Heartbroken

This is not whom I love. This is not to whom I gave my heart. My heart is falling into pieces and lies scattered on the floor. I close my eyes filled with tears, tears of anger and wish with what little is left of my heart, of my soul to be all a big, fat lie. I open my eyes and it is still there. My heart is in such excruciating pain I could shout and lose my sanity. Hyne knows I loved you, and I loved you more than anything. I placed my family, PEOPLE beneath you and I would have given everything for you and now you do this? Unspeakable.

It is not a secret for anyone that I love IBM. My first two laptops were IBM ThinkPads. Omi, MY beloved Omi, whom I place above everything and everyone, and who's far more important to me than even my lovely and faithful Nagi, IS an IBM ThinkPad, one of the last true IBM ThinkPads, untainted by the unclean hands of Lenovo, whom I consider a disgusting worm crawling under everything that's pure and beautiful in the world. I have driven both Jules and Shimmy INSANE with my fixation over IBM ThinkPad. Jules wanted me to go "I have no idea, I don't remember", and Shimmy did even the impossible to drive me to the lands of Dell and Mac, and yet I never gave in. I accepted buying Nagi, an Acer Aspiron because I always considered him an assistant, a subordinate of Omi, the brain, the King, The Great, and even said I couldn't care less if Nagi went missing or got damaged during the travel. Omi is my heart and my soul and him I'd care for with all I have. I still think and still believe him to be the best thing that has ever happened to mankind (after me).

Well, first they sell out the ThinkPad and all the hardware part to this "Lenovo" character. It made me cry bitterly in the arms of my friend, mourning the loss of hope in the future. A life without IBM ThinkPad was as bleak as you can imagine it to be. There's nothing worse. I came to terms with the loss, survived, and now this.

"IBM Offers To Move Laid Off Workers To India"

The blow has been too much. It's deception upon pain, upon my hurt, upon desolation. Pay close attention, my dear children: This is the end of the American Dream. 4000 people laid off last month, and the solution is to ship them off to the India, where wages are insultingly low. Of course, it looks tremendously nice: for the worker you offer a job, for the economy, you wipe a chunk of unemployment as if it never existed. For you, well, a substantian cut in the expenses. It's pretty simple, you take the unemployed and place them in a part of the world where you can afford to pay him or her a tiny part of their original salary. Well, things are far cheaper there, you mind, so you don't need the whole $4000 you made in the US, but you can make it with the $100 you'll get for your job... which, BTW, has some differences regarding workload, schedules, and, of course, your rights as worker. BUT you get to have a job in what, well, you've been doing. Ummm, of course, nobody is saying a word about RETIREMENT because, well, ummm... that might be managed according to the local customs, you mind. Oh, and learn to speak, what do they speak in India? Oh yes, is that funny language with letters that look like the spatial writings from sci-fi series. Or maybe, is the Elf language?

The good ol' American worker might be outraged and has all the right to be so. He's being taken away from the land where he has all the rights because, baby, the American is the LOCAL in America. In India, he will become the foreigner, the last one, the mocked one, the minority, the one that has to adjust and against whom the law would judge if a dispute of rights is between a Hindu and him. Locals always have the upper hand, homie! So yeah, it looks bleak for the American being laid off, but what can he or she do? Fuck, people has to work in order to support the family, and there are a lot of immigrant in the world, he or she wouldn't be the first, and.. they make it somehow, right? Right? Yes, they do, honey.

Only also think about this: if IBM secures you the job in India, it's a job you are taking from a Hindu. The Government of India might be counting on those jobs to curb their own problems of unemployment. Countries usually also allow the functioning of this kind of enterprises, and make all kinds of concesions in taxes and so, to create job opportunities for their people. Lousily paid, offering terrible conditions, near to the reality of service-sweatshops, but in the national statistics the question is not: is your job fair? Only do you work or not? The more people you have employed, the better. Now, if the Americans start flowing in, and they don't bring their American money, but take the Hindu jobs, and the Hindu lands, and the Hindu houses, what happens with the local population of India? Gets unemployed. Unemployment will start rising there, and at the same time, there will be more people buying, probably people who has no real idea of what things cost, which will probably promote the rising of the prices, which will give the final push to those who could barely survive to go under the surviving level. Hunger, desperation, inflation AND unemployment... export the crisis to some other country you don't really care, as long as they provide you what you need nice and cheap.

Then comes the unavoidable rising in crime. Yeah, yeah, big cities are so dangerous... wanna see dangerous in one of those "exotic lands"?

This is not a solution, this is criminal and shameless.

From this moment on, I break my bond with IBM. They shall take care of Omi, because Omi is not to blame and he's still perfect, but I want nothing more, ever again, with IBM.

Amazing

In today's news in Le Figaro, I read that the Immigration Bureau (actually, it's the whole shebang, ministry and all), have decided to make the knowledge of French and French culture a requirement to opt for the visa. Immigration, you mind, not tourism. The idea is that people who wish to go live in France already possess a certain degree of knowledge about the language and the customs, so immigrants have an easier time adjusting to the community. Then again, it's not like you have to have the C2 to apply for the visa, but you have to have a minimal level of French and knowledge of France and the French culture in order to apply. In all honesty, I find the idea great, and I think all countries should apply it. (It doesn't apply to people over 65 or under 16, nor to people escaping from countries in war or from natural catastrophes.)

I dunno how it is in your country, but in my countries (both Costa Rica and particularly Hungary) there are many immigrants who don't care about integrating into the community or interacting with it in any productive or positive way. People who live for years without learning to speak the language, and though it is already outrageous when someone spends ten years in Hungary without learning a single word in Hungarian, it is far worse when someone spends fifteen years in Costa Rica and never learns Spanish because that's "the language of the beaners and Indians". People who don't learn the language, nor learn the treats of the culture they are immigrating into, are prone to form tight groups which do not help them integrate, but feed the separation, and ultimately that can bring trouble for the group and for the society they are immersed. Now, I'm not saying that if you go to Frace, you must kiss good-bye your heritage, your language, your culture and all that that gives you a "national" identity, so to say, but you must bear in mind that you ARE going to live to another country, which you have chosen, probably, and not the other way around, so you better start doing the adjusting and making the commitments, because a whole country won't change to fit to your liking.

Now, if you can't or you don't like it, stay in your own country. If you simply refuse to give up your culture and customs and the whole deal, dude, stay in your own country. Or move to a deserted island.

What surprised me in the article was that there was this guy, Gaye Petek of the Elélé Association, that complained against the measure because it made the immigration very difficult. Dude, really, if it is so difficult for you to learn some French, why the hell do you want to go to France? First of all, French ain't difficult. Actually no language is difficult, it's just a matter of adjusting your language-thinking process, and once you get the hang of it, it's a piece of cake. Second, you are bound to learn it sooner than later, so why the resisting? And finally, when it comes to work, because one must assume that if you with to immigrate to a country, you wish to work there too, and for everyday things, you do need the local language. Understand the media, get services and products, understand lables at the store, prepare a C.V. for a job, and the motivation letter (it's so funny, because in Costa Rica, there's no such thing as a motivation letter, so when we have to write one, we just stare and the paper wishing to write: Hello! Smile! Be Happy! Hire Me! You are Awesome!), interact with coworkers, understand the public transportation and the laws... for all of these you need to know the language, and yes, learning it before hand easies your chances.

This year is the first time I'm going to a place where I do not speak the local language, not even on the most basic level. Yes, the world wide famous trip to Bulgaria (to which my husband refused to go with me, by disappearing for ages from the MSN, thank you. Sorry honey, now I'll score Bulgarian Hotties and have loads of fun. ^_^). In case you wonder, I'm hurrying to pick up some phrases and so... just like I should be working on my German to prep it up, so I don't have to rely time and again on God to illuminated me with his infinite wisdom so I can understand and form phrases I can't actually say, but which I'm able to mutter once I've spent a few hours in Vienna. It's not my intention to say a blasphemy, and I beg forgiveness if I do, but really, my German is pretty much a sort of miracle. I would really believe that I get to speak in Tongues, because I really don't know as much German as I manage to squeeze there. Funny thing is, this topic makes me remember my ex-fiancé, and how he would bet his head and swore and was 100% sure that he would speak in Tongues (which I believe he neves did) and yet so far... I seem to on regular basis. ^_^ No pun, no blasphemy intended, just mere comparing and remembering!

So anyway, the point is that when you arrive to a new country, it feels good to be able to communicate with the people. I can't tell you how beautiful and easy my life is when I can go to any store in Paris, any little restaurant or stop someone on the street and be able to ask them a question. A lot of people say the French are mean, but they are not. The lady at this bakery near the Opera smiled at me and was patient while I picked the sandwich I wanted, and gently explained to me which is the difference between the kinds and wven went back to explain one fo them because my memory is really poor. All policemen have always been nice and patient, and a man at the Gare du Nord actually WALKED ME to the corner to show me which is the Rue Maubeuge, since streets and maps in Paris have little resemblance to each other.

Vienna was even more of a blessing, because, like I have so colourfully stated it, I do not speak German, only a very, very little. Then again, God is merciful to me and has made Austria a country full of lovely, gentle people who undestand that there are a few people, like me, who have difficulties learning their language (lack to determination to actually follow through it decently, even though every January I decide to spend the year learning German, and in November I realize I have 6 week and have done nothing of it!), and are patient and help a lot. Yet so, I make a point out of not speaking English in Vienna, and again, it feels good to be able to exchange some simple phrases with the cleaning ladies of the hotel, buy a "semmel" (a small bread of round shape... like a bagel without the whole and made out of "regular bread" doug... well, a bit lighter, maybe. Anyway, I love them!) at the U3 store, order food from the menu, understand the tags and prices at the stores... And that's for someone who is staying over night or only three days tops!

One could go can care less, because one goes as a tourist and that's that, why would I learn their language-ain't like I'm using it again/that much, and all that, which is wrong, but let's not go there. However, when you are MOVING into another country, TO LIVE, don't you want to be able to be at ease, the more you can? You already have to learn the new public transportation system, the schedules, the streets, the customs, traffic, currency, the bills you have to pay (in Costa Rica there's no winter-winter, and so no house has heating, so we don't pay heating bill. There's no gas outlet either. If you want to cook with gas, you have to buy the gas tanks, and for that there's a whole system known only to the "initiated". We have a gas oven and the water heats up with gas, but I still don't really get how the gas tanks get home, or where should I go to buy them.), the social obligations, the healthcare system, police... why add to it the impediment of not being able to communicate in order to learn them easier?

I would tell you one mean thing that comes to my mind about why: because there are stablished groups that want people to feel defenseless and dependant of their guidance. The Community seeks for a good job for you with one of our own. The Community has all the people in the system that will help you... Don't worry, the Community got your back, but you've got the Community's back too.

This breeds separation. These breeds the underground "apartheid" that reached beyond race and feeds on xenophobia.

Just an observation

Regarding the current "fucked up" market situation into which the U.S. managed to pull the rest of the world (and I hope now the rest of the world learns and next time knows better before trusting all their assets into the hands of one egomaniac nation or group, and stopr thinking the "Memo Zúňiga"way where the future is the problem of the future, thinking they can fuck up stuff, bacause they'll be long dead before hacing to pay for it...), I watch how the different countries get the Government to help their financial systems. It's kinda funny how if Hugo Chávez talks about "nationalization" it means "socialism", "communism" and therefore evil satanic practices left only to cruel, people torturing dictatorships, where people leave in fear, poverty and denied to express themselves. BUT if the US talk about "nationalization", dude, that's okay because that's gonna save us. (The EU does "nationalize" as well, but 1. Yes, I'm partialized about Europe, because for me Europe is beyond perfect, and 2. As far as I know, Europe hasn't gone out of its way to point fingers at nationalization.)

Who is responsible for the crisis... oh, the Democrats for not acting on time at voting the bailout! The Republicans for not acting together, because they didn't need the Democrat votes to pass the bailout (of $700 billion, according to the American Press, $850 billion according to Le Figaro...) Fuck it, people! The bailout ain't the root of the recession. This was lurking since 1995, almost fall into the ditch in 2001, but the 9-11 came "miraculously" to the "rescue", so people didn't pay attention to it. But it was there. Poverty raising... okay, haul over some of those paupers, make them soldiers and have them killed out there. That's actually very, very Hegel. "The way to end with misery is killing the miserbles." Hey, at least there's a philosopher backing it up, right? So, who's responsible? Everybody from the President down.

Like they say in Internal Control, "the responsability is not transferable". You may "empower" someone, and delegate functions and capabilities, but you cannot delegate responsability. So yes, if the President didn't pay attention to it, it IS his responsability still. Sorry, no way out of this hole. It's responsability of the people as well, for electing him. It's responsability of the enterprises for not taking measures, for thinking they could surf through it and take no precautions even if they had a 13-year notice that this wasn't gonna last. It's the fault of people as customers, for pushing for more and more loans, for not living within their means (yeah, me talking), for not demanding the State to keep their hard earned social warranties. Dude, press your representatives! You have Senators to talk for you! Honestly people, for a country of Freedom and Right of Expression, you really don't get to say much. Anyway, you got into a pit, and now you have to pedal back, and you see you have to go against your own preeching. The irony of it it's actually wonderful. And not because I may or may not be a supporter of the Socialist Systems (I'm not really, for I still don't understand them fully), but because this is like in the 30's, with the Great Depression, when John Maynard Keynes finally had the chance to prove that, yes, he was right and Jean-Baptiste Say was wrong.

The markets themselves are imperfect, and you can't leave them do as they see fit, all guided by their own "selfishness" and feed the fools' hope that it will work out fine. The world is not an economical model, starting with the fact that a. products are not homogenic, b. agents are not the same size and evidently those with more power WILL exercise said power (hey, they are SELFISH and we encouraged them to be so!), but above all c. the agents are NOT rational. Selfish doesn't mean they are by default rational. Why? Because they are ran by people, and people is NOT rational. People is irrational, and hell, I'm rather irrational, so of course the rest of the world is irrational! So, will the individual "every man for its own" attitude save the world amd make us live in a better place? Of course not! If we let them, well, you can well see what happens. What do we need to prevent this? Intervention. Institutions, a government that sticks its nose in the market and makes sure the little people are fine and the conditions are fair. What is fair? Well, for me, but that's just "good ol' keynesian thinking", "fair" means welfare, national well being. People able to support their families, capable of providing to satisfy their basic needs secured in the long term, and the tools to get to those means at hand for everybody without discrimination of age, race, gender, political affiliation or ECONOMICAL and SOCIAL CONDITION. Meaning? Education, and I mean ALL education should be free for the people. From kindergarden to the PhD. Access to health and medical assistance should be free, ranging from a cold, a cut to a nutritional consult, a psychological appointment to AIDS, cancer, or any illness in the world... all of them along with the treatment and the medication should be for free for everybody. Maternity leave, sick days, retirement... should ALL be covered by the Government. And this ain't some "she drank too much coke and is hallucinating" kind of speech. This have been existing around the world, so they are very much possible. Oh, and I include up there also the dental stuff.

State provided education and health doesn't have to be poor quality. It becomes poor quality if you LET IT go that way. Pay no bribes, demand enough people working there, go to no private clinics... Start and finish your education in the State universities, and don't go to "easy" schools where you can pay for the diploma, or end medical school in two years instead of six. How can it be that during the 50's and the 60's universal health and state education where the top in quality and now people think of them as the worst it can happen to you? Dude, that's not because the State stuff don't work, but because you let corruption enter. And I won't go there sounding like my Mom and telling you how the corruption is the little "capitalist pig" people have lurking inside (though right now I see her point), so let's leave it like that. (However, ain't that capitalist pig sweet? Oh, I just love it! Made me laugh a lot at the office!)

So, the thing is that "nationalization" and letting the State take care of matters that affect the population has been around for quite a long time. And we have known of what happens in the "wild, wild capitalism" when you take away all restrains and let the burgeoise, the Co.'s and the "Big Private Money" do their bidding. Just in case you have forgotten, please let me refer you to Karl Marx and "Das Kapital" or "The Capital", available in pretty much all languages... as far as I know. It's available since 1867, so it has been around quite some time now. No, no, before you even say so, it is not Socialist Propaganda, and please don't say you don't write stuff written by the Russians or the Soviets, because it is GERMAN. Okay, so stated these facts, I found it utterly amazing to read in the news that this Mr. Gordon Brown, British PM said, and I quote from the CNN

"This is not a time for conventional thinking or outdated dogma, but for the fresh and innovative intervention that gets to the heart of the problem."

(CNN, London, England, "Britain unveils $84B rescue plan".)

Fresh and innovative. Say, I guess if you plan to use slave labour force... LEGAL slave labour force it won't be fresh and innovative anymore, right? C'mon dude! Some common sense here! Don't try to invent the sliced bread. Go back to the books and do things as they are supposed to be done. This ain't no time to go "experimenting" with something that "doesn't look so leftish, specially not so Soviet". It's fucked up, now own it, face it and work on it.

Threat to Omi

Each year I travel to Hungary, if nothing else comes in my way, such as held up vacations or running short of financial means or others on this line. Each year I call Air France and order my plane ticket reservation going over dates, making last minute vacation calculations to see if I can squeeze in one extra day, and then always, always telling the lovely young lady at the other end of the line that 1. I will spend the night in Paris when I'm coming back and that 2. I will take the AF 2694 flight when I'm going because I would like to see Paris during daylight "now this time for real" ^_^. And each time the only moment I lose my smile is when I cathegorically insist that I'm flying through Caracas or Bogotá. All South, nothing North. Put me on Taca, never on American Airlines. It's my thing. I don't care that flying through the U.S. I can carry up to 40 or 43Kg of baggage while goutn through Caracas or Bogotá I'm allowed only to 20 Kg. I don't care for times and schedules or the fact that I have a valid American Visa, which I have used only twice in my life, and it was to, yes, do transbording from Miami to my plane going to Paris. I don't like the Airport, and don't even care to know its name or code. People is rude, from the custom officer to floor sweeping dude. I don't want my passport to be messily stamped without any order, with a seal oozing so much ink it stains several pages. I'm used to the neat Costa Rican customs that orderly open the passport, go through the pages and angle the stamp in such a neat manner that it takes little space, it is nicely visible, the ink is rightly measured, so it doesn't stain and other stamps are allowed in the other pages. Like it should.

I don't like the fact that custom officers look so shabby. I remember the first time I stared in horror at this guy, MORGUE-WHITE, skin so translucent I thought he would glow in the dark, with HUGE tatoos, close cropped bond hair and camouflage uniform worn in almost drunken disarray. I was shocked, and back then I was quite a vision of carelessness myself, I cut my ouw hair and wore baggy, male clothes. (I was in the University, so I was allowed to live my "hippy" style.) Yeah, yeah, ugly guy... whatever... who cares? Well, try not to care when a dude like that glares down at you because you slipped him a Costa Rican passport and you would like to smile and wave your Air France ticket and say: "Worry not. No money would make me stay here..." The flux of mean people actually start at the plane, where the flight attendant SHOUTS at the passangers:

"Seatbelt! Seatbelt!"

Well, yeah, forgive me for being so delicate and expecting EVERYBODY to be like the flight attendants of Taca, Air France, KLM and Malév, who silently walk up and down the aisles with their hands neatly behind their backs and then politely lean forward to the passanger who has not buckled him or herself up and say:

"Madam/Sir, please fasten your seatbelt."

Odd... I can't remember the English word for ... when the airplane leaves the ground. The word always comes to me in French: "decollage".

So, mean people. At the Airport of Miami people bark at you and pointedly ignore you. Not a smile. If you speak to them in English, they will force Spanish on you, and if your speak to them in Spanish, they force English on you. They should walk around with a billboard disclaiming the language they are willing to speak. The stores have NOTHING your would like to buy, and talk about "selection", the same useless Revlon lipstick in EVERY store and the same Disney sweat suit. Coke cans are HIDEOUSLY expensive, and Dude, I have had coke at Paris, so I KNOW expensive, restaurants are STINKY and conveniently located next to the bathrooms, which STINK so fucking much, nor angels or idiots would venture into its stench-soaked guts. You rather wait for the plane and take a leak there than venturing into those torture pits of stench.

So, in a nutshell... through the U.S.? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Never.

Well, more to the point, in today's Washington Post (which is neglecting to send me the full newspaper and is sending me only sections) I came to read this article that says that as a new order from the DHS (the folks that will be now in charge of spying instead of the good ol' CIA), all travelers Laptops will be detained for unspecified time. The contents could be copied and the computer searched away from travelers all they want. This applies also to U.S. Citizens. You know, more anti-terrorist measures. Geez, might as well do as the Chinese and censure the Internet! I mean, what the fuck? They can't do that!!! I mean, loads of people are not terrorists, but they do have WORK files in their laptops, for mostly laptops are carried around for working purposes, and a lot of that information is classified. Financial statements, contracts, sensitive market information, agreements... Just to give you an example: when doing the Roaming agreements, operators keep in secret the discounts they offer to some counterparts. You can know the "face value" fee charged, known as IOT or Inter Operator Tariff, which must be disclaimed and can't be changed, but you can't know the agreements which operators do with each other to stablish a discount or some arrangement based on this fee. If executives have to surrender their laptops at the border, what would stop the DHS from copying the contents and then blackmarketing the information among interested corporations? Or let's go less conspicuous. I'm Company A and Company B is messing with my market share. I take a group of my executives and infiltrate them in the custom office. I have them copy the contents of the laptops of some Company B executives and the CEO (why not?) and then forward it or deliever it to me and my analysts and so, smack Company B out of mah turf... and while I'm at it, take his old turf as well.

I don't keep company secrets in my beloved laptop, Omi, and sure the custom officers would have a hell of a time starting him up, since I still haven't fixed his DIM card problem (but he's such a sweet, he still works for me and does everything just perfect!!! My baby is simply PERFECT!!! ^_^ I love him so much!), but once they get there they will gauge their eyes out due to the brutally large amount of NC-17 slash fics and stories, as well as my ongoing novels, which are, really, so hard to read due to my overly tight-packed style. (A lot of introspection, which makes the reading heavy.) In other words, they would gain nothing by copying my laptop. No secrets and certainly no terrorism, only slash, economics, letters, downloaded legal codes, all kinds of projects and procedures... old homeworks, drafts upon drafts, more drafts, loads of music and the history of Internet searching which will invariably go on a loop of: Amazon.com, Yahoo, Gmail, Google, Cuil, Mail.com, Facebook... and the blogs on Blogger and Freeblog.hu I religiously check. Hehehe... this reminds me of this tee shirt I want to buy. Hyne, I swear, I'm so close to buying it!! (If I can talk Jetty into getting one too, I'll SO BUY IT!!!) The tee says: Get a Taste of Religion, Lick a Witch. For a Lutheran like myself that could be too heavy, specially because I adhere to my Lutheran church for tradition and family reasons, but as I was telling my good friend Márton over the Facebook, God, religion and church are not the same. The last two are man-made. So, why not? Plus, the tee really looks so cool! and it looks awesome to wear at the gym.

Where was I? Oh yes, U.S. customs plotting to take our laptops. The way I see it, this whole "anti-terrorist" strategy has actually achieved the goal of the terrorists. I don't know any terrorists, nor I follow conversations with them, or know what are their goals, but as I look around, what have they achieved? If they did what they did because they hate the U.S., well, now the Government have finished the job for them and made the U.S. unlivable. Would anyone like to go there? No. What sense of security will the population have? Which foreign executive would risk to go to a meeting or a seminar in the U.S. or give information to any executive who would be flying to the U.S.? People travel with their WORSE shoes because U.S. customs are known for ripping shoes off, destroying them and not paying any compensation. Now working isn't possible either? And if you fly in today at 5 am and have to give a seminar at 8 am and your laptop his held up? Then what? When will you get it back? Will you get it back? Are you sure it will be in pristine conditions? Can you be certain it hasn't "developed" some vyrus, maybe files have been damaged... you never know... maybe it was opened, closed and now it won't work. And if it was new and the service won't take it, the warranty won't apply because it has been opened by unauthorized people? You know how it work! This could void a whole fucking lot of very, very important warranties!

The abuse atthe borders isn't something new, and while anywhere else custom officers are nice and polite (you should see the ones at Charles De Gaule! The smile, and are so extremely polite! In last December this lovely Custom Officer paged through my Hungarian Passport when I gave it to him.

- Quelque probléme, monsieur? (Something wrong, Sir?)- I asked.

He smiled and gave it back to me.

- Pas du tout! J'ai jamais vu un passport hongrois. C'est jolie! (Not at all! I have never seen a Hungarian passport. It's beautiful!)) in the U.S. you have to endure being treated like a Jew in the hands of Nazis. Your belongings are destroyed, you are held up and delayed and your humam rights are trashed. This is just icing.

I can avoid it, and I systematically do my traveling through South and avoiding any visits there, whether by job or pleasure reasons. I don't go visiting my friend Roo, who lives in California, and I just make sure my boss don't consider me for seminars in the U.S. I guess I would go to the extent of denying to have my visa to avoid going, and if they send me to get it (can't because I already have it) I might take the morning off, go shopping and then say that it was denied because I .... "popped up on the system as a Nazi Officer sought for war crimes"... or something of the sort. But now, with Omi in danger, when my first thing after getting my boarding ticket and locating my gate (it's always THE SAME, so I don't have to do much locating), the first thing I do is locate a power outlet, hook my beloved Omi and sit either doing some work (because, really, I'm such a natural workaholic), or composing on word the entry I'll publish in the blog as soon as I get in the vicinity of Internet. I can't and wouldn't survive if Omi is taken away from me. Hyne, the first thing I do is carefully unpack Omi from my hand baggage and tell the customs:

"It's my laptop... are you sure the X-Rays won't damage him? It's very, very important for me!"

And then, when he comes up the other end I hurriedly pick him up, kiss him (yes, I'm a looney who kisses her laptop) and carefully pack him back into the handbaggage. I even bother flight attendants when they try to help me put the luggage in the overhead compartment.

"No, no! My laptop is in there, and he stays with me."
"It will be safe up here, Madam, and it will be more comfortable for you too during the flight."
"You can put the luggage up, but the laptop stays with me. My peace of mind depends of that."

I guess I'm not the only one who feels this way. After this, I'm sure I won't be the only one avoiding U.S. customs to avoid the extra pain of traveling, and also to care for what little privacy and personal posessions I have. It's kinda ironic that in a world where all State assets are being "privatized", private individuals are being deprived of their own privacy. "Private" is something allowed only for those who have the capital and political means to afford it. Now, it not only a matter of money, but a matter of corruption as well.

Help Outside, Ignore Inside

The key words for this might be: indifference, lack of priorities, lack of interest in what matters, wish to "make believe". Truth is, this is not a new phenomenon. I'm talking about the case of black people in the US who have AIDS and yet receive less aid than people abroad. It's not really making headlines in the newspapers, though it will work as excellent racist matter for white parents who wish to keep their white kids from "fraternizing" with those "infected monkeys". Oh yeah, racism is still heavy in some of the most developed parts of the world. In the brink of an election where there is a candidate who's said to be black, and really, I would have never known if someone doesn't tell me, and even so, I don't see him black (then again, I don't think Beyoncé or Halle Berry are black...), there are harsh differences made between citizens based on flimsy matters such as skin color.

In an article about the efforts made by the US Government to aid in the fight against AIDS, the reporter mentions that there are more black people in the US with AIDS than in some of the "target nations" the Government is helping. Why is the Goverment spending $19 billion in these people and let their own black citizens struggle? The article says that if they were a separated nation, the US would surely help them, and that the percentage of adults with this virus comes close to that of Uganda. Dude, that sounds bad. Why, oh why is it so? The American black population is at risk with this virus due to the fact that many black men have several sexual partners, and so the percentage of people infected among them is higher. Okay, first of all, why talk about "Black America" and "America"? Let's start with the unavoidable FACT that AMERICA is not a country, but a continent, mainly LATIN, so you are screwed. Then the U.S. is the U.S., same and only to all its citizens. It is, at the same time, rather interesting that different politics have to be issued for different groups of citizens based on the skin color. Does it means that in the US there's a "white law" and a "black law"? Or is it that you are to help the black in detriment of the white? Or the white in detriment of the black? Segregate straights from gays, Republicans from Democrats as if they were not the same? The Government should be one and only for the entire population, helping the poor and establiching the conditions for dignified living for all citizens.

For me, the schism between citizens and the aid they get separated from skin color is just another veil upon a larger fact: the people who elect the Government, and finance it with taxes, is the first neglected. It's not a matter of black or white, but a matter that good American taxes, paid with the working effort of American citizens and residents is shipped abroad to fund wars that give little to non to negative benefits for the taxpayers, and now, on top of that, after education is crumbling into abismal medicrity and there's no "health" or "care" in the taxing American Healthcare, a good chunk of that tax money is spent in other countries, to help people that did not elected the Government and didn't pay the taxes that fund that aid. All Christian values fade here. Hell, one thing is to be a rich country aidng with its excess to poorer countries, but the US has long since been a real "rich country". Wealth is concentrated in a few hands and the large portion of the population is slipping into poverty rather fast. Arrange your home first and then help others later. Stop with this campaign to get the favor of other nations, pretending to be the Big Rescuer and for once, rescue your own people.

E-bay's win a win for customers

My first thought was "fuck, I really should improve my French, because that sounded so wicked". But then, after reading it a tiny bit more carefully, I realized that, no fucking shit, e-bay actually claims that winning this trial against Tiffany's for letting people use the name of the brand on fake jewelry, and not be punished IS a step up for the rights of the customer. Fuck yeah! We are entitled to be taken for fools and cheated with cheap knock-offs in the name of fucking capitalism. Fuck dude, this makes my day! There's a company on the Internet, where trust is vital like air and fragile and expensive like a beautiful Lalique glass pendand, that ensures our right to be sold a lemon, to be tricked, cheated, robbed, misguided and subjects of forgery and fraud. Really, how can I thank them? Oh, I know! I'll never buy from them!!! Geez, that would be awesome, don't you think? ^_^ It would be just great! And since they lost a similar case in France, where those "stick-up-noses" pretend to protect the customer by forcing the enterprise to punish knock off sellers and disclaim faux products,, yet in American soil they where given the right to let their customers be cheated, well... would I buy something pricey or of a good brand from any Internet company? Oh, you can sit and wait for that to happen! Adidas sportswear from Internet? Not in my life time. Out of the cart!!! Lovely Swarowsky glass pendant ring? Give-It-Back! Lalique pendant for Christmas? Hahahahahahahahaha!!! Yeah right.

One case won sets a precedent, which will be brought up over and over and over in each long case, and meanwhile Internet companies, which should be the first ones to ensure the up-most quality and the most precise information (since you can't actually see the product and properly inspect it before purchasing it), let the veil of doubt fall upon their merchandise. It is easy to shake off their responsabilities and say that "the customer should know better", or that it a provider is bad it will eventually disappear because people will notice how bad business is with him or her. Suuuuuuuure! And rumors do not affect the stock market because eventually brokers will realize it was a rumor and they won't listen to it again.

I would like to say that the world, and the market, is not like in the books, so please don't be as stupid as to think that the perfect competition can be made a reality. I know there are a lot of imbecilic people out there, many of them product of purchasing their degrees or grouping up with "the right people" to get a job or get the school projects done instead of studying of Hyne forbid, "working". I mean, yes, I am a 108 Narcissist, but I am not stupid, and all in all my results are perfectly normal (someone as smart and hot as me NORMALLY will turn out to be narcissistic. Or what? Do you EXPECT ME to consider myself equal to my peers and just as STUPID? HA!!). So, I know about morons and imbeciles. I work at the very core of their civilization. Yeah, lazy and ignorant people, like those who think that "maths" have no use, and "history" is a waste of time, or that the "literature and language" class is a bunch of useless crap, and so, are likely to think that "perfect competition" is duable. However, the ones pushing these ideas into people's mind, pretending to have the key to get there, are not necesarily imbeciles, but rather corrupted people who need a smoke screen to ste their crooked business. Open markets so they can have a share of a former public enterprise. Sell State assets so they can get a "bonus" for it. Sure, they are imbeciles but that's not the matter. Their imbecility is shadowed by the smashing magnitude of their corruption. At least in the past, in the Ancient and Medieval times, these corrupts in power claimed to have a Divine Right, but what do these claim to have? The aproval of the people? The people they are squeezing into poverty and death?

World, where are the daughters and sons that once stepped up in France, in America and around the world in revolution for their right to be human?

This One is Sweet

Article at the New York Times:

China Lists Dos and Don’ts for Olympics-Bound Foreigners

HONG KONG — Do not bring any printed materials critical of China. Do not plan on holding any rallies or demonstrations in China. Do not think that you are guaranteed an entry visa because you hold tickets to an Olympic event. And do not even think about smuggling opium into China.

That is some of the eclectic advice issued by the Beijing Organizing Committee on Monday, in a document listing 57 questions that foreign visitors to the Olympic Games in August may have: “Does China have any regulation against insults to the flag or national emblems?” “After eating or drinking at restaurants or hotels, if you have diarrhea or vomiting symptoms, how do you lodge a complaint?”

By KEITH BRADSHER

Published: June 3, 2008

Okay, just out of curiosity: do Americans know what's asked from us when applying to a regular tourist visa? Stuff like:

1. Are you a terrorist?
2. Are you a Nazi?
3. Did you were part of the Nazi Army during World War II?
4. Have you commited war crimes?

This are the ones I remember from 2000... before the Twin Towers thing. Okay...

1. Do you think I'd say "yes" if I were? If giving a false answer would be punishable by revoquing the visa, don't you think that by answering truthfully to this, in case of a terrorist, and say "yes" would also mean to deny visa? Or are you giving the visa to a terrorist because "he admited to be one"?
2. I'm a half-blood Hungarian! How could I be Nazi!? Plus, I was born in 1976. No Nazis. (Those you think of are called neo-nazis)
3. Yeah. I came to the world 37 years before being actually born and joined the Nazis. Get real.
4. Wouldn't you have me in a list if I did? The only war I've been in, and even then as an expectator, was the Pepsi-Coke brand war.

I'd suggest journalists and other commentarist to check on what their own country does before criticizing what other countries demand from visitors or their own people. Kinda quoting a great figure of history, "don't look at the wire in your brother's eye, but look at the entire telecommunication network in yours".