doublethink

and so it ends...

2005-12-14T14:12:00.000-06:00

Well, it's hard to believe, but here I am: posting my last post from Aix at the end of an incredible semester. As I am sure it did for you all, the semester flew by, and it seems not too long ago that we all went out to dinner the first night and met everyone even though we were all jet-lagged. Needless to say, this semester has been everything I had hoped for, and a lot more besides. No matter how much pressure this puts on my remaining semesters at Vandy (looks like it might be 18 hours for the next two, ugh), I am extremely glad that I decided to come abroad for the semester.

Firstly, the people I have gotten to know here have been a lot of fun. I was kind of nervous coming into this semester since I basically knew no one on the trip. Sure, I had met a few, maybe even had a class or two with some, but I never hung out with any of these folks outside of class. Thankfully we got really lucky with our group, and pretty much everyone here is really, really cool. Obviously being in a foreign country with only 25 other students forces you to become relatively close with the other students, but we have had a lot of fun when we hang out, and it is going to be kind of sad to leave (although seeing all our friends at Vandy is going to be awesome).

Secondly, just the experience of living in a different culture has been fascinating. Granted, it's not like living in some country in the Middle East where the culture is almost completely different, but it has still be quite an experience, and one which I am very glad I was able to be part of and one which I will not be likely to forget any time soon. From observing the way people here dress differently, act differently, etc, to eating with an older French woman 4 nights a week, we have been privy to a good deal of French culture, and it was very interesting.

Lastly, the improvement to my French has been quite substantial, and one cannot be helped at being impressed at the progress everyone in the program has made in just 3 months. Sure, we may not be fluent, but we can watch French movies, converse with French people, etc, etc without a problem.

I am really excited to be going home (especially now since I am flying into Nashville directly and avoiding the whole Atlanta-then-drive-home deal). All the same, I would lying if I said I wasn't sad to leave France and Europe behind. I would love to come back here someday, but obviously one never knows, and thinking that this might be my second-to-last day in Europe, ever, is kind of sad, lol. Well, I suppose I should be getting back to the 10 page paper that is hanging over me...got that and the PSCI final for tomorrow. Tomorrow night we are prolly gonna hit up the usual haunts one last time before we all go our seperate ways. Hopefully the friendships made here will translate into more fun times at Vandy....on verra.

I guess I probably should include some pictures since I know that they are integral to a blog that isn't otherwise terribly interesting or well written, so let's see what crazy photos I can dig up.

Me, Shannon, and Chris at the Thanksgiving party we had at the center.

Sara, Amanda, Jenn, Stephanie, and moi at Le Manoir the other weekend

Beginning of one of the craziest nights (from Barcelona of course)

Taken at the apartment of some students kind enough to have hosted a christmas party...and it had vin chaud too!

Au revoir....

the home stretch...

2005-12-07T14:29:00.000-06:00

Well, this last week of classes is pretty quiet, with next week being the real killer. I guess I should not complain too much since I only have 2 finals and a final paper (albeit 10 pages), but these are pretty important for my grades in the respective courses, so there is a good deal of pressure. I am not too sure what the plans are for this weekend, although I am sure they will include a last hoorah at Bistrot Aixois and O'Shannons and Le Manoir. We'll see.

On a side note, they have really done a nice job decorating Aix for the holidays, and below you can see some of what they have done. The Cours Mirabeau (aka Main Street) is lined with little vendors who are selling everything from cheese to handmade plates, etc. Unfortunately, the prices are, for the most part, outrageous (seems to be a recurring theme in Aix, hah). On the weekends, there are a lot of families out and about browsing around, and it is fun to just go and watch/browse.

Last weekend we had a lot of fun going out to O'Shannons and Le Manoir. We rounded up the usual suspects along with Amanda's boyfriend Chris who is studying in Rome. He is a lot of fun, and I think that he enjoyed Aix although it is just slightly more constraining than Rome, lol. A few of the people in the program were nice enough to throw a little Christmas party at their apartment Saturday night, so we stopped by for a bit before heading out. They had hot wine, which is (gasp) wine, heated up with nutmeg, cinnamon, rum, and some other ingredients. It was quite good.

I'll make at least one last post before I head back to the states, but apart from that I am not sure. Oh yeah, hopefully I will be able to make it to Vandy on the 17th to see any of you that are still there, so if you are going to be there, let me know. I realize most people will have left by then, but if on the off chance...

picture extravaganza

2005-11-23T15:01:00.000-06:00

well, I was able to raid Jay's computer and steal some of his pics, so here are the best below:

- Crazy OM fans at the game we went to. The crazy fans sit at either end of the field (behind the goal posts), and the North end (called the "Supers" I think) try and outdo the southern end (the "Ultras"). Each side has their own clothes with their own logos, etc...pretty wild. And yes, those are flares.

- This is us upon our arrival in Venice for fall break. Shannon, Louise, Alexis, Jay, me, and Eric. This was the first bridge we crossed and we made all the foot traffic stop so we could have our pick...man I love being a tourist.

- Yes, that is the pope...in his pope-mobile no less.

- Jay and I suckling on the she-wolf that fed Romulus and Remus. We had to do it quick when cause the guard was just around the corner, lol.

- This is from our first night in dinner when the whole group went out to dinner. Was a blast.

- I hope you know what this is...

- Jay and I at Versaille. We were troopers....this was Sunday morning, and I didn't get to bed till 3:30 or 4:00am the night before, and we still managed to wake up and make the morning train to Versaille (~30 minutes outside of Paris).

- Going out after dinner the first night in Paris...had some interesting drinks there, lol.

- Notre Dame

- Montmarte...kind of this artsy-quarter in Paris (close to the Moulin Rouge). This is at the bottom of the stairs leading up to Sacre-Couer. Yes, this is where they filmed that scene from Amelie.

- The result of my back being turned and Jay telling Shannon to "make a creepy face at Aaron" and then me turning back at the last moment.

Well, hoped you all like the pics!

Oh yeah, barring some drastic change for the worse with the train strike in France, it will be back to Paris for the weekend! Even better, there is snow in the forecast....if it snows while I am in town, that would amazing as I am sure Paris is even more beautiful with a little layer of snow.

coldplay concert

2005-11-22T06:06:00.000-06:00

I almost forgot to mention that on Thursday night we went to the Coldplay concert. There were a lot of us (around 17 or so), and the bigger group meant it took a little longer to get to the venue than we had hoped. When we walked in, it was absolutely packed (the opening band Goldfrapp was already playing), so we had to split up into smaller groups in order to find seats (like 5 of us did). The others went down to the floor which ended up working out well since they got to go near the front.

The concert was amazing, and was better than I had expected. I knew the music was going to be good, but the show was awesome as well. The venue was fairly small, and was nothing like being in a huge stadium and not even being able to see the band. They performed most of my favorite songs, and Chris Martin's little bit of French was hilarious to hear.

The only downside to the concert was the fact that they let people smoke indoors, and within a half hour, the air was thick with smoke. On the plus side, it made the lights look even cooler. Hopefully some of the pictures people took turned out and I will ad them if I can get a hold of them. By far the coolest concert I have been to.

paris

2005-11-22T04:33:00.000-06:00

wow

Paris was so much better than I had even hoped, and this weekend was a blast. In fact, it was so amazing that Jay and I are going to try and go back this weekend to hit some sights that we did not have time to see this time around. Also, we both would like to just wander and explore and I would like to do some people watching along the Seine.

Like fall break, it would be too difficult to try and relate everything that we did, but here is a list of places that I visited (either with the whole group or with just a few friends):
- La Tour Eiffel: It is pretty awe-inspiring when you are standing underneath it and look up. Went to the top but was too cloudy to see too far. They have it all lit up and every hour for 10 minutes they turn on these blinking lights which look really cool.
- Arc de Triomphe: Really neat as well. It was too funny to stand up on the top (did both this and the Eiffel Tower at night) and look down at the staggering traffic jams that happen every 10 seconds or so thanks to the fact that at least 8 major thoroughfares are pouring into the circle around the Arc
- Louvre: Needs no introduction I imagine. Saw the Mona Lisa (very anti-climatic...so small and they have it behind like 6 inches of bulletproof glass...on the plus side it was in the room from the Da Vinci code, heh), Venus de Milo, and some other famous works. However, the museum is just too much, and it gets a little overwhleming.
- Musee d'Orsay: Awesome, awesome, awesome. Prolly the coolest art museum I have been to. It is an old train station that was converted to a museum. Not nearly as big as the Louvre, so you don't feel like you are overwhelmed. Plus, Orsay has the impressionist and neo-impressionist painters. Saw some Monet, Manet, Renoir, Van Gogh, etc. Really liked it.
- Notre Dame and Saint Chapel: Really neat
- Versailles: The Hall of Mirrors is closed for four years, but there were still some amazing paintings on display...well worth the 45 minute train ride outside of Paris
- Les Galleries Lafayette: Coolest "mall" I have ever been to
- Montmarte and Sacre Coeur: Offers an amazing view of Paris and has the famous Place de Tertre where all the painters are...they were very impressive to say the least.
- Took a boat tour along the Seine...even though it was bitter, bitter cold, it was well worth it.

Speaking of the cold, I can't remember ever feeling so cold in my life. The high/low was something like 6/-1 or around 40/30, which is not uncommon for Nashville in the winter, but I guess I take for granted the fact that at Vandy I am usually outside for like 10 minutes and then I am in a building. However, in Paris, we were walking around outside a lot, and the cold felt like a slap in the face. Thankfully I had a scarf and I found some cheap gloves or I would have died (hey, I grew up in California, so cut me some slack).

Back to Paris...I have decided that I have to go back there and live at some point in my life. The city just has so much character that it is impossible not to like it. Like Barcelona, it is not covered with high rises (I saw one I think), and so when one is walking along a street, you don't feel like an ant. I think that New York would just be "too much," if that makes any sense, while Paris is the perfect size for my tastes.

A view of the Siene from one of the many bridges. There are these little vendors and street performers who take advantage of the fact that people are always walking along the river...it is really charming.

Yea, that is Van Gogh...couldn't get any closer. I overhead one of the museum workers talking to a co-worker and she was saying that she still doesn't understand why the exhibit is set up like it is with the oranges.
A shot of the Musee d'Orsay...awesome setup.
The Arc de Triomphe
Another one of Musee d'Orsay.
The middle of Les Galleries Lafayette on the women's side. The tree was huge, and the whole place is decorated.
This is a shot looking at one of the escalators on the men's side of the store...it was packed.
Looking down at the ground floor where some designer's set up shop. Unfortunately, I didn't do any shopping as the "stores" were basically just little areas (no walls/seperation between the areas) with designer labels. The men's side was pretty exorbitantly priced, but it was still fun to walk around.

We had a ton of fun seeing the various sites, going to dinner (well, at least 2 of the nights...more on that later), and then going out afterwards. Unfortunately, Paris can be pricey depending on what you want to do and where you are (apparently beers along the Champs Elysee run about 10 euros...eek), but with a little exploring and willingness to freeze while searching, one can find a good spot to hang out.

Unfortunately, I don't have that great of pics on my camera, and the best are on friends', so I am not sure when I will have them on my computer, but I will try and post some of the better pics I have to tide you all over.

If I go back this weekend, I really want to see Les Invalides (has the tomb of Napolean), Institue du Monde Arabe (supposed to have an amazing exhibit of the scientific achievements), and a few other places. One of which will unfortunately not be the "Tour d'Argent" which is the most expensive restaurant in Paris. It is on top of this building along the Seine, and it looks amazing. Chris knows someone who went on a date there this summer and the total bill for the two was over 1400 euros, lol. Their wine cellar dates from the 16th century. It was where Henry III first ate with a fork, etc, etc. Not too pretentious, eh?

Well, while I have so much more to say, I will end with the good news that for the first time in many months, I was able to go to Starbucks not once, but twice. It was a heavenly experience. The new Mocha Praline drink is like a party in your mouth (thanks Bavo). Ahh, I can't really put into words how cool it was, so I won't even try....needless to say Starbucks rocks.

On a sad/happy note, our time here is coming to an end very, very soon. It is hard to believe that we have only 3 weekends left before I will be back in the US. The time is flying by...

the perfect storm

2005-11-15T06:08:00.000-06:00

With all the stuff due this week (2 papers, 2 tests) and the huge impact it will have on my final grades has made this week the perfect storm when it comes to assignments being due at the same time. Needless to say, the stress level for everyone is quite high, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel: namely the Coldplay concert Thurs. night and then Paris from Fri-Mon.

Well, I won't pretend that I have any great wisdom to depart..this post was more of me getting so fed up with my Maghreb homework that I had to do something else.

On the plus side, I will try to get on Jay's computer sometime in the coming days and get some good pics of fall break and the OM game we went to. He even got some of the crazy fans with flares.

It's quite hard to believe that we only have like 4 weeks left here...it seems like yesterday I walked through the Vandy Center's doors for the first time. I am excited to be back in the US, but I will miss it here and the all the good times we have had hanging out together.

Take it easy

still alive despite the rioting

2005-11-07T10:26:00.000-06:00

Yeah, despite the somewhat dire news reports, we are all ok here in Aix. Since Aix is pretty upper-class bourgeoise, I highly doubt anything will occur here. That is not to say the situation is not serious in France. Au contraire, the rioting has apparently spread to Marseille (and if that city blows up, God help France since it has a similar demographic profile to the suburbs which are currently burning), and the first death occured last night in Paris (some 61 year old man was beat to death while trying to put out a fire in his trashcan).

So yea, people are pretty tense in France, and Europe as a whole (apparently some cars were burned last night in Berlin and some places in Holland). Whether or not this will continue for much longer remains to be seen. Hopefully by the time of our excursion to Paris (18-20 of this month) things will have calmed down.

In other news, I won't be making the trip to Amsterdam this weekend, as Friday is apparently a holiday, and the trains are pretty much packed, and the price of tickets is outrageous. Oh well, as Amanda said, "we will just have to fete in Aix." So the last weekend that we can travel is Thanksgiving, so I will need to decide soon if I am going to do anything. London is a possibility, but it is just soooo expensive there that I hate to make the trip even though I am sure it is awesome. We will see....

We went to Avignon this last weekend, and it was fun but ridiculously cold. Below is a pic from our stop at Pont du Gard (a old Roman Aqeuduct..yea, I prolly spelt that wrong) and one of the front portion of the Palais du Pape (Pope's Palace). The palace was impressive to say the least, and one can't help but wonder if the Popes really needed such a huge castle, complete with the little holes to pour boiling oil down on their enemies. Unfortunately, after seeing St. Peter's and the Vatican, all buildings seem kind of "meh." But still, Avignon was a lot of fun, although most of us didn't get a lot of sleep the night before so we would have preferred to sleep in, heh.

While the Amsterdam trip fell though (no hommage to the mecca of American's in Europe unfortunately), it looks like we will be going to another OM football match. It will be the 10th of December, so the last Saturday (or Sunday, I forget) that we are here, so that will be a fun way to round off the semester here.

And while scheduling classes for next semester is never too much fun, esp. sans black-book, that along with the housing application made me excited at the prospect of returning stateside and seeing all my friends and family. Europe, esp France, is great, but I am looking foward to being back in the good old US of A in a little over a month. Unfortunately, United Airlines decided to bump me from my flight, and since I bought the ticket with a student discount, I am worth nothing to them, so the only way I can get back is flying from Marseille - Frankfurt - Chicago - Atlanta.....which means I will be leaving here at 9:00am, getting into Atlanta around 9:00pm, and then going for the 5 or 6 hour drive home. Yay! So if you all have any relatives or friends in the airline industry who could hook me up, let me know, otherwise it is going to be 19 hours of flying (7 hour time shift) plus the drive back, lol. Oh well, maybe I will be able to read a book or two, or three, or maybe even four.

Well, I guess that is a pretty good update...I got to go and eat dinner a tad early tonight since our hostess is going to some sort of academic lecture this evening (she is prolly really going to initiate some riots in Aix). BTW, I went with Jay and some americans he met here to see Elizabethtown on Friday, and it was a lot better than I expected. In fact, we all really liked it, and I would recommend it...take care all, and hopefully the French govment will lay the smackdown on the rioters in the near future (something tells me the NYPD or LAPD would not react in the same manner, lol).

not my usual fall break...

2005-11-02T05:04:00.000-06:00

Well, since my fall breaks are usually pretty low-key affairs where I just go home and don't do any of the work I was hoping to get done, this last fall break was quite out of the ordinary. The places visited were: Florence (3 nights), Venice (1 night), and Rome (3 nights). So yeah, when we all got back to the center today and everyone was asking about each other's fall break, one didn't hear the usual "well, I didn't do too much..."

People went to a lot of different places: some going to the UK, Prague, Amsterdam, Spain, Germany, and of course Italy. In Florence and Venice there were about 6 of us students and in Rome it was just me, Eric, and Jay. It was a ton of fun, and I won't even try to say everything we did since one could easily make each day into a few blog posts. I will post some pics since I know those are cooler than me just rambling, although the quality is not the best since I had to make sure there was enough space on the memory card for all of the days.

I am pretty sure most of you can guess what that is without me explaining it. It was amazing in person, even cooler than I had imgained. Sorry for the people in the pic, but cameras were banned, so I had to kind of hold it against my backpack in order to avoid the ever-alert employees. The detail on the statue is astounding, wth one being able to see the veins in the hand, muscle definition, etc

We were pretty gung-ho when it came to climbing tall buildings in order to get great views, and this is a pic from the Duomo in Florence looking down on the church to which the dome is attached and the belltower (yea, we climbed that too). We really lucked out with the weather for our trip, and we were able to see some gorgeous views of Florence and Rome.

This is a pic from the belltower looking at the Duomo. The way they built it is very impressive as they obviously did not have any of the modern day tools, and they had to basically build each section independently of the other parts.
Ahhh, Venice. While only there for 1 night, I can say with authority that the city absolutely rocks. Perhaps I will make a post in the future about the time we spent at Quadri and San Marco's square our night there. Suffice it to say that it was very, very, cool. Anyway, this is a pic looking at some sort of tourist building from across the river. Lol, that reminds me, perhaps I should make a post about our hostel in Venice, which wasn't in "real" Venice but actually in the armpit of Venice, nicely known as Marghera.

This is looking at the Rialto stop for the Water Bus thing (which was a lot of fun to ride). The Rialto is kind of the "it" spot for a lot of places, with nice hotels, restaurants, etc.

This is a long shot of one of the hallways in the Vatican musuem. The ceiling was awesome, and it was neat to stand there and look down almost as far as you could see and just see more rooms. The Vatican was one of the most ornate places I have seen, and the architecture/decor is like nothing I have seen.
Pic of the Sistine Chapel ceiling. The chapel itself was incredible, and the detail that went into the frescos for the walls and ceilings is stunning.
This is a shot of the coolest building I have ever been into: Saint Peters at the Vatican. It is the world's largest Christian church, with the door to the back being over 200 meters. You can fit the Statue of Liberty in the front where the dome is without a problem (or so the guide says). It is absolutely HUGE inside. One cool thing is that the statues, etc, are all made much larger than normal, so when you are inside, it doesn't feel too big, as everything inside is on a larger scale as well. That reminds me. The day we went to the Vatican was Wed., which happens to be the day the Pope comes out and gives a blessing and benediction. So we got to see the pope (at one point while making a sort of pre-game victory lap in the pope-mobile, he got within 100 feet of us) and he blessed us in 7 languages (latin, french, english, italian, german, russian, spanish).

Well, that obviously barely scratches the surface of the trip, and when my travelling companions put up their photos on the internet, I'll steal the best ones to put here.

checking in..

2005-10-25T11:38:00.000-05:00

Just wanted to let you all know that I am alive and having tons of fun thus far in Italy. I am currently at our last stop: Rome. We just got in and we decided to go to an internet cafe for like 30 minutes to catch up with our emails (and the news in my case).

I wont even try to relate the stories thus far from Florence and Venice since my timer now says 9 minutes and I still have things to do. Look for more of a real update in a few days if lucky, saturday or sunday if unlucky.

take it easy all.

barcelona part deux

2005-10-19T06:17:00.000-05:00

Well, since I handed in my 10 page beast of a paper and I have like a half an hour before my next class, I felt there was no reason why I could not finish my post on our weekend Barcelona. Additionally, in light of the fact that I will probably not have any sort of internet/computer access during the long break (I will be in Italy for a week beginning this Friday), I felt that leaving you all (all 5 of my readers, lol) hanging would be cruel, and I doubt I will have any time tomorrow since I have more work to hand in and then I have to pack (gotta cath the 6:30am bus to marseille on fri.).

Anyway, we left Aix Thursday night at like 11:30PM and got to Marseille at midnight. Since the bus drops you off right next to the station we thankfully didn't have to wander around Marseille in the wee hours of the morning. The Marseille train station was not at all sketchy (I am sure it is a diff story at like 3AM when no trains are running), and so our wait for the 1:16am train to Port Bou Espagne was pretty uneventful.

So our train pulls up, and it looked kind of old, but we weren't too worried since we were going to be sleeping anyway. Well, we get on the train, and there is the guy who starts walking to the same cabin that we are. He peeks in and quickly closes the door. He tells us that there are already people in the beds (there were 6 couchettes/beds per cabin), and so we were like, "uhhh, ok." So we get off the train to make sure we were in the right car, and then we hear the whistle which means you have approxamitely .5 seconds to get on the train, so we hop back on and set off to find the conductor. He explains to us that there were some mechanical failures in some of the cabins, so they had to re-arrange the locations of passengers. So we were put in the last available cabin (not liked it mattered since all the 2nd class ones were the same size/etc), and climbed into our little sleeping spaces. I included the pic of Amanda and I in our little beds in my first Barcelona post, so I won't bother putting it up again. Needless to say it was tiny. I had to "sleep" with my legs bent. I guess I shouldn't complain too bad since I was able to sleep most of the 5 hours to our station, but some of my travel mates were not so lucky.

So we roll into Port Bou Espagne (just inside the border) and stumble out of our beds. With my air pretty atrocious looking we all sat down in a little cafeteria place to begin our half hour layover. Unfortunately, the next train we got on for the 2.5 hour trip into Barcelona was a commuter train type train, and the seats must have been made out of titanium. We tried to stretch out as best we could, but along with the uncomfortable seats there was this crazy lady who spoke Spanish, French, a little bit of English, and who knows what else that was basically explaining anything to everyone. So, a pretty stiff 2.5 hours later we make it to Barcelona, where after a little difficulty we find the metro system and get to our stop like 15 minutes late (yea, metros rock).

So we start heading down towards where we think our hostel is, but along the way we spot this 1 star hotel that looked clean enough and had a great location. We ask about prices/availability and it turned out to be perfect. So we drop our stuff and head out to explore. We walked a good bit, saw a cool (and very tall) monument for Columbus. Below is a pic of Shannon, me, and Amanda in front of it.
This is at the end of La Ramblas (the kind of main pedestrian street) and maybe 300 yards past the statue is the Med. Sea. We then walked around the harbor and grabbed a quick lunch (we hadn't eaten since Thursday night's dinner, and this was like 2:oopm friday). We then took a Gondola ride that gave us an amazing view of the city, but unfortunately I haven't yet seen any good pics that really turned out well (it was kind of drizzling), but it was really neat. We then walked back to our hotel (we were at the hill where a scene from L'auberge Espagnole took place..pretty cool). Oh lol, let's just say that we walked down an, erm , "interesting" street at one point, heh. Then we went out shopping since there were some really good priced clothes stores such as Zara, H&M, etc. I did some shopping and some wandering as the girls were pretty serious about it and it lasted for at least a few hours.

After that we went back to the hotel and showered/washed up and waited for the second group to arrive (Bavo was driving down with Victoria and Louise). They arrived in the early evening and so after we all dressed up (it was Bavo's birthday) we all went out to this really nice restaurant called 4 Gatos. The food was superb, and while we didn't have dessert, we all had a little bit of absinthe, and that was quite an experience (no, there was no hallucinating).

We found a little pub called the Travel Bar that was operated by some British/Australian guys and it was nice cause everyone there spoke English. We got back to the hotel about 2-2:30 as we were all pretty worn out from travelling.

The next day didn't start until like 1:00PM since we all slept in. After walking around for a bit, we split up into two groups as some people wanted to shop and those that had already done that wanted to go some some stuff by Gaudi. It was really neat, and while I have never been a huge fan of modernist art/architecture, the Gaudi stuff was jaw dropping. We visited the outside of the Sengrada Familia (it was closed, we went back Sunday morning before we left), La Predrara, and one other whose name escapes me. He are some pics:

Anyway, after walking around a ton we headed back towards the hotel, but not after walking down what was Barcelona's version of 5th Ave, complete with the uber-expensive designer stores (can you say Louis Vuitton small handbag for 4800...euros!). So on the way back we grabbed a quick sandwhich for dinner since we had to change and head back out. Needless to say, Saturday night was way too much fun and we did not get back in until 5:00am. Can't relate everything that happened cause some people wanted "ce qui se passe a Barcelone, reste a Barcelone." (What happens in Barcelona stays in Barcelona). Suffice to say there was much craziness, and we were pretty beat the next morning, but we still somehow managed to wake up, check out, pack, visit La Sengrada Familia, pick up our bags, and go to the station.

Even better, thanks to Alexis' astute observation that a connecting train from Montpellier to Marseille was running late and our ability to sprint while caring a lot of luggage, we not only made all of our trains, but we made 2 that we were not supposed to have been able to. That meant that we were back in Aix at midnight instead of 1:30AM, and since we still have some homework, that was a really good thing.

Well, that was more or less what happened last weekend...it was definitely one of the most fun messages I have had.

One last tidbit of exciting news: I decided to cut short my Italy trip by one day in order to get back here Saturday morning so I will be able to go to the OM game against Lille. And to think I once mocked soccer, i mean football.

barcelona

2005-10-17T11:04:00.000-05:00

wow

Barcelona was a blast and it had to be some of the most fun I have had in a long time. There were 7 of us (4 by train, 3 by car). It was Bavo's birthday so he came down (he was the one who drove) and we got to celebrate his b-day at a nice restaurant which was fun.

Even the fact that the train ride there was pretty tough (the couchettes were quite small, and you can see Amanda and I in ours in the pic below).

So while we were kind of sore and worn out when we arrived in Barcelona at 9:30am, we still managed to explore aound for a number of hours. We got to see a lot of the city, and that was a good thing since Barcelona is very pretty, clean, and definitely one of the top cities I have been to.

The architecture is amazing, and especially in the "bourgeois" quarter the layout of the streets is refreshing since they are very wide, with tree lined boulevards, etc. After being in Aix with its narrow streets everywhere, it was nice being in a big city that didnt feel closed in.

One thing I learned was that the time for dinner in Spain makes France look early. Apparently people routinely eat at like 10:00PM and later, and whenever we got home (in our case 2:30am and 4:30am) there were lots of people on the streets, and not just shady people like in Aix at that time of the

Friday night we all went out and here is a pic of us on La Ramblas (the kind of main street in Barcelona).

There was a lot of stuff to do, and while we were not able to see/do everything, we never really stopped running around except when we were sleeping. We even ran into a guy from Vandy (Miguel iirc) who lived in Reinke freshman year and who is in Barcelona through a program from a different school (Vandy's is in Madrid). I also met a guy from Menlo Park, CA, who knew a guy who was on my water polo team for a you, so that goes to show how small the world is.

I also saw the first Starbucks I have come across since leaving the states, so that was a lot of fun (unfortunately we didn't go inside since we were looking for somewhere to eat lunch).

Well, I have soo much work to do this week (can you say 10 page paper for wed!!) so I can't really make this post much longer which is a shame since this weekend left me with enough stories for a number of posts (although I am not sure how much I can tell in some cases, heh). I will ease the pain of my departure with a pic of this mime I saw on the street. This guy was impressive. I thought it was an iron sculpture until someone put a coin in his bucket and he started moving...was kind of disturbing actually, lol.

Take it easy all!

sitting in the dungeon bored with my work....

2005-10-11T16:03:00.000-05:00

Yea, I am sitting in the little annex all of us students have a key to that is affectionately called "the dungeon." At first I thought it earned the name thanks to its low ceilings and the somewhat jail-esque architecture, but I think a more apt reason is the fact that there is no power here. Yes, they have been telling us that it will be fixed since we got here (the latest estimate is after fall break, as in 2 weeks, lol), but electricity in Aix (in my experience) is spotty at best. Therefore the only real redeeming quality is the fact that it has wireless internet, and while the center closes at 11:00PM, the dungeon is open (since we have the key) 24-7, so it is great for times like now when I have to write a paper.

Unfortunately, the paper is quite boring, so I decided to take a little blogging break. On Sunday we visited a number of towns including Gordes, which is basicaully built on this cliff, giving the town a ridiculously good view. The second place we went was a little town where some of us had a hhuuggee lunch which was extremely tasty, to say the least.

Here are some pics of some of the places we visited.

Oh yeah, here is a pic of "Mr. B" that Matt and Amanda created during the bus ride (yea, it was boring):
Isn't he so french?

On Friday I went to a dinner party hosted by the 5 girls and 2 guys (Bavo and his friend Francois) in their apartment. It was lots of fun and the food was really, really good. They all know how to cook, and we were all quite stuffed after the meal. There was then a few games of beer pong, and below are some pics. Afterwards we went out to a club which a lot of fun.

Well, hope you enjoyed this update...I prolly won't have time to do one till after Barcelona, but it should be a good one since I am planning on having an awesome time...

fun times last night

2005-10-05T02:36:00.000-05:00

Vanderbilt arranged for everyone to have one night of wine tasting, and so we decided to split it up into two groups: those who took the wine tasting class and those who didn't. Anyway, our (those of us who took the class) dinner was last night, and it was a blast.

We went to the restaurant that some of us went to on our first night here (almost exactly a month ago..hard to believe). The food last night was very, very good. Our four course meal along with the 6 wines made for a nice way to end the day since the Maghreb course seems to be getting worse with every class, and the test yesterday was, in a word, lame.

So, needless to say, I slept soundly last night and when I woke up and realized it was Wednesday, I was pretty excited since the last day of my school week is Thursday (thanks to my awesome scheduling skills). This Sunday we are going on an excursion to the Luberon and some other places, so while there won't be any long range travelling beforehand, I think some of us are going back to Marseille to shop/look around since it is only like 8 euros round trip on the bus, and the prices of clothes are not outrageous like they are in Aix.

marseille

2005-10-02T04:11:00.000-05:00

A group of us went to Marseille yesterday since there wasn't a whole lot going on here, and none of us had really seen the city (except when we drove through it from the airport), and it is France's second largest, so we figured why not.

It turned out to be a lot of fun, and while we did a good deal of walking, we made it up to the top of this old fort and were able to chill out for a while and we had an amazing view of the Old Port and most of the city.

There were sooo many people out and about (it was a Saturday). We ran in a few stores, including H&M, but they were ridiculously crowded, so we did not stick around for too long.

Well, not much to say beyond that, other than at times the city felt dirtier than San Francisco with all the trash lying in the streets which is unfortunate.

phew..its been busy

2005-09-29T11:46:00.000-05:00

Yea, so my laziness and heavy workload this last week precluded any updates, but it isn't too big of a deal since nothing major happened.

Last Friday, we hiked up Mt. Saint Victoire, and below you can find some pictures. It took like 2.5 hours up, but not so long on the way down...no, not because it was easy, but because Bavo told us that there was a bus at 5:00 and one at 7:00. All of our feet were killing us, and we were tired, hungry, sweaty, and we definitely did not want to miss the 5:00 bus.

So, in a great act of self sacrifice, a group of us started power walking down the mountain in order that we might catch the bus driver and ask him to wait for us instead of leaving us stranded. After a while, our little group started to straggle, so Jen and I ran on ahead. Then I started running really fast and unfortunately had to leave Jen behind (who then got lost for a bit). I was sprinting down the hill when I see our program director and some students on the path back to the bus. They had chosen not to climb all the way to the top, so they were walkng leisurly back, and they incredulously asked me why I was tearing down the path.

When I told them that I wanted to tell the 5:00 driver to hold on, Mme Monchal was like, why don't you just wait for the 5:35 bus? Needless to say, Bavo won't ever hear the end of this one.

All in all, it was a blast, and if I lived here, it would definitely be something I did fairly often as it is a great workout, and the view is abslutely stunning (could see all the way to the southern Alps, to Marseille were it not for the mountain range in the way, etc)

This weekend should be pretty quiet, which will be nice after this week, which had a ridiculous amount of work. The classes here require lots of reading and writing (in French of course), and that is very, very time consuming. There is a group of 7 going to Corsica this weekend, so they should have blast as the weather is supposed to be nice...I am looking foward to hearing this stories of the trip.

Moi-meme, there is a chance that I might be going to Barcelona in a few weekends...we will see how the train thing works out as I don't want to spend an arm and a leg....If I did go it would be with some people that don't have class on Friday (like me), so we could get a full 2 days in, and still make it back here by Sunday.

Well, I have to head out to dinner at Mme Villa's, and that usually lasts from 7:30 to about 9-9:30...sometimes even to 10:00, lol. The French take their meals seriously....and I am definitely a huge fan of drawn out meals (1.5 hours is perfect imo) as you don't feel bloated like you do after scarfing down a huge meal in 20 minutes.

One last thing, it looks like I will be able to volunteer at the local Lycee Militaire (kind of like a toned-down West Point highschool) with an english teacher who would like me to talk with his class about current events/politics....should be interesting since I think the fact that I am a conservative in American terms puts me just to the left of Attila the Hun in france. They are going to England for a week, so my first day would be the 13th, so I will be sure to upate everyone on how it turns out.

Take it easy all.

quiet weekend

2005-09-19T03:06:00.000-05:00

It has been a pretty quiet week, with most people settling into life here and not doing anything too crazy. Today there was a huge flea-market type deal that happens once a year. It is called a vide-grenier, which basically means “attic sale.”

There were tons of people, and here are some pics showing the sheer number of people selling things. It was fun to walk and see everything and hear the people haggling over prices (there was this one really rude guy who was dressed quite nicely, but he was telling this lady that her radio for sale at like 2 euros was worthless and way overpriced.

One other funny thing I saw as I was walking were four policemen standing around this car inspecting it. I then saw that they were writing a ticket, and I found it quite funny that it took four to do so (two police cars, lol). I snapped a quick photo so I could settle the age old question of “How many French policemen does it take to write a ticket?”

Well, not much else to report….just have been taking it easy eating baguettes, cheese, and drinking wine….ahh, c’est la vie.

lots happening

2005-09-12T03:16:00.000-05:00

Well, it has been a pretty packed last few days, and since the Vanderbilt center closes for the weekend at 4:30 on Fridays, I didn’t have a chance to do an update until now. The easiest way to say what happened is simply to go day by day.

On Thursday evening, we were shown a presentation by this guy who is part of the Students in Aix program. Their building is a lot like our Vandy center (has computers, meeting rooms, etc), and is open for all foreign students in Aix. The guy was nice, and he had a huge southern French accent, and it was quite humorous when he pronounced certain words. Anyway, he organizes these weekend excursions to a lot of place and wanted us to see some pictures/slides of where they go to see if anyone would be interested. The price for these trips is only like 25 euros, which isn’t bad at all. However, most of the places I would really like to go we are already doing through Vandy (like Avingnon). Afterwards, he invited us to the Students in Aix center for some cheese and wine (it was like 10:00pm). The wine was boxed, and since we had already eaten dinner, I wasn’t too hungry. However, we did get to meet some other students who were here in Aix, although some of them turned out to be less than nice. The other students we met where Swedes, who apparently are known as the jerks of Europe. This was told to a friend of mine by some Europeans on different occasions, so I don’t think this is an uncommon belief. Regardless, some of them were really nice, but a few were extremely rude. From mocking Vandy students’ French accents, to condescendingly explaining that in Sweden, everyone speaks English and our pathetic attempts at French were unnecessary. Well, needless to say, we didn’t stick around for too long, and headed out for a bit, but I was feeling tired and didn’t stay out for long.

I was looking forward to Friday because I do not have any classes on that day, and Shannon (the girl who lives in the same building but one floor up – oh yeah, apparently the “chic” quartier [kind of like neighborhood] of Aix is right where we live, haha) and I were going to go explore for a bit to see what we could find in the city. Well, as we were leaving, she asked whether we should bring our umbrellas since, as she put it, the weather here is “bipolar” (probably the best description I have heard of the weather here so far). Me, in my infinite wisdom, said “No, it is really sunny right now and if it gets cloudy we will have ample warning.” So we depart sans umbrellas and have a good walk and get to the western edge of the main part of the city when we notice that the sky has become very, very dark. We duck into this sports equipment store (since we were looking for backpacks anyway) in order to wait and see what happens. All of a sudden, it starts pouring. I don’t mean raining, but I am talking about tropical-storm amounts of water. Oh, I forgot to mention that we had to be at the Vanderbilt center in 30 minutes because there was a presentation we had to see, so we couldn’t just sit in a doorway for an hour.

Well, after waiting in the doorway to an apartment (in which some nice French guy offered to let us wait out the storm, but since we didn’t have the time, we had to pass on his offer), we decided to make a run for it since this is France, and there has to be a café just around the corner where we can take shelter for a bit and then run off to the next one. Wrong idea. This street is so bare, and has nothing except apartments and there are no roof overhangs whatsoever. Needless to say, when we got back home some 10 minutes later, we looked like we had jumped in a swimming pool. Now I am going to carry my umbrella wherever I go, sans exception.

Friday night was fun, and we met up with most of the Vandy group about 11:00 or so and went out to this bar. It was a student one, so there were no older sketchy people there which is always good. We hung out there with Bavo (one of the French tutors and one of the coolest people to hang out with) and some of his friends for a while before deciding to call it a night.

We had to meet at 8:30AM to get on the bus for Nice, so while that wasn’t the best way to start a Saturday, we were all excited to go to Antibbes and Nice (unfortunately Monaco got cut off the itinerary since we were doing this all in one day). All three of these places are fairly close to each other, and are about 2+ hours away from Aix. Needless to say a lot of people slept on the way up, and the ride was pretty uneventful (although they have so many tolls on French highways/autoroutes that it is insane….they are like 3-5 euros for each one too). Anyway, we got to Antibbes and headed straight for the Picasso museum, which is shown below:

While I am not a huge art conniseur (I know, I know, uncultured and all that), the museum itself was absolutely amazing. Not so much the architecture or building (which used to be an old fort I think…right on the water), but the view was awesome. You could see all the way up the coast to just about Nice, and the weather was beautiful.

We then grabbed a quick sandwich on the way back to the bus and were soon on our way to Nice. Unfortunately, it started getting a little overcast, and our bus driver could not find the art museum we were supposed to visit, so we spent a good 45 minutes driving around Nice, which was packed and had a lot of traffic. Finally we found it, and it was a lot better than the Picasso museum in my opinion. It had works by Marc Chagall, a painter from the early 20^th century who, while not classified as a religious painter (since he has a lot of secular/normal paintings), painted a series of quasi-Biblical paintings. They were really very neat, and the layout of the museum was very nice. After that, we were set loose in Nice, albeit for only like an hour and 45 minutes (argh, stupid bus driver). A group of 5 or 6 wanted to climb these stairs (shown in picture I think) to the top of this huge hill overlooking Nice, and then stop on the beach for like 20 minutes or so. The climb up took under a half hour, and it was well worth it. I have some pictures of the view, and it was absolutely stunning. You could see the rolling hills upon which the city was built (actually kind of like San Francisco), and the entire length of the beach.

Unfortunately, we didn’t have too much time to stay on the beach after that, so I didn’t bother changing into my swimsuit and going into the water. Which was too bad since the water felt quite warm, and was ridiculously blue and clear. One interesting thing was the beach, which was not sandy, but pebbly. It is not comfortable to walk one, but once you site down, it is surprisingly nice. Some of our friends decided to play this game where you stay in your clothes, and slowly move out into the ocean to see who can withstand the waves the longest. Needless to say, with their loud screaming and laughing, just about everyone on the beach was watching and probably muttering not-nice things about Americans. We only had like 25 minutes on the beach, and so we soon headed back to the bus, but it wasn’t too bad since we got to walk through a really enjoyable part of Nice.

After getting back, we went back to our rooms and changed/showered/napped before meeting for dinner. I met up with Chris, Amy, Michelle, Eric, and Audrey for a quick bite of pizza (only like 2 euros for a slice for dinner, mmm, cheap dinner) since no one was really hungry. We then proceeded to the apartment of four Vandy students (Amanda, Sara, Jenn, and Michelle). Soon, some other vandy people showed up and we had a pretty good size pre-party going on. After hanging out for a bit, we headed out just before midnight. The first place we went was a favorite bar of some of people (it is pretty cool, it has a drawbridge type door and everything), but it was so packed that it took like 10 minutes to get to the back of the place to find a place to stand. (Mayfield people think of the huge party we had last year, except more crowded, lol). Matt and I decided to leave the girls there since they wanted to dance for a bit and we didn’t even have room to turn around. We headed down the street to a pub called O’Shannons, and were hanging out there over a beer when two of the girls decided they wanted a breather. So there were four of us chilling there when we here this really loud chant going, “Tennessee, Tennessee, Jack Daniels, Jack Daniels!” We look around the corner, and there is the rest of our party surrounded by an entire Italian rugby team. Apparently, after they went outside, some of the Vanderbilt girls ran smack into the middle of the group and the conversation apprently went something like this (remember to use an Italian accent):

“Where you from?”

“American, americaine.”

“No no, but where in America?”

“Tennessee.”

“We know Tennessee! Tennessee is Jack Daniels!”

Soon a spontaneous cheer was going up, and we headed over there to see what was up. The guys on the team were really nice, and we had a great time standing in the street yelling and making noise. There were 2 that spoke good English, and a few more spoke French, so we conversed with them in a Franglitalian. Apparently, this was their last night in Aix after playing some rugby games (they went 1-1), and were going back to Italy the next day. They were from the central part of Italy, and were a club team. We had a blast, but the bouncers from this one discotheque wanted us to move down the street, so we moved about 20 feet down the street, all the while trying to talk to one another, which was hard since at this point there were four of us Americans (2 girls, 2 guys) and like 15+ of them, and we all had to huddle around to hear one another. Within five minutes, one of the Italian guys asked if Matt and I were “hunting, fisherman” for the girls, complete with hilarious hand gestures. We had a blast, but then their coach came out of the original bar they were in to see where his players were, and he then began to talk to us in French, since his English, as he put it, “was finished.” Anyway, we talked for some more before wishing them good luck, exchanging American/Italian handshakes, proclaiming how good American-Italian relations were, and then going home, but it was definitely one of the funniest things we have done here.

Well, that is a pretty huge update, and I am sitting here typing it Sunday morning in order to post it on Monday morning before classes start. Hope everyone is doing fine at Vandy or wherever you may be!

did a little exploring

2005-09-07T06:28:00.000-05:00

I had some freetime yesterday and so I decided to do a little exploring around Aix. The heart of the town within which one can find most of the commercial shops is not that big, whcih is quite nice since we obviously do not have cars here.

As I was walking around enjoying the beauty of the city, I couldn't help but notice the amount graffiti that is all over the city. It is really quite unfortunate since the town is so pretty and the graffiti stands out so much. Below are some of the examples of what I am talking about:

And this next picture is from my street:

It is not really centered (as far as I can tell) in any one part of the town, but is instead spread pretty evenly. I am not sure if the authorities/citizens paint over or otherwise try to remove the graffiti or not, but I am sure if they did, it would jut appear there again.

Oh well, that is by no means enough to truly detract from this city, but just something that I noticed when walking around. On a happier note, I discovered a little Boulangerie near the Palais de Justice which I will try to visit when I get a chance as the pastries they were selling there looked ridiculously good.

That brings me to another subject on a somewhat related topic: obesity. I have seen maybe 3 or 4 obese French people here...it is insane. Everyone is pretty thin, and it was one of the first things I noticed after living in the US for so many years. When I asked Bavo (one of the French tutors who is like 25 andhas lived here his whole life), he attributed it to a number of facts. First, most people here don't drive a whole lote, they usually take the bus and walk. Secondly, people in the South of France eat a lot of vegetables, fish, etc, and hardly drink any soda (since it is so expensive). Also, I think a large part is that the food portions here in restaurants are a lot smaller than those in American places. When you finish eating here, you are usually satisfied, and do not have the bloated feeling that I usually get after eating at an American restaurant.

Unfortuantely, apparently the younger generation of choldren are getting larger, and the obesity rates are going up (nothing like in the US though), and Bavo also said that people in and around Paris (and in northern france in general) are a little larger since they eat a lot of beef, etc...guess I'll have to check it out when we go there in a few weeks.

Today is the first day of classes, and while each class only meets twice a week, all the classes are 1.5 hours, and one is even 2. So we will see how this works out. Well, we are going to Nice, Antibbes, and Monaco this weekend, so I should have some pics up on Mon or Tues of that.

Guess that is all for now...drop me an email if you are so inclined as it would be nice to hear from some more folks in the good ol' US of A.

rain = lame

2005-09-06T07:41:00.000-05:00

Yeah, today's weather has not been so nice thus far. It was a little cloudy and breezy this morning, and then there was a thunderstorm in the afternoon, which made walking around not so fun. This is for a few reasons:
- The sidewalks here are big enough for one, sometimes two people abreast: max
- When everyone is trying to walk around with an umbrella open, that makes it even harder
- The drivers don't seem to mind these facts, and continue barrelling around street corners like there is no tomorrow

So going to Petite Casino for some groceries took a little while and was not too much fun. It wasn't all bad though since beforehand we had lunch at a nice little sandwich place. Steak frites (sliced baguette with steak and french fries are great, and it was less than three euros. The guy who worked there was pretty funny, and he loved when everyone was crammed in there (the place was the about the size of the common room in the mayfield) and tried to order.

We had dinner with our hosts for the first time last night. It was me and two other students, and our hostess was really nice. She lives about 15 minutes away from the center of town, so it isn't too far to go.

I got my cellphone yesterday, but I still need to get a phone card thing to fill it up with minutes since it is a pre-paid kind.

I took some more photos of Aix yesterday, but I have yet to put them on my computer, so hopefully I will do that tonight or something. Unfortunately, classes start tomorrow, so I might be a little busy....oh well, can't just go to the beach and hang out in town everyday. :)

more pics

2005-09-05T04:29:00.000-05:00

Here are some more pics:

By the way, the Mediterranean was not as warm as I had hoped, but it was still nice seeing it was like 80 degrees outside.

bonjour d'aix

2005-09-05T04:12:00.000-05:00

Well, I arrived safely and without too much hassle here the other day. It was a long flight, but Lufthansa turned out to be a great airline, and even their food was, dare I say, good.

We went to Cassis (the popular beach getaway) yesterday, and it was awesome. The weather was perfect, and there were tons and tons of people. Ill try to post some pictures of the trip.

My room is really cool. It has a 15+ foot ceiling, so that makes it seem really big, and it also has a small shower and mini-kitchen (fridge and microwave). I live alone, and the lady who owns the apartment lives on the same floor, but on the other side of the building. THere is one other Vandy student upstairs in the same building, but no roomates. We are only like 5 minutes from the Vanderbilt center, so that is really nice.

THe town is really pretty and quaint. The streets are very narrow, and no one drives anything bigger than a Range Rover (and I have seen only 2 of those). Mostly it is Citroens and Renaults, and lots of mopeds and motorcycles. The people make nashville drivers look good, and it can be a little scary walking across the street sometimes, lol.

The food here is amazing, albeit a little pricey, but one just has to watch themselves. One funny thing is the soda here is as expensive, if not more, than wine and beer, so one does not see many people drinking Coke with their dinner (not that any civilized person would...see, I am already getting snobby). A coke costs like 3.50-4 euros at dinner, with wine around that too. An apparatif (pre-dinner wine) is usually cheaper (because it is not a full bottle or large glass), so that is an affordable and tasty way to go.

The people have been friendly for the most part, with myself and friends only coming into contact with a few rude French people. One cultural shock is the way French men act towards women. When walking down the street, they wont think twice of leering and making some remark, and of even kind of getting in one's face. The people here said to just not make eye contact or even smile, since that means that you kind of "accept" what they are doing. Apparently, this is one of the reasons when French women (and some men) are walking alone they do it without smiling or making eye contact with people.

I will be getting a cell-phone in a day or so, and when I do, I get free incoming calls, so if you all want to give me a ring, by all means; I would love to here what is going on at Vandy. Not having internet in my room sucks, and I already missed so much news that I dont know what to do, lol. Rehnquist died, Katrina is still going on, etc. Oh well, lol.

I hope you all are having a great semester, and I am sure it will go by extremely fast, and I will be seeing you in no time.

shift in terminology by the Bush administration

2005-07-28T11:55:00.000-05:00

Phew, it has been a long time since I have updated my bit of the blogosphere, but better late than never I suppose. Hopefully I will get into a better pattern of updates, and once I go to France to begin my semester there, I will definitely make more of an effort to keep you Yanks apprised of the situation over there.

Anyway, in one of my many news-checking internet sessions the other day, I came across this article from the International Herald Tribune, which as far as I am aware, is basically an international version of the NYT.

The article was then briefly picked up by Drudge, but I no longer see it on his site. Regardless, it is very interesting, and I would be surprised if the other big outlets don't do some sort of feature on this topic in the near future. Essentially, the article is about how officials in the Bush administration have reworded their soundbites, and now say "struggle on terrorism" rather than "war on terrorism."

The reasoning behind this move is best explained by General Myers:

General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the National
Press Club on Monday that he had "objected to the use of the term 'war on
terrorism' before, because if you call it a war, then you think of people in
uniform as being the solution."

While this may seem like a silly matter of semantics at first glance, I think it is instead indicative of a larger shift within the administration which acknowledges that combatting terrorism through military force cannot, in the end, solve the issue. One sign that this is not just a temporary fad is this quote by Douglas Feith:

Douglas Feith, the under secretary of defense for policy, said in an interview
that if America's efforts were limited to "protecting the homeland and attacking
and disrupting terrorist networks, you're on a treadmill that is likely to get
faster and faster with time." The key to "ultimately winning the war," he said,
"is addressing the ideological part of the war that deals with how the
terrorists recruit and indoctrinate new terrorists."

Now, the quote itself may not be all that remarkable, but the fact that it comes from someone like Feith is. You see, Feith is one of the dreaded bogeymen, aka NeoCons. For Feith, a staunch supporter of the hard-line Israeli Likud party (Sharon's party), to say something like this is pretty amazing in my opinion.

What actual changes in policy might this shift bring about? It is hard to say, but I would place some money on the bet that the US will start to exert a lot more so-called "soft" power (power which comes from economic or social means) rather than rely so much on military might. Whether this means leaning on Israel to cease construction of the wall, or increasing pressure on the Saudis to open the political process, one cannot be sure. However, I do believe this is a move in the right direction.

very interesting developement between State and the Pentagon

2005-02-24T23:07:00.000-06:00

The other day I stumbled across this article from WaPo, and it is fascinating. The title seems innocuous enough, but what is revealed in the course of the article is that the State Dept. is (and has been, apparently) fighting tooth and nail against an attempt by the Pentagon to give itself the authority to dispatch Special Forces anywhere around the world without getting permission from the US ambassador to the country in question.

State is apparently worried over what is called "chief of mission authority," meaning that the US ambassador usually has to give the go ahead in order to run military operations, as he/she is theoretically aware of the political/social situation in the country. The Pentagon is arguing that there is too much red tape to go through, and should a priority target pop up, they need to act immediately, not wait days to get permission.

Two extremely interesting tidbits I found were these two paragraphs which detailed some instances where State claims the Pentagon proved its recklessnes:

In one instance, U.S. commanders tried to dispatch Special Forces soldiers into Pakistan without gaining ambassadorial approval but were rebuffed by the State Department, said two sources familiar with the event. The soldiers eventually entered Pakistan with proper clearance but were ordered out again by the ambassador for what was described as reckless behavior. "We had SF [Special Forces] guys in civilian clothes running around a hotel with grenades in their pockets," said one source involved in the incident, who opposes the Pentagon plan.

Other officials cited another case to illustrate their concern. In the past year, they said, a group of Delta Force soldiers left a bar at night in a Latin American country and shot an alleged assailant but did not inform the U.S. Embassy for several days.

For one thing, this goes to show you that there is a lot of stuff going on that we as the public never hear about until years after the fact: if at all. This is how the war on terror needs to be fought: quick, efficient, and lethal. Hit and run attacks are perfect for disrupting and elminating terrorist cells, and in countries where it would be bad politically (such as Pakistan) for the leader to be seen allowing US troops onto their soil, such 'dark' operations as these are just what we need.

One last thing I found interesting was that the CIA is apparently fighting alongside State on this issue, as they feel the Pentagon may encroach on their territory. I don't why they do not just cut a deal with the Pentagon, and arrange for the CIA to play a close support role in these ops, as I am sure the Pentagon would love access to some of the info the field stations have.

israeli cabinet makes landmark decision...

2005-02-20T14:04:00.000-06:00

Well, it seems the Israeli cabinet has approved Sharon's plan to pullout from Gaza. This is a big deal, as now the only obstacle Sharon faces vis a vis the government is getting his budget plan approved by March 31.

Hopefully, this will strenghten the ceasefire accords, and give Abbas some leverage over the groups that refuse to halt attacks on Israelis. The best line from the article is a quote from Shimon Peres which goes:

"'After 40 years in Gaza ... what have we gained?'"

This is so true that it is depressing. The Israeli reasoning behind their stay in Gaza was that it was better for security. However, the effectiveness of this policy is highly questionable, and it served to inflame Palestinian/world opinion time and time again.

This is really good news, and hopefully more such news will come out of the region in the coming days/weeks.

puzzling move...

2005-02-15T19:21:00.000-06:00

Well, everyone has no doubt seen the footage from Lebanon, where the former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, along with 9 others, were killed by a large car bomb. Everyone seems to be pointing fingers at Syria, and the US has even withdrawn their ambassador to Syria-a fairly significant developement in my opinion.

I think it is safe to assume Hariri was indeed the target, and I also think everyone agrees that he was a thron in Syria's side. What I do not understand is why on earth Syria (if it was indeed them) would kill him in this manner. It screams of an out-sourced, messy assasination attempt. Instead of killing Hariri alone, a car bomb was used, which then entails civilian casulties, which inflames (rightly so) the population.

It just does not appear that this was a very wise move, as I would have to think there were other ways of neutralizing Hariri politically, and his assasination appears extreme, to say the least. If Syria was the sponsor of this attack, I think it only weakens whatever shread of credibility their "we are here to maintian the peace" argument had left.

could use some help...

2005-02-13T20:03:00.000-06:00

I am thinking of writing a paper on a military vs. a police (or a mixture of both) response to terrorism, and I would really appreciate it if anyone knows of any good books/articles detailing Israeli policy towards suspected militants. For example, do they detain suspected terrorists with their police force, or do they use the IDF/Shin Bet only. Actually, any info on this topic regarding any country would be very helpful.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Bush acknowledges need for HUMINT...

2005-01-18T20:40:00.000-06:00

At last, it appears as though the upper echelons of the powers that be are realizing that as much as we spend on sattelites and signals intelligence (the NSA's budget dwarfs that of the CIA, for example), it can only go so far in protecting this country.

According to CNN, Bush said

"Human intelligence, the ability to get inside somebody's mind, the ability to read somebody's mail, the ability to listen to somebody's phone call -- that somebody being the enemy..."

This is very good news in my opinion, and will hopefully signal a resurgence in the developement of human intelligence sources around the world. What really needs to be done, however, is a re-examination of the CIA policy formulated under Clinton that basically prevented the CIA from recruiting assets in the field that might have committed human rights abuses. However unsavory it may seem, the use of such assets is quite necessary in the war on terror, as the chances of the CIA/MI5 penetrating Al-Queda or similar groups is virtually nonexistent, and they therefore must rely on seconhand information.

interesting poll released

2004-12-27T08:23:00.000-06:00

USAToday is reporting on a poll that has recenlty been released, and I find it quite interesting. It points out that there is still strong support for the war in Iraq and that the troops are far from despondant, as the NYT likes to hint at every chance it can get.

On another note, I am having a nice and relaxing Christmas break, and I hope you all are as well.

it is done...

2004-12-09T21:55:00.000-06:00

Well, my poli-sci paper is finished at last. That ends the essays that are due this semester. Unfortunately, I cannot celebrate to much because I have a French final tomorrow, along with my cello performance/final.

I was palnnning on posting my paper online, as I figured some people might find it interesting. The title is: "Lessons in Group Think: The Neoconservtive Grip on U.S. Policy Towards Political Islam."

However, it is like 16 pages, so posting it would be kind of lame. Until I find a web host for it, just email me and I can email you back a copy of the paper.

-cheers

anything but my paper

2004-12-06T22:12:00.000-06:00

Yea, it is 10:13 here, and I am working on my History paper (a 15-20 page biography on James Stahlman).....

While I am more or less done with most of the work, I am having a hard time actually bringing myself to sit here and finish it. I am always able to find distractions (like this, heh) which seem to start out as a 5 minute study break and end with me saying, "hmm, I should finish this paper" some 30 minutes later.

Oh well, might as well enjoy it as my paper that is due Thursday is not nearly as far along as this one. That is going to be an all-nighter for sure....better dig up one of those energy pills, lol

addressing a certain argument.....

2004-11-13T23:32:00.000-06:00

I have a friend who received the following reply to a post in which she explained that she was happy that Bush won the election:

You can be forgiven for being young and naive, but you should seriously re-examine your feelings toward Bush. Supporting him as a Christian seems like the right thing to do until you actually think about what you're saying about yourself: That you believe this country's reckless disregard for human life in other countries is a fair tradeoff as long as you can possess some superficial sense of security, and as long as two gay men or women can't gain legal recognition for their bond. Oh, and of course, that women don't get the final say in their reproductive choices.

Do you really think that's going to help you get in to Heaven? Do you really think that God himself would root for a president who paid much lip service to peace and democracy but who actually had very little appreciation for it? What's sad is that there are actually adults who believe the same thing as you. Take comfort that you've fallen in to the flock. If you rush into the fiery blaze while hypnotized, I hear it hurts less.

I felt the need to look at what this person said, and attempt to tear down their arguments, as they are ones that you hear every day in some itineration or another.

First, they say:

That you believe this country's reckless disregard for human life in other countries is a fair tradeoff as long as you can possess some superficial sense of security, and as long as two gay men or women can't gain legal recognition for their bond. Oh, and of course, that women don't get the final say in their reproductive choices.

Firstly, I do not believe that America has a reckless disregard for human life in any way. If we did, I do not think we would bother having so many boots on the ground in Iraq, for example. Why put thousands of soldiers in danger by sending them into Fallujah when we could have simply carpet-bombed it back into the stone age? We could easily have rationalized it by saying that most non-combatants had left (which reports had confirmed), and so the number of civilian casulties would be relatively low. Instead, we are going house to house in an effort to not only make sure less escape, but also to try and minimize collateral damage. I think that America has been very careful about its war planning, and has shown a profound respect for human life.

As for the gay marriage issue, the majority of Americans (and people in some European countries, like Italy) do not feel comfortable granting marriage rights to homosexuals. Is this because they are less of a person the heterosexuals? Absolutely not. It is just that many see the "institution" of marraige as a quasi-sacred relationship between a man and a woman. More importantly, they feel that a healthy society requires healthy families (this has been shown to be the case in numerous studies). Thus, if one does not feel that gay marriages yield a family environment for children, then one probably would not support gay marriage.

What I am not sure of, is when gay marriage advocates saw all the polls clearly indicating there was not enough support to block the amendments, why not switch trakcs and instead call for simply civil unions? I realize some did this, but it was not until the 11th hour, when all people heard was "gay marriage." It is like they scared people by calling for gay mrriage instead of doing it piecemeal by first going for civil unions, and then later going for marriage.

With regards to the statement on abortion, this poster, like so many other pro-choice advocates, reverts to the "it's the woman's choice" mantra. This is a red herring, however. I say that because the real issue vis-a-vis abortion is when does life begin. If it is at conception, then the woman has no right to choose to arbritrarily end another person's life (if her life is at stake, and it is the reccomendation of doctor, that is a different story). Simply not being "ready" to be a parent does not give you the right to murder someone. Yes, I said murder, because if life begins at conception (or say at 5 weeks, and one wants to abort at 15 weeks), it is murder. If, however, you do not believe that life begins until the child is born, then yes, you can bring up "women's choice." Sadly, it seems that the argument over abortion does not deal with the issue of when life begins, but rather over "choice" for the pro-abortion advocates.

I am not going to touch the last portion about getting into Heaven, as what the poster says is more theological, and not really dealing with public policy.

Anyway, I just wanted to give my thoughts on what was said.

-aaron

trouble brewing at the CIA

2004-11-13T23:24:00.000-06:00

Well, just in time for me to send in my intern application at said agency, there comes a number of reports indicating that all is not well at Langley. Apparently, there is some serious internal squabbles taking place, and the arrival of the new director, Goss, has supposedly made things worse.

This is really bad news, as the CIA is pretty much our first line of defense against terrorism, and when the agency as whole is having morale problems, one must question whether the job is getting done.

I saw another article the other day pointing out how politicized the CIA was this election, and how much the top brass wanted a Kerry victory. If you remember, the last few months saw a number of secret documents "leaked" to the press; with all of them harsh and critical of the Bush administration.

Thus, it appears as though the strife at the CIA goes beyond political fights over control, but rather there seems to be a genuine feeling of antipathy between the CIA and the White House. I am not sure why this is the case, unless it is because the CIA has been somewhat left out of the decision making process in Iraq.....

Either way, this is definitely something that needs to be cleared up as soon as possible.

-aaron

the neo-con conspiracy

2004-11-10T19:02:00.000-06:00

I am writing my poli-sci research paper on who influences/shapes the US' foreign policy vis-a-vis political Islam. Interestignly enough, I had always briushed aside charges of a conspiracy hatched by the neo-cons in order to seize control of American policy, and while I still think that charge is blow out of proportion, I will admit that the control neo-cons and their sympathizers exert over policy decisions is a little troubling.

It is not that their worldview is particularly wrong or dangerous: in fact, I agree with a lot of what they have to say. The danger lies in the fact that they seem to have a monoply of decision and planning at not only the Pentagon, but the State Department and even to some extent on Bush's National Security Council.

Just thought I would post that as someone may find it interesting....I plan on posting either my full paper, or at least the thrust of what I have to say here for people to see. Who knows, if I am ambitious enough, I may turn it into and article for the Orbis or Torch.

Cheers

back from the dead

2004-11-02T08:13:00.000-06:00

Well, I have returned from my extremely long haitus. School proved more work than I had anticipated, so I had less time to post than I wanted.....hopefully I can get in the rythym of things are start posting again.

As everyone is well aware, today is the big day, and remember, "Friends don't let friends vote Democrat!"

israeli spy in the pentagon?

2004-08-27T20:07:00.000-05:00

There are numerous reports popping up here and there saying that the FBI is ready to arrest a suspect(s) in an investigation that has been going on regarding a possible spy in the Pentagon. Apparently, according to reports here and here, the spy seems to be an Israeli agent who possibly was in a high enough position to have a hand in shaping U.S.-Israeli policy decisions, along with seeing what the U.S. was planning to do with regards to Iran.

This is quite disturbing, although not that shocking, to be honest. The Israelis have long been known for their efficient espianoge programs, often run by the Mossad. It is not suprising that we were penetrated by them, and I bet that there should not be too much of a political fallout between two countries that are as close as Israel and the U.S. Unfortunately, many people on the extreme left will take this as 'further proof' that Israel had a hand in 9-11 by conjuring up some ridiculous hypothesis.

I will update as the info becomes avaliable.

back to school...

2004-08-23T09:54:00.000-05:00

Well, I am now back at school and getting settled in here.

Look for some stuff coming in the next few days.

apology

2004-08-11T19:51:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone...I just had to say sorry for not updating my blog in a while. I have been really busy with preparations for school, and trying to line up a job at Vandy. Hopefully in the next day or so I will be able to add some nice posts.

Also, my good friend Chris Handy has decided to join this one man (up until now) blog team. Maybe he can fill in on days when I get lazy. ;)

new book to slam Kerry's time in Vietnam

2004-08-04T19:41:00.000-05:00

Some of Kerry's swift boat companions have banded together and written a book titled Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry.

While the book is not due out for a little bit, Drudge, as usual, has gotten some info ahead of its release. Apparently, the book includes such allegations as:

Some of his wounds were self-inflicted
His tour of duty was only four months because he was such a poor commander
He burned down homes and killed livestock he found in an abandoned village

One website that can be found here is sending an email with a free excerpt of the book (chapter 3) if you enter your email address. The site is getting hammered (it was linked on Drudge), but I was able to get through.

Chapter 3 (titled "The Purple Heart Hunter") opens with a quote by William Franke, a swift boat veteran, ,who says this:

Many took exception to the Purple Hearts awarded to Kerry. His 'wounds' were suspect, so insignificant as not to be worthy of such a medal. That Kerry would seek a Purple Heart for such 'wounds' is a mockery of the intent of the Purple Heart and an abridgment of the valor of those to whom the Purple Heart had been awarded with justification.

wow. That is a pretty scathing attack, and quite a harsh thing to say...the Republican campaign managers are going to have a field day with this book. But the chapter is full of such information, going on to say that Kerry is the only swift boat veteran to have received the Purple Heart for self inflicted wounds. The "true" story of Kerry's first combat experience in Vietnam was not that he was hit with enemy fire, but rather fired a grenade launcher to close to the boat and a small (few centimeters) piece of shrapnel was lodged in his arm...

All I can say is that if the stuff in this book is true, then Kerry is going to have to come up with something to counter it quickly. Getting a Purple Heart for a self inflicted wound is about as low as one can go in the military...and the veterans who stood up there with him at the DNC might not be there come November.

north korea now has missiles that can reach the u.s.

2004-08-03T11:47:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow, in Jane's Defense Weekly, there is a report that North Korea now has the missiles in place that are able to theoretically reach the US. Apparently, the acquired the know-how by grilling Russian scientists and buying some old missiles from submarines.

This is quite worrisome, and also very frustrating as it seems that after years of haggling and attempted talks, the US has failed spectacularly when it comes to keeping North Korea from threatening not only our allies, but now America itself, with nuclear weapons.

The international community needs to get off of its collective butt and do something quick about this. Maybe this will help:

Apart from targeting the United States, South Korea or Japan, cash-strapped North Korea might seek to sell the technology to countries that have bought its missiles in the past, with Iran a prime candidate, the article added.

Even the policymakers in Europe will have to do something now that a close neighbor of theirs, Iran, might acquire this technology.

GOP to push for national sales tax...abolish IRS??

2004-08-02T09:51:00.000-05:00

As always, Drudge was the first (and only so far) media outlet to break this story, and a story it is indeed. It says that the speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, along with the White House, will push for the abolition of the IRS and instead the use of a national sales tax or VAT in its stead. This is an extremely interesting development, as I do not know of a previous time when such heavy hitters (speaker of the house & white house) both pushed for such a plan. In the past, mainly fringe groups or lone politicians have argued for a sales tax instead of a graduated income tax.

The below is an excerpt from testimony delivered to Congress by a member of the CATO institute (one of the big think-tanks). It is a long read, but here are some of the things that he believes would be solved by a flat tax.

Because the sales tax exempts all savings and investment, the double taxation problem would be eliminated. Because the sales tax is a single flat rate, the disincentive effects from high marginal rates would be eliminated. That giant sucking sound you would be hearing would be investment capital from across the globe sweeping into the United States.
By eliminating the income tax entirely, compliance costs- -estimated at $200 billion a year--would be substantially reduced.
The sales tax would virtually eliminate the Internal Revenue Service. The sales tax is the only plan that solves the intrusiveness of the current system.
A sales tax would be paid by consumers every time they purchased a good or service at the cash register. Because the tax would appear on the receipt, the sales tax would be highly visible to taxpayers. All purchases--from an 89 cents grape slurpee at seven-11 to a $20,000 Ford Bronco--would be taxed. Taxpayers would be constantly reminded of what a hefty price we pay for government in America today.

There is of course the possibility that this is nothing more than a ploy to deflect criticism of Iraq, but I bet that most people actually do hate the IRS enough to support such a move.

update on origins of terror threat

2004-08-02T09:46:00.000-05:00

In the last day or so, much clearer information on the origins and specificity of the current terror threat have been released. As this NYTimes article claims (it was also corroborated in the WSJ this morning), the capture of a young Al-Qaida computer/internet coordinated has apparently revealed a 'treasure trove' of information for officials.

...the official said "documentary evidence" found after the capture had demonstrated in extraordinary detail that Qaida members had for years conducted sophisticated and extensive reconnaissance of the financial institutions cited in the warnings on Sunday.

<>
Another interesting tidbit, this time from the very end of the article, perhaps may shed some light on why Bin Laden is so hard to find:

Asked about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Mr. Khan has told interrogators that even the top Qaida commanders do not know, the Pakistani intelligence official said.

terrorism in NY

2004-07-31T21:27:00.000-05:00

ABC is reporting that the feds believe that AQ is plotting to use suicide bombers in attacks against corporations in New York city. This sounds a little more worrying than the normal color threat as the officials have some pretty specific info leading me to believe the attack is pretty far along planning wise.

Another interesting thing to note is this little tidbit:

Intelligence sources say al Qaeda plans to move non-Arab terrorists across the border with Mexico.

Authorities already have in custody a woman of Pakistani-origin arrested after crossing into Texas. She carried a South African passport with several of the pages torn out, $7,000 in cash and an airplane ticket to New York.

I posted on the story about the lady in Texas a few days ago, and it seems that the officials still do not realize that we *must* beef up our border security.

kerry dissed by marines

2004-07-31T18:38:00.000-05:00

In his attempt to be like one of the 'common' Americans Kerry claims to represent, he stopped at a local Wendy's where some Marines happened to be eating. And then this occured:

The Marines — two in uniform and two off-duty — were polite but curt while chatting with Kerry, answering most of his questions with a "yes, sir" or "no, sir."

But they turned downright nasty after the Massachusetts senator thanked them "for their service" and left.

"He imposed on us and I disagree with him coming over here shaking our hands," one Marine said, adding, "I'm 100 percent against [him]."

A sergeant with 10 years of service under his belt said, "I speak for all of us. We think that we are doing the right thing in Iraq," before saying he is to be deployed there in a few weeks and is "eager" to go and serve.

haha. Serves him right.

michael moore in hot water

2004-07-31T16:31:00.000-05:00

Apparently, Moore's liberal (no pun intended) use of facts has gotten him in trouble with an Indiana newspaper which says it was 'misrepresented' in Moore's Fahrenheit 9-11. The newspaper has filed a lawsuit against Moore for copyright infringement. Their main claim is that:

Early in the movie, according to the paper, a large headline appears in the film, purporting to be from a Dec. 19, 2001 edition of the paper, and reading "Latest Florida recount shows Gore won election." The paper contends that the headline actually appeared on Dec. 5, 2001, in much smaller type, and above a letter to the editor, hardly a factual news story or editorial.

Very interesting....if the suit is won/settled out of court, I would love to see the mainstream press pick this up in order to maybe enlighten people to the fact that Moore's 'documentary' is fill of 'evidence' such as this.

did Bush lie? - part 1

2004-07-31T10:34:00.000-05:00

There has been more than the usual amount of hot air going around lately, and much of it has to do with the 'Bush lied!' claim that seems to be popular among leftists. I am going to do a multi-part 'series' and look at whether one can truly say that Bush lied or not. Below is part 1 of the topic.

-----------------------

With the revelation that NATO intelligence agencies, along with that of a few other countries (including Russia), were so wrong about Iraq's WMD capabilities, many are questioning whether the US should have invaded Iraq at all. With car bombs going off, kidnappings rampant, many people are angrily pointing their fingers at Bush acalling him a liar. Obviously, the most public of these people is Michael Moore. I will deal with his 'documentary'(ha.ha.ha.) in a later posting, but for now, the question is whether Bush lied about the pretense for invading a sovereign nation.

There were three primary reasons that I supported the war, all of which Pres. Bush used as justifications one time or another. These were:

Firstly, I believed that Iraq had WMD capabilities, and if not that, was on the verge of acquiring such capabilities.
Secondly, I felt that Al-Quaida (AQ) connections to the Iraqi governemnt and other groups within the country were dangerous and needed to be eradicated.
Thirdly, I felt, and continue to feel, that in the end, a democratic state in the Middle East will do more for the region than any number of peace accords (But the Oslo accords were sooo successful!).

Like I said, Bush invoked these claims as the primary reason for going to war. At first, I would say he made issue 1 most important, issue 2 second most important, and issue 3 was more of a side thought. However, now that the revelations of WMD capabalities (or lack thereof) have come to light, the administration has changed its tone to make the order of importance go in order of 3, then 2, then 1.

In the next installment, I will look at what we know, or think we know, about the validity of those three claims...

NATO to train iraqi troops

2004-07-31T10:15:00.000-05:00

It appears as though after much haggling and wringing of hands (mainly by the French), NATO will in fact send a small contingent of officers to Iraq in order to help train their fledgling defense forces. While they are only sending something like 40 officers, it is nonetheless a major political developement as this agreement may indicate future roles for NATO in the country.

some changes...

2004-07-30T21:00:00.000-05:00

I changed the title of the blog to something more creative, and I think more applicable. I also changed the style to something more minimalistic.

Unfortunately, the ads are here to stay unless I get the money to host my own site, which I am not sure if that is going to happen anytime soon...we will see.

how low can you go

2004-07-29T17:09:00.000-05:00

I see that Planned Parenthood has started rolling out this new gem for sale at their online stores:

I find it hard to believe that any self-respecting person would wear such a shirt. From anecdotal experiences, not to mention studies/statistics, undergoing an abortion is hardly blase. It is traumatic and often times emotionally scarring. In my opinion, someone would have to be extremely callous to go through an abortion and then wear such a shirt.

It seems that others are starting to raise a stink about this as well now. I don't have much more to say, other than I would like to hear what some of you think...

caught up on some reading...

2004-07-29T16:53:00.000-05:00

As much of an avid reader as I am, I have never read either 1984 or Brave New World. I finally got around to reading both of those books these last few days, and was pleasantly suprised at how good they were. I had kind of expected them to be somewhat dry and boring, but I was mistaken.

One interesting thing about the books is how often people have gone on and on about how 1984 and Brave New World demonstrate the same end of true humanity. However, this, I found out, is wholly wrong, as 1984 presents a world in which Big Brother has terrorized and forcibly set up a totalitarian state whereas in BNW, Huxley presents a picture of the future in which people more or less willingly live in a dumbed-down society (yes, they were predestined at birth, but nonetheless, there is none of the police-state tactics seen in 1984, as they are not neccessary in BNW).

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I reccomend both of these books highly, and it is interesting to think which of the two extremes (if either) society is most likely going to end up near.

high ranking al-qaida member arrested?

2004-07-28T16:21:00.000-05:00

A certain Farida Goolam Mohamed Ahmed was arrested in the southern area of Texas a few days ago, and according to this report, the feds are now saying she may be a *much* bigger fish than anyone had previously thought. There is also this article here giving just a tad more info.

The mainstream media does not seem to have picked this up yet, so what information is avaliable is scarce. What is unsettling is the fact that she was attempting to make her way to New York, and with the RNC coming up one wonders what she wanted to do there. If I were forced to bet, I would say that AQ is going to try something before the election, and if they risk sending such a high ranking operative, in person no less, to America, then that leads me to believe that some sort of plan is being developed.

If anything, I hope this story can serve as yet *another* reason the open borders are not a wise, safe, or practical policy for the US. When people can waltz across the Rio Grande with zero scrutiny or checking of passports, it is no doubt that AQ operatives are attempting to enter the US via Mexico.

convention

2004-07-28T11:14:00.000-05:00

Well, as pretty much everyone knows by now, the Democratic convention is in full swing, with much back scratching seemingly abundant love for everyone and everything liberal. I suppose it is important to present a unified face to the public, but I still find it funny that candidates who were only months ago at each others' throats are now all singing the praises of Kerry.

I don't plan on watching the convention; not out of spite, but simply because I doubt I will glean any useful information that will not be online within a matter of minutes. I am really waiting for some platform to come out from Kerry's camp beyond the Bush-hating that seems to be the only thing driving the Left right now...

Edit: I meant to include these pictures of Kerry, which were recently leaked from NASA. They are of his trip to the agency with Sen. John Glenn. The Kerry camp is crying smear campaign, and when you see the pics, you can understand why Kerry's team did not want them in the public domain. They are hilarious, to say the least.








Note: these images are hotlinked from US News, courtesy of Drudge, so if they go down, just let me know.

welcome!

2004-07-28T10:55:00.000-05:00

Well, here is my first effort at blogging! I doubt anyone is going to be reading this for a while, so this is more of a test to see how good the layout looks.

If you happen to stop by, don't worry as I will be adding more many posts on more interesting topics later on.