Liquid weapons

Just when I thought there was not really much to report for the day (only last two paragraphs), I made an interesting discovery today. Just before I left my dad asked me if I didn't want to bring a 15-inch bush knife - oh, wait, no. He asked me if I didn't want to bring a pocket knife. I said I would have liked to, but couldn't find mine (story of my life). He gave me a small one he had, but told me to put it in the luggage to be checked, otherwise they'll take it. Of course! Like I wouldn't know that. They will also take your nail clippers, your water and your coke – essentially all the times that the average Joe would use to bring down an airplane.

That they take the water really infuriates me. I have noticed on long flights that I have less problems with jet lag and on a trans-Atlantic flight I used to drink about 1/2 gallon of Gatorade and probably about the same amount in water. With all the extra food I was bringing and sometimes a laptop it wasn't unusual that my carry-on was heavier than my checked luggage!

So anyway, they do that stupid thing of taking away all your 'liquids' above 100 millilitre. Fortunately none of my bottles were bigger than that but I was supposed to put it in a clear plastic bag, conveniently sold for one whole euro where the line forms. What a rip-off. After all, I didn't make their stupid regulation. Anyway, the guy who had to special examine my bag was stressed, which is why I didn't want to start a discussion about why I don't consider sun screen a liquid. I had waited in line already long enough – of course because of all the morons like me who refuse to follow the silly regulation and put the so-called liquids into a plastic bag.

Anyway, back to the point. Now, three weeks later, I am looking for my pen that I have seemed to misplace (story of my life). So I am looking through my backpack that I also happened to have in the plane. Found my red Swiss Army knife. It had been there all along, including in the airplane from Frankfurt to Kilimanjaro. So what are those dudes at the airport paid for? That I get dehydrated during a flight and a sunburn in Africa???

I have now two more months to think about how to test the safety checks for the return flight... This, btw, isn't the first time I made the interesting discovery that the so-called security measures, especially since 9-11, are just a way of making money (think about all those nail clippers etc that people had to replace since then. Along with all the drinks that passengers have now to buy at the over-prized airports). In 2003 I flew with an expired ID, a bread knife on board and all that with a one-way ticket from Atlanta to LA. Another incident where people made money off of an unsuspecting passenger. Because I noticed that my Swiss Army knife was still in my carry on when I had checked my luggage, so I sent it via Mail from the Atlanta airport. Yes, the same knife that now traveled on a Condor flight from Europe to Africa. I should have tested it back then already and saved the couple of bucks for shipping.

Jack guessed the Mikefruit – no, wait. Mike guessed the Jackfruit and deserves a soy ice cream. Jack, was the fruit named after you??? The Swahili name is fenesi.

I am starting to get a feel of what some the difficulties are with the biogas project. It's basically coming down to the fact that materials are rare and expensive. For example, to increase the performance of the systems it would be good to have the plastic tube that gets filled with the manure, to be at least 1.2 metres wide. However, they currently use sheets that are only 90 centimetres wide. They come from far (Dar es Salaam) and are apparently the only thing available. To get a bigger gas storage tank approved (which is basically a plastic container like a trash can) they would have to rewrite the grant proposal and it would take forever...

Well, short entry today. I was looking into ways of maybe making the cooker simpler and also see if it's the most efficient in its current form. There also may be a leak somewhere in the test system. Any volunteer who wants to run around with a match and find it?