Russia in Private by Richard Yatzeck

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Russia in Private by Richard Yatzeck

Russia today seems very far from the country I grew up with as an international ogre on the TV news,  the Soviet Union or USSR. After all, the Wall fell in 1989, already 23 years ago. The Soviet Union 

dissolved in 1991, 21 years ago. It is mostly in the memories of those over 40 years old that crossing behind the Iron Curtain was an exotic, even inexplicable adventure.

In the spring of 1971 I left my high school teaching job several weeks early to join the second Lawrence University Slavic Trip. This three month long camping trip through the Soviet Union, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Yugoslavia (I left to go to graduate school at Cornell before the trip concluded in Hungary and Czechoslovakia) has stood as a formative event in my life. For the first time I was outside of the US and definitively in foreign cultures.

Now we have Russia in Private (Amazon link) by Richard Yatzeck. Professor Yatzeck suffered through my presence in his Russian literature courses at Lawrence University for four years. More importantly here he also participated in 9 visits between 1961 and 1997. He calculates that cumulatively he has spent three years in the Soviet Union then Russia. 

The structure of the book is loosely chronological from his 1961-62 years of study at Moscow State University (the Harvard of Russia) through camping trips with undergraduates to a final stint at semesters abroad in 1997 in Krasnodar. The central content is really the particular world views of Russians in their public and private lives.

Since there is more continuity in human affairs than not, this book is an excellent introduction to some of the driving elements in the current Russia. It is not a psycho-sociological academic exercise. Whatever didactic goals there might be, the book moves forward with many well told anecdotes and observations of the personal and the private as well as the day-to-day.

George Smalley in Yatzeck's Russia in Private

George Smalley, back cover of Yatzeck’s Russia in Private

One of the treats of Yatzeck’s book for me is the opportunity to revisit George Smalley. George was passionate, sometimes about matters that seemed a bit mysterious to a college-age student. He worked phenomenally hard. He demanded hard work in return and it was difficult not to reciprocate. His language teaching methodology, based in Prague school linguistics (think Russian linguist Nikolay Trubetskoy and the Russian-born American linguist Roman Jakobson), was a miracle of clarity and power. Above all George was a wild and crazy guy.

Who else would invite you in for your private tutorials in Russian with cigarettes burning in both hands, wave you to your seat across from the over flowing ash trays and announce, “You have parachuted into Karaganda. You’ve been arrested and are now being interrogated by the local police.”

Dick Yatzeck’s book inspired a flood of memories and comments from me. The 6,000 word letter I tapped out is available for download here (PDF).

Online Education Leaps Forward

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Coursera online coursesOnline education has been around for over a decade. Questions abound about the efficacy of e-learning. Here are two TED talks about the move by our flagship higher ed institutions into this space. The first talk by Daphne Koller:  “What we’re learning from online education”  is just plain thrilling.

“Since we opened the website in February, we now have 640,000 students from 190 countries. We have 1.5 million enrollments, 6 million quizzes in the 15 classes that have launched so far have been submitted, and 14 million videos have been viewed.” 

We appear to be rapidly approaching a point where we can say that the Web is delivering on its potential to expand access to education on a global scale. An interesting insight is that all of these courses are offered on a schedule, with homework assignments, quizes, exams, all of the scheduling features that drive people to actually get to the end of their course work. Deadlines do work, even in the virtual world.

Then for a closer look at just one of these online courses watch the 6 minute TED talk by Peter Norvig,  “The 100,000-student classroom“

Now, the class ran 10 weeks, and in the end, about half of the 160,000 students watched at least one video each week, and over 20,000 finished all the homework, putting in 50 to 100 hours. They got this statement of accomplishment.”

You can go to Coursera.org to view the schedule of classes and maybe even enroll. What are we doing in the evening? TV?

Not to Be Missed – Sam Pratt on FOIL

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The omnipresent and frequently useful Sam Pratt has a great introduction to our New York state Freedom of Information Law. Don’t miss it it on his eponymous blog

I am going to try it out to get the current contract between the city and Mid-Hudson Cable. Got to get a head start on rousing people to the barricades before the city gives away the store again when the contract comes up for renewal.

Internet Access and Service Levels in Hudson and Columbia County

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The Register Star featured an article today about internet service in the county, “County dials up broadband efforts: Working with local providers and developing a map of who can’t get high-speed Internet access among officials’ goals” By Nathan Mayberg. 

Counting the Number without Access Is Not Enough

It is good that our government officials are concerned with improving Internet access across the county. It is painfully obvious that Internet access is more important in our time than even rural electrification and telephone service was to earlier generations. Without Internet access people are increasingly cut off from an array of opportunities. They cannot participate fully in our culture and economy.

I want to focus on the quality of Internet access. Even in Hudson, the most densely populated part of the county, we barely have broadband service. Mid-Hudson Cable provides download speeds that are only marginally broadband. Despite their advertising campaigns proclaiming “blazing speeds” up to 5 MB/s (or for $5 extra per month – 10 MB/s) the actual service I have experienced, tested with easily available test sites on the Web, has averaged 3.7 MB/s over the last 2 years. Worse, the quality of this service is so bad that it has frequently made it difficult for me to conduct my business conferences over the Web. And, because cable Internet service is provided through a party line, when lots of people are online at the same time, the service becomes even slower and less responsive.

Some have said, “You live in Hudson, Get Verizon DSL.” Recently I have done just this. Now I get 5.2 MB/s download speeds and the service quality consistently allows for good video-conferencing. But this is as good as this service will ever get. DSL has its technical limitations. To be competitive in broadband access we need to reach for 20 MB/s and higher.

Use Next Contract to Leverage Services from Mid-Hudson Cable

What to do in the short term?

The contract between the city and Mid-Hudson is coming up for renewal next year. Our local government officials need to get involved.

  • Any new contract with Mid-Hudson must contain service level standards that are enforced by monetary means. 
  • We should expect Mid-Hudson to come to the table with a plan for enhancing Internet service in the future and this plan should be made part of the enforceable language of the contract. 
  • And, the contract should address a real economic barrier to access in Hudson. We need a three tier system. It might look like this: basic Internet with 5MB/s service for $20 per month; better Internet access with 10MB/s service for $35 per month and world class service with 20MB/s service for $60 per month. In all cases the service level agreement would guarantee that Mid-Hudson actually deliver these speeds not just their current “blazing speeds”. 

Hudson Takes the Lead –  County Benefits

If Hudson takes the lead on this, everyone in the Mid-Hudson Cable service area will benefit. We have the density and economic power to get Mid-Hudson to improve Internet access and service. Once we set the standard other communities in the county with less economic power can tag along.

Ramp Fest Hudson NY – 05/05/2012

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Ramp Fest Hudson NY may 5, 2012Karen, with friends Esther and Rose Hanig, went off to Ramp Fest Saturday. I stayed behind to mind the store.

They gave the food and the ambiance rave reviews. They ate enough so I barely had to make dinner.

 

Here are a few photos taken by Karen.

Ramp Fest Hudson NY Basilica

Ramp Fest Hudson NY - Jeff Loshinsky

Jeff Gimmel - one of the prime ramp movers

 

Ramp Fest Hudson NY - picture takingRamp Fest Hudson Ny - Truck Pizza - Sam Starr

Sam Starr's Truck Pizza got in on the action

Karen got carded - "Drinking Age Verified"

Hudson Sidewalks – more about Prospect Ave. and code enforcement

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no curbs on new sidewalk on Prospect Ave. Hudson NYA couple of weeks ago I came on a new sidewalk on Prospect Ave. that seemed to be out of compliance with local ordinances. At the time I wrote a bit about this, “Sidewalks in Hudson – Dangerous for Lack of Code Enforcement and Common Sense“.

Yesterday, my walk took me up Prospect again.

Now we seem to be seeing the finished product. Not only is it not as wide by 16 inches as the ordinance calls for, there is no curb.

Perhaps our Code Enforcement Officer Mr.Wurster could shed some light on this state of affairs?  Or perhaps it is to the Superintendent of Public Works Mr. Perry that we should address a question. It is not clear in the city Code  about who is responsible for overseeing sidewalk construction. 

Goodbye Mid-Hudson Cable – Verizon DSL and a Surprise

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We pulled the plug on Mid-Hudson Cable (MHC) for our internet service a couple of weeks ago in favor of Verizon DSL service. I have written about MHC’s terrible service and misrepresentations earlier. Most recently here.

Being fortunate enough to live less than 17,000 ft ((the current maximum distance from a switch office for DSL)) from the Verizon office next to the Post Office, DSL is available to me. Through acquaintances I learned of their good luck with DSL. 

After the installation I ran a number of tests using the same test site, Speedtest.net,  that I have used to measure the bad performance of Mid-Hudson. This showed that Verizon is very consistently delivering 5.2 MB/sec download and 750KB/sec uploads with a ping of 50 millisecond. And, my continuing tests using Speedtest.net show that the service is consistent throughout the day. No more of the slow downs so common to the party line affair of cable internet services.

Though this is hardly world beating service ((the US is 13th in the world with South Korea at the top with an average 13.8MB/s download speed of )) the real surprise came from the impact of the fast ping speed. ((Ping is the time between the click of a mouse and the return of a packet of information from the host server to your web browser))

I use Skype videoconferencing for both business and family purposes. With MHC the ping regularly measured in the hundreds of milliseconds. This caused jittery or frozen video and chronic echoes in the audio. My first Skype conference with clients revealed great audio without echoes. I even abandoned by headset. Just using the microphone on the desktop gave me great sound and the frozen video are now a memory. ((Verizon logo used without permission))

Sidewalks in Hudson – Dangerous for Lack of Code Enforcement and Common Sense

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sidewalk under construction Prospect Ave Hudson NY

My earlier posting, “New Sidewalk, Short on Common Sense and Oversight, a Disaster for Pedestrians“, about the new sidewalk in front of Wunderbar brought a number of comments and some interesting dialogue about what is really going on with sidewalks in Hudson. As wunderbar commented about that posting, “Stay your gavel and break out your ruler”. In fact, this sidewalk was built to the city’s code requirements.

With Carole Osterink pointing me the way to the applicable city codes (Chapter A330. CURB, SIDEWALK AND STREET REQUIREMENTS and Chapter 266. STREETS AND SIDEWALKS) where the requirements are spelled out in considerable detail, I now see a bit deeper into this problem. 

BTW – Carole has a different take on sidewalks in a recent posting, “Where the Sidewalk Ends”. Her words speak one story, the photos seem uniformly to support the assertion that our sidewalks are a hazardous mess.

The city has ordinances that are not being enforced. And, based on the evidence of a new sidewalk just up the block from the Wunderbar sidewalk as you turn the corner onto Prospect Ave., not being administered with consistency. The code calls for the width of a sidewalk to be 5 feet. 44 inches is a bit shy.

It seems that perhaps the deeper issue revolves around a reluctance by the city to enforce its own codes to get property owners to rebuild sidewalks. In some places, like lower Allen St. near Front St., the sidewalk has simply disappeared. We need an injection of pride of place. Hudson is such a compact walkable place, with many charms. But, one hesitates to walk almost anywhere without gazing fixedly downward for fear of  treachery by sidewalk. 

Clearly this problem cannot be solved without some action by the elected officialsThis might include developing a multi-year city wide project and perhaps the city asking for bids from contractors for large volume sidewalk construction so that the cost of the construction can be driven down. This could also facilitate whole blocks being rebuilt at once so that the finished product is a flat, safe surface for pedestrians.

Another area of enforcement that would appear to be flagging is the attention to the details spelled out in the ordinances for the materials and tamping of subsoils before concrete is poured. Everywhere in the city there are examples of subsidence of the sidewalk relative to the curbing of one and more inches. This can only be the result of poor construction techniques.

sidewalk width Prospect Ave Hudson NY

Finally, wheelchair ramps. Laws, regulations, and general social consent that disabled people should have fair access to social spaces have been in place for decades. Somehow, our sidewalks are exempt. There are innumerable intersections where there are no curb ramps. As part of a rebuilding of sidewalks we should put these ramps into place.

I do still stand by my comments that the sidewalk constructed in front of Wunderbar defies common sense. Practical people solve problems in a way that is workable and durable. This abrupt transition between the two sidewalks is not workable nor safe. The city code enforcement and the contractor should have come up with a solution that resolved this. Lacking some vigorous action by city officials or the shame of the owner of the building adjacent, this sidewalk mess will be with us for years (decades?).

New Sidewalk, Short on Common Sense and Oversight, a Disaster for Pedestrians

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Graffiti an Eradicable Problem

Articles in The Gossips of Rivertown and Register Star about the marking of fresh concrete sidewalks in front of WunderBar and the forthcoming The Crimson Sparrow with graffiti inspired considerable comment.

Can’t Erase This with a Trowel

04/15/2012 bad sidewalks in Hudson NYA recent walk up the street revealed a problem with this sidewalk work that can not be eradicated with a trowel. There is a mismatch in elevation of roughly three inches as you walk up Warren and another at the end of the new section of an inch or more, an obvious hazard to pedestrians, an insurmountable barrier to wheelchairs.

Common sense dictates that sidewalks be flat, regular surfaces without such hazards. Doubtless design standards for sidewalks say more.

What does this say about the owners of these buildings? What does it say about the workmanship of the contractor, a local one at that, to build something like this? And, where is the oversight of the city? Can one simple jack hammer a sidewalk and put down anything you want? 

By way of prediction, this ramp of concrete that the contractor put it to mask this travesty will not survive more than a winter of two before it begins to disintegrate. Good old mother nature, here through the freeze-thaw cycles of our winters, will reduce this to rubble.

Bad Construction and Poor Oversight Persist  for Years (Decades?)

Mid-Hudson Cable Continues To Be a Rip Off

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Mid-Hudson Cable continues to provide substandard internet services here. I have written of this earlier. Last summer I suckered up for the “up to 10 MB/sec” service for an extra $5 per month. Recently I updated my test results over this time span. The average download speed (all results based on 130 tests from August 2011 through today) is 5.9 MB/sec; the average upload speed is .43 MB/sec. The ping time average is 160 milliseconds.

So, in the strange world of Mid-Hudson Cable 5.9 equals “up to 10 MB/sec”. One does not need a calculator to see that there is a 40% shortfall here.

You can download the spreadsheet here to check out the data