tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4677184810774730082011-07-30T13:54:10.368-07:00Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.comBlogger241100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-25152273104107877192010-01-05T22:19:00.000-08:002010-01-05T22:23:31.372-08:00

Sonya and I are very probably moving to Paris in September. What happens between now and then deserves a little documenting. The reason: A few weeks ago I got into the MPA program at Sciences Po. More on this as it happens.

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-65127078151308820092009-06-02T10:38:00.000-07:002009-06-02T12:20:36.120-07:00

I'm writing from Las Vegas. It's been a while since Sonya or I have written. Now, I have time to kill in the hotel before we leave and felt like putting some thoughts into words. At the pool yesterday, Sonya listened to Bar lectures and did multi-state practice questions while I listened to Saint-Saens and read 1632 by Eric Flint along with the latest issue of The New Republic. There was

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-74958663635966371892009-01-07T22:54:00.000-08:002009-01-07T23:48:11.508-08:00

Almost half a year later, Sonya and I find ourselves in another riot. This time, it's Oakland. In case you don't know, a cop shot a 22 year old kid on New Year's day in an Oakland BART station. The kid was subdued and on the ground, possibly handcuffed. A BART train full of onlookers watched as the cop inexplicably shot the kid in the back while he laid face down.Today was the victim's

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-23959540099560006472008-11-21T18:30:00.000-08:002008-11-21T18:34:14.095-08:00

Today, November 21, 2008, I learned that I passed the California Bar Exam on the first try after having studied alone in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After spending my adult life dedicated to Apollo, tonight belongs to Dionysus.

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-85496898187659457532008-09-30T23:27:00.000-07:002008-09-30T23:29:19.171-07:00

Bail-out Wall Street? Or give a $35,000 scholarship to every single one of the United States' ~20 million undergrad and grad students? Take your pick.

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-80340241213532282762008-07-16T09:37:00.000-07:002008-07-17T11:59:38.532-07:00

Sonya and I leave the land of blue sky and Chinggis Khaan in a few short hours. We leave the apartment at 4:30 a.m. for our 6:45 flight to Seoul, then on to San Francisco. We have 30,000 Korean Won in our pockets to go with Chinese Yuan, Mongolian Tugrug, and U.S. Dollars. At the rate things are going, I'm not sure which will be worth more by the time we get back.There's much that will have to

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-12015752319192323722008-07-02T21:40:00.000-07:002008-07-03T08:15:30.477-07:00

It has been difficult to get accurate information about what's going on in UB.The rumor here is that 700 people who were present at the protests have been arrested.The western media has picked up this number. But, the central detention facility in Ulaanbaatar was over capacity when it had 698 detainees. So something isn't right.Most of those arrested were picked up on drinking charges.

Sonyahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00543490609496408525noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-6487164465344435842008-07-01T21:56:00.000-07:002008-07-03T08:15:02.790-07:00

We watched as smoke and flames billowed above the city until 2:30 in the morning. Bottle rockets and fireworks added to the noise of rubber bullets late into the night. Eventually, water tanker trucks paraded in single file on Peace Avenue's completely empty six lanes. They could only manage to keep the fire from spreading, however. Much was already destroyed.******Getting good information

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-89294318267184710062008-07-01T07:07:00.000-07:002008-07-03T08:14:25.452-07:00

As I write this, Ulaanbaatar burns. On Sunday, Mongolia held its parliamentary elections. Sonya and I and a handful of other Asia Foundation interns served as international election observers. At the follow-up meeting, the Asia Foundation's director for Mongolia impressed upon us all that in his opinion Mongolia's elections were "free and fair." As observers, we conducted a voter survey of

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-32418733146894511402008-06-18T18:38:00.000-07:002008-06-18T18:42:29.350-07:00

"These are pristine islands, not the place where you would expect to find a bunch of severed feet."I've got to say, I think the thing speaks for itself. But Manhattan, are you going to take that laying down? I think she's talking about you.

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-89043246831246906652008-06-17T00:17:00.001-07:002008-06-28T04:15:47.444-07:00

More BarBri. Finding decent study spaces has been hard. Our apartment is perfect in that it is quiet, gets lots of sun, has a decent desk and a chair. After a couples of solitary days straight, however, and I need a change of scene.This morning brought me to a couple of cafes--one French, the other German. By lunch time, however, the tables fill up. The noise levels rise and the productivity

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-36771945005459508822008-06-05T21:56:00.000-07:002008-06-05T22:35:02.056-07:00

Mongolia converted to capitalism in the early 1990's and is flush with mining-cash-infused- urban-yuppie-culture but it's water is still communist as ever. Ulaanbataar has centralized hot water. Each micro-district has a single communal hot water boiler. When it goes down, everyone's water goes cold. The boiler in our micro-district went down 3 days ago.But necessity is the mother of

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-87079291686583176762008-06-05T19:20:00.000-07:002008-06-05T22:27:43.216-07:00

The elements of the intentional tort of false imprisonment:1. An act by defendant to restrain plaintiff2. in a bounded area with no reasonable means of escape3. with the intent to restrain plaintiff in that area; and4. causation of plaintiff's injuries.An Australian couple apparently just arrived in Ulaanbataar to stay at Zaya's and refused to use Zaya's car service to get here from the airport (

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-66219587096413830242008-06-03T19:18:00.001-07:002008-06-04T06:47:24.964-07:00

This is what it all boils down to . . .As far as I have gathered, a major role of the org that I'll be interning for in UB is to facilitate understanding/negotiations between the government of Mongolia and local environmental groups. (The particular project that I'll be working on has to do with mining and water. I'll write more on this later.) So, I want to know the interests and motivations of

Sonyahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00543490609496408525noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-55588445147912602922008-06-02T20:59:00.001-07:002008-06-02T22:19:46.438-07:00

DSC00835Originally uploaded by ulaanbaatar08Our next stop was at this outcropping. Camel rides were offered again.We were told that in Soviet times up to 100 monks lived in the cracks and caves between the rocks. That number doesn't seem right to me, but it was easy enough to lose people in and around the outcropping.It had great petroglyphs with Uighur script and modern graffiti, including "Jr.

Sonyahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00543490609496408525noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-40149805405716139602008-06-01T19:45:00.000-07:002008-06-02T02:50:46.929-07:00

Andrew and I spent the day outside of UB in Tereldj National Park. It took about 1.5 hours to get there, and only 20 minutes for our car to get blocked by a herd of goats.There are two Mongolian traditions that should be observed before going on any type of journey. The first is that the journeyer, once she has everything prepared, needs to sit down and drink a cup of tea. I like this

Sonyahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00543490609496408525noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-86801147857523809822008-05-31T01:35:00.000-07:002008-06-05T22:26:27.355-07:00

Bar/Bri lays out a canned study schedule that I'm finding relatively easy to keep. Generally, I wake up between 7:30-8, shower, eat breakfast, read nytimes.com, and start studying by 9:30. I work until 12:30, at which point Sonya and I to lunch and take a walk around Ulaanbaatar. After lunch, I study for another 3-5 hours until I get sick of it and want something to eat and a beer. I spend

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-85353152141591716822008-05-29T16:51:00.000-07:002008-06-05T22:28:25.632-07:00

"Ulaanbaatar looks like shit," said Zaya, the hostel owner, to a bunch of us yesterday, "because Mongolians have no use for cities. What do we need? We need the sky, we need the earth, we need the river. No one cares about the city."The hostel occupies a floor in a Soviet apartment-block about 100 yards off of Peace Avenue. I'm not sure if the space between the building and the street

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-14383017516056286402008-05-26T06:42:00.000-07:002008-05-29T16:51:10.668-07:00

Everything came together at the last minute: four small pieces of luggage filled with clothes, sleeping bags, western medicine, a water filter, paperwork, Bar/Bri books, and assorted necessaries; an all-nighter take-home final leading into graduation; a marriage proposal and an acceptance. In less than 4.5 hours Sonya and I board a plane for Mongolia. In two months I'll sit for the

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-21545249280518067982008-05-17T01:05:00.000-07:002008-05-17T01:07:51.160-07:00

There's too much to write about now and not enough time. It'll have to suffice for the moment to say that I'm done with law school.

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-60110151275798783202008-05-02T12:22:00.000-07:002008-05-02T14:10:34.584-07:00

My Bar/Bri materials came in the mail this week.Bar/Bri charges $4800 for its iPod self study program, $900 of which is reimbursable upon return of the books and iPod. In return, you get knee-high stack of eleven books (see picture), a study schedule, scantrons, lecture materials, an iPod with audio of Bar/Bri's full lecture series, and an iPod charger. Together, everything weighs about 25

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-15449167254217712172008-04-24T19:47:00.000-07:002008-04-24T19:52:29.222-07:00

So in a late night stupor I accidentally entered the url as nolitorpore instead of nolitorpere... I can't change it because I keep getting this error when I try: bX-h59pth.Today was the last day of my law school classes. Just 65 pages of writing and a 3 hour in class final away from graduation!

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-80600088057500966962008-04-24T02:14:00.000-07:002008-04-24T08:33:23.958-07:00

One reason we're launching this blog now is because there's a lot to write about in the coming months.  I'm about to graduate from UC-Hastings in less than four weeks, which means coming to the end of a very long road and the beginning of a new one.  After undergrad, a year of grad school, and three years of law school, the core of my adult life, not to mention my childhood, has been academia.  

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-467718481077473008.post-85269491324508887532008-04-24T01:59:00.000-07:002008-04-24T02:14:07.543-07:00

The first post.  The essentials: Who: Sonya and I.What: Noli torpere is Latin for "Don't be numb/lethargic!"  Torpere is the root of the word "torpor."  If I had to make up a motto, it's the one I would make up.Where: Here.Why: We needed a place to document and easily share certain parts of our lives with family and friends.  Also, good living is all about challenging oneself and seeking constant

Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09304532455784705936noreply@blogger.com0