstances conspired against me so that I found myself on the last night of my lease frantically sacrificing various things due to lack of time and space. (I was reminded of that famous hypothetical: if your house was on fire and you could only take 1 thing/3 things with you, what would you take? Except that I had a car's worth of space, and many hard choices, and too much time to make them.)

I then drove to my parents' home with a full carload of stuff, unloaded it (since my brother would be using my car while I was gone), frantically packed for 6 weeks worth in Boston, and got a ride from my brother and sister (who was in town for just 2 weeks) to the airport. With 2 hastily packed pieces of luggage, and a shoulder bag. I distinctly remember during the packing process considering whether I should pack a jacket, in case it got cold and/or rained. But then I remembered various friends saying that it would be hot and humid in Boston, so I didn't.

With regard to weather, I was looking forward to being out of town for the summer, since the last two summers were very hot in Bakersfield. Especially 2 summers ago, when the daytime temperatures got into the 115+ range, and it didn't cool down enough at night (once, it was still in the 90's at 11 pm). So, I figured, how bad can it be in Boston?

The other preparation was for the work. I've never taught the more intense course that the curriculum would be based on, so I had to arrange to get a copy of the materials, and intended to start preparing it. Two of the teachers had taught last year, two hadn't, but had taught the intense course in their respective cities. One of the nonrepeating teachers had been with my company for about a year. So I felt in some sense that I was in the running for least experienced teacher who would be there.

Intended to do some more prep work on the plane, but only did a little bit. Slept a bit, felt cold, made another mental note to dress in layers when flying.

(Another post will come soon.)

Short updates

2008-02-25T18:16:00.000-08:00

Wow, it's been a really long time since my last post.

Hmmm, so what's happened that's been significant in the last 2 years? This is going to be a bit jumbled.

I've now had 5 jury trials, 1 bench trial (where the judge ruled on the innocence or guilt of the defendant), researched a good number of varied topics, written and argued a bunch of motions (many of which were variations on a theme), and helped prepare an appellate brief (state court).

I've also been the victim of a felony robbery (it's actually a pretty funny story), and testified as a witness in the case.

Gotten a bit of an insider's view of the criminal justice system. And of city government. I had a bit more of an idealistic view of both, previously, and that's now been partially replaced with...realism? cynicism? pragmatism?

Paid off a sizable fraction of my loans, but still have a lot more to go. The monkey on my back. Still, I'm much better off financially than I was when I started this job.

Other things, some of which will last a bit longer: joining, getting involved in, and serving in my church in Bakersfield. Joining/helping to start a Bible study group (which hasn't been quite as connected to the previous sentence as you might think). Teaching Sunday school for the youth group (ranging from 7th grade to 12th). Friendships with coworkers (believers, nonbelievers, and nominals).

Seen two of my supervisors elevated from attorneys to judges of the Superior Court of California. And that has caused me to think more about what a judge is, and how you get to be a judge in our system.

Spiritually, I think I've grown a bit in some ways, or maybe toughened. But in too many other ways, I've stagnated or gone backwards, or just lost passion. It's one of the things I feared about working a job, and being in this stage of life.

Gotten a view of life in a small urban area. This is a hard thing to articulate, but I have a bit more of a feel of what it would be like to have lived here. Some of this is evident in how long term residents view those from LA or the Bay Area or such. There's a certain love/hate relationship there.

New apartment in Bakersfield

2006-05-31T17:34:00.000-07:00

Life in Bakersfield has been good. I thought I'd have
my first trial, but it didn't end up happening. But
it looks like I'll have one in the next week or two.

Apart from work, I've mostly just been settling in to
my new apartment (after having rented a room in a
house for a month temporarily). I'm pretty amazed at
how much money I've spent already. I thought I'd be
living a pretty simple life, but even the simplest
furniture and fixtures and such seem to all add up.
And there's also clothes and shoes for work, too.

There's a lot of Hispanic folks in my apartment
complex, but I've yet to actually meet
anyone--probably because I'm at work so much.

The other thing I've started to do is look for a
church. I think this process may take a while,
because I'll be going back to Irvine for a good number
of weekends this summer, for various reasons,
including a few weddings.

Another email soon after moving to Bakersfield

2006-05-09T22:55:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

Hope you're all well. Some updates on what's been going on with me lately:

Up until 3 weeks ago, I've been living with my folks in Orange County, working for Kaplan as an occasional teacher and really more as an academic manager, supervising and training other teachers. And getting involved again at my church in Irvine. And watching a whole lot of tv (I joked that I made up for all the tv I didn't watch last year when I didn't have one). And sending out applications for legal work. And then, about 2 months ago, I got an offer from the place I'm at now.

So I've been at my new job for a little more than 3 weeks now. I'm now working for the city attorney's office in Bakersfield, CA. It's about 1.5 hrs north of LA, on the 99.

Before coming here, I'd had the fear that it would only be marginally bigger than those tiny towns you drive through on that drive (you know, those places with a handful of gas stations, fast food restaurants, and not much else). But as my friend J found out on wikipedia, it's a good sized city, the 11th largest in CA, with a bit more than 300,000 people.

The job has been really good, at least in the 3 weeks I've been here. I'm going to get a lot of experience doing a number of different things. Part of my time I'm in the office, doing legal research on issues affecting the city. The other part of the time (which may be the bulk of it), I'm in court or at the DA's office learning and starting to prosecute minor crimes.

(Which reminds me that I should write another post sometime about the level of certainty within a prosecutor's mind regarding the guilt of a defendant, both for trial as well as for plea negotiations.)

These last few weeks I've been spending a lot of time at work, partly to alleviate some of my vast ignorance, and partly because I don't have an Internet connection at the place I'm temporarily at. You don't appreciate what you've got until you don't have it anymore.

One of my co-workers in Irvine described Bakersfield as a blend of a central valley city (like Sacramento, Fresno, Stockton, etc) on the one hand and a greater LA area suburb on the other. Some of my coworkers leave town every weekend to go down to LA, or the bay area, or the central coast. The good thing is that there's a number of outdoor activities that aren't too far away, some camping, rafting, Sequoia isn't too far, and the coast (SLO) is about 2 hrs away. Or so I hear. I've gone back to the OC every weekend so far, though that won't continue for long.

One thing that a lot of people here say is not so good is the air quality. Since the city is at the southern edge of the central valley, we've got mountains on 3 sides that contribute to an inversion layer. So all the pollution from us (and partly from LA) stays in the area, and as the summer continues, my coworker tells me I'll gradually lose sight of the hills and mountains because of the smog. Apparently, LA puts some of its sewage in the fields in Kern county. Lovely.

Another thing almost everyone mentions is the heat. They say that Bakersfield summers are really really bad, and that while it's usually a dry heat, sometimes it's also humid, too. (I think it had something to do with that inversion layer.)

I'm not sure what to make of that. I spent the last 3 summers in Davis, and that first summer in particular, I remember was bad. Sitting in my apartment at 11 pm sweating and thinking to myself--when is it going to cool down? Visiting Safeway on a Sun afternoon to enjoy free air-conditioning.

And my second summer, working in Sacramento, it got so hot that the glue that held my rearview mirror in my car couldn't take the heat. A bit later, my brother glued it back on, but then another few months went by and the glue couldn't take the heat. So, how much worse than Davis is it going to be? Guess we'll see.

The plusses: Bakersfield is big enough to have all the major stores and restaurants: Costco, Walmart, supermarkets, Borders, Barnes and Noble, Trader Joe's, etc. There's a mall that has a Macy's though no Banana Republic.

And it's small enough not to have traffic. I live now about 5 miles from work, and on a good day, it takes 10 minutes to get to the parking lot at work. On a bad day, it takes 12 minutes.

And many of the people have the friendliness and genuine niceness that seems characteristic of the central valley.

Soon after moving to Bakersfield

2006-05-09T22:47:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

I've been pretty bad about updating this. And I know I haven't made an effort yet to let people know that this blog has moved from its previous location. But I've been encouraged to write once again, especially given my new locale.

So, here are some edited excerpts from some emails I wrote to friends in the last few weeks. To start, what's below was written April 17, 2006.

Hey C,

Sorry I didn't write earlier--these last few weeks have been really hectic, trying to wrap things up in OC for work and church before coming here. And finding an apartment. And moving here.

Anyway, I had my first day of work here at the City Attorney's office. Lots of stuff and lots of meeting people whose names I promptly forgot about 5 minutes later. HR people, secretaries and attorneys in the office, police officers, more police officers, other people we met in the hall as our supervisor gave us tours. And tomorrow and the day after we'll be meeting a bunch more people, various police people and the DA's. Pretty much everyone was gone by 5:15 pm, so here I am checking email.

It's nice to know that I'm not in the kind of environment where everyone works really late. I hope I don't stand out too much by staying later than the others here.

My initial fear was that I'd be pretty bored here in Bakersfield, but it looks like there's lots and lots to learn here at work, both with regard to legal stuff and with regard to people and relationships and organizational stuff.

The other 2 people who started with me today seem nice. They're both a bit more experienced than I am, so I hope I can show myself to be at least competent.

Anyway, lots of first impressions, but we'll see how things pan out in a few weeks.

--Wanr

The CA bar

2005-08-15T14:15:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've posted.

The CA bar itself was from July 26-28. It was an intense few days. Friends of mine stayed at a hotel right across the street from the Sacramento Convention Center, but I didn't want to spend the money, so I drove every day. It was not bad, though it was inconvenient driving, parking each morning, then walking to the convention center.

The structure of the bar is as follows:
the first day:
Morning: 3 essays, 1 hour each, on any of the subjects (CA and/or federal)
Afternoon: a "Performance Test"--a 3 hour block of time to read instructions, figure out what to write, and write it

the second day:
Morning: 100 multiple choice questions, with 3 hours to do them, covering the multistate subjects
Afternoon: more of the same

the third day:
just like the first day

Almost everyone I talked to thought the first day's morning essays were really hard. Hard to figure out what they were asking, what area of law they were testing, what to write. During the lunch break of the third day, a few of us were watching tv in a hotel room. We saw the scene in the movie "The Day After Tomorrow" where a military helicopter gets caught in a draft of cold air, and crashes to the ground. The crew survives the crash, and start moving to get out of the helicopter, but then the cold air freezes them.

A friend commented: that's what I felt like that first day--crash, then oh, maybe we've survived, but then, no, it's all over. All of us in the room started laughing.

I honestly don't know how I did. I certainly could have done a whole lot better. I wish I'd done more practice essays to train myself to think and write quickly. For the short essays on the first and third days, I felt I'd written too slowly and left out a number of things as a result. The multiple choice went well, I thought.

So, I won't be surprised either way, whether I pass or fail. But if I do fail, it's going to be a big downer, since I'll have to go through the whole deal of studying for the Feb test, and this time without the experience of going through it with other people.

It helps a lot to go through intense experiences like these with others. Helps keep you motivated, and keeps you from feeling like you're the only loser. We'll see.

bar studying

2005-06-10T23:26:00.000-07:00

Studying for the bar means:
classes 5-6 days/week,
4 hrs of class most days (occasionally more),
several hours of homework each day,
being in class with the same people every day, chitchatting during the 10 min breaks,
trying to remember stuff you crammed months, or, more often, years ago

The last semester of law school!

2005-03-08T16:41:00.000-08:00

So this semester is going quite well.

Last semester (fall 2004) was tough, almost as bad as last year. I took 18 units, and had a paper to write, and I was sitting in on some extra classes because I probably wouldn't have a chance to take them again.

This semester, I'm taking 11 units:
Public Health Law
Topical Issues in Health Law
Intellectual Property in Historical Context
Professional Responsibility (ethical duties of a lawyer)
Independent Study (working with a professor about crime and Asian Americans)

The first 3 classes all require papers, which I've been procrastinating somewhat on so far. But one requires a group paper (I'm in a group of 4 people), and for another, I'm using some of the research from the paper I wrote last semester.

The other really nice thing about this semester is that I don't have classes on Fridays, and the classes I'm enrolled in are on Mondays and Wednesdays. I'm sitting in on Immigration Law, which is Tues/Wed/Thurs, but I'm skipping a number of those Tuesdays, and some of those Thursdays, too. Also, on most days my first class is at 1 or 2 pm, which lets me sleep in.

So my schedule is pretty good. And with no classes on Fridays, I've gone snowboarding twice at a place that charges students $10 for lift tickets on Fridays (a friend pointed out that this probably promotes students to cut their Fri classes).

But I do need to get on the ball with those papers. And with the job search.

Quick side note: I've been thinking more about relationships lately. In the last 2 weeks, I've been asked 3 times why I've never had a girlfriend (or even a second date). Hmm.

Starting over

2005-02-28T17:48:00.000-08:00

So, the site of my old blog hasn't allowed me to post for a while, which is one of the reasons why it's been so long since my last entry.

I'm going to import the old entries, just in case the other site further deteriorates.

Rescued!

2004-06-21T00:36:00.000-07:00

So, at the time of my last entry, I had said:

I've still got Evidence on Monday, need to observe a trial and write a
short critique for Trial Practice, write a short memo on my attempts
to observe a suppression hearing for Criminal Procedure, study for
my Patent Law take home final, prepare for a graduation ceremony,
and then . . . some rest.

It has all happened, and I felt as I saw the graduation ceremony (for the Christian Legal Society) come together, I felt immensely relieved. In fact, rescued. Rescued from the pit of despair I had been in only a few weeks before.

Wednesday I picked up the 24 hour take home exam for Patent Law, then started working, and probably slept less than 4 hours in the next 24 hours. Turned it in Thursday evening, then slept some. Got ready for the CLS graduation. I invited two speakers to share their thoughts, one a tax attorney and the other a judge, and I was pretty worried that only 4 people would show. We ended up having about 12, which was fantastic for us (and I hope not too awkward for them). 2 of our graduating members attended, along with their families, which accounted for much of the increase.

One of the speakers noted that as an attorney, there's an occupational risk of treating those around you in your personal life with an attitude of "I'm an attorney doing really important things and I'm so busy that you should make allowances for me." This attitude should not be. How true that we have it, and how true it is that we shouldn't have it.

(By the way, I recently visited UCI and found that the painting titled “The Way Amidst Despair” still hangs in the student center there.)

Saturday morning was the official graduation for the law school, and I spent a good part of the afternoon at the reception saying hi and congratulations and goodbye to various former 3L’s. I also had the chance to speak with a few of my professors in the graduation reception.

Saturday afternoon was spent with one of my friends who had just graduated, and her family and friends. It was quite interesting—but I’ll have to leave it at that for now. Saturday evening was dinner with another friend from law school, at his aunt’s house. Inside, I felt a bit strange, since I was not a close friend of his, but was rather invited by his aunt, who I know from church. But her daughter, who just learned to walk a little while ago, kept us all entertained.

(Why do I feel the need to give an account of my time?)

The following week was good, caught up on my sleep, ran errands, watched the trial, wrote the critique, did various things I had previously put off until after finals. Then a week in Irvine, which was good. My next post will be about it. And now I’ve been back in Davis for a week now.

A good friend of mine who graduated from law school last year gave me some advice about this summer. He advised me not to spend it running around doing errands here and there, because I’ll then look back on the time and say that I wasted it.

I’ve tried to set some goals for myself: to study for and take the patent bar examination and the MPRE (the professional responsibility exam for would-be lawyers, a multiple choice test about legal ethics that I’ve heard isn’t too hard).

Possible side project: to build a projector (for watching DVD’s and computer stuff). Other possible side project: to revise the Law and Mental Health paper (that I spent 6 months writing—aaaargh!) to see if I can get it published in a legal journal.

And I ought to be doing job stuff, sending out resumes and cover letters and stuff. And it looks like I may be teaching for Kaplan to pay the bills over the summer.

And I’ve already commi

(rest of entry lost due to technical difficulties)

The way amidst despair

2004-05-07T20:12:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been many months since my last entry.

I've had some writing to do for school--specifically, a paper for one of my fall semester classes. Law and Mental Health. I tried to finish it last semester, but failed. Tried to finish it over Christmas break, spent many hours at Starbucks in Irvine trying to finish, failed. Got an extension until this semester. Put the paper away from my mind for awhile, thinking I needed to recover, to think about other things, to come back to it later. Then the deadline crept closer, and I tried to write again. Failed.

A host of things I meant to do got put off until after the paper was done, including updating this blog. And applying for more summer jobs. And studying (in a reviewing sense) for my classes.

And now, the paper is done, a bit past the extended deadline. Actually, more than a bit. But anyway, the paper is done, turned in. And now finals are upon me. An appellate brief for Moot Court needs to be finished. 2 more final exams (just took 1 this morning, Criminal Procedure). I've still got Evidence on Monday, need to observe a trial and write a short critique for Trial Practice, write a short memo on my attempts to observe a suppression hearing for Criminal Procedure, study for my Patent Law take home final, prepare for a graduation ceremony, and then . . . some rest.

But at least the paper is done. And now that it is, I feel more hopeful that I'll be able to graduate. There've been many times in trying to write that paper that I began to doubt whether I'd be able to graduate. The doubts are smaller now.

"The Way Amidst Despair" is the title of a painting that used to (and may still) hang in the student center of UC Irvine. I wasn't all that impressed by the painting, but I was struck by the title, and by what the artist was trying (with limited success) to convey.

I knew law school would be hard, and would require a lot of me. During my first year, I realized I wasn't nearly as smart as many of my classmates. Still, I thought the challenge would be for me to excel. To pass my classes--I thought this would not be a problem.

This year, I've felt hard pressed. I knew school would be hard, but I didn't expect to lose so much confidence in myself, to deeply question my competence as a law student (let alone a future lawyer), my capability as a student. Didn't expect to doubt my self-worth so much.

I do not write this to garner assurances from others that I'm really not so incompetent. I write to tell what I've learned.

Now, I feel that if I should graduate (an "if" for me, not a "when"), that will be a triumph, a victory. Triumph over what? Over despair, over the many times when I thought I wasn't going to make it. A limited victory over my incompetence.

A final push for the next few weeks . . . more entries later. I promise.

Post-college blah

2003-11-16T02:38:00.000-08:00

I was looking through the blog of a friend of a friend, and I came across this:

"When we are not living up to our true vocation, thought deadens our life, or substitutes itself for life, or gives in to life so that our life drowns out our thinking and stifles the voice of conscience. When we find our vocation -- thought and life are one."
--Thomas Merton

The blogger went on to comment on this quote. His next 3 paragraphs:

I think there are 3 levels of being - existing, thinking, and truly living. Something Eddie once said (actually has said many times) sticks with me a lot, how for a long time in his life he just existed. He didn't think at all.

I think very recently I've been thinking more about vocation, but that's all it's been, just thinking. And practically, there's no real difference between that and just existing. Either way I'm just paralyzed into doing whatever I'm doing. I just feel vaguely more unsettled about things when I think about. But no change, nothing like that.

I dunno, I don't want to do that anymore. I've been saying this over and over, but I don't want to settle anymore, I want to be deliberate, I want to feel called, I want to know why I'm doing something and really do it - I want to live. To reach a point where thought and life are one I guess. That's an awesome phrase. "Thought and life are one." But what does that mean practically? No clue.

(I would have linked directly to this blog entry, but unfortunately I don't know how to get it to go specifically to that entry. The page, which has a bunch of entries all together is found here. Use Ctrl-f and "Merton" to see the original.)

Wow. That captures a lot of what I've felt, especially in the years since graduating college. And it seems to capture the state of life of a lot of college grads I know, who are simply working, and feeling that they're not living deliberatively. Waiting for something, but not knowing what it is. I think this idea of thought substituting for life is what websurfing can sometimes become: thinking other people's thoughts, but not living one's life.

To a limited extent, I feel the Merton quote still characterizes me. Being in law school definitely gives you some goals (do this reading, write these papers, prepare these arguments, graduate from school, get a job), but I don't feel like I'm really accomplishing all that much, in terms of stuff that's important.

I need to decide soon about whether to apply for a Masters in Public Health degree. On the one hand, I feel that that would be important stuff, and likely to be quite useful in the future. Without actually having learned the material, I still feel that it would be closer to my life's work. And having another degree might help. On the other hand, it's another year of time, and a good number of thousands of dollars more in debt.

Choosing not to do it now doesn't completely take it off the table--I suppose I could do it later on, but it would be harder later. Doing it later would mean that the money would be less of an issue (since I'd presumably be working), but the time would be much more of an issue.

OK, I'll write later about my trip to Washington, D.C., which was a great trip, even though it didn't provide me with the summer job leads I was hoping for. Still, a great trip. Which I'll describe later, hopefully.

On a man's perspective on prospects

2003-10-12T08:51:00.000-07:00

The following excerpt is taken from a boundless.org article by Steve Watters found
here
(http://www.boundless.org/departments/beyond_buddies/a0000810.html).

The whole article is worth reading, but these 3 paragraphs I found particularly insightful:

Gordon Gano, leader of the 80s band the Violent Femmes, settled down enough as he got older to make a dead-on observation. In an interview with Details magazine, he explained that men by their nature overestimate their potential. Men assume they can have any woman. In their minds, commitment to one woman inevitably requires subtraction — it means limiting themselves to only one slice of a large pie.

I started to see that one slice of pie differently, however, once I decided to stop pretending Candice and I were just buddies and tried to reign in my wandering eye. It was then that I was reminded of the phrase “less is more” — how getting rid of the clutter helps the best stuff stand out.

Back when I was editor of my college yearbook, I got a crash course in photography. My photo editor told me, “don’t try to capture the whole world in one photo. Don’t feel the need to take one of those panoramic Grand Canyon like photos that attempts to squeeze everything in. Instead, focus in on something, a single building, a flower or an expressive face.”

Aaargh!

2003-10-09T00:42:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd write another entry, and I'd written a number of paragraphs, but then I wanted to put in the word "pinata" (with a ~ above the n), and I tried to use a number code to see if it would work. Unfortunately, it sent the web browser back a page, and I lost it all.

Why was I going to put "pinata", you ask? I've lost the desire to try to write it again.

From my Jewish Law seminar professor:
"Jewish law is a duty driven legal system
American law is a rights driven legal system"

He acknowledged that duties and rights are often found together, so that practically, it makes no difference. If a husband has a duty to support his wife, another way of saying the same thing is to say that a wife has a right to be supported by her husband.

But while American courts will only decide whose rights win (in a civil case, does defendent have to pay, or not?), in the Jewish legal tradition, rabbis have a tradition of being able to say to a defendant: no, the law doesn't require you to pay the plaintiff, but it would be a good thing (a mitzvah) for you to help them.

From another class, Law and Mental Health. One of the professors is a JD/MD psychiatrist, who said yesterday that one of the most fascinating and difficult issues in psychiatry for her is religion. If someone holds crazy beliefs, maybe they're crazy. But if that same person holds these beliefs along with a group of other people as part of an established tradition, then he/she is religious. The stories of the foundings of most religions sound crazy to a nonreligious person. An angel named Moroni came, some tablets buried, special lenses?

It reminded me of an incident when I was a lot younger, and I first learned of the Muslim belief that Mohammed physically ascended into heaven, saw many things, talked with prophets, and then descended back to earth. I asked my brother: do they really believe all that? And my brother said that when Muslims learn that Christians believe Jesus was crucified, was dead for three days, then came back, and ascended into heaven, it sounds just as crazy to them.

So is it not the craziness of the thoughts themselves, but rather the means by which one acquired them? Is this the position in psychiatry: that if you got your crazy beliefs by chemical imbalances (or brain tumors or whatever), then you have a mental illness, but if you got your crazy beliefs from a religious group, then you're religious?

Unrelated to the above: I'm flying to Washington D.C. at the end of this month, for a job fair that'll be held there. I'm flying out Thursday morning and returning Monday night. Most of my classmates are doing on campus interviews, and getting callbacks and such. I, on the other hand, have not been very proactive as of yet. Hopefully, the job fair will turn out well.

Much prayer needed for me! Not just about jobs, but about my own character flaws (some new ones I've just learned about, along with the old ones), workload, my witness in school. Lots more.

I thought summer was busy...

2003-09-10T22:23:00.000-07:00

What they say about law school:
The first year, they scare you to death.
The second year, they work you to death.
The third year, they bore you to death.

During this past summer, working 3 part time jobs, I thought the school year couldn't possibly be any worse.

I'm not sure if it is or not. There's still lots of studying to do for school, plus activities to do as a 2L, and looking for a summer internship (for this coming summer--yes, that early).

My classes:

Constitutional Law II (focusing on topics we didn't cover in part I, namely, Free Speech and Equal Protection)
My professor is the same one I'm working for as a research assistant (until November, when he plans to publish an article). Good professor, interesting subject matter, and the pressure of the fact that I'm personally working for him.

Copyright
Interesting in a more abstract way. Pace of the class has been somewhat slow so far. And I wonder how we'll be tested on the material.

Law and Mental Health
Very interesting class, taught by a law professor who used to do criminal defense, a medical school psychiatry professor (JD/MD), and a psychiatrist. (What might indicate that your client has a mental illness?, competency to stand trial, the insanity defense, and more)

Jewish Law Seminar
Introduction to another legal system that is much older than the American one. Where taking a Bible to class is expected for everyone.

Appellate Advocacy (moot court)
For this semester, it's pretending you have a case on appeal that you're arguing in front of a judge. Stressful and fun at the same time. Thankfully, a pass/not pass class, which is good. On the other hand, many in the class (including me) want to do well enough to sit on the moot court board next year.

Asian American Community Lawyering
I'm auditing this class. 1 hr a week discussing legal issues concerning Asian Americans.

That's it for classes. They're all pretty good classes. And I don't have any on Fridays, but I still come to school because I'm continuing the constitutional law research I started this past summer.

And there's also Christian Legal Society and the Asian Pacific American Law Students' Association.

And many of my classmates are doing more than me. I've now a total of 14 units, 2 of which are P/NP. A number of classmates are taking more (15-17). Some are doing Law Review, which involves publishing the school journal, and writing a "note" or "comment" (of many pages). Almost all the 2L's are actively looking for a summer internship. Some are doing clinicals (essentially, working as apprentice lawyers under an attorney/professor's supervision). One 2L I know is taking the Patent Bar exam this October (a test that takes a long long time to prepare for).

I'm tired. And I'm surrounded by tired people. Being a lawyer is supposed to be worse. And it's kind of hard to imagine. I don't try.

I hope next year will be better. Some 3L's say they don't care as much, because they're almost done, and often doing full time externships or other work. But some are stressing about whether they'll have a job when they graduate. Graduating with large amounts of school loans and no job would be a bad place to be in.

I'm considering whether or not to apply for a Master's in Public Health program for next year at Berkeley, and then coming back to Davis the year after that to finish law school. I don't know whether it would be helpful, interesting, worthwhile. Perhaps it's me trying to put off working for another year. (I also would like to do a judicial clerkship after law school for at least a year.)

Need to decide soon. And stay on top of the work now. Or at least, if perhaps not on top, at least not buried underneath.

Apologies

2003-08-28T00:24:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

My apologies for not having written earlier. It's been a busy summer, and it looks like it'll be a busy semester, too.

Also, part of why I haven't written was because my next entry would have been about OneDay, and what it meant (check out the link). It was not what I expected--it was both less and more. Two things from it: 1) a conversation with a Korean-American pastor there about the Korean-American church, some of its problems, and its future, and 2) the DVD I bought there of OneDay 2000.

There was far more, as well--a collage of memories, sights, experiences: seeing OneDay volunteers walk down the registration line (a long line of cars), praying for the people in each car; camping while Scripture was read over outdoor PA systems, lots more. Worshipping amidst thousands of fellow believers; praying, watching as many stood as a call for commitment to missionary service was issued.

Too much.

So, perhaps I'll go into more detail in a future entry sometime.

For now, let me just say that the summer was really busy--interning at the CA state public defender's office, teaching/working for Kaplan, and researching for a law professor at school.

Then at the end of July, my lease ran out, and I had to move to the other side of town. Thankfully, 2 friends from church helped out some. Still, it was a lot of work.

And throughout the summer, occassional weekend visits home to Irvine.

And now, school has started again, and I'm trying to figure out my classes, and take care of a bunch of things, and find out info about various things, and I also need to tie up loose ends from the summer.

Ok, more to come later. Hopefully soon.

And one more apology: to my friends in southern CA, whom I did not see on my last trip, I'm sorry I wasn't able to meet up with you. I drove home Wed with a cold, and Thurs and Fri I spent at home, battling it. Then Sat, I drove back up to Davis.

So, perhaps Thanksgivingish?

Be well (a parting phrase I've heard a lot recently).

Sacramento to Vegas to Dallas

2003-06-21T23:56:00.000-07:00

So after the official graduation ceremony, I rushed home, finished packing, called my friend, and got a ride to the airport. Took with me some clothes, some books, and my camping stuff (tents, camp stove, sundries).

Arrived late Saturday night at the Dallas/Ft. Worth airport. Actually, before I did that, I flew on the plane. It's only been within the last year or two that I've started flying again. Before last year, it had been a long time since I'd flown anywhere else. There was a short flight from Oakland to Orange County, and then a flight to Minneapolis/St. Paul to visit a law school there, then a flight to Arizona for a summer missions trip with my church. And then this flight from Sacramento to Dallas.

There was a commercial a while ago for an airline that made fun of other airlines by comparing their attitude towards their passengers to that of people herding cattle. Milling herds cramped in close quarters, shuffled in and out. For most, if not all, of the flights in the past year or two, I've been reminded of that commercial. Which is all o.k., because I've always wanted the cheapest flight available.

The flight went from Sac to Las Vegas, then from Vegas to Dallas. On the second leg, I saw next to a woman from Dallas who hadn't flown before this trip. Things were going fine until we hit some turbulence. She was a little freaked out, and the woman on the other side of her helped calm her down by talking, making jokes, and sympathizing. I had the window seat, near the wing, and I could see how the wing wasn't solid and immovable. Instead, pieces of metal riveted to other pieces of metal bucked a bit, and tried to get away from each other.

"A bad sign," I thought. She may have good reason to be freaked out. I really hope the ground crew in Vegas thoroughly checked out the plane, and didn't miss anything. I've flown (ridden) through turbulence before, but I think this was the first time I could see the plane's wing as we went throught it.

I was reminded of the Twilight Zone episode in which the passenger sees a monster on the wing of the plane as they fly through a storm, but no one else does.

Into Thy hands I commit my spirit, Lord. Give us traveling mercies. We were in the air, held up by the push of air beneath the wings. We were in the heavens, God's territory. And really, we were in His hands. I was stripped of the illusion of safety. Whether in the air or on the ground, we're entirely at His mercy, every moment of every day.

And, too, should we be taken from this life, there would be terror, and pain, and things left undone, but also goodness and mercy, peace and light at the throne of judgment.

"Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?" 1 Corinth 15:55.

I much wanted to be strong in faith, comforted by His promises, and I think I was, a bit. The fact that the woman next to me was pretty scared also helped me to stay calm. And, it also helped that about 3/4 of the other passengers all just sort of took it, and didn't feel any fear, or didn't express it if they did. (Now that I think about it, they didn't have window seats and didn't look at the wing.)

But it's easy to go with the flow. To be impassive, phlegmatic. Like a herd of cattle.

So I arrived late Saturday night in Dallas

End of finals and graduation ceremonies

2003-06-21T23:29:00.000-07:00

Wow--it's been a while since I've last written, and there's lots of stuff that's happened. So I'm going to break it up into several entries, which should update y'all to where I'm at now.

Let's see--where did I leave off with the last entry? Torts and Property. Yes.

Torts went fine--it was a mostly predictable final, fairly similar to the past years' exams that our professor had released. No big surpriese.

Property, on the other hand, was a surprise. Our professor, who we only had for spring semester (we had a different professor fall semester), had announced that after every lecture, he would go to his office and write a couple of multiple choice questions. Then, at the end of the semester, he would put them all together, and that would be the multiple choice portion of the exam, to be combined with an essay portion. It was his aim to make the test give the same proportion of weights to different topics as was found in the lectures.

He did indeed do so, but unfortunately, it seemed that after each lecture, he had written questions on some of the most obscure subtleties (did I spell that rights?) he'd mentioned in lecture. Thus, the exam was quite frustrating.

It wasn't quite as bad for me, because I had not made an outline for the class. This had actually worked to my advantage, because I studied by reading over my notes. Most people, on the other hand, had made outlines. The thing about outlines is that you don't want them to be overly voluminous, so you edit out most of the smaller points, the subtleties that don't seem connected to the bigger picture of the course.

I'm hopeful that the curve will allow me to have done well in the class, to raise my dismal performance on the midterm in Property. And I feel much trepidation about my grades in general.

So, that was it, the end of finals. The Property final was on a Friday morning, and then I went with another CLS member (Christian Legal Society) to get gifts for our graduating seniors. Friday evening we had a CLS graduation ceremony, a simple affair with some songs, a message from one of the law professors (I believe he and perhaps one other professor are the only Christians on the faculty), and a message from the pastor of one of the local churches.

The faculty speaker spoke about the role of lawyers as educators. Because of their knowledge of the law, they have a responsibiliity to their clients, and to society to educate people about the law.

The pastor spoke about fighting injustice locally and around the world. And if you aren't directly in that fight, raise awareness about it, and encourage those who are in it.

Friday late night I spent packing for my trip to Texas.

Saturday morning: went to the official law school graduation ceremony. Given that there were about 150 3L's, I was surprised at the number of people who attended. But I suppose I shouldn't have been, since each graduate had family, friends, etc there.

The faculty speaker was my Consitutional Law professor. A fairly young guy, in his early 30's. Very very smart. Openly homosexual. Won't be around next year because he'll be a visiting professor at Stanford. There's been much speculation that this may signal that he won't be back, but no one knows. He spoke, and I remember trying to hang onto his words, because I really did develop some respect for him this past semester, and if he never comes back, I'll be a bit sad. But as I sit here writing, I can't think of anything he talked about.

The guest speaker was Joyce Kennard, a member of the California Supreme Court. She spoke about having grown up in Indonesia (or was it Irian Jaya?), the daughter of a Dutch father and Chinese mother. Her dad left early in her childhood, she only had a school education to about 8th grade, and struggled much. Eventually her mom brought her to Europe, and then she made her way to America.

"I never felt that America owed me anything. Rather, I felt I owed so much to America. It was my dream, and the dream of so many, to just have the chance to enter this land, and America opened its doors to me."

"Coming from that background, to working as a secretary, to finishing college, then law school, then becoming a judge, to sitting on the California Supreme Court--this is an incredible privilege and honor for me. It could only happen in America."

(Not an exact quote, but just based on what I remember.)

It reminded me of the irony that immigrants sometimes are the most patriotic of all. We take living in America for granted, for we've always lived here. But outside of the U.S., people long just for the chance to come. And they appreciate it, value the ability to live here.

Because I had to catch a flight out of Sacramento, I couldn't stay after the official one to say congratulations to the recent grads.

I enjoyed the CLS one much more.

So those were the graduation ceremonies.

Prolonged

2003-05-16T16:49:00.000-07:00

Why is it that every other law school seems to be done, and we have another week of finals to go?

I hope we get an extra week of summer or something to make up for it.

I took the Civil Procedure final this morning, which was a hard test. The final was worth 80-90% of the grade for the year, depending on how the midterm went. 30 multiple choice questions. Straight scale, no curve. Very long tricky problems with many things going on at once. His midterm questions were like that, too, so I was rather apprehensive. Stayed up most of last night, and only got a few hours of sleep before coming to school this morning. I wish now I'd gotten those details down earlier, and slept more.

I've tried to make it my prayer that I will be glad in Him at the end, when all the results come. If I do well, let me give credit where it is due, and celebrate His goodness. If I don't do well, let me still be thankful for what He has given. Sort of a desire to be like Job: "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away--and the Lord sometimes gives not as much as I wanted--Blessed be the name of the Lord."

But the more common prayer yesterday and today was "Help!"

3 down, 2 to go. Contracts and Constitutional Law went ok. I typed those exams, but I know I didn't type nearly as much as the people sitting around me. I was spending too much time thinking, and organizing, and finding it hard to put sentences together. Talking with people afterward, they saw a bunch of things I didn't see. It'd be rather worrisome if I were to let myself think about it.

After the Civil Procedure test this morning, there was a Torts review this afternoon. And to decompress a bit, I've been on the web, where I found this great article about spiritual life. A quote, to whet your appetite:

"I found myself envying my hostess, a 70-year-old, extremely poor,
Christian woman named Jacqueline. I envied her for her joy, her
overflowing love, and for the way her eyes lit up or filled up when
talking about God. She didn’t simply regurgitate biblical stories, facts
and Christian lingo. She knew Him."

Will I become that kind of person? The kind of person who knows Him, and inspires others to know Him? Maybe you can't exactly inspire someone to know God, but it seems to me that you can inspire someone to want to know Him.

So, for all my southern CA friends, it looks like I'll be down from June 4 to June 11 or 12. Don't know how fried my brain will be, but I hope not too much to enjoy the brief vacation, before coming back here to work.

For now, on to Torts and Property. . .

Long day

2003-05-06T00:29:00.000-07:00

Today was a long day.

I had a Civil Procedure review that started at 9 am this morning. The professor had never done a review for this class before (though he's taught it for many years), and it ended up finishing at 1:30 pm.

Thankfully, he took 10 minute breaks every hour or so.

Then a Constitutional Law review that started at 2 pm (in the same room) that went until 6:15 pm.

Then I heard the beginning of a talk from 7-8. Went home, grabbed a pair of binoculars and a snack to eat, and drive to school, to hear another talk given by E.O. Wilson, the Harvard biologist.

That went until about 9:30. Went to the computer lab, checked my email for the first time today, tried to set up my newly bought laptop for Internet access, but didn't figure it out.

(Yes, I bought another laptop this past weekend. The 133 MHz Pentium I laptop that I bought on eBay a while ago was too slow to run the exam software that is optional for 2 of my finals. Though it wasn't necessary for me to use a laptop, I type far faster than I write, and I thought it was about time anyway. And my sister let me know about the deals at BestBuy recently.)

Was at school until about 10 pm. While there, I had a microwave teriyaki chicken/vegetables rice bowl (thanks, Kev, for letting me know about those. I've probably had an average of 1-2 a week since coming to law school.) Drove to church, went to the Monday night prayer meeting.

I've been to the Monday night prayer meeting a handful of times this past year. It's mostly made up of college folk, but there's no active exclusion of anyone. It's fairly simple: some praise songs (sometimes led with a guitar, sometimes acapella), a short devotional led by one of the college folk or college staff (these are recent college grads), and then the lights are turned off, and some people kneel or are prostrate on the ground while others stay in their chairs, and everyone prays. Many of them out loud. Some pray silently. Some pray in whispers. Some do a mix. As individuals finish their prayers, they quietly leave the room, taking care not to disturb those remaining.

With few variations, this is what prayer meetings are like at many Korean American churches. For some, sitting in a room with other people praying out loud (loud enough for you to hear them) can be distracting. And occasionally it distracts me, too. But you also learn to verbalize your prayers, order your thoughts into words, say them aloud.

I'm really glad that my church here holds these.

And now I'm back at school, again trying to get the laptop to connect, and also hopefully getting some real stuff done.

My schedule:
This week: Contracts exam on Fri
Next week: Constitutional Law on Tues, Civil Procedure on Fri
Week after that: Torts on Tues, Property on Fri

Friday 5/23 is my last final. Then I fly to Texas to visit my sister, and go to OneDay, and work on the law review competition.

Year's end, and a story

2003-04-17T17:56:00.000-07:00

The school year is wrapping up, and the impending weight of finals draws nearer. Everyone wants it to be summer already, but we don't want to have to go through finals. Perhaps a bit like Frodo and Sam, in the Lord of the Rings, not wanting to go towards Mordor, but being inexorably drawn there by their larger purpose.

Along with finals, the end of the year also means end of the year dinners and elections for officers for student groups for next year. Given that law school is 3 years, and that by your 3rd year, you often aren't on campus very much anymore (often, doing clinicals--legal work under the supervision of attorneys/professors, or credited externships, or simply apathy), it's the second year law students who do most of the work. The first years (1L's) don't know enough, and are also usually scared of taking on any extra responsibilities.

So, basically, an entire new group of officers comes in every year. APALSA, the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association had their elections, which I wasn't able to attend. So did the King Hall Intellectual Property Association. I attended that one, and managed to escape being given an office.

The Christian Legal Society only has 5 1L's, so all 5 of us will be officers next year (the school requires every student group to have at least 5 officers). I'm kind of glad. It's a chance for people to know that I'm a Christian. Not that I've denied my faith, or been ashamed of it. But in my relationships with other law students, many do not know that I am. Though I do make it a point to openly pray before every meal.

I was at the Good Friday service at my church today, and I heard the following story:

An elementary school teacher was teaching a creative writing class. The exercise she had was for her students to write the ending to a story that she would begin for them. The beginning was the fable of the Ant and the Grasshopper. During the year, an ant was industriously working every day to store up food for the winter. The grasshopper, on the other hand, didn't store any food at all, instead enjoying the outdoors. The winter came, and the ant was now in his home, with all the food he'd stored in the past months. The grasshopper was hungry, and went to the ant's house, and begged him for some food.

One student raised his hand and asked: "Teacher, can I draw a picture?"

"Yes, you can, but you must first write the ending to the story."

The students were given some time to finish, and handed in their work at the end of class.

Afterward, the teacher went through the classwork, reading what the students had written. Some had said that the ant said ok to the grasshopper, and that they spent the winter sharing the food that the ant had gathererd. Other students had written another ending: the ant said, "No, I only have enough food for myself--there's not enough for you, too." And the grasshopper left the ant's home and starved to death.

Then she got to the ending of the student who had raised his hand. The ant gave all his food to the grasshopper, and the ant went outside and died.

Below was the student's drawing of a hill with three crosses.

Quick things

2003-04-09T01:32:00.000-07:00

OK, this really has to be quick, because it's late at night, and I need to go home soon. Otherwise, I'll fall asleep here in the computer lab at school.

What's going on with me lately: I'll be working in Sacramento this summer as an unpaid intern with the California State Public Defender's Office. Most, if not all, of what they do is deal with death penalty conviction cases. Most likely, I'll be a part time intern with them, helping various staff attorneys with their cases by doing various tasks, some of which may be rather unsophisticated. E.g. inputting info into a computer. But I'll also hopefully do some legal research and writing. Don't know yet whether I'll be meeting any of the clients.

I'm also applying for part time summer research assistantships, to help professors do their research. I just found out today that one position I applied for has already been filled (by someone other than me). I'll be applying for another one sometime this week.

Housing: My roommate and I would like to again be roommates next year, possibly with 1-2 new people, but we need to find a place. Davis housing is pretty crazy, in that we're already a bit late in looking for places for this coming September!! The vacancy rate during the school year is something less than 1%, I've heard. One more thing I'll need to do.

Finals: are next month. We only have about 3 1/2 weeks of class left, until about the end of April. Then about a week long study period, then final exams over 2 weeks. So the atmosphere is getting more stress-filled. Our finals will be worth anywhere from 50% to 90% of our overall grades for the entire year (both 1st and 2nd semesters), so you can see why.

_________b

(this is how I indicate a break in a flow of thought in my notes, which I take on my notebook computer)

Stuff from today: I was at a panel discussion today, given by 2 professors here, as well as the dean of McGeorge (a law school in Sacramento, which is the only other ABA recognized law school in the area).

The discussion ranged a bit, but mostly was on America's treatment of the detainees in Guantanamo Bay, as well as others. "Detainees" = "unlawful combatants" So some of it explained why they're unlawful combatants, instead of prisoners of war. Much of it was about how federal courts, and the system as a whole (including international courts) isn't well prepared to deal with situations that are arising. (One question: does the Constitution extend only to the physical borders of US land, or does it extend to wherever the flag is flown?

One panelist highly recommended reading a New Yorker article about John Walker Lindh, the "American Taliban", so I found it on the web, and you can read it here.

___________b

This past weekend, I had the chance to attend the Asian Law Caucus dinner in San Francisco. It was held in a large ballroom at the Hyatt Hotel. Various "important" people there. Lots of lawyers, some political people. I heard that the SF mayor, Willie Brown, stopped by, though I didn't see him. There was a federal judge there. A local reporter was one of the presiders, and there was a videocamera set up.

I was reminded of a quote I read on someone's homepage, that went something like: "I will not let the glory of this place overshadow the greatness of my God." Or something like that.

The best part of the dinner for me, though, was the chance to shake hands with Fred Korematsu. If you don't know who he is, find out. There's an article about him here.

OK, time to go home.

Academics, and musings on social stuff

2003-03-17T19:39:00.000-08:00

Classes:

Largely the same as last semester, with a few changes. Of the classes I had last semester, I still have Contracts, Property, Torts, and Civil Procedure. They’re all year long classes, which means that my grades in those classes for fall semester are “IP”: In Progress. This means that once I take the finals in those classes, that gets factored in with how I did on the midterms (back in December), and if the overall grade is a B+, then my grade for both fall semester and spring semester in Torts will be a B+.

My Criminal Law and Legal Research classes were only for the fall semester, so I’m done with those. (By the grace of God, I managed to do well in both.) They’ve been replaced this semester with Constitutional Law I and Legal Writing.

Constitutional Law I is about federalism, the structure of our federal and state government. Lots of abstractions, big issues, theories, textual analysis, trying to reconcile apparently contradictory Supreme Court decisions. It’s definitely the class that I think the most in. It’s probably the closest to my picture of what law school would be like before I came.

Legal writing is a lot of work. The goal of the class is to teach us how to write like a lawyer. One surprising factoid from the textbook: a career as a lawyer will likely involve as much (perhaps more) writing than a career as a novelist. This is the one class without an exam at the end—instead, like Legal Research last semester, we have weekly assignments to turn in. Although it’s only 2 units (whereas most of the other classes are 4 or 5 units over the course of the year), many have said that the skills you develop in it are the most important for a future legal career.

Come to think of it, this class also involves trying to reconcile apparently contradictory court decisions. You’re supposed to extract the underlying legal principle from various decisions, then express that succinctly and persuasively. I have far to go in developing these skills.

Additional school related things:

Various student groups meet. The Christian Legal Society meets for lunch once every week, the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association sporadically meets a handful of times each semester, and the King Hall Intellectual Property Law Association occasionally puts on a talk or a panel. The International Law Forum hosts various speakers, about every other week, as well.

I’ve not taken an active role in any of these, but I’ve attended various events/meetings. Other student groups also occasionally host events.

One of the things I didn’t expect (or hadn’t thought much about) before coming to law school was the number of opportunities to hear interesting talks about various topics: racism in the 1950’s, trends in intellectual property law, prostitution as a human rights issue, water rights struggles between Israelis and Palestinians, the Chinese tort law system, treating “cyberspace” as a physical space, historical roots of the idea of law, the death penalty, drug laws, discrimination and immigration issues in Saipan (a US territory), 9-11 and the USA PATRIOT Act’s effects. These are all various topics I’ve heard people speak on since the beginning of the year.

There does seem to be the trend to learn about, discuss, criticize things, and yet not to do very much about them. This is probably true in any academic environment, but I feel it acutely here. How much have I prayed about any of the injustices in any of the issues above? Very close to zero. How much should I? I don’t know—there’s an article I once read about different roles that Christians have played in different societies, but I won’t get into it here.

But it does remind me of a discussion I had the other day with a grad student in sociology here. She felt that as a Christian, she should not be caught up in the way everyone else in her department condemned the American government vehemently for all the bad things it does. While acknowledging that they have done some bad things, and are doing some bad things, she also felt that attacking the government is not really the answer: instead, Jesus is the answer. Every knee will one day bow, and all things on heaven and earth will one day worship God. He will set all things right one day.

While I agree that the Christian hope is ultimately in Jesus, I had to disagree. Because people are created in the image of God, because He loves every person, because Jesus came to bring life and to destroy the works of the devil, Christians should work to affirm human dignity. We should fight injustice. We should fight those things that oppress the people who Jesus died for. Christians were involved in ending slavery (in England, William Wilberforce) and ending child labor (in the West). While they (rather, we) have not politically done much (that I know of) in the following areas, we have collectively (in the history of the world) fought poverty, illiteracy, and diseases through aid organizations, schools, and hospitals. Christians have founded orphanages, established hospices. Most of the Ivy League schools were founded by Christians (quoting from Ralph Winter: “Princeton University Press fairly recently came out with a restudy (Witchcraft at Salem) of the Salem event which showed that precisely the clergymen in Salem, who studied both theology and science at Yale, were the ones that insisted on a strict, scientific court trial which ended the hysteria”).

I do not mean to say Christians should be socially involved in a blind way. As the old saying goes, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”. The Crusades, colonialism, the destruction of cultures in South America, all may have had very good intentions, yet ended in much human misery.

Nor do I think social action is an ultimate good. While feeding the hungry, outlawing slavery, and diminishing diseases are all good things, they attack manifestations of the spiritual darkness in the world. The Christian struggle against “the principalities, the powers of this world” is fought on more levels than one.

When I was an undergraduate, I overheard a conversation between the president of the student body and a member of one of the Christian student groups. The president asked for support. The Christian replied that she would see if her group and other Christian groups could start praying for him and for the university as a whole.

I expected him to be disappointed. I thought he’d be looking for votes, or signatures on a petition, or attendance at some rallies, or manpower to help set things up. To my surprise, the president was thankful. It was the help he wanted.

Disclaimer: I know I'm not a historian. Nor am I a sociologist. I may be way off base, or wildly inaccurate in what I’ve said. Still, a friend encouraged me to write more spontaneously, and I don’t have the time to check the accuracy of what I’ve written.

Your thoughts?

Had to laugh

2003-02-27T23:55:00.000-08:00

Had to laugh

Something I came across on the web that made me laugh.

The original link:

From The Onion

And, the text of the article:

Temp Hides Fun, Fulfilling Life From Rest of Office

BOSTON—Ty Braxton, 23, continues to hide his fun and fulfilling life from the full-time employees of Hale & Dorr, the Boston law firm for which he has temped since July.

"At a job like this, where you're surrounded by angry, perpetually stressed-out lawyers who are working 80 hours a week, it's important to hide the fact that you're enjoying a normal, balanced, happy life," Braxton said Monday. "People get really pissed when they hear stuff like that."
Braxton, who earns roughly one-fourth of what the firm's lowest-seniority full-time employees make, said he has no desire to make his coworkers feel bad about their "boring, shitty lives."

"If somebody complains about how bad it sucks to work overtime five days straight, I just nod and agree," said Braxton, who spends his weeknights at parties, at concerts, and playing basketball in the park. "No point in rubbing in the fact that no matter how busy things are, I leave at exactly 5 p.m. every single day. If anyone asks me to stay later, I just say my agency doesn't let me do overtime."

After graduating from Wesleyan University in May 2000 with a degree in Russian literature, Braxton worked a series of part-time jobs in and around Boston. In December 2001, he signed on with QualiTemps, the city's largest supplier of temporary office labor, which currently pays him $8.44 per hour.

"I have so much going on in my life right now," Braxton said. "I'm helping a friend start up a little Cajun food stand, I've gotten way into this Russian poet Mayakovsky, I've been hanging out with this really cool girl I met when my band, Sophie Drillteam, did a show with hers. Honestly, I just don't have the time or energy to put into some job."

In spite of his happiness, Braxton said he makes sure always to project an air of dissatisfaction, in both facial expression and posture, while in the office.

"If I had a great time staying out until 4 in the morning the night before, I make sure to wipe away all traces of a smile before I walk in these doors," Braxton said. "If anyone found out I'm not living a hellish existence like they are, I'd be asking for trouble."

Braxton is also careful about engaging his coworkers in conversation.

"I stopped talking about movies, because no one here ever goes to them," Braxton said. "Every time I mention a movie to someone, I have to sit there and listen to them go through the process of figuring out the last movie they saw. The other day, Andrew Walser, this intellectual-property attorney who's trying to make partner, told me that his last movie was Gladiator. I was like, 'Oh, man, that's depressing.'"

In his long-term temp assignment as conference coordinator at Hale & Dorr, Braxton schedules employee use of the firm's five common meeting rooms and is responsible for keeping the rooms stocked with cold refreshments and snacks. His other primary duty is to procure audio-visual equipment for meetings when requested, a situation that arises "only, like, one or two times a month."

"People e-mail me about needing rooms, and I have to e-mail them back with room assignments," Braxton said. "I also have to post the schedule on the meeting-room doors and order paper cups and things. All in all, though, it's pretty easy. Everybody's usually way too busy to give me any work to do, anyway."

During his three to four hours of "down time" each work day, Braxton reads, surfs the web, and e-mails friends. He also works on long-term personal projects. Over the past six weeks, Braxton has translated 41 pages of Alexander Pushkin's unfinished novel Dubrovsky for a new English version he dreams of one day publishing.
Braxton has never mentioned his translation project to coworkers, nor has he mentioned any of his other pursuits.

"I don't want to rub in how much I get to do the things I want to do," Braxton said. "I feel sorry for them. They go home after a hard day, and they're so fried they just spend the night sitting in front of the TV. You know how these people spend their weekends? Resting. They rest."

Another advantage Braxton enjoys over the full-timers is a significantly more relaxed dress code.

"They're always on the way to the dry cleaners or the barber or shopping for another expensive suit," said Braxton, who estimates that his average coworker spends five hours a week maintaining his or her personal appearance. "As long as I wear deodorant, keep my tie reasonably clean, and wash my one pair of Dockers over the weekend, no one really gives a shit what I look like."

In his efforts to hide his happy, fulfilling life from his coworkers, Braxton has even resorted to lying.

"Just yesterday, somebody asked me about my last temp job," Braxton said. "It ended in May, but I told them it ended in June. See, after it ended, I took about a month off and just kind of dicked around, traveling around Europe until my money ran out. I knew not to mention that to people who won't be able to do anything like that until they're 65."

Though Braxton said he sympathizes with his coworkers, he added that the decision to pursue a prestigious, high-paying career path was entirely their own.

"They wanted to go for the brass ring and really live the good life," Braxton said. "What they don't seem to get is that the key to living the good life is to avoid that brass ring like the plague."
Posted by wandrew at 11:55 AM

Group Identity

2003-02-26T23:43:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago, I had the thought that we (Christians) are blessed, not only because of the life that Christ gives us, the relationship we have with God, but also because of the family we are a part of because of our faith.

Specifically, that we can call the martyrs of the past and present our brothers and sisters. Their sacrifices ennoble our lives. Men and women who suffered great persecution:

The martyrs of the historic past: Christians who were fed to lions in public, whose courage as they were devoured astonished Roman onlookers (and often caused them to become Christians themselves).

Missionary monks who gave up what they had to serve “barbarians,” but who did so willingly.

Christian women in Northern Europe whose homes were destroyed, their families killed by Viking pirates, taken as captives by these Vikings to Scandinavia—and then led their captors to faith.

Moravian missionaries wanting to reach slaves and slavemasters, who decided to sell themselves into slavery in order to do so.

The first Western missionaries to Korea, who were slaughtered soon after arriving.

Countless believers today in China, in Muslim countries, who knowingly choose to follow Christ.

Countless others.

I guess they’re not all martyrs, technically, but rather those who endure persecution for God.

I don’t want to romanticize this suffering, which has often been terrible, and often unrecognized for a long time (if ever). Rather, I think my feelings before when I heard stories of martyrdom were feelings of fear, mixed with some uneasiness.

Fear: The world can really be so cruel? Satan is really so ruthless, so fierce?

Uneasiness: Will God one day call me to make such horrendous sacrifices? Will this be the cost of discipleship?

But the more recent thoughts mulling in my mind were different. We, the Church (universal) throughout history and throughout the world have suffered much for our faith. We have paid the price in the past, and will do so again and again.

Others have gone before, and have shown that it can be done. Others have run the race, fought the good fight, won the prize. They’ve demonstrated that our lives are capable of more.

And they're believers, like we are. We are linked to them. Kind of like if someone from your high school becomes a celebrity. A tv actor, or an Olympic medalist, or a famous painter. You become proud of the fact that you're from the same place they're from. Or maybe, if you're older brother or sister achieves something great, and you're proud of them. And you're glad that you're part of the same family.

Again, there’s a temptation to romanticize. And if I lay claim to a group identity, to being part of Christendom, then that carries with it the bad things, too. Shameful, horrible things done in the name of Christ. The Crusades—the slaughter of Muslims, Jews, and Orthodox Christians, to “retake” the Holy land. The Spanish Inquisition. The Holocaust—German Christians taking revenge on the Jews, the “Jesus killers”. The ways in which Christians have contributed to colonialism, the exploitation of Africa and the Americas. Countless wars. Apartheid.

I don’t believe that these things were performed in accordance with Christian values and ideas. Nor do I believe that such atrocities performed in God’s name were done with His approval.

Many Christians today would simply say: hey, they weren’t really Christians. The Nazis, the Crusaders, the colonialists, the leaders who led their countries to war—they weren’t really Christians. They weren’t led by God, even if that’s what they were claiming.

Maybe. Maybe they were Christians who were deceived. Misguided. Deaf to whatever ways God was telling them not to do such things.

And even if the leaders were not Christians, but only claiming to do things in the name of Christ to gain support, how many of their followers were Christians?

I’m reminded of the parable of the wheat and the tares (aka weeds), from Matthew 13:24-30.

While the wheat is with the weeds, the two will be mistaken for each other. We Christians should be aware of our history, of what has been done in His name, whether good or bad.

Any thoughts? Disagreements? Comments?

Allright, I've rambled on for long enough. Time to read some Contracts cases, and Civil Procedure, and Constitutional Law.

Money Scheme

2003-02-20T22:33:00.000-08:00

Something I learned from my Torts class (lawsuits):

So, somebody, let's say Mr. Driver, is a bad driver and injures a pedestrian on the street, Mr. Walker. Bad accident. Serious injuries. And it was all Mr. Driver's fault.

Ambulance comes, Mr. Walker is taken to the hospital, scans are done, tests are run, operations are performed.

Hospital bill comes to Mr. Walker for $100,000.

Mr. Walker doesn't have $100,000, but he talks to a tort lawyer, who tells him he's got a strong case against Mr. Driver.

"So if I hire you as an attorney, how much will that cost me?"
"Like many personal injury lawyers, I charge on a contingency basis. So if you hire me and we win, then I get a percentage of the money Mr. Driver pays."
"How much?"
"If we settle things before a trial, 30%, and if the case does go to trial, 40%"
"But if we lose, then you don't charge me anything?"
"Right."
"Ok"

One of the first things the lawyer does is find out how much Mr. Driver is worth. Because if he doesn't have any money, then it's pointless to go after him. Unless his car insurance covers it, which it ought to.

Lawyer goes to hospital and says: Look, if I win the case, then Mr. Driver will pay Mr. Walker $100,000, but then I'll get $30,000 of that in attorney's fees. And then Mr. Walker will owe you $100,000, but he'll only have $70,000 left. So he'll be $30,000 in debt to you. Not a happy situation for him.

If I lose, then he'll be $100,000 in debt to you. Not a happy situation for him or for you, the hospital.

So you really want me to win. I'm fighting this case for him, but indirectly, for you, too. Because you'll be the ones to benefit if I win. So because I'm doing this legal work for you, I want you to give a discount to Mr. Walker, and charge him only $70,000 instead of $100,000.

Hospital says: ok. They send a second bill that says: forget the first bill. You only need to pay us $70,000.

Lawyer files papers with the court. "My client was injured by the negligent driving of Mr. Driver, and because of his injuries, his hospital bill came out to $100,000." The court should force Mr. Driver to pay Mr. Walker $100,000 for medical expenses, plus [some extra amount] to compensate him for the pain and suffering he has experienced and will experience from these injuries.

Who argues on the other side? Does Mr. Driver hire his own lawyer? Probably not. It's his car insurance company that has lawyers on staff.

Now if you sort of jumped into the middle of this, and knew about both hospital bills, the one for $100,000 and the one for $70,000, you might think that the lawyer is up to no good. But now you know the big scheme of things, and see that Mr. Walker, after navigating the legal system, will probably agree to a settlement for less than $100,000 to avoid the expense and length of time (could be several years) involved in a trial. And the hassle of going against the insurance lawyers.

Maybe it'll be a settlement for $90,000 + $20,000 [pain and suffering award]. Then $27,000 will go to the lawyer, and $70,000 will go to the hospital.

While the court thought that his pain was the equivalent of $20,000, he actually goes home with $13,000 after paying off the hospital and his lawyer.

"In our society, we don't want injured plaintiffs to reach for their hatchets [to get revenge]; we want them to reach for their lawyers"

I don't want to be a tort lawyer. I'm still true to the reasons that brought me to law school in the first place. Or at least, I believe I am. Still, this is the society we live in, our system.

Your comments? thoughts?

Links

2003-02-04T20:05:00.000-08:00

In a loosely organized order:

Internet Movie Database

Hotmail

KapNet Kaplan's intranet

Kaptest Kaplan's general site

Kaplan Feedback Kaplan's student feedback

Kaplan Forums Kapforums

LexisNexis Lexis

7:22

CalBar

Same links page

Craigslist useful site

cneo my gracious friend

xkcd webcomic of "Romance, Sarcasm, Math, and Language

ben's bargains deals

Sigalert LA & OC traffic

web sudoku number puzzle

miniclip game site

Martindale Hubbell lawyers' index

Law blogs by law profs

Cox Webmail More email

Google Puissant search engine

Hunger Site Fight World Hunger!

Bible Site Donate Bibles for free!

Setgame a great game

Costco abundance

Walmart ambiguity

Irregular Webcomic! web comic

Findlaw legal stuff

NALP legal directory

UC Hastings' APALSA Asian Legal issues

Martindale Hubbell lawyers' index

Attorney search & selection with postings

Legal Authority targeted legal job mailings

Government jobs largely county jobs

CLS at UCD

Breakpoint Christian perspective on news

Boundless Christians in higher ed

Lexis Legal knowledge vendors

Westlaw Competing legal knowledge vendors

Friendster can be a big time sink

Eternalpraise Sister's blog

Stonejewel Sister's recommendation

Sua Sponte law student blogger

Nipper patent law blogger

Glosses blog of a friend of a friend

Idle Digital Technology a creative friend's blog

Stirgirl a Xanga blog of another friend

blogger don't know him, but like his blog

livejournal (blog)of a good friend and fellow law student

commentary on current eventsalso a good friend and classmate, insightful and opinionated

Jeremy Blachman another law student blogger

Urbstone a friend's site

one more another friend (Dave)

What time is it? Pacific time according to NIST & USNO

Cross Community Church My church in Irvine

Davis Korean Church my church in Davis

CLS Christian Legal Society

Legal Dictionary from law.com: look up legalese!

Gender Genie It predicts gender based on writing!

Louie's messages worship & messages from 7:22 (updated weekly)

Perspectives on the World Christian Movement. Live for more

Jesus Film Project they're changing the world

Turkey love! he's changing Turkey

Babelfish you may need a babelfish, though

Hatrack River Orson Scott Card, one of my favorite authors

Tantrix another game

Word searchable Bible

CT's word with commentaries, dictionary, concordance, lexicon

things Something funny on the web

Poetry online magnetic poetry generator

Coalition of Immokalee Workers Successfully boycotted a huge corporation--and won!

Mission Frontiers Influencing the world-changers

How Stuff Works Learn

The Chronicle of Higher Education Higher Ed news

Hoover High School

UC Irvine Go Anteaters!

UC Davis and Aggies!

King Hall the law school, named after MLK, Jr, who never studied law

grades To check my grades at King Hall

Sisweb another site for grades and registration

Wan Predecessor

Yahoo Calendar personal calendaring

any suggestions ?

I've been meaning to set up a links page for some time now. Mainly for my own convenience, since I don't have a PC or rather, I don't have a personal internet connection. I have no landline at home, relying instead on my cell phone, which has horrible reception.

On the other hand, part of the reason for this is that my home is very close to the edge of town, beyond which there are open fields. So I get a nice view. And a good running/walking path, which I've not used much at all.

So anyway, because I use the school's computers to access the web, I can't bookmark pages that I want to revisit later.

Back

2003-01-15T20:02:00.000-08:00

It's the end of the 3rd day of class, and already I'm feeling tired. But first, some thoughts from over the break:

Overall, the holidays were great--a good chance to sleep in, read for fun, watch movies, and see old friends.

Christmas Eve service at church: the significance of the Magi coming to worship Christ struck me once again. Without really understanding who he was, they came to worship him--and were themselves enriched in the experience.

Perhaps this is part of what accounts for "Christmas magic" for some unbelievers: that they give worship (or something that approximates worship) to God, even without realizing or understanding what they are doing. They sing carols celebrating Christ's coming, and have some feeling of wholeness. Worship is itself an enriching experience.

On the other hand, I suppose one might say that people feel good at Christmas because they're with family, and friends, and are celebrating, and giving. But this itself--the functioning of community and family--could be considered a form of worship, a testament to God's creativity, His good will made manifest. The functioning of the human body is another such testament to His skill and power.

A conversation I had with a friend regarding church. He observed that the people at his church didn't seem to have changed much, and there was a sense of deadness, of church being the same old thing, time and again. Where is the fire, where is the passion? And yet even the Church, if we stare at it too long, can be disheartening. Our gaze must be on God Himself. A certain amount of self reflection, of evaluation, of constructive self criticism is right and good. And we should look for His hand at work in the living community of faith, and rejoice when we do see it. But we can focus on the community too much and fail to see the One "in whom we live and move and have our being".

I think the connection between people who think the same way is not as strong, not as enjoyable as the connection between people who believe in the same things.

OK, anyway, my professors assigned us some reading to do over break, and since Monday, I've quickly moved back into "school mode". There were times when I was at home when my entire 1st semester felt like a dream, another life. Did it really happen? Was that real?

But now that I'm back, and taking classes, and reading, and trying to stay on top of things, my vacation seems like it was only a moment. And it's only the 3rd day of class!

. . . the end in sight

2002-12-18T20:01:00.000-08:00

I've now taken 5 of the 6 final exams for this semester. Just took my Torts exam this morning (torts, if you remember, are the things you do or don't do that make you vulnerable to a lawsuit).

My Property professor had mentioned a couple of weeks ago (seems like a long long time ago, now), that after your first final--she meant your first real final, see previous entry--everything is better. You're not as stressed. It's the first law school final exam that you're most scared of.

This has been true for me. That Property exam was bad, and I didn't write quickly enough, and I should've taken more practice exams earlier on. But after it, Criminal Law last Friday wasn't as bad, and Civil Procedure this past Monday was tough, but not too monstrously horrible, and Torts this morning was also doable.

The worrisome thing, though, is that you see and hear that everyone else felt the same way. And all the classes are graded on a curve. So 20% of us will get C's. And almost all your classmates are bright and quite studious. The ones who don't seem studious, those are the ones you wonder about: are they geniuses? Do they not study because they absorb all the material readily? The ones who don't seem bright in class discussion are mostly the quiet people. The same insecurities apply.

So, the question becomes: hey, even if I did alright, did everyone else do better, meaning that I'll be one of the 20% with a C?

Well, that's not the foremost question in my mind, because I'm trying to shoot for the A (also 20%). But not getting the A sharply decreases the chances of my ever becoming a law professor. Even were I to get top grades this year, I don't know whether I could teach law (most law professors, including the ones I have, had top grades at top schools).

And really, would it be right for a law professor to teach a class that they didn't get an A in?

Anyway, my own insecurities aside, I still have 2 days more to go. My Contracts exam is on Friday afternoon, and it will be a completely essay exam. My previous finals have been a mixture of multiple choice and essay, which has been good for me, I think, because I feel pretty good about multiple choice questions most of the time. But this one will be harder.

And afterwards, I'm planning to drive home Saturday morning or afternoon, back to Orange County.

In the midst of . . .

2002-12-11T20:00:00.000-08:00

Finals.

Before I describe finals, first, about Thanksgiving: the break was great. Got to see my mom and dad and brother. Didn't see my sister, who stayed at school, but called her.

Seeing old friends was great. Especially at church, a place where I invested some time and energy into a community. Coming back, I was really warmly welcomed, and gladdened to see things progressing, changing, living without me. There's a whole digresssion I could go on about, but I'll leave it for another entry, some other time.

Driving took a long time. It seems that Thanksgiving weekend is the one weekend when everyone wants to be on the road. Well, maybe not everyone, but lots of people. Lots and lots of people. On the 5 between the Bay area and the LA area.

I left Davis at about 5:30 am Thursday morning (meant to leave at 4, but didn't). There were a good number of cars. Not congested, and not slowed, but a good number of cars. Then an hour or two south, lots of cars. Got home in the afternoon, having spent about 9 hours on the road (though about an hour and a half of that time was spend napping or resting). Normally, without traffic, the trip takes about 6 hours.

On the way back, I was a bit anxious, since I'd heard horror stories of last year's Sunday after Thanksgiving drive. Left around 4 pm, thought I'd drive around LA instead of through it. Unfortunately, a friend from Davis was in LA and needed a ride, so I ended up coming back for him. Lots and lots of cars. A number of accidents on the side of the road on the way. Got home at 3 am after dropping off my friend.

Ok, so. Finals.

My first final was last Friday, for Legal Research, a 1 unit class. In the memory of the oldest students (the 3L's), no one has ever had a final exam for legal research. Your grade had been based on the quality of the semi-weekly assignments turned in.

But our instructor decided to give us one. Which meant we all had to study much for it, since we're being graded on a curve (or at least, that's what we were once told. Later, we were told it's possible for all of us to get A's. I'm not sure how to reconcile these two statements).

Regardless, it was multiple choice, and lasted for 1 hr, so it wasn't really a law school final exam, in the sense that that word is normally used. As in "grips your heart with terror, writing essays furiously for several hours, and wincing afterwards when you realize what you should've included".

Ok, so the one "real" exam I (and all the other 1L's) have had is Property. 2 unit class, 2 hr final exam, worth 40% of our overall grade. It was an open notes exam, which was good in a sense and not so good in another sense. Good in the sense that you didn't have to memorize anything verbatim. Not so good in that everyone up to the last night was adding more and more things to their outlines. Not so good in that the professor had a very high standard of what she expected (judging from previous years' exams and the model answers she provided).

I winced much afterwards, when I realized what I should've included.

Actually, I was mentally hitting myself during the exam when I kept wanting to think about stuff, instead of writing. You're strongly encouraged to take the first 1/3 or so of the allotted time for an essay and outline your answer. Then the remaining 2/3 of the time you're supposed to write furiously. I spend way too much time thinking about the answer and not enough time writing it. So I ended up touching on a number of points that I wanted to describe in a little more detail.

All right, I've procrastinated long enough. Time to immerse myself in the intricacies of Criminal Law, a 1 semester class, which means that the 3 hour exam on Friday is our entire grade. Then, next week, a Civil Procedure exam on Monday (worth 20% of our grade if it helps us, 10% if not). Torts on Wednesday, and Contracts on Friday.

Pray for me, that I'd be disciplined in the next week and a half. That I'd give glory to God in this time. That Christ in me would help me be an example as I'm around fellow stressed law students.

I'm looking forward to Christmas break.

anticipating Thanksgiving

2002-11-27T19:58:00.000-08:00

So, I’m looking forward to Thanksgiving weekend, but at the same time, I’m dreading the finals that are just around the corner.

My professor for Property said last week that 1st semester finals during the first year are the worst, because you haven’t really taken any law school finals yet, and you don’t know what it’s going to be like. (She went to Stanford, and I don’t know whether they have practice exams there.)

Anyway, I'm looking forward to being home in Irvine this weekend. I plan to drive down by myself, which will be long. Especially since I’m still recovering from being sick this past weekend. And the traffic coming back up on Sunday night has historically been very, very bad. (One fellow law student said it took 10 hours from LA to Davis last year—a drive which normally takes about 6).

Please pray for traveling mercies for me.

On another note:

Check out the link to “louie’s journal” from the following link.

Click on "louie's journal archives", the button on the left side. I’ve been reading them in chronological order, telling myself not to read more than 2 entries per day, because they have so much for me to digest. I just read the October 12 entry from 1998, and I particularly recommend that one, though most are quite good.

Excerpts

2002-11-07T19:57:00.000-08:00

Below are some excerpts from various emails (sp?) that I wrote to various friends at various times over the last few months.

___

Good to hear from you. (Good to remember that I had another life before law school.) It's pretty hard, in terms of workload. Not quite as intellectually challenging as I thought it would be, but lots of dense reading to slog through. It's keeping me very busy. I'm occasionally caught up, but most of the rest of the time, I'm just a bit behind.

My feelings about law school are up and down. There are times when I feel pretty good ("irrational exuberance?"), but at other times, I'm a bit disappointed that it's not as meaningful as I'd thought it'd be.

And, the workload is a constant burden. I've stopped briefing for some of my classes, simply because I didn't want to be too overloaded. And there's the outlining, which I need to get started on.

My fellow students are mostly pretty cool, though. I can see why friendships formed here last long past law school.

___

My roommates and some fellow classmates took me out to dinner, which was a much anticipated break from studying. It was a lot of good conversation, funny stories, and generally a lot of fun, but in the midst of it, I missed being at Bethel, sharing fellowship with other believers.

My roommates and my closest friends here are not Christians, and it's exciting and challenging to try to imitate Christ amongst them. (I haven't completely committed to a church yet.) It's also pretty daunting, since most are very bright, and have lots of life experience, and are somewhat set in their own beliefs (or lack of them). And my frequent mistakes don't help.

But anyway, while I feel good about growing here, at the same time, I miss [friends] at Bethel. I'm looking forward to coming home at Thanksgiving and seeing all of you.

___

Went out to dinner with friends from law school, heard funny stories, had good conversations. Very fun.

Turning 26 has made me feel older. Especially when I'm around undergrads, some of whom are 18 or even 17. Turning 25 last year didn't bother me as much, but perhaps that's because I didn't ride the bus with undergrads every day. Not that it's a big big deal, but it's becoming a growing concern.

Hmmm--what is the concern? Not really about marriage (although a number of my good friends are now married, many are not. And I think the male advantage of extended eligibility helps). It's more about not having accomplished very much in life, and not having acquired as much wisdom, confidence, self-discipline, as I would have liked to have acquired. Not having mastered my personal flaws, or overcome my personal weaknesses.

Jesus Christ, Alexander the Great, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Isaac Newton, and most of the major mathematicians accomplished their greatest works before their mid 30's. Not to say that I expect to have done the same by the same age, nor to say some of them didn't feel a similar dissatisfaction with their lives that I do.

But rather, that there's a certain satisfaction that comes of having done hard, engrossing, (perhaps consuming) worthwhile work. I don't feel close to having done so. Ok, maybe I have felt close to it, on certain occasions. But I don't know my life's work yet. My personal mission statement, to the level of detail that I'd like.

Pacing, grumbling, etc.

2002-11-06T19:55:00.000-08:00

(I wrote most of the following a number of weeks ago.)

This past week was tough. But not as bad as the week before. In the past 2 weeks, most of the first year class has had 4 practice exams, since we're now a bit past halfway through the fall semester. We all have a total of 6 classes. Hmmm--it occurs to me that I don't think I've listed what classes I have. They are:

Contracts
Property
Criminal Law
Legal Research
Civil Procedure (basic mechanics of lawyering)
Torts (most of the lawsuit stuff you read about in the paper)

Practice exams don't affect your grade. I believe that the reason for this is that law professors want to do as little grading as possible, so they grade your midterms (in December), and your finals (in May), and assign you your grade solely on the basis of those 2 exams. In fact, the midterms in some classes don't even count for very much, which may be for the same reasons.

But since midterms are significant, and we haven't had any quizzes or homework in any classes (except our legal research class), profs for 1st year classes give us these practice exams, to help us know whether we've been understanding and integrating the material at a deep enough level.

So, those briefs that I mentioned earlier, as well as our class notes, are supposed to be reviewed. The general method of study that everyone learns about in law school (and many people follow), is to prepare an outline for each class. This means creating a Word document with an outline of all the material covered in the class so far. Depending on how much detail is put in (most students put in all salient points the prof mentioned), these outlines can run 50 pages or more by the end of the year. Other outlines summarize and leave out things and are shorter.

So, in preparing for these practice exams, all the 1L's (first year law students) have been spending long hours preparing these outlines by synthesizing their class notes with their briefs. Then, we read and reread the outlines we've prepared (and the ones we've gotten from other people) to prepare for the practice tests. This in addition to the regular reading and briefing we're supposed to be doing.

Practice exams are actually something nice that our school does for us, for our benefit. At a number of other law schools, the first exam that law students see is in December, which counts for up to half of their grade. But it still turns the pressure up another few notches.

So, that's the reason why the past 2 weeks were hard.

Minor league redemption

2002-10-14T18:04:00.000-07:00

Redux

So I’m back in my Criminal Law class, the one class that assigns more reading than any other, and whose lectures are more confusing than any other. It’s the class in which I’ve previously publicly embarrassed myself (see earlier entry “Socratic Method”).

And, I haven’t quite finished the reading, once again. Which necessarily means that I haven’t briefed the cases for the class, either (more about this later, in another entry). I’ve generally gotten better at keeping on top of the reading, but not today.

The girl sitting next to me tells me before class begins that she hasn’t done her reading, so she doesn’t know what she’ll do if he calls on her. She could pretend not to even be present. There have been a few times when he’s called on a name from his roster, and no one responded—which he didn’t seem to mind. He simply called on another name. The problem with this approach is that he has a seating chart. Lucky for her, though, someone’s taken the seat she’s supposed to be at, so she’s been displaced, and is now sitting fairly far from her old seat. So she has a valid excuse if she’s asked why she’s not there.

Option 2 is to simply apologize and tell the professor that she hasn’t done the reading and isn’t prepared. We’ve seen this happen twice before, and in both cases, the professor was very nice about it (in fact, slightly apologetic, as if he’d been slightly rude to the student!). Then he called on his next victim. Now despite the fact that we’re studying Criminal Law, which is all about the moral condemnation of the community poured out against those who have defied the laws by which we live, our professor is a very nice, noncondemnatory kind of person. (Perhaps this is due to his work as a criminal defense lawyer. Maybe things would be worse if we had a former prosecutor as our professor). In fact, stories have been told of professors who do not take option 2 well. In one of them, the professor yelled directly at a girl who wasn’t prepared and asked her why she was in the class, why she was even in law school. This reduced her to tears.

Option 3, which is only possible if he’s not asking for information directly from the reading, is to actually try to answer the question. This is risky, because you’re trying not to contradict anything in the reading (which you haven’t read).

OK, so she tells me she hasn’t read. I tell her I haven’t read. Option 1 isn’t open to me, because I’m sitting close to my seat on the chart. Furthermore, I’ve asked enough questions after previous classes that I think he knows my name. So it’s down to Option 2 or Option 3 if he calls on me.

Today’s topic is criminal homicide, the unlawful killing of a human by another human. Now depending on what laws apply, and how they’re interpreted, homicide can be split into a number of different specific crimes that you could be charged with: first degree murder, second degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, and some other things, too. So, this class is about how to determine which crimes people in different situations could be charged with.

We run through a couple of different hypothetical situations. He calls on different students to explain how to determine what crimes the defendants in each situation could be charged with. We have lengthy discussions regarding these 3 hypos.

So, time is running out, there’s less than 10 minutes before the end of the class period. Then he calls on . . . Brian (name has been changed to protect identity). Brian’s been picked on several times in the last few weeks. This is unusual, because there are about 60 students in our class, and he normally calls on 3-4 students in each class session. However, we only have this class twice a week.

Brian is always surprised when he’s called on. Well, everyone is, but he’s more surprised than most. Whenever you’re called on, and your mind is shocked, you ask the professor to repeat the question. This is a stalling tactic—it buys you a bit of time in which to formulate an answer.

But even before he does so, the professor realizes that he’s disproportionately called on him in the past, and says so. So, he looks at his list . . . and calls on me.

Now, understand that even when I haven’t read for a class, I pay close attention to what’s going on. Consequently, in every lecture, I’m learning a good deal. So, thinking of how he's gone through the previous hypos, I go for Option 3. It’s not exactly a conscious decision. I just automatically start thinking about the analysis and talk.

So, the situation is that a guy is running an illegal crystal methamphetamine lab in the woods somewhere, when he accidentally starts a forest fire. Such labs are known for their accidental fire potential. (I could gladly discuss why organic chemicals, of the kinds used here, are volatile and flammable, but that’s another class.) Firefighters come to put it out, including 2 airplane water tankers. The tankers collide, killing both pilots. What criminal liability is incurred?

I hesitantly manage to spout out something on its way to resembling a coherent answer. Along the way, I ask a stupid question ("I'm assuming that running a crystal meth lab is a felony, right?") and am mildly embarassed. But on the whole, I struggle through, and am saved by the clock before having to state a conclusion. (Depending on what state this happens in, he’s liable for either 2nd degree felony murder or involuntary manslaughter.)

Afterwards, 2 people tell me I gave a good answer. Don't know if they were lying just to make me feel better, but it doesn't matter. It does make me feel better. Cool.

A thank you, my weekly schedule, and some reflections

2002-09-20T17:52:00.000-07:00

First, a huge "thank you" to all who've stopped by this blog, especially to you who've written to me, either directly or indirectly. It's very good to remember that I had/have a life outside of law school. I'm encouraged by you who've written, knowing that those who write are probably a fraction of those who've stopped by.

But about the fact that I had (have?) a life outside of law school--almost everyone I interact with now is linked to school. I was about to run down a list of who those people are, but let me instead tell you what a typical week has been like:

Sunday: Church in the morning and/or afternoon (I'm still visiting different ones in the area), then lunch/dinner, and then in the evening, go to school and read and prepare for the classes I have on Monday.

Monday: I wake up around 8 am, get ready, pack some food, and either drive or catch the bus to get to my 9 am class (Contracts). After class, have a snack (which is usually my breakfast), then study or visit office hours of professors or tutors (tutors are 2nd or 3rd year law students. I haven't yet visited office hours, but I plan to). There might be a student group having a meeting or a visiting lecturer giving a lunch time talk. Then my 2 pm class (Torts--things people do that get them sued). I may study a bit more at school, then go home, relax a bit, have a snack, study, have dinner, study a bit more, then go to school to study more. (I need to change my environment every once in a while). If I stay past 11 pm or so, I'll see the janitorial staff at the law school. They recognize me now, though I don't think they know my name.

Tuesday through Friday: largely the same thing. My first class every weekday is at 9 am, though it's not always Contracts. Have a snack, go to class, have lunch, go to my afternoon class. All the while in between, trying to finish reading or briefing in that 30 minute or 1 hr gap to be ready for the next class, so that if the professor calls on me, I won't have a repeat of last time (see "Socratic Method". By the way, Kev, I did intend that to be funny.)

On the other hand, if I'm ready for the next class, I may chat with my fellow classmates. Often this is chitchat, but we also fairly frequently discuss cases or issues, try to clarify what things mean, or most commonly, commisserate over how much we still need to do. Our jokes very often make reference to the material we're studying (something which I believe all first year law students do).

Most days, after going home, I'll come back to school at night. Some days, though, I'll stay home and read there.

Home: I don't think I've described home yet. I'm renting a room in a small 3 bedroom house that's about 4 miles from campus. It's a quiet neighborhood, with cloned houses and wide streets, very much like parts of Irvine. My 2 roommates are a fellow 1st year law student who I share 5 of my 6 classes with, and a 4th year veterinary student who spends the vast majority of her time at the veterinary hospital. Matt, the law student, studies almost exclusively at the library, so when I go home, I'm usually there by myself, which is nice.

A 3rd year student said that when the rainy months come, people in the law school don't want to go out to the rest of the campus for lunch, which causes the atmosphere to be "incestuous". There's a bit less than 600 law students total, and there are only 3 floors in this building, if you count the basement. Thus, everyone will see each other numerous times each day--incestuous.

I think I will dread this.

But in any case, to close the point I was making earlier, other than the time I spend at church or with my veterinary student roommate, or time I spend alone, all the rest of the time I'm with law student, law professors, or the janitors who clean the law school.

Not that there's anything inherently wrong with law students, or with professors or janitors. Still, it's another adjustment from my previous life--where I spent a lot of time by myself, and spent some time with Christians from a wider range of ages and abilities. I suppose I'm adjusting to a new social as well as a new spiritual environment. In what ways does this change in my external environment affect my inner life? How does it affect my perception of the world and of myself? I don't know.

Perhaps this was part of the reason why I felt I needed to dedicate the first 3 days of this week to God. And it was good in that I'd needed to remind myself once again that "man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." And, also, that "the Son . . . sustain[s] all things by His powerful word." (Hebrews 1:3).

Still, it was a rather frustrating time, too, in that I didn't feel I'd become much more focued on God than in other blocks of time like that.

I feel I need every bit of spiritual power and strength that I can get--that I need more strength, more dedication, more intelligence, more wisdom to be able to endure here. And as Faulkner wrote, "not only to endure . . . but to prevail." But really I think I'm saying: "I need more ____ in order to ____ (fill this second blank in with "lead someone to Christ" or "be a good witness" or "accomplish career goals that will allow me to honor God" or whatever). As I write this, I chuckle wryly at myself. I think I ought to instead ask "With what God has already given me, will I prove faithful?" ("When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?")

Or, as Mother Theresa once said, "God hasn't called me to be successful. He's called me to be faithful."

How I'm doing so far

2002-09-07T17:59:00.000-07:00

A friend wrote to me a while ago, asking how I was doing, and I just wrote him a rather long e-mail, which I've edited slightly and excerpted below:

The transition has gone well. My parents helped me move in, and my roommates are both "good" people . . . [generous, friendly, not demanding at all--they're both grad students in their mid 20's]

Classes are demanding, and I'm studying more and studying more consistently than I ever did before. Still, it hasn't been quite as much as I thought it would be. I remember someone once saying that you have to be in a study group in law school because you can't possible read all the material yourself. So far, though, I have been able to read all the assignments myself (and so have all my classmates).

My fellow law students are all bright people, and a large fraction--I would estimate more than half--have not come straight from undergrad programs. Many people are in their mid to late 20's, though some are in their 30's and even a few in their 40's. I thought I'd be surrounded with lots of younger driven people who were all pre-law when earning their bachelors', but that hasn't been the case.

The other law students are also by and large very nice people. Friendly, sociable, outgoing. I know that these are good skills, especially because we'll one day be colleagues, and networking is a valuable skill. As for me, I've found myself being more withdrawn than I expected to be, having made a few friends, [and being willing to meet people, but not spending much time outside of class with people beyond my small circle].

My parents recently bought me a car, which has made life a whole lot more convenient. When I first found out I'd have one, I thought I'd use it minimally, only a few times a week [the bus system is enough to get by], but so far, I've driven somewhere at least once a day. Funny how the things you thought were unnecessary when you didn't have them suddenly become extremely useful once you do.

In connection to that thought, I've had the chance to help with 2 different moves in the last few weekends. Both people had lots of stuff. Lots and lots of stuff. In the hours spend packing it in, I kept thinking to myself that I'm going to be different, that I will live a simple life here in Davis. Once we got it all into the car or the truck, though, it was interesting to think that this was all (or almost all) that that person owned in the world. Not very much. But also, paradoxically, too much. I think St. Francis of Assissi once wrote something about the man who "in possessing nothing, owns everything."

Still, I find myself buying a few things here and there, and I've got to remind myself to value simplicity. Living in a small room, in a small house, has been good in this respect--there's not much room to put stuff.

Socratic Method

2002-09-06T18:04:00.000-07:00

This is the general teaching method for law school. Certain pages are assigned to be read before class. Students are expected to read these and be ready to describe and discuss the readings in class. Because so much is assigned, students will generally write short summaries of the court cases they've read, which are called "briefs". During class, the professor will begin a discussion of a court case by randomly choosing a student and asking him/her to talk about the case. It is extremely embarassing to flub this in class, because all of your classmates are of course ready to answer, and in every previous instance, have answered articulately.

Today I was called on. Today, I flubbed it. Of the lectures that I've been to, I believe I'm the first to do so.

Details: Part of the reading that was assigned for today was the case of People v. Beardsley. I'd read the case, but it had been late at night, and I hadn't quite had the time to write a brief of it. In my memory, the names of all the cases have already coalesced into a blur. Murphy's Law strikes again--he calls on me. I've been following on his outline, and I see that he has some comments about a motorist.

In a state of inward panic, but outward calm, I start talking about a situation discussed in the reading regarding a motorist, an accident, legal obligations, etc. I'm under the impression that this is the Beardsley case. As I talk, I see that heads are starting to turn, people are looking directly at me. Fortunately, before I get too far, I notice a certain look on their faces, and I stop my blathering and say, "Am I talking about the wrong case?" Heads nod up and down. Laughter ensues.

A guy in the row ahead of me says to me in a low, soft voice: "It's the lady who commits suicide." A surge of gratitude fills me. Bless his heart. The fact that a woman died perversely makes me happy, because it triggers in mind the outline of the case. I start describing it. Unfortunately, one of the key details escapes me, and the guy next to me points at a word in the book that he has circled. I state this, and am soon corrected by the professor, who says, "In fact, it wasn't a hotel, it was the man's basement, right?"

Mentally, I gulp. "Right."

Well, this 2nd flub was a minor one, and people don't audibly laugh--I think I have their sympathy. Much like having a household accident--observers laugh at first, but later just feel bad for you.

A little later in the discussion, a woman raises her hand and asks a question, and starts a discussion amongst the other, eager to be heard, well prepared law students. I've escaped, for now.

Oddly enough, though I've been considerably embarassed, part of me wishes that I felt it even more intensely. After all, this is the humiliation that is supposed to motivate me to push myself even harder. This is the Socratic Method, using social pressure to motivate greater studying output.

I hope it is enough, and that the lesson will not be repeated.

Quick unrelated thoughts

2002-09-06T18:01:00.000-07:00

Law students are only here to learn the system, not to critique it. Occasionally something comes up that we think is unfair, but for the most part, it's already starting to become assumed that we study the law, we don't seek to change it. We're losing our moral outrage at the injustices of our system, and perhaps some of us will regain it later.

In criminal law, there are two components of a crime: 1) the act, and 2) the mental state of mind accompanying the act. Practically, it's sometimes hard to figure out the act, and very often hard to figure out the mental state. How glad believers should be that on the Last Day, the One who looks at the heart will grant justice.

We fill our lives with thoughts, ideas, patterns, and then we later look into our hearts and are surprised to find that they've become part of who we are.

When someone we recognize as worthy, deserving of praise, dignified in the sense of having human dignity--when such a person honors us, we find ourselves both uplifted and humbled. How paradoxical that we are able to feel both at the same time.

Sleep is good.

A Preface to "Wan"

2002-08-23T17:50:00.000-07:00

Some comments to preface this:

I've lived in southern CA for most of my life, but I've recently moved to Davis, CA (near Sacramento) to start law school here. A month or two ago, I was in a small group discussion at church, and was asked how the others in this group could support and/or encourage me. Given that I was leaving soon, I thought I could avoid answering it.

One of the other members suggested, however, that I e-mail the others periodically to ask for prayer requests and keep them updated on my life, spiritual and otherwise. The thought of doing so, though, seemed too time consuming, especially given that my track record of keeping in touch with friends is atrocious. It takes me a long enough to write e-mail to one person, let alone 4, or 10, or 20 or more.

It would've been possible, I suppose, to send mass e-mails to everyone, but then there's always people who are on the list who don't want to be bothered, and others who were overlooked, and people who are changing their e-mail addresses, and so on. Maintaining a list isn't much fun. So, having read a magazine article about blogs (which is short for "weblogs", for those not in the know), I decided to start one.

Thanks to my gracious friend and host, cneo (who also has a blog, accessible from the main page of this one), I now have this space to communicate, not only to those in that original group, but to anyone interested in the wan ruminations of this sojourner, making my way for the next few years through law school.

I hope to write here at least 1-2 times per month, though I've yet to experience the infamous workload of a first year law student. If I've fallen short of this, or if you're curious how I'm doing, by all means write to me and bug me. Or just write once in a while to say hi.