March 19, 2003 : the day it all began.

I spent the morning sending my two friends to Amsterdam for a day and night of typically-Amsterdam-like-activities. They originally planned to go to Paris today, but Amsterdam seemed to be a nice replacement city filled with wild and crazy Dutch people who nearly all speak English. (a plus in this case)

I spent the rest of the day working away on my laptop listening to the BBC. (anything news) and working on a couple of projects. I have been wanting to add an audio entries to my journal but wanted to do it in the awkward text-to-speech format. Now once a week I'll have a new journal entry posted over to the right, next to that red arrow.

There's some sort of feeling in the air, and as I can vividly remember the day the war started last time around, I suppose it's the same sort of energy in the air--though this time I am more aware of it, and I won't spend the war-night walking around in a nearly-vacant suburban mall with my father before we head to our Wednesday-night church meeting. (Unless I want to be over-the-top and decide to go to Wijnegem Shopping Center.)

I know the "oil" version of why people don't support war, and the "he's a tyrant, but we shouldn't mess up the alliances of the world over him" version and I've heard the "it's too far away" version which includes the "it has nothing to do with me" version. Today, however, it seemed so pointless really, all of the efforts that so many people put forth to be against it. I cut a white swath of fabric out of an old bleached cotton scrap and hung it from our bay window. I don't suppose many people will see it, but it seems the only comment I (we) can/could make.

Hopefully, if all goes well (actually regretfully so), I'll be doing a project which compares the tv media of the US vs. the media of Belgium from the coming weeks. I have friends back home who will faithfully hit record when they watch the nightly news. As it approaches, I become more and more prepared to simply want the troops of my own country home quickly. It's going to happen, right? So let's just put it all to rest quickly and then get back to focusing on providing more health-care to American's with less money, providing cheaper and better education for college-age students, and cutting out more of the belching emissions of so many factories and cars back home.

I spent the day with the radio on, sitting here sorting out the love-hate relationship I have with my homeland, sitting here sorting out the "nerves" and views of my newly-arrived Midwestern friends, and sitting here reading the emails from my praying parents.

Before Eva got home, I headed to Del Haize on the bike. Replacing the scooter with bike will be easier the sooner I forget with what speed the scooter sent us from place to place. I actually found myself at the supermarket in a timely manner, being able to maneuver around cars with seemingly better ease then the gas-powered, quick A to B scooter. As I mentioned, it will just take some time.

When Eva got home, I started making dinner and opted to eat the heart-shaped potato we bought last week. I figured I should use it in an us-centered meal, and not actually let the heart sprout, so the heart-shaped potato ended up in my pork and veggie casserole.

We listened to the radio for the rest of the night, ran a few late-night errands, and headed to bed. It seemed so obvious that it was going to happen, but we set our alarm for 2am for when Bush was going to give his speech. To be honest, the memory fails me. I don't know if it was sleep or news-overkill which blocked it from my memory. Eva says that we woke up the best that we could and listened long enough to know for sure and then we went back to bed.

I was sound asleep the moment it all began. I'll remember today more for the white-flag hanging out of our window, eating the heart-shaped beloved potato, and the news I listened to all day, the cyclical BBC World Service which repeats, adds, and deletes a conglomeration of news-bits all day long.

And Eva? I don't' know what she'll remember from the day it happened. I suppose she'll remember more of the "moment' it happened that I do, but I suppose it's basically the same thing. Months of journal entries with closing IN THE NEWS items of concepts for and against the motion that began tonight culminating on one day that was much the same as any other day, though beautiful here. And tomorrow will be another, and so on an so forth.

IN THE NEWS:
American action began shortly before President George W. Bush gave an early morning address from the Oval Office. "American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger," He said the United States had struck "selected targets of military importance" intended to undermine Saddam's ability to wage war. "We will not end this campaign without victory," he said.

And I have another link of sorts: http://www.iraqbodycount.net/