Sunday, January 04, 2004

I want to put a website on here for you all to look at. It is for the The Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights. This organisation was established in 1990 by members of the Helsinki Committee in Poland. Today, we are a nationally and internationally known organization dealing with human rights education and public interest actions. We cooperate with the country's top lawyers, who advise members of parliamentary committees as representatives of HFHR. We also prepare expert opinions used by prosecutor's offices and courts.
You can find the English version of their page at
http://www.hfhrpol.waw.pl/en/index.htm
And, now here is today’s essay-

I have been getting some mail about this and as I have heard some repeated questions, I though I would take a moment and respond to those questions publicly. I have two today.
The first, and I have gotten this in person as well many times is: Why am I still living in Belarus.
Well, the easiest thing that I could say is that i am living with my fiancée here, she has a son and a family, and these people are not for all intents and purposes, my family. We eat together, I sleep with Tatyana, and for the most part, these are the sorts of things that inspire people to live their lives in the first place. Without such things as family or intimacy, people tend to become rather depressed or worse. Human comfort being pretty all that human beings want, don’t you know.
Of course, the next question is why I don’t simply bring them back to the states with me. Before I go into that answer, I would like to state that going to the United States for a foreigner is not the easiest thing to do. It takes a lot of paperwork, time and money, and this is not counting airfare. But before I stop there, I would like to point out to all of you that the United States is not home. Where I am sitting is home. And not only to them, but it was home to my grandmother and grandfather, and, insofar as my own situation is concerned, it pretty much is my home too. My only problem is I can’t make money here. But before you say to me that that is the reason I should go back to the states, let me point out again that the reason I can’t make money here is that Poland stole the investment money I was going to use to make the business I wanted here. Getting compensation for that crime is what this site is all about, and it is pretty much what I have been doing for the last 20 months or so. Going back to the states right now is an enormously depressing thought because I do not have anything even resembling a situation to go back to. In the states right now I would have to work from scratch, alone, and without any of those sorts of comfort I was looking for when I started all of this. And of course, I would need to be working, out of shape, at age forty, completely broke AND with the stigma of all of this following me around like a lost puppy with the mange. See what I mean?
The last question I will try to answer is: Why don’t I sue?
I would love to. I want $5,000,000 in compensation for what these putrid, lying slugs did to me. I want enough money to restore my face. I want enough money to make all of the things I wanted to do possible for the people who have stood with me and suffered this abuse along with me from the beginning. When all of this started, I had managed to be completely debt free in my life. I had some cash, I had the stuff to make a business with, and I had the health to do it, and more than that, I had the acceptance of the people living around me. Get it? I was a good guy. Now, I owe thousands in connection with having to have had to sit there while the Polaks played their stupid little games with me. Now, I have no way to pay back my creditors, the people who helped me or translated papers for me. And all of that face I built here, riding with the bike club, making plans that would put money into peoples hands, and even making cultural contributions for god’s sake is all crap now. I want enough money to restore my face to the place I spend years of my life getting it to. I was an honest man. I was a biker. I was a nice man. I cared about the world. I was independent and I wrote plays. Now, I am sitting here with nothing better to do than bitch about how loony it all is over the internet and having to look at the complete and utter wreckage that is now my life. And for what? For who? So a lowlife scumbag, thief of a traffic cop can go out and hurt people some more?
I would love to sue. But I can’t because YOU CAN’T GET A FAIR TRIAL IN POLAND. CAN YOU UNDERSTAND THIS ONCE AND FOR ALL? You read the book, right? See my point?
I had hoped that my own country would be gracious enough and interested enough in the situation to help a little. That of course is the point of all of this, right? Perhaps it will. Would be great. I am ready when you are. Let’s go.
Other than this, I would love to see and hear what kinds of things Poland would do to restore its face. I mean, they thought nothing of hanging me out to dry in public. Well let’s look at them for a while and see what they do. Let’s question their heart for a while. Or better, let’s both limit their ability to make money and make them explain themselves for about 20 months. How’s that for a good idea. That’s what they do. Right?