The short:
I am not a city boy.
I know how to chop wood, service the car, install electrical and heating systems, build a bike, a geodesic dome, a piano, record a musical performance, fly a para-glider and a few more things.
I also cook fresh meals from my vegetable garden, bake sourdough bread that is sometimes based on chestnuts or acorns, and pizza in my wood-fired cob pizza oven.
Professionally, I am a Physical Geographer turned spatial data wizard. Data analysis, logical and semantic modeling, harmonization and transformation are my thing. And colorful maps that tell a story.
I like technology that works for us. I see a lot of technology that works for someone...
The long:
I have been interested in our great big world, audio engineering and computer stuff for as long as I can remember. After earning my Masters Degree in Physical Geography, the "opportunities" for environment-related work were not huge. I was headhunted into a spatial-IT company, where I learned proper programming and taking part in large IT projects without ever really planning for it.
Meanwhile, I also started a small company called Throb Audio, where I designed and built very high quality custom loudspeaker systems. Eventually, I ended this company because most customers wanted the same thing, and building the same box many times grew old... Audio engineering is now a hobby again.
After almost a decade, I then decided that it was time to move my focus back to my academic background and started working with the Geological Survey of the Netherlands (part of research organization TNO). Here I became more and more involved in European and global geodata related projects, through which I had the opportunity to travel and interact with people from all over the world.
Along the way, I realized that so often datasets that important decisions are based on are not used to their full potential or in a downright wrong way. This happens just because there is ambiguity in the meaning of the data itself or the presentation and people make (wrong) assumptions because of that.
I also learned that there are ways to improve this situation by analyzing and describing all details and subsequent standardization in publication and visualization. This has pointed me further toward data analysis, transformation and logical and semantic modeling: the modeling of meaning.
During my non-work-related trips, I have experienced a fair bit of the world that is not at all like the Netherlands, my ultra-regulated home country: I have independently traveled by recumbent bicycle from Ulm in Germany to Istanbul, Turkey, and by folding bike from Mumbai to South-Goa in India. I have also crossed through India by public transportation a few times and trough Baha, Mexico, Costa Rica, Armenia and most of Europe. And by car through Outback Australia and a few American states. I worked as host on the overnight sleeper-train Alpen Express to winter-sport destinations in Austria just for fun and hiked the Tour Du Mont Blanc. I have also soared high above many peaks and valleys under my own paraglider.
The most valuable thing that I have realized during my trips is that people everywhere just want to live an enjoyable life and that we "need" so much less than most of us in the western world are using without even thinking about it for a second. This goes for energy, things, technology and also money and has inspired me to try to minimize my own use of resources as much as I can. And to focus on the things that really matter.
During 2022, I have decided to enjoy what I like to call an "in-between pension" and have all time to myself. With unlimited time available, I spent a lot of it in my garden and succeeded in being nearly self-sufficient when it comes to vegetable consumption. I also did a lot of work on home-improvement, so that I can now use even less energy than before. I installed solar PV, developed my own Arduino based energy monitoring and eliminated gas-use. My house now delivers more energy back to the grid than it consumes.
Thanks for reading this far!
Cheers, Rob