If the ideal situation tends to bring about the worst possibilities eventually, then wouldn't the opposite be true as well? It does seem possible to me, as I traverse the communities of Berlin with the savage realities of histories come and gone from its turf; all leaving their scars upon these resilient people, both those that are native and the one's who come here to escape other tyrannies. Tradition and possibilities still clash though and history always threatens to repeat it's painful truths to the German people.

Let's try to just keep the good pieces of the lesson. The German people are apt to dedicate themselves to what they see to be the good of their country; this can be a wonderful thing. There exist in the Germany of 2001 communities of such strength and beauty that I as an American can only look to in complete awe, such unity of purpose, such earnestness is truly a virtue. In America we dream of having squatter communities that can truly withstand the test of time and the turbulence of personalities. Of course the battles for the right to life as we see fit are still waged on both continents, but we can always learn from one another from our strengths and from our failings. People put their faith in the nazi party because it was dependable in it's realization of it's own wildest dreams. Same with us yanks, we are all children in essence who want to prove our super-powers to our friends, our families and ourselves. And we can too; I've seen it' six seven-story buildings, all part of the same cooperative unit. Autonomous beings within, striving for the survival of the whole. Doing so with style, with an eye for aesthetics.

The only thing that seems to get lost is the joviality of the project. The harsh reality tends to strip these of their sense of play; not entirely but enough to be a hindrance to a complete breakthrough. But also complete abandon becomes an obstacle as well. So we as people, Americans, Germans, Africans, blacks whites, yellows, reds, need to find our way through the gray areas by our compassion for one another's struggles and the celebration of each victory and a common love for life and that which affirms it. Creating these nurturing environments are a damn good start though, because the structures are already here and shelter being a basic need along with a caring community. We can aim our concerns at other struggles such as alleviating some of the suffering in the surrounding communities, whatever joy can be conjured can be shared and I've never met a person, rich or poor that didn't show some need for real joy in their lives.

Every once in a long ass time, I'll stop and ask myself the question: what's more important, knowing or writing? I guess without the rites of knowns most writings would be some boring ass shit. For the last two weeks my mind has been in the tumble cycle. Countries, cultures, languages, even the birds sing different songs. Histories, happenings, becomings, mutations and to think the U.S. was spawned from these soils; it's not much of a stretch actually. There are definitely some innate things we human's share. one biggie is fear, especially the fear that you could wake up tomorrow to find that there has been an enormous change in all the things that they've grown accustomed to over their life spans. That tomorrow you'll wake up in a world that looks, sounds, and smells foreign and foul to your specialized palette, that all the knowledge you want to sleep with, no-longer means anything. The people who had once held you and warmed you have either vanished or turned cold, that you and your kind are neither wanted nor needed.

As I've tumbled my way from Amsterdam to Berlin and Czech. I slowly realize that I've seen nothing only the tip of Alienation iceberg, never even a glimpse of the idea of what is really truly a horrifying reality to millions of people worldwide. Both past and present. Terrible truths, that helps to build the concerns of middle class America, hell! We can't even see the prisons and the slums built our own insecurities and intolerant ignorance. Those same events have looked through history many times on this side of the Atlantic and can still be heard echoed on the street so Berlin and many other places, which I'm yet to visit. The mission remains the same; keep moving, keep the collective footing on that precarious line between cooperation and chaos. We traverse the globe to share movements with friends and strangers, the good ones, the bad ones, none of it will ever be sorted out till the hindsight kicks in. For the moment, we push on with this mission of intangible ends, our reward is the opportunity to share, to learn, to grow, to build the sub-structures of utopias. The only thing we can be sure of is where we've been, clear paths behind us. Ahead are only the fog and the echoing vibrations of our vehicles and their inhabitants as we make our way through time and space. Leaving our tag on all available surfaces. Ours is to gain momentum together and to not allow our garbage to drag one-another down. There are mutants; in distress in all the nooks and crannies of the world. We receive their signals but what are we to do? We can only lend ourselves our talents, the magic and the surfer punks are only seen from without, all we have to do is get there on time. Our usefulness is of a very subjective nature. Flexibility and availability, that is us on our way to Budapest in the middle of the night. This mission relies on faith, in ourselves and from the source of those signals that we're using to guide us in to a tomorrow filled with just a little bit more joy than today was.

Laugh Riot

When the laugh riot storm troopers take their places in line blocking our path, they will not see a reflection of their own frustration and anger It is our duty to ourselves and to the to provide a different image. one they are not prepared to attack. one that doesn't exist in their manuals. We must put smiles on their stony faces. We must allow our passionate joy to warm them. If only for a moment. If this is not our goal then we strive for nothing worthwhile. Many have died for causes that never once made them laugh or smile. Those who've dedicated their lives to breaking the cycle of misery and injustice are the easiest prey for the forces that perpetuate these states. It's an easy thing to do. Terror invites horror and initiates the innocent in their moments of outrage. This is the goal of the riot squad to turn outrage into violence, thus preset nothing itself. The only way to perpetuate our own selves is to greet them with joyous celebration. To wake up the children encased in these statues. Everyone likes a good party; let's make this one a laugh riot! We made it to Budapest, arriving in the city around five o'clock. Christoph with the navigation of Steffanie drove us through the night. I stayed awake writing until just after the border in Slovakia. The bus is a wandering womb workspace, video studio, Christoff and Steff's bedroom, sleeping space for 6 others, a kitchen that feeds as many as twenty at a time, library, and cafe. This is the vehicle that has taken us from Berlin, a few days ago to Prague then to the party site in Krastany about 30 km south of the city at a demolished military site, surrounded by farms, the one's closest to us were growing radishes to feed to livestock. About 1500 meters away, you could make out the red and orange pointy rooftops of a tiny country town with one grocery store.

Our site was the playground of many of the local kids. I would have loved this place as a kid. There's a little less pool in the middle. one building was mostly underground and seemed to be a garage. The interior as well as the exterior was holes and sometimes entirely demolished wall. The rear of the building had been torn away. The complex in all seemed 60x40 meters. The partially hidden structure stood like a pyramid. With a hand out and spun fire the lot surrounding it was filled with cars and tots. JP little groups of Czech kids drinkin' and smoking and dancing and enjoying themselves and the music on this first stop on the phreakphorce festival tour (at least for Beth and myself. We missed the Berlin show. This tour has already played many tricks on my mind. Just the fact of being out of the U.S. has thrown me for a helluva loop. I've met many English speaking folx, but that in itself reinforces the feeling of being a stupid American. This does give much room though for non-verbal communication, noises, faces, gestures, actions that say volumes more to people and are by different cultures and international histories. Ancient and contemporary, there are the economic realities, infinite cross cultural slanders and attacks that all of us suffer from, or do we? Well perhaps not always those who deserve it the most. Beth and I both worked for America last year. Jobs that we both enjoyed vastly. We were both working with kids in the mountains of Colorado. The highest incorporated city in the U.S. and to my surprise, a very large Mexican American population. In reality, they represented the majority in that sleepy little mountain town. Many were third or fourth generation Americans. Some of them were the worst for hassling new arrivals about not speaking English. And I was constantly breaking up fights over this always justifying to get across how important it was to learn to communicate with people in any way you can. But it's just as easy to do something that would make them smile, as it is to make them frown. The fact remains that we live in a world where people die because they don't speak the right language or have the fashionable skin tone or eye color or any other difference that could be a potential threat. The only of these that can be helped by the 'other' is language and in many cases that requires immersion. Anyway back to the Krastany festival, the party Friday night went beautifully, except for the fact that a portion of the crew was unable to make it. They had been held back due to inspection needed to make the IFA legal. 20 k from the party they had a problem with the bolts on two of the four truck wheels. They finally arrived around noon. It was a calm day we all just played around doing the things we enjoyed and exploring our little post-apocalyptic playground. The sound was still set, and people kept spinning. By the evening we had a small group of revelers or actually several small groupings and had started a fire. Beth and I sat around the flames communicating and entertaining all these folx who spoke a completely different language but I believe we still made a couple of friends despite the language barrier by the time the sun rose at 4 or 5 in the morning.

The following day was Sunday and I was anxious to get back to Prague to find out if Fred Normal, Joe Mama and Andrea had made the scene. We got back in town at almost 11pm. Made the long hike from sly hove just in time to catch the internet cafe before closing only to find that Fred still hadn't left the states and Joe hadn't been able to pry himself from Amsterdam either. Several days past in Prague, not the best days either. Beth and I were bickering with each other constantly, repeatedly pushing at the insecurity buttons that we had discovered on one another over the past 2 and 1/2 yrs. Not the most pleasant time I've spent but it wasn't all terrible. We had many good times. We were just getting readjusted to this nomadic tribal thing after waving over a year of just being together and really getting comfortable with that situational. Now this was an entirely different group than we had traveled with in the past. Well mostly we had done a lot with x-tian, fan and Ritchie and Aaron also had gotten close to gauge and Jamie. But the French, Stephanie, Christ off, Jeremy, Emeric and Johan were completely new to us and we had the handicap of not knowing their native tongue although they were all pretty good with ours. There's a certain unfairness in this when all you can understand being said in their conversations among themselves. It's a bit of a paranoid trip at first, and we were at their mercy since the problems with the IFA. on Tuesday or Wednesday, Joe had made it to Prague and Fred had made it to Frankfurt and Andr'a was on her way back to Amsterdam after getting thrown off the train at the border for Czech for being a Canadian without a proper visa. As for the circus, all we really pulled off in Prague was a drunken show at the 1307 club on campus at Strahov, just a couple nights before we left for Budapest.

The IFA began having more problems just 20k outside of Prague so Aaron, Jamie, x-tian and gauge drove it back to the parking spot where the rest of us continued to Hungary. Kristoff drove all through the night I stayed awake writing until just past the Slovakian border. At about 6 am the bus stopped. Kristoff had stopped at a campground about 50k from Budapest, a beautiful spot covered by a green canopy of forest with a lake on the other side. We never ventured to the water. Their was a shack in the way with a guy who wanted money from us, but we just ignored him every time we say him and avoided him the rest. All pretty easy considering the fact that we were all asleep till about 2 or 3 in the afternoon. We pulled into the city at 5pm and got a hold of Attila and his crew they met us and showed us to a friend's house where we hung out smoked out and just had a good time, then they showed us the festival site where we could camp. The site was high above the city with a great view and meadows of wildflowers where Beth, myself, Joe and Ritchie all set up tents. The rain poured from the sky all weekend with only a few short false promises of good weather, which were all very short, lived. As the sun was setting the night of the party, we started a nice fire, the music was going, Joe Mama did some fire dance, I danced on stilts and the rain really came down. Luckily the hardcore Hungarian kids brought their raingear and danced all night under the tiny awning around the bus where the gear was sheltered. An exclusive party, but the kids had fun. The following day, we all went into town and checked the internet to see what was happening with the IFA crew and Fred and Andrea. It seemed as though the IFA was fucked and the crew discouraged about the situation. Fred and Andrea on the other hand were on their way by train from Amsterdam together at 2 am. Joe sent him a message saying to met us at the castle near the river at noon the next day, since we had no way to get down to pick them up. I don't know if you've ever seen Budapest but the river is lined with structures that look like castles but thanks to Attila we located them around 4 or 5 pm, went to his house to have a bowl and a beer, then to where we were meeting the bus. Then leaving just a couple hours later to make our way to Sophia, that night we made it halfway through Romania, stepping in a small town to sleep.

The following day we drove the remainder of the way to the border of Bulgaria and Romania. We had to take a ferry across so we all decided to camp there for the night. The border cats told us that we should go to the day camp ground down the road where we'd be safe from gypsies. We camped there anyhow. Beth and I inside our tent next to the bus, and Ritchie out in the open on his pad in between the bus and the van. I was rudely awakened in the morning to the sound of Ritchie being hassled by a cop for sleeping, when Ritchie peed on a tree. The cop took his passport. I spied all this non-sense from my tent door. The cop never bothered the two of us. Beth stayed asleep. I just lay at the top of the vinyl flap watching the early morning street scene. A couple gypsy men who looked kinda shifty were right at the corner doing some shady business. I watched for a while then was distracted by a strange sound to my left by the river and railroad tracks when I looked, I thought my eyes were deceiving me. Two of the tallest skinniest pigs I'd seen in my life. one seemed to stand almost 5 feet tall with teets that hung down a good 3 feet. An unnerving sight indeed. Then I spied the gypsy kids. There were two of them. one was about 7, the other was stumbling around steadying himself with a hand clamped on the older ones shorts cuff and couldn't have been more than 2 1/2. The older one stopped at the corner of the fence about 10 meters from the tent just past the rear end of the bus, noticing the dome and spying me at it's opening. I looked at them and smiled, them turning my head just a little bit to give them a full profile. I wiggled my hat back and forth then turned back to face them to see a huge smile creep upon the older kids face. The smaller one's head was still on a swivel as he still didn't realize that the older one had stopped or what he was looking at. I began an exchange of funny noises with the two that lasted about half an hour until Beth awoke to see what I was making so much noise about. Beth poked her head out and began engaging them as well.

Just before we had gone to sleep the previous evening we had been discussing gypsies and the kid of propaganda that still existed and the stereotypes that were still brought up upon any mentioning the name gypsy in Europe. In the states we don't know gypsies so we don't share these preconceptions. In fact, they are more romanticized. Quite a few people we've met in the states, having no negative connotations at all, have even called the circus modern day American gypsies. Hearing the European sentiment though did make me recall a term that was common at least in the mid-west while I was young. 'Gypped' this meant you'd been cheated or 'that's a gyp' meant you had been deceived. Terms brought from Europe no less that were carried by our grandparents and great grand parents. We brought Kristoff into the conversation to find out what his perspective was. As a French man he told us a few stories of his encounters with 'zigarous' the term he said was the proper term for these people,' only Americans say gypsy, none of his stories were too terrible or damning, just all ending on a bit of a sour note. His final statement being 'they have nothing to share with us and we have nothing to share with them!' I was a little bit worried by the time I fell asleep. Not to the point of sleeplessness but a little paranoia after hearing this statement from someone I trusted and respected. Stereotypes after all are based on some bit of fact although they can not be taken as universal truths and they are always the result of an outsiders perspective on a group and their behaviors without a complete grasp of they history and circumstance that leads to the instances in question. I began breaking down the tent as Beth played with the smaller child and the older one gave me a hand disconnecting the tent poles. I entered the bus to put up the tent bag and told Joe, Fred and Andrea to come out. That we had an audience. They brought out the flutes, accordion and juggling pins while Beth and I communicated with their dad and another guy both of about 19oir 20 with some jailhouse looking tattoos. Several others of all ages came over when the music and juggling began. When Kristoff hopped from the bus for his morning piss, he was greeted by the site of about 20 gypsies of all ages, all smiling and clapping, some playing with penny whistles, everyone engaged in the pure enjoyment of the moment. All Kristoff could do is smile and kinda shake his head. The one cop came back around and told us we had to leave. Kristoff had some words with him. He wanted a bribe to give Ritchie his passport back. He didn't get any money, yet Kristoff got his passport back for him. We pulled back to the border ferry stop only to be extorted for more money by the officials working there and waiting for about 3 hours for a ferry across to Bulgaria. In the meantime, we did clown juggling shows for the gypsy women and children on the other side of the fifteen-foot metal fence till even more cops began harassing us for associating with the kids and saying that they all have lice. This was just before our boat arrived and we departed from the shore of Romania where the gypsies are just people and the cops are a bunch of thieves.

Just inside Bulgaria, we stopped at a nice shady spot along the river where I made lunch for everyone and the rest of the folx played around. Kristoff did some carpentry on the inside of the bus. Then we headed onward all the way to a town named Montana to stop and get some money from an ATM. This is where Emerick's vehicle crapped out, turned out to be just the alternator so they took it out, but this meant that we could no-longer travel at night. Since it was getting dark already we decided to stay the night next to a gas station and leave in the morning. Joe and Fred went for a walk only to return 10 minutes later with a guy about my age and close to 20 kids trailing behind them. 'wanna do a circus show?' asked Fred. There really seemed to be no choice. I put my stilts on at the bus then walked across the busy street with Beth behind a cafe to a playground in between communist block style projects. There were only a hundred kids watching Fred when we walked up. They swarmed at my feet. We played and the kids were in a frenzy by the end of our performances. It seemed as though the number of kids had doubled or even tripled. It was hard to move and the kids followed us back to the bus, barely giving us breathing room. I had paranoid flashbacks to a scene from children of the corn, but me made it out of there alive. The kids were just awe-stricken, and so were we. We'd never seen such a reaction before. Afterwards we hung out drinking with the guy who had supplied us with our initial audience. Then he, his wife and their friends (all native Bulgarians) took us all to a nite club where we all drank and danced till the sun came up. Sophia is a very industrialized city in southern Bulgaria amidst mountains. The smoke stacks and cooling towers rise up from the capital of this eastern European backdrop. The big bang club is a little oasis hidden inside a maze of where houses and production facilities. Our teknival lasted for 3 nights with a circus show each night and loads of innovative dj's and live sets. Close to 400 kids came to party that weekend and us, the phreakphorce were styled out for our entire stay with all we could want in the shape of food, clothes, put, hash, beer and lodging. It was a nice time in which we met some really awesome folx; taught some fun skills and even had them displayed in the circus show. There was something not quite right going on, though. It's hard to say exactly what, some kind of deceptive presentation. It certainly didn't ruin this beautiful space but rather caused a bit of confusion, making it a little hard to say what is what. This is where we met Marionne though and that in itself is a wonderful thing for anyplace to have going for it. He is a man who is quite skilled at playing by his own rules no matter what tyranny may lurk around him, he was our cook and our herb provider during our stay and though he spoke very little English we almost always understood exactly what he was trying to get across to us. He had two beautiful children who we all took turns playing games with for many hours of our stay. His wife and the mother of his children was named Yana. She spoke even less English than he yet conveyed as much in her demeanor and facial expression as anyone could ever hope to.

The Monday following the festival we spent a day in the city. Marionne took us to the beer festival in a large park at the center of town. Fred and myself brought along some circus gear just to see if there was any luck busking in this city. We played around for several hours without any luck. Our audience consisted largely of nazi skin-heads between the ages of 10 and 16, all running around the park drinking beer, smoking cigarettes and wearing white power t-shirts. I never could have imagined such a scene had I not been in the middle of it on stilts. It seemed utterly ridiculous that all we could do is make them smile and laugh, try to remind them that they were still kids with the ability to be amazed and to do amazing things. The best part of Sophia though was the fact that the members of SPAZ that had to stay in Prague with the IFA were able to make it down on Saturday night to surprise us. They had rented a car in Prague and would be able to finish the tour with the rest of us and that was good to know considering this was our most hectic portion of the tour. 9 shows in just over two weeks thanks to Nikolai our Bulgarian organizer. So the final 7 would be made with our full accompaniment giving us all a certain sense of wholeness We left Sofia in the afternoon, relying on the directions of Nikolai, who'd been drinking vodka since the morn. Eventually we found our way out of the city and pointed the vehicles toward Varna, through green mountains.

We stopped about 250k from our destination at a rest area next to a little roadside cafe. After eating the entire food supply at the cafe we all went to sleep. About ten of us slept in the field next to the parking spot. I was greeted in the morning to the sound of an old woman laughing and talking to her goats in Bulgarian. I smiled and waved to her. From the cafe I could hear dance music. A blond waitress danced on the front steps in the early morning sun. Balchik was the site where Nikki had arranged our festival for the weekend. When we arrived his friend were still there cleaning up the outdoor amphitheatre which was the intended spot inside this huge old communist era resort along the black sea. Now most of the structures were dilapidated giving the impression of some ancient ruins. When in fact it was merely 12 years ago that this place was the happening holiday spot for party members in good standing. Now there were a few Russians visiting with their families and the remainder of the place was being squatted by the phreakphorce. Beth and I stayed in our tent but everyone else took their own villas. once again we had a perfect spot but not necessarily the best weather and although we had thousands of high quality flyers and posters, there was something important lacking in getting the word out because the only people to come to the festival were people we had met in Sofia, some of Nikolai's friends and the people who worked for the restaurant at the resort. So there was all this effort put forth for this tiny group of people but somehow it was really worth it. Those people got something out of it that they really needed and were so grateful that it outweighed the numbers and besides we got a holiday in a wonderful seaside resort so any complaints are really irrelevant. Also our friends nada and Angelique were able to join us here after a long journey from the states, and tadpole from the French crew had just gotten back from a trip to Paris.

Varna was just not nearly so nice for accommodations, a tourist city without a lot of open spaces. Nikolai found us a place to camp the first night, which was right outside the gate of a military base and next to a small half pipe. The following day was a show at the summer theatre in the middle of the downtown park. The space was spectacular, a real stage with lights. A very proper theatre indeed. This was supposed to be an official arts council performance that we were doing here. I'm not sure what they were expecting exactly but it obviously wasn't us. We did put on a very tight show though, working circus in conjunction with the djs and musicians on stage. only there was the same problem with logistics. Our audience was about 30 people. The beaurocrats were hoping for a larger crowd and we scared the shit out of them with our fire performances. Then we brought the audience up onto the stage to dance and this was the final straw. They shut us down and made everyone leave an entire hour before it was supposed to end. When all was over and done we all felt pretty good about it. one big problem however, no one could find the keys to the rental car, creating the feeling of doom for the IFA crew.

The following day there wasn't a show planned. It was a day off for everyone but the key-less who had their work cut out for them. The rest of us handed out flyers and put up posters for a Friday night show under the Bungee jumping bridge. Roger made a wonderful debut appearance in his first EOW circus show. Over the Greek mountain passes we go dwelling upon the morose subject of humanity at least until bad brains magically sprang forth through the speakers. A song that has summed it up for me: 'I and I survive', it really takes some understanding of our insignificance and the paltry sum of our sorrows and injustices to soberly account the evolution of our species. We will always have obstacles to overcome and half the time they will be placed there by none other than ourselves, or at least something inside all of us that lies dormant. (We thing, well we usually think it doesn't reside in us at all) till seen in the mirror of our peers. Then the initial outrage should lead to some serious introspection where we can finally face this true culprit. That sneaky little insecurity that's been sabotaging our relations with our fellows for at least thousands and perhaps millions of years. The catalyst for many an outrageous act of cruelty and petty maliciousness. 'I and I survive' seems sometimes that this will always be the set back but the only real solution seems to be an honest recognition and a refusal to act in this manner. At least for the moment we could resist adding more suffering to the world. There is no scarcity, only a tyranny that attempts to make it look that way. And it finally has come to terms with it's own obsolescence. 'I and I survive.' Let them think you're ridiculous. And know that you're serious.....

slim chance '01