Errands in the Urban Desert, and the Democratic National Convention

It reached 33°C today, and opening the apartment building door to step onto street asphalt was rather like turning one's face into the air stream of a warm hair dryer.

While trees and shrubbery have been pleasingly green late into August this year, thanks to the abundant rainfall, the grass on the median was looking suddenly golden and scorched again.

I went shopping for vegetables and fruit (apples, a yellow squash, mini-cucumbers, and onions, all grown in Germany, as well as red tomatoes on the vine that are probably from France), chocolate and milk and quark, lemon sorbet and salted caramel ice cream, this evening.

Although the shop sells organic produce and is presumably ecologically conscientious, that doesn't prevent it from cranking up its air conditioning: to the point that as you pass through the sliding doors, you practically enter a Swedish ice hotel.

Along the way I admired the dust on the huge windows of two long-abandoned businesses. Torn-up posters haven't been cleared away in months and have been joined by more posters for blockbuster music events: at the Berlin Philharmonic halls and elsewhere.

It feels like a failing of Berlin's or Germany's government that many shops lie empty as rents rise and e-commerce thrives, while affordable housing and dignified accommodations for vulnerable groups (including women's shelters) dwindle. There's an empty shop in our building, and the manager is concerned about losing the income: replacing the small 'to let' sign with a larger one, then replacing that large sign with an even larger one....

On the other hand, J. tells me – with the benefit of professional knowledge – that the official standards and requirements for residences are different and much higher than for office spaces.

Besides I cooked late lunch or early dinner: a "Huevos Hyacinth" recipe of cold cuts, tomatoes, egg, and cheese from The Pioneer Woman Cooks.

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For reasons even I can't fully explain, I put myself through 15 hours or more of the Democratic National Convention, this past week. It started with wanting to know more about the mechanics of US politics, which I haven't closely followed in a while. It ended with a sleep deficit.

That said, many things felt worthwhile:

Hearing the Chicks sing the national anthem.

I enjoyed Democrats being less defensive about the 45th president, for example in the speeches of Barack and Michelle Obama.

Michelle Obama's no-nonsense demeanour made her speech stand out. I'd read the days before that Barack Obama had more or less pitched a fit in private to employees at the idea of Kamala Harris becoming the next president, but both she and her husband presented convincing endorsements.

I thought it was also interesting that other Democrats who spoke the following day made reference to the Obama's speeches. It left the impression that the pair are still considered as philosophical or strategic mentors in the Democratic Party.

I think an investigation and proper prosecution of Clinton's own misdeeds is overdue. (In a different speech, it was also a bit concerning in this – hopefully – less macho, misogynistic, and mafia-happy day and age to hear the grandson of JFK say that JFK was 'his hero.') But I did think it was interesting to hear Bill Clinton's perspective on Trump. ('He creates chaos, and then he sort of curates it, as if it were precious art,' was one quotation that I noted down.).

The perspectives of Republicans who want to vote for the Democratic Party in 2024 were interesting, too. ('John McCain’s Republican Party is gone, and we don’t owe a damn thing to what’s been left behind.’)

Kenan Thompson's bit, where the actor from Saturday Night Live said of the Heritage Foundation's capacious political programme Project 2025: 'Ever seen a document that can kill democracy and a small animal at the same time?'

The children of Tim Walz, and some of the speakers, did give the impression of having their feet on the ground and being genuinely decent, not just intimidatingly polished and elite.

J.B. Pritzker: The governor of Illinois made a few necessary points. (e.g. After working in an American company in recent years, I was relieved when Pritzker used his speech to say that African Americans and Latino Americans should not be derided as 'Diversity, Equity and Inclusion hires' for having the supposed 'audacity' of being successful while not being White.)

Pritzker's withering words about Trump stuck with me because they had the ring of truth:

'Everything he's achieved in his own life was by hurting someone else.'

Jadedly, I felt there was a lot of truth-fudging, hagiography and 'baloney' in the Convention. But there was also a bedrock of genuine, undeniable conviction: It is not possible for any properly informed citizen to re-elect the 45th President, if they care for the US.

Netflix Streaming, and Surfboards

It's been a while since I wrote the Spanish test for my university application: I wasn't entirely sure if I'd fail badly or thrillingly pass as I gracelessly stumbled on my way out of the examination room. In the listening comprehension section, for example, I could barely understand the speaker at the first pass. Then, in the writing section, I forgot to look at the last 2 questions. But the instructors who invigilated the exam were so friendly that I really hoped I'd have the chance to be taught by them.

Within three days, the result: I passed at the B1 level and could study Spanish as my major at the first year level instead of taking preparation classes.

It took a few days to file my registration paperwork (i.e. personal ID, the proofs of acceptance, a proof of past student registration, an overview of my student data, and proof that I'd completed a bank transfer of the €304.40 annual student fee). It was more stressful because the university application and registration platform is buggy. I suspect a lack of quality assurance testing beforehand.

So now I've relaxed my Spanish autodidact's programme.

*

But on Netflix I'm still watching LaLiga: Más Allá Del Gol, a documentary series about Spanish association soccer clubs.

Despite the Netflix production's approving lens, an obvious quid pro quo for the 'All Access' nature of the series, I suspect there are far more problems in association soccer than just the rabid soccer fans who write and shout mean things about players and coaches. I'm surprised there aren't daily Luis Rubiales scandals in the men's leagues as well.

Hopefully I'm reading too much into it. But the amount of times managers, staff, and random people who might not even know the athletes, just pat, embrace, and randomly touch the athletes – without asking or giving them time to decline – throughout the series, implies to me a massive disrespect of athletes' personal space, safety, and individual autonomy. It would be considered inappropriate in most workplaces.

I also feel less annoyed that a security officer and a press officer have treated me (as I thought) like a potential rabid groupie in the past for being in the wrong place at the wrong time/making an innocent request... With so many people of all genders projecting their own (thwarted) ambitions and dreams onto athletes, some kind of security is necessary. Even if this particular kind of security feels sexist to me.

Returning to internal industry problems, though: in the highly monetized, highly pressurized, highly competitive milieu that's shown in the documentary series, it doesn't look like there'd be accountability for misdeeds that do exist.

*

My favourite offering on Netflix that was originally shot in Spanish is still El Pepe, the documentary about Uruguay's former president.

It's a fabulous film not just for its interesting subject, although he certainly helps. It's also fabulous because of archival and newly filmed vignettes of Uruguay nowadays vs. during the dictatorship, the "local colour" of the fields around Pepe Mujica's home and his favourite music, and the rather hair-raising opinions of his former comrades. Like him, they are not terribly repentant about their militant past.

*

La Vocera was frustrating. I think it's not a Netflix production, just hosted there.

Filmed in celebration of an Indigenous woman who is elected to run for the presidency, by an organization representing the many different communities in Mexico. But it suffers very much from the director's not being remotely critical-minded, and apparently being hellbent on ingratiating herself with the people whom she was meeting.

It's true that it's important to hear Mayan and other Indigenous languages being spoken. It's important to hear of a political organization that weaves in Indigenous perspectives and approaches, and also takes an ecologically conscious perspective. It's the kind of subject where I'm probably being socially irresponsible by being pedantic.

But the election platform, as it is presented in the film, could hardly be more vague, with the barest handful of policy proposals.

Guerrilla fighters in balaclavas, at times hugging guns, appear in crowd scenes, organizational meetings, and at road checkpoints. The fighters are presented without comment, or any explanation of why this veiled and armed presence is appropriate in a democratic process. Women are amongst the fighters as well.... but I don't believe that women and non-binary people adopting the absurd extremes of hypermasculinity is progressive.

(But I found a relatively even-handed Wikipedia article: It does seem that this particular guerrilla group is in a state of truce with Mexico's government now, and is not particularly bloody.)

The absence of glossy Netflix-production photography, evident in the 1990s VHS colour palette, is understandable given the likely modest budget. Opulence would be a weird aesthetic choice for a portrait of grassroots activism and hard-working communities.

Yet (perhaps this is also because I can't read Spanish that quickly) I think that the long intertitle texts are a needless filmmaking choice. They make the film drier, and unflatteringly emphasize that the footage that has been gathered doesn't stand on its own legs as well as it should.

*

My other obsession lately has been watching surfing at the Olympics.

For one thing, I still feel a yearning for the ocean from time to time, after 'getting to know it' growing up in Canada.

For another, seeing film footage of Tahiti reminds me of visiting my father's cousin in Hawaii as a teenager, twenty years ago. I admittedly didn't pay much attention when he pointed out the waters off Haleiwa and probably the Pipeline while we were driving along the shore, as I wasn't especially interested in surfing at the time.

Now I even feel philosophical when two surfing competitors sit on their boards in their pink and blue wetsuits for a fairly inactive half hour, letting wave after wave pass by without riding hardly any. It's soothing ... since I'm not one of the surfers: a balm for the pressures of everyday life.

*

As for my anaemia, I still need coddling.

Many forms of exercise briefly seem OK and then tip over into exhaustion, dizziness, feelings of heaviness in the limbs, and tingling.

But doing half an hour of beginner's ballet or yoga per day, provided I eat nutritiously and sleep enough, seems to be OK, and even help me feel better and stronger. My limbs don't ache much afterward!