100 things I learned and did in 2023

  1. The Maasai tribe in Kenya have a tradition of spitting at a new born baby, for good luck. What a way to start a life, eh? Hujambo beautiful people, welcome to my annual list of 100 things that I’ve learned and did over the course of a year. And what a year 2023 has been for me! More on this later at the end. But first, my yearly facts.
  2. 1 dog year is not equal to 7 human years, but instead they mature very rapidly at first and then slow down: 1 dog year = 15 year-old human, 2 dog year = 24 year-old human, and the afterwards each 1 year = around 4-6 human years. The same calculation is also applicable for cats.
  3. There is a type of fish that communicates with each other by farting. The guilty party is herring fish, and this fact was discovered 20 years ago in 2003, but I’ve just “herring” about it now. No, not funny? Ok let’s move on. Apparently, National Geographic explains that when the herring fish pass gas, the bubbles will make a high-frequency sound only audible to other herrings. The fish also use the noise to form “protective shoals” at night time to help them stay safe. I know what you’re thinking, can humans learn to utilize this skill?
  4. During the Middle Ages, divorce was a taboo topic. So people figured out a way to resolve marital disputes: divorce by combat. Yeah sounds a bit Game of Throne-y. The practice originated from Medieval German, it became a legal way of ending marriages, and it is exactly like it sounds: if a couple couldn’t resolve an issue and have exhausted every other methods, a duel will be arranged. Both wear tight bodysuits, the man got a short thick stick and the woman was given a sack with stones, and to make the fight “fair” the husband was put in a hole, while the woman could move freely. The fight was monitored by judges who will chose the winner. But here’s the catch: the loser had to die. If the woman won, the man will be publicly executed. If the man won, the woman will be buried alive. Yikes.
  5. Remember Joseph Stalin in Sri Lanka from last year? Well in Namibia there’s an Adolf Hitler. And apparently he’s a good guy, an anti-apartheid activist. And in November 2020 he won a local election in northern Namibia with 85% of the vote. Popular, popular guy. The best part of the election was, in his winning speech he promised not to pursue world domination. LOL, I like him.
  6. The tooth fairy is the go-to guy (a guy?) for teeth-for-money exchange in many countries, including in the US, some European countries, and Australia. But in some parts or the world, that role is actually played by a small mouse. In France, the mouse is called La Bonne Petite Souris (the good little mouse) and it was based on a story from the 1600s where a fairy turns into a mouse to fight against an evil king. The mouse eventually hides under the king’s pillow and knocks some of his teeth out.
  7. In Spain, the mouse is named El Ratoncito Perez (Perez the mouse), and he came from a children story written in 1877 by Fernan Caballero that had a mouse married to an ant but not yet collecting teeth. This changed in 1894 when Luis Coloma wrote a children’s story for king Alfonso XIII when he lost his first tooth at the age of 8. Coloma used Perez the mouse character but changed his story to be a mouse that live in a cookie box in an alley in Madrid, and at nights he would go to children’s bedrooms, retrieve the lost teeth under the pillows, and exchange them with coins. This tradition then spread to Spanish-speaking countries.
  8. Gravity is not the same everywhere on Earth, but instead it is slightly stronger in places that have more mass underground compared with places with less mass. In fact, 9.8 m/s^2 (meters/second squared) is just the global average, while for example it is 9.7803 m/s^2 at the equator, 9.8322 m/s^2 at the poles. The lowest gravitational acceleration is 9.7639 m/s^2 at mount Nevado Huascaran in Peru, while the highest is at the surface of the Arctic Ocean at 9.8337 m/s^2. This heatmap shows where in the world that gravity is strong or weak, with Indonesia looks suspiciously very red (this actually scientifically explains why it’s a bit difficult for my mates to get up from bed in the morning, and maybe, juuust maybe, I’m not slightly over weight after all but I just happen to live in a high gravity area).
  9. Did you know that us humans have a snooze/sleep button? Yeah, I was also today years old when I discovered this. It’s called anmian, and they are located a little under the lobe of each ear and behind the bony-feeling protuberance (you know what, just google image it). If you lightly press both acupuncture points together, you can go to sleep quickly and peacefully. You’re welcome.
  10. The name Amazon means A (without) Mezos (breast). The word is derived from an ancient tribe, an all women warrior (sure, that one in Wonder Woman movie), who all removed their right breast so that they can use bow and arrow better. Now, the reason why the biggest river in the world is called the Amazon is because during the conquest of the Spanish explorer, they encountered a local tribe that fights, according to the Spanish, like the ancient tribe and they gave the local tribe the Amazon nickname. Well the name stuck. And as we all know, the giant tech company is also named after the river. So, in other words, let’s not get distracted from the main point here: the Amazon river and the Amazon company literally means “no tiddies.”
  11. So, have we found where Atlantis is? We need to revisit the Green Sahara period from 100 things 2022 no 44-47 for the background context, where the Sahara were once a green lush jungle area like today’s Amazon. Done? Ok let’s continue. So, there’s a spot called the Richat Structure, it is located in the North African country Mauritania in their part of Western Sahara desert, which also commonly known as the eye of the Sahara. The shape and the location of the Richat Structure happens to match more than a dozen similarities with a place that Plato described as the lost ancient capital city of Atlantis. First, its shape is said to be made of concentric circles, 3 of water and 2 of land, which is similar with the Richat Structure. It is also has an opening to the sea, which if we see the Richat Structure from the satellite imagery it is clear that there used to be a water gate near the concentric circle.
  12. Moreover, Atlantis was said to have mountains to the North, and at the North of Richat Structure? There’s the Atlas mountain. Atlas, by the way was the name of the very first king of Atlantis. Looks very convincing doesn’t it? If this is true, then we got the speculation wrong all this time, Atlantis is not buried under water but under the sands. And there’s more. According to Ben van Kerkwyk, Atlantis is not a single city per se but it was more of a capital city of an empire
  13. The founders of Mercedes Benz were Karl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler, who founded the company in 1886. So, where did the name Mercedes come from? About 15 years later came a wealthy Austrian industrialist named Emil Jellinek, a racing enthusiast that requested Daimler and his chief engineer at the time, Wilhelm Maybach, for a racing engine to compete in this race in Nice. So they made him the engine and the car, and he won the race. Now, the pre-requisite for that deal was the car should be named after the Austrian’s daughter, which happened to be Mercedes. And the rest was history.
  14. You know that we often hear that several hundred years ago life expectancy were like 40 or 50, and then thanks to modern medicine now life expectancy rises to 70-80? As it turns out, the cavemen had life expectancy of 80. So what happened in between cave men and us? Modernization led to degradation of our health, because we started to live in cities and towns where hygiene and sanitation was so poor and diseases crept up. Hence the low life expectancy back in the days. Modern medicine did save the day and life expectancy rose again for the baby boomers generations. But don’t get too happy though, today life expectancy drops again due to unnatural living condition from the likes of the chemicals we use at our food, the pollution, sugar consumption, and as menial as wireless or lightbulb exposure.
  15. Vultures are famed for eating corpse or rotting flesh that are full of germs and bacteria. But have you ever wondered why they don’t get sick from eating them? Michael Roggenbuck at the University of Copenhagen discovered after examining the gut of 50 black vultures and turkey vultures that they have 2 very specific types of bacteria: 1. Clostridium 2. Fusobacteria. The first is a bacteria that causes tetanus, gangrene, and botulism toxin (that causes muscle paralysis, difficulty breathing, attacks the nerves, and can even cause death) while the second can cause blood infections.
  16. So how do they survive these 2 killer bacteria? Firstly, they have an incredibly strong stomach acid (10 to 100 times stronger than humans) that kills many germs before they travel to the intestines. Secondly, through their evolution they have developed an immunity to the germs over time. And thirdly, the deadly bacteria found in their gut act as a probiotic, i.e. not allowing other bacteria to exist. But vultures can still die by poisoning, with lead is one of the few examples.
  17. On February 2021 a meteorite landed in someone’s drive way in Cotswolds, England. And this 4.6 billion-old rock provides a credible evidence that water on Earth may have come from outer space, in a form of ice and dust, and they came through an asteroid. This particular meteorite in England was collected within hours after it crashed without being damaged by rainfall and whatnot. Making it a rare uncontaminated specimen. The analysis was published in the journal Science Advances and it concludes that the meteorite was originated from an asteroid body somewhere near Jupiter. And most importantly, they found that the ratio of hydrogen isotopes in the water closely resembled the composition of water on Earth. Whoa.
  18. I’ve been vaccinated 2x plus 1 booster, I wear a mask all the time, including everyday at office when I always WFO from the start of Covid till this day, there are 5 people in my close circle who died of Covid, had Covid myself once, I saw unvaxxed people as dangerously stupid, even more for those who believe in the Bill Gates, 5G, or any conspiracy theories. However, this is so disturbing and I cannot fully digest what this means (yet): how the WHO was captured. I will let you guys read it straight in the web, and judge it for yourself. And this is actually one of the main arguments in a book called Philanthro-capitalism, edited by the Gandhi of grains herself, Vandana Shiva. To be clear from the get go, I neither agree or disagree, but choosing to take no side (it’s possible to do so, just in case you forget) while entertaining all sides of the arguments.
  19. Here’s more on Vandana Shiva’s view on Gates and here’s more on Bill Gates influence on WHO. A little research down the rabbit hole after reading Shiva’s claim surprisingly confirmed what she had said: That Gates didn’t invent MS Windows and that Gates is the largest owner of farm lands in America. So her claims checks out. I really don’t know what to do with these information.
  20. The word “human” has its roots in humu, a Latin word that means soil. The name “Adam”, the first human in Abrahamic traditions, is derived from Adamus, a Hebrew word for soil. Is there any silver lining for this? Maybe. Or maybe not. One thing is for sure, a lot of ancient way of doing agriculture, as it turns out, proven to be sustainable after all. That the “primitive ways” that the Indians, the tribes at Amazon, the Aborigines, etc have been doing are producing food in a sustainable way for the environment (i.e. extracting food without damaging the environment). Now compare this with the mass agriculture giants of today’s corporate world, they can produce food in an unprecedented speed but using chemicals and technologies that are damaging the environment (and our health too) in the name of mass production and share holders’ wealth. And this is also one of the arguments made by the book Philantro-capitalism.
  21. According to whale experts, if you see a whale with a spout of water coming out of their blow hole, that’s a drowning whale. Because their blow hole is their nostril that they use for breathing. Sure, they may spray out some water every now and then, which creates more of a water vapor spray like a kettle would do. But if it looks more like a fountain water, that whale is drowning. So, the many children books with whale shooting water fountain out their blow hole? Yeah mate, that’s a dying whale.
  22. On 6 February 2023 Turkey and Syria suffered from a massive 7.8 SR earth quake, with epicentrum on land. Buildings collapsed and 30,000+ people died as a result. It was a catastrophic event nobody could have possibly predicted. Or so we thought. Up until then it is commonly believed that nobody can predict an upcoming Earth quake. One dude at Nat Geo once predicted a massive one in Iran with a specific date but then it occurred months later in Pakistan. That’s the best we can do. But apparently, 3 days before the earth quake in Turkey and Syria, there’s a Dutch independent geologist by the name of Frank Hoogerbeets predicted that there will be a massive earth quake in the upcoming days in the exact spot where the eventual earth quake did happen. He was using planetary/lunar geometry to make the prediction, where he argued the pattern before 6 February 2023 looks similar to the year 115 and 526 when a critical planetary geometry preceded massive earth quakes. Is this a new breakthrough in science, or is this just another crazy guy trying to seek his 15 minutes of fame? You decide yourself, this is his YouTube channel.
  23. During the month of Ramadan I usually take the chance to use the entire month to read about religion, any religion, with the goal of eventually reading about every religion. Last year I read 4 books on Islam, the previous year I read 7 book ranging from Islam, Christianity, to atheism. This year the theme was mysticism: I read about Islam mystic (Sufi), Judaism mystic (Kabbalah), mystic Indian religion (Sikhism), mystic Americas (Shamanism), mysticism in Java and went back to India and read the phenomenal book Nine Lives: nine people, with nine different religions, that shows the richness of spiritual India.
  24. It was such an intriguing reading month, a revelation for me that Sufi emerged as a spiritual alternative to the conservative and by-the-book Islam, and they in turn became the medium for assimilation for Islam in ancient Java, which had a strong Hindu-Buddhism local tradition. Sufi was also the stepping stone of the spreading of Islam in Hindu-majority India, and the many religion emerged in the sub-continent were one way or another a separatist from Hindu, specifically those who tried to abolish the caste system. Religion such as Sikhism (merging Hindu and Sufi teachings), Buddhism (abolishing the caste but practicing the rest) and Jainism.
  25. Now, Jainism is the most fascinating one for me. It is the enhanced version of Buddhism where hair shaving for monks and nuns in Buddhism are replaced with hair plucking, vegetarianism means also not eating root vegetables (pulling them from their roots is a form of torture), and not killing animals also includes not travelling by car to avoid running over ants and avoiding western medicine because they test their medicine to animals. And then we have the controversial and often misunderstood “sallekhana.” It is a form of suicide by fasting, but it is not done in a violent means where the practitioners abruptly fast to their death, but instead they do it gradually: first they eliminate one food like no longer eat fruits, then vegetables, then chicken, etc, until they are left with drinking water. The last stage would be stopping from drinking altogether and at that stage their bodies are already very weak. They say that through these stages the body slowly cleanse itself for purity, so the soul is ready for the afterlife. It is really a matter of perspective, as this is not a “suicide” but a “cleansing” for the next stage of life. Sounds peaceful to me.
  26. Anyway, in the world where India this year has become the most populated country in the world with 1.3 billion people, while Hindu and Buddhism are part of the big world religions with 1.1 billion and 500 million worshippers respectively, overall the Sikh community has about 25 million worshippers, there are surprisingly 60 million people who practice Voodoo, while Jainism has 4 million followers. Which brings us to my next point. With all that hype and controversies surrounds it, guess how many followers does Scientology has? 10 million? Nope. 1 million? Keep going. 100,000? Not even close. The actual figure for Scientology member is only about 35,000. Worldwide! In most stadiums they wont even fill the entire stadium! Imagine, 60 million people practice Voodoo and only 35,000 Scientology, but yet the latter seems to be the larger one. That shows the power of media has into our perception.
  27. Speaking of the power of media on our perception, the most recent wave of debate come from the LGBTQ+ community, especially the trans movement and their influence on children’s sex change controversies and involvements in women sports. Do you know how big is the LGBT community in the US is? Only 7.1% of the total population. Again, small but loud. Or more precisely, small but given the media attention that makes them seems big and everywhere.
  28. Just to be clear where I stand in this issue: I’m all about justice and equality, so to achieve that for the trans community, they should have their own sports category instead of hijacking the women’s category, or they should have their own trans award, rather than winning the woman of the year award. It’s not fair for the women and it’s a form of hijacking women’s world once again (the fact that feminists are so very quiet about this is confusing). Just like they have their own bathroom in Thailand (so, 3 genders bathroom) they can learn a lot from the Thais on how to nicely assimilate them into the society rather than forcing their way of life on everyone like extremists. Which brings us to “teaching” children about transgender by force, it is like that meme on religion: “religion is like a penis, it’s fine to have one, it’s fine to be proud of it, but please don’t whip it out in public and start waving it around, and please don’t try to shove it down my children’s throats.”
  29. One more thing about religion, there’s a small religion from the past called Adamites, it is a sect of people who wear no clothes just like the first person Adam used to do. It became especially big in Czech in the 14th century. But before you’re thinking about joining, they have a strict no-boner policy. That is, once there’s something up, they will beat it up mercilessly [Insert the meme of grandpa Simpsons leaving the room as soon as he enters].
  30. Have you ever wondered why do we pee more when it’s cold? As it turns out, there’s a scientific explanation for that. It is called cold diuresis, it is when our body temperature drops and it reacts to constrict the blood vessels in order to reduce blood flow to keep our organs warm as well as to prevent hypothermia. This consequently increases our blood pressure since the same amount of blood is now being pumped through a smaller space, and in response to this increased pressure our kidney work to filter out excess fluid in the blood to reduce the blood’s volume, which leads to more water in the kidney that makes us pee more.
  31. You know that graduation gown and hat almost all universities in the world use for graduation day, with the hat features a flat top and a bookmark-like string? That’s actually originated from Muslim universities in the 9th century, where the best and brightest in Europe went to earn good knowledge back then. And the shape of the hat? The flat top represents the Qur’an as the highest form of knowledge. The string (or the tassel) is indeed represents a bookmark for the Qur’an.
  32. North Koreans are deliberately made hungry by the dictatorship, even though international community are pleading to provide food to the country. But as an interview with a North Korean defector (Yeonmi Park) reveals, it is not because of incompetency of the government, but it is because when people are hungry all they can think about is survivor, while if they have enough to eat they will begin to think about the quality of life and can start a revolution to topple the regime if they’re not happy. Now that’s dark. The podcast interview with Yeonmi Park led me to a [small] rabbit hole of more research about the country, and it led me to this complete book about the country.
  33. Hamsters deflated when they’re sleeping. That’s it, that’s the entire fact. Just google image it, so hilarious.
  34. Coral is the largest biological structure in the planet that cover 175,000 square miles of seafloor. And every year on the same day, the same hour, and the same minute, corals of the same species all over the world will suddenly spawn in perfect synchronicity despite being separated thousands of miles. The dates and times will vary from year to year, but yet they always managed to do so despite being a primitive species with no eyes and ears and brains. We can even break a coral up, put it in a watered container and place it in our apartment in the city and it will still spawn the same time with other same species corals in other parts of the world. And you know what’s even more cool? Corals of other species will wait for their turn when another species is spawning, and they too will synchronize their spawning at other dates. Until this day we haven’t figured out how and why they can do this (dissertation idea alert!).
  35. While we’re still on the subject of not knowing, on 29 June last year the Earth spins 1.59 millisecond faster than usual, making it slightly less than 24 hours of rotation. And here’s the fun and mysterious part, nobody knows why it spins 1.59 millisecond faster. Anyway, in general the rotation of the Earth is actually slowing down, thanks to the gravitational pull of the moon. This means that the length of a day is gradually increasing. Now, before you’re freaking out, it is space, so of course it is happening at a ridiculously slow pace (in relative to our brief stay here on Earth). But anyway, it is estimated that in about 50 billion years’ time, the length of a day on Earth could reach 1000 hours (that’s 41.6 days in current 24-hours cycle).
  36. There’s a fun superstitious idea about “seven minutes past the hour.” It is that situation where we’re in a gathering, talking and laughing, but then the conversation falls to abrupt silence for a brief few seconds and nobody knows why. Well, the superstition suggest that Abraham Lincoln and Jesus Christ had both died at seven minutes past the hour, so humanity would somehow always fall silent on that timestamp to honor them. A Jewish tradition believes that people fill that silence by saying “a Jewish baby has been born.”
  37. What if I told you that there’s a real life Hogwarts, a genuine school of magic? It is called Shangqing School, it resides at Mao Shan mountain (the portal to a Daoist world) in modern-day China. This Daoist school is still exist today as the oldest surviving magic school in the world, but it is actually the youngest in ancient history after the Greek school in Troy, Persian school in Babylon, Egyptian school in Alexandria, and Roman school in Florence. One of their most famous students is Tao Hongjing (aka China’s Leonardo da Vinci) who among others invented an elixir to make the body weightless. He also taught princes and able to draw supernatural talismans.
  38. It is said that the Mongols also learned magic from the school and they bring along the teachings to Thailand and all the way down to Indonesia where the local notorious practice of “santet” is said to be one of the magic originally taught in Mao Shan (it’s hard to verify this claim though). The school even got a limelight in 1970s Hong Kong horror movie, where Mao Shan masters would perform black magic rituals to catch ghosts and demons. Today, the school is still exist although they say that they have different teachings and belief than it used to have back in the magic days.
  39. This one is for my Indonesian friends. Did you know why plenty of people in Palembang look like Chinese? It was because of Admiral Zheng He (or Cheng Ho in Indonesian) who on behalf of the Ming Dynasty commanded 7 expeditionary treasure voyages, traveling to South East Asia, South Asia, West Asia and East Africa. Legend has it that his large ships carried hundreds of people on 4 decks and they were twice as big as any wooden ships ever recorded (just google image this: Zheng He ship vs Christopher Columbus). He was also a Muslim who was responsible of introducing the religion to everywhere he went to, including the kingdom of Sriwijaya (present-day Indonesia) with Palembang as its capital city.
  40. So, yes, Palembang. Zheng He managed to create a diplomatic relationship between Sriwijaya and the Ming Dynasty, covering trade, art, cultural exchange, and transfer of knowledge of maritime matters. And every once in a while some locals and their Chinese counterparts fell in love (Disney version). Hence, the Chinese-looking people at Palembang. And oh, that famous food pempek Palembang? It was originally a Chinese dish.
  41. You know the story of Mansa Musa? He was the emperor of Mali and in 1324 he began a journey to Mecca for a Hajj pilgrimage, bringing along caravans of gold and many other stuff. You see, he was (and arguably still is) the richest man in history. Anyway, on the way to Mecca he visited Egypt and long story short he spent and gave away so much gold there that it triggered an inflation where gold value in Egypt decreased for the next 12 years.
  42. Which brings us to today. Can you guess the modern-day equivalent of Mansa Musa? Not Bill Gates, not Elon Musk, but apparently Beyonce. In June this year the government of Sweden officially pointing fingers at Beyonce for contributing to their high inflation. So, Beyonce had 2 shows in Sweden that kicked off her world tour, and due to the weak Swedish currency and cheaper ticket prices compared to other countries plenty of people (or BeyHive) flocked to Sweden from all over the world. As an effect hotel and restaurants were on high demand and created a price increase, which, according to the statistics, accounted for 0.2% out of the 0.3% added to the country’s inflation in May. That’s fantastic.
  43. This next fact’s believability depends on how you see Neil deGrasse Tyson, as a trustworthy scientist of a fake news spreader. So his claim of truth is this: during the Bubonic Plague in Europe – that was spread by the flea on rats – every cat owner did not get any symptoms of the disease because their cats killed or eat the rats and its flea before they reach the house. And the majority of the cat owners were single ladies, and that’s where the witch association came from.
  44. There’s a village in the Dimasa Hasao district, India, called Jatinga (population only 2500) where birds migrate annually there to commit suicide. It is a weird phenomenon that happens nowhere else in the world, and it occurs every year between September to November, between 6 and 9:30 PM on a moonless night, at a specific 1 mile by 600 feet strip of land. It occurs year after year for more than a century. We’re talking about hundreds of birds, both local and migratory, that fly at a very high speed and crashing themselves into the ridge, trees, and buildings, and instantly died. And here’s the best part: nobody knows why for sure. Of course there are theories, such as bad weather, magnetic pull, or quite simply evil spirits, but nothing conclusive so far.
  45. Did you know that Adolf Hitler wasn’t the only Führer? In fact he wasn’t the last Führer either. Meet Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. He was a U-Boat commander in World War 1, and a supreme commander of the navy beginning in 1943 where he played a major role in the naval history of World War 2. And on 30 April 1945 after the suicide of Adolf Hitler, in accordance with Hitler’s last will and testament Dönitz was named as the successor as head of state. His reign as Führer only lasted for a week though, as on 7 May 1945 he ordered his Chief of Operations Staff to sign the German instruments of surrender that formally ended the war in Europe. He then remained as head of state as the president of Germany and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces until his government was dissolved by the Allied powers on 23 May 1945 (de facto).
  46. You’re maybe thinking why not Heinrich Himmler that became the successor, Hitler’s famed second in command? Near the end of the war, realizing that the war was lost, Himmler attempted to make open peace talks with the Allies behind Hitler’s back. Hearing about this, Hitler then dismissed him from all his posts in April 1945 and ordered for his arrest. Himmler then attempted to go into hiding but was then caught by the British forces. He died by suicide on 23 May 1945, on the very day the Nazi government was dissolved.
  47. There’s a village in Suloszowa, Poland, where everyone – that is, every single one of the 6000 resident of the town – live on just one single street. It’s a pretty magnificent picture.
  48. Pop quiz! Tell me who is the richest person ever in history. Nope, not John D Rockefeller, not our boy Mansa Musa, not Croesus king of Lydia, not Musk or Gates or Bezos. The richest person in history is Chris Reynolds. Who, I hear you asking? He is a regular guy from Delaware Country, United States, and in 2013 he became the richest person in history worth a mouth watering figure of $92,233,720,368,547,800! A figure shown in his PayPal account. But unfortunately he logged out and logged in again to his account and the balance shows $0! Yikes! PayPal quickly acknowledged the error in their system and apologized, and offered to donate an unspecific amount the a charity of Reynold’s choice. When he later interviewed by CNN and asked about what he would do if he could keep the money, he answered “I would probably paid the national debt.”
  49. In 2019 in Chile there’s a school teacher by the name of Giovanna Jazmín Grandón Caro who became famous because she decided to go to government protests wearing a giant Pikachu costume. She was a Chilean preschool teacher and one day her son maxed out her husband’s credit card to purchase all sorts of merchandise from the Detective Pikachu movie. They did manage to return most of them, except for this giant Pikachu costume. She then thought she might as well wear it to the protests, and she became famous for it, earning the nickname Tía Pikachu or Baila Pikachu. She didn’t get any special treatment from the police, however. She got hosed by a water cannon wearing the suit, got shot with a rubber bullet, but due to her celebrity status in the protests on 16 May 2021 she got elected as a member of the assembly that writes the new Chilean constitution as a response to the 2019 protests.
  50. This June the global ocean surface temperatures were at record high in 174 years of data, thanks to the emergence of the El Niño weather pattern. The coastal Atlantic waters near Miami reached 32C (90F). Our waters serve a vital function: to absorb the world’s excess heat, where in recent decades global seas soaked up 90% of the warming caused by greenhouse gases. Now as oceans are warming they trigger a vicious cycle of causing higher land temperature, which in return contributed to hotter seas. As a result it also causes stronger storms, rising sea levels, and the death of coral reefs and other marine life not accustomed to warmer water. And it’s very visible to see. Temperature in Sardinia touched 46C, in China it went as high as 52C, India and the Indochina region sees temperature above 40C, forest fire in Italy, Greece and Canada, heat waves in Europe, among many other instances. And no, discarding single-use plastics and using steel straw like a douche won’t help the environment, only stopping the fossil fuel extraction activity will give us a genuine shot (which is not going to happen).
  51. Which brings us to Just Stop Oil. I genuinely understand where their concerns are coming from, but really? Destroying historical painting, gluing your hands on the pavement, disrupting snooker, F1, and tennis matches, causing traffic jams everywhere? It really never occurs to them that these stunts on civilians will never solve the climate crisis? Why can’t they do their stunts at oil rigs, airports where billionaires’ private jets are, storming off OPEC+ meetings, blocking coal shipments? Utter idiots. Anyway, for those who haven’t seen it yet, some blokes took a revenge on Just Stop Oil and for once disrupt THEIR party (which is satisfying). And to lighten things up, here’s a story where on a stag night the groom-to-be was forced to wear a Just Stop Oil shirt by his mates and get stopped by the police several times LOL.
  52. You know when you read anything about the galaxies and planets and whatnot, we often get this measurement of “light-years.” Like this sentence: “the Proxima Centauri is the nearest star from our solar system and it’s about 4 light-years away.” Do you know what that actually means? It means that it takes approximately 4 years for a light from there to reach to us on Earth. And here’s the interesting part: most of the stars that are visible to our naked eye all lie within the range of a few hundred light-years (and all belongs to the Milky Way Galaxy, just like us). Meaning, those stars that we can see at night could well be dead or exploded by now but we still can see them shining brightly for the next 90+ years. Now that’s terrifying (there’s even a theory that the reason why we haven’t found aliens yet is because everything in the universe have exploded and we’re the only one left. We just can’t see it yet for another couple of centuries). For a measurement, our sun is 8 light-minutes away from Earth.
  53. You know that universal hand gesture that we signal to say “come here”? Apparently, it comes from way, waaaaay back, during the time we were still cavemen (or cavewomen, or dare I say, cavethem?). The hand gesture was said to be used even by the Neanderthals, and it is also definitely used by present-day monkeys. Yes, it is arguably one of the proofs that we’re all descendants of the same ancestor.
  54. There’s a race event in the rapids of Vuoksi River in Russia, where contestants swim in the water using sex dolls as their floating device. I’m sorry, what? It is called the Bubble Baba Challenge, and it began in 2003 and have been staged ever since. Some notable years: in 2011 as much as 800 people participated in the race. And in an undisclosed year, that event went horribly wrong when the wind swept almost all the sex dolls into the sky, creating a chaos (and presumably confusion for those nearby who aren’t aware of the event).
  55. Last October I got banned from Amazon’s “community” function, aka the book reviewing part. Prior to this, I’ve written more than 300 book reviews, with me adding one review a week, which made me ranked the 2838th reviewer in Amazon among millions of users. So what the hell happened? No idea why, they just gave me the entire terms and conditions and said I violated their rule. It’s like putting someone in jail and then give him a book that contains the entire law and ask that person to figure out himself what he did wrong (a bit Kafkaesque, don’t you think?). I emailed them to ask for a clarification but they never bothered to reply. I wonder what happened, which book review got me suspended? Why did I get suspended at the end of October while the last book review I posted before the suspension was on 5 October (exactly when I had my mini break)?
  56. In the early morning hours of 7 October, Hamas launched 2000 missile attacks toward Central and Southern Israel, breaching the Iron Dome system (which previously had a success rate of 90-97% of striking down rocket attacks). Hamas then breach Gaza’s “Iron Wall” (the border with hundreds of cameras and automated machine guns that fire when sensors are tripped) and can proceed to kill 1400 people in the nearby towns and kidnap hundreds more without any difficulty (revised stats: 1200 casualties, where “a number” of them were killed by a “friendly fire” from Israeli apache helicopter and tanks that cannot differentiate between Hamas and civilians. Post-script, on 17 December Israel revised down the casualties again to 695). How can Hamas easily breach Israel’s world class security? Coincidentally, that morning the Israeli army that normally guard the Gaza wall were also nowhere to be found. In fact it took the ground troops about 8 hours to eventually arrive at the towns to fight back Hamas (while it only takes around 6 hours to drive Route 90 from North to South Israel, the longest route in the country). So the question is, where was the army?
  57. And this is what’s even weirder. The first people who were allegedly slaughtered by Hamas were those in a music festival very close to the border with Gaza. But here’s the thing, the music festival was moved 2 days before the event, from southern Israel to merely 5 KM away from the border, during the time the Israeli government had already received a warning from the Egyptian intelligence about an imminent attack by Hamas. Top Israeli journalist Lisa Goldman confirms that the government did receive clear warnings from Egyptian intelligence. At least someone knows that it’s going to happen and profited from it. And former Israeli defense minister Moshe Ya’alon said Netanyahu was warned several times but he did not even let the Chief of Staff speaks to the cabinet. If they have the intelligence report, why do they allow the music festival to move that very close to the border where something is about to happen, and the government is doing nothing to prevent it? Was this a false flag operation? Was this Netanyahu’s George W. Bush moment?
  58. As you may already know, Bush’s moment came when the greatest military and intelligence power in the world let slip the Al Qaeda terrorists to attack the Twin Tower and the Pentagon, and then use the horrible stories and pictures of the 9/11 to gather support for US invasion on Afghanistan, and then 2 years later made a link between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein and Iraqi WMD (which has now proven to be false) to invade Iraq. Was that a false flag operation, letting a terror attack to happen in US soil in order to gain support to invade 2 sovereign nations, which happen to be rich in gas and oil (not to mention opium and others stuff)? After all, the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis led by an Egyptian and the Taliban did offer to hand over Bin Laden if the US could provide proof that he was behind the attack, and thus avoiding unnecessary war, but the US rejected it. And whether this is a false flag operation or not, they are sure milking it. Just as Putin did in 1999 with the Chechnya war, Erdogan did in 2016 with the failed coup, or Hitler did in 1933 with the Reichstag Fire.
  59. But what’s Netanyahu’s angle? Prior to the attack, he became increasingly unpopular, after the fraud and corruption scandals, and especially after attempting to weaken the supreme court in order to consolidate power to himself. Massive protests were conducted, including a rare protest by the big brother US government. But then after the Hamas attack the nation is united again and almost everyone got Netanyahu’s back to “defeat the common enemy”. And then Israel proceeded to drop 6000 bombs on Gaza in its first 6 days (weighting 4000 tons, the same amount the US dropped in Afghanistan in an entire year), 12,000 tons after 19 days (equal to the Hiroshima atomic bombing), 26,000 tons after a month (equal to Hiroshima AND Nagasaki, with death toll equal to the 9/11 and Pearl Harbour attacks COMBINED and times 2), 50,000 tons after 61 days (equal to 2x Hiroshima nuclear bomb). They also use the illegal white phosphorus bomb, and told the people in Gaza to get out of the place (to where? It is a walled city, with the only way out is through the Rafah crossing, which Israel is bombing also), bombed 22 hospitals, 239 schools, including 20 UNRWA schools, bombed a refugee camp, hit 146 mosques (66 destroyed), including the oldest mosque in Gaza (The Omari Mosque, built in 1344), 3 churches, even the 3rd oldest Church in the world the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church, and killed 85 Palestinian journalists, 101 UN officials, and over 25,000 of Palestinians are killed or missing, 8697 of which are children (on day 60). So far. But sure, Israel’s unwavering right to “self-defense”, but this aggression violates our current international criminal law (Read article 6, 7, 8, and 8 bis) and our human rights charter. And funny how these little “coincidences” can turn around Netanyahu’s popularity and grip on power (right on cue, the Israelis formed an emergency war government led by Netanyahu). Like Bush, whether he deliberately did it or not, he is sure milking it. Not surprisingly, Netanyahu is my wanker of the year.
  60. But what if Netanyahu’s motive is more darker than just a political ambition? After 3 weeks of the asymmetric assaults, Netanyahu had a press conference and saying “we are the people of the light, they are the people of darkness – we shall realize the prophecy of Isaiah.” This statement creeps the bejesus out of me, because the prophecy of Isaiah refers to the end of day and the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. The believe goes something like this: in order for the Kingdom of Heaven to arrive on Earth the Jews will need to control all the Promised Land, Jerusalem should be its center of power (aka capital city), and a Third Temple should be built. In order to build the Third Temple they need a red heifer, which would be used for a cleansing ceremony. Now, red heifer has not been seen in Israel for centuries but last year a Christian farmer from Texas sent 5 of them. Why is this disturbing? Because this means the attempted genocide on the Palestinians could be seen by Netanyahu as a collateral damage to clear the land, that their sins of murdering Palestinians will be cleansed during the ritual using red heifer and thus after the Third Temple is built and the Kingdom of Heaven has arrived, they will still enter heaven. Another problem with this is, the site where the Third Temple should be built now stands the Al Aqsa compound (with its Dome of Rock) which is the 3rd most sacred site for Muslims. If ever there’s a cause for World War 3 (which is highly unlikely), this might be it. More explanation for this can be found in Reza Aslan’s book Beyond Fundamentalism (I know what you’re thinking. And yup, maybe because of this review. Censorship over comments on Israel is nothing new).
  61. Looking at our phone screen between the hours of 11 PM and 4 AM will activate a specific circuit in the brain area called the Habenula. This circuit will lower our dopamine level and create a sense of disappointment, which then can carry forward as a depression in the waking hours. Moreover, frequent exposures to these kind of artificial lights after dark will end up disrupting our ability to get a good night sleep, which will eventually do damage to our mental and physical health. We can prevent this by wearing a blue light blocker, or using night mode at our phone/tv/etc, but the best way to prevent this is just by avoiding screen time altogether when it’s time to sleep (but yeah, the memes are funniest during this time period).
  62. Have you ever heard of 6 degrees of separation? Well, after analysing 721 million people and their connections, Facebook concluded that as at 2016 on average 2 people in the world are separated by only 3.57 people and not 6. Which makes sense. Because for example, I have a Colombian friend who is friends with F1 driver Juan Pablo Montoya’s cousin. LOL, I know, I know, this is a really poor example.
  63. You know that song from a while ago, Asereje by Las Ketchup? It was only this year that I learned the meaning of the (Spanish) song, and I was mind-blown. The song tells a story about a dude at a night club, who approaches the DJ and asks him to play his favourite song. He doesn’t remember the name of the song, but he said the song goes like this… and he proceeded to sing it in an off-tune kind a way, with a Spanish twang: aserejé-ja-dejé, De jebe tu de jebere seibiunouva majavi an de bugui an de güididípi. Which as it turns out are the first few lyrics of the song Rapper’s Delight by the Sugar Hill Gang! Which goes like: I said a hip-hop, the hippie, the hippie to the hip, hip-hop and you don’t stop the rockin’, to the bang-bang boogie, say up jump the boogie, to the rhythm of the boogie, the beat. Mind = blown!
  64. The level of poverty and the dire living condition in India can be traced back to a single signature, a stroke of a pen by Lord Cornwallis in 1793. Through the British’s permanent settlement, this signature gave themselves the “right” to dispossess the peasantry, and to tie 20 million small and marginal farmers and peasants into Zamindars, which is created by the British to extract murderous “lagaan” (taxes or rents). This control over lagaan became the incredible source of wealth for the British Empire – which over the course or 200 years the British extracted approximately $45 trillion – and conversely causing poverty and starvation for tens of millions of peasants.
  65. Hip-hop was born at a party that happened 50 years ago in 1973, in the Bronx, New York City. Clive Campbell (aka DJ Kool Herc) was in charge of the music while his sister, Cindy Campbell, was in charge of the crowds at the door. Imagine hosting a party that’s so dope, it becomes a sub-culture and still talked about 50 years later.
  66. The Vulcan point in the Philippines is probably my favourite island in the world. It is located in the Luzon island, inside lake Teal, which has Volcano island that has Main Crater Lake that host the Vulcan Point island. Confused? Let’s reverse it: the Vulcan Point island is located inside the Main Crater lake, which is located inside Volcano island. Volcano island is located inside lake Teal, which itself is located in the big island of Luzon in the Philippines. That’s 3 layers of islands!
  67. Peer review is considered as the standard-bearer of the scientific community and modern scholarship in general. The concept was created in 1965, with the idea that before a new work is published in an academic journal, experts will take a look at it, fact-check the evidence, the research, and argument to make sure the validity of it. Sounds good so far. You know who created this concept? Robert Maxwell. Yes, THE Robert Maxwell, the infamous fraudster and Ghislaine Maxwell’s father, a well known Mossad agent who also bought McGraw-Hill that provides the textbook to American schools. Oh yes, this is a dodgy story. But this time, let’s just focus on the concept of peer-review.
  68. In practice, many authors, reviewers and editors have difficulties with how the system works, because it runs on volunteer labour from already overworked academics (more on this below). And those that can survive the screening process? Their journal will be “published” (or to be more precise, sold) through companies that publish academic journals like Robert Maxwell’s pioneering Purgamon Press (or the many imitators ever since). In essence Maxwell came up with the system to hack the academic niche by profiting from the exchange of ideas: if you’re a university and want to have a complete library of all the journals that have been peer-reviewed, you have to buy it from him.
  69. Maxwell’s greed aside, this arrangement do create some other problems that undermine the integrity of the system: firstly, like mentioned above, journals are reviewed voluntarily but then sold at a price. This, in effect create a counter-incentive for people to actually do the reviewing, and thus “peer” review are ended up usually done by only a bunch of people. In fact, one study of biomedical journals in 2015 discovered that just 20% of researchers performed up to 94% of the peer-reviewing.
  70. And secondly, while only a handful of people are doing the reviewing, they are done anonymously where the name of the authors and the reviewers are not shown. It is arranged to ensure honesty, but in practice it also makes the process less transparent and less accountable where bias and agenda can get inserted in their review. Thus, over time, a certain bias consensus have been established in the respective communities, with only a bunch of “key reviewers” are in control, and where any fresh new ideas that don’t conform with the “consensus” will be rejected by the “peer-review.” Imagine how many breakthrough ideas have gone unnoticed because of this.
  71. Which brings us nicely to Graham Hancock, who argued that there once exist lost ancient civilisations that have advanced technology, living during the Ice Age. But then they all quite abruptly disappeared due to the end of the Ice Age that saw melting ice became floods. The floods were all actually told in the many mythology and religion around the world, from the flood of Noah in the Bible, to the story in Hindu scripture, to South American mythology, to Greek tragedy. Hancock believes that myths are not necessarily created by unsophisticated society trying to understand the world from a primitive point of view, but rather a historical record occurring in many parts of the world that have a similar storyline. To be exact, the apocalyptic event happened on Earth between 12800 and 11600 years ago, when during that 1200 years time period the Earth was an inhospitable place. Very intriguing hypothesis, and the best part is Hancock actually provide the evidence for his each claims. Here’s the full review of his hypothesis. But if we can only take away 1 lesson from the whole lot, it’s probably this: ancient civilisations were not immune from extinctions, and so do we.
  72. But weirdly, the “peer-review” of archaeologists refused to acknowledge his findings just because they have already established a generally agreed narrative, where the academic consensus believe civilisation was first developed in the Fertile Crescent in the Middle East, in Mesopotamia. So any new evidence that prove this consensus believe will be instantly discarded. Now that’s not how science works!
  73. After the Pandemic there’s increasingly a call for a 4-days workweek and 3-days weekend. Which I cannot support enough. And this got me thinking, who decided that weekend should be 2 days? Sure, a day of rest is rooted in Judaism with their Sabbath day, but that’s only 1 day. As it turns out we need to thank the workers’ rights activist in the Greater Manchester, where in 1843 they launched a campaign to change to working regulation at the time from a 6-days work week to finish early on Saturdays. They won, and thus invented the 2-days weekend that eventually copied all around the world.
  74. Increased inflammation in our body will make us more likely to engage in social media – likes, comments – instead of just keep quiet and consuming the contents. In other words, being inflamed makes us inflammatory too in our behaviour on social media. I wonder if that’s also the case for poor social behaviour in physical space? Inflamed Karens makes such a perfect sense.
  75. Buckingham Palace was built on the site where a gay brothel used to stand. So in 1609 King James I created the Mulberry Gardens at roughly the north-west corner of today’s Buckingham Palace, while the first building on the site was at the southern end of the present-day palace (a house for George Goring, the 1st Ear of Norwich) while the Mulberry garden remained in Royal hands. But then came the civil war in 1642-1651. George Goring sided with King Charles I (King James’ son), and when the Royalist lost, the opposition Parliamentary forces took the land, including Goring’s house, which was then used due to its strategic location. Now, when army march pass the house, they bring along food wagons, weapons, and more importantly for this story, prostitutes. Male prostitutes at that.
  76. So, what happened between gay brothel and today’s Buckingham palace? After just several years in operation, the area would have been cleared when in 1664 the land was purchased by Henry Bennet, the 1st Earl of Arlington that build a new house on the land. The house was then sold by Arlington’s daughter to John Sheffield, who was the 2nd Earl of Mulgrave, the 5th Baron of Sheffield, and the Duke of Buckingham and Normanby. In 1703 he commissioned a new mansion for the site, named Buckingham House. In 1761 the Buckingham House was acquired by King George III, and his son George IV remodeled and renamed the house into Buckingham Palace.
  77. The word hobby comes from hobbled horse. So you would hobble a horse (keep it from running) and hobbling it with a stick or string. And then kids would ride the hobbled horse for play. Over time, “riding a hobbled horse” became “riding a hobby horse”, and that evolved to simply become a hobby.
  78. This year I’ve read 57 books in total, and this year I like to read beyond my usual comfort zone, especially the unexplainable (like Graham Hancock arguments), the counter arguments (like on Bill Gates), or things that don’t necessarily have the answers to. And fiction, lots of fiction. In fact, I think I’ve finally found the comfortable zone or angle to read fiction, and I feel like princess Jasmine on a magic carpet ride, seeing a whole new world. Anyway, there are so many good books this year, from the very timely like The Price of Time to the very entertaining like How to Live with a Huge Penis. Audiobook also features a lot for me this year, with The Oral History of Bob Marley to be the most entertaining. I also find children’s book Ruthless Romans to be immensely entertaining AND insightful. But this year is an Indonesian year for me, where a dear foreigner friend of mine encouraged and inspired me to read up more about my own country. We spent quite a long time in an underground second-hand bookshop area, hunting for ancient books or long-forgotten books which led me to discover the greatest literature ever written, and one of my absolute favourite books ever.
  79. What is this mysterious book, I vaguely hear you ask? For the first time, my book of the year is 4 books instead of 1. It is a series, the so-called Buru Quartet by Pramoedya Ananta Toer. Pramoedya was an intellectual Left that was arrested after the 1965 coup in Indonesia and exiled by the Suharto regime between 1969-1979 to Buru Island in Eastern Indonesia, with his library back home in Jakarta burned. He wasn’t permitted access to pen and paper in exile, but that didn’t stop him from creating his magnum opus: the 4 books that became known as the “Buru Quartet”, which he recited orally to other prisoners in 1973 in Buru before they were eventually written down and smuggled out in 1975. Such was the power of his ideas that after Pramoedya came back from exile and produced the books, they were then quickly banned and confiscated. Today the Buru Quartet are freely circulating in Indonesia since the fall of the Suharto regime, and Pramoedya has since considered as one of the biggest writers (if not THE biggest writer) in Indonesia. Here’s more on the story of the making of the Buru Quartet.
  80. Marriage counseling was created by the Nazis. HA! But seriously, it was a part of the eugenics movement that came to Germany in the 1920s. The eugenics is a pseudoscientific theory that argues it is possible to perfecting the human race through genetics and the scientific laws of inheritance. They used an incorrect and biased understanding of the work of Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel to champion the idea of a racial improvement. So, yeah, looks perfect to be a Nazi-esque movement.
  81. In late September this year NASA successfully collected asteroid samples from deep space. They use Osiris-Rex spacecraft and they collected around 250g of rocks and dust from asteroid Bennu. Bennu is a 4.5 billion-year-old remnant of our early solar system and scientists believe that the samples can help shed light on how planets were formed and evolved. Interestingly, the mission was made possible thanks to one astrophysicist Sir Brian May, who helped identifying where Osiris-Rex could grab a sample from the asteroid. You might know Sir Brian May better as the guitarist of the rock band Queen. Yup it’s THAT Brian May. You might say, he just took “We will rock you” to another level.
  82. Sharks don’t have bones. They are a unique type of fish known as “elasmobranchs”, which means fish that made of cartilaginous tissue (that clear gristly stuff your ears and nose tip are made of). Another elasmobranch fish includes ray fish, sawfish, and skates. In an unrelated fish matter, a blue whale’s poop can weigh as much as 4 tons, making it the second largest piece of shit after Benjamin Netanyahu.
  83. The first homicide in history is believed to have occurred around 430,000 years ago. The “evidence” was found in 2015, when archaeologists working in Atapuerca, Spain, pieced together the skill of a Neanderthal and discovered that the owner of the skill had been bludgeoned to death and was thrown down a cave shaft. That’s some real CSI stuff right there, can trace back a murder that far back.
  84. Stories of the year: This year’s standout stories that I’ve read all come from a single theme: mistaken identity. 1. A disturbing case where a son vanished and then an imposter replaced him for 41 years. 2. The heartwarming story of a mixed up babies that eventually got married 3. The awesome real-life story of that Mike character in the TV series Suits 4. A tear-jerker story of how a woman learns his adopted son’s bride is her long-lost daughter on their wedding day. 5. And speaking about identity: Missing pig named Kevin Bacon reunited with owners after help from Kevin Bacon.
  85. Let’s talk about Bob Marley. The song “get up, stand up” was written by Marley when he visited Haiti and was moved to see the poverty there. “No woman no cry” was not a song about no troubles without women but instead it might look different with punctuation: “no woman, don’t cry.” But my favourite got to be “I shot the sheriff” that apparently is about birth control. Wait, what? Yes, the song would eventually become an anthem against corruption and injustice, but it was written during the time when Marley had a disagreement with his former girlfriend Esther Anderson over the usage of birth control pill, with Marley believed that using birth control was a sin and that the doctor who prescribed those baby-killing pills became the sheriff.
  86. Remember my person of the year from 2022, Dr. Katalin Karikó? She finally won the Nobel Prize in science this year, over her discovery on mRNA research. Well deserved! This year, my person of the year is also a woman, but a fictitious woman. Now, I’ve never picked a fictional character to be the person of the year, but this character is an amazing one. Her name is Nyai Ontosoroh, and she’s a character from my book of the year Buru Quartet. Yeah, I’m afraid it’s like those years where Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings wipe out all of the awards. So, Nyai Ontosoroh, she’s a 1890s character in the Dutch East Indies, a local woman who rise herself up in the hierarchy of social caste in the colonial rule, that can weather any hardship with grace, dignity, and incredible courage. No further spoiler, but let’s just say her character is so strong that she became very popular on the island of Buru when the author Pramoedya Ananta Toer was held captive with other political prisoners. To boost morale, Pramoedya then created the stories that would become the Buru Quartet and recite them at the barrack, on the hut, in the veranda, and the people there would quote her dialogues and her incredible journey from hardship to position of power and the strong character that she has gained with it, inspired the prisoners and raise their spirits. She is also an inspiration for me and a rock to hold on to in dealing with some of the most difficult circumstances this year. And with this struggle against oppression in mind, a special people of the year are the journalists and the paramedics in Gaza, the absolute rock for the people of Gaza.
  87. You know when we put a chicken in the oven, in the cooking process it goes from pink to brown? That process is called glycation. Well, us humans also go through the glycation process, where from the moment we were born we slowly glycate (slowly cook or slowly age), and when we’re fully cooked? We die. So, when scientists look at the cartilages (connective tissues) of babies the color is white. But when they check in people close to 100 year old? It’s brown, because it’s been cooking and aging. Here’s the kicker, the more glucose spikes we have the faster the glycation process in our body = the faster we age. It is shown in the wrinkles in our skin, and as collagen molecules glycate they also become less flexible. Thus, while we cannot see it on the inside we can feel our organs slowing down and deteriorating. But here’s the good news, we can somewhat control how fast or slow we’re glycating, by controlling our sugar intake (the trigger of glucose spikes).
  88. What is the largest stadium in the world ever? Not Brazil’s Maracana, which can host 78,838 people. Not the Narendra Modi Stadium in India, which can host 132,000 people. But it is currently the Rungrado 1st of May Stadium in North Korea, which can host 150,000 people. But if we include history, the largest stadium in the world was Circus Maximus in the Roman Empire, a chariot-racing stadium, where at its peak can seated up to a whopping 300,000 people. It’s all but gone now, however, with only ruins remaining in the valley between Palatine Hill and Aventine Hill where it was once stood.
  89. The average person blinks around 15 times per minute, or once every 4 seconds. If you’re awake for the traditional 16 hours a day (with the remaining 8 hours for sleeping), that’s a total of 14,400 blinks a day. Every blink takes about 300 to 400 milliseconds, so you’re likely to spend more than an hour a day just for blinking.
  90. The following message is NOT funded by the piranha community: Piranha has the reputation for being a ferocious meat eater, and if our childhood cartoons teaches us is to stay away from quicksand and then be careful when dipping in the Amazons. But the reality is, piranha rarely attack people (I said rarely, not never) and for sure they hardly ever caused a big injury or even death (again, hardly, not never).
  91. 2023 has been one hell of a year for me! You know the Roaring Twenties after the Spanish Flu? This year got to be our own version of Roaring Twenties. For me the jazz age is replaced by so many concerts and festivals. The freedom of movements outside the house brought me to camping at mountains, body rafting down the river, swimming at the sea, sunrising at the highest plateau in the country, running at 2 offline (offline!) events (one of which was filled with local ghosts on Halloween), watching not one, not two, but four football matches in the stadium (including U-17 World Cup matches), and plenty of impromptu adventures in between, including turning 40 (which, as it turns out, was awesome).
  92. Of course it’s never going to be all rosy and well during the course of one year. The low points are in fact very low, Earth-shattering, life-changing, low. But remember what Rosie Swale-Pope (my person of the year in 2021) said “I believe that if you can keep your strength in a difficult situation, that strength is still yours for ever when you need it.” And just like in the previous pivotal moments in my life, somehow a book randomly appear at the right moment and at the right time (yes the Buru Quartet). If Dan Schreiber ever going to interview me, in my batshit list I will say I truly feel that God speaks to me through books: The book introduced to me by a random cousin that I met just once, which saved me when I was a teenager. That book that altered my life to finance. That book that comforted me when I sat besides my dad’s deathbed. That book that suddenly pop in my mind when I was 37 years old, with the character in the book aged 37 years and provides lessons that are very applicable for me. And many more.
  93. But besides the ups and downs of 2023, this year’s theme for me is also about the unexplainable. Why corrals worldwide can spawn in perfect synchronicity, why do birds come and die at Jatinga, why do the Earth spins a split second faster, why did ancient civilisations around the world have similar folklores and similar carvings on their temples, who on Earth are the Bilderbergs, or what’s the real deal with Bill Gates. I also have a funny feeling that the practice of magic is actually trainable and that it’s not some supernatural thing outside human control. The existence of the ancient magic school of Shangqing is a testament to this, as well as that Dutch guy who can predict the Earth quake.
  94. This is not a blind faith though, because the techniques of magic apparently could well be as trainable as the lost ancient technologies mentioned by Graham Hancock that rely on frequencies and energy. In fact, Nikola Tesla also said that “if you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency, and vibration.” Because, while some times ago we tend to associate spirituality as a divine intervention, it is now scientifically proven that the brainwave of Theta produces a deep spiritual connection (for more about brainwaves, visit 100 things 2019, no 49-50) and that we can condition our brain to eventually reach that Theta state. Hence, just because we don’t understand it yet, doesn’t mean it’s an illogical mambo-jumbo. Like the still-mysterious technologies used by Ancient Egyptians that we cannot figure out yet.
  95. Meanwhile, I cannot end this year’s wrap without further elaborating on the main worldwide focus of the last one quarter of the year: the horrific ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza and the attempted genocide on them. I finally understand why so many people kept quiet when the Nazis conducted the Holocaust: It is because of justification propaganda and their echo chambers that blinded people to the fact that a genocide is taking place right in front of their eyes. The same thing is happening right now, with their own echo chambers that create the pro-Iraeli biases. I also learn that the countries that still supported Israel in doing their war crimes and 60+ violations of international law are countries like European countries who had a colonial rule in the past, countries who themselves have conducted a genocide to their native population such as the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, or countries that are still currently conducting a massacre over its own citizens, like Myanmar. Once you see this, you’ll understand that this is never about justice, but just another justification over European colonialism. Because 55% of Israeli Jews are Sephardic Jews, who originally came from Spain when the Catholic monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella expelled them in the 15th century and were accepted by Muslim Ottoman Empire (when other European kingdom refused to do so) including in Palestine. And 45% of Israeli Jews are Ashkenazi Jews, who originally came from Central and Eastern Europe, a lot of whom migrated from German refugee camp in 1947 to Palestine. So, in other words, Zionism is just another form of European colonialism.
  96. This can partly explained the high rate of skin cancer among the Israelis, because their European genetics are incompatible with the Middle Eastern environment. Just like Australia has the number 1 case of skin cancer in the world, because the caucasians are not meant to settle long at that part of the world, while Melanoma rates are far lower among native Aboriginal people that have more pigmented skin. Why do you think that Israel has the largest human skin bank in the world? And do you know where the skins are coming from?
  97. And there’s really nothing we can do to help the Palestinians, as long as the Jewish lobby groups keep bribing Congressmen and women, the US with its veto power in the UN and its funding and weapons supplies still back them up, and even the new head of ICC is pro-Israel. And the greater Gaza plan is going to eventually happen: that this whole thing is never about Hamas and the 7 October attack (something that theoretically could not happen if the Israeli to government is doing its job properly), and instead this is very much likely to be a false flag operation designed to justify what they are planning to do next, the ethnic cleansing of Gaza either by killing the Palestinians, systematically killing the best and brightest in Gaza, or force them all to move south to Rafah and then pressure Egypt to accept the “refugees”, with Israel will eventually control all of Gaza. And meanwhile the Israeli atrocities in West Bank is already happening, where at the time of writing 240 Palestinians have died, which is very telling of their intention since there’s no Hamas in West Bank. The end goal? Look at no 60 above. And Gaza happens to sit on top of a pretty big natural gas deposit (Biden already sent his oil lobbyist to Israel and Lebanon).
  98. Maybe this is why I increasingly appreciate people like Charles Bukowski, who is clearly an asshole and own it instead of being a two-faced hypocrite. What you see is what you get, something that becomes rarer by the day. And I’m also becoming weirdly attracted to Franz Kafka’s dark works where there’s no happy ending. Because that feels more like the real world, where justice hardly prevail and the innocent can be sentenced guilty while the real perpetrator can get away with their shit, where 115 violations on financial fair play don’t get prosecuted, where a murderous country can sportwash their way to better PR image, where corrupt political elites can easily give an unwavering support to a murderous regime conducting a genocide, where US veto is much more powerful than UN’ Secretary General’s strongest tool in Article 99 and shows that the international system is rigged, where in general the winner doesn’t always have to be the best and most capable but instead those who has mastered manipulations. This imperfection is also the main strength of Chuck Palahniuk’s writings, another author I weirdly drawn to recently, where he explores all the imperfections of the world and really push it to the limit (he’s nuts, I love it).
  99. But anyway, despite all of the crazy things happening, 2023 is still an insanely good year for me. And I thought I would end this year on a high, a literal high, 2093 meters above sea levels. It is fitting for a crazy year where I got to see a lot, learn a lot, and do a lot. Here, as I write this closing remark, I’m sitting above the clouds in Dieng Plateu, a place that I’ve always wanted to visit but never thought I would. It is the second stop of a multiple spots in a trip deep in the heart of Java, which perfectly sums up my year. It is a Buru Quartet-inspired adventure that also covers some of the places mentioned by the book Bandit Saints of Java and covers an area that my daughter is studying about and performed on at a historical-themed school play. If everything goes according to plan, the trip would start high in Dieng, we then go down to dozens+ towns and cities, riding an old steam locomotive, visiting an old Dutch quarter, visiting a temple commemorating admiral Zheng He, visiting an ancient Mosque built by the so-called “Wali Songo” the spreader of Islam in Java, the museum and tomb of R.A. Kartini (one of the first enlightenment figures in Indonesian history), sleeping at a 200+ year old ancient house, having dinner at a royal palace, visiting a factory that feeds an entire village, and visiting an old port town famous for being the melting pot between Zeng He’s influence, Majapahit Empire and the rise of Indonesian nationalism during the Dutch occupation. And of course foooooooood!
  100. And so, without further ado, I bid you guys farewell. Imma cut myself off from the world for a while, and stay off grid intermittently. Have a great 2024 everyone!