Without a Traceroute

So of the three free internet terminals at the hostel, one of them has never worked (the screen is just dark), and the other one has been frozen all day (based on the error message displayed, it’s actually running eLux NG). Yes Virginia, Linux can freeze. Although, based on the errors it looks like what actually happened was bad javascript killed Firefox 2 (update, people!). The mouse still responds, so X seems to be working. For all I know, Linux is actually humming away fine in the background, but the system is locked in a terminal mode, and none of the system interrupt keys (ctrl+alt+del, ctrl+alt+bkspace to restart X) are available. We’ve asked the hostel clerks to reboot the box, but they “don’t know where the computer is”, although it seems to me like it’d be a simple matter to follow the cables into back room, but whatever.

The terminals are connected to a wifi network which is locked (WPA encryption), and “not ready” for guests to use until October, so they won’t give us the key, which is very strange. BUT, there are wired ethernet jacks underneath each terminal. I’m assuming there used to be computers connected with ethernet here, but the jacks are still live so I pushed the keyboard and mouse from the non-functional terminal out of the way and set up my laptop. Since setting up here, I’ve loaned my laptop to like 5 different people to check their email or banking stuff.

Also, I am apparently the only person in the world who carries an ethernet cable along with my wireless-capable laptop. Maybe it’s just because I’m kind of a geek, but that seems very strange to me. There are still plenty of places where there’s no wireless, and carrying a patch cable just seems like carrying the power cord  to me.

But about 3 people have seen me with the laptop and been like, “Oh, is there wifi?” and I go, “No, but you can plug in right here.” and they’re like, “Oh, I don’t have a cable.”

Anyway, this XKCD is incredibly resonant.

I found a ride back to the Netherlands on this ridesharing website. I went and met the guy, he seems like a pretty nice, somewhat crusty, laid-back Italian guy. He also has a drop-dead gorgeous Spanish girlfriend, who won’t be accompanying us on the trip and an excitable black Labrador that will. He said he’s a Dutch citizen and he’s going up to Holland for a week or so to take care of unspecified paperwork. At the moment I’m just trying to do some laundry and take a shower. We’re leaving at 2 am this morning (this is not nearly as sketchy as it sounds, I promise).

Oh, also, this hostel has free internet terminals that run Linux, which is pretty sweet. I haven’t been able to figure out which distro, but the window manager looks like maybe a modified blackbox.

There was a big protest march in Barcelona yesterday. They passed down Las Ramblas which is the biggest tourist drag in town. There were quite a few demonstrators. The ones in the front of the march seemed very militant. They were shouting slogans and throwing flash-bang fireworks (you can see the smoke from one in the first phot below), but the march seemed orderly and not violent. There were some demonstrators wearing masks and sunglasses who were tagging buildings along the street with spraypaint. The police were following the march in vans but weren’t interfering, even to stop the vandalism. By later that night, almost all the grafitti had been cleaned off.

As near as I can make out from talking to a few of the protesters and searching online, Amadeu Casellas is an anarchist who robbed banks in the 70s and 80s in order to finance labor demonstrations. He was sent to prison and has been there for 22 years. Some of the sites claim that 20 years is the maximum allowed sentence for his crime. In any case, Casellas has apparently been on a hunger strike for the last 70 days and this demonstration was in support of him/his freedom.

On the one hand, a convicted bank robber seems like a lousy choice to rally around. On the other hand, 70 days is a freaking long time to be on a hunger strike. I’d be curious to learn more about the situation, but all the information online seems to be pro-Casellas propaganda, so it’s hard to know what’s really the truth.