Thursday 31 January 2013

Mother tongues

"Polish now the second most common language in England and Wales" proclaimed the Sun yesterday. When I heard this I was a little perplexed. I mean I live in London, in a neighbourhood with a very diverse ethnic mix, including lots of Poles, but I haven't really noticed huge numbers of people speaking Polish. So I delved into the detail.

According to the latest census data released by the ONS, over 92 per cent of people in England and Wales speak English as their main language (English or Welsh in Wales) and fewer than 0.5 per cent of people (137,511) do not speak English at all. Polish is the main language spoken by 546,000 people. They together with the speakers of the other top five other main languages (Punjabi, Urdu, Bengali and Gujarati) number about 1.5 million people, almost all of whom speak English as well. For the record some 570,000 people in Wales and England speak Welsh (but to be fair to the Sun, it is unlikely to be their main language). 

So now we know. Far from being flooded by immigrants who are diluting British culture and robbing the nation of the English language itself. Even in London, one of the world's great melting pots, 80 per cent of people use English as their main language. That is the same as the national figure for the United States. 

Immigration is not to be feared but embraced. Immigrants enhance British culture, contribute to the economy. Immigrants don't steal jobs, they aren't welfare scroungers. A National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESCR) report last January found that the number of migrant workers coming to the UK over the previous decade had had little or no impact on joblessness, with "no association" between rising immigration and an increase in unemployment benefit claims.

I should declare an interest here. I am an immigrant, actually an asylum seeker, although when my family came we were called political refugees, in our case my parents were fleeing the apartheid regime. We probably wouldn't have qualified under current asylum rules, so it is just as well we arrived when we did. We were allowed to stay, stayed long enough to acquire British citizenship and we are still here. Britain is our home.  

I think we have made pretty good citizens as well. My dad got work straight away and worked hard every day  until he retired on a state pension. My sisters do proper jobs in the public sector adding value to people's lives for small reward. And I pay my taxes (to be clear my whole family pays their taxes but compared to my sisters that is the only contribution I feel can claim). Yes, we have benefited from this country's education and health systems but I believe we have made in our own ways our own contributions to the health and well being of Britain.  

Our story is typical of so many immigrants. We come, we settle, we assimilate, we make our mark. How dull Britain would be without all of the things which immigrants have brought? I could list all the wonderful thing immigrants have contributed to science, technology, the arts and medicine but I will be obvious and list some of the food we would be without: fish and chips, curry, spaghetti, sushi, hamburgers, yams, and sourdough bread which thanks to the Poles is now available in my corner shop every day of the week.



Wednesday 23 January 2013

Targeting guns

I went shooting today. Clay pigeon shooting. I had never done it before. It was freezing. I have very poor eye to hand co-ordination at the best of times and today I had a dodgy left contact lens. But I loved it. Every icy moment of it. It was scary and testing and completing exhilarating. And I even managed to hit some of the clays, thanks to the wonderful Richard who coached me, very patiently, through the session.

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed myself because I worry about guns. I have always regarded them as fundamentally dangerous and to be avoided. It is not because I am unfamiliar with them. Compared to lots of people I know, I have been around a fair few guns. I have worked with armed police officers and military personnel who are trained to use guns to protect others and know regular folk in the USA who think they are a good way to protect themselves. You can probably tell what I think about the two groups. I just don't buy the right to bear arms position - that might have made sense in the 18th century but times have changed. There are an estimated 300 million guns in the USA, 33 people die each day because of guns. I don't get why a civilian would need to have a gun in their home or to carry one around with them. Ok I accept that certain types of guns are required by farmers, game keepers and the like. But I certainly don't understand why anyone needs to own an automatic weapon or assault rifle. Seriously why does any private citizen on the right side of the law need an AK47?

In the wake of the horrific killings in Sandy Hook, the USA has an opportunity to do something real, something serious about gun control. President Obama is trying to push through tough action (well tough in the American context) but some of the substantive changes will have to be passed by Congress and although the public mood seems to be shifting and the gun control supporters are winning influential support,  this will be a real struggle.

So how have I got the nerve to get so excited about my day shooting? Well, because Britain is different. Our attitude is different, i think we we have got gun control right. Gun clubs are well run and well controlled. Gun crime is relatively low and we are horrified by, rather than immune to, it. And I loved it!






Tuesday 15 January 2013

The bright side of the road.

I have become obsessed with roads over the last few days. Liberia is building roads, hundreds of kilometres of them. In the last two years it has rebuilt over 300 km and there are a further 500 km planned for the next three. That is a lot of of road in a very short space of time. The expansion of the road network is a reflection of the progress Liberia is making and is one of the key building blocks of sustainable prosperity.


We take roads for granted in Britain. We are very well served on this front. Yes sometimes there are problems fixing potholes or gritting but basically we can rely on them, so much so that almost every road building project provokes challenge and opposition. But here in Liberia there simply aren't enough. Getting from one end of the country by land is difficult and takes a really long time, especially in the rainy season. Some parts of the country are completely inaccessible by road. Until recently this included Vahun, a small town near the border with Sierra Leone. During the war, the road out of Vahun to the neighbouring town of Kolahun which connected it to  county capital and Monrovia stopped being maintained, so just disappeared, cutting Vahun off from the rest of the country. The townsfolk of Vahun had to go across the border to Sierre Leone by canoe to do anything. But in the last few months the road from Kolahun has been restored and finally the children of Vahun can go to school without having to paddle across an international border.

Roads, particularly in rural areas, are bringing communities together, helping farmers get their food to market, increasing employment opportunities, allowing children to go to school and giving villagers access healthcare. And major roads attract foreign investors who can see how they can move their goods, people and services around the country quickly and safely.


In Monrovia itself, the main thoroughfares have been in pretty good state of repair for a while now. They are now tackling the side streets. And the other night driving back into town, I noticed something pretty amazing - catseyes along a long and particularly busy stretch of Tubman Boulevard (the street which bisects Monrovia). It is a major innovation and I for one am pretty excited about it (and that is something I never thought I would say). So now Liberia can look forward to a future with more and safer roads. The way ahead looks bright.

(Yes I know the photo isn't of catseyes but the one I took was even worse than the pic of the cheesecake.)

Thursday 10 January 2013

Liberia at last

So I am here, finally. I arrived 16 hours later than scheduled, crumpled and dishevelled but delighted to be back. I really do love Liberia. It feels comfortable. Now anyone who has been here will know that when I say comfortable I don't mean in the creature comforts way, but in the familiar, I know and like this place, I know where to get great cassava greens and there are people here who know me and dare I say are pleased to see me.

But things have changed in Monrovia since the last time I was here.  The progress I reported then continues. The road building programme has been going apace and there is so much construction work. There are brand spanking new petrol stations, hotels, markets and homes from luxury villas to modest three- and four-roomed houses. Today the Minister of Energy announced an extensive electrification programme which will see 10 times as many properties in Monrovia connected to the national grid by 2015 as now as well as turning the lights on in large parts of the rest of the country. It is hard for those of us who live in the West to conceive of life without being able to flick a switch whenever you want. But in a country where nights last about 12 hours and the cost of using a generator is high, the impact of affordable, safe electricity will be huge. Businesses will be able to stay open past dusk, employment opportunities will increase, children will be able to study after school, the streets will be safer, food will keep safely longer. Life will be better for many more people. And for a country still healing from the brutal wounds inflicted by 16 years of war which ended just 10 years ago, this kind of progress is just what is needed.

(By the way I am claiming Casablanca - I was there nine hours, that has to count.)

Wednesday 9 January 2013

We'll always have Paris

I am in Casablanca. As previously reported I had no plans to be here today but circumstances are such that I find myself in the Royal Air Maroc lounge waiting for a flight to Liberia which has been delayed so I am unlikely to make it to Monrovia before 0600.

When I decided that visiting the letters of the alphabet would be one of my resolutions for 2013, my rules for myself were that it had to be a proper visit, I couldn't claim any places I was just passing through - so Crewe wouldn't count if I was just changing trains there. I still think it is a good rule but I think I can make the case for Casablanca. I will be here for at least 5 hours, will eat a meal, drink a Coke and might even have a shower (believe me I would like to have a shower, the only doubt I have stems from the fact there seems to be little evidence of the required facilities). I think that constituents a visit. And people, we are already half way through January and I haven't bagged any places yet, so for the time being at least Casablanca is on the list.

If the airport is anything to go by it may not be a place to which I will want to return. I know this is a very poor criterion, on this basis one could hardly recommend London - yes Heathrow is getting better but Luton? The lounge I am in is over-lit, playing rather exhuberant marching music and has very uncomfortable chairs. Rick and Ilsa would not recognise it and I am sure Captain Renault would have something to say about the state of the loos.

Wait in lounge

I am being tested, severely tested. As well as my many New Year's resolutions, I also decided that I would give up alcohol for January. My poor liver was pleading with me to give it a break and who am I to deny one of my vital organs? It really hasn't been too bad and I have been using the time I would normally spend in a bar, running.  There has been lots of running. But today I find myself in an airline lounge with hours to kill and booze on tap. Thus far I have resisted but for how long I am not sure.

It was going to be easy to stay on the wagon, I had two relatively short flights  and was scheduled to land in Liberia in good time to meet colleagues and have a sober dinner. Alas this was not to be. Instead of being in the skies above southern Spain right now I am sitting in Heathrow where I have been since 5.30 this morning. I did leave briefly on a plane meant to take me to Brussels but there was a "bird strike" and we returned.

The whole experience has confirmed my view that I am not a good traveller. By that I mean that while I love to be in other places, to see discover new horizons and return to favourite spots, I am not good at the getting there, especially by plane. I find the experience of being a commercial airline passenger unbelievably tedious and irritating. Plus I have never been one of those people who manages to look stylish when she travels, you know the sort, comes through the arrivals gate looking super fresh, well coiffured and perfectly made up. I always arrive clothes crumpled, skin desiccated, hair a mess, make-up smudged. I never start out like that, it just seems to happen almost as soon as I walk into a terminal building.

Inevitably by the time I get on the plane, I am grumpy because I have had to get up hideously early to get to the airport hours before the departure time in order to get through security where I have been almost always the subject of a rather too intimate body search and the picking through of my hastily packed bag. This has then been followed by a ridiculously long time waiting in lounges with varying degrees of comfort.

Once aboard, I use all my Jedi powers to stop the person sitting beside me from catching my eye in a way that can only mean s/he wants to strike up a conversation - I can't do chit chat with strangers on a plane (of course if I am travelling with someone I don't stint witty repartee). Then I have a moment when I have to remind myself that it doesn't matter that I don't really understand how a plane stays in the air (yes, I know it is all about lift and thrust but I still don't get it) because thanks to the laws of physics  its being able to stay in the air is not dependent on what is in my brain. And then I laugh to myself for being an idiot before plugging in my iPod, closing my eyes and falling asleep until a member of the cabin crew tries to feed me.

And this morning, we were on track. I woke up at 0415 (some three hours after I had gone to bed - so wise), got angry with the cab company for collecting me late (I could have had those 10 minutes in bed), made my way to Heathrow and two hours after I woke up boarded a flight to Brussels. As I was going through the "it doesn't matter if you don't understand" routine, it occurred to me that the plane (an Airbus 319 I believe) was making a noise much like my on-its-last-legs washing machine on its spin cycle. It was very noisy and all a bit shaky. I was closing my eyes with the intent of catching 40 winks when the captain said something in Flemish which didn't sound good. To be honest very little sounds good in Flemish but whatever he said got the cabin crew going. Anyway, five minutes later we were informed that as a result of said "bird strike" we were now flying on just the one engine and so were returning to Heathrow. As if to underline the seriousness of it all when we landed, we were met on the runway by half a dozen fire engines. But I have had a lot of dodgy flights - lightning strikes, mega turbulence, no lights and a chanting hippie to name a few - so a few fire appliances were not going to upset me.    

What has upset me is having to repeat the security, searching, waiting all over again. This time with bells on because I have missed my connection so am waiting for a 1740 flight to Casablanca - too late for it be bearable but too soon for it to make sense for me to go home and come back later. Once in Casablanca, I will have a four-hour wait before catching a flight to Monrovia which will get me in at about the time I got up this morning - perfect. I have had to queue much more than I would have expected, pay for the privilege of printing out my boarding card at the airport and been searched for the second time in a morning.

But it hasn't been all bad - I have soothed myself in the traditional manner, purchases from LK Bennett will be delivered next week, and even better the lovely people Clarins have given me a complimentary facial. I just need to steer clear of the complimentary bar. 


Cheesecake update 1

So this weekend I made my first cheesecake of 2013 - here it is as it came out of the oven.

I took it into the office to test on my colleagues and sadly their concurred with mine. While the top layer, the cheesy bit, was pretty good, I am dismayed to report that what should have been the easy bit - the biscuit base - was a veritable disaster. I am afraid I had what the great Paul Hollywood would describe as a soggy bottom. A first for me. I still reeling from it. But demon baker Ellie has given me some very constructive advice and I am hoping this kind of rookie error can be avoided in the future. I am determined to get it right and will keep working on it until it is.

Brace yourselves for a lot more cheesecake.  

Friday 4 January 2013

Driven to distraction by the men in robes

Whilst running this evening, I was reflecting on the fact in spite of my desire to extend (still don't know if that is the right verb - advice please) my hinterland, all my blogs so far this year have been firmly in my heartland. So I decided that I would write about the moon. Why not? I love it. Its beautiful and fascinating. So why isn't this post about the moon? Because of the Church of England, that's why.

Not for the first time the CoE has driven me to distraction. Today it was the revelation that the House of Bishops, one of the three houses of the General Synod, has agreed to allow gay clergy to become bishops. "Now Tanya," I hear you ask, "you're an equality freak, surely you support this?" Well, I wish I could. But this isn't about equality. The Bishops are just perpetuating inequality. For let us remember that only gay men who agree to remain celibate are allowed to take the cloth. They have even gone as far as countenancing gay men who are in civil partnerships becoming priests as long as that partnership is not sexual. What we learnt today is that the Bishops are cool with allowing celibate gay priests start wearing purple robes. A fudge if ever I saw one. And of course as recently as November the General Synod blocked women from becoming bishops. So as long as you are a straight man you are welcome to carry a crook but if you are a non-celibate gay priest or a women forget it.

I acknowledge that it was not the House of Bishops that put the mockers on female bishops and I suspect the Bishops are not trying to be obstructive when it comes to gay bishops. No I think they are desperately trying to stop the Church being rent asunder by the opposing forces that can't agree whether it should join the 21st century. So they are trying to sneak reform through, centimetre by centimetre, rather than drive forward real change. I can't see this strategy working. The CoE needs a new one. I appreciate that is easier said than done. I recognise that the Anglican Communion in Africa, Latin America and parts of the USA is socially very conservative but hey, I am not insisting they adopt my liberal positions. I am just suggesting that the new Archbishop of Canterbury gets a grip. He must make some tough choices about he wants what the Church to be and who he wants to include amongst his flock. He needs to be a leader.

Thursday 3 January 2013

Syria: enough already


You might not have seen it what with all the reporting of the fact that 2012 was very wet (who knew?) and the Argentinians deciding that it was about time that it reminded the world that it has a claim on the Falkland Islands (I am afraid I just can’t get excited about this), but last night the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights reported that in the period 15 March 2011 and 30 November 2012 more than 60,000 people had been killed in Syria by both sides. More than 60,000 – it is truly staggering.

And let’s be clear, these are not mickey mouse figures based on hunches or the claims of the opposing sides but based on five months of analysis by independent experts who have only counted people for whom they have a first and last name and a date and location of the death.  So no exaggeration, rather supreme caution. As the High Commissioner’s spokesperson chillingly put it “There are many names not on the list for people who were quietly shot in the woods”.

And what have we been doing while 60,000 people were killed? Well, pretty much nothing. We had effectively been twiddling our thumbs while the country burns.  The Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay warned that thousands more would die if the conflict continued and if we failed to prepare for the inevitable instability that will occur when it finally does. She called for serious planning “not just to provide humanitarian aide to all those who need it, but to protect all Syrian citizens from extrajudicial killings and acts for revenge.”

And she’s right. We have been here before haven’t we? Somalia, Iraq, DRC, Afghanistan. But with well-planned strategic support from the international community, post-conflict mayhem can be avoided. Just think of Sierra Leone, Liberia, Rwanda, Mozambique.

Now, I don’t pretend to know what the solution to the crisis in Syria other than it must in the end come from the Syrians themselves. But I do know if we fail to heed to words of the wise Ms Pillay 60,000 dead will seem small.  

Wednesday 2 January 2013

Toby was right


I have been thinking about Toby Ziegler. This is not that unusual. He is a hero of mine. I still don’t know whether when I grow up I want to be Toby or CJ. I am sure I want to marry Josh. Anyway, there is a great episode of West Wing (what am I talking about they are all great episodes) in which Toby is asked to help representatives of the newly emerging democracy of Belarus write its constitution. The Belarusians just want to do a bit of search and replace on the US constitution but Toby, increasingly testily, urges them to start with a blank page. As he explains, the US constitution is not a good start for a modern country. The separation of powers as set out by the Founding Fathers might have been rationale in the post-revolutionary 18th century America but, he declares, makes absolutely no sense today.  The good folk of Belarus think ill of Toby, questioning his patriotism. 

But Toby was right. I can't for the life of me fathom the US constitution.  I mean how is it possible for the most powerful political leader in the world, a man who can invade any country on the planet at the drop of a hat, not be able to get his domestic policy through? Just think about the ridiculous amount of time it took to pass his health reform. And even then it was a watered-down version.  

And of course there is the fiscal cliff. 

Ok, enough Republicans in Congress co-operated sufficiently with the President and the Democrats for the immediate danger of falling over the cliff to recede and the markets have bounced back. But they took it to the brink and given threatened spending cuts have only been postponed for two months, we will be back here before too long. Now I know the Founding Fathers wanted to spare their new-born country the threat of the autocratic rule from the likes of the House of Hanover of which they had just rid themselves, so deliberately instituted checks and balances to stop the President getting too big for his boots. But times have changed. If POTUS were suddenly to get all George III on the citizens of the 21st century USA or indeed the rest of the world there are other levers that can be pulled. I am not sure that preventing him implementing policy on which he was elected is reasonable or dare I say democratic. Yes, other countries have similar power-sharing systems but it seems to me that in the USA, Congress men and women have no incentive or desire to sort things out for the greater good. Too often it would seem they have a vested interest in blocking change in order that they and their constituents whether they are the voters of their state or the interests they represent benefit from the inevitable horse-trading – “Yes, I’ll vote for your finance bill but only if you give me a new highway/factor/tax cut”.  I am not sure why it should be, perhaps it is a consequence of federalism or the lack of a whipped party system such as we have here but whatever the cause, it is naked self-interest, unedifying and I cannot believe is what John Adams, Thomas Jefferson or George Washington intended. 

Would my tune be different were I not to be a supporter of Obama? I would hope not.

Tuesday 1 January 2013

Happy 2013 - its not a prime number


Happy 2013 - it hardly rolls off the tongue does it? There is no obvious poetry or rhythm to the sound of the date. It would be different if it were a prime number - then there would be some magic and mystery about it. It isn't. It does, however, have the redeeming feature of having having three prime factors (3, 11 and 61) which does give it a glimmer of mathematical allure. Who'd have thought it? I am writing about maths. But one of my resolutions for 2013 is to extend (is that the right verb?) my hinterland, so expect more references to numbers, physics and potentially even chemistry over the coming year. Did I mention that I have also decided to blog again? I am starting this year exceptionally resolute. I have written a list, a long one, of things I intend to achieve in 2013. It includes in no particular order:

·      To make the perfect cheesecake – it has been on the list before and I am almost there. I have been adapting an original recipe from the marvellous Bill Pentler but I still think there is room for improvement. I am looking for the New York-style, sticks-to-the-roof-of your-mouth experience. I am pretty confident I can get there by Easter assuming I can find enough people to be tasters for me (see the next resolution but one).
·      To make choux pastry – again, we have been here before but I have so far failed to get around to this one completely. I want to make crab profiteroles with hollandaise sauce by the spring – and yes, I will be looking for tasting volunteers.
·       To lose another three kilos – another rollover, but for the first time possibly ever I am starting this year lighter than I started the last one, considerably lighter. I would still like to shed a few more kgs but more than anything I want to be fitter. I started running last year but remain a reluctant runner. I still haven’t had the supposed euphoria that exercise is meant to bring but I have, in recent weeks, found myself a little grumpy when I miss a run. Now, I promise I am not intending to run a marathon or anything crazy like that, but I would like to run a bit further, a bit faster, a bit more frequently. In my wildest dreams, I would like a flat stomach but I know this is reaching for the stars beyond my universe.
·      To do something new or scary at least once a month – I think this is a must for everyone. It doesn’t have to mean taking up skydiving, rather doing regular things that are intimidating or daunting and new things that might be fun and/or scary.
·      To visit the alphabet – that is to say, to visit places which begin with each letter of the alphabet, although not in alphabetical order. It sounds easier than I believe it will be – I think X and Z will be a challenge.

I have a couple of others which I do not intend to declare  but just be sure I am as committed to fulfilling these as the others. I shall provide regular progress reports as well as musings and abusings about other matters of major and minor consequence.

Best wishes for 2013