Hole in the sky

The last time I have experienced such a massive closure of airspace for civilians was in the days after September 11th 2001. Two days later, I flew to Buenos Aires and it started with an evacuation of Hannover Airport triggered by a bomb threat. Finally, we arrived well in Argentina, where the country was in a severe economic depression and surging inflation driven by the pegging of the Argentinian Peso to the USD. Later, in December that year, Argentina busted into riots, and Argentina declared state bankruptcy. In all of this, we had a car factory, with ambitious targets of the newly appointed company president for Argentina, Viktor Klima. Viktor gained experience as a politician before, being the Chancellor of Austria from 1997 to 2000. It took me a while back then, to understand that actually, a former politician can achieve more in this environment than a bunch of restructuring managers.

Back then, there were no cool internet tools to map the airspace, so I literally drew up my maps on the back of an envelope, continuing travel to Brasil, Mexico and finally the US.

Today, it’s a few clicks on the web browser to see a huge hole in the sky over Ukraine and parts of South-West Russia. Personally, I was surprised to wake up to the news, that Russia actually did launch a “special operation” last night, claiming to take out Ukrainian military infrastructure. Russian friends told me, that this clearing of the airspace and rerouting of civil flights started visibly at one in the morning and this hole took shape at around 3 a.m. This morning at shorty after 9:00 Russian media reported that the Ukrainian air defence is largely destroyed. Who knows, what’s true. But given that airspace interference started visibly to the public, just after midnight, I can’t quite understand why Western Media acted so surprised in the morning. Not paying attention? Making a drama? Well, it’s dramatic enough, if you ask me.

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Source: www.planefinder.net (accessed on 24.02.2022 at 12:50 GMT+1)

Friday 13th, 2020

Despite some outliers buying toilet paper and noodles, we get so far quite gracefully through this Covid-19. Since my last blogpost, the disease has been officially renamed. I was extremely surprised by how fast Malta actually implemented mandatory quarantine for people coming from risk regions. On Thursday it was also Germany, so Lufthansa cancelled all services to Malta. I should have thought twice to book myself onto a Friday 13th. Then on Friday 13th itself, Malta imposed obligatory quarantine for anybody entering from any country. Immediately three logistic hubs supplying food were set up, and delivery organised. Well, contemporary Maltese food is a bit “English”, you know what I mean, but it will supply you with more than the calories needed. Medication plans for the elderly were put on the road to have them avoid coming to the hospital for dispensing. All very swift and quite well thought through. I am even more impressed because looking at Malta, we have a county which in normal times can’t even implement traffic rules. But when things get tough, you can get a bit of a feeling why these islands have been invincible so many times. Sure, these things are hard to do. And of course, they hurt the economy. Now is the question of how to minimise the effects of that.

I was very impressed by how China was able to impose measures so quickly and curb the new infections relatively fast. Of course, not everything goes perfect, especially when as a first-mover it was not even clear what we were up against. And the effects were not just slowing down the infection rate in China effectively, but also it was a service to the rest of the world, winning time. Now it’s up to Europe and soon also to the USA to learn from that and define their strategies. Actually, this already happened in many cases. A little less dramatic, but I hope equally effective.

It took me another day in Malta until I was able to get a seat on a flight to Amsterdam, and from there I continued by train. Back in “Mainland Europe” people are calm, but take care of hygiene quite a bit. It appears that solidarity is on the rise between travellers. It’s not cool anymore to be dirty, put feet on the seat opposite, spit on the floor, or vent bad smell. It actually never was cool, but some people thought it would be. It could be that also in other aspects, there are some collateral improvements. Suddenly, people really use digital tools to avoid meetings, really do home office and avoid commutes. Last but not least, pollution is down. So is the stock market. But that’s fine. These kinds of crisis seem to have always a common pattern. And one outcome is, that a lot of “bullshit” disappears, all across the spectrum from smelly hippies to financial speculators. All gone. I don’t even know where they are now. On the other hand, creativity is blossoming. Italians perform operas at the window of the apartment they a quarantined in, others find ways to produce protective gear at home, convert household chemicals into disinfectants and find ways to keep operating under these conditions. With all the damage and tragedy acknowledged, I personally do like such circumstances more than boom times, when even the dumbest mind stays afloat in the current. Of course now they won’t sink. But this is a good exercise for the bigger problems we urgently have to solve on this planet.

View on Kalkara on the way to Birgu. I was not subject of the quarantine, but actually there worse things than sitting here on the balcony for two weeks.

Constant travel

Global view in Amsterdam.

Travel became so much the norm for me now, that most of the path is described in my normal blog. There is no base from which I do "trips" now. But it is all one long journey, since the end of November 2014. Starting from Beijing, first some places Germany, then Amsterdam, Copenhagen. Then one month in Hong Kong, 6 weeks in Australia and New Zealand. Back to Germany. And now as I write these lines, I am sitting in London.

Sydney Rawson Institute for Seamen

Sometimes I try to make an analytical judgement on which might be a place to settle. But there are so many factors, which are completely random, but still making a deep impression. In the end it is more the what than the where, on which the decision will be based.

But a few things, I learned about travel itself. For example to stay in every place at least a week, if not a month. If you move around too much, you don't find the time to get things done, and you stay a tourist. Also it became quite conscious, that I don't like winters. They are cold, dark and you have to carry a lot of clothes. Traveling light is important: rather 15 kilograms, then 20. Also when you mix urban and real outdoor trips in one bag, this will get quite bulky and not appropriate for any of the two purposes. As we had to repurchase a lot of things, after our destroyed container from Beijing to Germany, this also lead to quite a "modernization". There are no heavy leather good or business suits any more. And when you live so minimalistic, you think twice, whether you buy a book on paper or electronically. I even have a luggage balance, with which I scale a pair of socks before I buy them. 

Vive le "Velosolex"

Today I tried to get spare parts for my Wanderer bicycle in Beijing. It is strange that even you would think China is a bicycle country, people actually don't know much about bicycles, and it is not easy to get parts. You also don't really get the impression that they know even how to use a spanner key or a screw driver. So finally, I decided to get what I need when I am next time in Germany, and then repair it myself.

But on my Odyssey, I had a closer look at the electric bicycles available. There is a whole range of electric scooters, but my interest was in some kind of "muscle-electric hybrid", which also is called "Pedelec". I have been trying a prototype from a colleague once, and found this the "Velosolex of the 21st Century". Not many remember the old bicycle with the small one cylinder two stroke support engine which was just flipped on the front tire when needed. I was still once riding one in the late 70s, and remember well how it blew the oily exhaust fumes strait into my face. Of course this does not happen with an electric version. Actually, the original version of the Velosolex is still available and is advertised in the US, as the "French way of getting from A to B". Other electric personal mobility concepts are provided for example by Segway. Segways are also available in China, via an importer in Guandong Province, but far too expensive to compete with the local bicycle electric competition. The one I decided for, is a simple 20 inch bicycle with a 36 Volt (10 AH) Lithium Ion battery, which is supporting via a 240 Watt motor in the front wheel. Really a bit like a Velosolex. But the manfacturer is Giant, which is a Taiwanese company, of which lso my racing bike is made. Could be called the "Chinese way of getting from A to B". The range is very much determined on how much you rely on the engine and how much you paddle. It is really a hybrid. Today I tried out nearly the full electrical range, which is about 20 km. Then the engine stopped abruptly and went home on a conventional push bike.

Currently Out of Office

I am currenly out of the office. As I am roughly following the red arrows on the map above, please allow longer time for responding e-mails due to potential lack of sufficient infrastructure. Please also allow infrequent updates of this website, if at all. Later though, most likely at the beginning of the next year, I am happy to condense field book notes in some blog posts and also upload some photos. If you like you can subscribe to the RSS Feeds and you will not miss it when I am back to Cyberspace. I will try to feed the Microblog from time to time, which you also find in the left column or you can link to Twitter, which is the system via which I feed this section remotely. I hope you excuse, that I have pulled the contact form on this website into the "members only" section, as I will not be able to respond to website requests. If you have a login to this website, you will see emergency contact data and satellite communication features. I wish all you on the Northen hemisphere a good autumn and those on the Southern hemisphere a nice spring time. Some of you I might meet on the way. So far, take care and all the best.