Getting Woken Up By Commies

What could be more obnoxious than being woken up every morning by communist propaganda being blasted from loudspeaker? Not much I'd imagine. This morning was the first time I've been awoken by it and even though I didn't understand a word of it it was still pretty obnoxious.

The hotel I was previously at was far enough away from one of the scratchy-sounding loudspeakers that I slept through the broadcast and had no idea what Winnie was talking about when she mentioned being awoken by them. This moring I found out. Not knowing what was being said during the broadcasts, I did a little research and discovered that they are propaganda broadcasts and patriotic songs. There is a movmenet underway to ban the broadcasts:

http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/scotland-on-sunday-edinburgh/mi_7924/is_2009_May_24/clamour-grows-silence-communist-propaganda/ai_n35476298/

If I lived near a loudspeaker here, I would be up in arms. Not necessarily because of the content, but because I really like my sleep.

Along with the propaganda broadcasts, Facebook has mysteriously been unavailable for the last few days. Apparently this is due to a blackout by ISP's, enforced by the government because anti-government movements were using the site to organize. The block is pretty easy to get around, but is effective because a social networking site's usefulness is eliminated if most people can't get it to.

These two things brought home to me the differences at the margin living in a one-party communist state means.