Friends in Redwood City

we decided not to write every day, but wow, so much is happening that I forget what we did yesterday already. It isnt really that we did so much but everything is laced with interesting conversations and new insights about how the Empire, as the USA is sometimes refered to, works, about nuclear weapons, resistance, poverty, the Catholic Worker and everything in between.
On thursday we started out by cleaning the street opposite the main house. It wasnt done in a long time because there are always parked cars in the way and the sweeping machines can`t reach. We filled a large container full of leaves and dirt.

Then we went to a large facility of Lockhead Martin where they built all kinds of military stuff, including Trident missilles that are, amongst other places, used in Faslane, Scotland on the nucleair submarines there.
The CW has vigils there regulairy but this one was specially organized because we where there. It is done together with Workers from the San Jose CW. So we got to meet them too wich was really nice. One of them, Andrew, will be coming to Büchel!
We walked around the factories to three different gates and on the way back were stopped by a security man who explained that we should not cross the blue `US Government property`lines or we would be arrested and that he was concerened about our safety, to wich Susan C. replied that concern for safety was the exact reason why we were there too.

The next day we planned to join the CWers as they hand out food and all kinds of other things to whomever needs it. Susan C. said it was her favourite day because of all the happy faces of people leaving with full bags of produce. The amount of donations they get every week is amazing, a truck full of fruit and vegetablesbut this week also lots of coffemakers and soaps from a hotel and duvets and meat and all kinds of stuff. Larry is very good at connecting people who have things to people who dont. But! Although Chris joined for a bit and helped with picking up food, Larry quickly decided he could do the rest of the day by himself (with the help of many volunteers) and Susan C. could take us out to see the giant Redwoodtrees in the Great Basin park. We thought we didnt have time to go see them, so it was a big surprise.

The trees, sometimes 1800 years old where indeed big, no huge! The conversations in the car and while hiking with Susan C. where even better. One thing we talked about was a letter Susan C. got from the German police when she was in Hamburg earlier this year for the trial of Gerd. Gerd had entered Büchel airforce base together with Susan c. and others, but he was the only one who had to go to court (we suspect the Germans dont want the added publicity of North Americans being on their base so they choose not to persecute them). The letter said she was banned from going near the airforcebase on this trip, even though she didnt plan to go there, she wanted to go to the trial. The letter came with a impossible to read map that was supposed to tell her where she could and couldnt go, but it is such a bad copy that nobody can see where exactly the boundaries are.
Some lawyers present at the trial told Susan C. they could fight this court decision of the ban but they botched it up badly and Susan C. (once again?) swore to never use lawyers again.
In the evening we were taken out to dinner by Larry (again!).
All our time here we tried to pay for things but Susan C. and Larry would have nothing of that. They were such kingd hosts and truly dont seem to care about money or stuff. I have learned a lot from them and wish I were better at writting down all the things we talked about. Our next stop will be Saint Francis House in Columbia, Missouri where Steve Jacobs lives who we met earlier at one of the European CW gatherings. More about that next time!