Originally posted on Twitter, regarding about a comment about whether Elon Musk is savage.
Imo, it is, in a sense, as in not caring.
Unless some conspiracy theroy is true, Ukraine is fighting a powerful aggressor alone. By alone I mean aside from some volunteers, it is mostly Ukrainians that bleed and die fending off Russia.
In a world where people travel for fun, how many has gone to Ukriane to fight the fight in which Ukriane unfortunately being the attacked due to its geographical location? (I'm convinced aggressors can always find reasons, however unreasonable they might be, to start aggressions.)
If there is unity among us human, is it appropriate to say it is the business of Ukraine and the others are helping like it is charity?
It is hard to say who are helping whom.
Any help should be appreciated and starlink is surely an enormous help. In terms of amount it is more than many people and organizations combined.
But it is the soldiers who are giving their all, putting their entire existences on the line.
Lastly, I found it reasonable enough for the Ukrainians to be furious when they are asked to back down and let referendums that won't make much sense to decide if they can get back their lands, when it is them suffering war crimes, their people dying and their home burning.
But life is not a fairytale I guess. I am not sure if I still believe there is any worthy cause.
P.S.
I forgot to mention Urkaine used to have (former Soviet) nuclear weapons. Asking Urkaine to compromise (unfairly) out of the fear of Russian nukes is kind of a mockery to Ukraine.
Asylum daily #13 & #14
Unlike the others entries. This one is more like a reminder. There are a lot of details that's hard to explain.
8 Oct, 2022
Three days ago, I went out and bought an electric kettle and a bottle. Apparently the electric kettle is not allowed into the Foreigners Registration Centre while knives almost as big as cleavers are allowed. Also, a guard said that there should be an electric kettle in the kitchen on each floor. I checked again several times after, nope, there isn't one. The guards said the kettle will stay with the social workers. I am not sure if there are differences between the terms social workers and volunteers here. I will just use social workers like they do.
I rarely go out because I have very little money which I planned, before I know that what happened in my homeland would repeat here, to save for the expense when I have work permit. I went out with just a shirt, I was asked if I didn't feel cold. I replied that I don't have many clothes and want to save my coat for colder days.
6 Oct, I asked to take the kettle back for refund. I was asked if I didn't feel cold again, and I gave the same response again. The social workers came with the kettle and offered to give me clothes. Quite a change, I thought and thankfully accepted.
A photo of my ID for the Center was taken in the process. I am not saying put of privacy concern, if you have read my previous writings, you would know that my privacy is long gone. I am just saying because I have no idea about the process. It's the first time in 5 months I received clothes. 2 or 3 months ago, I was offered like 2 underwears and a T-shirt, which I didn't accept because of the distrust of that social worker. After these months, now I know that it was not a problem of that particular social worker.
The shop keeper said that the owner was out for a meeting and told me to return the next day when the owner would be there.
7 Oct, I went to the shop again, the shop keeper said that she asked and was allowed to give me a refund. It was not surprising that she was alone, and actually although it was sad, at least it was not thrill that was on her face. Am I again imagining someone has a heart?
Later in the day, I asked about the rumor of food allowance, and I realize nothing has changed. I am slow and naive to have thought otherwise. Nothing changed since I came to believe I am still under the grasp of the CCP or equivalent. Nothing changed since months before I left my homeland.
I am sorry that I don't quite know how to discribe it yet.
11 Oct, 2022
I was told to collect the allowance. I asked to take a photo of the list I have to sign, The female officer (or a female in officer uniform) said it was not a game, I replied that's exactly why I wanted to take a photo. I began trying to take photos of what I have to sign after maybe 2 or 3 months of surveillance and harassment. By the way, I surely is not the one who think that it is a game. I am the one being toyed with. The female officer said that there was information of other people and I replied I will cover the information of the others. She kept making it difficult by taking the list or arbitrarily moving the papers I used to cover the information of the others, yet blamed me for being the one who wasted "precious time" at the end. The photo was not well taken, my name and the amount (14.7 euros) were not in it, but she took the list already and wouldn't let me do it again. Proved me right for wanting to take the photo before signing. She also said that the name of someone around the title of the list is not responsible for the matter and required to have it covered. During hindering me from taking the photo. She made some accusations.
1. Accused me of being aggressive and causing trouble.
I replied I wasn't aggressive (which is actually just defensive) before all the troubles came my way. Also pointed out she was the one making it difficult.
She continued her accusation and said that there will be trouble for me every where. I do not doubt their reach is far and wide.
2. Blamed me for not knowing the law of Lithuania before I came.
I asked what law she was talking about.
She said every law.
I asked if she knows every law of the country.
She said she does and she is a lawyer.
(I doubt if there is any lawyer who knows every single law of a country.)
I asked her to tell me which law is about the allowance.
She told me to google it.
3. During the accusation, she also said something like "you are so clever". Kind of like attributing it to the reasons why I am in trouble. I don't know what she referred to. It probably works this way though:
If you are trusting, they think that you are dumb and deserve all their harassments and discrimination.
If you are defensive, they blame you for being aggressive and say that you deserve all their harassments and discrimination.
Either way they are right harassing and you have to be happy with that.
Talk about aggressive, remember that I mentioned in a daily entry that I was often asked to fight for my rights and write applications even when I didn't ask for anything?
Sometimes it doesn't matter if you know the exact truth or not. If things keep going the same way as they would if an assumption is true, then it doesn't really matter if the assumption is actually false. Two variables with the same value is really not much different from one variable.
As I left the room, the male officer said "Šuo!" The Lithuanian word "Dog".
When I was told my asylum application was accepted (just accepted, not granted) I was grateful and finally felt kind of relieved although I still worried the influence of the CCP. I planned and tried to give the best of me. But what happened as you can learn part of it from my writings was that I was met with hostility, surveillance and privacy violation, harassment, discrimination, lies and insults. The harassments was not limited within the Centres, hm, I see that my feeling changed. I used to think that the CCP has influence outside and the Pabrade Centre was the safe haven. Anyway, I tried to take the first step to show friendship but it was used to further the aggression. I repeated times and again until I finally gave up and just try to avoid all unnecessary contacts. Actually I gave up but tried yet again when I was moved to the Kybratai Foreigners Registration Centre. Things just repeated. I tried almost another month before I finally totally gave up again.
Read from my previous writings and you can see I mentioned that even children were used as tools. Pretty sure the children had no way to know what I did when was alone in a room with all windows and the door closed. So someone(s) told them and instructed them to act certain ways to me. I told the children to remember what happened and think about it when they grow up. I can only hope that they will remember. Hopefully it will help them build a sense about right and wrong.
10 Oct, 2022
Yes, it is the day before.
The same female officer came and asked me to go to the "class" on the ground floor. She seems to be good with English, chance is that she used "class" instead of "classroom" intentionally because I am enthusiastic about learning and I was enthusiastic about the Lithuanian language class.
There could also be a reason why I was asked to go there instead of talked where we were, but I will leave it for now.
It was about my enquiry about an option of taking food allowance the week before.
I was asked about what I wanted. I asked to be told about my rights and the allowances again. "According to the law, asylum seekers will be paid an allowance. The maximum amount is 14.7 euros." or something similar was repeated a few times in the conversation, I will mention just once here.
I asked why I didn't get the allowance earlier. I was told that my asylum status was established just last month. I asked so what I was before that. The female officer said I meant my status. Didn't want to raise the tension, I went along with that, but I regretted when she smugly said her job was done and she was going home when I wanted to continue the conversation after I waited for her to finish with all the other people who came in during our conversation. Minus the smugness, similar things happened on various occasions by various people. No, I didn't mean my status, I meant literally "what I was?". I think you won't be too surprised if I say that I don't feel very human with all the surveillance, harassments and whatnot.
So, what I gathered from the conversation? Not much really. It felt more like I was the one providing information. Aside from she saying that she saw on the computer system my asylum status began just last month which I cannot verify, pretty much everything else she said about my case was not true. She asked for the precise date I came to Lithuania, apparently it was not on the computer system. The date happened to be irrelevant and was not talked about after she wrote it down on a paper. She said I was caught when I crossed the border which I corrected with I went to the Migration Department myself. She said that I had no identification document. I said I had my passport. She followed with my passport stays with (taken by) the Migration Department and that I asked for asylum but the process takes time so my asylum status was confirmed just last month. I told her I was told I was an asylum seeker since April.
