Vipassana, which means to see things as they really are, is one of India's most ancient techniques of meditation. It was rediscovered by Gotama Buddha more than 2500 years ago and was taught by him as a universal remedy for universal ills, i.e., an Art Of Living.
This non-sectarian technique aims for the total eradication of mental impurities and the resultant highest happiness of full liberation. Healing, not merely the curing of diseases, but the essential healing of human suffering, is its purpose.

Vipassana is a way of self-transformation through self-observation. It focuses on the deep interconnection between mind and body, which can be experienced directly by disciplined attention to the physical sensations that form the life of the body, and that continuously interconnect and condition the life of the mind. It is this observation-based, self-exploratory journey to the common root of mind and body that dissolves mental impurity, resulting in a balanced mind full of love and compassion.

The scientific laws that operate one's thoughts, feelings, judgements and sensations become clear. Through direct experience, the nature of how one grows or regresses, how one produces suffering or frees oneself from suffering is understood. Life becomes characterized by increased awareness, non-delusion, self-control and peace.

There are no charges for the courses - not even to cover the cost of food and accommodation. All expenses are met by donations from people who, having completed a course and experienced the benefits of Vipassana, wish to give others the opportunity to also benefit.

Why hack the planet when you can hack yourself? Rootor your mind, d00d. For real. It works. This will make you a better haxor. Those 10 days were the hardest thing I have ever done. But it was also the best thing I have ever done. There is a center near you. Try before you buy.

Vipassana Meditation Website

Samar is a very radical community. One of the stories that circulates around the Kibbutz Movement about them is the story of their common purse. They used to have cash freely available in a basket in the dining room, whoever needed any could go and help themselves. This wasn't actually denied, but I saw no evidence of this basket when we had lunch together there. However, they do set their own budgets, both of money and of labor days, and the different members differing needs are respected and catered for. They are not strong on committee work, preferring to give themselves an anarchic freedom to do the things that seem best to each one. And they keep themselves solvent, generating a profit each year to invest in projects of various kinds. On the way down to the dairy farm Brian showed me some solar powered glow lights, enough to mark the path on moonless nights.

The Greening of the Kibbutz

A kibbutz (Hebrew: קיבוץ; plural: kibbutzim: קיבוצים, "gathering" or "together") is an Israeli collective community. Although other countries have had communal enterprises, in no other country have voluntary collective communities played as important a role as the kibbutzim have played in Israel; indeed, kibbutzim played an essential role in the creation of Israel.

There's even a 160 person fully anarchist Kibbutz Samar.

Kibbutz - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The BIRT project addresses a wide range of reporting needs within a typical Java application. Today, reporting capabilities in an application are often implemented in an ad hoc fashion by the application developer, using technology that is not ideally suited to the task, or through the development of a one-off solution for that application. This is expensive and time-consuming, and provides limited reporting capabilities for the end users of the application. BIRT aims to address this problem by providing Eclipse-based open source and extensible tools and frameworks that allow developers to easily incorporate reporting functionality within their applications.

Eclipse BIRT Project

Judicial Watch released this Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Intelligence Information Report (IIR), declassified and released to Judicial Watch on October 30, 2004, in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) open records request filed by Judicial Watch in January 2000, concerning the decision of the Clinton administration to bomb the al Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan, and suspected al Qaeda terrorist training camps in the vicinity of Khost, Afghanistan on August 20, 1998. The dual-site bombing operation was codenamed ȁCInfinite Reach.ȁD The bombing was reportedly in retaliation for the August 7, 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
The DIA is derived from handwritten documents obtained through a classified intelligence project with the unclassified nickname ȁCSwift Knight.ȁD According to the report, the documents were written during the first two weeks of October 1998. The spellings, references and phrases in the report are verbatim transcriptions from the original handwritten document (e.g. Osama bin Laden [OBL] is referred to as ȁCUsam ben LadenȁD). The IIR provides basic biographical information concerning bin Laden and traces key points in his public, militant activities, resulting in the formation of al Qaeda.
The IIR includes language from the document that describes how al Qaeda envisions achieving their goals, including ȁCethnic cleansingȁD and ȁCcontrol over nuclear and biological weapons.ȁD An additional reference is made to ȁClatent penetration,ȁD a reference to so-called ȁCsleeper cells.ȁD A good deal of information concerning bin Ladenȁ9s and al Qaedaȁ9s efforts in Chechnya, the Caucasus, Crimea, and the Central Asian Republics is covered in the IIR.

Al Queda-Chechnya links.

Intelligence Information Report / Swift Knight - Usama Ben Laden's Current and Historical Activities, Oct 1998, released Oct 2004

10 x 500mg Vitamin C (to improve taste of iodinated water)
20 x 5mg Valium (to rest on the train/bus to Dharmasala)
10 x 400mg Flagyl (Metronidazole, instestinal amoebic/bacterial infections)
10 x 500mg C-flox (Cipro, ciprofloxacin, intestinal bacterial infections)
20 x 2mg Loperamide (Immodium, for diahrea)
10 x 25mg Promethazine (Phenergan tablets, industrial strength anti-naseau, potentiates opiates)
10 x 0.5mg Dexamethasone (for severe Acute Mountain Sickness/edema)
10 x 10mg Cetrizine (Zyrtec antihistamine)

15g tube Miconazole Nitrate Ointment (Anti-fungal)
20g tube Soframycin ointment (Framycetin, antibiotic)

3 x Packs Oral Rehydration Salts (Why am I so thirsty? Oh...)

5 x Bandaids
1 compression bandage
1 roll medical tape
1 pack cotton bandages

Goan Price: 485 rupees, or about $11 US. Medical supplies in the US are too expensive. I heard the VA gets supplies from India, and its no wonder.

Things I must get in Delhi:

1) Diamox (Preventative treatment for Acute Mountain Sickness)
2) Codiene/Hydrocodone/Oxycodone ("Dude, you broke your leg! Now ride out of this valley to help.")
3) Iodine Tabelts (Water purification)
4) Ibuprofen (Muscle/joint injury/aches)
5) Sterile Alcohol (Prep for item 6)
6) "Sewing kit" (Stitch kit: pop a painkiller, then STOP THE BLEEDING!)

Things I already had:

10 x 500mg Chloroquine (Malaria prophylaxis/treatment)
20 x 500mg Paracetamol (Tylenol, Acetaminophin, fever/pain)

All told it will be less than $13. Even though I knew it would be cheap, I am amazed. Just thought I'd share.

Interesting note: Wanna sleep? Straight to valium, no in betweens. Wanna prevent Naseau? No dramamine. Straight to Phenergan. Stuffy nose? No benadryl. Straight to Zyrtec.

The lack of the OTC designation for all but the strongest opiates seems to make Indian pharmacueticals "evolve" quicker, in that you get access to the most effective drugs over the counter morequickly, and the OTC stuff that kinda-sorta-works is completely absent.

The flowchart is a means of visually presenting the flow of data through an information processing systems, the operations performed within the system and the sequence in which they are performed. In this lesson, we shall concern ourselves with the program flowchart, which describes what operations (and in what sequence) are required to solve a given problem. The program flowchart can be likened to the blueprint of a building. As we know a designer draws a blueprint before starting construction on a building. Similarly, a programmer prefers to draw a flowchart prior to writing a computer program. As in the case of the drawing of a blueprint, the flowchart is drawn according to defined rules and using standard flowchart symbols prescribed by the American National Standard Institute, Inc.

Flowcharting

For that is the purpose of Watergate in today's culture. It isn't about Nixon and the cover-up anymore. It's about Woodward and Bernstein. Watergate has become a modern Horatio Alger story, a real-life fairy tale, an inspiring ode for mediacentric college types - about the two young men who found exciting and challenging jobs, who slew the dragon, who became rich and famous by doing good and who were played by Redford and Hoffman in the movie version.

Woodward was nervous once, like you.

Eeek!

Life Lessons From Watergate - New York Times

What is the sequence of events in the criminal justice system?

...

Whoah. Holy clear visualization of enormous sets of rules, batman!

Criminal Justice System Flowchart, from the Department of Justice

Sensors placed in the borehole could detect changes in strain, tilt and pressure in the ground miles below the surface. "That will be a great advantage in giving us a few days or hours warning before something happens. Current warning systems in Japan only warn us 10 minutes before a large earthquake strikes. We need real-time data from the exact point."

Detect shifts in the mantle, and the resulting earthquakes with... a big shaft down into the mantle?

Guardian Unlimited | Life | Journey to the centre of Earth