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Published: July 28th 2008
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I don't often drink so much that I am hung over the next day. Last night was apparently an exception. When I get like this I always think of the description of Peter Fallow's hangover in
Bonfire of the Vanities:
an egg yolk in his head exploded into millions of silvery minnows swimming towards his flesh
The occasion was a barbecue at the lake for the students. I got there an hour late because I turned right instead of left when I reached the lake and walked halfway to Geneva before turning back. I was ready to give up when I heard rowdy drinking songs coming from a distant mob.
When I arrived at the edge of the mob I saw the cause of the commotion. At the center one student held another student upside down by his ankles. A plastic hose ran from the inverted student's mouth to a large funnel filled with beer that was being held aloft by a third student. Apparently the goal was to suck the funnel dry without taking a breath while the crowd chanted and cheered. Standing on the picnic tables scantily clad female students were grinding against each other to hip hop music that blared from an iPod connected to a speaker.
This year
Goon Squad
Apparently my student, Aimee, and I befriended the shirtless goon. HEIG-VD is running a program for business students in parallel with the Computer Science program. These were the business students. The computer science students were quivering in a tight huddle several yards away. I joined them. We agreed that the culture gap between "geeks" and "greeks" was a lot wider that the gap between Swiss and Americans.
A shirtless goon leaped onto a picnic table and belched a command. Like a well trained marching band the business students organized themselves into a line and a new "game" began. Am I the only one who doesn't know about these games? Well no, the computer science students looked equally at sea. The Swiss business students took turns hugging each student in the line. Many of the hugs were so enthusiastic that both students crashed onto the lawn, occasionally bringing down the neighboring huggers in the process. The hugging, or was it now tackling, continued even after the downed students began rolling toward the lake!
I ventured over to a clutch of business professors to see if they could shed some light on this insanity. Gail, a business professor in her 60s from the US, started to explain when we were
Merlin
"No one dares challenge the authority of the holder of this wand," intoned the sorcerer. interrupted by the mob insisting that their professors take some beer bong hits. "Yeah, right," I said to myself, but a second later Gail was upside down with a hose in her mouth. After she successfully drained the funnel I asked her if she was like this when she was in college. "Well... yeah," she replied.
To multiply my hang over agony, I had an 8:45 lecture this morning followed by a lab. After class a student showed me a photograph in which I'm kneeling on the beach holding a stick over my head. Apparently I was proclaiming that my "wand" was the ultimate source of my authority. I don't remember any of this, but I did find that stick in my bed when I woke up this morning. There was also an empty beer bottle in the pocket of my sports coat.
After class I came home, took a short nap, then left for
Paleo, the "Woodstock of Europe".
Strong Reciprocity The Swiss public transportation system seems to be based on the honor system. In theory, some official might ask to see your ticket, and God help you if you don't have one, but so
Bunny Forest 1
Paleo featured this forest of giant swinging chocolate bunnies. Creepy. far this has only happened to me on the inter-city trains. My students and I don't need to worry, of course. Our hosts provided each one of us with a precious Swiss Rail Pass that lets us ride "free" on any bus, boat, or train in Switzerland.
As I disembarked from the little commuter train that takes me from my house to the train station my way was blocked by a line of men. One of them kept asking me something in French. I was in a hurry to get to my train so I kept trying to go around him, but he was insistent that I stop and show him something. What?
"Your ticket,
si vous plait." I reached into my right front pocket and pulled out a wad of large bank notes. My pass was conspicuously not among them. Was I offering him a bribe? A quick search of my other pockets revealed the unthinkable: the pass was not with me. I talked fast in a mixture of English and high school French. I told him I was a giant college professor at HEIG-VD, that I did have a pass and always carried it with me
Bunny Forest 2
Close up of one of the creepy bunnies. and couldn't imagine where it was. Lost, perhaps, at last night's Bacchanal. I offered to immediately return to my house to look for it.
"That's okay." He said. "Just remember to have it with you next time."
One of the computer demonstrations I do for my students-- called
Strong Reciprocity-- involves simulating a society in which most, but not all citizens are honest. After several hundred generations-- each lasting a couple of seconds in real time-- the evolutionary advantage of being dishonest eventually produces something that resembles Sicily. I repeat the demonstration, but this time I imbue each citizen with a measure of vindictiveness—the tendency to punish cheaters even at a personal cost. There are few cheaters several hundred generations later. Amazingly, vindictiveness disappears too. In effect, I grow Switzerland!
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