Brief Encounters with Real Life

By Jon Van Loon

Like most 0.9 billion citizens in developed countries I thought I was living the “real life”. A variety of circumstances detailed herein proved that this was not so. As an environmental sciences researcher at the University of Toronto and a consultant living and working worldwide it became clearly evident that the “real life” belongs to our 6 billion co-inhabitants elsewhere. This monograph provides brief often amusing and emotive, glimpses into the reality we seldom yet see. The book is structured by country and begins with surprising past, local incidents. China, South Africa and Brazil are among the several counties glimpsed from abroad.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jon Van Loon
• Release date: May 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301087068

Jon Van Loon

My life has been complicated by 3 factors. A severe learning disability and a bipolar condition could have easily doomed me to a troubled, non productive existence. However a prodigious unrelenting manic drive was the burr under my saddle that propelled me to unexpected achievement in academia. Of interest here in this regard was that developments in my laboratory at the University of Toronto lead me to opportunities to work, teach and live for short periods in many locations on the 6 continents over a 25 year period. During these intervals, I chose to live in local category accommodation thus maximizing my exposure and participation in parochial experiences. In contrast to the calamitous relationships dogging present world interrelationships my experiences were entirely welcoming and solicitous.I was born in Hamilton Ontario Canada. My interests include jogging and other fitness programs having run in and completed 4 marathons together with numerous 5, 10 and 20 km events. My prowess in sport to say the least was very average. Non-the-less I participated in and then later coached ice hockey both in Canada and Australia. My reward for all this activity is that I have a healthy cardiovascular system and have endured 3 knee replacement operations. Most particularly I have a passion for work related to environmental concerns. In this regard I have 120 peer reviewed research papers in Environmental Chemistry, one of which nearly landing me in jail.

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Preface

I have jogged over 75,000 km. This was on foot the bulk of which was jogging to work 20 km every day for over 15 years. The jogging involved the acquisition of no material for this book but was the direct cause of 3 knee replacements. No the 3 is not a misprint but occurred due to 2 replacements being required on my left knee. At the age of 76 I now require at least 1 more knee replacement and you would be correct if you guessed the left knee again. But so what?

Three times around the world sounds like a prodigious distance. This interval travelled by aircraft computes to approximately 120,000 km which is less than ½ the expanse I have jogged totally within the precincts of Toronto. The 120,000 km is the distance that I have travelled in pursuit of the stories contained in this book. But this travel was not mainly related to acquiring the following story material. Instead it was the result of profession related pursuits with the stories being a collateral asset.

Introduction

Why Only Brief Encounters with Real Life?

Some of us in developed countries have a few brief encounters with real life many have none. Our poor, well that is another story.

Glance back on the truly impressionable episodes that constitute your existence so far on this planet and it is my guess that there are several, probably a few, that stand out quite particularly vividly in your memory. The remainder of your waking hours form a slightly varying roadbed upon which these episodes protrude. Most particularly for most individuals their life’s roadbed is also relatively short, not perhaps in age but in distance ventured from a home base. For example most born-in-North America citizens have a relatively small piece of geography in which they have lived their total existence, with the possible exception of relatively short periods abroad. In fact less than 40% of Americans even have a passport. It is my contention that despite exposure to conditions in other countries through abundant media hype, only actually being physically exposed to incidents and even more so, actually living in another country can make a meaningful impression.

Middle and upper class North Americans seem to think that our relatively consumer dominated comfortable life style can go on forever. My experience suggests that we are quite wrong in this contention based for example on our disproportionate consumption of the world’s resources and consequently our major and incommensurate contribution to the world’s pollution. Although thoroughly attached to the democratic political system I believe the present democratic structures are designed for life as it was in the 19th century and requires urgent change to be applicable to the problems of the present.

My research here in Canada has been dominated by evidence which is strongly in support of the above contention. Additionally it has presented me from time to time with the opportunity of living and working in a variety of jurisdictions on all the Continents except Antarctica. I found that I experienced what I call striking evidence that it was only during these brief intervals both here and abroad that I was experiencing examples of what the real world is truly like. Another important point to mention in making such judgements is my propensity for choosing living accommodations that were regional in nature to maximize my exposure to the habits and living styles of the locals wherever I resided abroad.

The point in this debate is that Life in North America which contains less than 10% of the total world population is hardly representative of life in the real world. On the other hand the dynamics of life of the other 90% or so of our fellow earthly sojourners is what constitutes real life.

Perhaps you should be warned before to proceeding further that you are about to read a monograph by a 76 year old writer with only grade nine capability in spelling, vocabulary, grammar and syntax. Due to a learning disability my visual and auditory memories are only in the 40th and 60th percentile ranges respectively. Despair not because despite these problems I have earned a PhD in Chemistry and am a Full Professor at the University of Toronto, now retired. During my career I wrote several science books published by major publishers. Presently I am writing eBooks published by Smashwords this being number 7.

The facts here-in have only with great difficulty been extracted from a miasma of memories and notes scratched on odd bits of paper. This memoire is comprised of a sequence of short eventful stories accumulated here in North America and over a lifetime of travel on scientific missions covering 6 Continents. These describe events often of a humorous or compelling nature. The overseas material is grouped within sections bearing a location within the world in which the action transpired. Although several articles contain scientific material the latter is of an elementary nature and expressed simply and hence should not provide an impediment to the reader.

As a point of possible amusement my keyboard technique consists of the one fingered hunt and peck method. Also it should be mentioned that it was quite common for me to spend several seconds discerning the position of a letter before it could be struck. Additionally, a miss hit of a letter in close proximity to the one desired was a common difficulty. I spell phonetically and hence the spelling check program with Microsoft Word 2007 deserves particular praise for discerning errors in spelling since the word typed often bore only a cursory similarity to the correct spelling. Still there were also times when my spelling of a word was so erroneous that even spell check was unable to find the word and identify and correct the spelling. Thausarus.com must also be commended. I found this to be frequently needed mostly utilizing their innovative Clever Keys approach.

Having read these credentials the readers might be forgiven if they wondered if I am living in a world neither real nor unreal but somewhere in the nether reaches in between.

Although several of the stories contained herein have appeared in other of my eBooks most of these are in different or more suitable versions to suit their purpose here. This manuscript it must be emphasized is by far the most extensive rendering of my material.

Brief Real Life Defining Typical Occurrences relating to Canadian Incidents

Yes it is possible to obtain glimpses of the real world in the developed countries. Environmental researches like me have been involved in such issues. Thus a number of stories particularly in this first part of this memoire contain typical examples. Additionally there are stories contained herein that are here simply to provide amusing interludes.

"Pick a Number any Number" (Jon Van Loon, Chemistry in Canada published May 1973 A glancing right handed blow rang off my nose. Although I had not been quick enough to totally avoid contact, my colleagues unexpected offering had been forceful enough to draw blood. This incident that occurred in Canada was one of my more memorable brief encounters with real life.

Have you ever viewed with bewilderment the numerical values on the doctor’s copy of your blood analysis results? The conversation will perhaps approximate the following: Mr. Van Loon look your sodium results you will see here fall slightly below the acceptable range and your red cell blood count is low as well. Otherwise everything seems to be within acceptable levels. The sodium results come from a chemical analysis of your blood whereas the red blood cell count is obtained by counting red blood cells in several areas of the slide. Probably both your doctor and you believe these results as printed on the report to be accurate within acceptable limits. In 2013 this is a pretty reasonable assumption. However even today if a set of blood results is to be a crucial determinant in coming to an important conclusion about your health you must be certain to ask for a second set to be performed, something a perceptive doctor would insist on in any case. The same situation is true with chemical results on important toxic environmental substances and food contaminants.

Now let’s go fast backward to 1973 when I published the article Pick a Number Any Number which occasioned the smack in the nose and that I nick named the nose bleed paper referred to above. Apart from problems resulting with the inferior equipment and methodology available for this task in those days one other serious deficiency existed; standard reference samples and blind references were rare and hence infrequently used. (Standard Reference Samples will be explained below)

Okay but so what? Equipment existed at that time that analysed important samples such as blood, environmental and food materials for chemical substances of interest. Results were obtained and data sheets were generated just as they are today. The deficiency was that there no way to properly judge the accuracy of results for most chemical constituents in these important sample types in the 1970’s at the time I published my nose bleed paper.

Mercury is a serious toxin and is commonly found in fish samples in areas where mercury is released in the aquatic environment. It is critical to know the levels of this element in fish caught for human consumption. Using a large volume of data for the determination of mercury in particularly fish samples from around the world I was able to show that the numerical data varied so greatly on the same samples by different labs and using different procedures that the results were on the whole useless for verifying the safety for consumption of fish. Thus I was able to conclude that up to that date the data being used to judge the amount of mercury in fish was useless. It was after presenting this data at a National Conference that a disgruntled colleague with a vested interest in the subject administered the nose bleed blow in a nearby hallway.

Needles to say this and similar work by others resulted in changes that make chemical analysis of such substances much more accurate and useful today.

Divulging Honest Results Can be Dangerous

An ugly possibility, jail loomed menacingly. As an idealistic young researcher I possessed no fear of publishing the truth, or as it was in this case what I strongly believed to be the correct chemical results. The reality of being challenged by one of industries giants in a court of law was for a scientist at quite a different level of encountering fear.

They were Cool but bright days in early May 1972. A friend and colleague and I were studying the fish population and water quality of a suite of lakes near an industrial city in Central Ontario. Emanations from the cities smelters were sulfurous and metal bearing in nature. Nets had been set at strategic points to allow an estimation of the fish population. The acidity was measured in situ and water samples were taken and stabilized for lab analysis.

The numbers of fish being caught were few and those that were turned out to be elderly indicating that these species, mostly trout, were unable to spawn under the existing conditions. Other scientist could use scales rings and the calcium content of reproductive organs to age the fish. Our host, a trapper and hunter, made the most delicious fish stews from our catches eaten with sour dough bread slathered in butter it was a delight. (The fish had been taken in gill nets and were not in a fit state for release). During all this enjoyment and good science the threat of a possible jail incarceration never entered our minds!

A confidential Government report was compiled using our chemical and fish count results. It was on behalf of the local indigenous people who depended of fishing for a large part of their livelihood. The story becomes hazy at this point. Whether the government sued the large industrial complex for pollution of the large suite of lakes that we found almost bereft of fish and highly contaminated with metals and acid I don’t know. All I do know for sure is that soon we were threatened to be sued for publishing erroneous results and hence slandering the company in question. Jail was a small but distinct eventuality we might face.

Ours had been one of the few laboratories in North America using standard reference samples to attempt to verify our results. Thus it was beyond our understanding how the challenging industry could claim their results showed our reported values to be 10 times too high! I was too frightened to attend the trial and any way the lawyers had my co-worker and all our results. It came down to the last day and it was clear the judge could not tell which side was right when suddenly an anonymous person from within the industry supplied a document showing that their results in fact agreed with ours. Immediately the industry settled with the Indigenous people, affected, for the full amount! Sometimes beads of perspiration still break out on my forehead when I think of this quandary. Since then sometimes although I am certain of my veracity I still have vestigial doubts.

Perhaps we had not learned our lesson well enough about tackling big corporations, since a year or so later a few of us from the lab went down to Southwestern Ontario Canada to investigate the contamination of Lake Erie by another prominent Industry. This Industry had a year or so previously been the subject of a notorious TV program called Air of Death relating to another pollutant.

In this case we were investigating Phosphorous as (phosphate), the so-called limiting nutrient. This element achieved this name because its low level in most lakes, compared to other nutrients, prevents harmful algal blooms from forming. Thus any plentiful amount in the outflow from industry or other sources causes an undesirable green slimy algal bloom event. (It might be important at this point to indicate the deleterious nature of algal blooms-other than their unsightliness and impediment to recreational use of the water body. Another more serious problem arises when the algae dies and decomposes, a process which utilizes dissolved oxygen and hence results in it’s depletion in the water. The loss of dissolved oxygen seriously affects fish populations, particularly the desirable fish that are commercially important and those that are of greatest interest to anglers).

We found astoundingly high levels of phosphate, in the aqueous effluent of this Industry. We reported this to the press, but by the time it appeared the story was general enough that it seemed that the Industry had not stopped emitting the original air of death pollutant which had caused such an outcry the year previous and which they had promised to stop. That night I was curled up in a ball on the bed in tears fearing that there would be a phone call from the Industries lawyer. Sure enough the phone rang. I asked Maureen to answer because I couldn’t. But instead of a lawyer it was a company representative apologizing for the situation and promising that immediate action was coming! We never found out about whether they did remediate the phosphate situation. This was only one of many sources of phosphate from both the US and Canada into Lake Erie, the shallowest and least voluminous of the Great Lakes. Thus in the 70’s and 80’s the Lake had a serious problem as far as algae was concerned. Although many of these sources were much diminished or eliminate and Lake Erie went through a lengthy interval of much improved water quality for swimming and fishing, expanded shore line urban density is threatening to return the lake to its untenable state of pollution.

The Flin Flon Caper

I was involved in a project in the area around a Smelter in the Flin Flon area of Manitoba Canada, to study the acid and trace metal content of lakes and assess the damage to fish populations and local vegetation there from. My colleagues and I drove in via Government vehicle to the town one lovely spring day and holed up in a local hotel for the night. As is common in these northern climes, cold had set in overnight and by morning, although dawning sunny, a blanket of snow had fallen overnight, too much to allow travel by truck on the back roads to sample lakes. Being at loose ends we magnanimously decided to introduce ourselves and our mission to the boss down at the Smelter Headquarters. What a mistake! They received us very politely and in the ensuing conversation we divulged our mission and present predicament. The Boss said, NO problem he would have the pilot fly us around in the company seaplane and we could sample from the floats. We were astonished at our unexpected good fortune. A phone call brought the pilot, a few whispers between manager and pilot ; my assistant collected the equipment from our truck and we were loaded aboard the craft. Swoosh and we were airborne. Suddenly I realized from the map on my knee that we were over flying the first lake and I tapped the pilot on the shoulder, notifying him to this fact. Oh he stated and put the plane into a sudden circling dive, which left my breakfast on the floor of the craft. Next thing I knew we were taxiing to the center of the lake. Clearing the tears of fright from my eyes I watched my assistant out on the float taking a water sample from, the still slowly moving conveyance. He swept himself in giving me a questioning glance. Apparently the pilots instructions were to take us exactly where specified but make things as exciting as possible. By lunch time we were happy to reach terra firma and declined an afternoon’s repeat. The remaining lakes would have to wait for conventional sampling.

This happened on a new foray in June. By then the weather had turned hot and by the first days end I was so sweaty that I thought a swim would be in order, so from the end of the dock at the motel I dangled a cautionary finger into the water’s surface, and felt about 22 degrees C temperature water. It was obviously deep in this area so I took a running dive in; when to by bone chilling shock I hit a thick layer of water just about 5 cm below the surface that must have been near the freezing point. In exiting this lake back onto the dock I may have been only the second being in history to have walked on water. In my imagination I thought I could see a gleam in the smelter Manager’s eye as I supposed he might have planned this little surprise as well.

The final episode in my christening in the first job that involved anything north of the Sudbury area in Ontario Canada was the result of the simple idea to return to Toronto quickly to take the samples to the lab in as pristine a condition as quickly as possible (even though they had been preserved by the accepted method). The other members of the team at Flin Flon were either gone or staying and I had the Government truck with samples aboard. Misguidedly I decided to leave at night; at this latitude in June it was light until about 10.30 pm, so I was going in a sort of dusk when I left at that time. My idea was to drive all night to arrive in Winnipeg and leave the samples in a refrigerated condition until the departure of the Toronto flight. I would drop the truck off at the Governmental Depot the next morning.

Merrily along I drove until something flashed in the headlights from the side of the road only meters ahead. Then before I could really react there was a bone rattling thump and the truck was almost instantly still. The windshield was partially caved in and a red liquid seeped onto the dash. I hung there in my seat belt (these had thoughtfully been installed in Government trucks and we were told there was a mandatory rule for their use). I had learned 2 golden edicts in a trial by fire. I was safe and basically unhurt, but the moose was most certainly dead. Apparently travel by night in these areas was fraught with just such a danger. The truck had an immense pipe cage on the front which although damaged had prevented damage to the radiator, engine and head lights. Thankfully the mangled moose lay off the road and I was able to drive away with only a damaged windshield to deal with. I drove slowly and with trepidation, for what seemed like forever until I found a Motel. This made me the strongest possible supporter of seat belts.

Essential Background Defining My Own Life’s Crenelated Roadbed-The Bottom Line

This section defines the roadbed from which the stories above protruded as important Canadian brief-encounters-with-real-life and might logically have preceded the above incidents. I thought it more propitious for the reader to digest a few protrusions before envisioning my roadbed. I hope the reader will find these details of interest at least