The Secret Streets

*

The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my
soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my
good behavior. What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?

This ... government — what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instant losing some of its integrity? It has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend it to his will. It is a sort of wooden gun to the people themselves. But it is not the less necessary for this; for the people must have some complicated machinery or other, and hear its din, to satisfy that idea of government which they have. Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed on, even impose on themselves, for their own advantage. It is excellent, we must all allow. Yet this government never of itself furthered any enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way. It does not keep the country free. It does not settle the West. It does not educate. The character inherent in the ... people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. For government is an expedient by which men would fain succeed in letting one another alone; and, as has been said, when it is most expedient, the governed are most let alone by it.

Henry Thoreau

He wrote, movingly, profoundly, catching the multiple strings of the argument, a piece about trace memory, the struggle to survive in remote places, the voices that came down to him from the past. He was shattered and in awe of what was happening. The lyrical phrases pounded in one after the other. Then he pressed a button, went to publish, and asthe entire trace memory spiel disappeared; as if it, too, wanted to vanish into the ether, to show off the shallow nature of time, the way nothing would stick. Even that half hour he had spent writing it could never be retrieved. The words could never be rediscovered. Whatever was happening to him had a higher purpose; that he had always felt. Hence, of course, the great disappointment with the grinding present.

His life had been a preparation for something else. That was why it had all seemed so damned profound. Caught in sockets, flashed about in caves. That was why he could hear the ancestors; hear them in his blood and in his dreams. They were coming for him; but not yet, not yet. The human life span was so tiny and its concerns so insignificant it was natural to hope for more. Six billion stories and rising goes the tagline on SBS, a flickering screen in a derelict building, an alcoholic resident. He looked at the man, his friend of recent months, and thought: how did you get here? All the blokes warned him against Bridgette. He was shocked by the passing days. Shocked by the shallowness of his concerns, the predictability of his children, the queitness of the present; the roaming conversations.

Which is why he thought of red light districts; his habit of always seeking them out in strange cities; and of one of the most bizarre of them all, the red light district in Istanbul. First he had gone alone, then with his friend; finally an American sociologist asked if she could come along, but was blocked from entry by police at the gate. No women allowed. And then suddenly the path was cleared. They could enter. They passed through the gates, past the police, leaving the feminnist academic in their wake; he glanced back to see her still arguing with the security guard and smirked. There were still advantages to being male; entres into secret societies. And he looked once more on the strange scene before him. And smiled again.

There was a network of streets; each house a brothel. Outside each one a crowd of a hundred or more men had gathered. There was a liquid tension in the air, a certain smell, men on heat, a murmuring in the crowd. Every now and then a man would go forward and the crowd burst into applause. The women were of varying degrees of beauty. He had written this before. They were of varying degrees of beauty and varying prices. The crowds were thicker at the cheaper end. Down one alley, with the prices higher, the crowds thinned. He saw a slim, barely touched girl from the provinces and caught the look in her sad eyes. Your life not mine; and a spark of understanding passed between them. She was looking for a client. He was just another stranger in the crowd; but he was European, a tourist, would have more money, would treat her better. She smiled bravely; it was meant to be enticing.

But these liquid moments were rare; fancy going where so many had gone before. He returned to the more crowded sectors; his friend, sometime boyfriend, in tow. The cheaper women were fat, the rolls of their flesh billowing out of their garish outfits. He was shocked, decimated, by everything that had happened; love gone wrong, adventure gone wrong. These things were nothing to be frightened of. He couldn't be that bold. He couldn't lose everything all over again. He coldn't be that shattered again, ineffectual love, never enough money. He didn't want to be dependent on someone else; he wanted to make sure everything would work. He wanted to be certain everything was in place.

The crowd of muslim men pushed forward; as if getting closer to the forbidden could change their life; or at least relieve their tension. He knew how brief and unsatisfying the event they were paying for really was. In seconds it was over, after all the buildup. And strangers continued to bless him. Shapes continued to shift. Trace memories continued to haunt him. Momentarily diverted, nothing would ever be the same again. Not used to being told no, the woman academic had argued long past anything that was reasonable. They had bid their farewells, after arranging to meet at the same restaurant the following night; at the line of fish restaurants underneath the bridge. To see once again the Hagia Sophia; to be entranced by the oldest domed building in the world. And he glanced once more at the thrusting crowd; he could feel them, their urgency, the unlovely nature of men en masse. And he prayed for their souls to be released from the desperation of the flesh; as he sidestepped quickly into another realm, secrets in the winding alleys, beauty in despair.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/04/30/2556555.htm?section=justin

US President Barack Obama has called Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to express his thanks for the extra Australian troops being sent to Afghanistan.

Mr Obama says he personally thanked Mr Rudd for what he is describing as a substantial troop contribution.

The President says the 450 additional Australian soldiers will help enhance the training of Afghan security forces, support the approaching presidential election and bolster efforts to build and strengthen civilian institutions.

Mr Obama says greater commitments from countries like Australia are critical if Al Qaeda and the Taliban are to be defeated in Afghanistan.

But a leading defence expert says the decision to boost Australia's troop numbers is just a show of support for the US government.

Professor Hugh White told ABC 1's Lateline program that the increase is a symbolic gesture.

"I don't think it counts for much. I think the chances of this making any real difference to the situation there are low," he said.

"I think really it's best to look at it as a political strategy by the Prime Minister to address the very deep problem he has over supporting the US rather than a serious attempt to change the facts on the ground."




http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5juui7didNwh_vzBmJyrbjxkeF-IgD97SB1I80


ARNOLD, Mo. (AP) — Marking his symbolic 100th day in office, President Barack Obama told Midwesterners Wednesday: "I'm pleased with the progress we've made but I'm not satisfied." "I'm confident in the future but I'm not content with the present," the president told a town-hall style event in a St. Louis suburb.

Later, the president planned to head back to Washington to send that same message to the rest of the country at a prime time news conference.

Even as his administration sought to minimize the symbolism of the 100-day marker, the White House staged these two high-profile, high-visibility events to promote Obama's accomplishments while pressing his big-ticket agenda.

In office just three months, the Democrat enters the next phase of his new presidency with a high job approval rating and a certain amount of political capital from his history-making election last fall. But he also faces a thicket of challenges as he seeks to move ahead on multiple fronts both foreign and domestic amid recession and war. He will need continued public support to accomplish his lofty goals.

Thus, Obama used the anniversary — some aides derided it as a "Hallmark holiday" — to travel to Missouri to press his case.

"We have begun to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off, and we've begun the work of remaking America," Obama proclaimed. But he acknowledged, "We've got a lot of work to do because on our first day in office, we found challenges of unprecedented size and scope."

He defended his ambitious, costly plan, saying: "These challenges could not be met with half measures. They couldn't be met with the same, old formulas. They couldn't be confronted in isolation. They demanded action that was bold and sustained."

And, Obama countered critics who said he's taking on too much, as he works to turn around the recession while revamping energy, education and health care in the United States.

"The changes that we've made are the changes we promised," Obama said. "We're doing what we said we'd do."



http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25406815-5013871,00.html

TWO boats carrying almost 80 suspected asylum seekers have been intercepted by Border Protection Command, bringing to 17 the number of vessels detected since August.

The interceptions occurred less than 24 hours after the mysterious discovery by Customs of four suspected asylum seekers on Deliverance Island, 30 nautical miles off the coast of Papua New Guinea.

As more of the injured from the fatal boat explosion of two weeks ago left hospital - for immigration detention - Afghanistan's ambassador to Australia backed the Rudd Government's argument that global instability was behind the surge in arrivals.

One of the boats stopped yesterday was carrying seven people and was intercepted one nautical mile north of Ashmore Reef.

Sources said the passengers, who included at least one child, appeared to be Indonesian. The second boat was carrying about 72 people and was stopped 27 nautical miles west of Bathurst Island, just north of Darwin.

Several women and three or four children were believed to be aboard.

The interceptions occurred hundreds of kilometres apart, suggesting the boats were not travelling together.

They came less than a day after four people, understood to be two Afghans, a Sri Lankan and an Indian, were detected by a surveillance flight by a Customs helicopter.

No boat was found with the men.

Yesterday, a government source speculated the find could be a new trend, with people-smugglers preferring to drop their cargo and go home rather than stay with their passengers and risk arrest and prosecution.

Afghanistan's ambassador, Amanullah Jayhoon, told The Australian yesterday a recent crackdown by Pakistani and Iranian authorities on Afghan refugees was a major factor behind the spike in boat arrivals.