31 December 2001
26 December – 19h50 –
I’m home now.
Sky News is back. It’s now on channel 51, BBC World’s old channel and BBC World is now on 50. I’m glad Sky is back as that means I’ll still get the CBS Evening News.
21h – 500 detainees in France are running into the Chunnel stormed the barriers to the Chunnel in attempt to get to England. This has closed the Chunnel and stopped EuroStar service.
There are many huge wildfires burning out of control near Sydney (Australia). They’ve already burned 150 homes.
It appears that I’ve missed something (I didn’t have a TV in the hotel I stayed in). A British guy tried to blow up a Paris – Miami flight a few days ago.
20h01 – Beverly Hills Cop 2 is on Polsat. I’ve only seen the first one.
22h – Beverly Hills Cop 1 is on PULS now. Go Figure!
22h52 – An observation: Looking at the block of flats behind mine (60 flats, all of whose windows face mine), NONE of them have Christmas trees. Only 1 of them has even decorated for Christmas (they have a snowman that lights up in their living room window).
27 December – 8h10 – According to BBC World, The prime minister of Australia has said that it appears that the fires were set deliberately. If it’s true, my guess is that it is to protest the environment of some kind (people earning more money, suburbs expanding, etc).
Last night, €1,000,000 in new, uncirculated Euro notes, were stolen from a bank in Milan, Italy.
9h15 – Moderate snow
10h13 – “Touched By An Angel” is on at a different time. It must be one of the first ones as Andrew has long hair. He looks better that way.
13h – I’m back. I went to the internet café to use the internet today at 11h, but there was a 2-hour wait! So, I had to go to the one I dislike above the cinema. About 10 minutes after I got there, a hoard of kids came in to play computer games, and it was full.
13h13 – There’s a movie called “Christmas on Division Street” on.
14h50 – It was a good movie, in a Christmas type of way.
16h – It feels different today. We currently still have twilight. Perhaps that’s because it’s a week after the shortest day of the year. Perhaps our days are already getting longer. This whole winter has seemed strange for me. I’ve loved the snow and have cheered for more. The cold hasn’t been too bad. The Christmas season has just flown by.
16h15 – Pitch dark now.
17h16 – Just when I though I had seen it all..EuroSport is showing some kind of dance competition from Russia.
20h07 – I’m watching a movie called “Born Into Exile” now. I’ve seen the beginning before but I don’t think I watched anything past the very first scene, the cliff jump.
20h48 – I remember a few other parts of this movie now, so think I probably flipped back and forth through the channels when it was last on.
22h20 – There’s a show on called Trinity, which tells the story about a family in NYC. It seems like a great show, except for the fact that it shows the World Trade Centre buildings in the opening credits! I assume it’s a USA prime time show.
22h25 – One of the characters is a police detective and his brother is a priest! Their sister gets pregnant and she’s not sure who the father is! I know that my description makes it sound stupid, but it’s really not. It’s a great show.
23h11 – It’s a fantastic show and I’ll make sure to watch it.
28 December – 8h29 – It’s snowing again.
8h52 – The snow has stopped.
8h58 – According to EuroNews, Belgians may have problems getting Euros on 1 January because the country’s biggest bank’s ATMs can’t handle dispensing two currencies, so they have to shut them down on 31 December and change all the money to Euros.
I’m excited about getting Euros when I go to Spain in January. Also, it’ll make it a lot easier than converting from pesetas (dividing by 188) as the Euro is worth about 90¢ US. The coins will have one side common to all of the Euro countries, and the reverse side will be country specific. This is the first time I’ve heard that.
EuroNews has a really cool weather map.
According to EuroNews, the USA is going to hold captured Taliban and Al-Qeada fighters at the Guantanamo military base in Cuba. Interesting choice of location. I bet Castro will love it!
9h11 – According to BBC World, a fire crew that was fighting the massive fires in Sydney (Australia) came back to their fire truck to find that it had been looted!
9h17 – According to BBC World, Argentina is working on making a new currency.
Daylight report: Sunrise – 7h45
Sunset – 15h30
13h – It’s stopped snowing now.
I went to the internet café today and it was closed. No reason or anything, it was just closed. With as busy as they were yesterday, the should be open today. They’d make a lot of money! But, no, they’re closed. They’re making it very difficult for me to accomplish my goal of using the internet every day of my holiday.
As I was about to start walking up to the one above the cinema, I saw my friend
Bernard. It’s been a while since I’ve seen him, so we talked as we walked up that way.
20-03 – Mortal Combat Annihilation is on. I assume that’s part 2, as I saw the original one and liked it.
20h20 – It’s snowing heavily and it’s very windy.
29 December – 8h43 – It snowed heavily most of last night and is snowing moderately now.
9h15 – I’m watching BBC World and Bill Clinton is giving a speech. What a great surprise.
10h – The snow has stopped.
11h40 – Moderate snow.
I’m meeting some friends at 18h this evening.
I was looking through the TV guide and found the Paris – Dakar race. Interesting, I knew that it was coming up in January, but wonder why they’re showing parts of it now. It was too late for me to stay up to see. EuroSport also has it listed late at night as well.
Looking ahead in the TV guide, starting on 1 January, EuroSport will have 30 minutes of highlights of it on at 8h30.
12h17 – Heavy snow
13h30 – The snow has stopped.
15h30 – Heavy snow again.
16h44 – Another waste of time. I thought I’d use the internet before meeting my friends tonight, so I braved the wind, heavy snow and cold weather and went to the internet café above the cinema (it’s the only one open at this time on a Saturday), and all 12 computers were being used by kids to play video games. So, I came home.
17h13 – Wow, the wind is really howling tonight.
30 December – 8h36 – According to Sky News, senior Cuban officials have told the USA that they oppose the USA’s plan to hold the captured Afghan fighters at Guantanamo. That was easy to predict.
9h02 – According to Sky News, the fires burning in Australia are now only 12 miles from central Sydney, but they’re almost all under control.
Also according to Sky News, reporters from a British newspaper, the Sunday People Newspaper, smuggled weapons hidden in a coat, a wallet and a pen onto British Airways planes at London-Heathrow and Manchester airports. British Air is investigating how that could have happened.
So, what’s the plan for today? I’m meeting Joanna at 14h for tea.
11h30 – It’s snowing again.
12h09 – According to BBC World, there’s a “viewing platform” near the WTC cleanup sight.
13h24 – I’m home. I left at 12h40 so that I could use the internet at the internet café above the cinema before I went to meet Joanna. Once again it was full of kids playing video games and there’s no place else in town I can go on Sundays. So, I walked back up the hill and came home.
Ski Jumping is on EuroSport at 17h today. Go Malysz!!
13h45 – It’s time to get bundled up again. I’m going out to meet Joanna now. I’ll try to use the internet after that as the café we’re meeting at is right across from the internet café. Otherwise, I probably wont be able to use it until 2 January at the earliest.
16h – Tea with Joanna was fun. She brought Malwina (her cousin who sometimes joins us for pizza) with her and we had a nice time. After, I went to use the internet (the one above the theatre is the only one open on Sundays) and saw Saikat. We chatted for a bit as we had to wait to use it.
I downloaded MSN IM to the computer I was using and found a relative and a few friends online. It was good to chat with them.
Moving on…
MSNBC was talking to a NYC tourism person and asked if they meant for the viewing platform for the WTC to be a tourist attraction. The tourism official said that they know it will be an attraction and there will be bus trips to it, but it’s still supposed to be a respectful thing. Yeah right, it’s just a way for NYC to make some badly needed money.
19h55 – A sorting machine in a NYC post office tested positive a 2nd time for anthrax, after it had been cleaned the first time. The Postal Workers want it closed and treated exactly like the Senate building that has been closed for a few months. I complete agree with that.
20h30 – It’s finally stopped snowing.
31 December – 9h10 – Light snow.
According to Sky News, the London Police are trying to get people to go to planned events instead of just hanging out in the streets. Many people hang out at Trafalgar Square and there have been quite a few incidents of gang violence in the past few years.
10h – It’s sunny!!! Hooray!!
13h – It’s midnight in Sydney! What a great firework show they have!!! I have to be there for New Year’s some day!!
14h20 – “Every Which Way But Loose” is on.
I found the comments of Jerry Fallwell and Pat Robertson on Robertson’s show “The 700 Club” made on 13 September on MSNBC.com:
Fallwell: “When we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists, and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternate lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say, ‘You helped this happen.’”
Robertson: “Well, I totally concur.”
I feel that what they said was totally inappropriate. From what the article said, Fallwell later apologized, but Robertson didn’t. Idiots.
In the article, I also found this quote from Bill Maher, host of the show Politically Incorrect:
“We have been the cowards, lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away. That’s cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building, say what you want about it, it’s not cowardly.”
The article went on to say that he apologized for it, after several sponsors pulled their ads from the show. So much for freedom of speech.
I heard from my friends I’m going out with tonight. They’re on the other side of town (near my old flat), so we’re going to meet at the bus station (it’s a central meeting point for us and also on the way to where we’re going) at 20h10.
16h32 – I can hear people shooting off fireworks already.
18h26 – CNN just decided to show a “retrospect” of 11 September, so I changed the channel. I don’t need to relive that.
20h – Soup’s made, laundry’s hung, time to go.
I’m writing this on 1 January 2002, but since it’s the end of the year, I’m adding it to the last journal of 2001.
The party turned out to be a lot of fun. It was at Pub Leif and I met Joanna, Agnieszka, Malwina & Saikat at the bus station and we went from there. We didn’t have any idea what to expect, all we knew was that there would be food, dancing and drinking. The place was packed, about 50 people. Right after I walked in, I saw my friend Pawel. He lives in Olsztyn now and I hadn’t seen him since June. I also knew his best friend (also named Pawel). Justyna came over and greeted us and we sat down to eat. There were trays of cold cuts on the table as well as orange juice and Coca-Cola. We were also given a chicken leg on rice pilaf, which we started with. We talked and ate. Joanna, Malwina & Agnieszka went off to dance and Saikat and I talked. I also talked with Pawel and we caught up on the last 6 months of our lives. Eventually, Malwina dragged me in to dance.
At 23h55, many of us went to the hall of culture (a 3 minute walk from the pub), watched the fireworks, wished eachother a Happy New Year, hugged and some people sprayed us (and everyone) with champagne. We then went back to the pub as it was warm there. They served us bigos and kielbasa. That was the first time I had tried bigos, and I loved it.
Something interesting happened….I tried to SMS a few people (in my town) just after midnight to wish them a Happy New Year, but I got the “message failed” response. I guess the Polish cellular phone system was overloaded, as none of us could get any SMSes or calls to go through. At 0h30, a bit frustrated at that, I jokingly said to Joanna "Let me try calling a relative in the USA. Knowing how things work in Poland, I'll be able to make a trans-Atlantic call, but not a call within town," The call went through on the first try!!! We were all very surprised. I wished him a Happy New Year, hung up and tried sending an SMS again. It didn’t go through. We were finally able to get calls and messages through at about 1h.
At about 1h15, a friend, Szymon, called me to find out where I was. He joined us around 1h45. We left at 5h25 and I was home and in bed by 5h45.
I hadn’t planned on staying in Mragowo this New Year’s Eve, but am glad that I did. I had a lot of fun and spent the time with fun people. I also met new people. It was a great way to end the year. Goodbye 2001.
