CANCUN CITY, MEXICO -- Two iced chocolate mochas and a comfy couch in this restaurant have made up for not having lunch until 6 pm. It's been a big day, and we've done a lot.

The convergence center is open! We arrive mid-morning after finishing our proposal for the eco-encampment. The landlord has workers still clearing out the space -- a big, three-story concrete building. Somehow in this work I seem to end up spending a lot of time in big, echoey concrete buildings -- but I'm grateful to have this one. The bottom level smells heavily of mold, but we have the third and fourth floors and access to the roof, which requires ducking through a small doorway and climbing an iron radio tower, which provides a broad view over much of downtown Cancun City. From here we also have a good view of the major roads, which those of us who have survived police raids appreciate.

The energy is building, and more and more people are coming into town. In the early afternoon, we meet to discuss actions, with at least 20 people there, mostly internationals who have somehow made these actions a focal point of their lives. I sometimes think of us as an intuitive, self-organized, nonviolent, volunteer army -- all responding to the same call, some inner voice that says, "Hey, this is it -- put aside your other work; nothing else is as important right now as this effort to turn the tide."

We brainstorm actions, everything from puppet marches to naked water ballet to spell out "No WTO" with our bodies. We're trying to come up with creative ways to have an impact on the meetings, which will be very, very difficult, sequestered on the island as they are. But we will try, even though the possibility of police brutality is always in the back of our minds and sometimes in the forefront of discussions. Two years ago, at a protest here during a World Economic Forum meeting, students were brutally beaten by police. I've seen the video, and it reminded me of Genoa, with cops losing control and whaling away with their big batons in bone-crunching fury. But the same students are coming back. On the plus side, they weren't tortured in jail, like activists were in Genoa, and were released fairly quickly. The internationals are wary of getting arrested and hesitant to employ the kind of nonviolent civil disobedience tactics we often use at home, but the Mexican students are undaunted. "I wouldn't want to put any campesino or Mexican student at risk of getting arrested," one of the internationals says, but Anna, one of the Mexican students, just shrugs. "They will do it anyway. Even if it's badly organized and not done well, they will still do it."