The particular Apple style of being innovative

I think it has been demonstrated that all I was told in this conversation a few months ago was just a bunch of bullshit.

I’d love to know when the G1 is coming to Europe, maybe for Christmas?

Europe, the world, and beyond

Seen in a recently purchased flight:

Check-in times:

• European: 90 minutes
• International: 2 hours and 30 minutes
• Israel: 3 hours

Congratulations to everybody

Today we have nine less borders in the world.

(Many thanks Dad for the message!)

Manifiesto 2009

Now that Esteban is aiming a gun at me living chez moi for a few days I’d like to write about his latest project: Manifiesto 2009 (by the way, I think I’ve seen that picture before ;-))

As he explained some time ago in Polisea, it’s essentially the Spanish version of the manifesto2009 website, an initiative from the Party of European Socialists (PES) to foster an “an open consultation on priorities and progressive policies for our common manifesto for the European elections in June 2009“.

In other words, with more than a year in advance, PES has started a “social 2.0″ initiative (blogs, Facebook, Youtube, Flickr …) to promote our participation in the next European elections. We usually say –and we’re often right– that politicians are isolated in their ostentatious offices, far away from the people. We feel that our democracy is not participative enough, only limitedly representative. Well, this looks like an idea exactly in the opposite direction. And, therefore, on the right track; I don’t see it as just a vote-harvester.

I don’t know how the project will evolve (it depends on us), but I find it quite… dangerous. Imagine it works. Think for a second we provide enough input to the PES and they create a program based on our comments. We, poor and innocent citizens, would be generating policies for twenty seven countries. Isn’t that unacceptable?

I Only Came Here for Six Months

It’s fantastic when you discover that someone else has written what you wanted to write, better:

Living in Brussels is like living in a golden cage – you feel trapped and you dream of escaping almost every day. But you never do because you know life will be more difficult, more complicated and more expensive on the outside.

I should know. In 1993 I came to the Belgian capital to do a five-month traineeship at the European commission. Fourteen years later and I’m still here, complaining about the squally weather, lousy service and infuriating officialdom, making plans to move to Britain, the United States or the south of France but secretly suspecting that the most likely way I’ll leave Brussels is in a coffin.

I am not alone. Virtually any expat you speak to has a similar story to tell about outstaying his or her welcome. In fact, playwright Alecky Blythe fashioned a whole drama around the everyday twittering of Brussels’ expats in 2005. Unsurprisingly, the title was ‘I Only Came Here for Six Months’.

Continue reading “Slow seduction in Belgium“, in Guardian Abroad.

(¡Gracias Lola!)

Story versus History

I took this picture yesterday while visiting a fantastic exhibition on the 50 years of the “European adventure”:

“General Franco organised a coup d’état against the legally-elected republican government (July 1936). With the help of the Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, he won the civil war (March 1939) at the cost of 400,000 lives and a savage repression.” [Free translation: “El General Franco organizó un golpe de estado contra el gobierno republicano legalmente elegido (julio de 1936). Con la ayuda de la Alemania Nazi y la Italia Fascista, ganó la guerra civil (marzo de 1939) con un coste de 400,000 vidas y una represión salvaje”.]

I’m really impressed by the ignorance (or evil) some people still show in Spain regarding Franco’s dictatorship. The most offensive example I recall is Jaime Mayor Oreja’s recent statement in the newspaper La Voz de Galicia: “Era una situación de extraordinaria placidez” (Free translation: “It was an exceptional calmness state”). It’s absolutely shocking to see how an MEP and former Minister of Spain can be that irresponsible promoting such a wrong vision.

For this reason it is specially comforting to check that outside our borders Europeans have a clear vision about Franco. During the exhibition you can sadly see how Spain arrived late to every international effort carried out in the last fifty years; it is doubtless the biggest disaster in the recent history of my country.