In a picture from Monday Nov 28 we see Herzen sitting in the ‘Pocket Change’ at Santiago de Cuba’s Punta Gorda Marina. In the upper-left corner – to the northwest; we can just make out the contours of the Sierra Maestra Mountains where Fidel Castro and his column once operated and directed their attacks against Battista’s troops. Herzen is looking in the opposite direction - to the east – across the Sierra Cristal Mountains – towards Guantanamo Bay.
Out of frame is the main part of the European column - five cheery Jamaicans; all drinking iced rum punch out of large pink plastic jugs. Obviously someone has taken pity on the mission leader and handed him a jug of the Jamaican brew. Next to him are Europe and the sonic weaponry.

Three hours earlier Europe had carried out its long awaited attack on the American base at Guantanamo. The following is an excerpt from the Battle Log:

Employing the service of the Cuban state taxi mercenary Jose [130 Pesos], they set out from Punta Gorda at 10 AM, Cuban time. En route from Punta Gorda to the battleground – some 140 km away - morale seems high. The column is carried forward by a forest of encouraging slogans in the roadside, the most poignant of which spells: No hay mission impossible! Points of identification are given to us by rows of portraits of great revolutionary generals – Che Guevara being the one closest to our generational segment.
Midway, the Jamaican faction seems momentarily to loose confidence in the sense of the mission, but Buggy-Up’s pessimism quickly dissipates when we make a stop at a roadside stand to replenish the stock of Cuban Buccanero beers.


1.30 PM: As we reach the town of Guantanamo, our radio picks up the first audio signals from our American adversaries – Radio Gitmo. Suddenly that most dreaded weapon in the US arsenal of sonic weaponry is booming out of the PA system of our Lada. [Oh, no - can it be. Yes, it is… - Oh, the horror – it is the tune from hell. It is, yes it is HOTEL CALIFORNIA!!!]

On a dark desert highway / Cool wind in my hair / Warm smell of colitis / Rising up through the air / Up ahead in the distance / I saw a shimmering light / My head grew heavy, and my sight grew dim / I had to stop for the night / There she stood in the doorway / I heard the mission bell / And I was thinking to myself / This could be Heaven or this could be Hell

Jose desperately tries to blend out the American psychotronics with several of his own interpretations of the Cuban evergreen Guantanamera at the top of his voice. Chocked and weary from the exacting journey, no one thinks of turning off the radio. This standoff between Cuban and American pop culture comes to an abrupt end when the lethal “Eagles” song gives way to a message from the radio host cheerily announcing a Woffle Ball tournament 'down at "Cable Beach"'.

2.02 PM: Stopped by Cuban soldiers some 20 kilometers south of Guantanamo. We have reached the Cuban military training grounds, which surrounds Camp Delta. Appearing not to notice our ghetto blaster, they let us past with a military vehicle leading the way, accompanying us this last stretch up a steep winding dirt road to the Loma Malones [Mirador de Melones] observation point.

2.22 PM: The column takes up its position at Loma Malones above the American Naval Base. On the far east side, down at the beach, Camp Delta, the detention facilities with its line of low huts accommodating the prisoners surrounded by watchtowers, can be seen shimmering in the midday heat.



At 2.27 PM: The attack is launched. The sonic bombardment swamps the plain below with at least two movements from Furtwängler’s Vienna performance of Beethoven’s Third Symphony.


2.30 PM: The Jamaican Europeans loose interest in battle operations and go to the nearby restaurant [Mirador de Melones] to look for more Buccanero’s. The Cuban mercenary Jose is bantering away with employees from the restaurant.



2.35 PM: First assessment of impact. Herzen borrows the powerful Cuban binoculars fitted with state of the art prism technology to assess the effect. Nothing much seems to happen!!! No one is moving down there. No rush to man the posts. The guards in the watchtowers don’t even look in look in our direction. - The breeze doesn’t seem to be favourable to us! It’s carrying our Napoleonic terror notes away from the American savages. Straining the ears of the poor Cubans instead of the ears of the straw-chewing, short-cropped, evangelist, hormone-bred farmers down below.

2.38 PM: Second assessment of impact. Our weapon of choice is useless under these conditions. Then an unexpected turn of events: The mood of the column changes synchronously with the music; the sublimely gentle second movement triggers a profound feeling of nostalgia for the European homeland. Feelings of acute melancholia blends out the remainder of European heroism and confidence. - The exact same thing that happened to the Swiss mercenaries of yore whenever they heard the clang of cowbells. They would instantly lay down their arms to return to their beloved homeland.

2.40 PM: Herzen suffers an acute attack of self-doubt - was this all just another middle class quest for identity and selfhood?

2.41 PM: Herzen declares the mission an all-out failure. Realizing that he too, like everyone else, is thrown into this world, he switches off the ghetto blaster and walks off.



The journey has reached the end of its parabola and Herzen – der reine Tor; the pure fool – is no longer as pure as he would like to have been Europe wasn’t ready yet for this kind of intervention. Europe has no heart; only nostalgia for something that is not of this world. The answer lies in Congo – it lies in the heart of Africa.

Our embedded journalist, Ulla Hvejsel, recently submitted three video blog reports from various stages of the mission. More are to follow.

Nov 24-25 - Will It Break?:


Nov 25 - The Cast:


Nov 25-27 - The Crossing:


In a parallel development in the first world, The Parallel Action Control Room was broken into on Friday Nov 25 - the same day that the mission sat off for Guantanamo Bay. The 37 inches control room LCD display, the Dell control room server and some additional electronic gear were taken - thus debilitating communications between agents in the field and control room operatives in Camberwell.

Thomas Altheimer had hired the gear from ADI and kindly placed it at our disposal. Sadly nothing was insured, but Altheimer has now most graciously offered to help The Parallel Action out of its financial embarrassment by taking out a loan. We wish to thank him for this outstanding sacrifice to the cause of Europe.

There are speculations on CIA involvement. A Gulfstream V jet frequently used by the agency was apparantly spotted on a remote runway at Heathrow the same day. But we are still looking into the facts. More on that story later.

There are still entries needing to be added to the blog. Thomas Herzen has assured me that he is working on an account of what took place on a mountain slope above Guantanamo Bay on Nov 28.
____________________
filed by Hannah Jefferson

We were finally allowed to dock at the pier at around 10 am, Sunday, after six hours of waiting anchored up out in the bay. Three different teams from the Cuban Department of Health, Customs, and the Interior Ministry boarded to inspect the boat. To the occasion, I had disguised myself as a "tourist" - dressed in jeans, t-shirt, wearing no footwear. - All a precaution as not to attract too much attention from the diligent officials. Ulla indulged in polite conversation with a woman who also worked teaching English - presumably always on the look-out for a chance to practice that most difficult tongue. A Health Ministry official was bouncing round inside the main cabin catching mosquitoes with his hands - very agile – every time he caught one, he would incarcerate it in a small container for further inspection.
Down at the bottom of the pier, two uniformed guards sat in the universal white plastic chairs; one training a big camera lens in our direction. The process lasted about two hours. When they had all left, the captain turned kind of philosophical as he exclaimed, “you are free!” I did not agree with him, as it seemed like we had just substituted the clenching fist of nature with the fist of human society i.e. a paranoid State.

Anyway, we used our newfound ‘freedom’ to get rid of our ludicrous disguises and went about preparing uniforms and weaponry for what was now to be an assault by land:

Friday night, Nov 25: We finally left the pier in Ocho Rios around midnight in torrents of rain season showers. The boat – the Pocket Change - was one of those sport-fishing powerboats that have a seat in the back where strong men can lay proof to their strength as they battle huge, obstinate marlins. A crew of two, ‘Rasta’ and Marlon, seconded the captain Norman Spence – an all-Jamaican crew. We had spent five hours on the boat waiting for the captain to persuade his fiancée to come aboard, all the while listening to the drumming of the rain and the playful bantering in patois between Marlon and Rasta as they went about preparing the boat, each black, black man in shorts and bare feet, dressed in cut-out plastic sacs. Real pirates!
Incomprehensible for the inexperienced listener, patois sounds like Dutch spoken with Spanish speed topped with a whiff of English. The first word I learned on the journey was a word of greeting - ‘Rauuff’ – pronounced like a dog’s suspicious, first greeting to a stranger. I would soon get to learn an extensive patois vocabulary.

With the fiancée safely stowed away below in the captain’s cabin, we sank northwards into the blackened horizon, gradually exchanging rain and clouds for an ominously howling wind and a great starry vault above. Warmed by four shots of white rum with Pepsi, at first I didn’t notice the change of weather. I was just very, very happy; the waters making that pleasant sound chafing the hull of the ship as we glided through the waves. Cluck, cluck, we’re finally on our way, all the gear including ‘Europe’ below deck, all set for Guantanamo Bay. A journey estimated to take about nine or ten hours. Soon we would be at that great geopolitical monolith of injustice.

Now in the planning stage of this mission, the weather as a factor had been discussed, but mostly with this simple, cartoon-like understanding of Caribbean conditions where one imagines a season of roaring hurricanes followed by 7-8 months of flat seas and interminably fair weather. In the preparations I had single-handedly decided that November would carry all the features of the latter phase.

A hurricane named Gamma had a different understanding of this all. In its death throes somewhere to the Northeast, off the coast of Florida, it was still creating a low that sent winds and seas pulsing down in a Southeasterly direction. Keeping a course from Ocho Rios towards Guantanamo Bay of 60 degrees, our ship was heading straight in the direction of those winds and waves. The captain had seen the forecast. I had seen the forecast. His fellow captain friend Paul had been around earlier with a printed sheet off the website of the US meteorological service with a lot of wind arrows and printed somewhere at the bottom: ‘17 feet waves to be expected’. Surrounded by all of us in the dank, cramped deck space, Paul in his huge yellow rain coat was shaking his head, saying that he would never risk going out in such conditions.
I chose not listen, too much was at stake for us; we had to go to Guantanamo Bay before our time ran out. The captain chose not to listen; he had just pocketed 4000 dollars, which he would stand to lose should he follow his common non-pecuniary sense, and choose not to go out.

I went below deck to the fore of the boat to sleep as the lights of Ocho Rios were extinguished by the jagged horizon of waves. After dozing off for a while I was violently thrust out of my tiny cubicle as the hull bounded, hanging seemingly weightless in midair for a brief moment, before it fiercely hammered into what was felt to be a very, very big wave.
This was to be the beginning of a very, very long night. During that night I learned how to sleep while keeping a tight grip on any kind of bolted object – all the while keeping my body straight as an arrow with feet and arms pressed against either end of the tiny space to avoid falling off the tiny madras. Often waking up hanging weightless instances before gravity and the hull’s impact with the waves slammed me back down deep into the cushion and the wood of the cubicle.

Some hours into the night, a loud clang was followed by a change in the sound of the thumping engines. It seemed like one of the two engines had gone out.
Deeply nauseous, I staggered out of the cubicle trying to pave my way through the main cabin which had now been totally rearranged with the huge deep freezer sliding back and forth across the middle of the room together with Rasta and Buggy-Up laying flat on the deck on a pair of thin white leather cushions. There is no describing just how violently the ship rolled. It felt like it would tip over any time as one wave would push it down 45 degrees to be followed by another that would tilt it twenty or so further. To get from the fore to the open area in the aft where the marlin chair was, I had to crawl. Reaching the door of the cabin I saw our embedded journalist Ulla curled up on the starboard side with one hand clutching the railing in a continuous shower of water and foam from the breaking waves. She was in a stupor completely unable to move.

Marlon was sitting in the swivel seat at the helm on the platform above, seemingly unmoved. It was quite a balancing act to get up to him, first ascending a ladder and then skidding across a stretch of very slippery, curved glass fibre deck with very little railing to hold on to. Then locking your body down in an extremely uncomfortable positon: pressing against railing surrounding the helm, gyrocompass and the board of instruments. Around us were the hugest waves I have ever seen in my life. 17-18 feet. They made the sea appear like a mountainous landscape with valleys and ridges and constant landslides. Marlon confirmed that one motor was gone. As we steered head against the wind and the waves, the boat was practically brought to a full stop by every third wave, which came on with the right angle. We were going by less than half speed – 2-3 knots – practically a floating bathtub getting tossed around by waves as big as houses. I was dead scared. Feeling very human, going through the what-ifs; like what would happen if the boat keeled over and I was the sole survivor. It would have been my stupid idea that would have killed these real, living people.

Saturday Nov 26: This went on through the morning. Same strong winds. Clear skies. Same ludicrously big waves. Ulla had managed to drag herself into the cabin. I kind of took over her position in the aft. Relieving myself of yesterdays KFC menu over the side of the boat. Vowing never again to go anywhere near Kentucky. Tending paranoid fantasies of CIA plots to poison us in order to preempt our aggression.
All our gear, including Europe, was in our cabin in the front. Each time I went down there to get something, I would throw up afterwards. Ulla was incapable of moving, let alone filming. So, in order to catch some of this pandemonium on tape I dashed down in the cabin to fetch the camera only to be hanging over the side of the boat in the next instance. This pattern repeated itself for some hours whenever I had to get something. Like sun lotion. Or my Tilley hat. Or the sunglasses.

It went on through the afternoon. Strong winds. Clear skies. Big waves. Practically drifting, but still holding our course assisted by the one engine. Accompanied by hours and hours of staring towards the Northern horizon to conjure up the outline of Cuban coastline. Inner eruptions of pure joy at the sight of a bird or a drifting cocoanut as all boys know that this is a sign of nearby land. Recalling scenes from the movie with a marooned Tom Hanks. Trying to remember if Corto Maltese had ever been depicted clutching onto the railing of a ship.

It went on through the evening. We were supposed to have reached American waters 10 hours earlier. We were not anywhere near. The captain decided that we would have to go to Santiago de Cuba instead – 60 kilometers to the east of Guantanamo Bay. Somewhat out of hearing range even if we had Beethoven playing on full volume. No point in quarrelling with the captain. It wasn’t until then that I realized that the authority of the captain practically put him in charge of the European project. In that moment I decided I would come back next year in my own boat, in a boat belonging to Europe, a boat where everything worked. Not another one of these third-world collages of spare parts.
But for now we would have to commence with plan G or H and make our advance over land through Cuban territory instead.

Sunday Nov 27: It went on through the night. Staring at the slightly lighter grayish quadrangle that broke the darkness straight ahead of us. A discolouring which Marlon thought to be the reflection of the city lights of Santiago de Cuba. I was laying head to head with Rasta in front of the helm both of us as always clutching a bit of railing while we dozed. Marlon had been sitting at the helm fifteen hours straight. The captain was spending most of the time in his cabin with the hidden fiancée who was not pleased with this little picnic.

We reached Cuba around 4 o’clock that morning. It was a very strange feeling to enter the Santiago de Cuba Bay. Disappointment about the lost opportunity of a maritime standoff with the Americans was mixed with a dose of cold war paranoia, which projected all kinds of intrigues, spies, radars, and Soviet missiles onto the darkened stretch of land that opened up on either side of us. All triggered and enhanced by Marlon’s claim that the Cubans would have followed our movements from the point where we left Jamaican waters (this would have been something like 15 hours earlier, a very slow moving aggressor indeed). A sweeping beam of light was trained at the boat for a while until we anchored up outside Porta Gorda to wait for clearance from the Cuban authorities to enter Cuban territory.

6 pm - we're setting off in an hour. It's beyond cats and dogs here. No news can be expected before monday.

Europe and its representatives are setting off to free Guantanamo Bay at 7 pm, Friday Nov 25 from Ocho Rios (don’t tell it to the Americans).

We finalized the deal yesterday on the terrace above the pool. Norman Spence, Captain of the war boat ‘Pocket Change’ and Henry Pottinger, Spence’s factotum, were present. 40 crisp $100 bills exchanged hands. Norman was in a wholly different, quite pleasant mood. I realize now that his hostility through our initial negotiation was nothing but a mask to increase my desperation and willingness to take whatever bid he would offer.


The weather cleared during Thursday. But a new storm picked up around midnight, raising showers, pummeling the coast. This resulted in another sleepless night and many hours of catatonic, idle sitting, and futile looking towards Cuba; all the while cursing the fact that there is no god to ask for fair weather. There is only Europe. And Europe has no power over the weather.

It is still pouring today, but I think it is ‘rain wind’ and not ‘wind wind’ (the sea seems relatively calm considering the occasional strong gusts of wind). I’m pretty confident that we will set out at 7 pm today. I’ve explained our mission to Norman. After one of my semi-long lectures he concluded, “Ah, so it is something related to the university”.

I called ‘Buggy-Up’ in Port Antonio and told him to pack and make sure to bring his passport. He’s arriving today around 12 and then we will have a few hours going through procedures with Jamaican customs. The cross will take about 9 hours, which means that we will be launching an early-morning assault somewhere on the Southwestern corner of Guantanamo Bay’s restricted waters that extends 40 miles from the coast.

When we have liberated the area Saturday, we have a day of celebration Sunday, before heading back towards Ocho Rios around midnight. I will then compose my letter to Javier Solana to inform him of the European annexation of the territory of Guantanamo Bay. Monday around midnight we then leave Jamaica out of Norman Manley to go back to the mainland.

As we immerse ourselves in the Real of reality, we surrender to chance and exterior forces. The one factor that is wholly absent from my preparatory calculations is the last dimension in human history, which still harbours a trace of the metaphysical – this factor goes by the name WEATHER! I curse the fact that I wasted my last credits with the absent God by praying for – and getting - another goal in the ’96 Odense UEFA qualifier against Real Madrid - a goal that put OB through to the second round.
Just-turned-European ‘Buggy-Up’ found a boat in Ocho Rios, which might take us Friday around midnight – the distance is about 90 miles. The price has now gone up to $4000 and the captain didn’t seem happy by our appearance. As always, when you find yourself close to a geopolitical hotspot the paranoid imagination is the preferred frame of mind. Most Jamaicans either think that I’m a missionary or a spy – a spy in a suit carrying the flag of his home country – sort of like an overcover agent…

Norman, the captain of the powerboat ‘Pocket Change’, is suspicious of our ‘real intentions’ and scared by the very real prospect of getting his boat confiscated by either the Cuban or – less likely – the American Coast Guard. But still I consider the $4000 to be sufficient for soothing Norman’s uneasiness. Apart from the colossal factor of contingency, our main worry has now shifted to the weather forecast. It is rather windy and the cross is not possible with present weather conditions. This all means that we’ve reached the apex of the parabola of this mission. I have now decided to stake everything on the deal with Norman – and the weather. We have been put up in the Ocean Sands Beach Hotel with a nice terrace adjacent to the beach with a clear view of the sea and Cuba out there to the north beyond the horizon.

Worrying about the weather, I was unable to sleep and sat halfway through the night on the terrace watching the wind in the palms, anxiously listening to the surf, trying to discern a change in the weather. Will it break? Will Europe be delivered?

Yesterday, was a happy day of transit. Everyone elated. All confident that everything will go well and Guantanamo Bay liberated by Monday. I’m telling everyone that they are Europeans, that I regard this as my home country and I invite them all to go and settle on the European mainland. I have now gotten my very own Jamaican nickname ‘Preacher’. Much to the point of these activities.

On our way across the island I inspected some European projects and Saw That They Were Good. I enhanced an European installation during a minor intervention at a banana plantation, getting on the box, flying the flag, playing Beethoven, and giving a speech to the assembled workers about Europe, offering to include them all in a European world order, concluding by pronouncing all present to be European. We meet no hostility towards this idea and the natives are all quite fond of the thought of them going to the mainland to settle and vice versa.

Herzen sees that it is good

Preparing the act of European shamanism

Herzen discussing Banana market regulation with a native
banana farmer who turned European by the shamanistic ritual

We hired Tony aka 'Buggy-Up' to do the cooking on our war ship. A most depressing day of waiting yesterday as Tony and Barry at Shadows called around to find a boat in one of the ports on the North coast of Jamaica.

Waiting, getting a tan while there is time

We left our lodge on the hilltop to do a full scale high noon intervention down the main street of Port Antonio. The former colonial subject Donovan aka “the Lion” was carrying the burden of Europe. I had been entrusted with the European standard.



A crucial session with Tony, the chef, was scheduled for 12 o’clock at the Shadows lounge. At the bar we were served obligatory white rum which kind of made us all well-disposed toward one another. Tony called someone who then called someone. The last someone apparently mentioned a price of $2500.
We were then taken to meet our prospective captain at the gated marina which we entered at around 1 pm – with Tony and Lion our numbers had doubled. Our group by now looked kind of impressive.

Captain Paul Bruehnhoffer of the ‘Nadine' received us at his gleaming, glamorous fishing boat with 20+ fishing rods all pointing towards the north – towards Guantanamo Bay. He was American - from Florida. At last - we had found our would-be-European American!

If we could get the right ‘weather window’, we could set out towards South East Cuba Tuesday at 6 am. Everything got rather hectic, I would have to stamp out $2500 and Mr. Bruehnhoffer had to go about finding 250 gallons of fuel. After that we would face 4 consecutive hours of paper work and inspection by the Jamaican Customs Police to clear the boat.

I had a cruel two-hour session at the bank where they asked to see two identity cards with photos. I only had my passport. Back to the hotel going through everything. Then saved by my London University Student card!

Rushing back to the marina, we were met by an apologetic Bruehnhoffer. Sorry, he had tried to call us. It wasn’t possible to go to Cuba. He lacked a mandatory copy of the proof of ownership to the boat which has to be renewed each year. His disorganized boss back in Atlanta, Georgia, had the paper somewhere in a pile in his big house. He could maybe fax it here, but chances were slim.

Oh, the sorrow…

European despondency on the Port Antonio Marina

________________________

Advance Nov 21: Port Antonio -> the Port Antonio Marina

This lazy town is divided into two parts. Or no. It is rather like this: The town has been added a monstrosity of a vulgar marina park with lush green lawns carrying signs saying ‘Absolutely no littering’ all fenced in with guards at the few gates. Few people is seen on this vast theme park-like compound. Tied up at the pier are a few massive power- and sailing boats of the kind you see in the intro in Miami Vice.The prospect of us persuading an owner of one of these floating gated communities to take us to Guantanamo Bay does presently not seem likely. But we will be much wiser in a few hours time.

Meanwhile, yesterday, we engaged upon a minor parallel action of boat hiring in the part of town, which surrounds the marina. Halfway through a nice, ethically tainted meal of dolphin, an old cruise ship cook, who goes by the name of ‘Tony’, approached us and told that he could get a boat for us if we wanted to go to Cuba. He left without leaving behind a number, but I found him again later that day. By that time he was quite plastered but I managed to get his phone number and he seems to be quite serious about everything.

I’ve successfully enlisted an indigenous Jamaican to the cause of Europe. After some experiments, Ive found out that “money” seems to be the most efficient means of mobilization. He goes by the name of ‘Lion’ and does all sorts of errands for us. Leaving our journalist behind at the hotel at midnight, he took me to the darkest of darkest night clubs yesterday on the outskirts of Port Antonio – the Mandela – where a local weed they call Ganja is smoked in great quantities and washed down with white 63% rum. I was a sole pink, tall beam in a sea of delirious dark faces. Luckily, I had had 6 Red Stripe beers which made me feel in perfect control.

At breakfast this morning, Lion promised me to supply us with some fearsome war music to back up Beethoven. He’s going to bring us a cd with the “coolest ‘reggae’ music ever”.

This mission has yet again been endangered by an unforeseen factor. Friday, installing the Control Room in London it was the our primary means of communication – the laptop – that irreparable broke down resulting in a day of total frenzy and near disaster. On Jamaica, it isn’t authorities, logistics, or European self-doubt that threaten our success, but a cancerous form of music, which the indigenous of the island know as "reggae". This tumor-causing music from hell has proven to be a danger to our mental sanity. Its deadly rhythms are directed at us interminably from numerous sources all at once wherever we go.

After an evening and a day on Jamaica, it already looks like we have to skip plan c and commence with plan d. The mobilization plan seems to be overly optimistic as backpackers and Jamaicans most amiably refuse to sign on the mission. We have not given up our hope for to see a joyous army of backpackers but prospects certainly looks bleak:



Christopher from the UK chose not to join the mission

Lars & Kim from Denmark chose not to join the mission

Imaj from Japan chose not to join the mission

Not everything is going against us: regarding military hardware things are looking up. Thus, we successfully signed a deal with Althea of ‘Courts’ in Kingston involving the crucial supply of the deadly boombox, which is to be used against the American. Oh, what a fantastic moment in this most tackiest of home supply stores when glorious Beethoven for a brief moment blended out the lethal ‘reggae’ of the in-store loudspeaker system.

Ten days to take-off. We have received some assistance with the military hardware from our American adversaries. Our weapon of choice - the 1944 Furtwängler Eroica - just landed with a thump in the hall of my shared flat in Clapton, London; kindly shipped with a tiny bag of fruit gum from CD Universe in Wallingford, USA. This even though I’ve been told that an agency called the 'US Munitions List' keeps tight control of the export of military articles, services, and related technologies. Not a good omen regarding the effort to stem the spread of WMDs. – All these open democratic societies, oh dear.

I’ve managed to scrape together approximately £11.000 for the operation which is a far cry from what I hoped for. This means that the success on the battlefield – or to be more precise: the battle waters - is not entirely in our own hands. We thus depend on blessed constellations of the planets and our ability to persuade and mobilize former colonial subjects on Jamaica to take part in this new, great European adventure. But again – as with the unexpected help on the weapons front – I revel in the symbolism of the fact that the cheque was issued from a branch of The Bank of New York. There’s globalization for you.

I’m sitting here in Clapton tapping away on my laptop, getting more than tipsy assisted by a six-pack of Stellas, trying to focus on the macropolitical issues at hand - rather unsuccessful, I fear. By now, I tend to lapse into the micropolitics of women and the urge to become a normal, proper human being. Who’s to blame? George Herwegh, of course! He was the treacherous one that abandoned all ideals, friendship and honour, to pursue and dazzle Natalie.

Videoblogging [Copenhagen]:
First attempt at an outline of what this is all about

This is what’s going to happen: On Nov 18, the European representatives, Thomas Herzen and embedded journalist Ulla Hvejsel, leave the Parallel Action Control Room in the House Gallery in London carrying Europe in a box. They head for Heathrow to board an Air Jamaica plane bound for Kingston. On Jamaica they go to Port Antonio (earlier considered the banana capital of the world) on the north eastern coast. From here they set out in a boat and sail towards the American zone of emergency, Guantánamo Bay. In a seaside assault they batter the American soldiers with Furtwängler’s 1944 recording of Beethovens Third Symphony, Eroica. When the Americans have fled, they install the contents of the box on the territory, thus Guantánamo Bay is turned into a huge European, colonial, spatial installation.