Torcan: the Vortex and the Boar

Summers often hold hints of golden light and unforgettable good memories, but the summer of 2003 was not one of them. There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens. This was the season of disappointment.

Jan's plans for the anticipated trip to Asia had unraveled. She had been invited to Hong Kong, and asked to present her curriculum the summer of 2003, as part of the "one country, two systems" principle. In November 2022, severe acute respiratory syndrome, SARS, was identified in Foshan Guangdong China.

Colds and the flu are shrugged off by many people, but Jan was not one of them. China had previously been the breeding ground for the Hong Kong bird Flu, that had laid her low, in 1969. As summer approached the outbreak did not slow down. The World Health Organization issued a global travel advisory.

Jan cancelled her trip. The dreams of summer never materialized but fell apart before they began. Jan felt self-righteous and responsible telling herself, "It is not so much about me getting sick as it is about me bringing back a disease that could potentially spread and hurt others." The Iraq war and SARS had reduced the desirability of traveling to and from China. However, by late June 2003, the travel advisories were lifted. Huge increases in the China’s foreign currency re­serves and improvements in China’s international trading position, plus the Chinese government allowing citizens’ movements overseas, increased international tourism.

Jan's inflated ego plummeted as the reality of a business model that runs the world splattered it into oblivion. Without her ego blinding her, Jan was able to appreciate facts that altered the course of the future and threatened to leave the human soul void, and the prospect of the future, unfruitful and unfinished.

Jan sat beside the big brute computer, appreciating the breeze of her vintage Torcan electric fan that infused her soul. Torcan is an index used to estimate the likelihood of tornadoes. A vortex was sweeping up humanity. Torcan is also a name meaning wild boar. Mankind would have to assume the mythical traits of a wild boar, a species known to survive in diverse environments. It is the symbol of a preserver of a sacred past life, with instincts of fearlessness, wildness, stubbornness and courage in unforeseen confrontations.

In many parts of the world there were extreme weather events. Daytime temperatures were humid, hot and sweltering. This was one of the ever increasing warmest "extended summers" on record. Jan's universe reflected disappointment as melting glaciers in the Alps and Arctic dropped their tears as heavy rains. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, that tracks world climate, eventually confirmed that increasing world-wide temperatures and ocean and global warming were significantly caused by human activity.

The hazy dream-like state of denial of climate change was enhanced by politics and economics. In 2003, the 'word of the year" was democracy. In the year 2000, one of the most controversial elections concerned Al Gore winning the nationwide popular vote in the US, over George W. Bush by more than 500,000 votes but narrowly losing in the electoral college. Popular vote, public opinion and “An Inconvenient Truth” were ignored.

There is no changing the past, but it is a tragedy when mistakes of the past are repeated or solutions are ignored.

That summer, cinematic productions such as The Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, the Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, and Finding Nemo, revealed the power of superstition, fantasy, the allure of power, the reality of short memories, and the lack of discipline to resist following urges. Movies are window dressings that direct social awareness.

A niche market, fulfilling the desire for instant gratification, was met as Facebook and Twitter entered reality. The trend of individuals seeking and obtaining trending information from varying sources, faster than ever, left little time for reflection.

That summer, the breakthrough of new ideas and discoveries formed skeleton maps of events to come. The World Health Organization adopted an international treaty aimed at curbing the global tobacco epidemic. Smoking in public was banned in several countries. Obesity was considered a serious and pervasive health risk. The Atkins diet, based on protein reached its peak as did the deforestation of the Amazon basin, for cattle.

In 2003, HIV/AIDS pandemic had the highest number of new infections and deaths recorded since the beginning of the epidemic. Of the 8.3 million HIV-infected persons in Asia, 5.7 million lived in India. In Asia and the Americas, AIDS transmission was attributed primarily to various high-risk behaviors (e.g. unprotected sexual intercourse, often with sex workers and injection-drug use). About 64% of HIV cases were in sub-Saharan Africa. They were caused by poverty, weak healthcare systems, and cultural norms that encouraged high-risk sexual behavior.

The limits of science were tested. Ocean decline stories started reporting, that because of changing ocean currents, waste was creating the 'plastic' island larger than the state of Texas.

Mars made its closest approach to Earth in nearly 60,000 years. The universe was determined to be 13.7 billion years old; flat; and made up of 4 per cent “ordinary” matter, 23 percent dark matter, and 73 percent dark energy. What we know is far less that what we do not know. We are unaware of the forces that direct us.

The Human Genome project was completed, mapping railroad lines of known genes traversing large areas of what was called ‘junk DNA’, since shown to be instrumental in gene control. Media reported China’s genetic gold mine is a resource that would lead to the imminent “gene war of the century.” Genes can be used to help or cause diseases.

China had its first, one man run, spaceflight mission Shenzhou 5 , while the Space Shuttle Columbia experienced the tragic loss of crew members during re-entry.

China is resourceful. It followed Japan’s lead and began to acquire US debt.

The Chinese economic and industrial structure with large state-owned enterprises, lead the way, to overseas expansion. Investment in extracting minerals in resource countries and purifying and smelting them in metal processing plants in China.

In Canada asbestos was banned, for health reasons, in 2003. That year Chinese investments in asbestos mines increased. Asbestos production forms jade as a byproduct. Jade is a sought after commodity by China. This left Canadian jade sculptors facing short supplies.

Jan looked back over the years realizing humans are often blind to critical events that only become clear in hindsight. In 2025, the global population has grown by almost 2 billion since 2003. Previously it took 123 years for the population to double from 1 to 2 billion.

China's one child policy was not making a singificant global difference.

Since 2003, the mean individual income has increased, but economic inequality is still prevalent, with most of the world’s wealth held by 10% of the population.

Jan felt the quiet ache of what almost was. Life follows a sequence of events. The moon waxes and wanes and remains new or full for a short time. A cell spends most of the time growing and getting ready to divide. Now, the pace was accelerating. What was new and modern was disappearing faster than ever. There was no time to savour or prepare for the new human journey. The destination was taking humanity to a new place in its 4.6-billion-year history. Mankind was in the midst of the 6th mass extinction.

In 2003, data measuring global iridium, showed that the 5th extinction was caused by a meteorite that sparked volcanoes and climate change. Predictions warned that if the world's human population continued to rise at its current rate, threatened species would disappear. By 2025, human actions had put mankind on the road to becoming one of these species. The lack of a consistent global response and the lag period, between actions taking effect, were making prospects for the future dim.

The speed of new developments was slingshotting humanity into a fog of emotional and psychological amnesia, leaving many with a short-sighted focus. Jan was determined to adapt to see beyond the blur of change. Perhaps sharing facts and awareness could somehow help actions collide in a pinball world and create a new trajectory that could prevent the past from being slung into the future where it would be diminished into the nothingness of the summer that never was.