One of the most important days of my life in Germany, June 2008

oh yeah!

Kafka

I had a very nice evening with Franziska.  We went to a place called Karma for dinner and then mosied our way across the street to the City Theater where we took in a Franz Kafka piece called “The Trial”, a existentialist tragedy in realist absurdism.  Originally a book, it is about a 30-year old guy finding himself arrested but he doesn’t know why.  He goes and meets various people in this building wherever he is and thinks it’s all part of this great injustice in his life.  Yet they let him out to work at his job.  Exactly a year after having been arrested, when he is 31, he might be arrested again and he kills himself.

The stagecraft definitely enhanced the performance which for me was often difficult to follow in German because of the purposely confusing speech by increasingly wacky characters, people half their heads shaved and a long green ponytail on the other side, and 10 people on the stage at one time dressed in white tights.  In the beginning the stage was at an angle tilting towards the audience.  It gave a sense of distortion and was unnerving as a beginning.  Later, when the tilt was slowly, mechanically corrected, on the rest of the stage behind it is in a few inches of water with a steady light shower of water on the stage in one long line.  They could put characters in the back of the water and when not lit, they were most definitely secondary and yet part of the rhythm of the piece.

The theater was full of teenagers from nearby towns who apparently all at 16 have to read the book, like in America we had to read “The Red Badge of Courage” or “A Separate Peace” or “Grapes of Wrath”, ya know?

We had good seats, in the 5th row in the middle but the acoustics weren’t so good and were uneven and with the discordant speaking made for a play that came out you in waves and pulses but not always as they’d intended.

His first week

I tell ya, Obama’s been president for a week and I’m already totally wrapped into the politics of the big almighty Stimulus Plan, 1-year to close Guantanamo Bay, and much more.  It’s hard to believe that this isn’t a monumentous time in human history and he and people who believe in him have a lot of work to do to implement the changes that he sees as America’s vision.

For his first week as president, I’d give him an 87.  Points off for agreeing to cut the family funding and the National Mall renovation (where the Inauguration was) and for putting too many tax cuts into the bill.  However, he does get extra points in my opinion for his first international phone call when to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and his first interview to Al-Arabiya based out of Dubai.  These were gracious, obvious attemps to restart new relations with nations and peoples who are of vital interest to the United States.  He has a lot to juggle, hell they can’t even find all the files on the guys from Guantanamo Bay!

But, I remain hopeful with anxiety.

Growing disappointment

Obama has been president exactly a week now.  I already feel disappointment.  It’s weird, because he’s attempting to be post-partisan and reach across the aisle to the Republicans.  Now I am all for people working together on important issues but I don’t seriously think that the Republicans are negotiating in good faith.  I think he is already putting too many tax cuts into the Stimulus Plan and in the end the Republicans aren’t going to vote for it anyway.  Hell, the Democrats don’t even need the Republicans to pass the plan.  Have we already forgotten how the Republicans treated the Democrats during the past 8 years?  Seriously, the Republicans completely ignored the Democrats and gave them nothing, never once compromising on anything.  The only times that ever may have happened is when the public overwhelmingly sided with the Democrats.

Now here we are, the country is in dire straits, conservatism and its “ideals” have failed.  The United States has tortured people, and now we learn that the White House can’t even find all the files on the detainees in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.  Can you imagine being held for 5 years in a black hole and when a light begins to shine on righteousness, they can’t even find the files in order to prosecute those who are really guilty.  Corporations that have taken TARP government bailout money are buying 50 million dollar French jets, not even buying American for god’s sake.  They take government aka taxpayer money and spend it on a jet.  They are spending government aka taxpayer money in order to lobby the government in order to loosen the rules on the TARP bailout money.  Policemen are using their taser guns with impunity.

And there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  It isn’t necessarily Obama but what he espouses.  Simple things like not torturing human beings is going to use LOTS of his political capital.  Can you imagine how far we have come? And please, do not give me some Jack Bauer “24″ scenario where there is a ticking time bomb.  Experts have testified that this has never happened as far as they know and yet that is what we were basing torture on.  It makes no sense.

Please Obama, don’t forget that the American people want you to change things.  You were given a mandate for this.  Negotiating with the very people who got us into this mess who are going to embarass you at every turn.  Hell, you had dinner with some conservative columnists last week and not only a week later they are all blasting him.  Why are you wasting time with them?  You know what you need to do.  Please do it.

7

Yesterday I bought 7 new books on Amazon. Don’t tell me I don’t take my job seriously enough:) It’s ok, I tell myself enough. Here are the books:

Paperback Oxford English Dictionary: 120 000 words, phrases, and definitions. Spelling-notes, Factfinder (Dictionary)

How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life (Signet)

Slang and Euphemism (Signet Reference)

How to Enjoy Your Life and Your Job” by Dale Carnegie

How to Win Friends and Influence People“ by Dale Carnegie

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms (Dictionary)

Merriam-Webster’s Vocabulary Builder

Images

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/01/the_inauguration_of_president.html

images of the inauguration from around the world.  And please watch the Daily Show from last night, absolutely amazing commentary about America in this moment… www.thedailyshow.com

Political analysis

http://www.haloscan.com/comments/farlio/1452610728626667331/

The above address is from a comments section of a blog called ‘Lawyers, Guns and Money’.  This seems to me to be a way to deal with the awkward situation of prosecuting high government officals for authorizing torture, another serious topic Obama has to deal with in one way or another now, just like the economic crisis, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, New Orleans still unfinished, tremendous job losses, Wall Street shaken, as is consumer confidence. This might be the best idea, here below, a commenter who also read the blog

Well, the sensible thing to do is to allow the torturers to be prosecuted by another signatory, with our approval, and to simply refuse to allow the US to be a party to the case for the defense. So I recommend the kind of sting operation that works so well with low level criminals. Send Cheney et al a “you have been invited to an all expenses paid trip to Lichtenstein/spain/etc…” and arrange privately to have them arrested by some hyperactive judge and prosecutor once they get there. Then the US government jumps backwards one step and says “we are unable to confirm that what you did was under color of US law because it violated our treaty obligations *on its face* and, oh yeah, sucks to be you.”

Vereidigung

I learned a new German word today: Vereidigung = Inauguration.

It’s been powerful to watch it on CNN in my living room. I am 6000 miles from home right now and in a way I felt even more “home” than if I’d been in California, probably driving my car to work or something instead of actually watching it.

It’s an exciting time in the world because shit is definitely fucked up but there is still hope on a global sense, if for no other reason in that technology allows us to see hope from all over the world.  There is hope.  That is what we are inaugurating today, hope.  It’s been a long time since there was that collective feeling around the world, right?

Stuff

The world economy is falling apart. I have felt a little bit of it with one of my two company jobs letting me know they won’t need me this year until at least October and the other one not having written me back at all.  Feeling the crunch a bit, I told one of my bosses I would work at 8:15am-9:45am the next 3 Mondays, just to stay in good with that employer. I am “down” to only five employers right now and this week I’m only teaching 22 hours, when normally I am up to 30 hours around this time.

But you know what? I am doing just fine.  I have enough money to live for all of 2009 without earning one penny.  That feeling along makes each morning easier to get up and go to work.

Today I took two trains and walked 15 minutes for a total commute of one hour and 50 minutes each way to/from work.  I didn’t start until 11:45am so that meant the 10:15am train would be right.  I taught 5 full hours today, teaching them about qualities necessary for getting a job, and then they interviewed each other, did a quiz on proper email etiquette and then finally I put them into groups of 6 and they had managment meetings for a major fashion retail chain.

Something that sucked about the experience is that after this long ass commute to work, I am taking my last step into the building when my winter jacket catches on the corner of one of the tiles next to the door and before I know it, a small, penny-sized square rip has shown up on my right sleeve. The innards of my nice, new waterproof jacket could be seen when I fingered the rip.

I am taking my jacket and one of my shoes to be repaired at different places tomorrow morning after my morning class. Both places will probably say a week.  They always say a week and I think, come on dude, this thing will take you five minutes and we’ll be done with each other. I have cash, I sing as a lullaby.  Nope, it’s gonna take a week.

But the jacket is just one of my many new possessions, along with hiking boots, a pair of shoes, a new travel backpack and today, after work while eating my oven pizza (was too lazy to cook the pork steaks, tomorrow for lunch!), I bought a new work bag.  The one I have now is okay, it is still in okay shape but the water bottle mesh parts are slowly ripping and the shoulder pad is breaking up and not totally comfortable. If I had to use this bag another 2 years, that would be perfectly fine but I saw a student today with a Timberland bag and I was totally checking it out. In the break he even showed me on the website.  74euros.  Ouch, that was way more than I wanna spend on a new work bag I don’t even need.  So I checked out the timberland site, nothing good and then to ebags.com, where I have bought bags in the past and they happened to have the final day of a sale on some Timberland work bags bringing the cost of one passable work bag from 69.99 down to only 25.99.  With the shipping a little more than 7 bucks to my parents in California and the current exchange rate at 1.31 (down from 1.44 a month ago), that Timberland bag (not the same one he has), this one:  http://www.ebags.com/timberland_reg/stratham_authentics_claremont_laptop_messengers_bag_closeout/product_detail/index.cfm?modelid=77229 is only going to cost me 25 euros.  Now, is it worth it to save those 50 euros?  I am travelling to California in March and will meet my parents in San Francisco and then I will pick up the bag there and bring it back here.  I won’t have the bag for 2 months.  I have to bring it back here.  Does that still make it worth saving the 50euros and the answer is…

Yes?

No?

And because I don’t live in the States, I am totally out of the loop on the inauguration and the whole “change” happening with the changing of the guard in Washington.  Tomorrow is a big day.

And that is stuff.

A Quick Exit

So we were sitting in a gay bar last night, the buzz having begun and Franziska and I left suddenly, around 11:20pm in order to catch a tram to bring us home.  I fear we may have left one of our friends there, her drinking wine spritzer and sitting next to a straight friend and surrounded by smoke and men.  I hope she’s not mad at me this morning!

Today: Work on the university newspapers exam, do a small workout, write in my book, do some grocery shopping and that’ll be about it.  There is good but cold as hell weather outside, I’m not too motivated to do anything and while that is a good feeling, it sometimes takes over.