Out of Africa - wish I could have stayed

Out of Africa (Modern Library)


by Isak Dinesen

Great read. Hemingway said it was one of the best books written on Africa. I can't attest to that but it was a great read. Isak puts the charm in charming with her direct writing style. You wish you could spend a month with her and just enjoy her life. This book was written from a different time than the modern world.

This book makes me want to rent the movie again.

Red Plenty - Wow!

Just finished Red Plenty by Francis Spufford.  This book focuses on the Soviet dreams from 1940 to 1970.  Leaders span Stalin, Krushchev and Brezhnev.  Why did I read this book?  It addresses the economy of the Soviet Union and is an insightful read into Russian history during this period.  I like economics and history so it fits.  Not a lot of finance insight but this was to be expected.

The large picture nugget that was given to me from this book is the insight that Marx did not intend for the the Revolution to occur in a backwards society - as Russia was at the time of their revolution.  Marx referred to a revolution in a developed industrial society similar to England, Germany or the United States.  The workers would simply take over the machine and out the intellectuals that were stealing labor (this makes Atlas Shrugs such an interesting read).  The result is Russia took on a very complex problem.  How to build a socialist society from an agrarian economy to an industrial economy.  As the book reads through you see this was a significant oversight by the initial instigators.

To further complicate the ability to transition, Stalin removed the liberal arts (and related instructors to the gulags) from the universities creating vocational engineering and science programs at the universities to focus on developing industry.  A brain drain ensued pushing the theoretical modeling abilities back a generation. 

Linear programming was introduce to centralized planning giving the hope that supply an demand could be attacked through computer programming iterations.  True supply and demand is not as simple as algebraic applications and requires calculus to determine optimization.  While the Soviets were trying to pin down supply and demand through algebra, the West allowed for natural optimization through open markets.  Red Plenty tracks how the system used paper folders to determine the demand and available supply of over 300 commodities required to run the economy - to the extent there was one man in a room wheeling between folders updating each for a change in resource requirements.

The book then goes into the black market and how it operated.  An example was given of a factory that could not meet its demands and determined if they had an upgraded piece of equipment they could meet the demand.  There was not a possibility of ordering a new piece of equipment since they already had one that was an older version.  They decided to run a bulldozer through the plant as an accident causing an emergency need for the new piece of equipment - vs. just letting the authorities know that modeled demand was not deliverable with the older version of the equipment.  Meanwhile, the black market operators stole key pieces that put together the machinery that was needed to fill demand from another factory trying to increase its production.  Etc, etc.

So what's the take away from all of this.  Human nature doesn't change regardless of political or economic structure.  The key is how does information become transparent as soon as possible allowing markets to react efficiently.  A free market allows for the quickest exchange of information between rational investors.  As people, we are not necessarily better than others - we are just in a market that allows for a more transparent exchange of information.

We have had our share of failures in the West.  While Stalin was murdering millions and causing millions more to suffer in severe poverty, the United States was in a great depression with millions suffering severe poverty.  We have recently seen Wall Street deal makers and trusted investment managers hiding information from regulatory oversight.  The result is millions at the age of retirement seeing their wealth reduced or wiped out.  Transparency of information is critical to the success of any organization - large or small.

Let's ask ourselves about our own organizations.  Do we allow information to flow freely?  Is accountability transparent?  Can executives really see what is going on in their organizations?  Challenge yourself.  We are only as good as what we know.  While we smirk when we think of the planned economy, we may be sitting on our own little fantasy.

A Farewell to Arms

Just finished Hemingway's first book -  "A Farewell to Arms".  Hemingway taps into his experience as an ambulance driver to create a story of one on the Italian front.  "The Lieutenant" gets hit by a trench mortar and sent to a hospital in the rear wear he meets his girl (Catherine).  She is a nurse that takes care of him.  They fall in love but he has to go back to the front.  Shortly after arriving the Italian army is forced to retreat.  During the retreat the Lieutenant gets cut off from the main retreat and is behind enemy lines.  Eventually he is able to find his way back to the main body of the retreat but finds out the Italians are shooting all of the officers.  The Lieutenant jumps into the river to escape being shot in the head - Farewell to Arms.

The Lieutenant finds his girl (who is with child) back in Milan.  He knows he will be reported so he and Catherine row a boat across a great lake to Switzerland where they are politely arrested but allowed to live freely in the country.  They spend a winter in romantic wonder awaiting the birth of their child.  The story ends with the child being stillborn and Catherine losing her life shortly after the birth - a different Farewell to Arms.

The books is a great read.  It gives you a unique insight into the war during that time and is a great romance - guy romance. 

My next book is a Hemingway suggestion - "Out of Africa".  I will tell you of the hills outside of Mombasa.

Red Plenty

Ran across this book review in the Economist this week. "Red Plenty" is an interesting economic survey inside the Soviet Union. One might ask me why I would want to read about the Soviet economy post collapse?? The author posed an interesting thought. It is difficult to understand things clearly when you are inside the model. If the economic model is all you know then all your thoughts and attempts to solutions become framed by your situation.

It is going to be interesting to read this book and see how thousands of people thrashed about trying to resolve economic issues inside of this static framework. Is our workplace often such a closed economic system? Do you have a Nikita Khrushchev in the corner office?

This reminds me of a story about Stalin and the building of the Kremlin. When I visited Red Square the gentlemen showing me around mentioned that Stalin had several architects work on the plans for the main building. Two architects presented their different plans to Stalin at the same time. One building design was on one side of the desk and another building design was on the other side. Stalin said to go build it. Everyone was afraid to tell him it was two different buildings. So if you look at the building today, they built one building with one elevation on the left and another elevation on the right.

I will give you a full report when I am finished. As a side note - I found very few copies of this book in United States.

A Different Time

Those who know me well know I enjoy reading Ernest Hemingway. I am going through a reread cycle on his books and decided to start with "A Moveable Feast". Why did I pick this first? I believe to really understand Hemingway you have to read this book. It is a collection of short stories about his time in Paris during the 1920's. The stories introduce different people that he spent time with during this part of his life. It can be off color at times so don't read it if you are easily offended.

I think the overarching thing I like about reading during this period of time is how slow everything was. Life was simple yet fulfilling. In our time it seems like we are constantly trying to cram everything into every second or we don't feel like we are fulfilled - not Hemingway in the 1920's.

The stories focus on the life of Ernest and his first wife Hadley. They live a simple life in one of the poor quarters of Paris. They actually lived on top of a saw mill. Ernest's days consist of rising, walking to a cafe through the city, writing through the morning, taking a relaxed lunch and then spending an early evening with friends in the cafe's. There is a lot of drinking, but, it is Ernest Hemingway.

The people in this book influenced Hemingway's young life and the experiences produced his first book "The Sun Also Rises" (which I am reading now). "The Sun Also Rises" captures this generation known as the lost generation. Hemingway spent a lot of time in the mountains in the winter and in Spain in the summer. The trips to Spain are highlighted in "The Sun Also Rises". The trips in the mountains are used in "Farewell to Arms" which is a love story set in the Italian Front where Hemingway served as an ambulance driver.

The best story in "A Moveable Feast" is the story about F. Scott Fitzgerald (Great Gatsby). Scott was a piece of work and was adversely affected by alcohol. Hemingway writes of a trip the two of them made from Lyon to Paris bringing Scott's Renault back. The Renault had been left in Lyon because his wife (later certified insane) didn't like the top so she had it sawed off. The rains started so Scott and his wife left the vehicle in Lyon and took the train to Paris. Hemingway and Scott went back down to retrieve it. The adventure back up to Paris is classic and gives great insight to the tragic personal phobias Scott had.

If you enjoy and easy read and have an interest in Paris during the 20's - read this book.

Atlas Shrugged

I started reading Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged over vacation. I had read in many places what an awesome book this is but it's a sizable book and I decided it was best saved for a break from the daily routine. I have not finished it yet but it is a staggering read.

The theme of the book is complete control of economies by governments (the "Looters"). The concept of reallocating wealth to those that are neediest vs. rewarding the producers. The industrialists and creators of ideas decide the way to battle this is to go on strike - disappear. The result is all global economies in a downward spiral.

I am a bigger fan of economics than politics. The concept of the book challenges your thoughts on the responsibility for society to find the balance between rewarding production and providing a safety net for the less fortunate (in this book that would be those who do not produce).

The one hole I see in Rand's thesis is she points out that only the upper classes are destroyed in revolution. However, there has not been a society built like the United States - built on freedom of thought and capitalization of ideas. Previous revolutions have occurred against the ruling classes - royalty by birth - not by production.

We shall see how Ms. Rand wraps it up. If you like to read - you need to read this book.

The Risk Pool

I went out to Northern California to visit my aunt who is working through cancer treatments. The gentlemen (Dave) that she lives with gave a book to me called "The Risk Pool" and let me know when he read it he thought about my childhood. Dave's a nice guy and I thanked him for the book adding it to the stack.

I finally pulled the book out and read it this month. The story is about a boy who grows up in the late 40's and 50's in upstate New York. His father comes back from the war and decides he is going to focus on himself, eventually leaving wife and son. The mother goes into a shell and the boy eventually goes to live with his father for a few years before going back to live with his mother. While the connection with specific facts does not match up to my childhood several of the general themes do.

The main thing that does not match up is that I never new my father. My mother did not marry him and I have never had contact with him. However, my mother did marry a man, Walt, who I spent time with from eight to fourteen. All young men want a father and I thought Walt would be the person that stepped in. There was one problem, Walt was an alcoholic. Walt's primary hang out was a bar. When I was younger the pattern was I would go with Walt somewhere with anticipation of a Father and Son outing and he would end up at a bar, at first it was the Villa. He would hand me all the change in his pocket and head in. I would go buy some candy and sit in the car, for hours. He would eventually come out. On Sundays, he played bar league softball and would take me with him - quality time. They all drank beer and I was supplied with an unlimited supply of Coke. After the game, he would go to the bar and I would sit in the car.

Eventually Mom and Walt became serious and decided to live together. We moved to Union City (East SF Bay Area) into an apartment. His bar in Union City was the Eight Ball. This is where my relationship with Walt, his friends and time at the bar begin to match up with the Risk Pool. I was allowed to go into the Eight Ball and hang out. Since Walt was there all day it worked for me. Similar to Ned in the book, I learned to play pool and could pretty much clean up all players and have an endless supply of Coke and free pool. The owner of the bar, Stan, would eventually come back to the pool room and let me know the adults were ready for me to go home and have dinner.

Similar to Ned, I was "Walt's kid" - he was "Sam's Kid". Walt did things that in relation to me that his friends did not approve of as did Sam. I grew up with, by default, this large group of characters at the bar. None of the people were "healthy" role models, let me see if I can remember some names. There was "Wild Bill", a guy that drank like crazy at night and the weekends but put together steel frames for skyscrapers in San Francisco during the day. He was a 49's fan by the way. There was "Hawiian Pete", allegedly from Hawaii he would bury a pig in a fire pit on occasion and they would all eat it. "Big Dan" was a huge guy with a handlebar mustache, he was married to another alcoholic that drove us down the wrong side of the road on several occasions. "Lucky" was a merchant marine that was in and out. He took us up in a plane once, not for sure how much drinking was going on there but I suspect anyone named Lucky didn't drink and fly. "Don the muffler man" worked at a muffler shop. This guy deserves a whole paragraph.

Don lived in the same apartments as us for some time. I spent time with the kids of some of these characters if they were close to my age. His son was Donnie (of course). Don's drink of choice was rum and coke and I don't believe I ever saw him without said drink in hand - even when driving. He had a AMC Javelin that was built for speed at all times. If Don went from one four way stop to another he would reach 100mph between each one and maybe would only stop at selected ones. I thought I was dead on multiple occasions in his car. As to his parenting style, his wife had a piece of paper on the wall titled "Donnie's Sh#% List". Anything Donnie did during the day that was inappropriate was written on the sheet. When Don came home, first thing Donnie received a spanking for each item. At the muffler shop, the entire bathroom was covered with Penthouse centerfolds - every square inch. But my favorite story is when Don became angry with the apartment manager one day. The apartment manager was on the bottom floor of the apartments with only a sidewalk separating his door from the parking lot. Don backs his Javelin all the way up to the door of the apartment to block it. He then proceeds to knock on the door, scream at the guy then get into the Javelin and absolutely smoke the tires all the way out of the parking lot. I believe that was the last month that family was there.

So these are the people that Walt introduced me to. In the book, Ned and Sam reconnect as Ned matures and there is an ongoing relationship. Sam continues his alcoholic ways and is in and out of Ned's life until he dies of lung cancer. Unfortunately, or at least I thought at the time, Walt left us when I was 14 and that was the last I saw of him. Drinking and the "bar" was the most important thing to Walt - always was.

So Dave put me back in touch with that part of my life. It's something I have always put behind me and never really considered it as a life that I would want to live. However, it is part of the fabric that weaved me. When I was younger there were many times it embarrassed me but as an adult I can look back and see it was really something that I was placed into. It's a sad life for the people that see their drinking friends as their true friends - regardless of the sophistication of the atmosphere. The real friend is the drink - the people are just there to make them feel better about themselves.