baslog

Almost on my way back to the U.S. I was almost joined by my youngest nephew, Jip, who is two and a half. When I went to say goodbye to my brother on Saturday he crawled in the car as I left, announcing he was coming to America. Small problem, he was not wearing anything from the waist down. By the end of the drive way he realized that this was a problem: "geen broek," he said (no pants) and got out.
If life could only always be this simple.

I've got legs

I am training for a marathon. Nothing as boring as those marathon blogs. Most of them seem to be by out of shape people who finally decide to run a marathon and duly record and report every mile they run. I think one should be more casual about it, in an “oh yeah by the way, I run a marathon, anyone another beer?” kind of way. (Heather might argue that I have displayed anything but this attitude around the house, and she would be less wrong than she usually is.) Anyhow, in case you wondered and to get it out of the way: here is my marathon story.

In April, I decided to run the Twin Cities marathon which takes place Oct 1. I cannot say that it was something that I had been dreaming of for a long time, but it definitely was something I wanted to do at some point. But running a marathon was not higher on my to do list than eating a
15pound burger, watching all the Sopranos episodes in one sitting or learning all the
baseball terms and rules.

(About baseball terms, I read another one I did not get the other day: an "unearned run." What on
earth is that? A run for which a player is not allowed to celebrate? How can it even count if the player
did not earn it? How did he get it in the first place if he did not earn it, did he find it? Did he make it out of chicken? )

But the pieces somehow came together: I had time this summer, my brother is coming over to run it and the professor I was a TA for, a runner as well, also prodded me to register. I built mileage first (I hadn’t been doing much running during the Winter) and started an 18 week program in May. It went well until I strained my back. It was very painful, but it got better after a couple of days (combination of bad running shoes and overtraining). In late June –on the day of Holland-Portugal- I sprained my ankle pretty bad during a soccer game. I had a softball size swelling on it and it turned black and blue from above my ankle to my toes. I thought that I could shelve my marathon plans, but somehow I managed to deal with it. I spent the first two weeks in the rec. center doing aquajogging and exercising on low impact equipment. After two weeks, I started on the treadmill again, and was able to complete a 9 miler on the treadmill three weeks post injury. I stayed on the treadmill for a couple of weeks (boring), switched to a less ambitious training schedule and was more or less able to catch up. Now I am running back outside and just completed an 18 mile run. (ok, 17.5) I need two or three more of those before sept. 12, when the “tapering” period starts. The ankle still bothers me from time to time, but overall it is holding up well. I think the running may have slowed down the healing process a bit, but that’s a price I am willing to pay. While I was here, I went to a physical therapist a couple of times and I can tell the difference already. I also have some hip and knee pain, perhaps as a result of changing my stride to compensate for my ankle, but it is not too bad and I hope it will disappear during the easier training weeks leading up to race day (oct. 1). We’ll see, I guess. I’d be happy to just finish it at this point. Being able to do it within four hours would be great, but don’t bet your life savings on it.

As I was driving home from the sea today, I was thinking about some other goals I have in life for the near future, once the marathon is scratched off the list. I came up with a list of five goals/resolutions.

1. Having an event catered by Quizno’s or Subways.

I think one of the great American inventions is the party sub or the sub tray. They are things of beauty. Yet, I have never been to or organized an event where there were party subs present. This needs to change.

2. Start watching movies from before 1970

3. Read a book by Tom Wolfe, Philippe Roth and Saul Bellow

I haven’t read a lot of American fiction apart from John Irving and Raymond Carver. Seems like these three are a good place to start.

4. Learn how to hang things on walls

I have a drill. I want to use it. Does anyone have a studfinder?

5. Learn the difference between Pinot, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon

Not just pretend to know it, but know it in a learned old man of the world kind of way.

getting back....

I am getting a bit worried about being allowed into the United States on my way back. As required, I have my letters of employment with me, to show customs officials that I have a job in the United States, and convince them that I will not have to take advantage of the country’s generous welfare program. I won't use up any cardboard boxes to make a bed out of and I will not take up any valuable space underneath the city's bridges.

I once gave an older man a ride to his house, there was a torrential downpour and the guy was getting soaked at the bus stop, so I offered him a ride. I told him that I was studying here and was looking for a job, and as he got out he said to me: “well, as long as you have a job, that’s fine, but don’t just stay to take advantage.” I wanted to tell him that if I wanted to be taken care of by the government, Belgium would have been a better place than Bushmerica, but I just wished him a good night and made a mental note not to be nice to rained out old men anymore.

But even though my visa seems to be in order, there may still be some trouble for me, as Belgium is getting a bed rep recently from conservative America. The Washington Post ran a bizarre editorial about the “Many faces of Belgian fascism.” (Regardless of the content of the piece, I find this gratuitous use of the term fascism somewhat shocking, shouldn’t one be a bit more selective with the use of the term “fascism,” lest we forget what it really stood for?)

And a while back, Fox News’ john Gibson wrote a book entitled: Hating America: The New World Sport. A book in which a bully complains about being bullied, and one of the nations that is at the receiving end of Gibson’s vitriolic tirade is Belgium. One of the chapters of his book is called “The Axis of Envy: North Korea, Canada and Belgium.” I did not read the book, but was able to collect some quotes from the author and the book.

"Without the reins of international justice, Belgium is no more than Nova Scotia: pleasant, cold, and completely irrelevant."

"Now that the Iraq deal is over, let’s invade Belgium,” Gibson prematurely declared about a month into the Iraq invasion (4/28/03). “It may be a small country, but, man, is it annoying. . . . Isn’t it time to invade Belgium, just knock some sense into them and give the Frenchies next door a scare?”
(http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2863)

“Belgians are proud of their higher consciousness, their at-all costs pacifism, of a sense of world morality they cling to regardless of circumstances or risks.”

With all this stars and stripes inspired backlash against Belgium, I am afraid I will be on a transfer flight to Guantanamo bay before I can say “Geneva Convention.” But allow me to take issue with Gibson: A sense of world morality? Does losing wars give us the moral high ground? At-all costs pacifism? Has this guy read King Leopold's ghost? What this colonial power did in The Congo is best described as a Holocaust. We stole its resources and killed its people in the most cynical and atrocious way. Higher consciousness? This country has also been selling arms to despotic regimes just to make a dime.

We can also be cynical, self serving and ruthless in foreign relations, we just might not be as good at it as the US. But our intentions are pure and at heart we are also an evil hegemonic empire who is ready to obliterate everyone who does not like the way we do things. We are only still in training. If I can convince customs of this I might still be back in the States by next week….

Prison break, Belgian style

The item dominating the news since I came back to Belgium is the prison escape of 28 dangerous criminals from the prison of Dendermonde. No laughing matter for the people living in the vicinity of the prison and the victims of these violent thugs (most of them from Kosovo), but the manner in which it happened is more Monty Python than “24”.

Friday night, two prisoners pryed open the outdated lock of their cell with a metal bar they had “recovered from their cell door.” Yes, it does not make sense to me either. But it gets better.

The Belgian justice department was quick to point out that it knew that the locks were outdated, and it even had bought new ones, but –alas- had not installed them yet. Why not? “We wanted to paint them first in the color of the cell door before installing them.” Nothing breaks the aesthetic of a 19th century prison cell like non matching door locks. Do you think it is possible that Martha Stewart sat out her sentence in Dendermonde?

Next came what was probable the easiest part: overpowering three of the four prison guards. Yes, that is right, four prison guards for 200 inmates. Explanation of the prison guards’ union: “If something bad happens, we call the police.” Unfortunately, the gangsters –armed with a kitchen knife and broken mirror- did not read the union’s charter and instead of granting them a free emergency phone call, ordered the frightened guards to hand over their keys and locked them up. The gangsters, looking for power in numbers, then opened the other cells. Some lazy inmates could not be bothered and decided to stay in for the night, but 26 of them joined the party.

Then, they encountered their first big obstacle, a high prison wall with a gate to which they did not have the key. However, using scaffolds left behind by some bricklayers, they were able to climb the wall. The workers were doing some work on the wall to –I kid you not- increase the security of the prison. If prison security is a priority, not leaving behind scaffolding that can be used as a stepping stool for escaping prisoners might be a good start.

They jumped some more walls, using their bed linens to protect them from the glass and razor blades on top of the wall. The last jump to freedom was somewhat high, but fortunately the escapees could use a phone booth to jump down in two times, so they all got down without broken bones or sprained ankles. Now here is the kicker: the phone booth had been used as a landing platform “in previous escapes.” Wouldn’t you think that after three or four escapes in which gangsters used this phone booth on their way to freedom, that some one would have said: “Ein minuten bite, would it perhaps not be a good idea to move the phone booth across the street?” And perhaps someone did, but the papers for removal probably got stuck on the desk of some government employee who is on her 11-month maternity leave (and throw in a couple of extra months because she is breast feeding).

By now, the fourth “perceptive” prison guard posted at the main entrance sees some suspicious activity on the security monitor and, as requested by the union, alarms authorities. The prison director, who lives –and I think this is kind of cute- next to the prison, runs out on the street (what I want to know: what was he wearing?) to help and applies a time tested Belgian law enforcement technique: he yells at the escapees. They did not comply with his request to please return to their cells. (Cake or death?)

In the meantime, the other three guards had been released by some brown nosing prisoners who had chosen to stay in their cells. How sad is that? Especially since escaping from prison, as long as you don’t use violence, is not a crime in Belgium; it is even considered to be a fundamental right of the prisoner.

As of today, 19 prisoners are still on the run. One got caught taking a nap in an empty pub (neighbors had noticed a bicycle outside the deserted bar and notified police) and an Iraqi escapee was caught walking happily in the street in broad daylight. However, the more “cunning” (and one has to use this term loosely when dealing with Belgian police and prison guards, recently a prisoner escaped by putting on the clothes of and posing as a cell mate who was being released) gangsters are still on the loose. Now, in the United States, I’d imagine some hard-nosed prosecutor or police officer wouldlook sternly in the camera and make statements like: “And I want all of these escapees to know; you can run but you can’t hide, and we will hunt you down, rest assured.” Now, as Osama-bin laden has shown George Bush, talking the talk is easier than walking the walk, but still,…. Americans seem to look for this kind of reassurance from their leaders, even if they cannot deliver. Here on the other hand, every instance of efficient government is considered to be a pleasant surprise. The prosecutor has been quoted as saying: “I am sure we won’t be able to recapture them all.” Well, at least we don’t have our hopes up, so we are saved the disappointment. As Oscar Wilde famously said: ambition is the last refuge of failure. He was not an American

It is quite a big deal over here right now, and everyone is pointing fingers, the extreme right party will undoubtedly feast on this bone thrown at them by yet another example of inefficient government and the prison guards' union –you guessed it- organized a strike.

Reports of my death were greatly exaggerated

Some feared it would never happen, but today I celebrate my triumphant return to the blogosphere (I really hate that term by the way). As the attentive reader may have noticed by now, I am writing this in English. Loyal fans may remember the inverse spacio-linguistic demands of the baslog: When I am in Belgium I write in English, when Stateside, my wisdom and wit find their way to the screen in the language of Bredero. (American fans, use Wikipedia). So yes, I am in Belgium. A quick one week trip at the end of the summer before (Warning: shocking revelation follows) WORK starts.

Later more about that, first a little update and explanation why the baslog went silent for so long.

Too much was going on. I found this blog perfect to write about sweet nothingness and matters of no consequence, not so much about myself and the “direction of my life.” I am stressed enough just thinking about it, let alone writing about it. In the past couple of months, I finished and defended my dissertation, bought a place and found some kind of job. This consumed a big part of my summer, and when I was not working on these things, writing about them was the last thing I wanted to do. Now these things are more or less behind me and I have enough critical distance to write about them without anxiety.

In Hawaii, my digital camera quit on me. The zoom wasn’t retracting anymore. Fixing it would have cost about 150$, “You might just as well buy a new one, sir” some kid at Target told me. Being gently forced to buy new technology that is so complex it is impossible to repair, I guess that’s progress. Anyhow, without camera, blogging was not nearly as much fun. I am still without camera at this point, but plan to buy one duty free on my way back.

I lost my free wireless connection at our old place. Well technically, I never had one, but I was able to piggy back on the wireless of our neighbor, until the selfish swine locked me out by password protecting his connection. I should have taken it easier on the illegal downloads I guess. After that, I was back to my shaky dial up connection. As anyone who ever had to switch back from high speed to dial up can testify, it really tests your patience. Blogging requires a lot of uploading, and I just would be waiting for minutes only to have my words of wisdom disappear in the “blogosphere’s” abyss because of a disconnection. Drove me insane. Now, in my new place, there is wireless throughout the building, so I will be able to pick up my old habit of blogging while watching Conan O’Brian.

So be prepared for more adventures of B.V. eternal student, uhm, I mean young professional.