I have been a non blogger for the past year. So much for good intentions a year ago. As always, when confronted with a blank sheet, ideas of blogging suddenly evaporate, whereas when out cycling or gardening or doing a whole lot of other things, blogging ideas flow thick and fast.
Well, what are the Big Events of the past year? Apart from the global melt downs of various kinds (top of which in the UK must be the Eurozone crisis, even though the UK is not a member of the zone), including riots in UK cities (leading to much moral panic), and the Arab Spring (fast turning to autumn in key countries like Egypt), what personal events have occurred?
Firstly, I was home for spring. Often I've been in Australia during March-April, and have returned home in time to miss some of the earlier manifestations of spring in the garden. This year I was here to view the bumper crop of hellebores in the shaded border: some forty plants bloomed, providing the kind of effect that I've aspired to in past years.
Secondly, our grandson Oli, who turned two in February, has is now sharing his thoughts with us. He is, of course, the ultimate and perfect grandson. Even so, it's impossible not to be affected by the combination of innocence and vulnerability on the one hand, and the determination to assert identity on the other, which characterize this stage of childhood. Recently I heard this period of childhood referred to as the Research and Development phase of growing up -- a very affirmative way of viewing the behaviour and thoughts of a youngster.
Thirdly, travel. This was the year of what is likely to be my final trip to SE Asia and Australia. I was asked to teach on a course in Danang, Vietnam, in September-October, where I did one week last year following my usual gig at UQ in Brisbane. Last year my colleague Andy and I had travelled from Brisbane via Singapore and Siem Reap to Danang, wishing that we'd arranged things so as to be able to include a visit to the great Khmer ruins. So this year I decided that whatever else I did, a visit to Siem Reap was essential, and it was duly arranged. Fortunately, the great ELT Network (in the form of one of last year's course participants based in Phnom Pen) put me in touch with both a good hotel and a tuk-tuk driver to take me around, so the visit proved to be very successful. Being a real tourist as opposed to a working visitor is a novelty. But being a tourist is also hard work, particularly when visiting significant sites which call for much walking and climbing in a hot tropical climate.
As well as visiting new places, this trip provided a chance to revisit Singapore, where I was lent a splendid flat just off Orchard Road, and was able to make contact with someone I taught at Manchester over thirty years ago. This brought the Christmas card exchanges up to date, while also bringing me up to date on Singapore itself, a place which I really enjoy visiting, not least because of the gastronomic opportunities if offers. Where else in the world, I wonder, would the excellent national museum devote a whole gallery to the history of the national menu?
Fourthly, IT. I resisted buying an i-Pad I, for the simple reason that the first version of most items of technology are a means whereby the manufacturer uses early adopters as a source of R&D. I eventually purchased an i-Pad II at David Jones in Robina on the Gold Coast. (There is a buzzing Mac store in the same shopping mall, but I felt distinctly out of place in this temple to digital natives, despite being a Mac user since the mid 80s). Has the i-Pad changed my life? Well, no, not really. Has it enriched my life? Possibly, though not in any significant way. Has it provided convenience? Yes, it's quicker and easier to use than a MacBook, but it does mean that I now check the Guardian and the Independent at the breakfast table and even deal with e-mails -- the latter not being a good idea. And it's so easy to Google or check Wikipedia for information. Most usefully, it does provide a really good way of displaying photos, and since my most recent trip to Asia and Australia has added to my photo gallery, this is a great benefit because even if family and friends rapidly lose interest in viewing one's pix (particularly as many were posted in Facebook while traveling), it's fun to be able to flick thru them oneself. Oh, and I shouldn't forget that it can be used as a Kindle, which means that it's possible to use it as a reading device. Since it doesn't require external lighting, it's possible to read anything on screen even in a dark room. Curiously enough, I find this a most useful feature.
Finally, transitions. Several people have died, and although none of them was close, their departure was a reminder that we are all mortal. There is, of course, a poignancy in viewing photographs of the departed in their prime. My daughter-in-law's grandfather, who early in his career was an RAF test pilot, was a distinctly dashing chap and he and his wife made a glamourous couple and in fact, the image that comes to mind when thinking about them is a photo of them at a swish party rather than of them in their old age.
Of the non personal transitions, I think that the death of Steve Jobs was most significant, but not entirely for the reasons that have been most discussed. Jobs was diagnosed with a treatable cancer. A man whose business career and creativity were based on the applications of science to technology elected to ignore the treatment available to him and self medicated by alternative means, until basically it was too late to receive effective treatment, although apparently he collaborated with medical researchers developing treatments based on genetics in the final year of his life. His life may have been prolonged by a few months as a result. How ironic. And what a great loss. (On a happier note, it's good to see that Jonathan Ives has been given a knighthood.)
Twenty-twelve. What will it hold? We shall see. In the meantime, to anyone reading this blog: Happy New Year!
Tuesday, 3 January 2012
Thursday, 20 January 2011
Obama and the Giffords shooting in Arizona: newyorker.com
Obama and the Giffords shooting in Arizona: newyorker.com
As always, Hendrick Hertzberg offers a thoughtful commentary. By now, of course, there has been time to reflect. And as he says, "The atmosphere smelled cleaner in the days after Obama said what he said. Something had changed. And when it fades, as it must, perhaps the memory of it will leave us all in a better place than where it found us".
Read more http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2011/01/24/110124taco_talk_hertzberg#ixzz1BZZrWjSB
As always, Hendrick Hertzberg offers a thoughtful commentary. By now, of course, there has been time to reflect. And as he says, "The atmosphere smelled cleaner in the days after Obama said what he said. Something had changed. And when it fades, as it must, perhaps the memory of it will leave us all in a better place than where it found us".
Read more http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2011/01/24/110124taco_talk_hertzberg#ixzz1BZZrWjSB
Thursday, 13 January 2011
Domestic concerns
As a World Service junkie, I probably suffer from an overload of 24/7 news. Even so, the WS does provide a counterbalance to the largely domestic focus of the UK news, and today the news focus in various media sources is a reminder of how, ultimately, the news tends to be largely domestic in its concerns.
President Obama's Tuscon speech is featured on the BBC News web site, and it is reported in three of the quality dailies: the Guardian,The Independent and The Telegraph (I didn't bother with the Times as it is now behind a pay wall). But, it doesn't receive much in the way of commentary in the UK media, although there was quite a long item on it on the Radio 4 Today programme. In fact, the focus of the UK media today is the by-election up north, whose results will be the subject of minute examination in the context if the coallition government.
In comparison, the New York Times [ http://www.nytimes.com/] as might be expected devotes a lot of space, both reportage and commentary, to the President's Tuscon visit and speech. The discrepancy of focus between the UK and US press highlights the essentially domestic nature of these various events. What goes on in American politics seems to foreign observers to be America's business, which makes the character of political rhetoric seem even more exotic. Just as the vox pop interviews of Americans and samples of shock jock radio that appear on UK TV seem like samples of curiously alien cultural practices.
But, the effects of such cultural -- and political -- practices don't just stop at the shores of the USA. Just as the rabid extremes of political rhetoric are not without wider effects, however indirect. So, while the Oldham by-election will take centre stage in tomorrow's news, what continues to nag me is the international implications of the aftermath of the Tuscon shootings.
President Obama's Tuscon speech is featured on the BBC News web site, and it is reported in three of the quality dailies: the Guardian,The Independent and The Telegraph (I didn't bother with the Times as it is now behind a pay wall). But, it doesn't receive much in the way of commentary in the UK media, although there was quite a long item on it on the Radio 4 Today programme. In fact, the focus of the UK media today is the by-election up north, whose results will be the subject of minute examination in the context if the coallition government.
In comparison, the New York Times [ http://www.nytimes.com/] as might be expected devotes a lot of space, both reportage and commentary, to the President's Tuscon visit and speech. The discrepancy of focus between the UK and US press highlights the essentially domestic nature of these various events. What goes on in American politics seems to foreign observers to be America's business, which makes the character of political rhetoric seem even more exotic. Just as the vox pop interviews of Americans and samples of shock jock radio that appear on UK TV seem like samples of curiously alien cultural practices.
But, the effects of such cultural -- and political -- practices don't just stop at the shores of the USA. Just as the rabid extremes of political rhetoric are not without wider effects, however indirect. So, while the Oldham by-election will take centre stage in tomorrow's news, what continues to nag me is the international implications of the aftermath of the Tuscon shootings.
Wednesday, 12 January 2011
Blood Libel, Mrs Palin and Mr Diamond
That mistress of understated political discourse, Sarah Palin, has now produced a smooth talking to camera statement in which she attempts to turn the criticism of the kind of inflamatory language used by herself and others of like mind against her critics by invoking the term 'blood libel'. In doing so, she seems to me to demonstrate precisely the kind of distorted and hectoring language for which she is being so justly criticised. The tone of American political debate produced by the right wing is well and truly off the scale as far as many observers outside American are concerned. Even in Australian political debate, notorious for its robustness, there is little to match the extremism so common in American political discourse.
Without harking back to a prelapsarian golden age of politeness and even deference in public discourse, I think it's possible to discern a ratcheting up (or down, depending on your perspective) in the range of violent language used in American political debate. This is nothing to do with robust discussion and argument, but has a lot to do with stoking up emotion and confirming allegiance to an extreme position.
When, within weeks of 9/11, I was in the USA working with a group of people from the former Soviet bloc, I was both struck and dismayed by the quality of discussion on mainstream US TV. One day in a coffee break, we discussed what we were witnessing on TV, and one member of the group expressed a widely agreed thought: 'It is propaganda'. And this was a group of people who had, until quite recently, spent their lives deconstructing propaganda so they certainly knew propaganda when they met it!
The American media are, thanks to the dismantling of regulatory controls, under no obligation to present a balanced viewpoint on any issue. This has given a carte blanche to the purveyors of propaganda -- of either political extreme -- only, of course, it is right wing interests who largely control the media. So, that guardian of free speech and open political debate, Rupert Murdoch, is secure in his business as well as political interests in running Fox News, whose trademark slogan, 'Fair & Balanced', is evidently taken at face value by an alarmingly high percentage of viewers. (In January 2010, Public Policy Polling reported that Fox News was the most trusted television news channel in the country with 49% of respondents stating they trust Fox News, and only 37% distrusting it -- source Wikipedia).
In effect, strange political/celebrity creatures like Mrs Palin have access to and support from a major source of propaganda masquerading as news. At its most extreme, these right wing forums not only purvey propaganda, but do so using language and expressing attitudes which contribute both to a coarsening of political discourse and to a normalizing of extreme views and forms of expression. No doubt, Mrs Palin is correct to claim that the Tuscon murderer was not persuaded to carry out his shooting by such language and views, but equally, Mrs Palin cannot simply accuse her critics as promoters of a blood libel. The accusation is as obscene as it is spurious. But I doubt that the viewers of Fox news will think so.
Meanwhile, the boss of Barclays bank was faced with some pretty robust questioning when he appeared before the Treasury select committee. Unlike the Royal Bank of Scotland and several other banks, Barclays wasn't bailed out by the taxpayer in the big bank meltdown, so Mr Diamond felt entitled both to his £8million bonus and to adopting a pretty bare faced rebuttal of the criticism levelled at him for taking such a huge bonus.
What is reprehensible is not merely that he is being awarded (or awarding himself) such a bonus. It is. rather that, as was pointed out by a financial expert on this morning's 'Today Programme', neither Mr Diamond nor his over compensated team have done much to secure shareholder value for Barclays shareholders. I checked out the evidence: on 14 January 2000, Barclays shares opened at 398, and ten years later, on 31 December 2010, closed at 361.65, with huge fluctuations in between, but mostly in the past several years, trading at less than the opening value in January 2000. So, what is Mr Diamond getting a bonus for? It's time for a revolt by Barclays shareholders (many of whom are insurance companies and pension funds).
So, in both banking and right wing politics there is a level of deceit and self interest which is truly staggering. Not so much 'blood libel' as 'bloody libel' and barefaced greed.
Without harking back to a prelapsarian golden age of politeness and even deference in public discourse, I think it's possible to discern a ratcheting up (or down, depending on your perspective) in the range of violent language used in American political debate. This is nothing to do with robust discussion and argument, but has a lot to do with stoking up emotion and confirming allegiance to an extreme position.
When, within weeks of 9/11, I was in the USA working with a group of people from the former Soviet bloc, I was both struck and dismayed by the quality of discussion on mainstream US TV. One day in a coffee break, we discussed what we were witnessing on TV, and one member of the group expressed a widely agreed thought: 'It is propaganda'. And this was a group of people who had, until quite recently, spent their lives deconstructing propaganda so they certainly knew propaganda when they met it!
The American media are, thanks to the dismantling of regulatory controls, under no obligation to present a balanced viewpoint on any issue. This has given a carte blanche to the purveyors of propaganda -- of either political extreme -- only, of course, it is right wing interests who largely control the media. So, that guardian of free speech and open political debate, Rupert Murdoch, is secure in his business as well as political interests in running Fox News, whose trademark slogan, 'Fair & Balanced', is evidently taken at face value by an alarmingly high percentage of viewers. (In January 2010, Public Policy Polling reported that Fox News was the most trusted television news channel in the country with 49% of respondents stating they trust Fox News, and only 37% distrusting it -- source Wikipedia).
In effect, strange political/celebrity creatures like Mrs Palin have access to and support from a major source of propaganda masquerading as news. At its most extreme, these right wing forums not only purvey propaganda, but do so using language and expressing attitudes which contribute both to a coarsening of political discourse and to a normalizing of extreme views and forms of expression. No doubt, Mrs Palin is correct to claim that the Tuscon murderer was not persuaded to carry out his shooting by such language and views, but equally, Mrs Palin cannot simply accuse her critics as promoters of a blood libel. The accusation is as obscene as it is spurious. But I doubt that the viewers of Fox news will think so.
Meanwhile, the boss of Barclays bank was faced with some pretty robust questioning when he appeared before the Treasury select committee. Unlike the Royal Bank of Scotland and several other banks, Barclays wasn't bailed out by the taxpayer in the big bank meltdown, so Mr Diamond felt entitled both to his £8million bonus and to adopting a pretty bare faced rebuttal of the criticism levelled at him for taking such a huge bonus.
What is reprehensible is not merely that he is being awarded (or awarding himself) such a bonus. It is. rather that, as was pointed out by a financial expert on this morning's 'Today Programme', neither Mr Diamond nor his over compensated team have done much to secure shareholder value for Barclays shareholders. I checked out the evidence: on 14 January 2000, Barclays shares opened at 398, and ten years later, on 31 December 2010, closed at 361.65, with huge fluctuations in between, but mostly in the past several years, trading at less than the opening value in January 2000. So, what is Mr Diamond getting a bonus for? It's time for a revolt by Barclays shareholders (many of whom are insurance companies and pension funds).
So, in both banking and right wing politics there is a level of deceit and self interest which is truly staggering. Not so much 'blood libel' as 'bloody libel' and barefaced greed.
Tuesday, 11 January 2011
Empathy
The news from Queensland has not been good for the past two weeks or more, with serious and extensive floods in Central Queensland, effectively trashing a major agricultural region while also bringing to a halt the mining and export of around 25% of the world's coking coal. Terrible and disastrous as these floods have been -- and in fact, they are still covering huge areas of the state -- the most recent floods in Toowoomba and now in Ipswich and Brisbane have hit a vein of empathy prompted by few other natural catastrophes. Why?
Undoubtedly it is because I know people involved, have managed to Skype one friend near Toowoomba (in the misnamed Highfields -- height has not proved to be a protection against these floods), and have had a very affecting e-mail from friends in an outer suburb of Brisbane saying that they have had to take refuge in a nearby church (presumably a designated refuge centre) as their house is threatened with being engulfed by the flood when it peaks on Thursday.
This news has had a very unsettling effect because it is only recently that I was staying with or visiting the friends involved, and was passing through the areas and the town -- Toowoomba -- where the flash floods have occurred with such terrible effect. I know the house which has been flooded in Highfields, and to which our friend only shifted from Brisbane a few months before, and in November, I was staying with the friends now in the flood refuge. Their house. while near the Brisbane River, had always seemed to me to be comfortably above river level, which was many feet below the riverside ramble which I occasionally took while staying there. In fact, it now transpires that the flood level is so enormously above the levels I have observed in happier times that it is virtually impossible to comprehend the scale of it. Except that I know that if it really does hit the 25 metres or so above normal that is predicted. my friends' house will surely be flooded.
And I am aghast at the prospect of trying to cope. How to remove precious belongings and. what is even more pressing, where to store them safely? How to handle the prospect of sitting helplessly by while one's house is trashed by the overwhelming force of the flood? And how to consider the prospect of having to re-establish normal life again?
So, with a first hand knowledge of the areas being flooded, and with a stake in the safety and well being of friends, a deeper seam of empathy has been mined than has emerged in response to equally or more tragic disasters -- the Haiti earthquake is one that comes to mind. I suppose it demonstrates how significant -- even vital -- personal experience and affection are in discovering a capacity for empathy and sympathy with the victims of these events. Not, really, an uplifting discovery, but, a sadly pragmatic one. Meanwhile, we monitor the news with anxiety -- and empathy.
Undoubtedly it is because I know people involved, have managed to Skype one friend near Toowoomba (in the misnamed Highfields -- height has not proved to be a protection against these floods), and have had a very affecting e-mail from friends in an outer suburb of Brisbane saying that they have had to take refuge in a nearby church (presumably a designated refuge centre) as their house is threatened with being engulfed by the flood when it peaks on Thursday.
This news has had a very unsettling effect because it is only recently that I was staying with or visiting the friends involved, and was passing through the areas and the town -- Toowoomba -- where the flash floods have occurred with such terrible effect. I know the house which has been flooded in Highfields, and to which our friend only shifted from Brisbane a few months before, and in November, I was staying with the friends now in the flood refuge. Their house. while near the Brisbane River, had always seemed to me to be comfortably above river level, which was many feet below the riverside ramble which I occasionally took while staying there. In fact, it now transpires that the flood level is so enormously above the levels I have observed in happier times that it is virtually impossible to comprehend the scale of it. Except that I know that if it really does hit the 25 metres or so above normal that is predicted. my friends' house will surely be flooded.
And I am aghast at the prospect of trying to cope. How to remove precious belongings and. what is even more pressing, where to store them safely? How to handle the prospect of sitting helplessly by while one's house is trashed by the overwhelming force of the flood? And how to consider the prospect of having to re-establish normal life again?
So, with a first hand knowledge of the areas being flooded, and with a stake in the safety and well being of friends, a deeper seam of empathy has been mined than has emerged in response to equally or more tragic disasters -- the Haiti earthquake is one that comes to mind. I suppose it demonstrates how significant -- even vital -- personal experience and affection are in discovering a capacity for empathy and sympathy with the victims of these events. Not, really, an uplifting discovery, but, a sadly pragmatic one. Meanwhile, we monitor the news with anxiety -- and empathy.
Tuesday, 7 December 2010
WikiLeaks and Julian Paul Assange: newyorker.com
WikiLeaks and Julian Paul Assange: newyorker.com
This is an informative and thoughtful article on Assange, even more important now that he is under arrest and there seems to be a concerted effort to 'get Assange' and to marginalize or even close down WikiLeaks.
This is an informative and thoughtful article on Assange, even more important now that he is under arrest and there seems to be a concerted effort to 'get Assange' and to marginalize or even close down WikiLeaks.
Monday, 22 November 2010
Arrived back late yesterday morning after very comfortable last sector -- Dubai-LHR -- in top deck of A380, which certainly redefines the way to fly. Emirates have quite a fleet of them, all kitted out in Emirates corporate style, much given to moulded plastic faux wood (yew?) right down to the loo seats! Business class passengers inhabit what could be a smart bit of kitchen furniture, inserting oneself into a kind of cupboard with reclining seat and lots of cubbies for shoes (that must be a first) and shelves, and, a feature of which Emirates is very proud, their 'award winning' ICE system (basically entertainment).
They are also proud of their catering, and yesterday one of the charming flight attendants (seemingly another Emirates speciality), while serving breakfast (which I didn't need, having broken my fast on a the previous Emirates flight) agreed to provide me with an early lunch, which she did about half an hour later, having meantime delivered a starter course of 'Arab style Mezze'. And very good it all was, in line with all of the catering on every Emirates flight on this UK-Oz return journey.
At the aft of the A380 cabin is a 'lounge' with banquette type seating and an on-duty bar man. Yesterday there was a unique combination to be observed, with a man using an airline blanket as improvised rug, praying to Mecca in a corner of the lounge, while several passengers were standing around the bar with alcoholic drinks in hand. Neither party seemed to be mindful of the presence or activities of the other.
They are also proud of their catering, and yesterday one of the charming flight attendants (seemingly another Emirates speciality), while serving breakfast (which I didn't need, having broken my fast on a the previous Emirates flight) agreed to provide me with an early lunch, which she did about half an hour later, having meantime delivered a starter course of 'Arab style Mezze'. And very good it all was, in line with all of the catering on every Emirates flight on this UK-Oz return journey.
At the aft of the A380 cabin is a 'lounge' with banquette type seating and an on-duty bar man. Yesterday there was a unique combination to be observed, with a man using an airline blanket as improvised rug, praying to Mecca in a corner of the lounge, while several passengers were standing around the bar with alcoholic drinks in hand. Neither party seemed to be mindful of the presence or activities of the other.
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