General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDFW: if you are reading DU now, please check in and let us know if you are allright!
We had a nice exchange about Brussels when I was getting ready for trip there. I know you are based somewhere near there and travel a great deal for your work. I hope you were not at the airport at the time of the bombing.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Hope he is OK and checks in.
Quite sure though his is probably very busy.
Thoughts and prayers......
unc70
(6,119 posts)CTyankee
(63,912 posts)He rated the hotel I had booked and told me it was great (I got a great deal on Travelocity). Gave me tips on places to eat near our hotel on Grand Place.
Brussels is second only to Paris in beautiful Art Nouveau design throughout the city but it's a slog to visit them all. It was a great trip.
Jeez, now that I think about DFW I get nervous. He could very well have been in that airport, given the regularity of his travel...
NV Whino
(20,886 posts)malaise
(269,157 posts)SoapBox
(18,791 posts)Just a thought.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)I like Brussels and always enjoy his posts.
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)steve2470
(37,457 posts)7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)KamaAina
(78,249 posts)but yeah, he gets around. We had a similar scare when the Germanwings flight from Barcelona to Dusseldorf went down last year. Turns out he's taken that flight in the past.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)He had a great knowledge base of Brussels.
It was a nice trip. Bruges Madonna, Ghent Altarpiece...what's not to love...
CaliforniaPeggy
(149,699 posts)Here's part of what he said:
I saw subway cars I usually ride in, completely demolished, burned to a crisp and torn to metal shards
Tell those who asked I'm touched and humbled that they remembered me enough to bother to ask, and I thank them for their thoughts
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I hope he goes on DU and tells us about the experience. It sounds like a searing time for him and I'm glad he's fine.
msanthrope
(37,549 posts)steve2470
(37,457 posts)So glad he's ok!
a la izquierda
(11,797 posts)7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)He should not be surprised at being loved and cared about. He has been a part of DU for far too long!
Thank you again and please send him lots of hugs.
blue neen
(12,328 posts)How terribly frightening this all is.
karynnj
(59,504 posts)MissB
(15,812 posts)Glad to hear he is safe.
renate
(13,776 posts)So glad he's okay, so heartbroken for those who are not.
panader0
(25,816 posts)Last edited Tue Mar 22, 2016, 10:51 PM - Edit history (1)
All the best.
One of my favorite DUer's.
Skittles
(153,193 posts)I thought you were saying there was a bombing at DFW
Hekate
(90,793 posts)So glad to hear DFW is okay. Anybody else?
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)DU is the best.
Most of all is lots of love to DFW and all his friends and family.
DFW
(54,436 posts)Though I left the account open for future reference, I have basically left DU. I just didn't think it was worth a big announcement with the usual wordy farewell and accompanying fireworks display, so I did a quiet fade about a month ago.
Peggy told me about this thread, and I am not so unmoved as to ignore it.
I WAS scheduled to go to Brussels yesterday, but due to the short workweek--Friday is a holiday in most of Europe--I decided to move a Friday trip to the Utrecht area in Holland up to Tuesday, and do Brussels today (Wednesday). By the time I got to Utrecht, the news was all over. I called all of my friends in Belgium, and none of them had been adversely affected, fortunately. Most of them knew someone who was, however. Belgium is not a big country. Needless to say, they advised me to let my Brussels appointments go this week, and that is advice I will be heeding. They said there were long security lines everywhere, including the train stations. Air travel in and out of Zavantem will probably be disrupted for a while, and the airports of Antwerp and Charleroi are tiny provincial facilities incapable of handling the immense intercontinental traffic of Zavantem (Brussels airport). I suspect that Schipol (Amsterdam), Köln/Bonn and Düsseldorf here in Germany will be used as alternate landing destinations, and busses/trains will bring people the rest of the way to Belgium. Köln to Brussels is usually only a two hour drive (three, if you intend to find a place to park your car legally).
The basic message, is yes, I managed to dodge another bullet. I always seem to have last minute changes in plans when bombs are scheduled to go off somewhere. I missed getting blown up at Frankfurt by a day a couple of decades back. When a fire broke out at the Düsseldorf airport 20 years ago and dioxin fumes killed a couple dozen people in the terminal I usually fly in and out of, I had blown off travel plans that day at the last minute to bring our daughters and a few of their friends to an amusement park in Holland instead, as they had the day off from school.
I am probably building up, in the words of the fictional Nicholai Hel, a huge karma debt, one that I will have to pay in spades some day. Yesterday was not that day.
To each and every one who asked/inquired: I am humbled by this, and my gratitude goes out to you all.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)see the world. You help us get a broader view.
If you take a brief respite and come back, you know you have friends here who care about you...
steve2470
(37,457 posts)7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Last edited Wed Mar 23, 2016, 10:33 PM - Edit history (1)
Take care. You are missed. There are no words, ljust you and all your loved ones, your friends, your colleagues are all in our thoughts and heart.
Peace.
DFW
(54,436 posts)I'll check back periodically. It's just that the bile and evil sentiments had come to dominate the home page and most of the discussions to the point where there weren't enough posts that seemed worthwhile participating any more. Then a post of mine got (deliberately, to my mind) misinterpreted as comparing Bernie Sanders to Hitler, and hidden for that reason, and that did it for me. This has become Karl Rove's board, and I am perfectly content to wait until the primaries are over, Rove's surrogates are gone, and we can concentrate on the main goal again, i.e. making sure there is a Democrat in the White House, and that he (or she) keeps their eyes on making things better, not more complicated.
I deeply appreciate (and am frankly amazed at, in a very positive sense) the sentiments like yours. It's not like I was ever a major player on DU. Your posts are the reason I'll be back some day.
I was in Paris today, by the way. The Gare du Nord looked like an armed camp, and there are now security checks (in and out) at the train station just like the airport--something for which the train station was never designed. But Brussels is on everyone's mind, and no one objected. I'll be back in Brussels next week. I do not intend to become debris on the side of a wall just yet.
JustABozoOnThisBus
(23,364 posts)Once the Democratic convention is done, and a day or two of gloating and moaning is done, thing should settle down considerably.
Glad you're safe, and hope the "high-security armed camp" look is not the new normal for Europe.
DFW
(54,436 posts)And it WAS a high-security armed camp.
Goethe's "Zauberlehrling (Sorcerer's Apprentice)" has now become reality: Die ich rief, die Geister, die werde ich nun nicht mehr los. The spirits I have summoned, I can no longer be rid of them.
--from another Bozo on this bus!
OriginalGeek
(12,132 posts)If I was the guy keeping score, you'd be so far ahead just on the basis of your posts here you'd be a karmillionaire. That's not even counting the people you affect in real life.
I can't imagine there's any scorecard in the multi-verse that has you behind. You have improved this world and I thank you for it.
Be well!
Boomerproud
(7,964 posts)Please let us know how you are when you can. You are very valuable to us, especially now.
DFW
(54,436 posts)I don't have exclusive privileges--there have been plenty that have preceded me in that regard.
I'll see whats going on after the convention: