BipolarLab.com

The new year has finally come. It was time for a long break to Greece, to spend time with the most important things in our lives, friends & family (& bipolar dogs). Hopefully 2008 will be a year of new discoveries, less friction, love and health for all.

I am counting my first few minutes back at the IOP, a very British colleague/friend is just asking whether I am happy to be back, I am saying NO to him and we laugh at each other. He gets very defensive of his country. I’ve always liked to tease the Brits telling them how bad it is living in their country… mind you I have spent most of my adult life studying and working in Britain. It is a great country, no question about it, and people here know how to respect each other. They have a peculiar culture though and a level of social intelligence that makes it difficult for “foreigners” to understand and accept them. They take their time with people and they have lots of social rules to follow.

Spending time in Greece and going back and forth makes you appreciate all the differences between the two countries and people. Greece is such a dynamic country. We are still evolving down there, financially, politically, and socially. Every time I go back there will be some scandal or some “big event” happening - be it a burning country or more lately corrupted politicians jumping out of their office windows because their sex and political corrupted lives were exposed. People observe these events with disbelief and naturally have little respect for a system that does not respect them or takes into account their needs. But I guess some progress is taking place, corrupted people have started to jump out of their windows and even go to jail. Maybe this is part of a process of self-repair. Who knows? We can only hope that the country is evolving towards better days.

Many of us who left Greece to study and then work in “exile” wish to go back and do their bit for our country. We are trying but it is not easy, the greek system is self-destructing in a way, supporting the very own people that abuse it. If they could all jump out of their windows. I have been trying to setup a Greek charity for bipolar people in my dad’s memory and just before the formal founding of it, this corrupted politician decided to jump out of his window. His glorious jump consequently exposed how the different greek governments have been using NGOs to do their money laundering. The hell with it, who needs their money anyway, but I could do without the negative press about NGOs.

I am glad my previous post about T.S Eliot and poor mushroom stayed up for so long. It gave a good laugh to my participant and her family. Keeping people entertained and engaged throughout this project was the least I could do. They did so much work to help me see this through. Hopefully I will be able to deliver back by producing a descent thesis and hopefully a few good papers. I know there are many good things in there - but I am struggling to grasp what I really have on my hands. On one hand I am thinking…great you have produced a mini-mega trial (3 months daily data of approximately 35-40 people) and on the other hand I am feeling that I need more participants to answer some of my questions.

Luckily we still have my student’s web study going on that is getting close to having our first thousand participant, and it may balance things up or save the day with some of my questions but it all comes down to actually starting to write things up.

Anyway, no time for great and long posts this time. Hapi New Year to all, as one of my greek members wished to me (Hapi in greek means pill)