Poetry from the Blue Break Room 6

On the Meadow

In the fields of Hades, the soldiers run away

Talking of the greatness to be achieved today.

 

The rotting trees I have seen

The rusty sap I saw descend

The broken night skies I glimpsed in sudden lights

Scrawled into memory as poppies do blow.

 

And the dust swirls around

Squeaking about on the ground,

Whipping its tail of precipitate,

Hesitating, failing to find escape.

 

The grass ticks, and the tree tocks

The finger is glued to the trigger and the shoulder to the stock.

 

And if I lie here, thumbs frozen, legs broken,

And if I listen to the ticking grass and the tocking tree,

Who will ever know that I am here, and how long will I stay?

And what will become of me?

These fields and forests loom like palisades in my path.

 

And what should I do?

Should I stand up and die?

Maybe I shall lift myself like fallen trees do

From time to time.

 

In the fields of Hades the soldiers run away

Talking of the greatness to be achieved today.

 

And the dust that circles around,

The dust that settles on my scarlet clothes

And nibbles me away

Like cheeses on a silver plate

Seem to be as trapped as I am.

 

And in the distance, I hear the shrill voices of women;

I will never see them.

I hear the cocking of a rifle,

And the cries of lost children fluttering through the night.

 

And in the distance, I hear the clanging of canteens.

I will never quench my thirst.

I hear the fumbling of a magazine,

And the fuming of cigarettes hissing by my face.

 

The green prison bars ahead disable,

Fingers twitch, barrels smile,

And hateful embers impale.

Poetry from the Blue Break Room 5

Pushups

Camouflaged

Adolescents in rank

Furious instructors in black

 

The earth

Suddenly gets closer, then farther, then closer, then farther.

It is an earthquake, and the ocean pours over it

with salty water.

 

Suddenly, the ground stops moving,

and the wind stops howling.

 

Watch the menial labour of the ants below.

 

 

Poetry from the Blue Break Room 4

Why I am Here

Purpose unseen or heard

Doubt everywhere, emerging like a plague.

 

Then, stories from above

Come after considerable lag.

 

They shun the pestilence away;

I know now why I am here today.

 

Poetry from the Blue Break Room 3

This is Our Holiday

 

Candidates sitting outside, holding the cigarettes that

Cast syringe-like shadows from the street lamp overhead,

Which forms clumps of blurred silhouettes out

Of tired bodies on the carefree cement.

 

Wet circles appear with a plop

And mark their place within the darkness

Like muted fireworks on display

 

Two hours to kill after a long hard day

We will watch the rain and stay.

This is our holiday.

Poetry from the Blue Break Room 2

Pennant

Platoon pennant flies

Do we deserve to have it?

I can never tell.

 

 

Poetry from the Blue Break Room

Chatter

Filling the break room

Chatter of future leaders

“The Captain is hot!”

Week 2

Week 2

Monday

Before I fell asleep on Sunday night, I did some workouts in my room. I know I shouldn’t be exercising outside of training periods so that I can get enough rest, but ever since I’ve gotten here, I’ve lost some weight and gotten in better shape. I figured I might as well get as fit as I can while I am here.

In the morning, we had PT again, and then a topography class. Today was also our first day of first aid training.

First aid was especially horrible – I found the lesson content to be quite repetitive. Also, the civilian staff treat us like crap. Sure, the military instructors don’t make us too happy, but at least they respect our dignity. Not true with the civilians. The platoon is quite angry that people who haven’t gone through basic training are treating them so rudely. One female instructor with blonde hair is fond of putting candidates down.

Tuesday

We had morning PT from 0510 to 0545, and then we showered, ate breakfast, and then cleaned our rooms until 0650. 0700 was our inspection, and it went pretty poor for the platoon. They found a pubic hair in one of the platoon toilets. I don’t know whether to laugh or to fear the repercussions of not being able to keep the common washrooms clean as a platoon.

Next we had a drill for about an hour. We marked time (alternating knee 90 degree knee-lifts) for quite some time, and now my heel hurts from stomping the ground so hard when bringing my leg down. Next we had another PT – circuit training.

Again, we had first aid classes. A master corporal with the loudest voice I had ever heard yelled at us so hard that the entire platoon seemed to be petrified. It’s funny – 60 adolescents with beads of sweat forming on their noses, standing straight and looking forward at the roaring of a middle-aged, out-of-shape master corporal. I guess when you’re part of the masses, group mentality can have a positive feedback effect on influence.

At night, I went outside for a breath of fresh air and met a man named Vincent. He is married to a Korean woman, and lives in Toronto. He told me his life story, about his contracting business, how the military hospital gave him a drug that caused his stomach lining to practically begin melting away, and more. He is around 40 years old, and he has a huge house in Toronto with a swimming pool in the backyard. He has two sons, and he gets to visit Korea once or twice a year. I’ve only ever visit my own home country once. I wonder how long it will take for me to get what he has?

Thereafter, I spent a lot of time lying down on the grass outside the north doors with my friend, Young. We seem to click well with each other since we can freely talk about our feelings and thoughts on a variety of things. When I lie down on the grass and look at the sky, I also take my phone and play Claude Debussy and reflect. It doesn’t really help me with anything, but I like to think it does. To be honest, things can get pretty boring during basic even though you are so busy every day. When I’m not bored, it probably means I’m too busy to take a break from training. So when I get to lie down and listen to Debussy, I feel like I’m experiencing the “perfect boredom”, where boredom is appreciated in and of itself because it signifies freedom to me.

Wednesday

We had morning PT again – we were forced to hold the plank position for 2 minutes, and then had a 2 minute break. This repeated for 30 some odd minutes. By the end, my abs were made of jello. We had a short timing thereafter – I climbed down 7 floors, marched 300 meters to the mess, ate a breakfast sandwich in 2 minutes, marched back 300 meters, and climbed up 7 floors just to get to my room. This took about 10 minutes total. Thereafter, we had to prepare for inspection.

When we are preparing for inspections in the mornings, some people in my pod don’t help out with anything and sit lazily in their rooms while others are brushing floors, dusting nooks and crannies, and mopping. I wish the staff could be there to evaluate integrity and sense of duty, but then again, if instructors were there then people wouldn’t be lazy. I guess it can’t be helped.

One of the cadets here really angers me as well. The cadet is really experienced in the military, having done BMQ and reserve training before coming to RMC, but he can’t seem to correct other people’s mistakes without criticizing them or making them feel bad about themselves. Everyone is different, and some people won’t be able to perform as well as others until they have some more time to grow up or change, but putting them down is one thing I cannot stand.

I keep standing up for the cadets who often get made fun of, but I feel that this might make many enemies for me. At the same time, standing up against “bullying” is something I am proud of. I’m going to try to stop bullying on an after-action basis by having a frank, friendly, one-on-one chat with the cadets that do the taunting. Of course, everyone here is still reasonable, and deep down, they all want to become better people. This is why I trust my comrades even when they put each other down.

We had first aid for the rest of the day. This time, the civilian staff was an old Frenchman. He was so friendly and polite, that I actually felt like learning first aid for the first time. I wish all classes were taught with respect, but this is an impossibility because there are those that fool around and don’t listen when instructors are nice. For a subject such as first-aid, it is critical that everyone knows completely what they are doing. So I guess this cannot be helped either.

Thursday

Today, we had a free morning, and then an inspection at 0700. We had PT (physical training) after inspections today and I liked it a lot. It was running class, and they taught us how to run better. The platoon commander was watching from the bleachers. I ran extra hard for our Lieutenant Navy. I guess I understand now why the mere presence of an officer can be a big morale boost. I’m anxious to be able to boost the morale of my subordinates some day.

Next, we had first aid classes again. We performed CPR on adult and infant mannequins. Seeing 60 future officers crouched on the floor, carrying choking baby dolls and administering back blows was not funny at first, but the more I think about it, the more I laugh. Group mentality can make people do silly things and keep them from seeing the silliness of their actions completely.

At the end of the day one of our sergeants was very angry and gave us a long speech. He didn’t yell, and he didn’t disrespect anyone. It turns out that a quiet, lecturing can be the most painful at times. He commented on our poor morale, our inability to work as a team, our irresponsibility, and compared them to the expectations of an officer. His words were so true that I would have rather done PT than listen to what he said. One thing that remains burned in my mind is that he says that people can either salute you or your rank.  A captain that does poorly will receive only salutes for his rank, and nothing else. I never want to be saluted simply for the symbols I wear on my shoulders.

Friday

Finally, Friday.

We had morning PT involving chin ups and planks. Then we had a first aid review class. It was pretty uneventful like last week’s Friday.

Saturday

Today we went to the war museum in Ottawa. Although I had a lot of fun looking around at the various exhibits, we were given a sheet of questions to answer while touring the museum, and thus I couldn’t enjoy the museum as much as I could. On lunch break, Young and I walked to the roof of the war museum where a small field of poppies were in bloom. I can see why John McCrae was so touched by the poppy fields in Flanders. Will the later struggles in my military life be represented as such beautiful red flowers? I don’t even know if I will ever go through anything that physically difficult once I become a logistics or legal officer. So I feel guilty about thinking that I should ever deserve the blood red beauty of the poppy.

Sunday

We went to the cemetery today to show our respects to the fallen soldiers of past and present. We marched off the buses and made a circle around a large cross. We heard O Canada, The Last Post, and God save the Queen. The sun was in our eyes, and I could feel that many didn’t want to be there that day because some people were looking around with their eyes while the songs were playing instead of looking straight and concentrating their efforts in silent reflection. After, we were given thirty minutes to roam the cemetery.

They say that this is one of Canada’s oldest cemeteries. I saw tombstones dated from the the 1700s. If I ever die on a mission, will I be visited by hundreds of recruits and officer candidates? It is a sad thought that I can’t seem to avoid. What I really learned today was that it is not one tombstone that makes a war cemetery, it is the efforts of all soldiers that die in combat that makes a war cemetery. To that effect, I will make sure to at least try add to that effort more than the average officer does

Week One

Day 1

We were very busy on the first day. We had a 1.5 hour briefing in the morning then went upstairs to clean our rooms. Even though people had been sweating all day they couldn’t take a shower because of a lack of time. Next we went to the drill hall to be evaluated on military drill. We were there for almost three hours. We marked time like there was no tomorrow. I remember my body heat fogging up my glasses. I still dont understand how marching can possibly make me sweat so hard.

My section’s sergeant is a woman and to be frank, we are all intimidated by her. At the end of drill she made us do pushups. She did 10 one handed pushups while keeping a smile on her face. It was the epitome of fear.

After drill we had lunch and then we were sent to the barbers to have our heads shaved. One by one we filed in and lost hair clumps of individuality. They made us purchase various things we would need for the rest of our course. The total amounted to 200 dollars worth of goods. The whole thing took the entire day and when we were finished we had dinner and then were sent upstairs to go clean our rooms and polish our boots.

I volunteered to do then laundry for my section so I headed down 6 flights of stairs carrying 8 smelly laundry bags. I washed and dried the contents of each bag. It took the entire evening. Luckily I brought my LSAT book to study while I was there. From what I remember it was a fucking oven in the laundry room – close to 40 degrees. Spending four hours there was quite depressing and I felt quit dehydrated.

An entire day spent cleaning rooms and common areas and doing drill. We were told to wake up tomorrow at 0630 hours. I crashed on my bed without time to shower.

Day 2

First thing in the morning was physical training. We woke up to the barking of a master corporal. Apparently we are supposed to wake up no later than 0600 at the mega. He filed us into the hallway and intimidated a lot of the cadets. We grumbled later on about how we were ordered to wake up at 0630.

In any case we proceeded downstairs for physical training. It was quite hard – a circuit of pushups situps leg lifts planks and lunges. Each exercise was followed by a 0.4 kilometer sprint. Somebody threw up but no body could break formation to help her.

Next we headed upstairs for a shower then cleaned our rooms. We were inspected by our section sergeant then we filed downstairs for a stress management briefing. The instructor gave us time to relax and turned on an audio file with a man with a relaxing voice talking about mountains. somebody joked that it was Morgan Freeman talking to us in that recording. That class was a life saver. Many were already on the edge of fatigue.

Next we had another physical training period. We ran pretty hard for an hour. My section won a relay race but the prize was “pride”. I was half expecting extra time for showers. At shower time I slipped and fell, bruising both my knees in the process. I recoiled in pain and also missed my 8 minute window to take a shower and change. Rubbing against other sweaty men, I just changed back into my uniform still soaked in sweat.

At lunch I smelt disgusting and I lost my appetite.

This was followed by a briefing on winter combat, and then a class on how to tie Swiss seats – restraints made from rope that are used as harnesses for rappelling. They were bound so tight to our bodies that some people discovered bruises and rashes on their hips when showering later in the evening. We joked around slapping each other on our bruises – at this point anything other than training is fair entertainment.

As I did the laundry in the evening I got symptoms of a cold. I also bumped into a sergeant while marching in the hallway and was told to watch my step. I told him to fucking move out of my way. He had long hair and was wearing civilian clothing so I assumed he was a recruit. when I realized he was a sergeant I quickly apologized and wished him a good evening. I am anxious to see that nothing comes of this incident in the following days.

course is pretty bad but I’m getting a strengthened appreciation for every freedom I had in my life.

Day 3

It is the first of may. We started the morning at 0500 hours. We did a long run. The same girl from before threw up during the sprint portion. I am worried about her health but her determination in the face of difficulty gives me strength. My bruised knees hurt pretty bad so I appreciated every bit of morale strengthening I received for the barfing girl.

Next we ran up to our rooms on the sixth floor to shower and get ready for inspection. Our sergeant gave us 25 pushups at the end of each of our inspections. A master seaman told me to never say the number 22 again because it represents the vingt-deuxieme regiment and we are not good enough to say the number. I was told to pass it onto the rest of my platoon. The next person to say the number 22 will give me another 25 pushups.

Next we spent the rest of the morning being taunt how to properly polish our boots and do other menial tasks.

We ha lunch and then shuffled to the quarter master to be issued kit for the course. It took 8 hours and my legs were tired from lugging three bags full of equipment up to the sixth floor. I was also assigned the position of platoon commander for the evening and the next day. I had to organize the un packing of the entire platoons issued kit and the preparation of a standard for the fighting order for tomorrows field day fir leadership assessment.

My leadership position started off horribly. The common area became crowded with equipment and there was general chaos and disorders because we had a 30 minute time limit to get everyone their three bags of kit that were randomly piled into a small room.

Fortunately we succeeded and I was able to organize the platoon for tomorrow morning’s field expedition.

I have 60 pairs of eyes looking up to me for the next 24 consecutive hours. Will I be able to lead? I am nervous.

Day 4

Today is LPAC day – leadership potential assessment course day. We woke up at 0430 and I lead the platoon to breakfast. Then we filed out equipped with full fighting order. One person forgot their bush cap and so the entire platoon had to wait on her while the sergeant jacked me up fir failing to ensure everyone had their equipment. I found out that a close friend of mine couldn’t form up with us because he was sick and barfing. I later found out that he was diagnosed with bronchitis.

It started raining. We boarded the buses. I couldn’t sleep a wink the hour drive to the Farnham training area. Once we got there though we had a lot of fun. I got to slide down a rope from a tower to cross a river. I also got to rappel off a 34 foot tower.

Later we were tested on our leadership. We were given an obstacle and had to lead a section through the obstacle in 20 minutes. I did a bit better than average. Although I am disappointed at the outcome I am confident that I will improve my leadership capabilities throughout this course.

At lunch time we had barely twenty minutes to secure our kit, march tot the mess, clear out of the mess, and resecure our kits again. I still do not understand I got 60 people to do this in 17 minutes but my assessor commended me for it.

During LPAC four people lost various kit. I organized search parties to find them and luckily we found them all. The consequences of losing kit would have been lots and lots of pushups. I am glad I was able to lead the effort to search and find the equipment. The feeling I got when some platoon mates thanked me for saving them from an evening of pushups was unreal. I want to feel this way for the rest of my life.

I ended the day getting ready for tomorrow morning’s inspection. I passed off my position to my second in command. And felt relaxed for the first time in 24 hours.

Today I learned one important thing about leadership. Even though a leader has the power to command, a leader is also accountable for the performance of his people. Thus, the leader is much more dependent on his people than the people are. A leader must be able to squeeze out the last drops of performance from his people by persuasion in order to excel.

Day 5

Quite uneventful. We had morning physical training and a briefing on conflict resolution. We then went over how to set up our ruck sacks and gas mask carriers. Our first weekend commenced at 1600 hours.

Everyone is busy organizing the standard for the newly expanded inspection standard. I can’t stop looking forward to the weekend. They say we only have one physical training session and two inspections during the whole weekend.

That just about sums up my first week at the mega. I hope to be able to learn more about leadership in the weeks to come.

Training Log: two days before the start of BMOQ

A view of other rooms that house poor souls like mine.

I’m spending this summer doing a Basic Military Officer Qualification Course (BMOQ), and I will keep a training log that I can update maybe once or twice a week so I can keep track of my summer. So here’s the one for yesterday:

Changing up Breakfast

Spinach. It's not gonna kill you.

Yeah, I’ve been putting on quite a few pounds the past year. In fact, 20 pounds. It’s a freshman’s 20, except I’m in military college and I exercise quite frequently. What’s the source of my weight gain? I think it’s my diet.

Life is like a Plane Ride

“Know where you want to go in life”

I remember taking the Korean Airline to In’chon International airport in the summer of 2006. When I got on the plane at Pearson International, the pilot told us that we would land at In’chon in exactly 13 hours and 51 minutes. Now, if you know anything about flight, you would know that headwinds and tailwinds, as well as turbulence affect the speed of the plane enormously. In fact, for 99% of a flight, the plane is off-course. The pilot simply adjusts the plane’s direction constantly so that it does not veer off-course too far.

What freaks me out to this day is the fact that we landed at In’chon International exactly 13 hours and 51 minutes later, like the pilot said we would. How did the pilot do that? How was this possible?

Escaping to Queen’s

Military college is great, but nobody can argue the fact that its military foundations can cause school to be a bit more tedious than their civilian counterparts. I often find myself pressured and singled-out when I’m at school. I think it has to do something with not respecting authority and not following orders during my first year of schooling .

So I like to study at Queen’s Stauffer library. I get to catch-up with my civilian friends from high school, the atmosphere is casual and pleasant, and there are a lot more books here than at Massey library. The air conditioning is great and the temperature is just right. I always get my best work done at the library.

Stauffer library is a 50 minute walk from my dormitory.

Time, I Am

I woke up this morning and I took one look at my alarm clock on my book shelf. Its tin hands face away from each other and cut the clock face vertically in half. I bolted up and brushed my teeth while I moisturized my skin for a shave. I shaved while I anticipated putting on my bathrobes. I walked to the shower and took a bath only to dry off and return to my room again. It’s been about 6 minutes since I bolted up 6 minutes ago. Now.

I anxiously read the morning business news, checking for signs of economic weakness. They say that there will be a hyper stagflation. I spend my time hoping for the economy to tank. It’s all in due time. I spent 54 minutes here. It’s been an hour since I’ve woken up. The market wasn’t open yet. It is closed. It will open in another hour. I am on time, I am on top of time, and I am in control of my time.

I am not a BIG FAGGOT

I have a good friend of mine who used to post things on my wall with such enthusiasm and friendliness that he often forgot that there are other people besides myself who look at my wall. Examples of his posts include the following:

Enjoying Past in Present

Starting from the 2009 posts, I grinned while I read my own writing from high school. How fun it is to see how guilty I felt when I hadn’t done my fair share of work in a school project. How funny it is to read-up on my previous cult-like adulation for Epik High.

How fun it is to see how much of a big deal I made out of losing weight. At the time, I felt that it would attract viewership. I was correct, but I also made an absolute fool of myself in the process! I’m just lucky that the majority of my viewers were also of my age and wisdom.

I think I’ve realized the value of keeping a diary or personal blog. It helps oneself to consolidate thoughts and form them into goals. It also places constructive pressure upon the self to stay on track with one’s own goals given that the goals are published online for everyone to see!

I think I’ll be keeping this blog up-to-date after all. The benefits of a personal history greatly surpass its costs in time and effort.

The Tradition of Raising and Lowering the Flag

What is the importance of Flag Duty, and how bad could it really be at the Royal Military College of Canada?

Map the Soul

Epik High introduced a new album last week: Map the Soul.

When you buy it, it also comes with a book that Tablo (lead rapper) personally wrote. I can’t wait to get my copy.

In fact, I was so elated that I took nearly two hours to write this short message to the members of Epik High a few days back:

Karaoke

Today I went to Yonge and Steeles to go and meet some of my dad’s friends. They’ve been practicing some old school music from the 70′s and 80′s in an amateur “band” or so to speak. so I felt really out of place. But after a while, I surprised my self by having a good time – relating with people who were, perhaps, thirty years my senior.

I tried my best to sing those oldies songs – like “up where we belong” and “kokomo”, etc. but then I added in a few new songs like from epik high and sg wannabe etc…. the whole teenage kpop list. I was surprised by their open-mindedness to the music of today.

As you know, I’ve been having this awful cold. It made me sing out of tune and I can’t count how many times I cracked my voice. It was okay though – everytime I made a mistake I kinda smiled a sheepish smile and the older women laughed… I found myself doing that more and more. Maybe that was kinda off the wall and/or inappropriate… whatever I had fun teasing them ^_^.

As I sang those few songs tonight, I really began to think to myself – so much so that I sometimes stopped looking at the tv screen with the lyrics on it and kinda paused a bit – just thinking to myself.

I never really had true respect for seniors. Because of my Korean heritage, I bow to them, I greet them respectfully and I am generally well-mannered towards them. But I never saw 40-50 year old men and women as potential friends before.

I think what I learned today is that the youthfulness within people never disappears – it just appears less often as time goes by. The people I met today were just like me – albeit a bit differently dressed and behaved, but altogether a bright, jovial bunch of high spirits.

Teens today are too caught up with people of the same age. Sometimes it pays off to spend some time with those who are younger than us, and those who are older. Our seniors indirectly teach us a mentality that is mature and beyond our current knowledge and wisdom. Our juniors indirectly remind us of ourselves in our youthful stage; we may benefit them with the knowledge gained through our experiences and also receive from them an essence of something eternal within us – our own jeunesse (youthfulness).

Thinking in this mentality rings a famous line from Louis Armstrong’s song – “What a Wonderful World”

I hear babies cry I watch them grow
They’ll learn much more than Ill never know
And I think to myself… what a wonderful world

What better way to end this post than with oldies song??
-Eric

Fixing Corrupt Word Documents

So I was working on a Calculus summative on Microsoft Word when some of the formatting started to go all out of wack.

I saved it, and re-opened it and got this file error:

The Office Open XML file Unit 1 Summative.docx cannot be opened because there are problems with the contents.
Details
Unspecified error
Location: Part: /word/document.xml, Line: 2, Column: 208781

… like what the heck is going on?? I have to turn this in in less than an hour!!!!

So I downloaded about 10 programs that claim to “fix broken word files”, and tried them all – not even one of them worked.

That’s it- now I’m really pissed.

I researched on the web and found out how to extract specific XML files from word documents. Apparently, if you rename yourdocumentnamehere.docx file to yourdocumentnamehere.zip, you can gain access to the file structure within the word document.

From here, I opened up the document.xml and searched for Line: 2, Column: 208781. At column 208781, I found the specific .xml tag I’m looking for: “/m:e”. The slash at the front of the tag tells me it is an ending of the tag, so I then basically I scrolled around trying to find the beginning of the tag that looks identical to the ending, except without the “/” at the front. After thirty minutes of searching I found “m:e” and then deleted everything between and including “m:e” and “/m:e”.

I then saved the document.xml and then converted the .zip file back into a .docx file.

OMG it works again!!!! I lost about a paragraph of information, but it’s better than nothing.

If any of you guys ever have the same error, try my method out. If still having problems, contact me via e-mail at ericchoi53@gmail.com and send me your file – I’d be happy to fix it up for you ^_^.

Game Theory in the Dark Knight

The past few days I’ve had a fever and it’s escalated very high today – I promise to continue posting up to 2 posts per day when I feel better

Anyhow, I have been lucky enough to enjoy the “Dark Knight” in 1080p blue-ray!

While watching it, and especially during the opening sequence that features the clowns robbing a bank, I couldn’t help but notice the unbelievable amount of “game theory” that was being implemented in Joker’s plan.

Game theory attempts to mathematically predict behavior in strategic situations, in which an individual’s success in making choices depends on the choices of others.

Here’s a basic game, called the “Pirate Puzzle”

Three pirates, A, B, and C, arrive from a lucrative hunt with 100 pieces of gold. Pirate A is stronger than pirate B, who is stronger than pirate C.

The strongest pirate present on the boat suggests a way to divide the gold. If the majority of pirates disagree with the deal, the strongest pirate is thrown overboard and then the next strongest pirate comes up with a deal, and so on. On the other hand, if the majority agrees with the strongest pirate, the deal is passed. In addition, Pirates value their life over gold.

How will pirate A take the most gold without losing his life?

No, it’s not an even split. In fact, pirate A only has to give pirate C one gold coin and keep 99 to himself. Why?

Pirate B will most certainly disagree with pirate A’s deal, since he gets nothing. In the case that pirate C votes against pirate A, pirate A will be thrown overboard. When that happens, only pirates B and C remain. Pirate B can easily just take all the gold because even if pirate C disagrees to pirate B’s suggestions, there’s only two pirates and it’s a 50/50 vote. Therefore pirate B gets to keep all his money and pirate C get nothing.

Thus pirate C is happy to get anything at all – 1 gold to be exact.

Let’s examine a case in which there are 4 pirates, A, B, C, and D.

Pirate A needs to give out only 1 gold again. This gold piece goes to pirate C. Why?

Let’s say that pirate C votes against pirate A. Then only pirates B, C, and D are left. Then pirate B only has to give pirate D a gold piece and keep 99 gold pieces for himself – pirate C will be helpless. Therefore, pirate C votes in favor of pirate A because 1 gold is better than nothing.

So now that we have a basic understanding of games, let’s move on to the Dark Knight game.

The original plan of equal division is flawed. Each robber has incentive to increase his share by killing a fellow team member. Once a member performs his job, he loses his negotiating power and value to the team. The Joker plans his strategy by instructing the robbers to take out fellow teammates once their tasks are performed.
Many of the robbers fail to see they can be victim to the same deceit they pull on others. The second robber on the rooftop is a prime example. After his partner disarms the silent alarm, he quickly kills him and then proceeds to perform his own job. He doesn’t see the same thing could happen to him. After he disarms the bank vault, he is greeted with a most unpleasant surprise:

Robber: Where’s the alarm guy?

Vault guy: Boss told when the guy was done, I should take him out. One less share, right? [opens the vault]

Robber: Funny. He told me something similar.

Vault guy: What? No! No! [gets shot in the back]

By now it’s clear the Joker wants everyone dead, and minutes later we learn the Joker has been present on the job all along. The plan finishes with two more deaths both involving the escape vehicle bus.

The Joker, being the “strongest pirate,” was able to sequentially bribe the weaker robbers one by one. In the end, he puts a twist on the game by taking the whole pie.

As you can see, there’s a reason why game theory, as an applied math, is very useful for corporations and economics. With game theory, we can always find the best outcome for ourselves.