| 2022 - When Things Got Back to Normal | ||||||
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This is the year things almost went back to normal. Here's a short update, featuring family first. Roger is in his third year of four as a PhD candidate. He tells me he's making good progress. He's never mentioned where it leads, presumably to a life in academics. This year he went on separate holiday trips to East Timor and Bali. The photos of both places indicate he had a good time. Rex continued working in GZA Environmental, an engineering services company near Boston. He says the work is getting more interesting as he spends more time there. His title is "EIT" which was a mystery to me. He said it means Engineer In Training. While that doesn't sound too flash to me, he further explained that to get it he had to pass the Fundamentals in Engineering test and have employment in the industry. Now he needs to work under a Professional Engineer (PE) for 4 years and pass the PE test to get that title himself. So I stand corrected, EIT is good and PE is the goal. Kung had a good year in Thailand. I managed to visit twice. Her son is close to finishing university. That will hopefully happen by the end of 2023. He's also in the engineering field.
And now for my year ...
I went to Thailand in March and August. The first trip was the most difficult thing I did all year. While the borders were somewhat relaxed, they weren't exactly "open". To make this visit I didn't have to get a visa, but a Thailand Pass. It wasn't easy. I needed to:
The non-sensical part of this was quarantine on Day 5. I could go out and infect hundreds of people on Days 2-4 if I happened to be unwell after passing the Day 1 test. I don't understand the logic. Before or after doing all of that admin you could make flight reservations with a minimum arrival date of 72 hours from the date the Thailand Pass was issued. To apply, all of the above evidence had to be uploaded to a website and if it was approved a QR-based Thailand Pass would be issued after 24-72 hours. Given the QR code could take 72 hours to issue and the travel had to be 72 hours after it was issued it meant the latest you could apply for a Thailand Pass was 6 days before your intended travel. Not a process designed for spontaneity. And here's the final twist. When you get evidence of each you get a pdf document, right? Vaccination certificate -- pdf. Hotel booking -- pdf. Evidence of health insurance -- pdf. Would the Thailand Pass application accept pdfs? No. Everything had to be submitted as jpg files. As I said, it was the hardest thing I had to do this year; and probably the hardest thing I've had to do for the past 3 years. Bangkok was good when I got there. Things weren't quite normal yet but they were well on the way. Before I arrived I thought the medium- to large-sized businesses would be operating but the small family or sole trader type businesses would be struggling or completely closed. In fact most areas were operating as normal, including both big and small shops, but there were other areas where everything was shut down. As a rough guideline I'd say 80% of places were open and 20% were not. There weren't many visitors / tourists so it was a bit like having BKK to yourself as a visitor. Overall it was good.
When I went back in August things were close to normal. No Thailand Pass, no onerous entry requirements, no PCR tests, no quarantine, just the need for health insurance with USD 10,000 coverage (which I can't recall anyone checking). And some of the formerly devastated areas were showing signs of life again. I'd say it was back to 90% of normal; and there were noticeably more visitors / tourists than in March. In between the Thailand trips it was time to go back to PNG. I went back in May, exactly two years after I left, and it's been good. I have a routine with 5-6 restaurants I go to for lunch every week, all offering good food, and I rotate between them. Interestingly, in Cairns, or the northern beaches where I live which are 25kms from Cairns, there are very few lunch time choices. You'll understand I'm not the world's best cook, I'm probably on the short list at the other end of the scale, so while it's nice to live in Cairns my lunches were certainly not great. With the lunch time rotation restored I found I enjoyed being back in PNG.
The only other thing of note in the year was my first experience with jury duty. Not something I enjoyed. I was on a jury for a guy accused of rape. The fellow was in his early 20s and the victim was a woman in her early 40s. He was found guilty and sent to prison for 7 years, I think with 3 years of non-parole. As he is not an Australian citizen he'll be deported at the end of his prison term; his family (parents, brothers, sisters) have all migrated to Australia so it means he won't be able to see them when he's deported unless they make the time and effort to go and see him wherever he ends up. He also has a daughter with an Australian woman who will be deprived of a father. I didn't enjoy anything about the experience. "Justice was done" but it wasn't pleasant. And it put into perspective all the courtroom dramas you see on TV. What I found is that, as a juror, you only know what you're told in the courtroom because they want you to make decision based solely on the facts of the case. What you're told is limited. It's limited by what the prosecution brings to the table, what the judge allows as evidence and what the defence decides to argue / cross-examine. As a jury we made our decision(s). We were not obliged to attend the court for sentencing but 3 of the 12 jurors did, including yours truly. We looked at each other in amazement at what we learned in the judge's summary during sentencing. We all said "we wish we knew that (at the time)" but it was clear the pursuit of justice, at least in Australia, is to only reveal certain facts to the jury, no doubt the ones the lawyers and the judge deem to be relevant to the case. It was a distressing experience.
The whole made-for-TV content of the investigative jury or the crime-fighting defence attorney is a huge myth. Let me put it another way.
Journalists say a good article covers who, what, when, where, how and why.
The irony is that last year I shared a list had of things I wanted to do in 2022 and the only one I managed was to buy some wireless security cameras for inside the apt. I used all the money I was paid for my jury duty to buy a 2 camera CCTV security system. A court case that resulted in me getting a security system. That's pretty amusing.
I can't do the other things on that list while I'm spending most of my time in PNG, so they're all on the back burner for a while:
Renovate both bathrooms Replace carpets in the bedrooms with wooden floors Minor changes / improvements to the kitchen Quite a bit of painting (walls, etc) As always, I wish you and yours all the best for 2023 and I hope it's a good year for everyone. |
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