Mindset

Busy with work, busy with the elections for the city council and the hot items such as the municipal tax collection, I got to make my taxreturn in the coming forth night.

I read the blogs of other bloggers. Some are busy at work too, others have holidays in Europe or study under war conditions.

I once had a girl who was adopted. At the age of 4 she came from Seoul to the Netherlands. There she was raised in a catholic family. When I met her she was in doubt whether she should search her roots. Via an organization for Korean adopted children she found her family. Her mother has died, but her father still lives and she has a lot of family over there. Her brother in the army and sisters working for the Government or in factories, all catholic. Almost like we do here actually. The language though is a barrier. Only her brother speaks or writes in english. With the organization she's been in Korea and met her family.
It's the barrier of 25 years history (and the language barrier) which makes the gap real huge.
It's a couple of years ago but I think that she's still wondering around and has so many questions.
Hopefully she's set or will set her mind.

Ratio 2

The Netherlands is going to send fresh troops to Afghanistan.
Politics was divided about it, whether to send them or not. The Cabinet of ministers agreed on sending them. Without support of Parliament it was difficult, if not impossible.
After discussion in the Parliament the biggest party (PvdA, social democrats)turned to the sending-side. So the troops can go to the province Uruzgan in Afghanistan.

There was political damage for one party in the Dutch cabinet. The party leader of D'66 (liberal democrats) decided to leave his post after his explanation of his parties position in the discussion. The party was calculating that it's attitude would help the PvdA to change it's mind. It appeared to be a fake attitude and that's the reason the party leader had to leave. He's still in Parliament as a chosen member.

Well, within a few months The Netherlands will be there. It's war there and after how many months will return the first casualties of war?

There is also the bird flu in Europe it is widespread. From Greece to the mainland of Germany (first on the peninsula of Rügen), France has to deal with it and time is ticking before Dutch birds will be infected. This is something for a cartoon.

This weekend I cycled a few kilometers in the cold. I'm behind the schedule of last year. I hope to pick it up in the coming months because I feel I get infected by the cycling virus. The worst thing is that it makes you hallucinate. After the hallucination part you feel better and cycling becomes a part of life. Your body needs it. At least my body needs it.

Sunset when I started writing this entry.

ratio

I just visited my webstat-counter and analysed that my visitors don't visit my page mainly on the words Mohamed and cartoon. Maybe the ratio (another word) becomes more important.
It's strange though that Canada outperformed the UK. Most Visitors come from the United States. But they too search on Mohamed and cartoon.

I got one visitor of Iceland. Hallelujah, that makes 2 on the overall list. But more important, in Iceland they are interested in Europe too. They should be, they are Europe.

1. cartoon.....14
2. mohamed.....14
3. MOHAMED..... 4
4. CARTOON......4
5. 4............2
6. renault......1
7. jylland......1
8. spain........1
9. +telefonica..1
10. carbomb.....1

Weekend

Tomorrow I got a day off. I am free for three days, That feels good. Got a lot to do, especially cycling. Didn't cycle for weeks now and that makes me nervous. This summer I planned a vacation on bike for 3 weeks so a lot of training is necessary.

Tomorrow I will have to wake up early to do the things I want to do. My desk for my computer is a mess, it has always been a mess. And as my mother will be here Sunday I have to have everything cleaned. Well there is much to do which I have postponed for years, such as new curtains in the livingroom. The ones hanging there are irritating me for years actually. I haven't found the energy to change them.
Well lets see what I van do tomorrow.

Visited countries

I thought the map of the world was to big to put it on screen.

1 Gold, 2 silver Olympic medals

The skaters did good work this weekend. It was their weekend. Snow outside but before the TV-set some wonderful pictures from Italy. Yeah, the Italians have done wonderful work so far. I was too skeptic.
The downhill skiing was exciting, the biathlon was terrific and the athmosphere was great. The start is good.

the real thing

Shocking, the World Press Photo's, the carbomb in Beirut, Lebanon in February 2005.

This hurts ME more than all the cartoons (silly or not).
These pictures show me that the world isn't what I believes it is. Showing these pictures is an act of aggression towards my happiness.
It should be forbidden to show these pictures. And I'm sure that 2.5 billion people are with me!

But what the heck with the cartoons, for some rest go to Portugal.

a serious cartoon

What I think is a funny cartoon with a serious undertone. It's against the manslaughter of innocent people in the underground, train, skyscrapers, market squares, hotels, police offices, planes, crossroads, etcetera, etcetera.
serious cartoon

almost a witness

Friday at the end of my working day something terrible happened.
You must know that the street is divided by a double tramway. This tram is fast and is very silent.
When I looked over my shoulder last week I saw 4 police cars and a tram waiting apparently. When I looked closer I saw on 70 metres distance on the side of the tramway a body. The ambulance came but the personnel only checked the body. She (as local news told in the evening) seemed to be dead. 70 metres from me it happened that someone lost her life. I didn't hear or see anything. Maybe that's my luck. I didn't have to think constantly about it
It's astonishing how life goes on. From Monday on a lot of people crossed the busy road and tramway on the same spot where the woman died.
Yesterday I heard that the son of my colleague is in the same class as the son of the woman who died. It's bad, but as my grandmother said long ago, life goes on.

We had a beautiful sunset this evening and the sparrows loved to play in the wind. I got a video of it But don't know how to put it on this site. So I got only a photo here.


witness

Not just one but four freedoms

Hi,

Is it worth it to publish the Mohamed cartoon ?
It ain't worth it to publish Jesus cartoon!

The Danish newspaper Jylland Posten did the wrong thing not to publish the Jesus cartoon a couple of years ago. Why not, was it afraid of bad criticism?
I think the newspaper should be ashamed not to publish that particular cartoon.

As an atheist I think it's a pity that they didn't go for the Jesus thing.
Jyllands Posten didn't satisfy an atheist's want.
Freedom of speech and expression is an important thing, but who thinks Jyllands Posten's profit is more important? Yeah right!

Just look here for the four freedoms

One hectic day.

I just finished the day.

express

Yesterday I used the words make fun of. Maybe that's not right.
However it's a right of man to express their feeling whether it's on paper, by speech or in a drawing. All the expressions are the same.
I can draw an old man with beard, a turban with a bomb in it, or say that the terrorists hide behind a fence of their believe. Apparently the first message is heard globally.

I doubt if the underlying message is understood.

a dull weekend

Well, weekend was not really hectic, ahumm. No cycling and no plans. In fact I did nothing. The weather was against me. So I had a real quiet weekend.
In the newsgroup nl.politiek I posted a lot of reactions especially about the cartoon incident.

> Throw out their fifth column. Don't forget those with our passports, and
> especially don't forget those already inside our political system.
>
> Go after the mastermind states, which seem to be Iran, Syria an
> Saudia-Arabia. Use all the means necessary to achieve this goal.

> Unter blinden ist der einäugige könig.


This is such a bad idea. Remember what the USA did in the 2nd worldwar with
everyone who had Asian blood. They didn't do the same with Germans.
Remember what Mccarthyism meant.

Just make clear what the rules are in Europe. If one doesn't want to live by
those rules than it's single trip to where ever one comes from.

Hopefully coming week will be better.

Danish cartoon

I'm furious about the Arab world. Democracy means that anyone can say almost anything unless it's discrimination. But artists are more privileged to say what's on their mind. So if they want to make fun of every kind of believes it's okay.
It's almost a duty of artists to confront people with themselves, to shock society.

This mob about the Danish cartoon shows exactly how thin the ice is. It shows also how explosive the middle-east and Muslim situation is.

Europe has to stand firm against the Muslim fundamentalism. Europe has to tell what their values are. What the Trias Politica is, what the separation of church and state means and that in case of an argument the juridical way is the ultimate solution.

You can read it also in words of Ibn Warraq published in Der Spiegel

Later in this year 1,500 Dutch soldiers, marines and their equipment will be shipped to Uruzgan in central Afghanistan. Dutch Parliament has decided 2 days ago to go. So from now on we have to count our words, every word matters, every argument has negative consequences.

In a democracy every person has the right to state a message. It can not be that if the message is against the Minister in power dealing with political refugees, economical refugees, illegal foreigners, that minister forbids the message and forces the protesters to recall the huge pamphlet's on mainly sqauts.

She, Rita Verdonk, tries it with legal action, that's true. Nevertheless if a Minister can't stand criticism, what kind of arrogant Government we got then in the Hague?
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Posted by Jan to *** JANSBLOG *** at 11/18/2005 11:12:00 PM

What's on a man's mind

Everyone knows the psychological drawing of the face of an older man, I call it'"what's on a man's mind" When I saw it for the first time in the early eighties in my dad's study-room, I saw nothing but the old man. It could have been Karl Marx. But if you look with your other hemisphere you see a woman framed in the drawing. Mind boggling? Yes, in the early eighties it was. I was astonished when I could see it.

I heard the news about an upraise of Muslims against everything what is Danish, because a Danish newspaper published a cartoon of prophet Muhammed with a bomb as a turban. It's a political statement what's made against the narrow minded terrorists.
You better fight with words than spreading terror.
The fact that the prophet isn't allowed to be drawn. Alla, that's mind boggling. I can imagine the astonishment. But every reasonable man must understand what he can see with his other hemisphere. Don't use religion to justify terrorism.