Year-end Review

[bcholmes]

2007 was a really good year for me. If 2007 had any one big theme, it'd probably be "Haiti". I started the year, there. I ate traditional Haitian pumpkin soup on January 1st (Haitian independence day), and other than losing a day in Haiti, it was a nice, relaxing vacation.

From a work perspective, I've spent much of the year doing projects related to e-Health and health care.

In February, I went to the CD release party for Jory Nash's latest CD. I also learned the secrets of BitTorrent, and started watching series like Life on Mars, which was really good. Eventually I cancelled my cable because I was annoyed by all the advertisements. Since then, I've been get a couple of pieces of Rogers junk mail a week.

At the beginning of March, I attended presentation by former Haitian Minister of Defense Patrick Elie, which was my first encounter with the Toronto Haiti Action Committee (THAC). I've been involved with them ever since.

In April, I submitted a paper to JavaOne and was accepted as a speaker, and I attended a Socialism conference. In May, I went down to SF for a day. May is also the month that YahooGroups decided to be big poopy-heads. And finally, I went to WisCon, which was amazing.

In June, I got more involved with THAC. We had a horribly confrontational session, but the group also inspired me to sign up for a human rights delegation to Haiti. I also started doing some interviews in anticipation of putting together a documentary. While travelling to one interview, I visited my grandparents and saw my grandfather for what would turn out to be the last time. He passed away in July.

Also in July, I got my new MacBook Pro and prepared for my trip in August.

Of everything in the year, August was the month that affected me most profoundly. I went to Haiti to take part in a human rights delegation, which involved some really grueling travel, but also involved springing people from jail, visiting Site Soley and making a bunch of new friends. But it also involved the kidnapping/disappearance of my travelling companion, Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine. To this day, if I try to talk about this too much, I get choked up. I'm angry at the Canadian embassy in Haiti for being completely unwilling to do anything, and although I got some responses from my MP, I'm still pretty disappointed with how little her office was willing to do.

In September, I went to the Toronto International Film Festival and saw great films. I also watched the Ontario provincial election and enjoyed seeing John Tory's campaign implode.

In October, the Liberals were given a majority in Ontario, MMP failed, and Expedia decided to screw up my travel plans to SF. I also did a presentation about my trip to Haiti, and went to Canada's east coast for the first time in my life.

November was another trip to Haiti, including an amazing trip to see 200 year-old forts in Kapayisyen, as well as more work with THAC.

And December has been quiet and uneventful. More THAC meetings, and I've been working with a really good team at work. I've started getting really interested in automatic graph drawing for a project at work, which has lead me to read a lot of math text on graph theory.

Within the last few days, I bought a new TV (watching DVDs is one of my favourite pastimes, and my TV is 15 years old -- I finally decided to get something that allowed for better widescreen aspect ratios). And it's amazing how much more detail I get from my DVDs.

My New Year's resolution for 2007 was to donate enough money to be uncomfortable. And while I really dialed up the "donating" part, I don't think I quite hit the uncomfortable benchmark. Most of the organizations I've supported have relationships with Haiti. Casey House AIDS Hospice is an exception, but is one of the groups I've supported the longest. I also gave money to Canadian Feed the Children (specifically directed to the Haiti operations), Médecins Sans Frontières, Pou Soley Leve, as well as contributing to a CTH (Confederation des Travailleurs Haïtiens) tour in Canada and some minor political events. I've also given money to the guest houses that I've stayed at in Haiti. The NDP is the only political party I've contributed to. And I've volunteered my IT skills to Fonkoze for 2008. Finally, in the last few weeks, one of my cow-orkers has made me aware of a programme for funding a University of Waterloo scholarship, and I started that process (but it'll be a 2008 donation). Next year, I hope to include Third World Awareness on the list of charities (I know a guy who works with that group, and I like what I've heard about what they do).

All things considered, 2007 was good to me (with only a few low points, although some were very low) and my hope for 2008 is to increase the amount of Haiti-related work I do.