Perth, Australia

Until last weekend Perth was the only major Australian city that I have not visited. This error has now been fixed. 

Perth is a modern, clean, well designed city. Thanks to fast suburban trains, parks, beaches, walking/biking paths, it is probably much more liveable than Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane. 

Perth has monuments of their best public servants and of business people.

John Septimus Roe - layed out Perth and Fremantle.

Old and new, both looking good.

Public art.

A piece of medieval England in the centre of Perth.

Transperth trains - fast, clean, and frequent.

Aviation Heritage Museum in Bull Creek.

Australian claim to the invention of a flight recorder.

Catalina - the flying boat.

Australian Army, Vietnam War era helicopter.

Resting place of 23 Australian F-111 planes - a landfill near Brisbane. Why? Because they were used for spare parts to keep the rest flying AND there was asbestos in their bodies. 

Transperth either has a lot of money to replace scratched train windows constantly or their public awareness/shaming campaign is working.

Transperth's campaign against graffidiots.

More shaming.

Appeal to the good in us.

If you see it, or hear it, tell us about it.

See something, say something.

Mandurah, south of Perth, ANZAC day.

Indian Ocean in Mandurah.

Back in Perth.

A monument to immigrants.

Two black swans in the centre of Perth.

Perth's CBD.

Perth's CBD - Government House.

Old and new.

Footsteps in time.

Footsteps in time - the monument.

This is not Disney, this is in Perth's CBD.

Perth CBD - a green cafe.

Fremantle.

A common situation in Australia: narrow track with an extra rail for standard gauge trains, or vice versa. This shows that lack of standardisation costs more in the long run.

The bow of the HMAS Ovens in Fremantle, this boat can be toured, it is part of the WA Maritime Museum.

The bow section with 6 torpedo bays.

A specimen of a Megamouth shark beached in Mandurah south of Perth.

The Oberon class submarines had 7 periscopes for different purposes.

Fremantle was home to American, British and Dutch submarines during WWII.

Submarines with their base ship.

Australia had submarines already in WWI !

Tsingtao - a German colony in China.

American ships in Fremantle - part of the aircraft carrier group.

Fremantle - building restoration - taking off the layer of stucco to expose the original stone and brick wall.

Fremantle feels like that small city in Back to the Future in 1955.

Including the clock tower near the city square.

Another Disney moment in Fremantle.

Fremantle - this is real.

A perfect city beach in Fremantle.

There was also an Australian Army museum in Fremantle, but I did not get lucky this time - you can enter only at two specified times and I missed the last entry by 20 minutes. If you are going to visit, check the tour times first.

QUT Introduction to Robotics

I'm half-way through a 6 week online course at Queensland University of Technology with Peter Corke. The course consists of two video lectures every week, live video sessions, forum, multiple choice and Matlab tasks. There is also an optional task of building a simple, two-joint, robotic arm and programming it to perform a simple task. Here is version 1 of my Lego Mindstorms robot:

The black ball is from a Lego Star Wars series - there is another, heavier ball inside and it works as a counter-weight for the motor. The green guy is a creeper from Minecraft - purely for decoration. :-)

I don't know if I will be able to program it from Matlab, because both ways of communication with my Mac Book Air: bluetooth and USB are broken - Lego's drivers are not working.

If you wonder how Matlab programs look like, here is an example:

This code defines a cube as a series of corners and edges (indexed pairs of corners), and then draws it as seen from coordinate frame C:

UPDATE 4 June 2015:

The course has ended. I passed enough quizzes and matlab programming tasks to get a certificate of participation and my clumsy robot made it too!  Here is a mashup of the robots, mine is at 2:51: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwCVHI9YOAw

Australian Citizenship Test - Study Notes

The test is quite easy. It consists of 20 multi-choice questions. You need to answer 15 correctly to pass. Here are my study notes from the testable section of the 2014 issue of  Our Common Bond booklet. It takes about 1-2 hours to prepare for the test if your English is good.

-- part 1
40000-60000 years ago aboriginals already lived in australia

11 convict ships - the first fleet - arrived 26 jan 1788 - now a public holiday
under command of captain arthur phillip - first governor of new south wales colony

first free settlers from great britain and ireland

1851 gold discovered in nsw and victoria
chinese - the first large group of non-europeans
between 1851 and 1861 population doubled

1901 commonwealth of australia
4 million people, not incl. indigenous

post ww2 migration - millions

over 22 million today and over 1/4 born overseas

national language - English
200 languages spoken in Australia

6 states, 2 territories (north, act)

nsw: icons: harbour bridge, opera house
sydney - the biggest city

victoria: smallest mainland state

qld: second largest

wa: largest state, wine regions
3/4 live in Perth

sa: wine regions, colonial architecture in adelaide

tas: smallest state, bass strait, hobart is capital

act: parliament house, high court of australia

26 jan: australia day
honour history and the people
on the eve of australia day pm announces in canberra australian of the year awards
citizenship ceremonies

25 apr: anzac day
australian and new zealand army corps landed in gallipoli in turkey on 25 april 1915
remember sacrifice, honour courage

Australian Flag

official flag: australian national flag:
blue white and red, it has:
1. union jack - flag of GB
2. commonwealth star under it
it has 7 points: 6 states and 1 for all territories
3. southern cross

Aboriginal Flag

aboriginal flag:
black, red and yellow
black - the people
red - the earth and spirit
yellow - sun

Torres Strait Islanders Flag

torres strait islanders flag:
green, blue, black and white
green - land
blue - sea
black - people
white - dancer's headdress
points of the white star - island groups
white - peace

Coat of Arms

coat of arms:
national unity
authority and property of australia
shield - six states, federation
kangaroo, emu - native animals
gold commonwealth star
background: golden wattle - national flower

golden wattle: small tree - south eastern au
bright green leaves
golden yellow flowers in spring

green and gold - national colours
national gemstone: opal
rainbow touched the earth

anthem: advance australia fair

--------- part 2

parliamentary democracy
parliament: make the laws
rule of law - all equal under law
living peacefully - reject violence
compassion, mateship, volunteering,
freedom of speech, expression
cannot harm others
freedom of association, religion
secular government
judeo-christian heritage:
good friday, easter sunday, christmas

resposibilities:
obey laws
vote
defend
serve on jury

privileges:
vote
work in public service or defense
seek election to parliament
passport
help overseas
register children as australian

referendum: a vote to change constiution
federal, state, territory voting is compulsory when on
electoral roll - over 18 years old

local government voting
is not compulsory in some states

18 yo - can be elected to parliament

--- part 3
pay a fine - if you don't have a good reason for not voting
AEC - austr. electoral commission
independent
secret ballot

1 jan 1901 6 colonies united
british act of parliament 1900
house of representatives
senate
high court
double majority to change const.:
majority of voters in majority of states

head of state: queen - elizabeth II
queen appoints governor general
on advice of prime minister

constitutional monarchy

gov. general:
signs all bills passed (royal assent)
sign regulations
ceremonial duties
approves appointments of government,
ministers, federal judges
reserve powers

head of state: the queen of australia
governor - each state
gov. general - federal
premier - state
prime minister - federal
gov minister - must be member of parliament
MP - representative of people
senator - representative of state in parliament
mayor or shire president - local council
councillor - elected

australian parliament:
house of representatives
senate

150 in house of reprs. - voting for 1 person
based on the size of population

senate - upper house, house of review
states are equally represented regardless of size
12 from each state = 6*12 = 72 plus
2 from from each territory

leader of territory: chief minister
nt: administrator instead of governor

state responsible for:
hospitals,
schools
rail
roads,
forests
police
public transport

... there was a bit more but I stopped taking notes.

Sex At Dawn by Christopher Ryan & Cacilda Jethá

The prehistoric origins of modern sexuality - by Christopher Ryan & Cacilda Jethá. First published in 2010.

Interesting. 

The authors argue, and prove, that human sexuality has more in common with chimps and bonobos, especially bonobos, than with other apes and monkeys. Humans had a common ancestor with chimps and bonobos about 5 million years ago. 

"Our DNA differs from that of chimps and bonobos by roughly 1.6 percent, making us closer to them than a dog is to a fox [...]"

Christopher and Cacilda show that in hunter gatherer societies, in which humans lived for much longer than in agricultural societies, the roles of men and women and the sexual norms were quite different from what is a norm today. Sharing was the norm, paternity was uncertain, possessions were few, conflict was rare, and food was free and not hard to find. 

A few interesting societies are described. For example the Mosuo of southwest China, where people do not practise marriage, but instead have a system called "sese" - walking - where sexual partners are friends, not husbands and wives. 

"The Mosuo are a matrilineal, agricultural people, passing property and family name from mother to daughter(s), so the household revolves around the women. When a girl reaches maturity at about thirteen or fourteen, she receives her own bedroom that opens both to the inner courtyard of the house and to the street through a private door. A Mosuo girl has complete autonomy as to who steps through this private door [...] The only strict rule is that her guest must be gone by sunrise. [...] There is no expectation of commitment, and any child she conceives is raised in her mother's house with the help of the girl's brothers and the rest of the community."

There are a few chapters about anatomy, which supports authors theory about humans prehistory being polyamorous rather than monogamic. 

There is also a mention of one particularly practical research about the effect of contraceptives for women. Contraceptives which contain hormones affect the partners women choose. Women who are on the pill may choose a partner who they would not choose if they were not on the pill.

Finally, the book ends with a review of perils of monotony of current marriages and a mention of swinger's clubs of American WWII air force pilots and their wives.

Free, legal download is available from free-ebooks.net

Personal Good News of 2014

In no particular order:

• Applied for Australian citizenship. Hoping to make the pledge in a few months.
• Kids and wife doing well or very well at their schools.
• Brother going amicably through a difficult process of separation with his wife.
• Mama starting to live normally with a pacemaker.
• In-laws in good health.
• Family trips to Japan and Melbourne.
• My project at work coming closer to a successful completion.
• Moved to a new, much better rental townhouse - no motorway noise, nice new kitchen and bathrooms, enough bedrooms for all of us.
• Maintaining contact with friends worldwide.
• Started training Krav Maga and trying not to lose hard earned Karate skills.
• Our community initiative - The Polish Language School in Gold Coast completed its second year of operation. A big thank you to all parents and the Helensvale Library for hosting us.
• Following the example of my American Australian colleague from work, I asked this year my closest family to donate to charities in lieu of Christmas presents for me.
• Donated at work to Fred Hollows Foundation - our boss matched our donations!
• Donated to Wikipedia and UNICEF.
• Learned about an idea that I would like to copy someday: http://www.books4pngkids.org/

Dock Dogs 2014 Australia

Today we watched, for the second time, Australian Dock Dogs competitions.

The event was taking place on the Bond University campus in beautiful Varsity Lakes, Gold Coast.

It was quite entertaining. A new Australian record was set today in the Extreme Vertical category.

Big Air category - after landing.

The new Extreme Vertical champion.