Best of 2025

Inspired by “Fogus’ yearly list of great things and people that I discovered, learned, read, met, etc.” - this is my version of what were the best things I discovered in 2025.

Main Stats

• Daily Steps (Avg.): 9158 (-7% - this is pretty bad: second consecutive year 10000)
• Aikido (Hrs.) 311 (-10% -still decent... I took part in few seminars this time, also I spent less time in Rostock all in all).
• Shodo (hrs) 23 (-56%) - Basically this year I mostly worked for Body callligraphy, and my teacher moved from Berlin to Dublin, so this is just an extimation based ot the few actual times where I can track having devoted time to Shodo... but it is still clear that I did not do much.

Fiction Books

I only completed 7-8 books this year, here is the "best of".

• The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi.
  A dense, unsettling biopunk vision of a future Bangkok where corporate power and ecological collapse reshape what it means to be human. I liked the style and the characters, but on second thought the world-building feels shaky: some key ideas—especially the energy storage “coils”—seem designed more for dramatic effect than for internal coherence.
• Bangkok 8 by John Burdett.
  A gritty, darkly philosophical crime novel that uses Bangkok’s underworld to explore morality, culture, and perception through a uniquely Thai lens. I picked it up after being intrigued by Bacigalupi’s take on Thailand; it’s engaging and often sharp, but the ending feels oddly underwhelming, as if the story loses focus just when it should converge.
• Kraken by China Mieville.
  A wildly inventive urban fantasy that turns London into a surreal battleground of cults, gods, and apocalyptic absurdity. If Perdido Street Station feels faintly D&D-inspired, this leans hard into Call of Cthulhu territory—fun to read, but I still prefer the Bas-Lag books
• The Thicket by Joe R. Lansdale.
  A raw, fast-paced frontier tale blending brutal violence, dark humor, and unlikely camaraderie in a coming-of-age rescue story. Not my usual read, but I picked it up to mine some genre tropes for an RPG campaign—turned out to be a solid, satisfying ride overall.

Technical and Non-Fiction Books/Papers

• N/A (alas)

Miscellaneous Web Articles

• ANTIQUA ET NOVA Note on the Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence A Vatican doctrinal note reflecting on artificial intelligence, emphasizing the ethical limits of AI and the primacy of human dignity and intelligence.
• Life Is More Than an Engineering Problem A wide-ranging interview with Ted Chiang exploring AI, language, and why human life and values can’t be reduced to technical or engineering problems.
• Jack Elam and the Fly in Once Upon a Time in the West A film-studies analysis of Aki Kaurismäki’s work, focusing on how his stylized minimalism, nostalgia, and use of gaze create emotional ambiguity and a sense of displacement in modern cinematic narratives.
• Lawrence of Arabia, Paul Atreides, and the Roots of Frank Herbert’s Dune An analysis of how Frank Herbert drew on T.E. Lawrence’s story to shape Dune, reworking its themes and characters into a distinct and more complex narrative.
• Flowers of Fire: Illustrations from Japanese Fireworks Catalogues (ca. 1880s) A collection of richly illustrated 19th-century Japanese fireworks catalogues showcasing imaginative pyrotechnic designs and early global advertising of hanabi craftsmanship.
• On The Death of Daydreaming A sharp critique of how smartphones have erased boredom and “in-between” time, undermining daydreaming and, with it, our capacity for reflection and fully human experience.
• Visual history of chessmen When you or I think about chess, what pieces do we picture? What pieces do people in other countries picture? What did people in the past picture? This is a timeline of chess set designs through history.
• Probe lenses and focus stacking: the secrets to incredible photos taken inside instruments A behind-the-scenes look at how probe lenses and focus stacking are used to capture highly detailed, wide-angle images inside musical instruments, revealing hidden structures as if they were vast architectural spaces.
• Clergy Blown Away by Psilocybin A long-delayed study reveals that most clergy who took psilocybin reported profound, often life-changing mystical experiences that reshaped their faith and ministry.
• An Introduction to Tribalism for the Modern World that has Forgotten it A polemical essay arguing that when trust in impartial institutions breaks down, societies revert to “tribal” power politics where loyalty and force matter more than law.
• A.I. Is About to Solve Loneliness. That’s a Problem A.I. companions may relieve severe loneliness, but loneliness itself has a human function we may regret erasing.
• Bourdain, My Camera, and Me Melanie Dunea reflects on her friendship with Anthony Bourdain and the story behind his iconic nude bone-marrow portrait.

Favorite non-book media and entertainment

I go to the movies mostly to entertain my mother, these were the best of the year (but this does not mean that, say, Dune was not good enough... I just did not see it):

N/A :(

Gaming

• I have managed to move forward (albeit at glacial pace) my Cepheus-backed Wild West campaign.

Content (produced by me)

Nothing significant.

Tools

• Alpaka Sling Good quality, very practical.
• AmazonBasics - Hard Shell Suitcase ABS Polyester after years of badmouthing people pulling trolleys around airports and stations... I finally caved in and bought a cheap, convenient one for short trips.
• Pocket Tripod not the sturdiest phone "holder" in the history of mankind, but it folds down to business card size, so it is really handy to keep around.

Services

• ChatGPT I suppose this does not need any introduction. I tested the waters for at least six months, using it sparingly and mostly to support my RPG campaing, and I finally decided toI have a separate account for actual business purfor fun/personal stuff.

Calligraphy/Art

• More Body Calligraphy Check this out, but please understand it is NSFW.

• I took part in the 53nd International Calligraphy Exhibit in Tokyo.

• 2 days Arabic Calligraphy workshop - in Berlin.

Martial Arts

As you can see from the statistics at the top I trained full time this year. My most "special" experience was training twice as a guest at https://aikidoteam.com/ in Egypt. For the rest, you can just consult my budp pass.

Food & Dining

• Octa cafe near El-Tahrir Square, Cairo.
• Zeeyara Restaurant in Al-Moez Street, Cairo
• XI Ramen a mano (Turin)
• Borlabor Budapest

Shopping

• No memorable (phyisical) stores.

Places

• Surprisingly enough... I spent one week in Egypt (mostly Cairo).
• I returned to Budapest after a few years. In a way it felt oddly "familiar": I went there always for short periods, I doubt I ever spent more than one full week in Budapest, but on the other hand it happened relatively often.

Art

2023 was so far my worst year, not much in quality, maybe, but in terms of dedication/productivity. Up until 2022 I managed to post almost daily, while in 2023 I sometimes let weeks to pass without producing anything.

It is of course too early to say, but I seem to have picked up the pace again in November/December. Let's see how it turns out.