"The Bethel Church in The Hague started its nonstop service on Oct. 26 to protect an Armenian immigrant family from deportation, under a Dutch law that forbids police from disrupting a church service to make an arrest."
And they saved them.
"Under an obscure Dutch law, police may not disrupt a church service to make an arrest. And so for the past six weeks, immigration officials have been unable to enter Bethel Church to seize the five members of the Tamrazyan family, Armenian refugees who fled to the sanctuary to escape a deportation order.
"The service, which began in late October as a little-noticed, last-gasp measure by a small group of local ministers, is now a national movement, attracting clergy members and congregants from villages and cities across the Netherlands. More than 550 pastors from about 20 denominations have rotated through Bethel Church, a non-stop service all in the name of protecting one vulnerable family."
For six weeks, they ran a continuous service, in The Hague, with priests from Europe.
I'm not sure why I, as an atheist, I was so deeply moved by this act of religious heroism, but there you are.
On to other things.
I'd been in 'store support' (as a cashier, baker, closer, seafood,) for an organic grocery store, moving 700 lb racks of shopping carts around the 4 floors parking garage, lots and lots of cashiering, which is kinna fun,) bakery (a bit more drama, lots of waste), seafood (wild; fun guys, doing more of this, which ended up not working out so well when they threw me upstairs into a boring job and gave me idle hands to make the devil's work, politically,) and Prepared Foods - 4 big hot/cold salad bar tables, a sushi bar, pizzeria, sandwicherie, and burrito bar, where I oft worked at the 'chef case' slicing all the deli meats and cheeses, and at making sandwiches, which is awesome and the realization of a dream. I was born to run a deli slicer. I am went through a lot of departments fast, and doing a lot of closings (cleaning up as the night crews come in to bake, stock and prep, which cleaning is rigorous.)
I learned a lot about sanitation.
The work was very physical: lifting 50 lb. bags of bread and 50 lb. trays of iced fish, pushing around racks of heavy shopping carts to cycle them back downstairs sweating my balls off in the heat, I was in so much better shape after 8 weeks its not even funny.
I was a real desk marshmallow in March - started around the 25th - and I'd been on my feet putting in 10-20,000 steps a day, much of it lifting, twisting, pulling and pushing.
8.5 hour shifts, with the only sitting being some of a 30 min lunch at 4 hrs, and 2x15 min breaks after 2 hrs, I'm no longer physically 65 years old, hobbling around like an old man... one of the reasons I took that job. And I worked with people that are, mostly, happy - no, really - and I learned lots of how a huge, complex, un-named grocery store machine works. I, too, was happy, though I took a 90% pay cut for the job, and lived in the ghetto. My lower back wasn't always delighted, and my feet were improving but had been in a lot of pain.
There were a multiplicity of hypocrisies, though: a management structure that is top-heavy and over-controlling, a fearful set of team leaders under them, a wasteful set of policies based on simplistic reactions to employee behavior, a company that had designed its own and our "organic" policies and certifications, plastic gloves, plastic gloves, plastic gloves. Why not have a separate even internal recycling program for them? Oh, dear, don't put things in writing, god forbid we'd be able to gloss over the nuances of a face-to-face conversation in management's favor.
The irony of 'organics': If you take an organic loaf and cut it on a non-organic bread slicer, it ain't organic any more. If you put an organic crown of broccoli and someone picks it up, gets to the regular broccoli, and put it back among the regular stuff, it's not organic any more. If the opposite happens, the pile of organic is no longer organic. Just the handling negates a lot of the standards. It is all a bit silly.
On a separate track, the sound list for an 8 hour shift repeats every 2-3 hours and is insufferable to the point of making one suicidal, which due to the sunlight is actually very difficult here.
The grocery life was not for me.
I left.
A Store Team Leader with ...fantastically terrible taste in tattoos and clothing didn't "want to be an art critic," but, was apparently fine with being a raging hypocrite regarding my Instagram, my age, and several other topics.
I miss having a studio to set up lights, a 12x12 or larger room, even a living room, where I can shoot. This might be forcing me to get out and photograph people in their natural environments more... something is happening there, my inner photographer has not exactly gone quiet, but is hibernating, or meditating, or thinking and giving me occasional flashes of what I want to see.
Shooting live requires me to be much more attentive. I'm often shooting bands indoors in low light - and really, having given it lots of time and thought, I don't like shooting in low light. Shooting 5 people at once is pretty challenging, too - five times more or less retouching, too.
Apparently, Oahu translates as "Land of Tiny Sharp Volcanic Rocks in Your Sandals," or, "Land of Beautiful Sunsets." Some other observations: I'm often the only white guy on the bus, which has been interesting and educational.
I now work for a bunch of bar owners, bartenders, and musicians, whom are a happily sketchy crew. It is often hot here, but not so hot as New York City, nor does it smell so bad. Every day is beautiful, and the evening light is an amazing soft warm set of shades and blue yellow and orange. There are an inordinate amount of rainbows, if you are in the right place.
In Hawaii, the soil is a red, rusty orange. There are many shades of green. The Poké is varied and delicious. I'm reluctant to say "Aloha!" and "Mahalo..." Kids have shouted at me that I'm a Haole.
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| Maguro Brothers Spicy Ahi Poké in the Kekaulike Market |
While major bands don't come here much, there's a great bar-band scene. Pictures of rocks, which others call "Landscapes," come out great, if only I was really into them. I do a couple of personal/pro Instagrams. There are things about @#&_)*@# roosters, barky little dogs at 3 AM, digestion troubles, rice, rent, and weird time slicing compared to being six hours after the world in Hawaii vs. six hours in front of it in Amsterdam that I'll go into next time.
Like most residents, I'll need to have secondary work to survive and make rent and not have a Safeway ramen-package diet, rather than the amazing and We-Aren't-In-New York-Any-More-Toto Dim Sum:
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| Pork Tofu Skin |
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| Bitter Melon |
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| Spicy Shu Mai |
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| Fat Shu Mai |
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| Fat Har Gow |
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| Steamed Pork Dumpling |
