Buffy Season 8: Long Way Home

Buffy Season 8: Long Way Home (#1-#4)
Script: Josh Whedon
Pencils: Georges Jeanty
Inks: Andy Owens
Colors: Dave Stewart
Letters: Richard Starkings & Comicraft's Jimmy

I just finished this. And I have only one thing to say; wow.

Before I start to talk about the comic, a brief monologue on the background should be in order; Buffy the Vampire Slayer aired seven seasons from 1997 to 2003, created a spin-off Angel which ran five seasons till 2004. Apparently TV-film about yet another character would be currently in production and come out sometime next year.
The show was ground-breaking in many ways; and to this day many of the more popular shows use plot-points and characters created here; Veronica Mars and Chloe Sullivan (Smallville) come readily to mind.

Background
The premise is pretty simple; the world is full of evil things, and vampires are pretty much the low end as far as the threats go. Slayer - always a female - who is armed with super strength, damage resistance and combat skills was created to keep humanity safe. When she falls (usually only after few years), a new Slayer awakens somewhere to continue the mission.

The TV-Show
Buffy is the Slayer. During the TV-series she and her friends went thru the education system (high school, university), had few relationships, tried to find their place in the world,, grew to be adults and finally got things working pretty well for them; at least as well as things can go when people around you die more or less frequently.
The thing that made the series great was in showing how mundane supernatural is when you are forced to live in the middle of it year after year. Even the demons have bars and have to sleep and get money somehow. And it might not be very good idea to go to the graveyard during night-time. Oh, and a looming apocalypse more or less annually, usually around May. Better leave the calendar open.

The Comic
It has been few years since the season seven ended. And as Buffy notes, the problem with changing the world is that once you do it... the world is all different. You have more responsibility, and there is nobody to tell you how things should be done. Because everything is new. The book has a nice balance between returning to the characters of the TV-show and telling how they are doing after we last saw them. And even as we follow combat training and assault to military installation, there is still time to catch on how the characters personal lifes have been going, why Lando Calrissian's outfit bode bad for the future (Ewoks!) and wonder who in the cast was harbouring true, unrequired love towards Buffy..


The goodness
If you didn't guess, I'm a huge fan of Buffy (and I don't use that word lightly), so I was a bit unsure how to aproach the comic. On the other hand, it doesn't have the facial expressions, background music or other techniques available in television, and on the other there also aren't any budget limitations for what you can and can't show.
And then there's the one limitation I was most worried off; 40 minutes of TV every week isn't the same as 22 pages of paper once a month. On top of it all I was quite worried about the deconstruction; the style of the later years to tell as little though text as possible to give more space for the art. The books look amazing, but you also read them in five minutes. This isn't the case here; text fills the space, confident that it's needed. And when a truly shocking sight comes up, it is given the space necessary. But all in all, the pages are used very economically, with only few boxes carrying minutes of conversation.
And speaking of the art; there's a certain amount of talent required to make the characters look like the actors that once did the roles, without making the art look stiff and unnatural. Save few panels with Andrew (above), the artist has avoided this in an excellent manner. Good old-school art with realistic yet simple style; no photorealism and no manga, both of which would probably ill-suit the series.

All in all; Buffy is back. With new direction and without the limitations that seemed to strangle the show sometimes during the later seasons. I confidentially wait for the new issues and the TPB's; the first one should come out in just few days.

I'll be waiting for it at the door.

I had forgotten I had taken this...

"Happiness"

Taken at Loch Lommond, during late May. I'm so satisfied with it that I actually gave it a name.

I wish that will be me in 40 odd years.

About religion

Boing Boing-post that shows the unbelievable stupidity of humanity. On the comments there is this line, the reason I wrote this post;

But why is it so hard for people to accept that maybe, just maybe, the people who compiled the Bible and told stories over six thousand years ago were possibly trying to just figure it out, just like we are today?

It is attributed to AndrewJC, who is the author of post #19. This pretty much sums my views on religion, and thus deserves a post of its own. It's far better said than anything I did in the Jehova's Witnesses-post a while back.

Buzzing in my mind

I have so many things I would like to write about, but can't seem to get anything together! I'm going to throw them up here, and if I ever develop them further, change them into links. How does that sound?

Comics Festival.
It's great to meet new people and old ones, but it's so hard to make people stay in contact afterwards (because of the whole "your a girl and I'm a guy and I kind of like you.."-factor). Which is a bugger, because not all the girls I like talking to I would like to bed.
Also; the hectic timetable and not sleeping enough.

Instant messaging etiquette.
1.) When you start talking to someone the first time ever, after greeting establish where you know each other from or where did you get the address. There's lots of idiots out there and you can't expect the other to do research to identify you.
Also: the person to start the conversation also has to establish the topic.
2.) If you are going to leave the computer, you are doing something else and can't answer - let the other party know. It's not nice to wait five to fifteen minutes for answer to a question or to carry on the conversation - IM's are not just about keeping boredom at bay. It's also legitimate way of conversation, and you have to take precautions for the fact that the other person is giving you his undivided attention.
3.) When the conversation ends, let the other one know - don't just leave it hanging.
4.) Remember, when you IM, you are talking to another person and not to a computer with limitless patience.

The connection between personality and the work the personality creates.
You love somebody's art, stories or jokes, and then find that your political views are almost opposite. Does it make the creations any less likeable? Many people seem to think so..

Facebook.
Unlike MySpace, it rocks.

Graduation paper
My "maturity sample", what I'm going to create to graduate from my "University of Applied Sciences". I was mostly thinking logistics, software, piracy and how copy protection is a see-saw between limiting too much and too little.

How organizations survive
Thinking about comics festival. None of the original founders are around anymore, but somehow it's still the same event. Why? Because of the same name? The feeling? Or just that it has been "passed on", like set of dinner plates, from one one generation to another?

11th of September 2001

It was about 15:30 when my mother called me away from computer to tell that WTC had been hit in New York. At the time I was only vaguely clear of the whole existence of the Twin Towers. Even so, after watching the news broadcast only few minutes, I got tired of it and returned to computer.
Not long after, my mother called me back - another tower had been hit.

I don't think I understood then what that meant.

I didn't understand it well the next day either. A friend of mine - who made a point of being anti-American - said something about them asking for it.

Now, six years later, it leaves me wondering. I wasn't terribly taken by USA myself. I had learned of the contras and the toppling of democracies not long before, and couldn't quite grasp the difference between nation as an entity, the person at the helm of the state ship and the people who voted him to power. It all blurred together, into a fairy tale creature called America who didn't care about the rest of the countries and was on pollution spree (Bush had not long before announced of not taking part in Kyoto).

During the following months and years, USA launched two wars, openly ridiculed Europe and threw away all the credits they had gotten in the tradegy. Carrying stuff thru airports became more difficult - they still didn't find the Swiss army knife forgotten in the backpack, but now you couldn't carry any water and I had to remove shoes before getting to the tax free zone. I read about USA abusing records of EU citizens when they entered on American soil and stories of a reporter who got jailed at JFK for a week and then turned back because ten years earlier she had overstayed her visa by a day.

I begin to realize the difference administration does to a country, and how well Clinton arranged his foreign policy.

I feel like something is happening, now. Something monumentous, something with a solid date that starts a new era. It is often so that every decade has an event that characterizes the following decade; WTC, Berlin Wall, invasion of Czechoslovakia and Apollo 11...

I feel something like that is coming. I don't know what, and I might be wrong, but somehow it all seems so very omnious. And, as so often these days, it has something to do with USA. And I don't think it's anything joyous, like Apollo 11 and Berlin Wall was. I think it's still becoming worse.

I'm scared. At some point future changed from something that one looks forward to to something you are vaguely scared of.

And back in September 2001 they had a moment for silence for the people who died, at 10 o'clock, in the beginning of the history period. I was late for the class and while sitting down I wondered why everyone was silent and what the hell was going on. In a way, I'm still wondering.

You take things for granted and..

I was quite happy just a hour ago, surfing net, reading comics. Then I checked my Inbox and found mail from my dad, who is currently vacationing in Mexico and living with a friend of his;

Hi,
I was the weekend, till Saturday, at San Antonio, where the heat was 40 degrees. Then we drove to Durango through Piedras Negras. We had to change our course, when we found a burning lorry in front of us (100m). We waited a while, but when the driver came by and told that he was shipping 22 tons of dynamite.
They springled water over the lorry and the fire seemed to be under control. We still decided to leave for safety's sake, and while we were eating 5 km's away we heard a loud explosion; 30something died and 70 got hurt. The group included firemen, police, reporters and inhabitants of nearby houses.

The crater was 4m deep and 10m wide.

We drove the motorway through the night to get here. Tomorrow we are going to Mazatlan to beach vacation, where I'm going to teach Jaime to fish.

I was quite disoriented after reading this, but decided to check if maybe there was something about this in Google News. This was the first entry with the searchword "dynamite";

Mexico Dynamite Truck Explosion Kills 34

By JUAN MONTANO – 3 hours ago

PIEDRAS NEGRAS, Mexico (AP) — A dynamite-laden truck exploded after colliding with another vehicle on a busy highway in northern Mexico's coal country, killing at least 34 people, including three reporters at the scene, state and federal officials said.
[...]
Shortly after the crowd arrived, the wreckage caught fire, and the dynamite exploded, sending a ball of fire into the sky that consumed nearby cars and left a 10-by-40 foot crater in the concrete, said Maximo Alberto Neri Lopez, a federal police official.

He said more than 150 people were injured.

My dad was there. He could easily have been one of the 150 people, if he wouldn't have wandered off (mostly out of boredom, I would say, more than from safety.. but I may judge him too harshly). It doesn't make it much better that the email starts with a nice tidbit about weather and ends in the plan to teach fishing. Like this incident was nothing..

I might be in shock. It's 1:15 and I should be sleeping, but my heart is racing. I wonder how the other people in my family will react, when they check their Inboxes.

I sent dad a reply and told how happy I was that I still had him. You take these things for granted. And I can't think that last Wednesday, the last time I had proper time to spend with him, I dismissed him to go watch telly...

Some songs I've been listening to

Three songs that I have played quite often on my iPod recently.

The first one is from a free concert in Helsinki in -92, and that is the genuine choir, and not some pretenders. This is the version of the song I most like;

Leningrad Cowboys and the Red Army Choir - Knocking on Heaven's Door


Juice was a groundstone of Finnish pop/rock for decades till he died a year or two ago. He had (among other things) very bad diabetes, and his living habits left much to be wanted. It's a surprise he lasted as long as he did.

Juice Leskinen - Musta Aurinko Nousee


Some Swedish band that was the representative of the previously mentioned country in Eurovision Song Contest this year. I heard this song at local music TV while idly waiting for something to happen.

The Ark - Prayer for Weekend


Listen if you care to.

Glasgow

I spent little over four months in Paisley, about 30 kilometres from Glasgow. It was great time, not only because I made new friends and (I think) learned something new about life and institutions..

While I was there, I felt myself somewhat caged in how everything possible was barred off, making many streets into labyrinths, where you could only move to one direction hundreds of metres without chance to turn left or right. When streets went like that to every direction, you started to get a bit claustrophobic. Even though the civilization-free hills were always on sight, in practice Paisley - and by extension, Glasgow - were like maps in first person shooters, the hills being unreachable background decoration.

The food was expensive even by Finnish standards. I disliked the crowds, the social injustice, and some aspects (such as the glorification of past military victories and the fact that sometimes the city looked more like a giant gravestone) quite disturbed me ...

..but I notice that, even after all those things, I miss it.
I miss the small alternative cafes where I felt like in a friend's living room.
I miss those small speciality stores in the very centre of the city.
I miss how people dressed more sharply than in here.
I miss those abandoned spaces in the middle of the city which everyone has forgotten.
I miss gardens that were built hundreds of years ago and relentlessly tended ever since.
I miss the fact that it was always chilly enough to wear a nice warm coat, but never so freezing that you wouldn't go outside without it.
I miss the feeling that Glasgow mattered, that it was worth of special notice compared to Helsinki or (ha ha) Kerava.
I miss the freedom to choose between many quality papers and some really trashy yellow ones.
I miss the donuts in grocery stores.
I miss the friends I left behind.

I miss Glasgow.

I think I might very well be homesick. Only four months there and I'm homesick. Will it ever rub off?

What I watch now

I wrote this last October. Since then I have discovered new shows and abandoned old ones. Lets see where we are, maybe you will find this interesting or not. If you are hooked on good shows like I am, it might be interesting to drop names and recommendations.

OLD SHOWS
Shows that have been cancelled, ended or otherwise will not be returning, but I will always keep close in my heart
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER - You know the drill. Beautiful blonde girl in the graveyard during night time. Vampire attacks. But the girl had a stake ready. Nice mix of comedy, horror, soap opera (I like my shows with soap) and good plot and acting. I tried to watch this years ago but left with impression of cheap morning action for teenagers. I couldn't have been more wrong. The show is about vampires in the same way as, say, police is about issuing speeding tickets. The hostile list goes from military to nerds and from witches to cafeteria workers.
Seven seasons long, it's a coming-of-age story where the main characters personalities develop and plots run their courses over years. I would maybe say this is very similar to X-Men/Spider-Man circa 1985, with added humour and no masks. Surprisingly, the series was very good (and sometimes amazing) from beginning to end. The worst parts were, imho, large chunks of the first and some of the fifth. But even at it's worst, it's still very interesting.

ANGEL - Buffy spin-off. Where Buffy is about building your own life, Angel is about getting your life back together. When Buffy lives in a world where everything is black and white, Angel is about shades of grey. About group of people who try to do good when they don't really have a reference point where to belong to - be it a goody vampire, failed demon researcher, street thug or former cheerleader-turned-office manager. Rather grim, the main characters betray, cheat and kill each other without much warning.. And still succeed in being likeable people.
Detective-series which morphed into heroic fantasy series and again into corporate politics series. The first two seasons were very good, the third season good, the fourth...well..watchable.. and the fifth is amazing.

FARSCAPE - When experimenting a new type of shuttle for inter-solar system flights, astronaut John Crichton flies through a wormhole to another part of the universe, where he is stuck on a living cargo ship with three escaped criminals. The show is very original Star Wars without epic "let's destroy the Empire"-plot. Most of the series is (at least in the beginning, I'm still in the middle of this show) about travelling from planet to planet and the developing relationships between the main characters, with the main characters trying to find a way home.. but without having any maps.

FATHER TED - Three Catholic priests are exiled to Craggy Island near the coast of Ireland. One for being demented, hostile and alcoholic, another for being unbelievably dumb ("He-Man is a fictional character?") and Father Ted for embezzling church-funds. The show is half-an-hour comedy about interaction with other priests, with their parish - most of who seem to be insane - and their personal differences.

HARVEY BIRDMAN - ATTORNEY AT LAW - Birdman was a hero of Hanna Barbera-animation in the sixties. D-class at best, he is now an attorney in a law firm which represents Jetsons, Flintstones and other Hanna Barbera-characters in lawsuits. Very funny in crazy "WTF is wrong here?!"-way.

JUSTICE LEAGUE [UNLIMITED] - Superman, Batman and other powerful heroes of the DC-Universe band together to fight battles that they wouldn't win alone. Exellent animation, this show had nice humour and the feeling of epic things going on.

VERONICA MARS - in Neptune High, the student body are the children of millionaires and their servants. Veronica Mars is the daughter of the town's former sheriff-come-detective, and focal point and go-to girl when things go wrong and you need someone to put things straight, even if that something involves hidden mics, video, stalking, scamming etc. Good plot, good acting and a sense that things are going somewhere. I once dismissed this as uninteresting. I am happy to be wrong. This would probably have been coming-of-age story, but it was cancelled after three seasons.

Shows I have dropped during the past year
HOUSE - Unlikeable, but genius doctor solves medical problems too complicated to anyone else. He is the guy to whom specialists turn to. The first two seasons were excellent, and I quite liked it. The third and most recent one were quite disappointing. Apparently the network moved off many of the writers of the shows and replaced them with new ones, maybe figuring that once established, show doesn't need as much talent as to launch it. The end result was that the mysteries didn't make any sense and that the character of House himself turned from sarcastic and unfriendly to hateful and unpleasant.
The show is retooled for fourth season, but I guess I will not be watching it. I might take a look at the first episode to find out how they changed it.

SMALLVILLE - Superman as a teenager in a small town. This is basically dumbed down Buffy without the character development, good plot or direction. I stop watching this every year, and then check the few episodes that are relevant to my interests. Every season is about 70% crap, the sixth less than the earlier five.

Shows that I will continue watching once the season starts
AVATAR - THE LAST AIRBENDER - Aang is the Avatar, who is tasked to keep peace in the world with his elemental powers. He is also 12 years old and can't take the responsibility. He escapes and is stuck in ice for hundred years. When he wakes up, one of the nations has taken over the world and is fighting against the remnants of the others. He has to set things straight.
This show has an epic plot, good characters and the third season should tie most of the plot points. It amazes me how this children's animation (look, I have no illusions) really encompasses the term "for all ages" in the original meaning, and not in the "suitable for kids"-way.

DOCTOR WHO - The third season was AWESOME. The first season was very good, and the second was almost as good as the first, but the third one? Awesome. I had a vision how the Doctor should act, which often came short in the second season... I mean, we are talking about character who -given time- can do almost anything, but chooses to limit himself to make things more interesting. The third season really nailed this side of the character, and I can't wait till the show returns.

EUREKA - In a secret government think-tank town, where everybody is a genius and holoprojectors, robots and virtual reality is part of the everyday life, the new average-IQ sheriff has to solve town problems and regular doomsdays due to careless research and button pushing.
TORCHWOOD - Immortal man heads a task force of specialists to stop alien/supernatural things from affecting daily life too much. Spin-off of Doctor Who, for adults. The first season disappointed me repeatedly, but I'm still hoping that the creators will push the concept through next season. It has much potential.

THE IT-CROWD - A very succesful company where the toilets are unisex, clean and well decorated, the view from the windows is amazing -- and it's all owed to the unapriciated tech-support, which works from the basement, answering repeated calls that go along the lines of "Your computer doesn't work? Have you tried turning it off and on again? Are you sure you have it plugged in? It works now? Great." From the creator of Father Ted. This is an UK-show, currently broadcasting it's second season. US-version is in the works for January.

HEROES - People find they have super powers - what happens? The characters are more or less international, and on background there runs premonitions of hellish futures, mass deaths and goverment conspiracies. The first season was good, it would have been amazing if not for the fact that some of the plot-points were spinned to spin-off comics series you could download from the show website. The comics were regularly pretty amateurish and contradicted the show itself, leaving a bit skitsofrenic feeling.

FUTURAMA - This should be pretty self-explanatory. The show gets 13 new episodes/four tv-movies next year.

NEW SHOWS
That I will quite possibly love..I hope
BIONIC WOMAN - After very bad accident that left her without legs and right arm, eye and ear, Jaime Sommers is given new military, top secret prostethics that let her run 60 miles an hour and other very nifty things. What will life be like now? A reworking of a 70s series, with promised new plot-direction, this should be interesting at least.

CHUCK - A nerd who works in a department store's tech help. Then he unwillingly absorbs (in a MacGuffin-way) all the information of NSA and CIA databanks, just before the databanks and their backups have been destroyed. Suddenly he's very important, and he notices that his customers often have guns hidden under jackets and earpieces on ears... Basically James Bond/Mission Impossible action on nerd-habitat. Should be interesting.

TERMINATOR: SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES - Name says it all. Takes place after T2, and I quite think that T3 is no longer in continuity. Good riddance. This can't help but be awesome, no matter what.

PUSHING DAISIES - A fairy tale like show about very introverted piemaker who can bring dead back to live, but only for a minute or somebody else has to die. Suppliments his income by giving hints on murder cases. Think the film Series of Unfortunate Events, but less grim.

REAPER - A 20something slacker finds out that his parents have sold his soul to the Devil. If he wants to keep it from being collected, he has to work as a bounty hunter for souls that have escaped hell. The gick gomes with mental powers, insight about supernatural and regular chatting sessions with very charming and pleasant (but ruthless) Lucifer himself. A Kevin Smith series.

Shows I will not be watching
FLASH GORDON - A reworking of a concept from 30s (50s, 70s and 80s) this very low-budget scifi-series lacks everything that makes it Flash Gordon.

Living extraordinary lives

During the past few days I watched (again) The Fabulous Destiny of Amélie Poulain and continued reading One Palestine, Complete, among other things. While doing this I again thought about how interesting and almost magical life was in the movie, or as descripted in the book (not talking about the violence). This led me back to my old thoughts about what interesting - or special - life essentially is. And while it should have been always readily apparent to me, it only now really hit home; life is [almost] never extraordinary; it's either normal or miserable. And I'm talking about judging your own life, here and now, and not someone else's.

Let me explain.

What makes life extraordinary, special or otherwise noteworthy? How someone lives, what he does or who he meets. This means riches, achievements or relations. The problem is, that in the first case we judge someone's living conditions compared to those of someone else; we are always ourselves the standard. Rich people see poor people living extraordinarily, if miserably. And poor people in turn see rich people living...well..extraordinarily happy.
The problem with the second is that while things sound glorious while told as a story or anecdote (for example, living abroad due to father's work), the experience of going through with it is actually quite tedious and mundane. The long flights, living in a country with high language barrier, no friends etc. The extraordinary parts get buried under the pile of daily problems.
And the third? Well, knowing great people does bring some light into your life, but I feel that it also lights the misery of your own life in comparison.

Now, after saying all this I admit that there are people who feel like they live extraordinarily; I expect most of them are people who's living conditions changed dramatically (and suddenly) after childhood, usually due to some singular feat (like winning in Olympics after years of practice) or because someone else did something big (distant relative died and left his considerable fortune to your disposal). But in normal life? There was a person in my classroom few years ago who had used two years to hitch hike around the world. I remember overhearing him talking about dancers in Brazil, about holy places in Jerusalem and the rush hours of Japan. I'm sure he felt he had done something nice and cool, but while telling you have been to all these places (and visualizing to others how you did it) seems grand, in practice I bet the grandiose is lost in his mind under the nights in flea-ridden hostels and days walking in rain.

The only people who in practice ever think that their life isn't normal are those who are chronically depressed and want to get better or find a way out.

And Amélie? She walks in Paris where nuns cross the streets in flocks, a man with glass bones and artistic tendencies lives under the same roof and everyone you meet is a strong personality, worth a book by themselves. And she never realizes it, or wonders about it; I'm sure she thought about it briefly when she moved to that area, but in practice; this was her life, right? And life is normal, no matter how extraordinary it actually is.

Friends and emotional attachments

How do we define people around us? Unknown, people we know by name, people we spend time with (but don't actually know), friends? Particularly the last two categories fascinate me. You get from category #1 to category #2 just by introducing and maybe sitting in the same class room. To number #3 by going for a beer together. But to #4?
Is there an universal definition? Some people say that once you let people into your home you are friends. Or that you can spend time together without actually doing anything. Are mutual interests expected? Trust? Love? Respect? Something else?

I'm asking this because while there are many people I happily declare my friends in all the above definitions of the word, there are some that I don't. Or, to put it less bluntly, don't think if it's proper to call them friends. I'll get back to this shortly. Bear with me.

I remember that at the age of 12 an adult asked me who my friends (ystävät) are. I responded by listing my few mates (kaverit). After that, the adult in question was careful to call them as such. The distinction was that "mate" is a #3 while "friend" is a #4. I notice that some people are more relaxed with these terms. I have often wondered do they do so just out of courtesy, or are they so quick to forge the emotional bonds that friends have between each other? Or imagine that such bonds exist? Or maybe they just have a definition that allows #3's to be called #4's.

I wonder.

To go on; is there a proper way to make a friend? I have never been very good at this. A person is an occasional distraction at school... and few years later you notice its four in the morning and you have spent forty-odd hours in the "distraction's" apartment watching television, telling poor jokes and talking about life. Obviously, at some part between these two scenes the relationship changed.

Back to the definition. I hear that people who use MySpace and MSN to forge social contacts make a distinction between "friend" and "friendster". By definition, the latter are not real friends, but #3's. It comes to me, can one forge real, lasting relationships through the Internet, without actually ever meeting the other face-to-face.
I remember reading last year in newspaper about a Finnish guy who had entered exchange of letters with American girl in the 1950s (when both of them were still in middle school) and only met the week the newspaper came out. They had written each other letters for over 50 years, diligently and without fail. And while the Finnish guy had been to America - indeed, only few score kilometres from the girl, he hadn't had the opportunity to see her. And she had travelled Europe but had likewise been unable to visit Finland.
Were they friends? I imagine they wrote on paper everything that happened in their lives. I imagine, that over the years they told each other secrets they didn't tell anyone else, not even their spouses. But they had never met. They didn't know how the other laughed, how the other smiled. Didn't know how the other liked to form sentences or what syllables they give weight when talking. Or how the other has curious way of bending head when checking the time.

Are such things important for friendship? Is it strange, pathetic or otherwise improper to call people you have talked daily for years friends? Even if you have never met, even if it's only through IRC or instant messenger?

Where do you draw the line? What's the definition?

Learning about Israel

Ponte Corvo sent me One Palestine, Complete, a book about Jews and Arabs under the British Mandate. Heavy book, it seems to equal in page count with one of the later Harry Potter-books.

As I don't have that much knowledge about Israel (beyond that which was teached on the ninth grade of compulsory school (age 15), in high school (age 17) and newspapers thereafter) this is bound to be interesting read. If nothing else, it will afford a new perspective not mentioned in Finnish history books and media obsessed with the current events.

As I was thinking of my education, I remembered that my mother asked me to take my old school books with me when I left after the last visit. I therefore had my 9th grade book easily at hand, and decided to see what it said about Israel. I was somewhat surprised by the clunkiness of the text, but I should probably understand that not all people of that age were really comfortable with books. I decided to translate the chapter to show Finnish view on Israeli history looks like.
I have tried to make the translation easy to myself by keeping many Finnish turns of phrase that might not be entirely at home with the English language - I'm in a bit of a hurry with this text, as I'm leaving home for the weekend and I want this out of the way first.

My history book was called Horisontti - Napoleonista nykypäivään (Horisont - from Napoleon to modern day) and was written by Lappalainen et al, published by Otava in 1995.

The political situation of Middle-East in the mid1980s. The map shows the political areas of influence and local crisis points. A constant threat was that the small clashes on the area might develop into wars between the superpowers. Full fledged war was on between Iraq and Iran. There had been islamic revolution in Iran, where ajatollah Khomeini had ceased power from shaah [?] Riza Pehlevin. Iran was left in discord, which Iraq leader Saddam Hussein tried to take advantage of. The countries had arguments over borders and waterways. Hussein failed, but the war lasted nearly the whole 1980s.

Chapter 73: Middle-East in world politics
Area and its problems
The area shown in the map is called Middle-East. The area's belonging to it range from Egypt to Iran and also include Kypros and Turkey. Middle-East is a political, not geographical term. It is one of the focal points of world politics, and local skirmishes tend to unfold into international matters. The background of the problems is a mixed bag of religious, economical and geographical factors. Middle-East is the cradle of three world religions - judaism, Christianity and Islam. Of the 200 million people on the area the majority are muslims, who have divided into Sunni and Shiia-factions. Of Christians, there are also many factions. The different religious groups have often tried to force their own views with violence. The steepest differences are between the Jews and and arab-muslims.
[About the different nations on the area. ]

The Palestine Question
At the beginning of our recounting of time, Palestine was Judea-named province of Rome, where the majority of people were Jewish. When the Jews rose into rebellion, the Romans destroyed Jerusalem in the year 77. The name of Judea was switched into Palestine, and for Jews diaspora began, the scattering to different parts of the world.
After Romans Palestine has been under the control of Arabs, European crusaders and- after 16th century- Turks. When the Turkish realm started to weaken in the 19th century, a powerful Arab kinship was born, which was first targeted against Turkish control but also against European nations. They too started to be interested of the lands in control of the ebbing Empire. England and France took Egypt under their control when the Suez Channel was built. The First World War meant the final strike to Turkish control, and vast arab-areas were thrown under European control under mandates granted by League of Nations. Great Britain got Palestine, which it hand occupied during the war from Turkey.
During the World War Great Britain promised Jews national home in Palestine and assured that this move would not stamp the rights of Arabs. The promise was the beginning of Jews' exodus to Palestine. It was hastened in Europe - specially in Hitler's Germany - by persecution. On the year of 1918 84 000 of the people in Palestine were Jews - 11%, but by 1948 they were a third of population of two million. This led into clash of interests and violent incidents with Arabs and proceeded to situation where the Brits could no longer contain the situation. On the year 1947 Great Britain decided to subject the future of Palestine to UN to solve.

The birth of Israel and enlargement
The UN had two suggestions. The Arab states suggested proclaiming Palestine as independent nation, where both Arabs and Jews would live. The other suggestion maintained that the area should be divided into Arab and Jewish nations. The second suggestion got the favour of majority vote, and so the Brits left the country and Israel declared itself independent nation in May 1948. Immediately after Israel's neighbours attacked the young nation with the help of Iraqi and Saudi Arabian battalions from every side.
Israel won the war and expanded its area. This happened three times later, as the maps of the next page shows. In 1956 Egypt nationalized the Suez Channel, which led to Israel attacking with France and England against Egypt. In 1967 the president of Egypt Gamal Abdel Nasser closed Israel's access through Akaba Bay to Harbour of Eilat. This led to so-called Six Day war, during which Israel invaded the whole Siinai, strip of Gaza, West Bank and Golan's Heights as well as Arab East-Jerusalem. In 1973 Egypt tried again. Its forces crossed the Suez and dug into defensive lines. At the same time Syria attacked Golan. Israel got weaponry assistance from the United States and blocked the attack. UN tried to instill cease fire and sent to the area peacekeepers, which Middle-East already had had.
In addition to peace negotations UN insisted Israel to leave the occupied areas, but for no effect. On the other hand, peace offering from Egypt led to President of Egypt signing a peace treaty with Israeli Prime Minister Menahem Begin at Camp David in United States. Accoarding to the pact Israel forfeited in 1982 Siinai to Egypt and evacuated the settlements. Egypt in turn recognized the Israeli state and stopped making demands for the independence of Palestine. Arabs declared the Egypt president a traitor.

Refugees and terrorism
When Israel became independent in 1948, most of the Arabs on the area fled to neighbouring states, where they were relocated on camps designed as short-term solution. The amount of refugees was then 700 000-800 000. Similarly over half million Jews moved to Israel. When Israel in 1967 invaded West Bank, the amount of refugees rose to 1,5 million. Today there are over two million on Israeli occupied areas, and the same amount as refugees on Arab countries. All of them have dreamed of founding their own nation.
On the refugee camps people are uneasy, and on them many terrorism using Palestinian resistance organisations have gained support. The operation of these organisations was centred specially in Lebanon, when other border neighbours of Israel had extorted the guerilla fighters from their area in fear of revenge strikes. In 1982 Israel attacked Lebanon, invaded its capital Beirut and finally forces Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) to leave Lebanon.

Surprising pact
In 1987 started on Israeli occupied areas Palestinian uprising, intifada, to which Israel answered with force. The uprising seriously disturbed peace negotiations, which United States as middleman had been able to be initialized between Israel and and the Arabs. In the negotiations Arabs demanded Israel to leave the occupied areas, which Israel saw as important for its security. In September 1993 these negotiations surprisingly led into a pact which has been thought as historical: Israel and PLO recognized each other. At the same time Israeli cabinet agreed on pact which gave Gaza and the town of Jericho autonomy. This pact happened in 1994, when Israeli occupiers left Gaza and Jericho. The pact opened a door for the continued peace progress in the Middle East. In October 1994 Jordan as well did a peace treaty with Israel and in November of the same year Jordan and Syria tied peace between each other as well.

Jewish elder stepping to "promised land". Arabs feared Jews would gain majority in Palestine. They got the Brits to limit immigration as early as 1939. After Germany's surrender the limit was pushed down to 1 500 per month. This led to rampant illegal immigration, that Brits tried to stop even by shooting illegal crossers.

My final text about Harry Potter

The past weekend I finished the last Harry Potter. Don't worry, there are no spoilers in this text.. there is some background information about Voldemort, which should not be hugely important for the plot. However, if you want to stay spoiler-free, please don't continue.

After reading the books I started thinking what set this one apart from other fantasy-series. I'm not a huge fan (I don't think I'm a fan at all, though they were good books), but I did see something worth noticing in how Voldemort was characterized in the books, as opposed to many other Big Evils in other stories (starting from Lord of the Rings and going all the way to other books of the genre from Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (of which, I dare say, I am a fan of).

The Thing that really touched me was the origin and characterization of Voldemort. He was not a god, he hadn't done anything extraordinary to get where he was. Even though he was expectationally powerful wizard - and some of it was probably thanks to good genes - he still didn't do anything that anyone else couldn't have. The spells he cast, the reputation he got and the minions he had -- hard work and sacrifice, all of it! He stayed awake during classes in Hogswarts (studied there from his 10th year to his 17th), "networked" with other individuals and secured connections thru his friendships. Of course Voldemort was a psycho, but basically, anyone could have done it.

And this is what I find great. During the series, Voldemort (a name he took himself because his own name was basically very mundane) is seen searching for objects, studying, making traps, trusting people, giving responsibility, punishing failures, manipulating, suffering information deprivation... he's not just sitting on his throne and gloating as his master scheme unfolds. He keeps busy. He delegates. Many times we see him acting and thinking like your normal company CEO. Of course, instead of running international company he's leading a crusade against society... but basically, isn't that pretty much the same thing?

And this is what I love about the books. Voldemort had the same education as everyone else. There was no secret knowledge or selling souls or such like. The whole Harry Potter-story could easily have been told in slashdot-posts; evil CEO, bad program (Sony rootkit, maybe?), department heads and PR, young hackers noticing and exploiting a weakness in the code (HD-DVDs); trying to silence them with lawsuits, pushing forward with the program (DRM in legal mp3-substitutes). Punishments. Some company figureheads get sacrificed, but most don't. Life goes on.

Sliders - creating alternative realities

Few days ago I had the opportunity to see the pilot to scif-series Sliders, from 1995. In the show punch of people "slide" from world to world trying to find a way back home. The plot of the pilot was - to make long story short - about four people who are stranded on an alternative timeline, where Soviet Union had won the Cold War.

For the record, I happen to like alternative timelines, the "what if"-scenarios. But I didn't like this one. A fast plot summary;

The sliders arrive to the new world, thinking they are home and separate. The first is in hurry and shouts a taxi; the second one decides to call home and the rest two (the inventor and his teacher) start to talk about physics in the park where they landed. Then each notices that something is wrong;

• The telephone box doesn't have a coin slot and the operator wants to know if the slider has calling privileges, and thus wants to know her id-number. The operator further mentions that the box is operated by PT&T (People's Telephone & Telegraph).
  
• The taxi driver speaks Russian and not English.
  
• There's a statue of Lenin in the park, instead of Lincoln.
  

The plot starts to develop as the taxi drives through a toll booth, and the slider pays his trip with a dollar he had in his wallet. This promptly gets him to jail.

Meanwhile the three sliders walk around seeing police beating, arresting and even shooting citizens. They stop to buy a sausage from a stand and pay with a dollar. The sausage seller mistakes the sliders into revolutionaries and reminds them not to waive the dollars around; apparently they are used by the resistance as a code. The official new dollars are printed with red ink and have Khrushchev's picture in the middle.
At this point police takes interest in the three sliders and the sausage seller helps them away into revolutionaries hide-out. Once there they see a broadcast from People's Court; apparently the show is entertaining in nature and has a smiling host. During the case witnesses are sworn in with the traditional oath, which ends in "...and help me God". One of the cases handled is that of the fourth slider, who is sentenced to Alaskan gulag for 15 years.

The revolutionaries explain how the world has come to this; how losing the Korean War started a set of events which spread communism to the rest of the world, leaving USA economically separated from the other countries. In the end even USA fell, and thus they are now living in the The Socialist States of America.

The revolutionaries help to free the fourth slider. After farewells the sliders depart the world.

* * *

I found the episode to be fairly painful to watch. The changes were for shock value and not at all consistent; the telephone box wasn't operated by coins but the city (San Fransisco) had toll booths; the court used vows that mentioned God; the difference between streets were the police acted like thugs and the devoted people who saluted voluntarily when the national anthem played and so on.

I have noticed similar problems with several stories; the writers often just replace some things (such as statues) and names (AT&T => PT&T) without considering how the changes affect the larger dynamic of the world. Writing a story is not just about character interaction (while that was pretty painful as well) but about surroundings, particularly in a show that is devoted to alternative timelines.

I don't know why I'm so disappointed. Maybe because the articles I read promised a show with large following and it had nine stars out of ten; maybe because once you see a story that has done it RIGHT you can't help but compare the rest to that one (for example some episodes of Stargate SG-1, Star Trek DS9, X-Men, Buffy.. the comicbook Exiles is all about alternative outcomes of other comics...) .

Changes in the blog

§1. The writer of Town of Ponte Corvo noted how my blog would need some colour. I started looking into the possibility and was surprised how much Google had developed the Blogger-template engine since I had last looked at it (about year ago, when I tried to make The Gulag-blog (now in deep hibernation, with all the illustrations broken links) all pretty. It used to be hard work and involved reading through the Blogger-template code and making alternations.
Now it was much easier; the only thing I had to modify in the template were the header-wilth, which didn't click with the new at all well. Even the sidebar - which had to be modified by editing template - can now be worked with using Java(?)-tools. Very easy, very simple.

§2. I checked the tags I have been making the past few weeks. I had been adding new tags like they were last day on sale, which is not very smart - too detailed tags will never get more than two entries in them, and are therefore useless. They are now sorted by categories (TV, Internet, philosophy) that are so wide they should get several entries. "Guest of the Third Reich" is exemption I made in hope that if ever finish it, readers that are solely interested in that should find it easier to check out. In the following weeks I hope to go through my posts from the last two years and tag them as well (only about 70 to go!), hopefully giving them some more value.

§3. I also added links to few (very good) blogs by my associates in the sidepanel. They are all worth looking, provided you are interested of my blog, which might be too strong of an assumption.

What do you think?

Sunset

Taken around 23:00 at my balcony about a week ago. You can't stay up too late - after 2:00 the sun starts to rise up again..

On another topic: Picasa, a service by Google seems to have a rather embarrassing bug; while Blogger and Picasa are both owned by the same company, I can't actually add pictures I have loaded to Picasa to Blogger -- but pictures I load to Blogger are shown as folders in Picasa, and can therefore be shown. To get this picture to you, I had to load it to Picasa here and to Blogger separately here.
Maybe I'm just doing something wrong, but I doubt it.

Kari Suomalainen

-Kuinka toiset jaksaa ja viitsii?
-Why do they bother? Where do they find the energy?
[The paper reads: "Massacre At Algeria" and "Indonesia Mobilizes"]

Kari Suomalainen (1920-1999) was a political cartoonist for the prestigious Helsingin Sanomat 1950-1991. He affected very strongly on the way different political parties were seen in Finland, and was an important opinion former.
Soviet Union tried to silence him several times as he poked on politically raw things.

His humour was based in stereotypes and making what seemed high and mighty into something small and ordinary; showing president Kekkonen (usually deciphered as a demi-god) as a normal (if demanding) man, the parties as avatars instead of people who got changed every four years and observing news through a small and old-fashioned village somewhere far from everywhere. Local news from Helsinki were often observed by two "men of the streets", who had been unable to fit back into civilian life after Continuation War, and had so become urban tramps. Sometimes he inserted himself into the commentary, as a small black wearing man wearing a ridiculous hat.

He continued on the paper long after his retirement age, and quit only after being forced to do so after several pictures that were too far out of line with paper's policy.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, when Finland was starting a new era in it's history without pressure from East, Kari critized very strongly on the decision to open doors to immigrants and war refugees, Somalis in particular (he drew them in a fashion that left little doubt of his opinions concerning blacks in general and Somalis in particular).

Kari continued publishing his pictures in local papers, but he was getting old which showed in his hand and in the jokes; the pictures weren't as funny as they used to. His views on subjects got more old-fashioned, to the point of bigotry. The avatars to which he based his humour on started to look old-fashioned, even antic (the tramps, the village stuck in the rural -40s). Those he tried to update ended up looking cluttered and forced (the political parties).

Kari's moral stance was firmly set on the early 50s, which shows ever more unfavorably as the decades went by. From there, he saw the country chance from a war-wrecked nation with GDP of average Third World country into one of the richest in the world.

-More important than riches is the quality of life, clean air, unpolluted water and beautiful scenery.
-If it's all right, I'll take that in money.




-You can no longer travel safely in this city.




-Hey guys, who was the one who first proposed consumer-protection law which says that bad promises are punishable by law?
[From left: Vennamo [?] who proposed the law and then the parties; Social Democrats, Rural Party (later Centre-Party, later Finnish Centre), Communists (later Left Alliance), Liberal Democrats (later dead), Swedish Party, Coalition (moderate right) and a cop carrying a box marked "Election promises". The size of the parties is relative to their (historical, exgenerated) power in the parliament. ]

I own several collections of Kari's work. Half the fun in them is seeing how the seeds of today (like the Green Party) slowly enter into the picture and how Kari tries to make fun of them, sometimes good naturedly, but often grumpily. And then the retrospect fun on his argument about "modern music" on 60s; Bach is still as popular now as he was centuries ago, but who will remember Beatles in the 1990s?

But after all is said and done, Kari was a person who was a master of his craft. After him, Helsingin Sanomat has been unable to secure a person to fill his place whose work is worth reading.

What is real?

Many TV-series (particularly scifi-series, which are very dear to me) have an episode where the hero has to question what's real and what's not. In the more extreme cases, the hero starts to have flashes where he or she is actually locked in a mental institution, and everything that has thus far happened in the show has been a figment of imagination. This is strengthened by people in the institution knowing about the series chronology, about vampires (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) or aliens (Smallville).

In Smallville Clark Kent finds himself in a such a situation. He is shocked to find that Jor-El is infact a brand of soap, and Oliver Queen (a.k.a. Green Arrow) is the name of the hospital worker administrating his medicine.
Buffy in turn finds out she has been in the mental institution for six years - since the series started - and both her mother and her father are expecting her to come out of it. All that has happened in Sunnydale is just dreams in a sick woman's mind. It makes it even worse that the series questions itself: "sick girl who's in mental ward or super-girl who battles vampires - which sounds more insane?" to paraphrase from memory.

This annoys me on three levels; first it ridicules fans who have invested time to the series chronology. It highlights the built-in ridiculousness of the more absurd parts of the series mythology (hero's super strength, origin story, being centre of the world). Also, for stories to work we have to believe in them, believe in the rules of the world; these is-the-hero-insane stories beg the question is that time well placed.

On second level, the stories don't end well. The mental ward is often thought to be in "our" reality, where there are no Kryptonians or vampires. It is inherently more "real" than anything in the series itself. After you introduce the ward, you also have to explain why the ward was just the figment of the hero's imagination. Otherwise we get to the "it was just all a dream" scenario, the most effect way to lose interest of the watcher.

In Smallville, Martian Manhunter explained how the ward was infact a psychic attack by hostile force, who tried to overtake Clark's mind by showing him that he was mad.
In Buffy, just the opposite is done; at the ward Buffy's mother explains how the friends in Sunnydale are not friends at all but traps that keep her comatose in the real world. The episode ends with Buffy asking forgiveness from her friends - and then cut to the ward where the doctor diagnoses Buffy comatose and we are shown parents weeping. It wasn't a trick, or an attack.

On third, and less popular culture-level these episodes beg the question about life itself. If we interpret the world solely by our senses, and our senses are processed trough our brain - how can a person decide if she or he is hallucinating? A person tells you that you are hallucinating - do you trust the person? Or if two different things claim that the other isn't real - how can you make an educated choice between the two?

This isn't just about me pondering TV-series. I have a friend who sees hallucinations. Doing pretty well with them too, as I gather. Takes medication for it. When my grandmother gets sick, she regresses one year at a time back to her childhood. Mother is going to get me soon. Who are you? Why are you here Uncle? Back from America? When her body gets better, her mind gets better as well, and again she knows who I am..
And while I don't have anything of that magnitude, I do get blackouts when I rise or make sudden moves, during which my ability to see or keep my balance greatly diminishes. They take up to 30 seconds and when my mind clears it always hits me how much on the mercy of few wirings I am. My whole world - literally - is hosted inside a lump of meat. And the distinction is so hard to make; am I living in the world or is the world living in me?

[ To talk about am-I-crazy scenarios, here is a good wiki-link about it taken to it's extreme; Tommy Westphall.

The mental ward or it's variation has also been used in Star Trek: TNG, Star Trek: DS9, Lost, Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis and Charmed. ]

Guest of the Third Reich: Mare nostrum: Villa am Meere

Before I go any farther, I should probably note that back when the book was written German was teached for children at schools from the age of 9 (this was replaced by English in the seventies). Mr. Paavolainen doesn't therefore deem it necessary to translate everything into Finnish. I don't speak German - at all - and my Swedish could be much better, so if the reader of this blog understands what some of the non-translated words mean, please don't hesitate to write.

Review.
Foreword.
Mare Nostrum 1: New Horisons.

Dichterhaus was founded by Nordische Gesellschaft but taken over by Reichsschrifttumskammer, Reich's Chamber of Literature in 1935. This brought changes to the modus operandi; while it used to be just a summer camp to bring writers together from different parts of the world, it now has "official programs" led by "determined staff". While there is no outright propaganda, the German writers are card-carrying members of national socialists.

Of the other people living in Dichterhaus, Sweden's representative Sven Stolpe was known to have a brilliant mind and "radical swings". He had studied in Germany, married a German as well as speaking the language fluently. Trough the newspaper Young Sweden he was one of the most important opinion-leaders of his generation. Paavolainen himself was quite stricken by the author: Stolpe was the kind of man who only exists in fiction; world-traveller, modernist and liberal, honest to the causes he championed and a great sportsman even as one of his lungs was non-functional after medical operation. Of all the writers in the house, he was the only one who openly criticized the Third Reich.
From the text you get the impression that the German government hoped to convert Stolpe to the cause. After all, his background and ties made him a terrific candidate. Alas,

When reaching the Third Reich, Stolpe had a surprise to us: he had come directly from England, where he had gotten an oxfordian awakening. "It is the greatest moment of my life", he repeatedly says.

He didn't stay long. He soon after departed to show his oxford-book to an old friend in Norway, and while travelling there his lung started acting up again and he could not return.

The Norwegian in the house was Doctor Eyvind Mehle, who had gotten his degree in Germany.

He was both the most popular person in Dichterhaus and its enfant terrible. Nobody could believe that this man [...] was the oldest person in the house - 41 years. Mehle was as black fascist as they came and one of Norway's Nasjonalsamling's leading personalities. He was [...] a newspapersman, who had visited both Stalin, Mussolini and Hitler, interviewed them all and forged strong ties to all European fascist-organisations. Wonderful and funny man who could not be taken seriously - for example when he lists who are going to be shot after the Norwegian fascists grab the power!

Paavolainen's room mate was Erik Bertelsen:

Bertelsen is so nice and good-hearted and un-revolutionary, that one has to wonder how one such as him can earn his living writing in our days.. he is not shocked by Nazism nor by Bolshevism. [...] He is only interested in his books [...] about old Danish memories.

About his fellow Finn, Göran Stenius.. the translation is hard and relies much on knowing the popular culture of the 30s (I don't). Apparently he had some interest toward Fascism, but because of language-movement (Stenius' native language was Swedish) was sidetracked and belonged to some fringe-group.

Stenius came to Germany well-versed in national socialism. Rising his hand up in greeting comes easily to him. Because of this I'm greatly interested to see how his moods swing.

But after everything is said and done, Paavolainen believes that he is level-headed, as is Mehle, and does not go all metaphysical and romantic as the Germans do.

Of the Germans..

My greatest interest was naturally toward the three national socialist authors - and how different they were!
[...] Rupert Rupp from Saars was only 28 years old. [...] Saars' suffering and humiliation during the French occupation were the main focus of Rupp's poetry. [...] Rupp has taken part in the fighting even as a youth in the ranks of Schlageter. This is why he has naïvely and with all his heart embraced the Nazi-ideology as only soldier-youth born in the south can. [...] No great originality could be found in Rupp's poems. The poems tended to become mystical [...], but the deeply felt pain and aching were very common to the young generation to whom Nazism meant salvation and the spring of new strength and innovation.

Another German, Friz Helke;

At the age of 30 Helke had gained his station by fighting. [...]During inflation he had worked as a businessman, started then studying at night [...] and at at the same time took part in political fights as a leader of youth-chapter in Stahlheim. [...]He quit [...] when he noticed that freemasonry had taken root in the chapter and joined national socialists in 1929 taking to Hitler all the 25 children in his care. Today Helke has a very influential position in the Hitler-Jugend [...] headquarters; he is the auditor for literature suitable for Hitler-Jugend(!), Referent im Kulturamt der Reichsjugendführung and his rank in Hitler-Jugend is Bannführer im Stabe! [...] According to Sven Stolpe his purpose is to "show millions of young Germans primitive pictures of national and military heroes and systemically force the youths to think that heroism is only possible in the military".
[...]Helke has written surprisingly many books for children during the past few years. [...] They only have one aim: to rise national socialists.

The third German, Ottfield von Finckenstein

I think it as a great personal victory that I was able to secure the friendship of this extraordinary man. [...]Sensitive, well-raised, good and wise man, who emits a strangely calming presence to all those near him. [...] Finckenstein is a marvellous example of what happens when old aristocrat has the ability to worship life and the straight-lined, non-compromising thinking of national socialistic ideology. [...] Stolpe's oxfordianism looks cold and calculating compared to Finckenstein's [...] radiating joy of life.
[...] When talking about Hitler, he has no reservations. "One must learn to believe, that even on our days can such genius be born." With Germans - even with Fincenstein - it is impossible to discuss... one just has to listen and wonder.

Paavolainen remarks how closed the German culture was. The national socialism was only interested in building its own view of the world, disregarding everything that happened abroad. He remarks that Doctor Domes didn't even know the name of Lawrence (of whose books at least two were banned in Germany). This made the German books so dry; Finckenstein was the only one who wrote lively books - and he had spent much time abroad.

Guest of the Third Reich: Mare nostrum: New horisons

Review.
Foreword.

This chapter is a short introduction on the writer and how he came to be at Travelmünden at the 14th day of August. The German-Scandinavian Dichterhaus, writerhouse had been opened late that year, and thus Finland's Writer-Alliance [?] had had troubles to find someone to go; the vacations were already over. Because of troubles, the writer arrived day late and missed the Olympics at Berlin.

I'm tired. I sit on my luggage on a dark and empty terrace. Silent longing everywhere. Again I ponder the question that has been troubling me the whole sea voyage, on railway thru Denmark, on train ferry over windy sea between Gjedser and Warnemünden: why this trip? What do you think you'll find?

The writer hopes to find something new. Too many years he has been trying to write about his trip to London four year previous, to write down the many projects that had haunted him for years. But he had never succeeded. The Finnish political landscape was in heavy movement; the failed coup d'etat of the fascists in 1932 had depressed him and he no longer felt like writing.

And still I knew that in the world something was happening, something that people back home understood completely wrong. We saw the world like thru an old window; greenish, blurry and distorted. Revolutions right and revolutions left.. but back home everybody was shouting: old, tried traditions are the way to go! The most descriptive thing: the clergy changed from defenders to attackers! Confusion over terms. Ignorance, pathetic good-will, [...?], doing small movements in the middle of steely, determined, bi-polarizing world...

In the end the writer is let in to the house. Everybody else is in Berlin, watching the Olympics. The next day he met them; the director (Doctor Fred Domes) and hostess (Madam Lisa Hayn) of Dichterhaus, two German writers (Rubert Rupp and Count Ottfried von Finckenstein), a Norwegian (Doctor Eyvind Mehle), a Swede (Doctor Sven Stolpe) and another Finn (Master Göran Stenius). Each of them was important to the writer, opening to him new horizons.

The weeks at Dicherhaus gave the writer new strength. Again he felt like he knew where he was, and how to to hold the pen.