Easy Debian is not emulated. It is a virtual environment, rather than a virtual machine. An entire Linux filesystem is inside that image file you downloaded, and the Debian apps use the files from there, not from Maemo. You can run Debian apps without the second X-Server, making the whole experience much more "Native", but the UI of most of the apps is so unsuitable for Fremantle that we rarely do it that way. Gimp is a good example of an app that works much better in LXDE (with the canvas on desktop 2 and the toolbox and menus on desktop 1) than in Maemo 5. Gimp isn't so great on the N900 for drawing; it has a noticeable delay after finishing drawing a stroke before you can draw another stroke. But it is fine for photo manipulation and touch-up.