World War Z notes; Warnings chapters 3 & 4

Disclaimer: notes transcribed as is, no editing has been made so as to preserve my original feelings as I read the chapter.

Part 1. Warnings; Chapter 3, Stanley MacDonald

Stanley MacDonald, veteran soldier of Canada’s army, first witnessed a “zombie” in Kyrgyzstan. Strangely enough, the transport from Nury’s account carrying Armani-man was headed for this same area. Stanley seems like a good man and a good soldier, helping to stamp out world terrorism’s financial support – drugs.
He reveals a macabre story. Following some massacre a lone survivor must have managed to escape. Stanley describes following the blood trail, the spot where the tracks inexplicably and radically change, the same spot where a right Nike shoe is found.
The trail leads to a cave. Carnage and mayhem are all that Stanley’s troop find. A one-sided fire fight, men succumbing to their own booby traps. They must have fled in panic to do so, a huge scramble to escape the atrocities against nature going on inside the cave. What Stanley describes is nothing short of a blood bath. His descriptions are not graphic by any means but the mind unhelpfully provides the necessary missing information.
It is after Stanley leaves the medical unit, where the left Nike shoe is found, that the soldier meets his first zombie.
He thought he was helping a survivor, but survivors have never been known to try and eat their rescuer.
A single shot to the head and the bewildered soldier is free from the clutches of the infected person.
Unfortunately, as Stanley was the only witness to this he then has to cope with his home country’s way of denying what he saw.
PTSD, exposure to chemical agents and other fancy plausible causes, because who could believe that the dead should try to consume the living. Stanley’s subsequent “evaluation” must have been seriously damaging to his psyche.

It is only interrogation when it is the enemy

World War Z notes; Warnings chapter 2

Disclaimer: notes transcribed as is, no editing has been made so as to preserve my original feelings as I read the chapter.

Part 1. Warnings; Chapter 2, Nury Televaldi

Nury Televaldi describes himself as an importer.
His definition of an importer is somewhat unscrupulous, his practices downright immoral.
He openly admits to importing boys & girls along with the usual drug trafficking and presumably anything else he can sell.

He mentions how he made many officials rich via his “business”, I’m sure he also made a pretty penny.
It seems Nury, and others like him didn’t think too much about any outbreaks. Not even near his old home in Kashi.
Max Brooks questions Nury about his practices and “air transport”. How to fool the officials if you are infected, thereby helping to spread the infection to other populations.
Hellfire! the way he talks reminds me of a human strain of bird flu some years back. Air travel was one of the worst culprits, purely because the signs of illness didn’t show until the person was already a continent away. Nury’s tale of a couple escaping to Paris is a classic example in how air travel works in favour of the contagion.
Nury than goes on to speculate that the infected husband may well have been the source of the Paris outbreak.
Gee, what a thoughtful couple. As Nury states, they must have thought the “West” had a cure.
He also mentions this event happened before Flight 575, although this obviously important flight is not elaborated on.

Okay, what he says makes sense here; if you escaped from some place, possibly dangerous, where better to hide than in a ghetto where people come and go everyday, or even disappear outright. A ghetto, even in a major city like London or New York are the perfect places for the infected to hide. A virus is an unknown factor but an infected bite mark – you can’t not know about the infection, hence escape with the hope of a cure. When that cure proves to be unattainable, hide.

The Potato’s Dance by Vachel Lindsay

LibriVox volunteers bring you 16 recordings of The Potato’s Dance by Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931). This was the weekly poetry project for March 22nd, 2009.

Running time=2m 0s (mp3@64kb)

World War Z notes; Introduction and chapter 1

Disclaimer: notes transcribed as is, no editing has been made so as to preserve my original feelings as I read the chapter.

Introduction
Max Brooks makes a good argument to his superior regarding the human factor. Reports shouldn’t just be about cold facts & figures, especially regarding any kind of human event, global or localised. It is important to remember what the human cost is on a personal level.
How else are we to learn from our mistakes, “our” meaning the entire human race.

Part 1. Warnings; Chapter 1, Dr. Kwang Jingshu

35 million+, reduced to 50,000.
That’s one heck of a dent in China’s population. What a way to open a chapter!

Dr Kwang Jingshu begins his account on the war with somewhat nostalgic reminisces on pre-war China, it’s politics and what average doctors were expected to treat.
A far cry from what is to come.
He muses about trying to find a village that technically doesn’t exist, in the dark, in deep rural China.
It doesn’t sound like an easy or comfortable drive but Kwang, being the good & concerned doctor he is, finds his way.
Although his mood suffers in the process.

This better be damned serious

Be careful what you wish for.
The villagers are afraid of the sick, Kwang’s grand cultural criticism may have some valid points but at least he doesn’t direct his anger at the villagers themselves.
He is a doctor first & foremost and proceeds to tell a most disturbing account, not only of the sick in their makeshift, cold & damp quarantine shed, but also of the boy.
We never learn of his name, only that his father is missing, his mother may be one of the weeping and that the boy himself is patient zero. The father is

Finding time is a strange concept

I’m tempted to start with dear diary but it seems silly somehow, diary though this is.

Last week was extremely busy and I hadn’t been able to find time to just sit down and read. My free time was taken up with sleeping and catching up on the lack of it, or by forcefully trying to remove a very large headache from my person.

I’ll be picking up World War Z again this week. Although I’ll have to structure the notes as this book doesn’t label the chapters, I’ll be marking them out myself instead.
The book is split in parts so I’ll be using those where I can, for the chapters I’ll be using the recollections from each person.
WWZ’s subject matter is very different from my previous two books and I am still a novice in creating a reading journal, it’s challenging project if a little daunting at times.
This won’t dissuade me, but I don’t think I’m up to reading a book per week just yet, like some groups and/or individuals have done.

ttfn,
raven