Look I’m Belgian

Greetings from THE Belgium my friends. Brussels, to be more specific. After going more than six months without seeing a family member in the flesh, I’m here visiting my wonderful cousins, playing with obscenely energetic children, and doing a bit of tourism, despite the fact that I’ve made this trip countless times.

If you’re thinking of coming to THE Europe, and perhaps starting in the dam, Brussels is only a three hour local train ride away. Or you can be posh and ride the Thalys. When I grow up, I’m going to ride the thalys. I know.. its posh.. but man.. its so nice.

Travelling has taken on a new meaning to me in the last year, mostly for one reason: podcasting. On my train ride down here, while staring out at Antwerp and Rotterdam and the piles of cow staring back at me, I listened to podcasts from around the world. An Australian journalist talked with Brasilians in the favelas about president Lula. Dr. Lesbian called random podcasters and discussed the concept of being “family safe”. And my personal fav on this trip, PW Fenton spoke of his life epiphony. Listening to that Billy Joel while staring out over neverending green fields was delicious.

bicyclemark50_050709

50th Show! From London to DC with our Washington insider D-Rock

AudioCommunique #50(mp3)
44min+, 64kbps, 20Mb+ (longer then normal, as it’s a special occasion)

You’ll probably be offended as I lay out my opinions on the London bombings
George Galloway says it better
Direct from DC, D-Rock reports on terrorism, drugs, Uzbekistan and the Conan OBrien show.
Audio Cograds from: The Mindcaster and Tokyo Calling
Further thank you’s to my first podcasts from way back: Loft405, Dawn and Drew, and Viva Podcast (links in the left column)

War Without War

So many terms are abused these days, I pity all those once respected and meaningful words that have now become cliché and worthless. You know of them, consult any media source and they’re staring back at you: freedom, war, ideology, barbaric, etc. The only thing worse than seeing all the despair of the past days, is hearing all the manipulative and worthless speeches spouted by so-called leaders.

terror in iraq The biggest irony or simply wierd factor in all this, is how shocked some are. War on terror… war on terror… you hear it all the time.. over and over… yet somehow this so-called war doesn’t involve many war-like situations for the people involved. Thats right, I mean regular people who’s tax money and who’s vote play a role in the waging of war in different corners of the world. They are as innocent as the people who were/are bombed in Iraq, or anywhere. Yet those types of tragedies are considered normal, we expect a few to die, daily, in the middle east, but when it’s in London- its tragic.

Oh the bizarre double standard. You’re at war, but you live like you’re not. And then something happens like this, and it’s shocking.

Breaking News: Londons Burning

Apologies for the poor taste headline. I’ve been reading the BBC’s text-message testamonies and its very sad.

Blasts in London

Worried about everyone there. Just like I worry about all the victims of violence around the world.

In the meantime Im in the fishtank and the Dutch news is running some story about a Puma being kidnapped or some shit. The corporate media has a keen eye for useless crap to keep us dumb.

13h52 UPDATE: Blair and the BBC are already spreading speculation and stupidity about how its “probably terrorism” or.. “possibly linked to Al Qaeda”. The world has no use for professional investigations or court systems anymore, political leaders and media have cut out the middle man. They are the modern day judge-jury-and executioner. Get ready world, someones going to get invaded or bombed over this.

Grass is Greener

At the fishtank today, I sat down to lunch with mrs toronto’s greatest chef in exile. The man himself was doing his thing in the kitchen. He feeds the fish all summer long. But the conversation at lunch today was one that I immediately thought to bring on the communique.

Frisbeee

At one point we were discussing how many Dutch people complain about how everything is “boring” here. Trams run on time, pay checks are decent, things generally work… which apparently gets annoying. You’ll often hear them plotting to move to Spain or Italy, where they believe the laid back pace is the perfect way to life.
On the other hand, I mentioned, many if not most people in Portugal get utterly fed up with buses not showing up on time, crap salaries, and generally how things don’t work. They talk of moving to richer countries, like the UK or France.

Grass is greener on the other side? I don’t think so… I think some people just don’t appreciate how good they’ve got it while the rest of the world dreams of having such a situation.

Hmm.. no linkage today…. thats rare.