The Virtual Life of Fizzy Oceans (41 page)

“Best ham in the world comes from Iowa,” says Randy as he eats voraciously. “At least it used to, anyway…”

After dinner, we do the dishes together: I wash and Randy dries and puts them in the cupboard. Day has turned to dusk (I’m sure Randy has maneuvered the lighting controls in his VL REP for my benefit) and the ambiance is perfect. We take a six-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon (Randy’s choice) out to the screened-in porch and settle onto a rocking love seat. Randy rolls a couple of joints of his homegrown, lights one, takes a pull then passes it to me. I, too, inhale the smoke, and as the high comes on the sounds of the rural night grow sharper, more distinct. The crickets chirp in perfect rhythm with Randy’s father’s Patti Paige record, which he is playing on the stereo. Over the eastern horizon the moon comes up and casts its gentle light on the feral fields. The cold beer goes down easy on this warm, humid evening, and I lay my head upon Randy’s massive shoulder. Ah, sweeter times in America…

Earth—the foundation upon which our existence is built.

I have an appointment to meet my good friend Trick Walkman in front of the Open Books shop, and when I transfer to the familiar coordinates he is already waiting for me. In Virtual Life, Trick is a poet; in Physical Life, Trick Walkman is actually Kenneth Rockford, an attorney practicing environmental law in the State of Connecticut.

On first consideration, the idea of an attorney parading around a virtual world as a poet might seem a bit out of character, but once you read Trick’s poems, which all deal in some manner with environmental issues of the day, the connection becomes crystal clear. At least that’s what Crystal and I thought when we first heard him recite some of his poems at the VBV. In fact, we were so impressed with the poems that we offered to publish them in a book entitled
The
Loyal Opponent
, which we eventually did. The cover we chose for the book came from an infrared NASA photo showing the massive ozone hole in the atmosphere above the North Pole. That was how I came to know Trick, and we have been friends ever since.

“Don’t you find it curious,” I say to him, “that in PL so many people end up doing something other than their most natural or dominant talent in order to make a living? Whereas in VL, everybody is more or less free to follow his passion? ”

Trick smiles as he answers, “That’s because VL is a silicon based world, whereas PL is carbon based.”

“I don’t follow you,” I tell him.

“In PL, you have a body, which is essentially made up of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. But take away the water and what you’re left with is mostly carbon plus a few trace elements. Now, your body needs food to replenish itself, which is also mainly composed of carbon. We find it difficult to live out in the elements, so we need shelter. With what do we construct our homes? Mainly carbon. In PL, we need to transport ourselves from place to place. What fuel propels our vehicles? Carbon based fuels. See what I mean?”

“Sure. But I don’t see where you’re going with this line.”

“Well, in VL none of that is necessary. VL is a silicon-based world. Our emulations are not self-generated or self-replenishing; they are projections within silicon-based circuits. They don’t need food, or shelter. And transportation is merely a matter of rerouting circuits. No petrol needed for that—just a couple of microwatts of power, which can come from any number of naturally occurring circumstances in the physical universe—electromagnetic (or solar), geothermal, gravity (or inertia)—even the nervous energy generated within our PL brains. So it stands to reason that if we are not saddled with the perpetual and rather clumsy burden of carbon maintenance, then we have the time and energy to pursue a different course than we might need to follow in PL.”

“Then you think it all comes down to elements…”

“So it would seem,” says Trick. “I know that VL does not seem to be physical in the conventional sense, yet it is a sub-dimension within the greater physical universe. It’s just a dimension that operates around a different elemental fulcrum.”

“I never thought about it that way,” I admit. “I just feel more comfortable in VL than I do in PL. Had it not been for Virtual Life, my existence would have been nothing more than that of a drone.”

“Well, Fizzy, you certainly do shine here in VL,” says Trick.

And now it is I who is smiling. Or at least the projection of (me) through a silicon microchip…

Of course we are not here to discuss the elemental nature of VL. We can do that any time. And since time does not even exist in the conventional sense here in VL, we probably have hundreds, if not thousands of (years) to figure out what makes this place (tick). Today, however, we are taking a little trip, Trick and I, to…China. That’s right! My friend Lili Xu, also an environmental advocate, has agreed to show us some of the less than beneficial side effects of China’s economic miracle—namely, the air pollution generated from the tens of thousands of factories that produce the goods that the First World can’t seem to live without. It’s a big deal, really. Because millions of Chinese are working as many as three hundred sixty days a year, living far away from families that they seldom see, making squat-all for their labor while the owners of the factories rack up millions, or even billions; and besides the human (or is it inhuman?) toll for all this, the atmosphere (and the rivers, too) are being so horribly polluted that they may never recover, even if the mass manufacturing ceased today! It’s all pretty hard to imagine, I guess, unless you are living the dream (or horror). I want to see it for myself, and Trick says he wants to see it too. So, off we go to Beijing!

Whoosh
…

We meet Lili Xu, a real beauty with jet black hair, Asian facial features and a slim figure, standing in front of a two story-high statue of Chairman Mao, his left arm poised at his side and his right arm extended and pointing (ironically) at a distant belching smokestack. The scene is an obvious non sequitur, and I can’t help thinking that if Mao Zedong himself could see what is happening today in China, he would either mount a counter-revolution to the People’s Revolution, or kill himself in shame and disgust. Contrary to Mao’s unyielding pose, Lili Xu’s posture is not like that of the former leader, or even similar to most Western personas; her body language is fluid, without resistance. Yet even as her emulation conveys an attitude of subtlety and tranquility, Lili Xu is all business.

“Welcome to my homeland, Fizzy Oceans. Welcome, Mr. Trick Walkman.” Lili Xu bows in respect.

“Thanks for the invitation,” I return.

Trick shakes her hand.

The sky overhead is stone gray, almost as if it were dusk; but it is not dusk, it is mid-day, and the effects of China’s industrial miracle are at once obvious. Of course I cannot smell anything here in VL, but if I could, I know I would smell the odor of burning sulfur, not to mention other pollutants.

“As you can see,” Lili Xu explains, “the air quality in Beijing is deplorable. It is also bad in Shanghai. In fact, sixteen of the world’s twenty most polluted cities are in China. One in five urban Chinese breath heavily polluted air. More than a hundred Chinese cities do not meet China’s own pollution standards. Everywhere the smell of high-sulfur coal and leaded gasoline permeate the air.

“The smog in Beijing and Shanghai is so bad that airports are periodically shut down due to poor visibility. In Shanghai, you can’t see the street from a fifth-floor window. Blue sky is an extremely rare sight. Fresh air tours to the countryside are very popular.”

“And all this happened in a period of about twenty years,” Trick comments.

“Yes,” Lili Xu confirms.

“Hydro-carbons,” the environmental poet says repugnantly.

“Coal is the number one source of air pollution,” explains Lili Xu. “China gets eighty percent of its electricity, and seventy percent its total energy from coal—most of it high-sulfur bituminous. Six million tons are burned everyday to power factories, to heat homes. Heavy traffic and low-grade gasoline have made cars a leading contributor to the air pollution problem.”

“An entire nation choking on its success,” I comment ironically.

“Sadly, you are correct, Miss Fizzy. But it is not so simple. Our leaders understood that a country as large as ours could not flourish in a post-modern world without industrialization, so they opened the economy to private enterprise. This change in philosophy and practice has brought many good things to China as well.”

“I’m sure you are correct, Lili Xu,” says Trick. “But you must know that the level of pollution we see here is unsustainable.”

“Many here in China—both scientists and members of government—recognize that what you say is true, and they are trying to make a difference. Yet we find ourselves in a Catch-22. A market economy has its own mind and its own momentum, and because policy, no matter how well intentioned it might be, is only implemented after the damage is already done, the pollution just gets worse and worse.

“According to the World Health Organization, only one percent of the China’s five hundred and sixty million city dwellers breath air considered safe by European Union standards. Another study done by WHO estimates that the amount of suspended airborne particulates in the air of northern China are almost twenty times what WHO considers safe.
”

“What is to be done?” I ask Lili Xu.

She turns her palms up and shrugs. “Nothing will be done,” she says, “because money has taught the people to love money more than life.”

Good-bye China (gasp)! Viva Mexico City (gasp-gasp)!

In just one generation, the air in Mexico City has gone from among the cleanest to among the dirtiest of all large metropolitan cities. Visibility, nearly a hundred kilometers in the 1940s, is now down to about one and a half kilometers. Three snow-capped volcanoes, Popocatepetl, Ixtacihuatl and Paricutin, were once a prominent part of the landscape; now they are rarely visible, and pollutants like nitrogen dioxide regularly exceed international standards. Levels of ozone are twice as high as the maximum allowable limit for one hour per year, but this level occurs in Mexico City several hours per day, every day. A haze hangs over the city most of the time, endangering the health of inhabitants.

Trick and I are here to meet with Pedro Cisneros, who owns an oxygen booth located at a busy intersection in downtown Mexico City. The price for one minute of pure oxygen is one dollar, and Pedro is
never
short of customers.

“Industrial development is a major cause,” Pedro tells us. “The population in 1950 was three million; today it is twenty million. And we now have more than three million cars on the streets.”

A woman pulling a shopping cart stops at Pedro’s booth, pays her money, and enters the chamber. She sits down then crosses herself as she breathes deeply. The oxygen she is breathing inside the booth is like the Holy Spirit filling her with life.

“
Gracias
,
Señor
,” she gasps.

Mexico City is two thousand, two hundred forty meters above sea level. Incomplete fuel combustion and higher emissions of carbon monoxide are the result of lower oxygen content in the atmosphere. Concentrated sunlight produces higher than normal smog levels, which prevents the sun from heating the atmosphere enough to penetrate the inversion layer. Not the best geographical location to build the largest city on earth. Yet, here it is!

“It’s not the pollution that kills people,” says Pedro, “but I guess some people die sooner than they would have breathing clean air.”

“It’s not the gun that kills people,” I echo, “but the gaping hole in the body made by the bullet.”

Fair enough?

Anyway, it seems as if Pedro’s got himself a pretty good business for as far as the eye can see. Which, come to think of it, may not be all that far these days. Especially in Mexico City.

If you were going to visit the most polluted city in America, where would you go? Well, don’t buy your ticket for LA or Pittsburgh. Not for Chicago or New York. Not Gary, Indiana or Youngstown, Ohio or Detroit, Michigan. Buy your ticket for Bakersfield. That’s right: Bakersfield, California. Care for a little car exhaust with your morning cappuccino?

But how can this be true?

Well, it
is
true; whether or not we want to admit it. Environmental degradation is not only for big cities anymore; it’s everywhere. And it seems to have come out of nowhere, while we weren’t paying attention. It happened while we were sipping Chardonnay and slurping oysters on the half-shell. Or when we were stuffing our faces with McDonald’s hamburgers, of Pizza Hut pizzas, or Pita Pockets. It happened as we drove our cars to the mailbox, or to the swimming pool three blocks away. It happened as we enjoyed the fruits of technology, and Ziploc bags, and disposable diapers.

Sitting at Otto’s Patisserie in Bakersfield, Trick and I deplore the fact that we cannot see the mountains that surround the Central Valley.

“Bakersfield is now the American city with the most fine particulate pollution,” reads a report from the American Lung Association.

The article serves as documentation for the obvious. I ask our waitress how she feels about Bakersfield’s air pollution, and she says, “Smog? What smog?”

Imagine that!

But I don’t know why I am surprised. These days, people seem willing to accept most anything if it doesn’t affect them directly, or immediately. Where’s the foresight? Apparently up in smoke!