It's rather hard to believe that the first semester has finished - does it really seem that long since I was in Australia at the start of the year? Judging by the change in temperature the answer would have to be YES but judging by how long it really seems I can't recall a semester going quite so quickly in my entire life before. Sadly I think that's the result of this semester not being one of the most memorable in my entire life (with notable exceptions of course). Hopefully in the next couple of weeks I can immerse myself in my studies and end up getting pretty reasonable marks - I am fairly optimistic about this because, in comparision with last year, I am prepared well for two of my three exams, and I don't have the carrot of the year being completely finished once my exams are over.

I guess this semester was one of stability for me, not really advancing my life but hopefully getting more enjoyment out of life than has been the case in the past. I think that I did achieve that, through creating and maintaining good friendships - however with the notable lack of a girlfriend/bestfriend in my everyday life the whole 'meaning' created by having such a relationship was slighly missing, but then you can't really ask for everything can you. I am fairly happy with my lot this semester as long as I can build on it next semester and hopefully make it even more enjoyable and meaningful.

So now it's on to my exams and then off to Australia which will be an incredibly welcome break from New Zealand. To get away from the cold weather for one will be really great (I am sure that I have told everyone how much I dislike cold weather).

My plans for next semester will probably be to continue/improve upon the marks I get for the first semester while also maintaining friendships and creating new ones (hopefully a girlfriend) and enhancing my life.

After a reasonably long break from updating my site - I am updating it. (Ya don't say!) I don't know why I haven't updated my page for the last 8 days, maybe I have been too busy (too busy doing what? You make it sounds like you have a life!), or maybe too lazy (that sounds about right, spending too much time watching TV) or maybe just not in the mood for it (that's a pathetic excuse). Anyway, as my reasonably skitzophrenic personality has seemed to have told you there is no logical excuse for it, just I didn't feel like it! It was my choice, which is rather ironically the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre, which I plan to incorporate into my Philosophy page as it seems to make a hell of a lot of sense (you making sense? That'll be the day......)

Un fortunately exams are looming, less than two weeks now I will be sitting my first exam, and exactly 2 weeks from now I will have just finished my second exam. That's kinda scary since it doesn't actually seem that long ago that I was still in Australia and that the University year hadn't even started - now I am almost halfway through the University year. BLOODY SCARY!

Now I have debated about the make-up of this news page. At the moment it's like a 70k document which is FUCKING HUGE for just writing. I am debating whether to break the news page up into parts (such as "Semester 1 2001" and then "Semester 2 2001) or whether just to keep it as one long long long document. I guess eventually I will have to do something. Similarly I am debating about whether I should fill this page with my dribble about what I am thinking - what's going on inside my head - or whether it should be more descriptive about what's actually going on in my life. As in "what did I do today, yesterday, tomorrow etc." I guess with the monotony of my life I would put everyone to sleep by just describing what's going on in my life every day - which is why I guess I inject a little bit of Philosophy. Feedback would be nice if you think that this page should be set out in a different way to how it is currently - I would be very interested. There's always the guestbook, my e-mail or (since I know basically the only person who reads this page personally), good ol' fashioned "Josh I think you should do this....."

It's scary how lonely University life can be, you're surrounded by 27,000 of the smartest people in the city and yet you could be in the middle of Fiordland for all the conversation you're getting. Sometimes I miss high school terribly, mainly because we knew everyone and even though we were sometimes pretty horrible to other people it was better than the embarrassing politeness that haunts University - at least you might have the guts to say something without it being completely out of place.

Somehow I have managed to get a day ahead of myself in my news entries - or is it that my watch has lost a day? Anyway it's pretty weird and means that I might actually be writing tomorrow's news, the great wish of every newspaper :).

I have updated my Philosophy page, for some reason I finally felt in the mood for it yesterday and I wrote a fair bit of stuff about what I believe that people are like and what I believe in. It's not complete, it might not even make sense but this is early days and at some stage I will be able to make my ideas run in a rather more cohesive fashion. My reason for this sudden urge to update my Philosophy page was that I noticed Dust Bunnie had decided to add a Philosophy Page to her web-site which I think's an excellent idea. While reading that I realised how much I needed to modify my page in order for it to make sense and come into line with the changes which have taken place in how I view the planet and human nature. For some reason it's rather more negative than it was before - but maybe one could argue that it's just more realistic. But I'm not a pessimist, the opposite being more the case so I do hope that I will be able to come up with an optimistic conclusion when I get around to updating the site again.

Meanwhile my life seems to be chugging along, my Geography and Philosophy essays are out of the way, while I have a Sociology 'thing' due in this Friday which hopefully won't take too long to complete (must remember that it's due at midday and not 5pm!!!!) although there might be a bit of work involved which I should get into today. Exams are looming, which is NOT so great because I don't think that I am where I should be in at least one of my subjects (Sociology), and that I will have to put in a lot of work in order for me to do well in the other two. Work is as boring as ever - although I did have a go at one of the managers last weekend because I didn't get my breaks which was fun! As for my social life - it exists!!! Which is a really good thing for me and hopefully things will continue to improve.

Hopefully I have posed some interesting questions for everyone (anyone) who has read my page in the last few weeks - I realise at times that I do have my own philosophy buried somewhere deep inside the complex fabric that is me and that it's my job to discover how that complex fabric compares with the well-explained philosophies that I study in my Phil152 class. At times I agree with the ideas of Plato, Hobbes, Rousseau, Freud, Marx and Hegel yet at other times I think their ideas are contradictory and are completely different to what I believe in. To write my own philosophy I would have to really sort out what I believe in and hope to justify it as the best way for people to live which wouldn't be an easy thing at all.

However, the entire 'post-modernist' view-point would bring that whole 'best way for everyone' idea into doubt. There is good reason to believe that we are all so different in our beliefs and our ideologies that it would be impossible for the thing that is best for me to be best for the person sitting next to me. And what is the point of having a philosophy in the first place? Why shouldn't we all just 'go with the flow' and see what happens without really worrying about whether your actions contradict your 'philosophy' in the first place. These are all very valid arguments, and it depends very much upon the individual as to whether they wish to follow a philosophy (as I think that I do) or whether they just want to 'take things as they come'. But then again, it could be argued that the latter is a philosophy in itself, and what use is it for me to follow a philosophy when I can't really describe what it actually is. Confused? Me too!!!

I know that I want to get maximum fulfillment out of my life - and I have some idea that fulfillment comes through happiness and through success or achievement as I have outlined in my Philosophy page, what is the best way to maximise happiness and success for me and to find the optimal balance between the two is the hard part for me and the part the keeps me guessing every day.

We are all on a journey of self-discovery, I guess at this point in my life I really am just discovering who I really am and what I stand for. The innocence of being a child has gone and I have reached a point where I need to find out what direction I want my life to take. This process began, for me, at the start of last year and is still far from complete.

It's hard to put into words who I am, I guess that I want to be a caring, kind person who lives by the "treat others as you wish to be treated yourself" quote. But then it's hard to keep that in mind with every action you take - spoiling yourself at times may not be a particularly bad thing.

I guess I am in the position where I have discovered as much about myself as I possibly can - now it's up to people who I meet and get to know (hopefully a girlfriend!!!) to discover parts of my personality that haven't been found as yet.

A whole second bunch of pictures should be available some time next week, as I have scanned in some more, while uploading them at the moment. Hopefully they should be easier to access, because of the decreased file size which means that they won't take forever to download to your computer and be visible.

I have to go to sleep... only have had 8 hours of sleep this weekend zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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My Page is now a year old!!! A year ago today (I think) I created my web-page as a place where I could post my University essays, as well as some writing about myself and things that I was interested in at the time. The history, cricket and soccer pages were the first to be built into my complex network, and this was followed in August by the addition of the Anna Kournikova page as I managed to get my own home computer for the first time. Since then advances such as the news page, the philosophy page, the cheetachat page and the chat friends page have kept all concerned very excited. The layout has become increasingly sophistictated, first with the addition of picture links and then with the drop-down menus.

There are a few people who I would like to thank for their invaluable help in the creation and maintenance of this site, first Nicole (DustBunnie)provided much inspiration about the layout of my page and with links to java code sources such as Lisa Explains my site had the nifty additions such as drop-down menus, messages in the status bar and many many other little tricks around my web-page (remember the little fish?)

Recently I have concentrated on maintaining and updating my news page, for which I have Rowan (x_chicky_x) to thank for in providing inspiration to create a news page as she has one on her site which is very interesting indeed (web-site will be found in the future and posted in future news pages). And finally my photo page has fulfilled the wishes of many who felt that my site had most things except that which is most common on all web-pages - a photo of myself. Fortunately my birthday present was a scanner which enabled me to complete my web-page up to what it is today.

What about the future I heard you ask..... Well hopefully in the future I will add some more pictures and organise them slightly better so that download times aren't so long as they are at the moment. I also hope to clean the page up - organise my cute little gif files and hopefully use them more frequently in ways that truly add something to my page. The philosophy page is bound to change, and I am debating whether I should keep the cricket, soccer and 'book' pages since I never get the time to update them. At the moment I guess that my site is a bit too large and undermaintained. To solve that I do need to put in some long hours to sort out everything and to provide new and exciting information to all my readers that will make them come back again and again and again. As an exciting possibility - my www.jarbury.rr.nu web-host are developing an e-mail forwarding service which means that in the future your e-mail address might be "yourname@jarbury.rr.nu" and can forward e-mails to your current e-mail address. Useful if you find that people are forgetting long e-mail addresses. Finally, the essay page which has developed far beyond just the subject of history will be updated soon with a Philosophy, a Geography and a Sociology essay having been recently written by myself.

So all in all, it has been an interesting year and the future looks equally interesting... happy surfing and I hope you come back!

Sadly my news addition from yesterday disappeared as my computer crashed. Typical after I had just written another pretty long entry (anyone noticed how my entries are seeming to get longer and longer?) My news page, which started off as a little something that I would write a few words on every day has magically transformed itself into the diary of my life. In a similar way that my e-mails to Jannatun last year provide an awesome archive about my year, hopefully this page will also provide an excellent archive about how my life progressed in the year 2001.

Exams are looming, which always gets my heart pumping a little bit harder with dread I think. Although hopefully things should be alright this semester considering that I only have three exams and that two of those exams are for stage one papers, which shouldn't be that difficult for me to do. Philosophy has been incredibly interesting for me while Sociology has its moments. The Sociology of religion is especially fascinating, explaining the role that religions plays within our lives, whether or not we are actually a believer. Very interesting stuff that I would like to know more about - strange how someone who doesn't believe in God like myself has always been fascinated by studying religion in history, philosophy and now sociology. Maybe it's because I can provide an objective point-of-view which may be harder for theists. Who knows?

An interesting conclusion is that personal relationships have taken the place of religion in many people's lives. We are now expecting our loved ones to provide the care and love that was (supposedly) provided by God when society was more religiously based. Is it fair that we expect so much from one person? Is that the reason why divorce rates have increased so much in the last few years? And on the last point, there is debate about whether a high divorce rate really is the sign of a sick society. Sure it does mean that there are more broken families which can have an impact on the emotional development of children (the lack of a father-figure etc.), but isn't it also a sign of a free society? A very low divorce rate may mean that people are living unhappy lives as they are forced (through one way or another) to remain living in a situation in which they would rather not be.

But then again, if we agree with the Marxist philosophy that there is no such thing as absolute truth and absolute right, only that which serves the ruling class then it could be argued that freedom is only valued because it promotes the ideals of the capitalist bourgeoisie. However this would be rather cynical and I doubt that Marx would agree with my twist on his theory. He does have some valid points though, which may pop up in some future writings of mine. And I do suggest that if anyone does care for some interesting reading, then the 30 page long 'Communist Manifesto' makes interesting and potentially enlighting reading - although Marx's diagnosis is far more logical than his cure in my opinion.

As one goes.... another one arrives... my Geography essay is complete (though slightly rushed on Thursday afternoon) and now my Philosophy essay looms - although admittedly it's only half the length it's still another essay.

University amazes me, the amount of intelligent people that are all clustered together in the one place is incredible. I reckon you could just be there, not enroll in any papers and not go to any lectures and still get smarter becuase of the immense presence the place holds. The entire 'critical thinking' attitude which brings into doubt every single pre-conception that you held, every little thing that you have taken for granted, it makes you wonder whether your parents values, beliefs and morals are really the best way of living life (as they drummed into you), and make you wonder if you can believe everything that people tell you or whether they don't have a clue about things just as badly as you don't. The main thing I have learned from University is that everything is complicated and that there is always at least two sides to every argument and always doubt about the 'right' answer. While people may argue "what's the point of all of this if the result is that we are more confused about the world than we were originally?" but I think that history shows that people who didn't look at both sides of the argument and who didn't critically analyse decisions have really fucked up human history.

As an interesting aside, I would like to comment on an action which has long been referred to as 'the necessary step which ended the Second World War'. More specifically, the dropping of nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I don't know about you, but I think that these two acts are the two single worst and most incredibly horrible acts in human history. To kill 200,000 people at once, on one day, through one bomb when you knew that would be the result is such an incredibly inhuman act that it puts into doubt any good feelings you have towards the human race. Sure, over longer periods of time events such as the holocaust are worse acts than the atomic bomb, but as a single act I think you would struggle to find something more inhuman throughout our history. Fuck you America! Imagine if a bomb was dropped on Auckland and every 5th person died....

Geography... geography.... geography..... my stressfull week continues with my geography essay still looming in my mind (you didn't guess??) semmingly 24 hours around the clock. I suppose that I will put my mind to rest slightly today since I did really get stuck into my essay and managed to get most of the research done. The only book that I still have really yet to read through I have taken out from the library and hopefully things will be OK and I will get my essay done in time. Damn McDonald's for making me work on Friday and not allowing me that free day to finish my essay, actually damn me for telling McDonald's that I can actually work on Fridays.

Unfortuantely I don't think that this year has been very constructive for me, I suppose that I have made a couple of new friends and I have kept up my good grades, but do I really feel any better than I did six months ago? It's an interesting question and I don't think that I could say, without doubt, that things are better than they were six months ago. My life desperately requires direction at the moment, some momentous event to enlighten me as to what I should really be doing with my life this year and where I should be directing myself. I suppose a good argument would be that I should be directing myself towards my degree and putting in my best effort so that my marks truly reflect my potential - but I really can't be that bothered. At the moment my constructive energy seems to get lost within the drone of everyday life and gets swamped by the destructive elements at McDonald's and by the stress of University. I guess I need a girlfriend, anyone interested??? LOL!!!

A diary has two purposes, the first to keep some record of what's going on in your life, and the second to somehow provide an outlet about your mental state at the time, somewhere for me to put my thoughts into words and to hopefully sort them into something that's a bit clearer than what they are at the moment. The first element making up a diary seems to have gone to hell in my last few entries, apart from the hugely momentous (hint of sarcasm there) event that was my 19th birthday. The good thing is that I really have put my thoughts into words in the last few weeks, hopefully you readers (are there any out there???? raise hands pleaseeeeeeee.....) have some idea about what kind of person I am, what goes on inside my head and what makes me tick. (Screwed, screwed and screwed you think......)

In my last entry I finished by asking "what is your moral code?" I suppose in response to that I should offer some sort of explanation as to what my moral code is (feel free to offer constructive criticism or an alternative). I guess that it's based upon the quote in my yahoo profile "treat others the way you wish to be treated yourself" in that I hope to achieve a position where I can't be accused of being a hypocrit. At times this can be hard, and you may find yourself treating another person in a way you would hate them to treat you - but as long as I don't do this too often I suppose that I can be fairly pleased with myself. This theory leads into ideas such as "equality" which I find very important in what I feel the world should be like. But of course things can only be taken to a certain extent and then you can get people taking advantage of the system - it's complicated you know....

You know when you sometimes feel as though your life is drifting, drifting into a direction in which you are uncertain whether you want it to go.... I suppose that I am in that situation at the moment, or maybe I am always in that situation and I am only just becoming aware of it. As I learn every day in Philosophy life is incredibly complicated and while it's easy to criticise it's bloody hard to offer and alternative. At the moment I sometimes feel as though I'm not in control of what happens to my life - I suppose that this is why religion exists. To explain the situations where what happens to you seems to be of no relation as to what I do, but is the result of some external influence.

I suppose that the way to avoid this problem is to 'get in touch with yourself' and to realise that you are the person who controls your life (if you take an Atheist point of view that is) and that what happens is really up to you, and that unexplainable 'thing' called 'chance'.

I seriously reccomend Philosophy to anyone studying at University, because it really epitomises what University is all about - the questioning of arguments and the counter-arguments that could be applied and their counter counter-arguments. This can be found in just about every single subject, from history to maths where an argument (or working in maths) is required to prove your answer (or conclusion in history) is correct. In a way a long equation is the same as an essay in that you are going to arrive at some decision based upon what you have previously found. Philosophy gives you that ability to take an objective look at your answer and to really decide whether it's the right way of doing something or whether you need to consider something that you didn't think was necessary before.

I suppose in a way this 'News' page is turning into my Philosophy page while my purpose built Philosophy page lies fairly idle with only the odd addition being made to it. Maybe when I get some more free time, and when I have further developed my own Philosophy and really given it some serious thought, I will be able to embark upon really putting into words what I believe in. In many ways this is the most important thing about a person - what is your moral code?