When you go to a country with a weak currency you should never change your dollars, euros, yens etc. at home. You should do the exchange on the spot. It is because countries with soft currencies are more eager to trade their shitty money than hard currency countries. As the risk is much higher for let's say a German bank to hold Turkish lira which devalue almost on a daily base than for Turkish banks to stock euros and liras. Liras are reprinted in Turkey not in Germany.

In the past especially Eastern bloc countries had a flourishing black market to exchange currencies. When you made a trip to Czechoslovakia, you had at least three different rates for German marks. The German one, the official Czech one and the Czech street rate. To make things more complicated there were several black market rates. When you tried to exchange your German marks on the street the dealers always used the same trick. As an example the rate was 15 Czech crowns to one German mark. So you gave two hundred marks and the guy gave you a wad of Czech banknotes. You counted them and it turned out that hundred crowns were missing. So you gave the packet back to your seller. And he added the missing banknote while removing five to ten of the hundred crown notes below without you noticing it. Who would ever go through a pile again to recount it?

An acquaintance of mine watched this procedure for a couple of times. One day he met someone who offered him 21 crowns for one mark. He accepted to exchange two hundred marks. When he counted the money there were only 40 hundred crown banknotes. He said to the dealer: Ok, everything is fine. Who wasn't happy of course and started shouting and threatened to inform the police. Which just raised a smile on the face of my acquaintance. He left and never succeeded to spend all his cheaply obtained money. There simply was nothing useful to buy for it except bread, toilet paper and beer.

P.S. I am not sure if the amounts, exchange rates or even the country is correct but I think you can get the gist anyway.

Live at the 400 Bar in Minneapolis: Cat Power 1999 (6 songs) and the Dirty Three 1999 or 2000 (3 tracks plus one introduction by Warren Ellis). Download rather slow. Link credit: largehearted boy

The first time I listened to Nick Drake was after Christmas 1979. Fruit Tree, the three record box set of all his three albums had been on my wishlist. It was difficult to get hold of. My mother had to order it. It probably arrived early January 1980. I don't remember what I felt when I heard Time Has Told Me, the first song on Nick's first record Five Leaves Left. I was 16 and stood six foot three at the time. The exact height of Nick Drake. He was the hero of my late youth. I never met anybody (up till 1990 or something) who knew his music and I only shared it with my best friend. Nick's music was a part of me. There were times when I thought he sang about me. About my inability to connect to life, to find a girl-friend. He was my friend in spirit though he had been dead for five years already. He was me. And still is.

I just heard a cover of Day Is Done by Norah Jones (see last post). And thought she should have been forbidden to cover him. God was her version shallow. Additionally she probably sold more with this one song than Nick did with all his records in his lifetime. Fck her. Nick Drake in my world is the most difficult musician to cover. I only heard a cover of his once before. It was Joey Burns from Calexico doing Clothes of Sand. It is a very nice rendition of the song though I must admit that this song is not on Fruit Tree, I guess it is on the compilation of rarities called Time of No Reply which I only have on tape (got it later) and didn't listen to very often. I never ever want to hear a cover of any song of any of the three original Nick Drake studio albums in my life again. I want to keep him in my heart like when I was 16. In January 1980.

Nick Drake Special on BBC2, narrated by Brad Pitt (!). (via said the gramophone)

Reading this article on the mysterious Berg "beheading" video at the Asia Times Online I have come to the conclusion that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is most likely dead. The US administration (via their intelligence) tries to blame almost every recent terrorist attack on him. The Berg "butchering", the bombs in Madrid etc. They try to hide the fact that they have no idea who directed these acts of terrorism. Like they had no clues about WMDs. It's better to build one man up as the über terrorist than to admit that one has no idea whatsoever who is behind the terror. Somebody who is already dead is much better to blame as he can't defend himself anymore and will never be arrested. He is the perfect Satan. The war on terrorism can go on forever if the people it is hunting are already dead. And that's all the Bush administration is aiming for.

Further reading: kuro5hin discussion on the video.

P.S. I am not yet there to believe in conspiracy. But conspiracy is more likely than the authentic beheading of Nick Berg. Which is maybe not such a bad thing. Supposing the US citizens get rid of the Bush gang(sters) in November.

P.P.S. Why did Bushco chose al-Zarqawi as the new leading terrorist? Bin Laden was too ill and looked too weak on his last videos. What's the point of hunting an old dying man everyone has pity with? Therefore they had to fabricate a new young and dynamic successor.

Fennesz Venice is like Wagner for the 21st century. Wafting like the fog on a lake in the alps in autumn. You can't see the hands in front of your eyes. To appreciate this music you should have emptied your mind completely. It's so heavy.

The weblog digest kinja seems to have fallen prey to its own success. It does not show recent posts anymore. Probably too many weblogs in the database. We had this before with freshblogs and others. As I like to practice the myth of Sisyphos I moved copied all blogs from kinja back into blo.gs and there they are on your right hand side in the blogroll (scroll down). Right now 34 excellent blogs (most of them on music) have been updated in the last 24 hours. 21 of them in English, 13 in German. Just go there for some fresh blogging.

[Listening to: Swell - Bastards & Rarities ...Well?]

P.S. Kinja works again. But who knows for how long? Better not to put all one's eggs in one basket.