Monday was my first official day of class as a graduate student here at APU. I had two classes, Introduction to the Asia Pacific Region II, and The Environment and Natural Resources in Monsoon Asia.

My Intro to AP class appropriately began with some confusion over which lecture hall we were meeting in. Apparently some bureaucrat in the administration wing scheduled the class for room H101 at the last minute, instead of H202 like it was originally planned to be in. This was a huge pain because these two rooms are on, obviously, different floors. So for the 10min or so before the professor showed up students were nervously shuttling up and down the stairs between the two rooms unsure of where to wait. Finally Michael Caine, oops, I mean Prof. Jeremy Eades arrived and herded all the wayward students into room 202, the original one.

Prof. Eades hails from Britain, and my APU Graduate School Faculty handout lists his previous accomplishments thus:

• Specialization – Sociology and Anthropology of the Asia Pacific Region
• PhD (Social Anthropology) Cambridge University, UK
• Associate Professor, Dept. of Cultural Anthropology, University of Tokyo, Japan
• Professor, Dept. of Social Systems, Shiga University, Japan

So, this salty ol’ Brit kicked off class by having us all introduce ourselves and what our field of study is, then gave us a hilarious and yet serious overview of the current and future developments of this region. One wise-crack of his that I thought I might share with you was this (and if you can imagine Austin Power’s voice right now, do so…)

“Oil, ladies and gents, tends to be located in places the US just doesn’t like very much…” Understatement of the year, that.

The rest of the class was bland but necessary orientation info, however he did leave us with one thought to ponder until the next meeting: If China attains a national level of development equivalent to that of South Korea, which it is projected to do within 2 decades, every year it *alone* will require 2.5 times the current world output of oil. South Korea, while highly developed, is nowhere near Japan or the US, and yet if China reaches that level, out of its sheer size, its energy needs will equate to two and a half times the entire world’s yearly supply of oil… one country, over twice as much oil as we can pull out of the ground… What does this mean? It means anyone who tells you there isn’t a fossil fuel problem is an absolute idiot for starters. Furthermore, what isn’t even stated in that tidbit is that India is developing right along behind China, and it too will require mammoth amounts of oil to sustain its economy, and it too has a negligible domestic supply. Obviously alternative energy sources, solar, hydro, wind, are going to become major commodities, but oil itself will still be around, and pretty soon Japan isn’t going to be the only country in Asia that desparately needs it. Enjoy that $3 gallon of gas while you can folks, it’ll go down in the short-term, but by the time my kids are driving it’ll be a wholly different game.

My next class was the Environment and Resources of Monsoon Asia, hosted by Prof. Paiboon Pramojanee. He is from Thailand, and is most definitely a shuffling, kindly old man much in the vein of yoda, and with similar articulatory difficulties. His bio reads as follows:

• Specialization – Ecology and Management of Land use in Thailand
• Doctor of Science, Tokyo University, Japan
• Director, Center of Academic Service, Walailak University, Thailand

So Paiboon, as he asked us to call him, gave us an overview of the most basic meteorologic and geologic principles in action in the monsoon region. This consisted of some brain-numbing weather diagrams explaining Hadley cells, Rain-shadows, and the like, coupled with some painfully simplistic diagrams of Plate Subduction and Orogeny. Essentially, it was a review for the people in the class who had a non-science background, of which there are many. For Shamik, my Indian geologist friend from Calcutta, and I, it was stab-me-in-the-face boring. This is ok though, it can only get better. Paiboon-sensei’s spoken English is just good enough to be understood if one is concentrating completely on what he is saying. This presents problems for note-taking, and even more problems for day-dreaming. For 90min twice a week I am going to have to really channel my brain in his direction, it’s almost like meditation…

That concluded Monday. Those classes also meet on Thursday. Today I had another two classes, but unfortunately the second one only meets once a week, so it is a gloriously awful 3hrs long. 12:30pm this afternoon found me in Seminar Room 5 for my Theories of Environmental Policy and Administration class. The presiding professor is Prof. Francisco P. Fellizar, bio as follows:

• Specialization – Environmental and Natural Resources Management / Human Ecology
• PhD (Public Administration) University of the Philippines
• Dean, College of Human Ecology, University of the Philippines, Los Banos

Interestingly enough, that bio doesn’t tell the whole story. He began with a BS in forestry, then earned an MS in Environmental Science. Later on he went back to school and earned an MS in public administration, and then ultimately the PhD. In his professional career he has served both the Philippine government as head of environmental policy, and did a three year tour at the United Nations in New York as a representative for Southeast Asian environmental policy. Why do I know all this? Because unbeknownst to me, Fellizar-sensei has been waiting for me to show up in his class since the day I was accepted. You can imagine my shock when immediately upon entering the classroom, Prof. Fellizar looked straight at me and said “Mr. Heath? I have read your research proposal and I think it’s very interesting…”

*Cough* *Cough* What?!? Let’s be rational for a moment here. I am new, not 1st year new, not 1st semester new, but 1st week – 1st DAY new, and this professor has not only taken the time to find a picture of me so he can recognize me immediately (I wasn’t the only Caucasian male…), and has not only read my research report, but intends to discuss it with me on the first day of his class. I just about died. So once again we all introduced ourselves, this was a much smaller class with only about 9 students, most of which were 2nd year and international public administration majors (booooo!). And after a short introduction from Prof. Fellizar he sets into his intro lecture on the functional aspects of environmental policy and administration.

The real kicker though, is the entire time he’s talking he keeps referring back to my research topic and is throwing thesis ideas at me left and right. It was wild. For example, his lecture went something like this- “In this class we are going to not only examine the national and international environmental policies applicable to the Southeast Asian region, we are also going to see how those policies play out on the ground, and what factors influence their ultimate effectiveness. For example, Mr. Heath, there’s a conservation initiative in the Philippines and Indonesia called NIPAS that you might find interesting. A detailed case study on how effective their policy implementation has been on the local preserve lands, coupled with an analysis of what factors, trade for example, are affecting the outcome, would make a very nice thesis I think. So you see everyone…”
It was awesome. This guy isn’t just blowing smoke either, he’s worked at the UN people, and here he is legitimately interested in my research ideas on the first day of class… wow, just wow.

After that mind-blowing 90min I had a short break and then began my once-weekly 3hr marathon known as Theories of Sustainable Development. Prof. Zhang teaches this class:

• Specialization – Growth Theory, Trade Theory, Urban and Regional Economics, Economic Dynamics, Ethics, and East-Asian Philosophy
• PhD (Economics) University of Umea, Sweden
• Associate Professor, Jonkoping International Business School, Sweden

This is another case where the bio I’ve been given doesn’t do the teacher justice. This fellow was head of the Chinese government’s equivalent of the EPA for many, many years. Furthermore, he’s a bit of a famous figure in China because after spending so many years working for, and researching in China, he essentially got the heck out and became a Swedish national. It’s fascinating to hear the Chinese graduate students speak of him as they talk in hushed, reverential tones of his background. He is extremely well-respected for his environmental work, and yet now has reached a sort of iconic status after having given up his Chinese citizenship.

Unfortunately for me, Prof. Zhang’s ability with my native language is also limited, although he’s a regular Cicero compared to Paiboon-sensei. I’m going to have to start packing some serious caffeine if I’m going to make it through his class though. Today was 3hrs of GDP and about a dozen other development indexes I didn’t even know existed. Economics are obviously a core part of Sustainable Development and they can’t be ignored, but I wish they didn’t have to come in 3hr chunks!

This class was very large, perhaps 50 students, and to my utter disgust a good many of them chatted throughout the entire lecture. It is widely reported that Japanese high school students can be pretty rowdy in class, but I expected better of graduate students. Having an audible conversation with your neighbor while your professor is talking is just flat out rude. Two Japanese ladies two rows behind me were being especially obnoxious, even more so considering I was sitting in the front row so they were maybe 12ft from the professor, tops. After 30min or so of their chitchat I had had enough. I turned around and very politely with a smile on my face, said “Excuse me?” in Japanese. Taking the bait, they both stopped talking and looked at me kindly, waiting for whatever charming request this cute American boy might ask of them (a date perhaps?). Then I dropped the smile and switched to a stoney stare-down and said the Japanese equivalent of “Shut-up!” They were shocked and didn’t say a word for the entire rest of class. My Chinese friend Gong, who was sitting in the row that separated me from the Japanese girls, nearly shot the water he had been drinking at that moment right out his nose, he was snickering so hard. I’m paying good money to come here damnit. I’m not about to miss out on a lecture because some retards feel like having chatty-kathy time right behind me.

Finally at 5:40pm we were let go. Tomorrow I have a bank account opening session at 1:30pm, and then at 4pm the first of what will be many research meetings. I’m not sure what the timetable is for assignment to advisors, but I very much hope I end up with Prof. Fellizar, I think we would be a perfect match.

Take care… and don’t talk in my damn class!