There was an "outage" yesterday

and it seems there was chaos with it. A major communications network was "down" and it seems we could not cope. 

The transport system was badly affected. Some train services were not able to run. Buses had problems too. Traffic lights were "out" everywhere. (At least one lot was flashing red though so I imagine patience was what was really needed in many places.)

People could not make or receive calls, not even 000 was working. They apparently missed about three hundred and thirty calls. Yes, I do consider the latter to be serious. It is serious, very serious. At the same time I suspect many other phone calls could wait. This is the school holiday period so traffic was lighter than usual and not so many people were dropping their children off.

It was not possible to look at the internet on your phone on the way to work. No, it was not the internet that was down. It was the phone network. That is a problem. What on earth do you do? Sit on the bus and stare at the scenery? Read an actual book? Talk to your neighbour? I suspect most people just stared impatiently ahead of them. 

The supermarkets and other shops had problems because people could not pay for goods. Most people do not seem to have any cash. All sorts of other transactions were also halted. People could not phone an order to a business.

Yes, there were major problems and I do not want suggest they were not serious. They were serious. It was alarming to realise just how vulnerable we are when a major system fails. This is why the "renewable energy" ideal is not the answer to everything. When did you physically last check on someone during an outage?

For those of you in Upover, here is Spooner's cartoon showing our "renewable energy Minister" trying to dial the emergency number in Downunder. 

 

 

"Highly inappropriate"

does not even begin to describe the Prime Minister's words on that "podcast". He should not even have appeared on the podcast. It is not an appropriate forum for anyone who wishes to be taken seriously. 

I do not pretend to understand the podcast idea very well. I do not  "have the app on my phone" or "follow" any. Perhaps I could, perhaps I even should - but I don't. 

I did not even need to do it to learn about "what the Prime Minister said". It has been reported on television, on radio and in the press. I saw the incident on the news service I (rather reluctantly) watch. Friends in other countries, and not just English speaking countries, have inquired about it. 

Politicians know how to avoid answering questions they do not wish to answer. Journalists know how to ask those questions in an effort to make them squirm even when they know the question will not be answered. 

So, why did the Prime Minister answer the very inappropriate question in an even more inappropriate way? If he had simply avoided the question most people would never have known he was even appearing on that podcast. Was that why he did it? Did he want to be seen as a "good mate who just happens to like a very popular singer"?

Our Prime Minister keeps reminding us he "grew up in public housing" and did it with his "single" mother. That story is just a little more complicated than he makes it out to be. Most children in council housing whose mothers are on a "disability support pension" do not attend expensive fee paying schools. They do not go on to university without excellent scholarships and outstanding results. There is no evidence of these things here. He is unusual in what he has managed to keep quiet about. His emphasis on the council house and the single mother is what he needs people to concentrate on.

The remarks on the podcast have been described as "lewd", "crude", "disrespectful", "misogynistic", "vile", "embarrassing", "smutty" and "disrespectful" as well as "inappropriate".  They were all those things and more - and his "apology" has not gone down well. 

Our state newspaper apparently emailed every member of his party who has a seat in the Lower House for comment. Only one of them has apparently replied - and that was with what is described as a "cryptic, thumbs up emoji". Of course they have not replied. Some of them might be feeling uncomfortable, even very uncomfortable, but they are not going to criticise the boss. That they have demanded the resignation of members from other parties for far less is of course irrelevant. They believe "the other side" would do the same given the chance. There would be demands for a resignation or, at very least, removal to the back bench. 

In this instance I am not too sure about that. My radical left wing neighbour has just informed me he is "disgusted" but "he's a great man really". Really?  

 

 

Please look after your volunteers!

Yes, I know there is a "Volunteers Week" somewhere in the calendar of events. I know there are "volunteers" who get those gongs for "service to the community" and I know there are many people who put in more than ten hours a week "serving others". They usually get some sort of recognition.

There are also all those quiet volunteers who make things happen. They do the dirty jobs. They do the things nobody else is very keen to do. They work "behind the scenes". 

I am thinking of someone I was talking to yesterday. I innocently inquired about a group she belonged to and how it was going.

"I've left," she told me. It was said quietly and I was not sure I was properly hearing what she said to me. She had been there for years. I have talked to the group on two occasions and she was always the one busy in the kitchen, clearing up after the afternoon tea.

Recently she was in hospital for eight days. I went to visit her. (It took two trains in each direction.) When I got there she was out of bed and helping the person in the next bed with their afternoon tea. One of the staff told me, "She's lovely. It's been a real help to have her around."

Not one member of the group she has done so much for had even inquired as to how she was. Yes, they knew where she was because she was not able to get to the meeting. She had sent an apology when she left a message to tell them how to get the tablecloths and tea towels she had washed and ironed. 

I know this because I spoke to another member of the group last night. She was upset over the resignation and said how useful this person had been. 

"Did you ever tell her that?" I asked.

"No, but she knew how much we appreciated her," was the response.

Really? There are people in the group who have been given "life membership" for far less.  

The person doing the washing up and putting the rubbish out is every bit as important as the person running the meeting. Unless you say "thank you" they won't know you appreciate them.  

How hard is it to forecast the weather?

 The Bureau of Meteorology has a job to do. It is supposed to forecast the weather. 

Now I know it is an "inexact" science at the best of times but they have a lot of very expensive equipment, including a satellite or two, with which to do it. Surely they can give us a rough idea of what the day holds? 

As a kitten I can remember being taken to a weather station. The entire school, around fifty of us, were taken to the "big" town about a hundred kilometres away. This was done by crowding everyone into  the two school "buses" (a Kombi and a Ford transit type) and cars. It was the big excursion of the year. 

We were excited. We were going to see the weather station, the "School of the Air", the airport and the dock for the ships. I often wonder what the modern child would make of these things. We thought it would be interesting. 

It was.  We said "hello" to our mates at a couple of the "stations up the track". (No, not railway stations but big sheep farming properties.)  The teacher at the School of the Air had arranged that even though nobody was too sure what to say to each other. We saw a plane come in to land and were then allowed to have a closer look. We went down to the water and a couple of the boys found a dead fish. We had lunch on the foreshore and there was the big treat of ice cream for everyone. 

Then we went to the weather station. It would be quite different now but back then it was a fascinating place of "things" going around in circles and bars and graphs and a telescope we could look through. (There was no stars of course. It was daylight.) And then the man in charge of the station showed us "the balloon". It was black. It had to be inflated. He told us how it would help to predict the weather. Then he did actually inflate it and, at the correct moment, it went up. Now, he told us, they would be able to tell what sort of weather we were going to have.

Suitably impressed by this we left and made the long trek back to our little school.

The following day the Senior Cat did all the proper follow up lessons. He talked about the balloon, of course he did. We had all been rather impressed by the idea that a balloon might be able to tell us what the weather would be like. 

It all worked very well until one of the boys who was repeating the final year for the third time because he was not old enough to leave school said something like, "I told my Dad and he said to go and ask Grandpa because Grandpa always knows too." 

I remember the Senior Cat nodding and saying, "Yes. That is the next thing we need to talk about. How do farmers know what the weather might do?"

We went on to learn about "observation" and "experience".  Our BOM could do with some of that generation of farmers to teach them a thing or two. This year's "dry" year has produced more rain in a month than we get most years.  

It is expensive to study

in another country. I know. I have done it. It is not easy.

It was easier for me than it was for many other students. I went from one English speaking country to another, to one culture which was very much like the one I had left. I could walk into the supermarket and find familiar items, even familiar brands. 

Supporting myself was relatively easy. I tutored. I did not need to try and find a job in a fast food outlet or as a cleaner. Well, realistically I could not have done those things. Tutoring was about all I could do and I knew I was lucky to be able to do it. Later I had a job looking after a small library. I did more tutoring and supervision.

Most students I have tutored have been students from other cultures. For many of them English has been a second or even third language. They have varied greatly in ability. Some have been outstanding, others less so...and a few should not have been here at all.

It will be interesting to see then whether the twenty-five percent rise in student visa fees has any effect on the numbers applying or their motivation for doing so. A staff member at one of our universities has expressed concern about this.

"We are too dependent on those students," he told me yesterday. "They bring the money in and, so far, it has kept me in a job but is it a good thing?"

He is a member of staff at the "new" university. This is the university which is the amalgamation of two of the three we had in this state. It took a long time to recognise the population here cannot, even with the large number of students from other countries. support three universities. 

I have long been of the view that there are subjects and courses taught there which could be better taught in TAFE (technical and further education) colleges. There are practical subjects which are now "degree" courses. It seems everyone needs a degree now. It is quite unlike the teaching, nursing and farming courses my fellow students went into from school. I found the "handbook" for the time I was at teacher training college recently. It was interesting but it made me realise that most students went out into schools as teachers after just two years. Somehow they managed to teach and many of them did a very good job of it. I rather doubt that the new teachers going into schools are doing a better job simply because they now train for twice as long and have letters after their names. They actually spend less time in the classroom than we did. 

I wonder what we are really teaching people and what the students coming in from other countries are actually learning. Are we giving them value for the money they spend? Is the standard really high enough? Looking at some essays I doubt it. I know some students will be given a pass mark because the person marking the essay will not be permitted to do otherwise. I have even been told, "Just get them to pass something in that looks as if they may have written it."  

Will there be even more of that now the fees have risen? Is this what needs to happen to keep the universities open and all those compulsory units of "indigenous", "gender", environmental", "gene therapy" and other "correct" issue courses taught? I am not sure it is going to work - or will there still be students who will find ways around it all in order to actually learn?   

Another "renewable energy" company has

gone bust in this state. The company apparently had four solar "farms" and one wind "farm". 

I am wondering how many more such companies are going to fail before we come to terms with how much "renewables" cost. How many people believe that, once the solar panels or wind turbine is there, renewable energy is "free"?

It is not free of course. There are costs associated with what is called "renewable" energy. 

There were some solar panels on the house I last lived in. There are no solar panels on this group of units.  There is no way they can be put on our shared roofing.  Would I want them there?

The solar panels on the house were used to heat the hot water. There was electrical back up when the sun did not shine. My BIL, an engineer, had calculated that the panels would be cost effective. Over the time they were there they made a miniscule profit (less than one percent) but only because my BIL was the one who could climb up to check on them whenever there was a hail storm. He would also clean them on a schedule known only to him. They were not something you simply put in place and then left.

Were they the "environmentally responsible" option? The reality is they were not. Without the work done by my BIL they would have cost more and none of the calculations we did took into account the cost to the environment of actually producing, transporting, installing the panels and more. I am left wondering about that.

A couple of days ago one of the very active environmental advocates was telling me gleefully how they had to close down a nuclear reactor in France. The weather was too hot according to him. For him it was proof that nuclear was not the answer.

I do not know if nuclear is the answer or not. (I do think we should be doing much more research into fusion rather than fission.) What I do know is that Europe in general is not used to very high temperatures. They last had a really hot summer about fifty years ago. One summer of very hot weather since then does not "prove" climate change. There is evidence to suggest summers were much warmer several hundred years ago.  Winters were colder too.  Houses are not built for extreme heat...or cold. 

There is also evidence that solar panels and wind turbines are vulnerable to weather events. Advocates for renewable energy claim that events like severe hailstorms which damage the panels or tornadoes which flatten the turbines are evidence of climate change. Are they really? Did we never have such events prior to monitoring climate change? How much environmental damage was caused manufacturing the panels and turbines before they were installed to "save" the planet?

It takes far more water and energy to produce one cup of "almond milk" than it does to produce one cup of milk but we keep being told that the "farm" producing the almond milk is the environmentally responsible answer. Is it?

I am not sure it is...but it might help if we planted more trees. 

   

A "canteen Christian"?

 Someone I do not know muttered this to me as we passed the stand which sometimes appears outside the local shopping centre. There are generally two people standing there with it and there is "literature" about "free Bible study classes" and "the Coming" and more. 

The person who spoke to me moved on rapidly. He may have been embarrassed at actually having said anything at all. That he had said anything was interesting but not that unusual. People I do know find those standing there everything from an annoyance to sad. I know of nobody who actually supports them or has engaged them in more than the briefest of conversation. What conversation there is may be polite but it is usually an irritated, "Not interested" or "I go to church" from the older passers by to, "Don't believe any of that" from younger people.

I pedal past and say nothing. For some reason they have never approached me or attempted to speak to me. I suspect they may think I am a very slow learner. It is a mistake which has been made more than once in my life...or perhaps I really am a slow learner. 

Yesterday I just pedalled around the corner, parked in my usual spot, had a short conversation with the dog shivering in the cold and went inside. I did what I needed to do and, as I was doing it, I thought about the two people standing outside in the cold. They were determined I suppose. I cannot imagine people were queuing up to talk to them or that they were bringing people in to their brand of Christianity. They must get some I suppose or they would not do what they do. 

But the term "canteen Christian" stayed with me. I have often heard the term "rice Christian" - someone who attends church and believes (or believes they believe) in order to eat, or perhaps do not believe at all but attendance means food and companionship.  What then is a "canteen Christian"? 

I thought about canteens and the more modern "food courts", the places where you can go in and pick and choose what you want to eat. Is that what the passerby meant? I am not sure it is. I suspect it was more "they believe they can hand you a meal on a plate and tell you this is all you need in order to survive". 

I also suspect they are saying "We are not giving you a choice. We are telling you this is what you need to eat. You do not need anything else."

I am not sure belief in anything works that way.  

 

 

"The road is too narrow for

it to have a cycle path," Middle Cat commented when I told her I had been asked to fill out the "survey" by the local council.

The local council is looking at extending the "cycle paths" in the local area. This means the roads where cyclists have dedicated lanes of use at least for part of the day.

The street I now live in leads directly to the local primary school. The next street parallel to it does too but it is much less used because people turn naturally at the roundabout and come down this street. Before and after school this street is very busy. I try to avoid being out at that time. 

Yes, I could try and stay on the footpath. It is legal to do that. The problem is that the footpath is not in good repair. There is growth along it which makes it almost impossible to get past if you are a tricycle rider, wheelchair user or pram pusher. 

The road is narrow. There are often cars parked on either side and that can mean cars having to stop and give way to an oncoming car. 

Some weeks ago the new occupant in the next unit had her boyfriend move in with her. He wanted to use my car parking space. I was not using it so why should he not be able to use it? 

I said "No." I was not being unduly difficult. I had allowed the policeman who was there at the beginning to use it occasionally. The next resident asked a couple of times when her father had knee surgery and needed to stay overnight. Apart from that it is used by people who come to see me. Middle Cat used it yesterday when she brought in some milk for me. (It was pouring rain and she had used her car to get them milk and bread as well.) My friend W... parks there when she visits. She will be 90 in August and uses a walker. It has been used by someone bringing someone else who uses a walker. Workmen use it occasionally and I have accepted that as necessary.

This time however the boyfriend wanted to park his work van permanently in my space. (His girlfriend has her own car.)  It did not seem right to me. He is not supposed to be living there anyway.

So, he parks on the street of course. He parks along with some cars that are there all day. Their owners have gone off to work at the shopping centre and parked as close as they can without breaking the two hour limit. It all adds to the problems. 

I would like a cycle path along the street. I know some parents of primary school children who would like it too. I also know it is not a practical solution. 

Before I finish filling the form out I think I need to speak to my friend J... He is still doing battle with the council over the "solution" they put in place with the railway crossing. The solution he offered was both simple and cheap. They went with something incredibly complex and very expensive. I am sure he can come up with a similar solution for this street...and that they might well ignore that too. Why are they asking for feedback?   

Whatever happened to "eccentricity"?

I am sure you know the sort of thing I mean. The adult who insists on only wearing a tie and socks in matching colours or only one shade of lipstick, the child who insists on counting the number of peas on the plate before eating them, the person who gets anxious if someone else sits in "their" seat on the bus and the person who checks all the locks twice - are they all "autistic"? 

There is an article in this morning's paper saying autism in this country is diagnosed at three times the global average...and that this is not necessarily a good thing. I have to agree. I would also agree that the National Disability Insurance Scheme and, once diagnosed, readily available money has been part of the problem.

Let me be quite clear about all this. Severe and profound autism is disabling. It can be severely and profoundly disabling. People with the condition need help. Their families and carers need help handling them. Some cannot dress themselves. They will only eat certain foods in a certain order and only if they are in certain positions on the plate. They will never hold a conversation with anyone.

At the other end of the scale the boy I went to school with who insisted on writing with only a pencil was not autistic. He admitted to me much later in life that he was afraid of making mistakes. You could rub a pencil mark out. You could not rub out pen marks. 

It is quite likely he would now be regarded as "autistic". There would be efforts to "encourage" him to use a pen, to do things differently. He might have ended up feeling less comfortable. In the year I knew him his teacher simply recognised an unhappy, uncertain little boy whose work with a pencil was slightly above average. He liked things to be precise. He ended up working as a draftsman but he never married and never learned to drive. He lived alone in a house where nothing was out of place and he kept his geometric garden immaculate. At his funeral his neighbours spoke of his eccentricity but also of his generosity with garden produce, the way he would mow the lawn for the elderly woman across the street and more. His immediate neighbour actually said to me, "I suppose that's what they call autistic now but really he was just what my dad would called a bit eccentric."

I know other people who are a "bit eccentric". I do not see them as "autistic". If we must label people then I will reserve it for the boy who looks perfectly normal but does not speak and will not use the lift. He will not eat some foods and only eats some foods on some occasions. He can also build complex Lego kits - the type they use for university students.  

I know "autism" is not a single issue. It is a complex range of issues and there are degrees of complexity within those issues. I just do not like the idea that some of the quirky little things which make us different and interesting and add to our interactions with each other are being labelled this way. 

Do we want everyone to be the same?  

Penelope Keith added a phrase to

our family's repertoire of insider jokes. She does not say it herself but her expression as it is said tells us so much. As the snobby Margot in "The Good Life" she is trying to clean up after her neighbour Barbara (Felicity Kendal). She has put down newspapers and brought out the vacuum cleaner in an effort to keep things immaculate and Barbara says, "You missed a bit."  Now, if anyone leaves something behind when clearing up we are likely to say "You missed a bit." We understand the joke but it has to be explained to other people. It is just one of those little oddities that occur in our family that have come from the outside.

Her death has left me wondering how many other families have been influenced by her superb acting.  Anyone can say the lines but saying them with meaning and that all important ability to do it at precisely the right moment is rare.  She was exactly right for that "snobbishness" but apparently not in the least bit snobbish herself. Her marriage to a policeman lasted, something of a rarity in the world of acting. That surely says a great deal about her as a person.

I have never had any desire to be on stage. The thought of having to so thoroughly immerse myself in being someone else is one I actually find genuinely frightening. I hope I could still learn the lines but I very much doubt I could say them. How do they do it? It is something I would like to have asked her, would like to ask someone like Dame Judi Dench, would like to have asked Dame Maggie Smith.  To my mind they are and were people who could really act. It is a rare gift, but one which would have to be worked at all the time. I am absolutely certain it would not be easy. 

I suspect I would have liked Dame Penelope if I had ever met her. It leaves just Dame Judi Dench, another apparently gracious lady, of the four "great dames". It has been a great privilege to "know" them. 

 

 

Please do not tax education

or the books which help to do it.

There is apparently a robust discussion going on in Upover at present. Their government introduced VAT or "value added tax" into their fee paying schools. The discussion revolves around whether they were right to do this, whether it has brought in any money, what the effect is on the overall school system and more. Those who oppose any form of "private" education - oddly known as "public" by some - think this has been desirable. Others do not.

We have the same sort of discussion here. It comes on every time there is any tax payer money spent on the fee paying system. There are people who strongly oppose spending any money on the "private" school system, so much so there have been serious attempts to ban it altogether.

I went to both public and fee paying schools. My parents worked in the public system and it was natural that this was where I and my siblings should go. Then, in my last year, it was no longer possible to do that. The school I was attending, the one the Senior Cat was principal of, could no longer cater for me. It could no longer cater for anyone who wanted to complete their secondary education. This was just the way things worked in rural areas. Students who wanted to go on had to move on. 

There was a choice of course. You could head to the nearest school which taught what you needed or you could go further afield to the capital city. Going to the nearest school might be two or more hours away so your parents might find someone willing to take in a "weekly" boarder, often a relative. The school would almost certainly still have a limited range of subjects and facilities simply because it would be a "country" school.  Or you could head off to the capital city. Boarding with a family might still be an option but it was much more difficult to find. Boarding school was the answer for many families. It still is.  We could do away with all this I suppose and have state run boarding houses for students from outlying areas like they do in Shetland but is that really the answer? 

The real issue however is should those who are already being taxed pay additional tax because of the choice they make to educate their young?  Most people would see that as wrong. I see it as wrong. I see it as wrong because I do not believe you should tax education. It is education which leads to employment which leads to paying taxes and a better standard of living for everyone. Education provides the services we need. 

I know not everyone will agree. There will still be people who say adding VAT to school fees is the right thing to do. 

Will they also argue that adding VAT to books is the right thing to do? Is it right to tax people who want to read? That is what happens here. There is our equivalent of VAT, the GST (goods and services tax), on books. It is something which should never have happened. Those who do not buy books do not see this as a problem of course. They do not see it as taxing knowledge. They simply shrug and say, "If you want to read..." 

I do not see reading in the same way as I see going to a football match. If I buy a book for myself then I potentially have that book for as long as I need it. The football match is over in a few hours and most of it, if not all, is forgotten a few months later. Information inside a book, or just the story itself, can remain with you forever. 

Education, including all means of accessing it, should surely not be subject to additional forms of tax? No doubt the topic will be back under robust debate when the next budget is being handed down.  

  

No, parents must be responsible

and be held responsible. You are not going to get children under sixteen off social media by trying to make "big tech" responsible. It will not work...or rather, it might work but not in the way the government intends.

I am fed up with the "ban". It is not working. You only have to walk through the shopping centre after school is out or watch the gang waiting to catch the train. You only need to be anywhere under sixteens are gathered and more than one of them will have a phone out and they will be looking at video clips and more. Of course they will. They have the technology in their hands.

The answer to banning under sixteens from social media is complex of course, even answering the question of whether they should be banned is not a simple "yes" or "no". The problem is that the government brought in legislation which has a secondary purpose. This is not about getting under sixteens off social media. It is about controlling social media. 

If they had simply wanted to prevent under sixteens from using social media then most use could have been wiped out instantly by making it illegal for an under sixteen to have a phone. That would have been the most radical solution. Parents would not have accepted that. They would have cited all sorts of "safety" reasons. 

There is an obvious answer then isn't there? Under sixteens can only have phones with a limited number of functions. They "need" phones that can make and receive calls, make and receive text messages. What else do they need for "safety"? Nothing. Such phones exist. They are not expensive. They are far cheaper than the phones which can access social media. They work on much cheaper plans. 

There could be a government scheme for all of this. You want your child to have a phone? We will allow your child to have one from this range. It will not be able to do more than we allow. Here kids, you can choose from bright yellow, lime green, hot pink, punk purple. We will be able to see if you are using something else. If we catch you using anything else then your parents will be held to account. 

It is not the role of "big tech" to deal with this. So, why is the government doing it? The answer to that is almost certainly a desire to try and control the use of social media or, at very least, the desire to be able to monitor everything which is said and done there. When the ban on social media doesn't work they are hoping for two things. The first is that the "big tech" owners will bring in measures that drastically reduce our ability to access information. A great deal of the information out there is inaccurate but so is the information passed on to us from "official" sources. The latter however is what the government of the day wants us to know, even if it is not true.  The second is that, when the information flow has been reduced and directed in ways the government finds more acceptable they will be able to still further control the growth of AI and the forms of information which are available. 

Social media may be a "scourge" but trying to control it now is something which might be working in North Korea and might work for short periods of time in places like Iran. Is that what we want? 

Delivering a parcel should not be

difficult but it seems it is.  The group of units in which I now live have letter boxes of course but these are some distance away out by the footpath. They are not secure. We are not permitted to put any sort of lock on the box which belongs to us. 

As most people get very little paper mail this is probably of no great concern. The local "postie" tells me it never takes her long to deal with the mail for all twelve units. 

I get most of my mail, such as it is, delivered to a post office box at the local post office. It makes sense. I can access it any time. It is the "street" address we had to have when we set up the micro aid group forty something years ago. It is secure.

The problem is not with letters it is with parcels. There are some places which will not deliver to a post office box. They use "courier" services rather than post mail. That can be a problem. A parcel went missing some weeks back. I have not received compensation for that even though the courier service was well aware they were at fault.  This parcel, again something to be shared out to a craft group, was "unable to be delivered to a safe location". It is still "on board" for delivery. 

In this instance I can only assume that the person doing the deliveries is not a regular post office person. It will be one of the many people who deliver parcels outside regular hours. They have other jobs. The parcel delivery job is extra, a job to be done at nights or weekends. It might be they could not find their way down the path in the dark. Yes, the parcel might get there in the end...when they can find time. 

Someone in another unit did have a parcel delivered yesterday. The parcel delivery person was going to leave it with me. He asked if I was L... and I shook my head and pointed to the unit in question. I was talking to someone in Venezuela at the time and it was difficult enough or I might have asked if he had the parcel being delivered to me.

Getting parcels in the post is not the huge excitement it was when I was a mere kitten. Parcels were rare. They came right to the front door, delivered by someone wearing a post office uniform and a cap. Now, unless a signature is required, they get dumped wherever the delivery person decides is convenient. 

The parcel should have been here three or four days ago. I am now wondering if it will take another three or four weeks to be returned to the post office which might let me know it is available. If they do then the "it cannot go to a post office" message will make even less sense than it does now.  

Is it "free speech" or is it

something else? 

I do not watch "breakfast" television or listen to early morning radio. I do not know the person at the centre of a "row" of some sort. The person in question apparently interviewed someone whose views are unacceptable. I know very little about that someone too. From what little I do know I do not think I would care for his views either.

That said, does he have the right to be heard? It is a question which should be debated at the highest levels and it should be debated seriously. It is no good simply saying "his views are abhorrent and he must be banned".  All that is going to do is make his views even more attractive to people who are already leaning in his direction. There will be others who have not even thought in his terms who will also find his ideas attractive simply because he has been banned. They will seek him out.

His removal from breakfast television (whatever that is) has reminded me of Giggle v Tickle again. One of the people behind that, the one who is attempting to retain as "girls only" space, tried to get our ABC (the Downunder version of the BBC) to publish her side of the arguments being put forward. They have published, interviewed, discussed and more the other side of the arguments. The bias they are displaying is clear. It matters not that the ABC is the publicly funded broadcaster whose charter demands they not take sides. They are not going to allow her side to be heard...at least yet. I cannot help wondering if this will change should the matter go her way in the High Court. 

If the High Court comes down on the other side then there is no hope for us as a country. I wonder if they will even be able to do what it is clear must be done. The government certainly intends to do nothing.  Why should it? It will just upset the very vocal minority group who will be able to manipulate the media into presenting the story so that they appear to be the victims.

It is that "victimhood" approach which is so successful. Behind the scenes of some of the major media stories there is a very different story being played out. One of the few aid workers left in a war zone told me recently that a "foreign" news crew came in. They filmed a "distraught" father holding a "dead" child. When the filming was finished the child went back to what he was doing. The crew apparently did not see this as a problem "because it is the sort of thing which is happening". Is it? Quite possibly it is but is it happening in the way which the media is telling us? One side of the story will have it that there was no "real" violence surrounding the kidnappings in Israel and that no children have been abducted by Russians in Ukraine. The protests in Iran are apparently all against America and the ebola outbreak has been contained and...I could go on. 

The reality is that "free speech" is intent on selling us the story others want us to hear. Sometimes it is a reasonable representation of what is actually happening but the reality can also be very different. The people on that maritime flotilla heading to Gaza want us to believe the worst about those who perhaps prevented them from likely being, at best, taken hostage. They have succeeded in meeting the Foreign Minister and the Prime Minister. The media is telling their story - and many people believe it. Is the reality different? It might be. We are only being told one side.

It would be good to have other views sometimes, even views we find abhorrent. We need to teach children to think about what is actually being said and encourage them to search for alternative views. 

 But...speaking up has consequences.

Has the Prime Minister benefitted from

what might be called "insider trading"? 

There can be no doubt he would have had to pay another $200,000 in tax under the new regime he has just pushed through parliament. It has been pushed through in coalition with the watermelon crew. That the new regulations not only break election promises that were said to be "cast iron" they are, if economists are to be believed, going to harm the economy. 

Of course they are being sold to us as the opposite. They are supposedly going to allow "young people" to "get their foot in the door" and "allow them to climb the housing ladder". I believe none of that. 

I do not know much about economics on that scale. I have, as far as I can, to trust those who know more than I do. They know much more than I do too. I hear people who have been running successful enterprises which are making a profit and employing a growing number of people tell me "this won't work". No, explained to me I can see it won't work the way the government says it intends things to work. Their moves are going to do more harm than good.

What has really convinced me however is the behaviour of our Prime Minister. He knew what the government intended to bring in last year. He sold three properties at that time. He sold them under the "old" rules. Doing that saved him paying another $200,000 in tax. That is a lot of money. He knew it would. Was it deliberate? 

He was asked this question in parliament - and refused to answer it. The Speaker ruled it out as well. It is a simple question. He could have said it was not deliberate. He could have said he was given advice to sell for other reasons. He did not. He refused to answer the question and treated the female member of the opposition who asked it with what I will politely call "disdain"...it was rather worse than that. He got away with that too.

The government has such a large majority in the lower house that he will almost certainly get away with it - at least for now. That he may be guilty of the worst form of insider training is not something even the media seems prepared to take up seriously. There have been hints of improper behaviour, nothing more and nothing less. 

This morning's paper also carries a news story about a journalist who was required to remove an interview with a far right personality. I have no time for the person he interviewed but  does it mean this person should be silenced? It seems the media is now doing the government's bidding. Is it also doing the bidding of the government here and keeping quiet an act which, if proven, would see a business person sent to prison? 

I might be quite wrong about all this but other people are asking the same questions. Is this simply some sort of conspiracy theory that needs to be dealt with or is it a serious issue? Is it time for some answers? 

There were just eleven people at the funeral

I attended yesterday. It was by invitation only. There were just eleven of us. 

Would I have gone without an invitation, if it had been an open to all event? 

If I am honest then the answer is "no". The person being farewelled was a difficult, cantankerous, downright rude at times sort of person. I did not avoid him but I did not actively seek him out. He was simply there as one of the old people on my regular bike route. When he had to move into a nursing home I saw him only as one of the other residents when I went to visit people I thought of as friends. 

His children had long since moved to other parts of the world. They did not come back. I dealt with a few things for him but only at the request of his eldest son. His eldest son was polite about it, very polite. He was the one who gave me the invitation to attend.

"Dad wanted you there. He had no time for us. He called us "useless" when we moved away. He never forgave Mum for dying so early."

The eleven of us stood around the coffin. It was a cheap coffin, the cheapest there is. He had chosen it himself. He had chosen who would be there.  He had left the instructions to be given to his eldest son and his son had carried them out. His daughter and other son were there but no other family. There was the priest, a representative from the nursing home, three people from the funeral home, me and two former neighbours. 

I thought of the other funeral I had attended on the previous Friday. The church it was held in was full. Good things were said.

This time the priest did not seem sure what to say. Nobody else was asked to say anything. I wondered what I would have said. I think I would have said "lonely by choice". It is a hard thing to say about anyone but in this case it would be true. He chose to be lonely. 

There was no standing around and chatting afterwards but as I was about to go his daughter suddenly hugged me tightly.  He did not need to be lonely and I suspect they tried harder than he ever admitted. 

 

 

  

Being a monocultural society

is not possible is it?  The redheaded politician has been accused of calling for that. 

Dig a little deeper into what she is actually saying and it is not that but it might easily be taken that way. There are apparently a good number of people who want it too. 

I do not believe any society is "mono-cultural". There have been attempts of course but have they really succeeded? I suspect that even in the last outposts of ultra-communist countries there are differences. There will be regional history, a regional custom, a regional word in use and so on. People who live along a border will share commonalities with people who live on the other side of the border.  The idea that you can simply stop sharply at a border and have a completely different culture just does not work for me. People have been taking on language, food and all sorts of cultural practices from those around them for as long as we have existed. Trying to stop that does not work even in China or Cuba or North Korea. A tiny country like Bhutan is not immune to change any more than a large one.

Of course change was once much slower. Perhaps it was so slow we did not really believe it was taking place - but it was. 

When I was a mere kitten a trip to Europe was a major undertaking. It was the sort of thing for which people saved for many years and almost certainly only did once. Many people never did it.  They never moved off the massive island on which we live. There were a great many people who never went to another state. There were people with whom I went to school who had never been to the capital city. Some had not even been into the big fishing port at the base of the peninsula. 

An outsider might have looked at that and said "mono-cultural". They would have been wrong. There were subtle differences in language and pronunciation even there. People who lived inland did not eat fish unless they happened to be visiting that port or the other major town on the coast. People who lived along the coastline did but transporting fish inland was not done for lack of refrigeration. Now you can buy frozen fish in the nearest township which has a "supermarket". You can add a packet of frozen chips too along with and the "Chinese" or "Greek" or "Italian" ready meals. Nothing is going to change that. Our food choices are not mono-cultural. It is unlikely they have ever been that. 

As a child I ate quan dong pies because the quan dongs grew where we lived. It was "free" food and people were not wealthy. Eating kangaroo or wallaby meat was common for many people. It was food you did not need to buy. (I have tasted it and cannot handle the strong flavour of it.) Now it is an expensive "healthy" alternative you buy at a specialist butcher in the city.

More than one area in this state was settled by German migrants very far back. Go into those areas now and it is not just the names which are different but the food often is as well. There are cook books based on it. Even when I was at school there were children who came from families where German was spoken at home and they had to learn English at school. Sundays, whether you were Catholic or Lutheran, were spent at church and in communal gatherings. That has changed now but it still influences life there. 

We were never mono-cultural. We could not become mono-cultural. I can see where there is need for change however. There have been calls for "sharia law" and that concerns me. A country needs just one legal system and ours is, rightly, regarded as a good one. There are schools which have been set up for minority groups but these can be a means of isolating children from the mainstream of society. There are government funded programs designed to retain other languages and other cultures. Those things can do harm if they are used to isolate people. We need to be aware of the potential harm which can be done even when we are told to "celebrate diversity", 

Getting the balance right and doing it in the way that does the most good is what matters. We are never going to be mono-cultural.  

"You could catch the bus"

someone told me when I politely informed them I would not be going to an event they were enthusiastic about attending.

No, I could not catch the bus. Catching a bus means getting to the bus stop, getting on the bus and bouncing along for almost an hour surrounded by people who have all the usual ills of winter. It means attempting to cross two very busy roads on foot....and then doing it all in reverse to come back again. 

"Or get a taxi...you have vouchers..." they added. I wonder if they had any idea what that would cost? No, I thought not.

I said again, "Thanks but I don't want to go. I really am not interested. I have a lot of things I need to get done right now."

There was a huffy silence and then a sigh, "You really are very unsociable Cat. The rest of us do our best and you just don't want to do things."

I did want to do something the other day. I was invited to afternoon tea for a friend's birthday. It clashed with another friend coming for lunch. I could not "splinch" myself Harry Potter style to do both...and my friends understood that - completely. I thought about this as I thought about being "unsociable". 

I don't mean to be "unsociable". It is just much easier if people come and visit me than I go to visit them. This doesn't mean I won't pedal off and see people if necessary but very often it is just easier for them to visit me. I can "put the kettle on" (now an electric jug) and give them the appropriate mug or cup and saucer. They do not have to do an extra trip to get me there and back to wherever they live. 

"Haven't seen you in a while," D... said to me when I appeared at the funeral last week. If he had thought about it he would have realised two things. The first would have been that I am not officially one of his parishioners. My name is on the church contacts list simply because so many elderly members of his congregation find it necessary to contact me about one thing or another. The other is that the pedal up the hill is almost beyond me. It's a steep hill and the trike does not like it any more than I do. I doubt he has ever thought of the practicalities. He just gets in his car and goes where he needs to go. He is not being thoughtless. It is just the way it happens...for him and a lot of other people. 

The person who wanted me to go to the event could have gone a little out of her way and picked me up but she never picks anyone up. It is something she refuses to do. There is always an excuse of some sort. She is well and widely known for it. For me that works well. She would have my life "organised" if she could. 

Not having a car is a nuisance at times but it can also be a blessing. In this instance I am not going to have to endure a concert of the sort of music I really loathe as a fundraiser for a political group I do not support. A friend is coming in to pick something up instead. We might even have a cuppa. 

   

"And your favourite swear word is...."

I can almost hear the AI interviewer asking a question like that.

One of the more outrageous columnists has a piece about swearing in the paper this morning. He looks at it as history and how attitudes towards it have changed.

I grew up in a family where swearing was unacceptable. Nobody I knew swore the more serious swear words. I am not sure I even knew they existed.

I remember a lesson the Senior Cat taught us when I was in the last year of primary school. He was my teacher as well as my father. My mother was the only other teacher in the school. One of the little ones had rushed up to my mother in the playground because another child had fallen and was bleeding. "He's got a bloody nose!" 

We had the lesson explaining how, in that context, "bloody" was correct. It was not swearing. The Senior Cat had some bemused parents asking for an explanation after church on the following Sunday morning. That most of the men would undoubtedly have sworn frequently did not stop the need for an explanation. 

Words like "damn" and "blast" were considered unacceptable in my childhood. There were more words my brother and I had heard around the docks of course but we did not understand them. We did not use them. Mum would have washed our mouths out with soap and given us a belting with the strap. 

I was in my mid teens when I heard my grandfather swear. Grandma and I were hanging out the washing. Grandpa was some distance from us chopping wood. The head of the axe suddenly flew off and landed near Grandma's feet. It gave her a start and it was much too close for Grandpa. He made a sound I had never heard before. Grandma had never heard it either. She had grown up on a farm and I am certain her father and brothers swore. I remember we looked at each other as Grandpa picked up the axe head and began to apologise over and over again. I remember Grandma saying, "It's all right Ben. It didn't touch me." 

That was not the reason for his distress. He had apparently used a swear word. That the word was in Gaelic. We did not understand it but it still distressed him. His parents had spoken Gaelic. His father was a sailor, ship's pilot and marine cartographer. No doubt he had been surrounded by swearing in more than one language. Grandpa though did not swear. My great grandmother would apparently have had something to say about it if her children had said anything unacceptable.

I thought of this again years later. I was working in a school for children who were physically and intellectually disabled. There was one child who was verbal and often uncontrollable. Her family background was German. One day she swore at me in German after having been told off for swearing in English. I told her I understood and did not like it. She then went on to swear at me in Italian and what I suspect was Maltese. I told her each time I understood. Finally she looked at me in a puzzled sort of way and said, "I not swear then." She never swore at me again but I sometimes wondered whether I should have allowed her to go on swearing to ease her frustrations.

Still later I came across a very frustrated profoundly deaf boy. I was crossing his schoolyard when he came out of a doorway backwards. He was using some very graphic signs at his teacher when he bumped into me. The transformation from absolute fury at his teacher to his horror at having been seen swearing in front of a woman was startling. He signed "sorry" and fled. His teacher let him go. "He will come back and apologise to me too. I would rather he did that than lashed out."

And perhaps that is the important thing. I don't feel a need to swear but if saying something like that helps someone not commit violence then it matters.

It was years later that the Senior Cat was putting up a bookshelf when it fell over close to where my then very young nephews were playing on the floor. He said "Blast". I remember the older nephew looking at the younger one in a slightly bewildered way and then saying "Papa swore." Their own father swears but they knew the Senior Cat did not...unless the bookcase fell over and might have hit them.  

I went to the "party" after the funeral

yesterday. It was C...'s funeral. She was in her nineties and in a great deal of pain. Yes, it was an occasion of sadness but it was also something for which to be thankful. 

Middle Cat and I had not planned to stay. Unlike me Middle Cat does not know most people at the Senior Cat's old church. She sees some of them in the shopping centre and they say "hello" of course but she will say, "Who is the person with the white hair down to her shoulders?" or "Who's the man with the very slow way of speaking?"  I can usually work out who she means and supply a name.

For me it is different, very different. These are people my parents knew well. Many of them came in and out of the house for one reason or another. I put the kettle on more times than I would ever be able to remember. Plans were made for occasions there. Things were bought to repair. I have talked to the Mothers' Union on more than one occasion. I looked after the book stalls at their fetes.

And I have been to more funerals than I care to think about. The current priest, D..., has been there for thirteen years now. I have been in and out of there three times longer than that...if not more. I have seen people who were much younger than I am now grow old. One person there yesterday was ninety-eight. I remember going to her husband's funeral twenty something years ago. I looked around and noted the absence of more than one husband. They are in nursing homes and I know there will be more funerals in the future. I know it is "life" and we would not appreciate life if death did not come with it. I still wonder what it must be like for D... to see his congregation, one he does care deeply about, growing older like that. There are a few younger people but not enough to sustain it far into the future unless things change now. 

The church was full yesterday. I knew it would be. For once there were enough people who could actually sing that the two hymns did not sound like dirges. Middle Cat's last visit to the church was for the Senior Cat's funeral. She does not pretend to know any hymns now but she is musical and said, "A decent choir can carry everyone along." 

Perhaps it was that. I do not know if it was planned. I suspect it was because I saw who began it. A member of the official church choir started to clap as the recessional progress began and suddenly it was a "celebration". The atmosphere afterwards was more party like than usual. It is just what C... would have wanted.    

Working from home

should not be a "right". It may be something some people can be fortunate enough to negotiate but it should not be a right enshrined in law. 

It would be patently unfair to do this...and so it is what the government in a neighbouring state is trying to do. That news has been in the media over the past few days. It is there this morning in an article by one of the columnists. 

The columnist has raised the issue by saying one of his mates owns a furniture business. When attempting to employ new people apparently questions are being asked about whether they can "work from home". How can you work from home if you are supposed to be selling a sofa or a kitchen table and chairs in a showroom? 

Teachers, members of the medical professions, emergency service personnel, carers in nursing homes, cleaners, transport workers and shop assistants are just some of the people who obviously cannot work from home. Why then should anyone else have the "right" to work from home? What makes them so special?

Yes, I know the arguments about it allowing some people to care for their families as well. I know the arguments about dropping the kids off at school and picking them up later. I know the arguments about "saving money" and not needing to spend time travelling to and from work.

I also know from actual observation that some people abuse the privilege. They meet someone for "coffee" in the shopping centre. Oh they have their laptop out. They pretend to be "working" but in reality it is a nice little social interlude. 

"I suppose I had better go and do some work," one such WFH person told me yesterday. He had wandered in to the shopping centre in search of coffee and a bun after dropping the kids off at school and going to the gym. It was well after ten in the morning. My morning had begun late too - the meeting didn't start until 5:30am - and I had done almost two more hours on top of that. I had been to the library as well. I am supposedly "retired" so perhaps I am allowed to be a little lazy...or maybe not. I grabbed the things I needed and left again because I need to get something done before I go to a funeral this afternoon. As I pedalled off I saw him walking slowly across the car park. His car was probably parked there. 

There are people who really do work when they WFH of course. They are the rare and disciplined people who have strict routines. They do not get distracted. Their roles allow it but they will still go into their workplace at regular times. They are available when needed. They are not picking the kids up from school or having coffee with a friend or doing their weekly shop on work time. 

Yesterday a friend called me and asked, "Cat can the kids come to you for an hour or so after school? It's my day off but I have been called in to a meeting and I need to see what is going on. I should be back a bit after four."

Yes, they could. They go to the local primary school. The older one will walk the younger one safely here. They will do any homework at the table. I will give them a snack and drink if they need it. They will read or draw until their mother picks them up. Attending a meeting on her day off is not unusual. She is a busy hospital doctor. I am happy to help because she cannot WFH. Her patients are in a hospital bed. It was also her day off and she was working.

"If you can work from home like that someone else can do your job from an even more remote location," she told me of the gym goer when she came to get her two. She had one of those "one of my patients has just died" looks I know all too well. It is inevitable in her area. You can't do her sort of work by staying at home. She hugged me and went off making plans with her two boys to make a favourite meal for their father. He will eat it when he gets home from his long shift at a different hospital. WFH is something they will never do but they will be catching up on the "paperwork" after the boys are in bed tonight.   

The abortion bill

failed in the Lower House last night. It had been presented in the upper house of our state parliament by one of those members of parliament I call "single issue" members.  

Let me try and explain that. They are people who go into parliament with one issue that is of extreme importance to them. Getting elected in order to deal with that issue has been the most important thing to them. They recognise that other things will need to be dealt with but they will do everything they can to get their issue dealt with before anything else.

These people do not usually make the best members of parliament. They inevitably forget they are there to represent the people who elected them. Those who elected them may have elected them for other reasons entirely, often because they are members of a political party the elector "always" and unthinkingly supports.

In this instance the member has not even stayed with the party she stood for at election time. She has moved to another party, one which supported her bill.

I have never had to face the abortion issue at a personal level. I do know people who have and I know it is an issue surrounded by intense debate. My personal feeling, as far as I believe I can have one, is that it is an issue that is best left for the woman who is pregnant to discuss with those she chooses. The decision should be hers. The idea that parliament can legislate a blanket decision in one way or the other is something I find disturbing.

It will be interesting to see what is said in the media over the next few days. Will the outcome be largely ignored? Will those who voted for the bill be interviewed? Will they be criticised? Will the activists make another attempt? 

It is likely the supporters of the bill will not go away quietly. They have stirred up public opinion. They will be expressing forms of righteous anger at the outcome. That there are many other issues to be dealt with in parliament will be of little importance to them. Failure is not an option for people with such strongly held beliefs. For them this is not democracy at work. They will see it as a failure of democracy. 

This is an issue which stirs up public debate but for many people there is no "right" or "wrong" here. There is no room for debate. The view they hold is the only possible one.  There can be no possibility of "agreeing to disagree". 

It all reminds me of too many other issues right now...or perhaps I am just wrong about everything.  

 

I was told of two deaths

yesterday. 

The first was of one of the regular dog walkers. I had actually known of her much longer than that. Her mother was a teacher in a school with which I was associated. It was obvious this woman was the cause of some anxiety even as a teenager.  She was "scatty", forever "getting into strife". I heard many tales about her. 

Somehow she married and had a child. The marriage did not last. The child, now an adult, mothered her own mother. She checked every day.  

She ended up living in the house her mother had lived in. It was on my regular bike route at the time. I knew, and still know, the people who live opposite that house. The husband had to sort out more than one issue with water, with electricity, with something falling down and more. Her three barking dogs were an irritation to the entire neighbourhood.  She would spend hours walking them. In summer she would put them all in her battered little car and they would head off to the beach.  Eventually there were two dogs and then just one.

I sorted out some minor legal issues for her more than once. "Because you know about these things Cat. I don't. Things confuse me." They did too. She was not trying to be helpless. She really was incompetent. You could tell her to do something and then watch her struggle to do it in the way she had been told. Left and right confused her of course but up and down did too. 

I saw her last week. She was tying her dog up next to the place I park my trike. We spoke to each other. I thought she seemed even vaguer than usual, a little slower too. She was several years younger than I am but, as someone else my age remarked that day, "She looks so much older but she is so accident prone."

I was told she had walked the dog one last time in the rain. Then she went home and lay down on the bed and did not get up again. It was a shock for her daughter but I suspect it might also be a relief. She was a responsibility for all of us but, somehow, we will miss her.

The other death was of a woman much closer in age to the Senior Cat, ten years younger perhaps at the time. I met her once when I was about eight. She was the daughter of Brother Cat's second grade teacher. For some reason we were visiting the teacher at home and she happened to be there. 

Even then she was an organised person. Her parents had a wonderful garden and she had another such garden. How she found time to do it is a mystery to most people. She had a career in nursing. She married and had three children. One of the children is profoundly deaf. Her husband was badly injured in an accident and it left him with a brain injury and unable to work. She carried on and became involved in several arboreal projects as well. 

When my mother died she kept up contact with the Senior Cat. She would appear occasionally with something from her garden. He would respond in kind. We had invitations to her home. She was there at his funeral and talked positively of his garden. 

It was only her own ill health in the last few years which meant she moved out of her home reluctantly. Several months back someone else brought her to see me. We had a wonderful morning tea full of silly and amusing stories and reminisces. 

I was quite literally about to finish sending an email to organise a visit to her when the email appeared telling me of her death. I scrapped the email and sent another off to someone else. Did they need food for the refreshments after the funeral? The response came back later in the day. No, they don't. She had already organised for caterers to deal with it. Only the tea and coffee need to be dealt with and that would be enough.  It was typical of her thoughtfulness and her ability to organise. The church will be full.

They were two such different people. I went to bed last night wondering how the first person would have turned out if the second person had been her mother. 

What is the point of travelling

if you only want the sort of food you could get at home?

In the hope of some useful hints I have been following a "travel" page. On that page this morning there was someone asking if it was okay to bring her "snacks" with her. Her argument was that it would be good to have some "familiar" food. This was particularly so if she was feeling tired or concerned about the food around her. The list of things she wanted to take sounded enough to feed her while she was there.

I could understand this if you were going to a country where the culture and food were very different. My parents went to China with a couple who took food for the entire trip because they did not trust the available cuisine. (This was almost forty years ago. I trust things are different now.) My parents tried the local cuisine.They liked some of it but not all of it. They took the advice of the tour guide though and saw it as part of the experience.

I have not travelled to any place with a wildly different cuisine but I ate Chinese style in Singapore because that is what my friend cooks. (In the supermarket where we bought a little food for breakfast we might have been shopping at the local supermarket here. The brands and packaging were identical.) I have eaten Korean food with Korean friends. I have eaten Japanese sushi with caution because of the vinegar (and had, sadly, to curtail the experience). I have eaten Indonesian and Malaysian food cooked by students I was tutoring. I have tried all sorts of cheeses and sausages and breads in Europe. I have tried (and rejected) haggis. I am not fond of meat. I would be cautious in some places but only because I do have a couple of genuine allergies.  I like to explore within those boundaries if cleanliness is part of the experience.

Food exploration should be one of the pleasures of life if we are fortunate enough to go on the journey,  

Last year Middle Cat and I travelled with one "emergency" food item each. That was on the advice of the travel agent who booked our tickets. There was a chance we would be delayed for several hours between planes. Yes, there would be food at the airport but it would be expensive and not what either of us would want to eat when flying.  In the end we did not need it but it was 50gms each of security I suppose. I ate very little on the plane. The lovely hostess was a bit concerned but I did not need it - just give me enough liquid please, preferably water or juice.

Of course I was thoroughly familiar with British food. Put me in a supermarket there and most things are familiar even now. They are often the same brand. The names of most things are the same. If I want something "different" or "local" I know I am going to have to look for it. There is plenty to be found. 

I came home with two packets of what my BIL called "birdseed biscuits" (seeded crackers to those of you in the USA) and that was simply because there is nothing quite like that here. 

The four Palestinian Activists

just sent to prison in England were not sentenced as "terrorists". They were sentenced based on the damage they had done to both people and property. In sentencing the judge took into account the reason for their offending and "terrorism" was perhaps mentioned but it was not how a finding of guilt came about.

There were a great many comments in my Twitter feed about the situation. Some were in sympathy with those who have gone to prison. Others felt they had received a fair sentence. Still more would have liked the sentences handed down to be far longer. Almost all of them failed to understand how the sentences were decided. Perhaps the media could have done a better job of explaining - but that would involve using words the protestors and their supporters would find offensive. 

My view? If you want to protest then do not break the law. There is no point in breaking the law. It is not going to gain you any sympathy. There are better ways of protesting. 

There are also better ways of getting things changed.

I have no sympathy with those who head off in a "flotilla" to challenge a naval blockade. It might be a feel good exercise that gets a lot of publicity but not all of that has been positive. The "protestors" were putting their lives at risk. (No, it was not from the navy which blocked them.) Yes, their views might get some air time but in reality they are not going to change the situation by doing that. 

Do you want to change something you see as wrong? Mobilise a lot of people to write to your members of parliament or send letters to the media. Do not buy the products of a company you think is breaking the law. Ask others to do the same.  Get public figures on side. Ask them for an interview if you know they sympathise. 

It is hard work. The "feel good" adrenaline fix is not there. It is just hard slog. It probably will not achieve rapid results. It may not achieve the desired result at all - but protesting in a way that breaks the law is even less likely to achieve results. People believe it will of course. It may even seem that it has but the reality is that behind those protests are a lot of ordinary people who have protested in a law abiding way.  Those with the ultimate power to do something will listen to them first.

So someone donates $200m towards

housing returned servicemen, men too old and frail to work...and people are complaining. 

The same person has just donated another plane to the Royal Flying Doctor Service. That makes two now...and people are complaining. 

That comes on top of around $800m in tax last year...which does not take into account all the other expenses of employing the people who also work for the companies which raised the money to pay the taxes.

Apparently it is wrong to be "rich", the "billionaire" sort of rich. No, I am not talking about the world's first "trillionaire". There is a funny little red line under that one. I am not sure that sort of money is the sort anyone understands, not even the person who is apparently "that person". 

No, the person in question is a fairly ordinary sort of billionaire. They had a great start having inherited from "daddy's company" but most of it since then has come from hard work. It has come from the hard work of themselves and other people.  This does not make them popular. 

I have often wondered what I would do with a great deal of money. A "millionaire" was a rarity when I was a childhood. I most certainly did not know anyone who was a millionaire. Inflation has changed that. I sometimes wonder what the millionaires of my childhood did with their wealth but I do not remember people talking about it much. I suspect that any generosity on their part was done more quietly. There was no social media for others to talk about it.

It is the comments by others that have irritated me in the past few days. Someone said the donor of the $200m "probably spends more on lunch" and that it was "probably tax deductible". The returned servicemen's organisation saw that donation very differently. They were grateful for it. The donor will have seen that it goes where it needs to go too. That is how they have become as wealthy as they are.

No, I do not envy that ultra-wealthy person. I suspect life if actually very difficult for them. They would be working many hours a week. They know the decisions they make affect the employment of the thousands of people they employ and ripple outwards into the community. The plane they donated to the flying doctor service might well be used by one of their employees in an emergency. There are other programs they fund for the same sorts of reasons. In part these are business decisions. They have taken on huge responsibilities. I would not want to take on those responsibilities.

I wonder whether those criticising the donations being made think the life of a billionaire is simply long "business" lunches and dinners?  

School assemblies

as I knew them are a thing of the past.

For me it meant the entire school lining up in rows - under the watchful eyes of our teachers. We did this outside of course. Our schools did not have "gyms" or "halls". Most schools did not even have any sort of sound equipment beyond a microphone.

School assemblies were held on Fridays unless there was something special to be announced or some sort of special event. On Fridays however we lined up, "stood up straight" and we went ahead with the words about being "proud" and "saluting the flag" and honouring the monarch of the day. We sang the old national anthem and a song about our country. 

It never made me feel proud or pleased. I found the whole ritual rather dull. I thought of other things even as I mouthed the words. I suspect many other children felt the same way. It was just something we did. Yes, I have mentioned this elsewhere.

The topic came up in the paper this week. We had a young columnist asking about the new national anthem. Apparently it is not sung in some schools because of "cultural sensitivities".  These are not just indigenous sensitivities either. These are the sensitivities of newer immigrants to this country. 

S.... called in yesterday and we were talking about it. Her two grandchildren have assemblies but they are not assemblies as we knew them. Her grandchildren have been required to walk around a ceremonial fire of some sort. They have been required to put their hands on the ground and chant "always was, always will be aboriginal land". They have been required to write "sorry" letters to aboriginal people following assemblies in which they are told they are living on "stolen" land.

From talking with other parents and grandparents in many schools this sort of thing is apparently not unusual. It follows on what is being taught in classrooms...and that is what the curriculum requires.

"So, how are they supposed to learn to be proud of their country?" S... asked me. It's an interesting question.

The national anthem changed while I was living outside the country. I never had a chance to have my say. If I had been here I would have campaigned against the present anthem. As I have said more than once it sounds like a "dirge". There were alternatives but I suspect the vote was rigged in favour of what the Prime Minister of the day decided.  

I wonder if a more singable alternative would have made any difference. Would more people know it, would they sing it? 

The reality is that almost everyone I know only know the first few words of the current national anthem. We have long since lost any interest in reciting words about being "proud". The country we knew is very different from the current we know now. 

Change can be good but I wonder what the very young would think if they had to do what we did...and how do they feel about what they are required to do.    

Unfit to ever work again?

There is more than one story about someone who has been declared "unfit" to work and, once compensation has been granted, returned to work. There is actually a name for this - "compensation neurosis". It has been the subject of some research too. 

The topic came under "discussion" again yesterday when it was announced that someone who received a very large sum in compensation, then became bankrupt, is back at work in a role where bankruptcy should disqualify them.

Downunderites will probably know who I am talking about. It raises all sorts of questions, not least questions about the original sum paid out. Not one person I know believes this situation should ever have arisen.

When large sums of compensation have been awarded to people then arrangements are often made for its use. There will be a trust fund set up. The money awarded can only be used for certain purposes. It is not there to provide additional luxuries but to compensate the person for what they have lost. 

It is of course what should have happened to the more than two million dollars given to the person who was under discussion. Other advice should have been given too - and there should have been ways of ensuring it was adhered to so as to prevent the subsequent issues arising.

The rules around bankruptcy are clear too. That the "employer" in question believes it can bypass those rules is a clear indication they are using the appointment for political purposes. The original compensation was paid for the same purpose. This is no way suggests that the alleged incident did not occur. It is not something that has ever been decided in a court of law. The payment was made without such a decision ever being made. It was a sum of money most people in that situation will never see, indeed most will see no money at all.

There are questions which need to be asked here. I can understand why so many people were questioning and criticising events around the issue yesterday. There will be more people doing it today. 

It could have been avoided if someone had taken charge and ensured the compensation had been invested and used as intended.   

 

"No space in special education units"

and no "specialist classes" available so your child is going to have to go into a "mainstream" class. He might be twelve and not able to count to twenty or have difficulty in going to the toilet alone but he will be just fine in the mainstream classroom.

This is not an NDIS issue. It is an education issue for all students. The article in this morning's paper is saying what most people have known all along. Some children need to be educated in a setting outside the "mainstream". What is more some of them will do well there.

I had a long and very happy association with a school for cerebral palsied children. It was a very good school. For years after it closed the students got back together for an annual reunion and invited me to come along as well. No, I was not a student there but I was part of "the gang". I had helped to run the Guide group and that was enough. I went in and out and I still have friends I made there.

I remember writing a letter to the national newspaper talking about the academic successes of the students and their ability to mix with the rest of the community. The abilities of individual students varied widely of course but overall they were encouraged, indeed required, to make the best they could of themselves. The school had given them an excellent education and the ability to mix with the rest of the community. 

Some years ago I had to go to a funeral for one of the students. There were two well known politicians and several other public figures at it. M... had made his mark on the community. He had held down a job in the "morgue" of a newspaper and been very active in community affairs. 

Later I spoke at another gathering to farewell another student. He had obtained a doctorate in mathematics. He worked at a university and published research papers. We had corresponded over the years, came together at another university and spent hours in discussions about a wide range of topics. He was proud of his old school and how it had encouraged him to move on when he was ready. His body let him down in the end but he always said he would not have achieved his academic successes without the early years at his "special" school.

That school produced more than one severely physically disabled student who went on to higher education and obtained a degree. It had a class for students with a hearing loss. 

I am so tired of having to argue that "special" schools are just that - special. The school I knew so well provided physiotherapy, speech therapy, occupation therapy on the same grounds as the classrooms. The  teachers were specialist teachers. 

Asking a general trained teacher with a class of twenty four or more other students to know and understand the learning difficulties of even a "bright" child with cerebral palsy is not the best thing for the child or the teacher. All the arguments about "socialisation" and "integration" can sound good but in reality they do not hold up. They might appear to hold up. It is no doubt "nice" for the parents to believe their child is going to an ordinary everyday school "like everyone else" but a really good special school can be even better if it makes demands of the child in a supportive environment.

We did no favours when this state did away with the "special" schools and the less able children now in the mainstream are not always doing as well as they might - far from it. Those who advocated for "inclusion" and "mainstreaming" did the authorities a favour of course. It is cheaper, much cheaper, to have a child in the mainstream with some "assistance". That it might mean they do not reach their full potential is seen as a problem for their family, not the rest of us.  

 

Can you "revive" a language

which has no current speakers and no written past?

There is a short article in this morning's paper about someone who is claiming to be doing that. She claims to speak two of the fifty or so indigenous languages which were spoken here before white settlement and to speak them "fluently".  There are four of those languages she claims are "strong" and another eight are "fragile" - meaning they are spoken only by the old. There are eleven more she claims are being revived through "historical resources".

I have written elsewhere about this. I want to know what it is this woman believes she is saving. That she is well meaning and determined I have absolutely no doubt. I also have no doubt she is mistaken if she believes what she is reviving is a language which was once spoken.  

There are a number of reasons for my doubts about her claim. These languages were spoken by very small groups of people. The population prior to white settlement was tiny. The speakers of these languages had no means of transport. They travelled by foot They did not go far. There was no written language. Nothing has been left behind in the form of manuscripts. Their vocabulary was limited to the world around them. It did not take long for these languages to become so corrupted that what was "saved" even at the time was essentially a different language. The information gathered at the time was not done for the purpose of "saving" a language or a culture. It was often done with the purpose of converting "heathens" to Christianity. Some information was never shared. 

What are we actually saving? What are we "reviving"? Is it really possible to teach young indigenous people these languages of the past and expect them to use them and pass them on to the next generation? What is the value of doing that in this context? Who benefits?

When we lose a language we lose a unique way of thinking, of seeing the world around us and understanding it. That's important to acknowledge but we also need to acknowledge that this has already happened in some places. Nothing is going to change that.