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The Others
Nov. 14th, 2009
11:54 pm - The Fall of the Wall — Berlin Diary: Tuesday, 14 Nov. 1989
Morning, November 14, 1989 — The View from Hotel Hamburg
Impressions: What a perfectly ugly city. Grey buildings. No real
skyscrapers. Dreary. Gray. Hazy. Looks better at night —
especially the boulevard called Kurfürstendamm (Kudamm) —
Glitter, Sparkle, Posh, that neat flowing clock.
Oh, and from up here, I can see a line in front of the post office down at street level.
The Morning Seminar
( Introduction to the Situation in East Germany )
Bus-Tour, East Berlin
Pre-border → a bit tense, a bit nervous. How will we be handled at the border? Will it be friendly? Hostile? Cut & dry? I wonder if the buildings in East Berlin will be as aesthetically unpleasing as in West Berlin?
The Border — hmmm… it looks like a prison. The East German official is friendly, though.
On the other side of the border, there are smiling faces, old & young. A giant line winds its way from the currency exchange building. The atmosphere's still a bit tense, but our tour guide is very relaxed.
Ok — we're only going to see the renovated streets. There are still many buildings which haven't changed since the end of the War.
That brings me to the buildings: a bit dirty, a bit depressed. Looks like some of the old parts of Queens or Brooklyn in NY. They'r mostly gray or brown. Color (at least, when one sees any color) are pastel. Or perhaps discolored — It looks as if it was once very colorful, but someone bleached the buildings, like someone threw them into the wash together and the colors ran!
YaKnow, it just occurred to me, that East Berlin doesn't know the meaning of the phrase, "Zoning Laws." It's like northern New Jersey scrambled into Long Island, factories next to housing.
The boulevard, „Under den Linden“ looks a bit better. Ah, there's the Brandenburg Gate! It's at the end of „Under den Linden“ . Lots of the other students on the bus are snapping away at their cameras. It doesn't look that special to me. The Lindenforum contains a bit of the old charm, and isn't so gray.
Some of the buildings still have bullet holes in them, far more than in the Kreuzberg district of West Berlin. The window pane frames in some are decaying. The buildings, on the whole, look deteriorated. Untended.
Now we're approaching the old Berlin Cathedral — burnt and left like that. Our guide tells us that 80% of East Berlin was destroyed and reconstructed from the original plans.
Ooohh – a building with aesthetically pleasing architecture! An A-frame building, or should I say several, all interconnected in a circle.
A bunch of people are at the border crossing that the bus is now passing.
Well, so far, my impressions remain the same: whether East or West, all times seem to coexist at once in Berlin. (Although one doesn't see much of the future in East Berlinyet.) West Berlin: Ups & Downs – Glitz & Decay. East Berlin: in the Middle – Lacking Disparity. But we're seeing only the good sections. I can imagine the other parts of East Berlin looking like the Bronx. Berlin — in the end — is like all other cities.
Next we reach, "the transit stop for the tourists," probably the best looking building in Easst Berlin so far. And that strikes me as tacky.
Oh, it's not the decor, which is very tasteful for a tourist trap. It's the fact that there even is a tourist trap in East Berlin. And that's not only tacky, but a shame, and also tragic. It's a form of self-deception, as if East Berlin is trying to legitimize themselves, to convince themselves that they have no problems and everything is alright. Tragic. This sense of self-deception extends to our tour guide. It's not, as some back in the US would claim, pure lies, rather she's trying to always present the positive, good, wonderful aspects of things. She's not trying to convince just us, she's trying to convince herself. It's as if they're all trying to convince themselves that they have no problems, no worries. And that's sad … if only they'd have the courage to face their problems. Perhaps that, too, will come.
[Note from 2009: Remember that, at the time I wrote those words, reunification was not an inevitability.]
We're back in the bus, bombarded with ever more statistics. Damn, she's spreading it on thick (like I said, a form of self-deception). Well, they're still living under the shadow of the Russians (even though the Russians aren't coming). Everything looks as if it's 20-30 yrs old. Postmodern, urban decay, reminiscent of some of the more depressed cities in the US, like the Bethlehem/Allentown/Easton area or Scranton in Pennsylvania.
Well, we're back on the border! There's more happening, more people there. We're met by the same border guard. And then a spark of Sunday night's crazy spirit appears: our bus driver asks the East German official if he'd like a beer. The mood is congenial, almost jovial.
Berlin has a different feel, to me, from any other city. East & West each have a slightly different mood, but each is only a part of a larger whole. You know, it just occurred to me that each half of Berlin developed along those lines that curried favor from the occupying forces who were in charge there. Not, mind you, that they had any choice. This would explain why large parts of West Berlin kept reminding me of the greater New York metropolitan area, and why East Berlin looks a lot like what I'd imagine a Soviet city to be. This city does not seem German at all — neither East nor West — it really is a foreign body in Germany.
Still, underneath all of the postwar changes, a mood, a pulse, is still there. The old Berlin was conquered, defeated, and divided, but its charater was not destroyed. Berlin is at last beginning to rediscover its own identity. Given the chance, I think that Berlin will rise again — no, I don't mean militarily, I mean culturally. It can never go back to its Weimar Era heyday, when Berlin was still characteristically Berlin. But someday, this city will rediscover itself and its identity.
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historicNov. 13th, 2009
10:46 pm - The Fall of the Wall — Berlin Diary: Monday, 13 Nov. 1989, pt. 2
The Morning Seminar
( A History of the Two Germanys )
[11/12/09 – Yeeesh! I'm not as fluent as I used to be! Since starting this project to transscribe my journal entries from Berlin, I find myself looking up words. These words were ones that I used, on my own, that came out of my brain 20 years ago. And I can't remember what some of them mean now.]
Bus-Tour, West Berlin
During the bus tour, I learn several randon details. Kochstraße (Koch-Street) is the publishing & news quarter. The Spree river belongs to the Eastern Sector. We see a bridge over the Spree, a bridge over which one can cross into East Berlin. Many of my fellow students on the bus snap photos.
We see the ruins of a former train station that was once the largest in the city, before the war. Nothing remains where it was except for a steel arch representing the height of the old main hall of the station. We see several other former-train-stations, their grounds also brown and untended. We see a church that stands in ruins, to this day, as a monument.
But there are 3 things on the tour that catch my interest.
The first is the, "forgotten quarter," of West Berlin: Kreuzberg. There are buildings in the Kreuzberg neighborhood that still contain holes in their facades, bullet holes unrepaired since 1945. There are buildings still damaged — rowhouses with a gaping hole where another building once stood. One sees, "RAF," and other radical (German)leftist graffiti.
Then we see the, "homeless wagons." In Kreuzberg, there was a small piece of land that belonged to East Berlin, but which The Wall didn't completely enclose. The Wall merely bordered it on one side. So, there it was, an acre or two that the West German police had no juristiction over. It was, technically, administered by East Berlin. In reality, it was no-man's-land. So squatters had built a small colony on it. And the West German police could do nothing about it.
Many young people had moved to Kreuzberg for the cheap rent in the, "forgotten district." So did many Turkish „Gastarbeiter“ … the "guest workers" invited to West Germany during its labor shortages in the 1960's and 1970's. (Like the generations of immigrants to the US, the Turks stayed.) This is why not much had been repaired or renovated. One reason why these apartments were so cheap was lack of bathrooms. The buildings had a shared toilet and sink on each floor, no bathtub or shower. Residents had to head to a public, "city bath," to bathe.
The second interesting sight was Sebastianstraße. This was an odd street, a result of dividing Berlin without checking the maps. Or not caring. The houses on Sebastianstraße stood in West Berlin. The sidewalks in front and the street itself belonged to East Berlin. The Wall ran down the street or along the opposite side. (I no longer recall which.) As a result, the lights on the front of the house, attached to the building's wall, were in East Berlin! The house lights even used electricity from East Berlin, due to the prewar wiring of the city.
The last sight stuck with me for a reason. It's a patch of earth where the SS and SA headquarters once stood. That building was like, "The Ministry of Love" — those that went in didn't come back out. The torture basement still exists, below ground. Within the fence surrounding this horrid place, everything looks brown and dead, except for a few sickly, twisted trees. What did grow, grew wild. There's some broken glass and other debris, like in the run-down parks I've seen in Brooklyn and Queens. I wish that I could state, dramatically, that the place looked eeeeeevil … but it looked dead. Abandoned. Were you to drive by it, you probably would not take much notice of it.
historic09:13 pm - The Fall of the Wall — Berlin Diary: Monday, 13 Nov. 1989, pt. 1
The Hangover After the Biggest Party of the 20th Century
Before I begin describing the remainder of the week, let's review why I was there to begin with.
During my junior semester at the University of Mainz, I'd registered for the Berlin Trip for International Students, back in September. The Iron Curtain, which had been slowly coming down over the previous months, came crashing to the floor on November 9, 1989, the Thursday before the Berlin Trip.
The Berlin Trip for International Students had been occurring for several years, once per semester. It wasn't just some vacation, either. There were seminars nearly morning, covering a range of topics from the history of the 2 Germanys, to political relations between them, to the economic system of East German. There were at least two afternoon bus tours around West and East Berlin. There was an afternoon free, for sightseeing on our own. Several cultural institutions provided complimentary tickets to evening events.
And, of course, we had our evenings free. In previous years, this naturally meant heading to a classic Berlin „Kneipe” for conversation and beer.
Given the dates that we were there, none of us „Ausländische Studierende“ got much sleep that week. Those of us who preferred coffee were guzzling it during the morning seminars.
But that's not why this section is named, "The Hangover After the Biggest Party of the 20th Century."
Every morning seminar began with, "Well, usually I'd be talking to all about [… East-West blah blah blah …], but now? I have to toss out my notes." I repeat: this Berlin Trip had been a semester occurrence, sponsored by both the West and East German governments, for several years. The presenters truly were at a loss.
During our free afternoons and evenings, we saw more of, "The Hangover." Public transit was packed. I'm talking Tokyo-at-rush-hour packed. On the U-Bahn (subway), on every bus, one had to shout, „Bitte aussteigen lassen!“ It translates, roughly, as, "Please let us/me exit!" It was the only way to get out of the bus or subway car.
Every post-office was, similarly, packed. ( Definition: Begrüßungsgeld ) It made buying stamps or sending a package very difficult.
Another symptom of The Hangover can best be described by an olde-timey song: "Yes, We have no Banannas, We have no Banannas today."
If you're from the US, forget the pop-aganda that Americans had been feeding themselves for the 4 decades before 1989. East Germans were not, "heading to West Germany for ‘Freedom.’"
They were heading to West Germany for banannas.
They were heading to West Germany for oranges. For pineapples. For other tropical fruit, and other produce that they couldn't get regularly. During the week that I was in West Berlin, there wasn't an orange or bananna in sight. Every grocery store had signs reading, "Out of oranges," and/or "No banannas."
I saw East Germans carrying boxes with newly-bought TVs, stereo systems, and other home electronics that were difficult to get back home (or were crappy and overpriced).
In short, East Berliners were heading to West Berlin to play tourist, then head back home It was still their Heimat, after all.
However, the biggest piece of, "The Hangover After the Biggest Party of the 20th Century," wasn't observable, was… Well, my impressions when I awoke that Monday morning say it best:
Morning Impressions
After my adventures on Sunday night, I wrote down the following when I woke up that Monday morning:
I wonder if the East Germans want reunification. I wonder, what they want, period. Capitalism? Probably not.It was indeed a concern back then. With events moving so rapidly, the events could've controlled the people, taking things in directions nobody would expect, or want. Worse, things could've spun out of control into chaos.The words of that young fellow still ring in my head: "The Germans may lose their lone chance at reunification." Was he German? Austrian? Swiss? When I told him that I was an American, he didn't act like one of the usual two kinds¹ of (West) German. He didn't start speaking English to me, or slow his speech and start o-ver-e-nun-ci-a-ting. He spoke to me as if he was speaking to any other native speaker.
We conversed a bit more after his statement. He expressed concern that everything was happening far too fast. That a new government (presumably in East Germany) could be elected too quickly. He's right, too. If one looks, one sees that the whole situation is changing a little too fast.
It makes the events of 20 years ago all the more miraculous.
¹Two Kinds of (West) German:
All of us Americans in the program at the University of Mainz encountered one of 2 kinds of German:
- "Oh! You're American! Let me practice my Englisch on You!"
- "You stupid filthy Ami, I'm going to show you that I know your language better than you do. And if I do deign to say anything to you in German, I'm going to act as if you're mentally retarded."
Heidi always encountered the first kind. Meredith and I, comparing notes after we returned from Berlin, realized that we were encountering the second.
historic09:13 am - Berlin Diary (raw): Montag, 13 Nov. 1989
Morning Impressions:
( Some thoughts regarding the night before )
Vortrag:
( Monday's Morning Seminar: The History of the Two Germanys )
Bus-Tour, West Berlin
( Impressions from behind the window in the comfy seat )
historicNov. 12th, 2009
06:19 pm - The Fall of the Wall — Berlin Diary: Sunday, 12 Nov. 1989, pt. 2
The Tail-End of the Biggest Party of the 20th Century
Heidi and Meredith stopped by my room, inviting me to join them. Or perhaps we had the same idea, to walk to the Brandenburg Gate. Well, regardless how it happened, Meredith, Heidi, and I began a walk from the hotel to The Wall, at the Brandenburg Gate, on a nippy November Sunday night.
Heidi and Meredith were already good friends from back at our college. I'd been hanging out with Heidi during the semester in Mainz. On this trip, all 3 of us would become friends in ways none of us expected. But that comes later in the week.
It turns out that we all underestimated the walk.
The „Straße des 17. Junis“ — "June 17th Street" — gets its name from a day in 1953, when East German farmers protested … something (I have more information about this in later posts). West Germany decided it was a protest for reunification, and named an avenue after it. A really long avenue.
Although we were getting tired and cold, we did see some amusing things. One of the street signs had a piece of paper, covering over the, „Straße des 17. Junis,“ changing it to, „Straße des 9. Novembers.“ Further down the wide, rather empty, "June 17th Street," was a Trabbi on the side of the road. (Recall: The Trabant, nicknamed Trabbi, was the DDR's automobile company.) Someone had placed a flower on the Trabbi's windshield, under the wiper.
As we neared The Wall, we began hearing cheers, but not from ahead of us. So we changed direction, following the sounds and the now-visible lights illuminating the air.
We arrived at Pottsdammer Platz.
Pottsdammer Platz had once been Berlin's Herald Square. (I'd actually translate its name as, "Pottsdamm Square.") It was a major shopping quarter at the intersection of several major streets. It was sliced in two by the Allies when they divided Berlin into 4 pieces. The Wall ran right through it.
But now, here, on this Sunday night in 1989, the section of The Wall dividing Pottsdammer Platz had a street-width hole in it. Floodlights illuminated the new vehicle crossing that now reconnected an old east-west running road. Crowds lined the road on the West Berlin side.
Goosebumps!
A sign hung on the wall, reading, "Last one out, turn off the light." (!) People, cars, bicycles … all headed through the new crossing in both directions. Every time a vehicle crossed in either direction, the crowds lining the road cheered. One car even moooed as it headed back east! The people seem happy to just see each other.
"Beethoven's 9th – Ode to Joy – is all we need now," I think, then jot it down in my journal.
I look up from my scrawlings to look for my two classmates. Ah, there's Heidi! She's chatting with two Germans, East or West, I can't tell. Some border police — whether east or west I don't know (though they're probably West Berlin officers, given the green uniforms) — said a loud, "Hello," to Heidi as she went by.
There are several elevated platforms around, presumably to offer a better view of the events. At some point, having wandered near one of these platforms, I overhear an old couple standing up above. One said to the other, "It'll be a long time before that comes down." They were probably in their 70's. What they must have seen in their lifetime.
I notice someone with a large video camera & lights, filming a group of people. Ah! It's a group of West Berliners wishing a group of East Berliners goodbye. As the Easterners head off to the crossing, to head home, the cameras turn to the West Berliners, interviewing them.
"So, writing everything down?" said a young man next to me in the crowd. "I have something for you write," he continued: „Die Deutchen verspielen hier vielleicht ihre einzige Chance der Wiedervereinigung.“ "The Germans may lose their lone chance at reunification." Strong words. I chat a bit more with this fellow, but don't write more down.
Later that evening, I find myself laughing hysterically on a wild ride in a West German police car.
But let's back up a bit.
At some point, Meredith and Heidi and I find our way back to each other. We wander away from the new crossing, away from the crowds. We're jazzed! We're excited! And we're really cold! I'd love a mug of hot cocoa, I tell them. We decide to find a cafe in the vicinity, so that we can warm up, then come back.
Umm…
Uh…
There doesn't seem to be a cafe in visible walking distance. There doesn't seem to be, well, anything in visible walking distance.
We notice a police officer, and decide to ask him for information. Being a bit more outgoing than Meredith or I, Heidi takes the lead. Of course, it helps that Heidi was a lovely young lady (and still is lovely) with a very genial personality. Heidi has recent German ancestry and, with her blond hair, looks like a native, a point whose importance will reveal itself soon. The policeman looked German too — no, stop that; yes I know that he should look German — he looked like something out of a billboard. His cap pushed down his slightly-curly Einsteinesque locks down in front of his forehead. His mustache looked more like a pushbroom glued to his upper lip. And he spoke a mile-a-minute.
So, picture it: 3 chilly American students, trying to understand a West Berlin police officer rattling off directions to hop-on-this-bus-then-transfer-to-that-bu
"Ummm… we only just arrived. We don't know West Berlin well at all," said Heidi auf Deutsch.
He looked at us. "What, just the 3 of you?" he asked, "Ok. C'mon."
"Well, come on!" he said, waving us over to his vehicle. We climb into the back seat, bewildered, trying to wrap our brains around what's happening. Then the policeman drives off…
…as we hang on for dear life! As we careen through the streets of West Berlin, the officer jokes, "Now, you won't tell my superiors I'm doing this, will you?" We all laugh! The policeman-turned-chauffeur starts cracking jokes with us. I'm near one door, hanging onto it for fear of sliding over and smooshing Meredith as we whip around corners.
"So, are you from Over There?" the police officer inquires at one point. We greet him with stunned silence.
None of us thought our German was that good. We certainly did not have a Berlin accent. We'd spent the past 3 months in Mainz, in a totally different dialect-region. Sure, Heidi looked like a native, but how could he not hear our accents? (We were all certain that we had horrible American accents, though we really didn't.) How could he mistake us for Germans?
"Um…," said Heidi finally, "Actually we're Americans."
"Ach! Better Americans than East Germans!" quipped the police officer. The three of us in the back seat were in stitches. The officer sped, wildly, onward to our destination. The 3 of us exit the back seat, offering our gracious guide repeated thanks.
I watch as the police car speeds off down the quiet streets. Neither then, nor earlier, did he use his sirens, by the way.
I don't recall much more of the evening, here 20 years later. I didn't write down those details. I do recall that the cafe had no hot chocolate, so I settled for a warm cup of decaf instead. I also believe that the cafe was actually not that far from our hotel, to our surprise.
historic06:15 pm - The Fall of the Wall — Berlin Diary: Sunday, 12 Nov. 1989, pt. 1
The Busride Into History
The start of the bus ride was … well, what can I say? 20-30 international students, who were attending the University of Mainz, boarded a comfy tour bus on a nippy Sunday morning in November. We were all excited from the anticipation. As we drove on the Autobahn towards the border, we relaxed and enjoyed the scenery.
Now, way back when, West Germany had sections of Autobahn that ran from the inner border, through East Germany (the DDR), to West Berlin. The East German authorities monitored all traffic on those sections of Autobahn. You stopped at the inner border crossing, then drove straight through to West Berlin.
When we pulled up to the checkpoint at the inner border, my first impression of the DDR was that all of Europe was now driving to Berlin. It was simultaneously relaxed and tense. The border police were unusually friendly. One had even „geduzt“ our bus driver!
(Cultural Footnote: Like all European languages except English, German has 2 words for the word, "you." One, "Sie," is the formal-form, what you use with, well, everyone but very close personal friends and family members. For the latter, you use, "du." This distinction is so important in German culture, that they invented verbs for it: „duzen“ and „siezen.“ The latter means, "to use „du“ with someone." The former means, "to use „Sie“ with someone." So, that border police officer was being very familiar with the bus driver.)
While waiting, I had an interesting conversation with one of my fellow international students from Poland, who remarked that the toilets in communist countries weren't so bad. I responded that it doesn't matter which part of the Earth one comes from, humans are, in the end, all constructed the same. Besides, all Europeans are culturally-similar enough to have the same standards of personal hygiene, regardless the economic system.
Then came passport control. "Now it'll get tense," said Heidi. (Reminder: Heidi, Meredith, and I were the only 3 from my college on the trip.) She was right. The official who came onto the bus was Not So Friendly at the start. Very starched, cut & dry. I jotted in my journal, This guy here seems to have a broom up his ass. Eventually, though, the mood even reached him. After he'd checked everyone's passports, he returned onto the bus, "to give our American friends a DDR-travel-stamp on their passports." The American women do it again! (Hey, it sure the heck wasn't my scrawny geeky face that won him over!) Well, now we have a souvenir.
Now finished with the official necessities of the inner border, we begin the long, nonstop drive.
Concrete and Barbed Wire, on a hazy gray day — and a very bumpy road. The atmosphere's still a bit tense, but more or less depressing. Now, central Europe is usually overcast from late-September until February. Rarely is the sun visible. Now, that said, DDR seemed even more gray than normal. I didn't see a speck of green anywhere in the landscape surrounding the Autobahn. One would wonder if one had gone color blind. Melancholy.
Then we passed that first overpass. East Germans had collected on the bridge above the Autobahn to wave at us. All of us. Every vehicle heading to West Berlin. Then we passed another. And another.
I suppose, though, that the ultimate symbol of the trip was an East German auto, a Trabbi. (The East German automobile brand was the Trabant, nicknamed the Trabbi.) The Trabbi was broken down on the side of the Autobahn. Next to it was a West German auto, asissting the East German driver. (Well, I guess that East German vehicles are allowed to use this BDR-to-WestBerlin artery, too.)
Arrival
It was still light out as we arrived in West Berlin, enough to get a look at the city.
Is that building city hall? I can only see its reflection in a lake, through trees lining what appears to be a park. (I'd later learn that it's the „Kongreßhalle,“ a gift from the Americans.) We pass the „Siegesäule“ – an old monument to Europe's victory over Napoleon.
Once we'd arrived at the hotel and settled in, I jotted down my impressions of Berlin: Open space, faster pace, (but not so fast as NYC) than other German cities. It has a definite grace, a city with one foot in the past, one in the present, and eyes on the future. All times seem to exist – coexist – in Berlin, together at the same time. Past, present, future – to Berlin, it's all the same time, or so it struck me.
historic08:29 am - Berlin Diary (raw): Sonntag, 12 Nov. 1989
The Busride Into History
( random, scrambled notes behind the cut )
The Tail-End of the Biggest Party of the 20th Century
( random, scrambled notes behind the cut )
historicNov. 10th, 2009
09:13 pm - The Fall of the Wall — OMG! We're riding into history!
Before I begin, I need to remind you, dear reader, of an earlier article:
The, „Berlinreise für ausländische Studierende,” was almost certainly planned months, if not years, in advance. We're talking East Germany here — obsessed with paperwork and an authoritarian Communist state. Those East Germans had to do background checks, prepare visas, file paperwork, check for spies, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, for every, „ausländische Studierende,” (international student) on the trip … especially Americans. Remember: for Communist East Germany, America wasn't just an enemy, it was The Enemy.
There were three students from my college who were going on the, „Berlinreise für ausländische Studierende.” (There were probably 20-30 international students, all total, signed up for the trip, students from nearly every continent.) When Heidi, Meredith, and I signed up for the trip the dates November 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, and 18 were just any old sequence of dates, 7 days a few weeks before Thanksgiving. Even by the afternoon of November 9, 1989, those dates were just, "next week, the week of the Berlin Trip."
Not when we woke up on Friday morning, November 10, 1989.
When I saw Heidi (I didn't yet know Meredith except casually), our reaction was, indeed, "OMG! OMFG! OMG!" I don't know whether I said it to Heidi, or whether Heidi said it to me, but the phrase, "We're riding into history!" definitely passed between us.
From here on out, there will be at least 2 versions of each entry:
- One is a direct transscription from the notes/diary I kept during the Berlin Trip. It contains my immediate thoughts, my reactions as things happened. As such, they'll be in a random mix of German and English.
I may make a few cosmetic changes, but that's it. I will also place the contents behind a cut, to prevent the entries from flooding your "Friends" pages. - The other entry will be a cleaned-up translation, rearranged and turned into an narrative. If necessary, I'll split it into two or more parts, to keep the articles from getting too long.
To retain some color, I may keep some German words and phrases, adding transations.
historicNov. 8th, 2009
Nov. 7th, 2009
10:34 pm - Alone in London
Parris will soon be on her way home to take care of the cats, before they start rioting and have wild parties. So I'm pressing on by myself. Arrived in London a few hours ago. Signing at Forbidden Planet on the 11th.
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lonely
Nov. 6th, 2009
11:25 am - Dublin Days
And here we are in Dublin. Ireland has been exciting but exhausting. We had a huge turnout last night for the signing at Eason's, with a queue that seemed to go on forever, but I finally scrawled everyone into submission, and afterwards I signed all the stock as well. If you missed the signing, or happen to live a thousand leagues away, you can still get an autographed copy of the SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH hardcover or any of the Ice & Fire paperbacks by phoning, emailing, or dropping by Eason's on O'Connell Street. They even have a few trade paperbacks of DREAMSONGS.
Afterwards we adjourned to a nearby pub for a lively evening of Guinness and conversation with the local fans. I met the good folk who will be running next year's Octocon, where I'll be GOH, and hoisted a few with the hardy survivors of the Eason's event. Didn't stagger back to the our hotel till after midnight, by which time Temple Bar was roaring. Ah, if only I were twenty years younger...
The Belfast event on Tuesday was also a hoot and a half. The crowd was much bigger at Dublin, but in Belfast some of the cast of the HBO pilot dropped by to sign books and meet the fans as well. My thanks to Ron Donachie, Richard Madden (Best Dressed Man in Scotland), Alfie Allen, Kit Harington, Maisie Williams and Sophie Turner (and their moms) for joining the festivities. And to the lovely Ros, Esme Bianco, who dropped by McHughes afterwards for the moot. Matthew Hughes, one of the authors who contributed to our Vance tribute anthology, also turned up at Eason's to help me sign SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH.
In between signing and mooting, I've been hanging round the shoot, trying not to get underfoot. "How is it going?" everyone wants to know. I think it's going great. Wednesday's location was amazing, so real I could hardly tell where the real castle ended and our fake castle began. I saw Bran and Tommen swatting at each other in the yard, Joffrey taunting Robb, the Hound growling at Ser Rodrik, while Arya displayed her wretched needlework to Jon above, and it all looked wonderful. Saw some of the footage from the crypts too, and that looked amazing as well. Yes, some things are not exactly as they were in the books, that's inevitable with any adaptation... but these are my characters and this is my story, and it's thrilling to see 'em come to life.
Last night in Belfast I got to meet two more of the cast, quite unexpectedly. Some of the Moroccan players were in Ireland for costume fittings. I ran into Ian McNeice for a brief moment outside the hotel, as we were waiting for our rides, and the night before we bumped into Dany -- the amazing Tamzin Merchant, who is even more beautiful in person than she is on screen -- into the dining room. What a terrific cast Nina Gold has assembled.
Also toured the Paint Hall, though we didn't do any shooting there while I was in Belfast. Some of our sets are going up, and look great. And in another part of the building the huge castle sets from the big budget (compared to us, anyway) feature YOUR HIGHNESS are still standing. Their great hall is pretty eye-popping and they built an impressive castle yard as well.
Tomorrow I'm off to London . Signing at Forbidden Planet on the 11th, Then it's off to Marrakech.
Life is magical and full of joy (but no, I have not been seeking out football scores, so don't tell me. TIVO is getting all my games).
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excitedNov. 4th, 2009
09:37 pm - Well, That's Stupid: Science⇒Belief
Okay, I just heard a bit of news on the CBC program, "As It Happens."
A court in the UK has ruled that a fired man's environmental beliefs should be protected the same as religious beliefs.
First, a detail about the man who was fired. He was VP of Sustainability at a British corporation. After another VP forgot his Blackberry, an IT tech was flown to him to hand deliver the Blackberry. When the now-former VP of Sustainability raised an issue with this hand-delivery airplane trip, he was let go shortly thereafter.
So, basically, he was fired for doing his job. End of Story in my mind.
What really concerns me is rather in the background of the court's action. We are sanctioning turing science into belief.
Belief has no place in science. You follow where the data leads. What you believe doesn't matter. Got a belief about what Quantum Mechanics "means"? Shut Up and Do the Math; belief is irrelevant. Science … as in the real scientific method … consists of collecting data, observations of the world, constructing a mathematical model of that data, then lastly, creating experiments to prove your model false.
You try to knock over your model. You slaughter your Sacred Cows. That's what science is. You take any beliefs you might have about your model and try to wreck them.
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doomed09:22 pm - Oooh! A Voting System Like One I Proposed!
An article about the Scantegrity system.
This system combines several things that I proposed before:
- You vote by filling in bubbles.
- You cast your vote by feeding your ballot into a scanner.
- There is a way to verify that your votes were correctly counted, but without revealing how you voted.
But theirs is much more ingenious.
First, you fill in the bubble using an invisible-ink marker. The marker not only darkens the bubble, but reveals a random-code inside of the bubble.
This random code is how you verify your vote. You write down your ballot's serial number, and the random codes revealed. You can then check later online that your ballot was counted. Since the codes are randomly assigned to each and every ballot, both those random codes and the serial number separately uniquely identify the ballot. Using cryptography methods, you can make sure that even half or 1/3 of the random codes uniquely identify the ballot. And since the codes are random and change from ballot to ballot, there is no way to use those random codes to tell how someone voted. All you can tell is if they voted and if the ballot was recorded correctly.
There are other nice features. Read the article for the full details.
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hopeful
11:50 am - The Fall of the Wall — Protests at the Anniversary Party
It's appropriate that I'm posting this installment today. It's the anniversary of the islamic revolution in Iran, and protests against the regime's corruption, as revealed by recent rigged elections, have broken out. There was a similar set of rigged elections and dissatisfaction 20 years ago, in East Germany, that definitely contributed to what I'm about to describe.
„Die DDR, die Deutsche Demokratische Republik, war am 7 Oktober, 1949, gefunden.“
The DDR, or German Democratic Republic, was founded on October 7th, 1949. On October 7th, 1989, the DDR held a 40th anniversary party.
( And Now, Some Foreign Parties (Political) )
The anniversary party was, obviously, an attempt by The Party (SED – see above) to spackle over the cracks revealed by the 20-somethings leaving their Heimat. The president of the DDR since 1976, Erich Honecker, was present at the celebrations to give a speech.
Now, I don't remember the exact details of what happened on October 7th, 1989. On that day, I heard newscasts over the radio, describing mass-protests. I later would read more about that day in newspapers and the news magazine, „der Spiegel“. Sometime later, I caught a TV broadcast of what happened.
The East-German Baby-Boomers, kept in the the Well-Ordered Kindergarten, were already fed up with the corruption revealed by rigged elections earlier that year. Then their children and/or younger siblings had done the unthinkable: They left their Heimat.
They'd had enough.
So, on that TV program, several months later, I saw 30- and 40-something East Germans erupt with posters and chants saying, „Neues Forum! Neues Forum!“ — right in front of Erich Honecker. During his speech, no less.
„Neues Forum! Neues Forum!“ said the placards that they held overhead. „Neues Forum! Neues Forum!“ they chanted.
Forget the propaganda you heard on this side of the pond. (And it was all propaganda, albeit consumer-driven propaganda.) These East German protesters weren't demanding an end to the SED. They weren't trying to overthrow Communism. They certainly were not demanding a market economy.
„Neues Forum,“ means, "New Forum."
They wanted a, "place at the table."
They wanted their voice, their perspective, to be heard. They wanted to be an actual part of the SED, not just symbolically. They wanted an end to the corruption. They wanted out of the f@#!ing Well-Ordered Kindergarten, dammit.
The „Neues Forum,“ was coming … but not without skirting a potential disaster.
(Now, before October 7th, 1989, I heard about other protests, growing in size. I would later hear, on my little radio in my dorm room, news about the increasing protests that followed. But those chants of, „Neues Forum! Neues Forum!“ and the images of those signs reading the same stuck in my mind.)
historicNov. 3rd, 2009
12:01 pm - A Voting Guide for Election Day
And this would be different from how the U.S. normaly votes … how exactly?
(This is an actual election placard from my area. I've only cropped out the "for councilman" part on the bottom.)
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activist