Holland #9

I was just in Holland for the 9th time last weekend.  The flight from Basel to Amsterdam was delayed 4.5 hours and I ended up making it to Leiden at 10.30pm instead of 6pm! haha, oh well.    Met Janet and Maya at the at the station, and we soon found ourselves with some small beers in front of us.  Also, an Egyptian guy cheated us at dinner by charging airport prices for our small water bottles and then giving us the wrong amount of change.  Didn’t matter and we made it back to our nice Holiday Inn in the Business district around 2.30am and drank some more wine and laughed at bad TV until around 5am or so.

As you can imagine, we were a bit tired the next morning and made it out into the city around 11.30-12 and it was a great day to be in Holland because lots of little kids were dressed with cute little costumes and black-painted faces for Niklaas, a day more important than Xmas for them but with the same sort of feeling.  There was a great market and after a fantastic tomato soup, we walked around for hours, sometimes in rain, sometimes clouds and we did some xmas shopping, had a waffle and walked around more and more and once it was dark we started drinking those little Dutch beers again, got to hear some local people singing Xmas songs which was really cute and then met a weirdo named Ben who took us to a different bar than the one we were looking for but we some interesting people there.  Then we got some lasagna somewhere else and one of us — no name will be given — wasn’t handling her alcohol very well and we ended up getting a taxi around 11pm and going back to the room.  The other two of us had another beer in the bar, a snack and then we called it a night.

Sunday, we had time to walk in the rain, looking for a place to eat, found a small cafe and we all had pretty good food but it all looked weird! A train to the airport, waiting awhile and then flew home.

I’m super tired today, thank god I don’t have to work but I have a lot to do and I’m going to get started soon but wanted to give you a short version of the weekend.

Also, Happy Birthday to my roommate, Simone!  But she doesn’t read this blog anyway…

a facebook response to a wingnut

1)I did not know it was a Navy SEAL. However, how do we know the guy was a terrorist? Seriously? Was he convicted in a court of law? If we have eye witness accounts of him throwing a grenade or laying an IED on a truck route or something, we have evidence and we put them on trial. That’s how our system of justice works, period. I understand that our soldiers are in harm’s way and I have nothing but the utmost respect for them. They have the courage to do something I don’t have the courage to do. I hope they come home safely as soon as possible.

2)That article you sent doesn’t actually prove that torture works. In fact, we know it doesn’t because people will tell you whatever you want them to say when you torture them. Sleep deprivation and waterboarding are illegal. Either we are a nation of laws or we aren’t. Using all means necessary, as you say, means we are not a nation of laws. Waterboarding has been considered torture since the Spanish Inquisition. Please understand, the United States put Japanese soldiers to death and imprisoned them for waterboarding our soldiers. Why are we allowed to do it now? I believe in the Geneva Conventions, no matter how inconvenient. It has been an international system of justice for 60 years, and for us to forego that means that we are not the country we were. I refuse to let terrorism change our nation that way. Yes, they are bastards and cocksucking pieces of shit who should put on trial when caught and executed as our system of justice allows. Torturing them allows people like Bin Laden to recruit more terrorists. And what about torturing an innocent person? What if the person who got the fat lip, I know, bad example, was really a farmer who lived near the person the SEALS were looking for. Do they have the right to beat him up to get information out of him? What does that teach them about American values?

3)With regards to our forefathers not having Boeing 747s in their lives to deal with all and all that jazz, that is what made them so genius. They made the Constitution flexible to change over time. It can be amended to deal with today’s world and it has been amended many times. We have 26 amendments now. They amended the 4th amendment to include the FISA court to listen in on phone calls. Why? Because they understood that it was important to be able to listen in on possible bad guys BUT they still need to get a warrant to do that. To get that warrant, you need probable cause. No probable cause, no warrant. Bush broke that thousands if not millions of times and there are penalties for that. 5 years for each instance.

Now you say “War on Terror” and blah blah blah but we never officially declared war on any of those nations. Only Congress can do that. Unfortunately Congress were spineless following 9/11 and let Bush do whatever he wanted, until he wanted to do immigration reform but that’s another story. And we have imprisoned people for YEARS and given them no trial. I believe it is the 6th amendment that gives EVERYONE, not just Americans, the right to a speedy trial. Holding someone in a detention cell, whether in Cuba, off the coast of South Carolina, or Romania, Lithuania or Afghanistan is illegal if they do not get due process. That has been the foundation of Western Law for almost 800 years and I don’t want to revert back to the 1200s to deal with people who live like it’s the 1200s. We capture someone. We talk to him, offer him cigarettes, hope to get information out of him but without evidence, sorry, we have to let them go after a short amount of time. That’s how our justice system works.

One big difference between us, I think, is that I this is a law enforcement matter and not a military matter. I don’t think that having 250,000 troops and just as many mercernaries (I realize they don’t all have guns but) in the Middle East is the way to improve our national security. Why not have a soldier standing at each park as security if you’re so concerned? Dude, don’t let the terrorists win. If you are afraid to take your child to the park, they win. If you think you won’t go to New York because Khalid Sheik Mohammed is going to be on trial there, the terrorists win. They want you to change your life, to step on our system of laws and be bad guys, just like they are.

4)Healthcare: I don’t go to the doctor’s in the States anymore, really, I live in Germany and have 6.5 years but spend a couple of months a year in America every single year but I have been following the health care debate closer than probably 98% of the people in the United States. I have not heard about these questions being asked but personally,I think we need to know about every single person that owns a gun. Hell, Christianists in Congress today want to get involved in who can have abortions and these are the same people who want LESS government involvement. It makes no sense. Unfortunately, the majority of democrats have negotiated the farm away with the Blue Dogs and 1-3 Republicans to get the health care bill to where it is. I’m of the opinion that wanting to help people get health care is a good thing and it’s something Jesus would have wanted probably. Jesus probably would have been a socialist, even.

5)I am for the troops but we also have laws and rules. We are not monsters, that’s what separates us from those terrorist bastards but we better make damn sure we know who is a terrorist before busting their lip or we are just monsters too. By the way, the President’s biggest job is not to secure our nation but to defend the Constitution. That’s pretty explicit.

6)Funny you bring up France. They have what is considered the best health care in the world. Anyway, the fact we can disagree so vehemently is one of the great things about America. I also think that if we could get through all the filters to the real information, you and I would agree on probably 66% of most major issues.

Afghama

fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

I’m going to be asleep tonight while the president of the United States makes what I think will be his biggest mistake to date.  He’s made quite a few mistakes probably, Geithner as Treasury Secretary, not taking a more hands-on approach to the health care debate and not repealing DADT but tonight at 8pm EST I think, Obama is going to explain to the world why sending 35,000 more American soldiers in the graveyard of empires is absolutely necessary for the national security of the United States.

What are our strategic objectives in Afghanistan?  Are we staying to help prop up both that government and Pakistan, and to keep Pakistan from freaking out about India moving into southern Afghanistan to fill our void?  Why can’t we afford health care for our citizens but we have to seek out and destroy dudes living in caves like it was the middle ages?  I thought we elected Obama to make changes.  Having a surge in Afghanistan is not the change I voted for.  Now, and this is a big, BUT, if he were accelerating withdrawing troops from Iraq and then sending them to Afghanistan for a tour for this big strategic push, “fine”.  But now we will deploying nearly all of our available soldiers to the most corrupt place on earth?

Our economy is hanging by a thread, the banksters are lighting hundred-dollar bills and reading about poor rich people having to sell one of their vacation homes, Sarah Palin’s bus tour is really an expensive plane from place to place and America’s citizens can’t get the help they need to get back on their feet and instead of healthcare, something that lets people sleep a bit easier at night knowing that they can get the care they need if they get sick, we’re going to spending that same amount of money (on the credit card or are we paying for it upfront?) on sending some soldiers to their FIFTH tour to hell.

This better be one hell of a speech and I just had the worst thought.  If I am lucky enough to live to be 80 years old, will there still be US soldiers in Afghanistan?

A big thanks for my life

I was sick yesterday and did not sleep well and woke to find that I am still sick.  A big thanks for my life because I don’t have to work today.  It’s true, I could have been earning a lot of money but the semester ended anyway and so I don’t have work on Mondays until the new year.  I am so grateful that, if I want, I can stay home the whole day and recuperate.  There is stuff I can do here, like my lesson plans and organize my desk and all that jazz and since I have to go into the city to work tomorrow morning, most of the other stuff that was on my list of plans to do today can be pushed back one day.

I have not seen Franziska for more than a month now.  True, we have skyped often and I’ve even seen her on video a few times but you’re kidding all of us if you think it’s the same.  I have accomplished some important things the past month, namely gotten a photo exhibition together, organized 2 more possibly (Romania and California) and finished writing AND typing my newest novel.  This novel is definitely one of the best of the 5 I’ve written and I’m looking forward to get a second draft finished and getting it out to some people, including publishers and then I’ll also look into self-publishing.  I’ve always been a sort of DIY-guy since I was 18 and first went to college.  Part of the influence of having been a punk.  It’s funny, I wasn’t a punk in the mohawk-sense but in my mentality, how I looked at things, borders I created for what offended or bothered me. Most of those borders were extended greatly by my time in college and yet some were shrunk, namely my feelings for lip-sync.  I am completely against lip-sync in any forum whatsoever and I am bothered by it when bands do it.  But most other borders, like people’s attitudes towards things started to become more of a curiosity rather than something that would make or break a friendship.  That’s probably one thing that led me to liking psychology, in addition to Robert Moser (rip), that punk rock had somehow helped me become a more understanding person and then psychology just sort of fit then.  I’d never thought about it like that but it’s interesting half a lifetime ago to think about such things.

I don’t accomplish nearly as much as I should in life but the problem is, compared to 98% of the people I know, I have accomplished “more” than they have.  Granted, many of them have children which in and of itself is an enormous accomplishment that I think I am still a few years away from.  I’m 35 and living like 25.  Is there anything wrong with that?  I don’t think so.  I’m responsible, I get my things done and I’m still thinking about the future.

And the future is telling me that I will finally see Franziska again in less than two weeks!  I’m flying home next Friday, I can’t wait!  I’ve got an interview for an internship before that and a short trip to Holland this coming weekend.  I think this will be the fifth year in a row that I will have flown in a plane more than 20 times in a year.  That is remarkable and I would guess that besides business travellers, there are not many people on earth who flew 20 times a year the past five years only for travel.  I’m proud of that, but I also know the damage it has done to the environment and that is another reason that next year I’m going to try and fly less next year.  It will easily still be 10 times because flying home and back is often 4 and if I do that twice and then go to Romania, bam! there is 10 times.  We’ll see.

Cheers.

Progress on the Renewable Energy front

the internet has been cutting out staendig all morning and it’s been totally annoying.  Good thing I’ve been gone the past 4 hours.

I got picked up at. 10.10am at the Schlecker on Talstrasse across by the Treff.  There was Dr. Josef Pesch, I guess one of the professors of the ReNewMan (it’s a new word i’ve invented for the abbreviated version of renewable energy management but i think it’s got a nice ring to it) who has a company called fesa that does sustainable energy projects.  mid-40s, had just come back from giving a presentation and knowledge about solar projects to the Canadian province of Ontario, and on Tuesday is flying to Cincinnati to give another presentation!!! This guy said he wouldn’t be able to meet until dec 18, when i will be, and then wrote well, you can come on this interview thing i have to do.

So it’s him, his teenage son and 3 Japanese people: a cameraman, a director/producer and an interpreter that has lived in Freiburg for 30 years.  She also teaches a japanese cooking class at the volkshochschule.

We drive past Waldsee past the Moeslestadion to the B31 and a view from a slight distance on a bridge going over the train tracks.  I tried to take a couple of pictures and then Josef, his son and me were instructed to walk along the bridge while Josef tells us stuff about solar energy and when the project was constructed (it’s a fascinating story, 80 investors from the 79117 postal code where the solar Anlage is and of course bank capital).  We did the walk again because the japanese producer dude wanted another shot and then we stood on the bridge and Josef told us more.  Then we were all interviewed very briefly and then we went over to the electrical center that collects the energy the solar panels create/save/capture.  They took some video and then we all went back to his office.  He asked me to come back there with all of them even though …I don’t know, so I just said ok.  And then the Japanese people interviewed him at his desk for about 45 minutes, with the japanese translation of his long sometimes complex answers right after what he said.  Occasionally the director (weird checkered pants, dark sweater, sparse facial hair, bushy hair and with a slight lisp or speech impediment).  Neither of the 2 Japanese tv dudes could speak English.  I mostly spoke German with the Japanese lady.

On the drive to his office that led to this long interview the son and I more or less patiently watched happen, Josef told me about a project he is working on in Bahlingen (not the one near Freiburg sondern in Wuertemberg 2 hours away.  He said I could help him with the project (!!!) and said that at the beginning i couldn’t get paid but maybe later.  We didn’t make any specifics, I told him I could do a day a week or so and we made plans to meet the first week of the year and figure out a plan for me to do some kind of internship there!!!  Considering he is I’m pretty sure one of the professors involved in the Renewable Energy Management program that could potentially help me a LOT.

ps on the off chance that gave me this hook-up now reads the blog, thanks a lot dude.  I owe you a beer fo sho.

pss got the newest black crowes’ show from san diego from Sunday blasting in the headphones

psss bought some deer meat for dinner tonight!

Until Thursday today

So I’ve got two chapters left to type in The Newropean, Thursday and Friday.  I have enjoyed it more or less but know there are a few things that will have to be added, cleaned, deleted, changed to make the story fresher and more poignant.

I had a phonecall today with a company about 30 minutes away from here that manufactures part for solar panels. I’ve scheduled an interview with the company  http://jrt.live.avenit.de/en/profil here if you want to check it out.

Not one student came to my 8am class which didn’t really upset me because it allowed me to make photocopies for the university on Thursday and also have a coffee and enjoy the city slowly coming to life.

I’m headed to the gym (again) in a little more than an hour, then a private lesson and then an early night in bed because tomorrow I have an 8am-8pm day (with some breaks in there for sure, but I probably won’t go home between) which always kicks my ass!

How are you?

French and Forward

Two stories this time, one French and one Forward.

“French” — A French couchsurfer named Mathieu spent the weekend with us and boy did he ever!  Let’s just say that it all culminated in dancing to Britney Spears at the Pink Party (wink, wink) at 3 am.  That had been preceded by live reggae music and dancing and beers, that preceded by homemade French Ratatouille with enough olive oil in it to drown an ant hill.  Friday night when he got here, we went to Walfisch and actually had the owner buy us a beer.  I couldn’t believe it, I’d been going there almost 7 years, mofo ain’t never buy me a beer before, but thanks!

“Forward” — I didn’t have to work today in the traditional sense, which is good because the weather was crappy and i got to spend the morning having coffee and getting my day in perspective and by 10.45am Mathieu and I were walking to the spot on the bridge where people hitchhike from.  That dude was at the last leg of a trip that had been going on for a few weeks and started in southern France and had gone onto Stockholm and back.  From there, I went to the gym, a whopping 45 minutes of cardio (usually do 30) and some weightlifting, came home and made lunch.  Here’s where the Forward comes in.  Throughout the day I had been in various forms of contact with people here in Freiburg and in California.  A guy who writes for publications on energy developments, which led me to a guy who is managing a project of some solar panels out by the autobahn and I even called a company in California about their recent sale of solar technology to a South African consortium.  That lady is now potentially sending my resume to the right person in South Africa who will be doing hiring/human resources for their projects throughout southern Africa.

That’s a pretty good step forward, I’d say.  Oops, I already did.

I will Survive in the past tense

My work week is over.  It was a tough week, even if it was only 4 days long but now things are looking good for me.  I will have Mondays off until at least the new year and it will free up a day for me to get some work done, I’ll just have to decide what work I’ll do.

A shoutout to Maya in Norway whose sister just had a second child and now Maya is an aunt two times over.

This was my highest earning week of the year.

I plan to go to a concert tomorrow night.  Shaky Hands is their name and they’re from Portland, Oregon.

I inspected the photos for my new photo exhibition in 2 weeks and they look really good.  In fact, the manager asked me to order 3 more photos to cover the hallway as well!

I wrote an important scene in The Newropean that I think will push the story towards the end now.  I’m 4/5 done with the first draft.

I’ve been writing in my journal only in German since the beginning of this month. It’s going okay but I’m going to have to use some new words to get them into my vocabulary.

I’ll be in Holland in 3 weeks and I’m looking forward to it.

And you?

3.20am to 8.20pm

3.20am — picked up in a gracefully aging BMW outside the punk bar next to my place. He’s a pilot for Austrian Airlines, actually a subsidiary of Austrian Airlines, part of Star Alliance.

4.55am — we get stopped at the german/swiss border, probably because i offered with little provocation that I was off to Liechtenstein. they had our passports 10 minutes and 7 cars that came in while we were waiting just got waved through. They pulled us out of the car, more or less completely went through my backpack.

5.35am — i’m dropped off at Rorschach, Switzerland on the south side of Lake Constance.   the driver often pointed out the black hole dark lake but I could never see anything, i paid him 13 euros for the ride..  the first train for me is at 6.21am.  the station is not open yet and so i sit at the platform, watch two trains come and go before mine came. It was cold, just a couple of degrees above freezing.  At times that train, which I was in until 7.10am-ish was a full-on commuter train, but also for students.  It was shocking how packed that train was at 6.50am.

7.14am — i file out of the train with everyone else in the cold gray haze of 5 or so buses waiting to go different directions. we were literally a long golf hole from Liechtenstein at that point.

7.25am — the capital of liechtenstein, vaduz, has 5,000 inhabitants, i was the first person to walk into the main church that day, as it had been locked and then i saw lights and then went back and went in, then mailed a postcard and got a stamp in my journal, went to a cafe across the “street”, has a cafe creme and a gipfel which is nuss hoernle, weissch?  That was 6.30Sfr.

8.15am — i’m walking towards the Rhine River, then cross it in the old wooden bridge, cut south and end up walking until almost 10.30am along the river on a bike path with huge mountains on the left, snow on top and still fall foliage in the bottom third.

10.30am — i try to hitchhike from Truebbach to Chur but am unsucessful.  I miss another bus and another while discovering that the next train isn’t for 90 minutes.  I sit and wait 20 minutes for the post bus at the post office in that village.

11.33am — i board a train from sargans to chur, 19 minutes and it costs 10 USD.

noon-5pm — was shown Switzerland’s oldest city by a couchsurfer named Martina, a girl who now works at the library of her fachhochschule.  we shared a plate of fries.  7.30euros

5-8pm — sat in the passenger seat and discussed many difficult topics in german with the other three people in the car.

it’s almost midnight now, i’m exhausted but just think, in  a 17 hour stretch, that’s what I did.  I’m proud of today.

a facebook status update that wasn’t

until I copied it and pasted it here:

 

said quite a few outlandish things in his American Newspapers class, among them that the sooner Dick Cheney dies the better (even though I think a jail cell is a possibly much more appropriate place) and that because I think people who ordered others to commit torture should be tried in a court of law and let the chips fall where they may, that alone makes me a pinko-Liberal.  My minor was Criminal Justice.  The professors I had there taught me to think that justice is blind.  Now we know that justice must have a special handshake for those in the know.  Great lesson for our children, guys.