Thursday, April 19, 2001

"Ponchos Pilate!" This is our refrain, a seemingly bottomless well of guffaws. "Ponchos Pilate!"

This cry echos up and down the pretty, completely empty streets of Brindisi. These people just have no sense of humour on the subject of their siesta. Between 1pm and 4:30pm, the entire population of this berg is gone; they couldn't possibly be any less there.

The only thing on the streets, other than us, is the breeze; pleasant and off of the water. As usual, though, it is not entirely kind to the shaggy:

M: If this wind keeps up, I'm going to choke to death on my hair before nightfall.
M: Heh. You should try lighting a cigarette with long hair. Actually, the worst was using the oven burner to light a cigarette, late at night. There's just nothing that pisses off your roommates quite like a guy running around at 2am, screaming, with his head on fire.
M & M: [Wild gales of laughter]

We reach the water again, which looks much better in the sun today. We consider that breezy Brindisi has actually been very kind to us. I mean, we could easily have been stranded at some freestanding ferry terminal at the ass-end of Italy. Instead, we got a nice cheap hotel, food, beer, video games, and laundry service. We are well content.

Waiting for the shuttle to the ferry, we run into four Australians—who are actually living/working for a year in Dublin; and are using it (as Australians invariably seem to do) as a base for new travels. We end up spending much of the ferry crossing getting drunk under the table by these guys (as Australians also invariably seem able to do). Out on deck:

M: I think we're in international waters now.
M: What does that mean?
M: Lawlessness!
M: Great. I've always wanted to be keel-hauled . . .

WARNING: TRAVEL-UNRELATED (ALBEIT RATHER INTERESTING, I HOPE) DIGRESSIONS!    CLICK TO SKIP

Over drinks in the ferry "saloon," we talk about the "happiness treadmill." As Pinker has noted, happiness is basically a tool our genes employ to get us to pursue things conducive to Darwinian fitness. We tend to be happy when we are safe, warm, well-fed, prosperous, liked and respected by our peers, and non-celibate—the keys to Darwinian success. However, one problem with this system (as Pinker further relates) is: How much happiness is enough? If cave dwellers spent all their time trying to produce Coleman stoves and hunting rifles, instead of sharpening their spears a bit more and accumulating pelts, they wouldn't have done so good. Well, the first cue as to how much happiness is enough is what other people have. Because, if the next guy got it, the odds are pretty good you can, too. (Thus, our incessant Jones-up-with-keeping, and benchmarking with peers.) A second cue is what you have already. This is by definition attainable; and if you got that, you can probably get a little bit more. Ie, we should expect "a man's reach should exceed his grasp; but not by much." (Thus our incessant dissatisfaction with what we've got, and focus on getting the next thing.)

"The tragedy of happiness has a third act," notes Pinker: It turns out there are about twice as many negative emotions (fear, envy, greed, physical pain, mental anguish, remorse, anxiety, panic) than there are positive ones (erm, happiness . . . tranquility, contentment, love). The reason for this is as follows: in our ancestral environment, more stuff was better—but only up to a point. There are decreasing marginal returns to accumulating, say, food (especially with no freezers). Ie, good things that can happen to you have a relatively low ceiling. Bad things, on the other hand, are legion—you can fall off a cliff, be eaten by a bear, stabbed in the back by a rival, etc. And if one of those things happens, you're infinitely worse off—out of the game completely. As there are a lot more ways to become drastically worse off, than drastically better off, you'd expect to see us hard-wired to pay much more attention to the negative than the positive. Which is what we do see, including in the lab. (Hence, our continual difficulty in looking on the bright side, and tendency to focus on our most trivial setbacks.)

From there, it's also easy to see why happiness tends not to be a lasting state. Our genes don't want us to be happy; they want us out there hustling for more Darwinian fitness. Hence, getting stuff makes us happy; having it tends not to. This is what's referred to as the Happiness Treadmill—our gene's dogtrack rabbit to keep us keeping on. So, Jeremy (based in part on a book he favors called Optimal Experience), has pointed out that there are two ways you can attempt to deal with the treadmill. The first is just to get the hell off—say you're not playing anymore, you don't want stuff, you don't want striving, and you're just going to learn to be happy from other, better, cues. This is the path of Eastern mysticism—renunciation. But, of course, this is a high price for most of us in the West to pay. The other, very interesting, tactic is to match your speed to that of the treadmill. That is, to measure and regulate your challenges and accomplishments so that they come at a steady pace; little constant rewards, new undertakings successfully undertaken, etc. And, it turns out, this really is when people are most happy. If you ask people what they think will make them happy, everyone answers: Sitting idle on a beach with a frosty one. But if you actually go and look—ask people 1) How happy are right now?, and 2) What are you doing right this minute?, it turns out that people are happy when working at work which they are good at, and which is appreciated, and which is measured with regular progress and regular rewards. (Jeremy's book calls it "flow.")

We're roughing it sans staterooms, so after a hard night of drinking with the Aussies, we retire to the big, shared cabin with all the seats, and hit the deck for a restless night. When morning finds us, the the islands have come out.

When we strike land in Patras, I have my 6 or 8 words of Greek to show for the journey (and they came a lot easier than the Hungarian, let me tell you). With moderate alacrity, we find buses, and tickets for them, and are soon bouncing uncomfortably along the Greek coast. Off the cuff, it calls to mind southern California: sandy, dry, warm, and breezy. Also, that water is blue. As I chat with my seatmate, and thank him for translations of the driver's announcements, I think a bit about the obligations of the traveler. I guess we really owe it to those who will come after us to not be flaming bastards to the people we meet. Only in this way will others continue to be welcome. (This aside from it, obviously, being the right thing to do.)

The bus takes us to, not quite Athens (erm, Athina), but within sight of it. We hop a ride with the world's most scrupulously honest cabbie, and approach the city center:

M: Man, look at the sprawl on this place.
M: Yeah, well, they've been living here awhile.

Our new room is nice, central, and cheap—but we pay for it with shower quality. Basically, we've got the wide-openness and hand sprayer of Roma; with the exiguous dimensions (about 2.5'x2.5') of Brindisi. While Mark soaks the room, bellowing "Monkey Style!" periodically, Matt and I talk homesickness:

M: Not that I'm not enjoying the trip, which I am—but I'm starting to think very reverentially about a Starbucks frappucino . . . and a Subway veggie sub . . . and a movie from Blockbuster . . .
M: And going to the movie theater. New releases!

Mark emerges from the shower, visibly a little worse for wear from the journey. (Getting from Roma to Athina is a monster! An overnight train ride, a shuttle, an overnight ferry ride, a walk, a 3.5-hour bus ride—and a cab ride!)

M: <sigh> We got to Athens. Can we go home now?
M: Travelling's only fun in retrospect, Mark. You'll enjoy it much more later. Anyway, the locomoting always sucks; that's the price you pay for the destinations.

We emerge into our little neighborhood—Plaka. This is by reputation, and our immediate experience, the nicest zone of the city. Shopping, pedestrians, greenery, and throngs of sidewalk (not patio, but sidewalk) diners. Even the Acropolis peeks out! With the sun exiting the scene, there are also lovely bruised purple and pink clouds—further strengthening my California comparison. (I thought we only got those at home.)

By happy consensus (happy to me, at any rate), we decide to dine at what may be the only vegetarian restaurant in Greece (which is called Eden). But the reviews we've read are stellar, and they serve lots of veg versions of traditional Greek dishes. In a very nice room, on a hill, we order huge piles to share—appetizers and entrees, and yum! The complexity and interplay of flavours is a little much for Mark ("I like simplicity."), but I for one am knocked out. After that (and a not-entirely-quick cybercafe run), we lie in bed, lights out, Matt and I telling jokes until we see Mark's ire actually spilling out onto the balcony.

Morning, and Matt and I run out for ferry tickets to the Islands. Afterwards, we have a very nice coffee, served by a very nice cafe proprieter. (As per stereotypes, Greek establishment owners have been warm and welcoming.) I discuss how extreme I've gotten, in terms of not worrying so much about my immediate enjoyment of the trip, but how I will remember it years from now. Matt makes a few comments that only one of your closest friends can make:

M: You are a person, Mike, who is never really happy with what he's doing at the moment. Whether it's the next job, or something else, it's always something better around the corner. I'm rather the opposite, content in each moment—that's why I'm able to work in a job where I'm not making a huge amount of money, and just be happy. Don't get me wrong—it's your kind of mentality that expanded the American frontier, that powered the space race. You just probably need to be aware of it.
M: Hmmm.
M: And that's why the travelog—why you enjoy moments so much more in retrospect: Because you're no longer stuck in them.

After pulling Mark, via his sheets, onto the floor, we take a turn in the nearby National Gardens, then get serious about the one thing we really came here to see: The Acropolis! We begin the hike; I thought it was, like, on a hill—not at the top of a huge, steep tower of land! Jeesh!

At the top, straight away, Matt and I exchange proof-of-presence photo duties, in front of the Parthenon. Naturally, I'm really only going around the world to get my photo taken in front of four particular buildings. Yes! Three down! (The shot of me in front of the Colosseum, by the way, is now available, after a slight upload failure.) While we fiddle around thusly, Mark gets off and makes like Mark, up on the roof of the city. Matt and I catch up; the views here really are quite nice.

Sad story: All the beautiful, stone figures that once sat in the triangle at the top of the Parthenon, currently live in . . . the British Museum. Some time ago, a bloke named Elgin came by and grabbed them, and Britain has been reluctant to return them ever since. I saw them a few months ago—but being here really puts them into context. (The Acropolis Museum even has a little, stone recreation of what it originally looked like.) Previously, I didn't have a strong opinion on this issue. But after today, I feel that not only should the Elgin Marbles (the Brits even named them after, not their source, but their kidnapper!) be returned to Greece—they should be set back on top of the Parthenon. That would be awesome.

As we linger, I try to impress on Matt that we're really in the birthplace of democracy—and of philosophy!

M: I wonder if Socrates sat right on THAT step there, and gazed off at the Agean!
M: He probably hid behind that tree, and hoped no one would beat the crap out of him.
M: He was a bit of a pain in the ass, wasn't he . . . The bus ride from Patras really sucked. But it was worth it. How could you possibly go your whole life and never come here?

From the plaque on the ground before it: "The great temple of Athena Parthenus. 447-432 BC. Highest achievement of ancient Greek classical art and the most significant and representative monument of the Athenian democracy at the height of its glory." On the way down, we consider the Athenians' accomplishments, and legacy:

M: I wonder if the Greeks were really the first self-aware humans? The first ones really plagued by consciousness, the first to really systematically address the problem of being a human on the planet Earth?
M: Or, rather, theirs was the first documented case of neurosis: "Why are we here?! We gotta be here for something! What are we here for?!"
M: Though, I guess, it might have just been Socrates—that's why everyone wanted him to shut the hell up: "Socrates! Drink some wine. Cavort with some boys. Relax a little."

Right now: early Thursday evening, and I sit at a table on a pedestrian boulevard in Plaka, sipping on a large, frosty one, watching the light begin to fade. (Matt & Mark are at the National Museum; I'm completely museumed out.) Tonight: Back to Eden. Tomorrow: 8AM ferry to Santorini, which stands accused of being the most beautiful island anywhere.

Wishing you a gentle ride on the treadmill,
Michael