Freak Waves

sufi

lala
just awful awful scenes, should make us remember how vulneraable we are :(

what did the us govt give? 35 million! laughable!
UK & others too, lamentable compared to anti-life expenditures on war & destruction :(
 

mms

sometimes
sufi said:
UK & others too, lamentable compared to anti-life expenditures on war & destruction :(

well let's hope negatives can create positives, but i'm particulary worried about the potential for the spread of viruses, there was alot of worry about the asian superbug coming thru this year, its much more possible now. terrifying.
but the british people have dug deep of course, generous bunch really, deeper than their governments anyway.
 

Backjob

Well-known member
Here in singapore you can make your donation through the atm machine - genius idea! It's impossible to withdraw 500 dollars to spend on yourself and NOT give at least an equal amount to the tsunami appeal...
 

polystyle

Well-known member
Asian Killer Waves

The scale of this disaster is overwelming ...
One story i rd yesterday from the Maldives was from a man who saw the high water keep rising until it was
at his chin , at that moment all of the Maldives Islands were a few feet underwater ...
Luckily for those who survived there , that particular wave of water didn't get higher

We also had friends there when it hit ,
again luckily they were on the other side of Thailand .
'
Was glad to hear today they got one of those stranded dolphins back into the ocean ,
the calf didn't make it through .
They'd both been tossed by the wave inland into backed up lagoon filled with bodies , trash , sharp metal

And well yeah , the Phi Phi Islands were a refuge -sanctuary for us too at one point a few years ago .
Fantastic place , very easy vibes there ...

What's happened boggled mind and body
even the planet wobbled
 

mms

sometimes
i was in the maldives 2003 b4 christmas, beautiful place and lovely people, very fishlike, they catch other fish using tuna which is very expensive in europe of course.
there are loads of fish it's a wonderland just under the surface of the water.

one funny think i kept noticing was round discs that looked alot like little tiles from a swimming pool washing up on the shore.
this of course pricked my curiosity and i found out that every 10 years people bid off the government for lease of an island, the winner then has to demolish all the buildings and start again for the next 10 years. the discs were remnants of the pervious incarnation of the island.
it makes me feel really sad that island is probably destroyed and all the lovely people on it could be dead. :(
 

sufi

lala
mms said:
it makes me feel really sad that island is probably destroyed and all the lovely people on it could be dead.
i know how you feel, from somalia, then from darfur - it's a terrible feeling of dislocation... :(

the whole comparison i made btwn war expenses & relief, felt somehow uncomfortable; ugly or inappropriate, but i'm glad to see that some others have picked it up

479.gif
 

Gerard

Well-known member
the whole comparison i made btwn war expenses & relief, felt somehow uncomfortable; ugly or inappropriate, but i'm glad to see that some others have picked it up


Nothing inapt. about it, the bottom line is alliance govts. have forked out so much to invade and then occupy Iraq the coffers must be unusually empty...
 

jimet

Active member
To go back to surfing (cos, really, there's nothing more to say about what happened in Asia. It's too big to engage with), this

<i>I hate surfers, though. Surf culture is really dismal. You know, they have this great lifestyle, and they ruin it by wearing terrible shorts and listening to rubbish like the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and acting like skate-brats. Surfers laugh at people who are learning to surf, as if they stepped out from the womb and stood up on a surfboard in a 10 foot swell. They have no manners. And no style. There are civlized, smart surfers, who live enviable lives. But they're not in the majority. </i>

Reminds me of a theory I always had - if there's ever a new Hemingway he'll be a surfer.
 

sufi

lala
jus looking back to olly's comments on surfers attitude to the tsunami...
while i was looking for canadian beer pictures, i came across this blog (?) from tofino in BC, a lovely surfer town where i was this summer,

ana_the_great said:
First of all, I would like to, in some cynical way, thank the higher power for the catastrophic tsunami that hit the islands on Boxing Day. Don't get me wrong, it would of been way better if it never happened, but in some ways, it is about fucken time that the Americans now have no reason to bitch about the 300 people they lost well over three years ago. 300 people is nothing compared to well over 100,000 people...who were already living in poverty. So stop your bitching already. I am sick of hearing the 9/11 attack, and the 'victims' of 9/11. get over yourselves. You have no rights to bitch anymore, especially since you re-elected the idiot who has done nothing to go after the terrorists who gave you reason to bitch in the first place. And then you have all these charities cry out for help and aid, and everything in me wants to help, but I want to make sure what I give goes to where it should be going. After the whole 9/11 incident, I have been very weary of when and whom I donate too. I don't think a dime of my money should of in any way, shape, or form gone anywhere else except for medical supplies that were needed those first days in New York.

I like the word bitch today!
not quite as callous as wot olly said but totally feckin hatstand nonetheless :D
(check the rest of the site ol - you will wince & cringe)
 

Helen

Tumbling Dice
Rogue waves

'Taken by Phillipe Lijour, the first mate of the super-tanker <i>Esso Languedoc</i>, during a storm off Durban, South Africa in 1980, the photo records a wall of water the size of an eight-storey building crashing over the deck of the ship. (For reference, the mast seen at the back of the photo stands 25 meters above mean sea level). While it was long understood that extraordinarily severe weather conditions or certain geological phenomena like undersea earthquakes could produce waves of enormous size, neither of these conditions were present when the wave that hit the <i>Esso Languedoc</i> occurred. In fact, the mean wave height at the time was only 5 to 10 meters. According to the longstanding method of ocean wave forecasting known as the Linear Model, the emergence of such a monster wave from this type of overall sea state could be expected to occur only once every 10,000 years.'
(-Jeffrey Kastner, from <i>Cabinet</i> Magazine, Issue 16, 'The Sea'.
 

rewch

Well-known member
just had to do a delivery trip from chichester to the clyde estuary & was waylaid by a nasty irish sea/st. george's channel storm to the west of anglesea of force 8 gusting 9... didn't have to deal with any waves quite like that but had several of 30-40 feet with nasty breakers on top... at holy island (entrance to port of holy head at north end of anglesea) with wind against tide saw some even bigger monsters... eek! didn't tell the rest of the crew but about half way through the 14 hour gale i remembered the words of a scottish fisherman & sailor who was vastly experienced to the effect that 'the only time i have been scared sailing was in mountainous seas off anglesea'... the rest of the crew thanked me later for keeping that bit of info to myself... every inch of every coast of anglesea is littered with wrecks
 

turtles

in the sea
sweet, hadn't seen this thread. surfing kicks ass.

Yeah, "riding giants" was great for the big waves, absolutely insane stuff. But i find all the pseudo-spiritual uplifting bullshit really hard to take. same with "endless summer" (the surf movie, not the beach boys album, of course!). Which is kinda weird cuz I agree with what's been said above about surf culture, essentially just jocks on waves (same with snowboard culture...jocks on hills), so I'm not really sure where the new-wave hippie crap comes from...

That said, i LOVE surfing, even though I'm pretty terrible at it. I try and make it out to tofino, on the west coast of vancouver island at least a couple times a summer. camping + surfing is definitely the life. and speaking of surf culture, how much better was surf culture in the 50's?? I'm telling you, nothing gets you pumped up for surfing more than blaring the beach boys as loud as possible as you're driving to the beach. I long for the days where it was all about riding the nose and beach parties with jane fonda ;)


Oh yeah, and to counter sufi's posted tofino blog, you should check out the blog by Ralf (or as my friends say "RRRRRRRRALF"), the Slayer-loving owner of tofino's only surf board & record store, a dirty old hippie of the trully great variety. I just found this and i'm now totally happy thinking about surfing again... :) :D
 

craner

Beast of Burden
Yes, I agree, the Spiritual Surfer schtick is painful. There are two great contra examples though.

1. Knoll in Riding Giants. He's, what, in his 50s. He compares Waimea to a past lover (he was her best, of course). And says something like, "I went out there a couple of years ago, for old times sake. There were a lot of hot young guys riding her, doing stuff I could never have done. But, you know, I got the feeling she recognised me. And she winked at me. She remembered." Wasn't that lovely? No "spiritual" shit there!

2. As "spiritualism" always going to its sinsiter side, which is inevitable (in my opinion): Surf Nazi Brody in Point Break with his disciples. "...and your balls are THIS big, man..."

The great ridiculous Spiritual Surfer scenes occur in the lamest Surfing film ever: North Shore. Who's seen that?

I have to say, though, that I do LOVE Big Wednesday. Particuarly because of Gary Busey, Patti D'arbanville, and Waxer at Bear's wedding. Beautiful stuff.
 

craner

Beast of Burden
Also, without wishing to emphasise the point, I'd seen Laird's Teahapoo wave in pictures well before watching Riding Giants. But to see it in motion, on screen, wide screen...well, you can understand why the man who pioneered Jaws like eating breakfast almost had a nervous breakdown after surviving that one. As I said, it was shocking. No mere bungee jump.
 
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