Sobibor

John Demjanjuk will stand trial in what is being described as probably the last Nazi war crimes trial to be held in Germany.

Personally, I am of two minds. The atrocities committed by Nazi Germany against its population, especially its Jewish population are well documented and should not ever be forgotten. There have been a number of trial over the years in an attempt to bring closure and justice, and I understand that.

On the other hand, Mr. Demjanjuk is 90 years old and while there is no statue of limitations on murder, much less genocide, I cannot help but wonder what will be achieved. From the position of incontrovertible proof, the government is going to have to come up with hard evidence. Documentation, photographs, hand written evidence, and it is going to have to be cross referenced and double checked because that is about all that is left that is credible. Any eye-witnesses that might still be alive will be either equally as old or have been almost too young to remember what happened that long ago and are still not young themselves.

I am neither Jewish, nor of Jewish or German decent. So I would like to think I can look at this as an objective observer. The BBC was interviewing a man who is going to Germany for the trial because he lost some 40 members of his family. Clearly, he suffered a great loss. But if Mr. Demjanjuk is guilty, what sentence could the German court impose that karma has not already imposed upon him. If he is guilty, he has had to live all this time with the memory of knowing he was guilty. In all reality, what is there left to achieve?

National Novel Writing Month, Day 22

I am not sure what the definition of frustration is, but I have a couple of ideas. It is either not being able to get started when you have write, not being able to write a great deal, despite coving several pages in dialogue or having your word counter tell you that you have passed the magical 50,000 word mark, only to have the official word counting program tell you that you are still 1,000 words short of the mark and then have to write another 1,000.

Well, yesterday, I pushed past the magic 50,000 word mark, according to my word counter, but the official word counter still had me at 49,000. Today, I pushed past 51,000, 51,800 to be specific, and the official word counter agrees with me, although it thinks I am at 50,891. The crux of the argument, I have passed the magical 50,000 word mark, and a week ahead of schedule. And the really good news, is that I still have not finished the story.

So I will continue writing and come the end of the month, I will post my final total.

Of course, you can follow along on the official site.

National Novel Writing Month - Day 1 Report

Don't expect daily updates. If you want to know my progress, then check the site.

That being said, I wrote a little more than 2900 words at my first outing and I am trying to get a leg up on the count so that I can actually have a day or two of rest, or below average count if I should go dry at some point.

And so it begins!