SPCC A Casa Amarela

the plumbing caught fire yesterday. someone threw away the egg boxes we collected. they were covered with polyurethane, so at some point probably someone threw a cigarette and ignited it. so a small fire melted the pipe, and therefore the crew had to move it.

this means we are now redesigning the plumbing, and including the water tank in the design this time. that means once the police takes the water down, we'll still have a backup water system, and with the coming winter rain, we'll be closing the water loop.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

it's been cloudy. that's it. cloudy means not as much power, which means we haven't had even remotely the same energy. therefore, i have an entirely new plan. a generator to charge the bank. whenever we need it, it goes up. and that includes powering the big concert sound system if needed.

by modding it for methane, we can build a digester and harvest the gas. actually, considering the amount of shit we produce, we might get all our gas from it. this way, it would be way easier to close the energy loop whenever solar is weak. consider winter, for example. it won't be enough, and just adding panels doesn't fix it.

bike generators, windmills and such are still in the works. they are not that complicated at all, and i might do one soon. but whenever we need massive power (heavy power tools, big sound systems), we should back it up somehow.

other than that, we're back to less people, smaller issues. the crew has been working on the stage, they have bigger plans (a studio in the back), and whenever one of the kids is around, they work hard on it.

i think within a month we might have proper concerts.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

last night the crew made some wood sculptures and at night they burned them, together with some poi and staff shows. someone was drumming, and i played the pipes in one of the bunkers. then the usual: amazing conversations spanning all kinds of topics, laughter, drunkenness and just another wonderful celebration of life. we made it.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

this weekend was particularly successful to us. not only did the workshops work out great, they were useful: we actually used the workshop built projector to project the lecture for discussion. so now we have a projector for the house (still needs some casing and a stronger lamp, but works). the fact that we built it ourselves makes us even more proud of the past weekend. we also learned how to make our own booze and started some home made wine projects with dumpstered food.

the hitchhiker crew + CS + helpx is both highly educated (and nerdy at times) and very eco-conscious and reciprocal, or at least, the ones that tend to stay. so in a week they've done more, given more, taught more and generally contributed more than the house residents (O, S, R, I) did in the past months. this is obviously causing the residents to close up and tribe up, as they always did, since they feel their privileges (free everything at our cost) threatened. so instead of going to the workshops, they all hid in S's room listening to the same old tapes and CDs, doing drugs and "looking cool". the issue, as usual, is both people not feeling included (even though they don't try to be a part of it), and with it becoming arrogant, angry or just generally prejudiced. so closing up in a room, making fun of people, doing what they said they don't do (hard drugs, lying, etc), has become a subculture of our little community.

in previous posts i got angry and frustrated. but if anything, what our residents are becoming, thanks to their lack of interest in any other thing other than mirrors, mohawks, punk music and themselves, is basic social center users. they use the water, the shelter, the food, but have no interest in any other thing. so instead of disciplining (which is something i was advocating in anger at some point), we are instead shifting to regular social work. we will treat the same respect and care we treat the homeless people we help. but if they want to have a say, they will have to work for it.

let's conjure up a simple example of this. we designed a cane flow around the building, for shelter and defining the space. it took us (mostly D) time and effort to do it. it was worked on, designed, an put in practice. some residents then, after we finished, said they didn't like it. so, usually, had we followed the principle "let's include everyone in the decision process so that we make the best decision" there would be no cane flow done at all.

what we're doing now is if it's done and you don't want it, you undo it yourself or start alternatives. in a way, we are using laziness against itself. we're using, instead of global democracy values (like advocated by the previous group), the local power model first described by myself in the beginning of this community. in a funny way, this is a right wing turn in an anarchist house that promotes anarchism. can we stop using anarchism so much, too, since everyone misuses it and the word is an oxymoron itself?

what i see this mainly as is a shift from allowing reactive intelligence to act on synthetic intelligence, and slowly empower synthetic intelligence and downplaying reactive intelligence. this is what we do with the model i provided. the generators of information (negentropy, exuberance, creative types, whatever) become the ruling class, and the consumers (reactive intelligence) are pushed to little to no power. this is, basically, a worker revolt. we are not ending our productivity and surplus generation. we are, instead, using it as our own power to set course of our community, instead of giving power to people that have no interest in community building at all, except for their own interests.

a big irony, as the anarchists are the bourgeois of the squat, and the more conservative, working people end up being the oppressed working class.

basically, we're testing out the new model, and dealing with those who don't agree with motherly love instead of discipline. a fairer, more humane way of keeping the community in motion. therefore, we are no longer an anarcho-punk-crust squat or anarcho-syndicalist squat, but an exuberantist cult with everything it implies.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

the house is full of proactive, creative people now, thanks mostly to the hitchhiker gathering. we're therefore spontaneously organizing a cultural day tomorrow, including a workshop on how to make your own solar panels. more on this later, since more people might join and give classes about other stuff.

obviously, no meeting happened. i guess S and R are too ashamed to show face after what they did. S apologized yesterday night. the old and wise tactic of always staying out of any trouble, even when inciting it in the first place.

quote of the day: it's better to do nothing than to do little (S). i guess that sums up the attitude right there.

personally, i'm more interested in the cool new people we got, and all the new stuff they taught us. we might have a projector soon if we get lucky.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

as predicted, and as i was saying before, the residents have been sinking into their own habits. but they have begun to feel their status is threatened, and therefore began a power struggle with the currently perceived alpha. R has been shouting and disrespecting random guests, and today did that to T.

considering this is out of bounds, we've summoned a house meeting tonight. it will have to be made clear that this kind of anti-social behavior cannot continue, as well as the freeloading. it was what got P and M out of the house, and it's what might get them out too.

often it is referred that i don't care or since i don't say anything it's because i'm ok with it. fact is, after my 8 hour work day, i have little patience and time to deal with these issues. but i do notice the weight on my wallet, and comment that in private with T. she ends up protecting me and showing the face for the global issues, which has been somewhat unfair to her.

i'm spending about 600€ a month on the house and the guests/residents. even when only residents are around, this would mean a 100€ cost a month for each resident. for residents that cannot afford, they've been paying with work. T and (now) D work all day at the house. that means they contribute what they can, in a basic sense of reciprocity.

on the other hand, S, R and O have no sense of reciprocity at all. if there's beer, they drink it. if there's food, they eat it. if there's money in the box, they take it. their contributions to the community are the drugs they sell, the loud music only they enjoy, and the obnoxious attitude towards guests. what saddens me is that i get lied to to my face every day. be it about drug abuse (which is higher than ever now that (I) isn't here), work-for-show (like cleaning a bit in front of me, a technique i first recognized at my old place), or simply empty compliments without any honesty behind it. these are easy techniques to cloud my judgment. if i'm working all day, and see two people working when i get here, it's easy to assume the both of them had been working all day, when in fact it's usually the opposite. they are working mostly because it's the ideal time to show work done.

i am no leader in this community, but i am the funding. in that sense, i'm more of a commodity than an authority. i fix the plumbing, electricity and get the food, among other things. so i'm payed tribute by the freeloaders in many forms. what is perceived as reciprocity (i give food, you give thank you) is usually just politeness. if i feed you every day, and every day you say thank you, i effectively did all the work. the man-hours spent in saying thank you are not even remotely close to the work hours spent in getting the food on the table.

the issue is that the perceived reciprocity (thank you = food) is not reciprocal at all. it is a one way gesture of consumption. and the irony is that not even a thank you is uttered anymore. everything is assumed to be there. these are just symptoms of very individualistic habits.

what is also very ironic, is how the failures of the current house organizational system are exactly the ones predicted by me and T since day 1. which means that the incompetence of the people behind the original organizational choices (A, L, S), our community (and myself personally) has suffered tremendously. an organization cannot be designed by the ones that exploit it. a working community cannot be designed by lazy people. it's that simple. but i guess the people that fucked up the design aren't here to deal with it, which is another great irony of our endeavor. we've been working with and defending a system we did not design, with people we did not choose to live with, for the simple fact of being the minority in the house. almost everyone that believed in everyone having an equal say has left, or is abusing the free goods. it seems obvious: if you're lazy, you design a system that protects your laziness. if you're a worker, you design a system that protects your work. it's the old lymbic response again.

i'm tired of defending behavior that has no possible defense. it will be a key point of my opinion in the meeting today. i'm tired of anarchists that define anarchy as chaos and disorder, tired of freeloaders that want to be part of the decisions, even though they do very little to help. we need a better system and better people, or this ship will sink.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

our crew has been busy. currently some of our guests have a couple of interesting DIY projects: a windmill (made from pvc pipes and recycled stuff), a swimming pool (out in the back, not even sure how it's going to work), gardens (though carrying soil is still too much), and a cane flow up and around the building.

overall, i think our method for choosing people has increased the percentage of workers (vs. freeloaders) in the house, leading to a more healthy and productive environment. this is making our previous freeloader load more obvious (our lazy residents).

anarcho-syndicalism (a-s) isn't working anymore. it assumes working class ethics is understood and practiced every day by everyone. but not everyone shares that view, instead choosing individualist libertarian anarchism. therefore, a-s ends up allowing for a constant, growing abuse of the workers' output. are freeloaders the bourgeois oppressor class of the squat?

we have more workers now, so that means that freeloaders need to do less work. this has gotten to the point where the residents (S and R mainly) have grown so lazy they don't buy or dumpster for food anymore, drink and eat the surplus the house generates, and spend all their money (including stealing house money from the box) on booze and crack. just the other day i was woken up at 2am with S asking me to go drive him to "get beer" downtown. it wasn't beer, 'cause he can get beer down the street all night. it was crack. it's always crack. drugs, especially cocaine, have a way of distorting people's reality to a point where they always live in mememe land. plus, if they don't have to fight for survival anymore and can sell drugs to an endless stream of guests, it is the perfect setting for indulgence.

i've always been sensitive to this issue and critical on what the street punk libertarians would bring to the house progress. what we see here is that even though we invested time, effort, money in creating a regenerating, empowering environment from which people could learn, grow and break free of their habit patterns, instead it is proving to be the exact opposite. since the house is becoming sustainable and self sufficient (thanks to our hard work), it only encouraged the hedonistic behavior of our residents.

in this sense, the 6 month trial of a-s failed as an organizational system. for it to work, it requires a shared worker mindset from all the participants, and therefore it is unfit for a diverse house such as our own.

as an alternative, my own model has been proposed, and will be implemented soon. it is based on the exuberantist ideology, and tends to empower workers and remove power from freeloaders. i have some (short) info on what it is on the main network website (exuberantism.org).

as a transition, we have begun to track all the work and money put in by each of the guests and residents. at the end of each month, a balance is to be done and we'll confront all the residents with their activity (or lack thereof). next, we will give everyone a period of time to change their behavior, and if nothing happens, we will go back to our founder authority and kick people out. it will only happen if people fail to understand community living.

as for the exuberantist ideology, it is sufficiently similar to anarchism to be mistaken for it. but as my big A for anarchy symbolized, the random specks can be seen as random, but may actually hide meaningful data in them. in my design, the random specks were a Ulam Spiral, a mathematical plot of prime numbers. i include it below. when done right, order and reason might be as rough and natural as nature itself. like the endless richness of a fractal, a rational approach does not mean a heartless approach.

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godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

after the hitchhiker craze (which still has some aftershocks, like the guy that showed up in the middle of the night and left running some hours later), work has been flowing nicely thanks to D and our new HelpXer. HelpXers, even when just passing by, have a much better work ethic than couchsurfers (seems obvious, doesn't it?). the fact that now the house has 6 people, 5 workers has made it much better to stay and live in. guests are more and more saying things like "feels like home" and "feels cozy". it only gets this way because people clean and work for it permanently. besides that, raves and parties are going on without fights, just interesting, happy conversations and good mood.

but the main thing is that our new culture of work makes people want to work, makes everyone more creative, and makes the freeloaders feel awkward. not that it makes freeloaders work (good luck with that) but it does offset that behavior and makes it marginal, not the main feel of the house.

D is going crazy workaholic, so they're building a pool out in the back, and they want to build a garden all over the place. we definitely need more soil to green up the place.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

we're getting a couple of hitchhikers for the gathering, i expect more to come, since the gathering is this coming weekend in sines.

the new lounge outside is turning out amazing. people now gather outside, in the front of the building, and we're back to the escotilha8/nomad base feel. yesterday we had about 10 people from all over: Serbia, Italy, Spain, Austria, Germany, Estonia and the US. we are now succeeding in creating a loving, giving environment for travelers. everyone is happy, sharing and contributing positively to the community.

it's been a tough ride, but now we're getting there. people really are shallow. prettying up a place changes everything. making cleaner toilets, nicer walls, fancy cane constructions, makes people feel less afraid i think. only a few can visualize the potential in their heads. most people get stuck on small things and that was a big hurdle to jump over.

also, the next door company has been closing down the plot of land because of all the people dumping shit there. i don't know whether that is warning us of something or just making our situation better. fact is someone destroyed one of the road blocks, so we're back to the trucks dumping shit every day. sometimes it's good, we get new stuff to work with every day

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆

our new sub woofer works great, but i think our PA is overheating. we're now pushing the 600W of music on the 2nd floor successfully. the party was great, as usual, so i think we'll host them regularly now. we also got T's laptop to work as a full DJ system, so we're set. the audio out is good enough for our purposes (48000Hz 32bit)

daniel and a new random guest (out of a hitchhiking forum) have been busy. daniel designed a very organic flow to give shade in the front of the building. it looks amazing, all built from string and cane. overall budget maybe about 20€.

our solar system is perfect now. we can use everything we need. we'll see how it works once the rest of the residents come and start using it more.

godspeed starstuff ☆★☆☆★★★☆☆☆☆☆