France Strikes Again...

I like that title, if I may say so myself. It has so many different meanings. And one of those should be evident to all though who spend atleast 15 minutes watching the news, and no, CNN does not count.

The entire country of France was on strike yesterday. Everybody. Here's how it goes in France when it comes to strikes: Usually they warn you a day or two in advance so that people can get their stuff in order to not get stuck on that day, and usually when there is a strike that concerns everyone, it's usually public transportation. Or a company here and there, but usually it's not very bothersome, just a little brouhaha here and there. Not yesterday, Thursday, January 29th, 2009.

Yesterday, France decided that they had had enough. The warning that there was going to be a strike went out since a week ago, meaning that there were many cautions to be taken lest you were willing to be stuck in the capital (and many other cities) with nowhere to run for cover. And this was not only some disgruntled employees deciding that they were not getting paid enough. This was damn near the whole country in the streets. With the exception of yours truly.

One number shows the sheer massiveness of this strike which had not been seen since 20 years ago: 2,500,000. That's the unofficial amount of people who manifested in the streets through France yesterday. Public transportation, dead. Businesses, dead. Schools, dead. Life, dead.

I woke up with one intention in mind. Put on the tv on the news channel and wait til someone gets hit in the head with a police nightstick. Didn't have to wait very long. But that's besides the point. There were alot of interesting topics discussed on the news channels as to why the people of this beautiful country in which I live in were striking. Many say the economic crisis, others demand better working conditions, but most were after the President. Many find that he is incompetent when it comes to running the country and yesterday it showed. There was little response from the H."N".I.C. and mostly he let his goonies do the dirty work. Typical.

He hid behind his ministers and decided to let them deal with the media and the crazy french people waving around picket signs outside in the street. They tried to put most of the blame on the economic crisis but we all know that if a country is run properly, that these situations can be avoided or atleast better handled, and since his inauguration in early 2007, he has made many questionable decisions. Most notably, marrying that lady. Ha!

But here we are today. A government that has enough money so that it's President and ministers live the good life, but is managing it terribly à la Bush Administration, and the rest of the country is suffering. And what you end up with is the biggest national strike of the 21st century in France.

Job well done fellas. I salute you. And yeah, keep blaming the recession. It's the in thing.

God forbid he is re-elected.

I'm out.

I Should Have Brought Along My Cellphone

Ever been in one of those situations where something happens and you just NEED to immortalize it? Never? Well your life sucks my friend.

I was in one such situation some day earlier this week, can't remember when. It all started when I was at home wondering what I would want to eat that evening. Oh yeah, I shop for like 2, 3 days MAX. I HATE shopping for food. Anyhow, so I decide to jump out quickly and go to the supermarket to pick up a couple things. It is around 8.30 pm.

I put on my iPod and we begin our journey (5 minute walk). As I round the corner leading up to the supermarket I see one of the most disturbing things ever. And I mean in the history of whatever:

*Insert cellphone picture here*

Can you see it? Disturbing eh? Oh no, wait, you can't. Well yeah I know you can't. Because I didn't bring along my cellphone, it was only a short journey and even though I bring my phone EVERYWHERE with me, I just decided to leave it home today. Oh well.

Let me paint a picture with my words. Imagine a middle aged man wearing one of those women's hoodies, but one that stops just above the navel, light pink in colour. And with that a full body spandex suit, except his head was exposed. Add to that a tiny pink hand bag that he tried to keep over his shoulder. And silver ballerina shoes. And what you end up with is a recipe for disaster. Or in my case, a near heart attack. And it just so happened that we were going to the exact same place.

Life in the supermarket literally paused. I was laughing LOUDLY. And my laugh is like a yawn. It's infectious. In the end everyone was laughing. I was saying that maybe he lost a bet or something, but seeing how serious he was about doing his shopping or whatever while constantly walking on his toes, I was thinking to myself that maybe he had lost his mind.

Girls, imagine waking up one day and your father is perfectly normal, and then when you come home from school in the evening you see him prancing around in your ballerina clothes in the street like a fairy. Scary. But funny. To us, not to you.

The only thing I regret in all of this is not having my cellphone with me. Oh well, hopefully God will smile upon me so that him and I cross paths again. I will be ready this time.

I'm out.

My Hero

Everyone has that one special person they refer to as their "hero".

It's a word thrown around loosely nowadays. Especially in America. Everyone and their mother is a hero, and all-American hero, to be precise.

Thank goodness the presidential election is over. Another month of that drawn out process and the term "maverick" would have become a permanent fixture in everyday referencing as well.

Some keep it simple with responses such as mom or dad. It's different to different people- politians have Lincoln, Reagan and Clinton. Sports fanatics have Jordan, Ruth, Gretzky, etc. Oprah for others, hell, Bill O'Reilly even has a few nutjobs that hold on to every toxic word he belches out. Firefighters and astronauts for some. The cheerleader for us ALL and it's clear that the world, as a whole, has jumped on the Barack Obama bandwagon (I think the LGBT community has jumped off though. Long story, not getting into that one SELF).

As for me, I have my sports icon in Scottie Pippen. Politican, Claude Wathey (*ahem* NOT!), and Bill Maher to apease my cynical side among others, but none of the aforementioned "heroes" have managed to leave to lasting impression that my hero has left on me, as I'm sure he has done for so many of you without you even realizing it.

He's been on television expressing his world views for well over a decade now. He's as hateable a character as Ann Coulter and just a little less loveable than the late, young Matty Stepanek who touched so many with his Heart Songs.

Although he may seem like any other young person, he's one that truly broke the mold (pun intended).

So, who is my hero you might be asking yourself?

My hero is none other than Eric Theodore Cartman. Yes, THAT Eric Cartman of the highly acclaimed cartoon series, Southpark.

For those of you not familiar with the program, Eric is an overweight 8-year old boy that lives with his mother who adores him despite the disrespect he dishes out in her direction almost everytime she's on screen.

He surrounds himself with three classmates/boys (Stan, Kyle and Kenny) from his little mountain town. Although they always do things together, they all detest Eric and are quite open about it. The reason they...and everyone else hate him, is because Eric is manipulative. Moreover, he's insensitive to others, antisemetic, racist beyond belief, prejudice for the heck of it and... to sum it all up he's simply an asshole.

How could such a person be my hero?

A child who's own hero is Adolf Hitler, a child that has a disturbing affection and shrine of Mel Gibson, a child that would infect you with AIDS just so he wouldn't have it alone if he himself had it (which he did), a child that would pretend to have Tourette's Syndrome just to get on television or poke fun of Breast Cancer... but I digress, let me go back to making my point.

Well, if you think about it long enough you'll realize that there's a little Eric Cartman in all of us. Eric is the cartoon personification of all that's bad in the world and in people. Emphasis on all, seriously, ALL. He's as real as they come though. We all think similar things as he, maybe not to mock those with Tourette, torture animals and give others AIDS, but we all have to own up to the fact that we, too, are sometimes afraid of the unknown and wish to keep things as they are (I live in the Netherlands, I know what I'm saying when I say people are afraid of the unknown and embracing change). Anyhow, my thoughts are running too fast for my fingers to catch up.

Okay, I don't like the kid at all and if real and residing near to me, I'd have no problem beating him to a pulp. Dude is seriously a little shit. Albeit so, Eric is a child that believes in his beliefs and doubts in his doubts. So you got to respect his authoritaaah.

Regardless of the outcome, Eric will see a situation through. He is passionate about his convictions and acts on them with when the powers-that-be fail to do so. That too is not necessarily accurate, if he realizes his actions will come back to bite him in the ass he take a lesser stance and let someone else take the brunt of the stick, but the same more would not help build my case.

To be honest, I really can't think of more ways of justifying his poor, inhumane behaviour. It's hard to make an argument/case for Eric when you think about it. You know what...let's just forget I mentioned all this.

Later

P.S.: Today January 12th, 2009 happens to be my 23rd birthday. Hip hip hooray for me. As I look back over my life I must say that it's been pretty cool thus far. I've met people, been to places and done things that most St. Maarteners would never get the chance to do. And as I enter this year I have decided to once again make it the Best year Yet. So I will now cut the cake and celebrate in my lonesome and to those of you who have forgotten me on this day: no love lost.

P.P.S.: Finally remembered the password to this thing. I should probably write it down, but I know I'll forget to do so.

Epic Fail

Ever had one of those times when nothing can go your way? That you seem to do things, but from beforehand you know that it will all be in vain? This week was one of those weeks for me. End of exams week.

Granted, I did not have that many exams, like 3, but my goodness, I lost this battle AND the war. First off, History class on Monday. Subject: The relations between France and South America after the Second World War. Sounds interesting enough, except for one thing. To know anything about this subject, you would have had to have attended ALL classes. And in my case, I attended none. I cheated, yes I admit it, I can't go down without a fight, but when you cheat with people who also have no idea what they are doing, your chances of passing are next to none. Verdict: FAIL.

Moving on. Next up, English on Thursday. Ok, brief history. This is my second time doing my first year. Yes, I'm a staybacker. So the subjects that I passed last year, I don't have to do them over this year since I passed them. Duh. English is one of those subjects. I passed with flying colours. Why did I do the exam over you ask? Glad you did. To help people out. I'm a team player. And help people out I did. Even though I did not give in my paper, just walked out the class leaving the teacher just as perplexed as those who were not involved in our shenanigans, I was proud of my accomplishments. And in return, a friend decided he was going to help a brother out for the Law exam. And help is what this brother needed.

Next official exam on Thursday was Economics. The teacher (someone I hate with all my heart, I kid you not, there is no one I look at with more burning hatred than him, he deserves it) gave us a previous exam and decided that since there were so many insufficiant grades that he would let those who were willing to be able to do a make up exam and on the exam that you score highest on, you keep that mark and the next one is discarded. I believe that I should mention that I cheated out of the book for the first exam. And I got a 6. Out of 20. Verdict: FAIL.

So we enter this second economy exam, and the teacher gives us 3 questions, and tells us that we must only choose one to answer. Yeah, I failed. I basically wrote a story for him, hopefully if I get my paper back, I'll be able to post it up here, so you guys can experience greatness. But nothing could compare to what awaited me today, Friday, January 9th 2008, oh wait, damn, 2009.

Law exam. Now this is another class to which I have NEVER been. Come on, on Friday at 3pm, the LAST thing I want to do is be in Law class learning about things I will forget the moment I get up from my seat. Anyhow, I enter the law class and quickly yet discreetly try and slip my way to the back of the class. By now, the way this post has been going, you know that I did not succeed. Add the fact that the class was empty except for the teacher and I, my shooting percentage went down another notch. He looked at me as if to say "I've never seen this kid before in my life", and quite frankly, he would be right. I had no idea who he was either so I guess that made us equal.

He then promptly directed me to a seat DIRECTLY in front of his desk. Now at this time, my brain is still working, so I go and calmly sit down, and I save a seat for my partner in crime to have a space to sit when he gets in so we can get our cheating on. And then I notice something terribly wrong. As the students file into the classroom, the teacher is the one who tells each one where to sit. And it just so happens, that when said partner in crime walked in, he was placed at the far end of the class.

He looked at me, and burst out in laughter. I could have killed him. But I digress. So now I am totally alone on the battlefield, with ANOTHER 3 questions in front of me, only this time we must answer all 3. I felt like walking out. And then a lady friend of mine sat down next to me, and I was like, "You're going to help me out", she says "Ok". I'm happy again. We do the exam, I write over what she says in my own words, and I give my paper with a smile.

We get outside where everybody is busy asking each other what the answers were and when they asked my lady friend, guess what she says. "I honestly had no clue what the answers to those questions were, I just wrote in basic nonsense". I had to restrain myself from choking her. So here I am thinking that I might have passed when I'm actually up against an EPIC. FAIL. Thanks very much lady enemy.

The moral of this story is: There is no moral to this story. This was just a quick recap of my week. A week I spent away from the internets (yes there is an s). A week I consider a cruel joke made to me by God. It's all good though. Atleast I have two weeks off, to get ready for the second semester. Good times all around.

*Sigh*

I'm out.

Thank You For Smoking

- Verbal irony is a disparity of expression and intention: when a speaker says one thing but means another, or when a literal meaning is contrary to its intended effect. An example of this is sarcasm. -

Irony is something I use everyday. Sarcasm is also. Sometimes it gets hard to tell the difference, and with the frequency with which I use it, I'm not helping you pour souls who don't know one from the other. I'm sorry about that.

It's pretty simple if you look at it from this perspective. Irony can be translated in many different ways, here we are sticking to what was quoted up there. When someone says one thing, but means another. Which is what some people claim to be sarcasm. True. But only to a certain extent. Sarcams is usually fairly negative. It's a way of expressing bitterness by saying something that is very obvious to the target, making your point of view on the subject very clear. Therefore you are telling them, cleverly I might add, that you do not agree with them. If I'm wrong, tell me. I don't like to be wrong, but I'm not always right, just most of the time. Ha!

Irony is sarcasm, but with a less harsh, jovial twist. Pretty simple. And I use both very often. And the title of this post is a phrase I use practically everyday that I'm not at home. Yes, I tend to believe that I live in the smoking capital of the world. While this might not be true, I like to believe it is.

Now, to the point of all of this. Is there really a point? God only knows, I'm developping as I type. This can be interesting. And just to be clear, I'm not targeting anybody with this. If you smoke, fine with me. I don't judge. But that does not mean that I have to like it. Clear? Good.

Smokers suck. Ok, not really. But people who blow their smoke in non-smokers' faces do. And they deserve to burn in Hell. I have nothing against smokers, it's all love. Do you. But I only have one question. What do you get out of smoking a pack of cigs a day? Or half a pack? Is it to look cool? Is it fun knowing you most probably might die a painfully slow death later on in life? What is it that is so attractive to the gazillion smokers out there? I have no clue. I really need somebody to break it down for me. That is all.





I'm out.