Sailing Ships

For most of the maritime history of the world, transport of goods and people over long distances was invariably by water. The oar and the sail for millennia were the only possible power for propelling ships and boats until the middle of the 19th Century. Then steamships powered by coal - and later oil - began to take over world trade. Even the tall and elegant clipper ships carrying tea from India and China to London or guano fertilizer from Chile around Cape Horn to Hamburg faded away and were obsolete by the beginning of the 20th Century.The great disadvantage of the sailing ship was that it was always at the mercy of the weather, either becalmed for weeks or driven by off-course by storms - resulting in ships arriving weeks late or sometimes lost for ever. As long as coal and oil were available cheaply, sailing ships had had their day. Some may have thought that a wonderfully romantic era had gone for ever! But how efficient and cheap the wind still is when blowing in the right direction!We are now entering a new period of history where slowly but inexorably the cost of energy – certainly in the form of oil – is rising. A few years ago we talked of crude oil at $11 per barrel. Today in December 2007, the price of a barrel of crude oil is $80 and some think it will reach $100/barrel soon. There are those who say that even where energy supply and demand are in balance, geopolitics will invariably cause political upsets and capacity limitations (at vulnerable refineries) so that uncertainty will now be ever-present. It is clear that if the price of oil were to go to $100 per barrel over the next few years, the impact on global economic growth would be dramatic. Some countries in the developing world would be unable to keep their peoples happy or secure.This essay however suggests that even if the global reliance on cheap oil to drive economic growth fades, there are many ways to combat the problem - by combining old technology with modern scientific advances. It is often forgotten that until the industrial revolution at the end of the 18th Century, technology required to sail a ship and navigate it from port-to-port over thousands of miles was quite as complicated as understanding a computer. A sailing ship was the most complex technology known to man until quite recently. We will then soon be forced to return to transporting cargos over long distances by using sailing ships again.This idea is not as far-fetched as it may sound. Weather patterns around the globe can be forecast with some accuracy by satellite, and course changes made to take advantage of wind speed and direction and to avoid storms. Computers can be programmed to plot a course that optimizes the course sailed and minimizes the risk and the distance covered. The bridge of my modern sailing ship would hum with computers, constantly receiving meteorological and satellite information, plotting exact positions.There is always the question of what happens if there is no wind or how to manœuvre quickly in and out of port under sail with a minimum of risk - in gale force winds or dead calms. The new style sailing ship would be equipped with two small diesel engines, one at the bow and the other at the stern, used only for turning, entering or leaving port, and  for those rare occasions of calm, bad weather, shallow water or avoiding other ships. For a very high proportion of any voyage, the motive power would always be the wind.We talk of “sails”. But the sails of a modern sailing ship would not be the spreading white canvass of the old days. Sails for the new sailing ship would be vanes, more like vertical aero-plane wings made of aluminum or titanium, which could be rotated mechanically for any wind direction. (We still would be unable to sail directly into the wind!)This combination of new sails, navigation by satellite and computer, and using small diesel motors would enable the new sailing vessel to keep up a high speed, which would minimize (fuel) costs and take advantage of weather patterns. The old Clipper ships were capable of speeds of 16 knots or more in ideal conditions, but were often driven off course or becalmed because the captain could not foresee the weather ahead. The new sailing vessel should be able to maintain high average speeds, be able to predict accurately voyage length and expected time of arrival at port.So although we may be drifting into difficult economic times as energy becomes more scarce and expensive, the new sailing ship is a solution to keeping world trade going in a way that avoids the cost of oil as a bunker fuel, and has the happy property of substantially reducing the pollution of the seas and air, a significant part of which comes from modern shipping burning oil.in future years, cruise liners also will carry sails and air traffic will become too expensive. We will then all return to a cleaner sea. Now is the time for serious forward thinking and planning. Governments and shipping lines must start to design and finance prototype sailing vessels, using all the most modern developments and technologies of the last 50 years. There is no need to be between the devil and the deep blue sea in planning energy futures!We do not need to build fleets! But I do suggest the time has come when a few prototype sailing ships should be constructed to prepare for a time when energy - in the form of bunker fuel  - will no long  be affordable.Perhaps in future years, cruise liners also will carry sails and air traffic will become too expensive. We will then all return to a cleaner sea. Now is the time for serious forward thinking and planning.

Latin and English

In a recent European survey on the use of English, foreigners thought that the people most difficult to understand speaking English were the English themselves, mainly because the English spoke a sophisticated language, depending on many original sources and with a very large vocabulary. At the same time, it was reported that in spite of Mandarin Chinese being spoken by the largest group in the world, English continued to gain ground as the business 'lingua franca'. Yet England and the English are slowly disappearing as immigration into the UK increases and the English disappear overseas.

Rather as Latin disappeared over the 1500 years since the collapse of Rome in 410 AD - although the Venerable Bede through to Sir Isaac Newton kept Latin alive in England until quite recently - only to reappear as Italian, Spanish, French and Portuguese, the same is now happening to English. The English nation will disappear within the next 50 years, but English itself will reinvent itself as a universal language, spoken all over the world by new nations. It won't be English we speak today but it will still be English.

A visitor to England in fifty years time will find a people who have nothing to do with an Anglo-Saxon history. The dialect will be recognisably English but the Anglo-saxons will have gone forever from the land once called England.

A Roman from the Roman empire vanished long ago, and yet bring him back today he would recognise at once the patois the Roman soldiers left behind in Italy, Spain or Latin-America. So it is about to happen again. Just as the citizens of Rome dusappeared long ago, so it is that we live in a time when the English as a nation will also disappear, bequeathing to the world their language but disappearing themselves.

Resumption of Service!

I see that I have not made any comment since June 2007, and here we are at the end of November. I have been overwhelmed with activity which leaves me with little time of inclination to talk to the world. I will try to do better at least over the winter!
First of course was buying and selling flats and houses. It took much longer to sell the flat in the north of England than I had anticipated once a firm offer had been received. This seemed to be due to the UK bureaucracy where if an enquiry letter goes astray or someone just does not reply, then the process grinds to a halt. This is alway annoying as being abroad one tends to have an exaggerated pride in the efficiency of the UK civil service and one can quickly become disillusioned. This all delayed the purchase of the house (legally in my wife's name) in Manila by a month or two. Nevertheless the UK legal system working alone was quite impressive and helpful. I remember once criticising the Malaysian bureaucracy in 1986, and was immediately rounded upon by a local manager who enquired if I had ever worked for the UK Coal Board! We must compare oranges with oranges and not with apples, and are apt to forget how really terrible governments are as compared to efficient private companies. (I see the UK government has just lost the records of half the population!).
One interesting aspects of value and curency is that the tiny UK flat with two small bedrooms and a sitting room generated enough funds to buy a 7 bedromm house in Asia! WE also noted that the Philippine legal sytem was more xpensive than in the UK! How would anyone with a US$4 million house in London wish to stay in the UK when property is so cheap elsewhere - indeed it is said a significant proportion the UK population (with houses?) are already leaving for good. The risk of staying must be significant.
In the Philippines, foreigners are not allowed to own land so funds sent in become owned by the Filipino side of the family. A useful way of improving the balance of payements in the short term, but may dissuade many from investing here. One wonders how many Filipinos actually own property in the UK or USA.
The other confusion of the summer is that the college I act for as a consultant is introducing the UK BTEC HND system. This has involved a lot of extra work and understanding a rather bureaucratic system It is too really to comment adversely in any detail, but the system relies on us checking each other and reporting in voluminous detail. One fears this a British government politically correct system where every student will in the end pass. Whether this improves the quality of the teaching is not so certain as students are left to 'research'. The system seem to be vocational and the top UK universities are not involved. The advantage of an HND diploma means that students can go to many (but not all) universities in UK, USA and Australia for their final year when they can get a degree.
Well! That's a start for resumption of service and I must find out how to advertise one's own blogs!

Immortality

In recent years we have come a little closer to showing we can be immortal in a very broad sense. Scientifically it would seem the little bundles of chemicals that make up our DNA and genes do not get destroyed but survive in our relations and offspring - even in other species - for long ages or even forever. That is a sort of unconscious immortality, and in theory we could one day be reassembled. It is also interesting to note that clones will have their own separate distinct consciousness, but even so that will not enable them to know the thoughts of the other clone! Neverthless this is a real departure from the past when we supposed that we would be entirely annihalated.

Emotionally in old age I have come to realise that we survive in other ways too. One of my wife's remarkably intelligent grandsons has attached himself to me, and he has shown a most remarkable care, sweetness and consideration for me. When he sees me busy, he will say "let me do it", and I do. At the age of three, he will appear without being asked with a glass of iced water for me, and recently in the evening on my arrival from work, he immediately asks if I want a cup of coffee, which he also makes all by himself from a packet of powder and hot water. He now feeds the dogs and mixes their biscuits and meat in a very business like way. He likes to be picked up, and will demand my using two arms rather than one.
He likes to sit with me and start-up my laptop. "I want to sit with you". "Where"."On your lap". "Why". "Because I love you", he says. "I don't like you going to work" he says "I miss you". Well, yes! He has some tantrums when I won't pick him up.
He tugs at my heart strings and he is a little angel for my old age. For the first time in my life I am alarmed that I may not be around for much longer and my concern is all for him and not for me. Most of us cannot remember much from before the age of five, and so it is quite possible that he will never remember me. There might have been a time when that would have worried me, but now I see very clearly that what I am giving him will be a foundation for the rest of his life - whether he remembers me or not.
And perhaps in seventy years time, he will unconciously take one of his own grandchildren - or someone else's - on his knee and pass on advice of how to live a good life for another generation. If I leave soon - as I will have to - I must shuffle off quietly, leaving him happy with his prospects in a changing world.

Teaching

After 40 years working in international business and on retirement, I started teaching in Asia courses related to business, environmental science and English. Although I have a degree from Cambridge taken in 1958, I have tended to assume that since this was 50 years ago, that qualification must have very little relevance or meaning to 2007 conditions. However that is not the way academia works, and it seems to be the case that a teacher with a PhD is supposed to be a better teacher than a mere BA. I do not see myself why a good teacher has to have a high academic honour! And that may explain why education is not entirely well-thought of! Does possession of a piece of parchment really demonstrate teaching ability?

In fact I have studied Medieval History and Theology more than science over the last 50 years: But no! My ability to teach was indeed measured on an exam that I had taken half a century ago - almost as if nothing I had done since was worth very much! It also seems to be the case that a degree from Cambridge somewhat outweighed any paltry English qualification! It is odd that I took a degree in sciences, which might suggest to some I cannot write English well. I think I can! The overall, result is that I teach, but not in the UK where I suppose the standard of teaching must by now be of a very high standard!

About ten years ago for fun in Riyadh, I took a theoretical course in teaching English from a Scottish college and passed with an 'A' grade. They liked the philosophical content of my essays! Subsequently I failed in 2001 a practical course on teaching English in Brighton, which was very far from being academic. It was slightly annoying to be told that my English was archaic and that the use of 'whom' was obsolescent. More lately I see that the Americans still teach the use of 'whom'!

I also have the impression that I would not be allowed to teach in the United Kingdom as I do not have a Bachelor of Education degree! This is all the more puzzling when one reads that many undergraduates at University in the UK cannot read or write well. I think I could teach almost anyone to read and write given ten years to do so, but I am told that might be forbidden as my methods might be out of date or even cruel!

To be fair, it has taken me five years to learn how to teach. At the beginning I just lectured and told my students what I knew. Five years later, I try and get the students to learn by doing - a distinct change from merely purveying knowledge. Nevertheless, there does seem to me to be a tendency in the teaching world to aim for passing exams and getting a piece of parchment showing that one has a degree. What happens to a graduate beyond the age of 23 seems of little interest to the teaching profession. I noticed in my 50 year career when nterviewing new young employees that I took a degree as evidence of a smattering of intelligence and not much more. Their overall performance in work was a combination of many other skills; some of which are social, diplomatic and political - not academic or technical - and always related to an ability to communicate whether by writing or by speaking.

Teaching also seemed to have rules! Appearance often seemed more important than intellectual ability. I am not too sure that our best brains care much for mere appearances, but I suppose we are training most of the population to obey orders and to be socially/politically correct.

There seems to be a hierarchy in teaching - professors, deans, faculty, academics, tenure - fearsome words which at first rather intimidated me. Words from the distant past when academic authority was to be feared came back to haunt me. I have never been very good at obeying orders from on high and found much in teaching that might not help students - and they knew it. There does seem to be a gap between people who do practical things and people who teach! I hear in the UK that the teaching profession is chiefly in the hands of women these days and that this is producing a generation of boys who see themselves as inferior. All my teachers at school were men! Does that make a difference. I can see it may do.

It is odd to be teaching business courses after I have retired. What was it I knew for a business career og 40 years that I had no written qualifications for? The perception of the business world as to what is needed for a successful career may be rather different from a dry academic approach.

Teaching English brings one to the threshold of what is politically correct and what discrimination means! I am told a have a clear speaking voice employing the accents of southern England - the only place in the world where I shall/we shall is used instead of I will/we will! Many seem to like the accent which is often better recognised in Pakistan, India, Hong Kong and Malaysia than in England these days. I have Chinese students who deliberately want a British accent instead of an American one. When some UK English teachers are teaching the accent of Newcastle, Liverpool and the East End of London instead of the Queen's English, we begin to get into problem areas. I am always surprised how many foreigners are employed by the BBC and CNN who speak a British English when American ought presumambly be the dominant accent. I teach British English too but I hope with a sense of humour that recognises the cultural differences!

So perhaps what I am saying is that the world is full of wonderfully skilled people who don't possess parchments that confirm they have degrees. These I see as merely a ticket to get on the fast train of life. Education should be honoured for making us civilised and much less related to what money we can earn.

Benedict Arnold/ Tony Blair

I felt quite a feeling of revulsion on reading in a recent Economist that in September 2001, Tony Blair in a speech had said “ Mine is the first generation able to contemplate the possibility that we may live our entire lives without going to war or sending our children to war”. If nothing more, that shows a lack of prescience and judgement to say such a things as a national leader and then a year or two later reverse that opinion with a vengeance. It looks in 2007 as if Blair has become responsible for many deaths and casualties in Iraq, which may not cease for many years to come, and without any obvious benefit to people in England or indeed Iraq! His latest argument is that we should contemplate 'liberal intervention' in the affairs of other nations overseas. I am not quite sure how this policy is different from old-style colonialism and implies a certain arrogance in a leader. I would hope whatever the policy a politician espouses, there should be some consistency and ultimately a measure of success, that we can all recognise.

It is quite understandable that the Americans should denigrate the name of Benedict Arnold (1741 – 1801) best known for betraying the United States forces and plotting to surrender the American fort at West Point to the English during the American Revolution. He is the most famous traitor in the history of the United States.

However the English probably took a different view and thought Benedict Arnold a loyal subject of King George. We had until recently supposed Tony Blair's responsibility was to safeguard the future of England and pursue policies that would benefit his own country - not the USA. While the Americans may feel happy that Tony Blair made what appears to be a 'personal' decision to support the USA, it does seem to be against the better judgement of the English people. However much Tony Blair may admire the USA, nevertheless one cannot help wonder whether there are not some other parallels in history, which need to be considered!

Servants

I have had servants at home since arriving in Venezuela in 1961, 45 years ago. I am not even sure one should admit it! Servants are wonderfully useful, and truth to tell I could not now live without someone to do my daily laundry and cooking. You could argue that it frees me to do other important and useful things in life such as writing! Servants are so cheap! You may pay a servant only US$100 per month plus food and lodging. A real bargain for a soul. It is lucky that populations continue to grow so fast, thus providing surplus labour which will eventually swell the pool of available servants!

It is not all cakes and ale! I cannot find things that only yesterday I put down in a safe place I know of. A continual tidying-up process goes on leaving me a stranger in my own house. When asked, the servant denies all knowledge of any artifact put down. Food that I buy disappears, and I am left eating 'laing' and rice when I had hope to be eating cakes and ale!

I get my own drinks from the kitchen - as Welsh ploughboy ought to - instead of calling for them on a tray. I still feel a sense of shame why I cannot do these things for myself, and no doubt a lot of people reading this essay will dislike reading my admission or even my truthfulness. Before retiring years ago, I even had a driver! Perhaps it stems from the day in 1944 when I came home for the holidays from my expensive school, and raised my cap politely to our gardener. My mother roundly ticked me off for raising my hat to an inferior. I still do not quite understand why in a world where equality and democracy are said to be important, very little effort is made by governments - and the international great and the good - to change to the status quo.

Some of us wonder why the world is not a better place, and I have slowly come to the conclusion that the elite from the ruling classes in every country of the world like it that way. However poor a country may be overall with people subsisting on US$2 per day, having surplus labour makes life so much easier for the ruling classes and elite, who may represent only 10% of the total population. Anyone who is anyone does not wish to see much change in the availability of servants. Change takes place but hopefully oh so slowly.

Abortion

I note the Pope was very much against abortion in his visit to Brazil. I think I would agree that abortion is a most unhappy result of young people unable to understand the consequences of their coupling. To what extent I would bring the full force of the law or even the threat of hell onto unhappy young people, I am less sure. It practice it does not seem to make much difference as abortions take place, law or no law. Young people need help, and I would think the girls especially, who often seem naive at this stage of their lives.
Looking at our biology, it seems men are capable of fathering many hundreds of children, and women often as many as 12 offspring in a lifetime. It is not quite clear to me why God would have created us in His image with this ability to breed! When I was born the world population was 2 billion, seventy years later it is 6.6 billion. This is an untenable situation economically and environmentally, unless of course you believe that famine and drought, disease and pestilence, violence and war will be the safety valve eventually. The Four Horsemen are indeed the ultimate solution.
I still feel mankind has some responsibility to worry about the future, but perhaps I am wrong. I take the view that allowing children to be born is perfectly acceptable - but only if children so born are looked after properly - food, love and education. It is not right that many should condemn abortion but then allow these selfsame children to die at a rather later age of disease, malnutrition and violence. I suppose that it is just possible to argue from a religious point-of-view that so many extra deaths of children don't really matter as God will take care of them after life is over, but I don't really like such a ruthless argument!

Intellectual Property Rights

It was reported this week that the combined wealth of the top thousand in the UK now stands at £360bn. This is three times higher than when New Labour took power ten years ago. These days some financiers seem to be getting US$1 billion annual bonuses! Is our only measure of success and morality to be made in money?

It also cannot surely be true that a 'New Labour' policy actually wishes to promote this division of national wealth. Is it fair? In a market economy, it is natural and right to allow the forces of supply/demand to govern much of the economic activity that takes place. However it cannot be an absolute priority that in a democratic society government should have no role to play at all in how wealth is made or shared out. Society has an interest! We must be reaching a limit now, and it cannot be right that decisions for society as a whole depend on the personal views of a very few, just because of money. You might of course argue that these 1000 rich people in the UK represent the brightest and the best of our nation, and should naturally be allowed to make political decisions for the rest of us, but I doubt if that is true!

Other aspects are causing concern. It does not seem to me to be right that there is no upper limit to the wealth any one individual should be allowed to control. Our laws should not be so restrictive as to protect the interests of only the very rich. on the other hand it is most important that those with inventive minds should be encouraged to develop new things and benefit personally from doing so. It would seem that the individual should benefit within his own lifetime, but that it is not the responsibility of society as a whole to guarantee that the inventors' heirs should benefit to the same extent. I see no problem in allowing untalented children to inherit something significant, but perhaps this should be measured in a few millions rather than billions. Society requires some balance. However charitable and good a man may be, he should not alone be allowed to bend society to his own way of thinking!

There is undoubtedly a problem of how to encourage costly research by business by allowing them to make a fair profit. Set against this, must be doubts whether we can really in a civilised society allow the poor to die in millions every year of diseases such as HIV, malaria, cancer, tuberculosis etc, merely because there is no profit to be made. The same might be said about famine, drought, violence and war where again we fail all the time.

Charles Dickens was most upset by the attitude of the American government because in the 19th century there was no copyright law in the USA, books printed in England were pirated in the USA without the payment of any royalties to the authors.
A broader view must now also be taken over the way the Americans and other Western countries pirate the brains of developing countries and persuade them to leave home to work in the West. Immigration of professors, doctors and scientists to the West is also a form of pirating intellectual property - only that the 'property' resides in the heads of clever people rather than on patent and copyright documents. Pillaging the schools and colleges of the developing world by the West for intellectual excellence is hardly a good example when at the same time we argue that patents, copyrights, and brands, often made by these immigrants, should be sacrosanct (by twisting the arms of politicians) for a long time ahead.

In a world where individuals and companies can earn billions, we need to rethink and explain more clearly why we are so strict on the theft of intellectial property when at the same time millons die of disease and we allow individuals to decide how our societie shsould be run - by the power of the purse. My suggestion is that nations should fund generously research that affects us all (malaria) until a solution is found. For individuals we should cap the wealth that any one person can accumulate in a life time by judicious taxation. We cannot call ourselves civilised if we ruthlessly exploit every business opportunity while millions die every year through neglect.

Training Children to Eat

Of course I agree with the idea that babies should be breast-fed. In fact I was recently surprised to read that many modern mothers still think that powdered milk is just as good as breast milk! I thought we had solved that one 30 years ago. Perhaps every generation has to begin again.

As a father and a grandfather, I have suffered vicariously for many years watching mothers forcing those extra few spoonfuls into the mouth a child, who looks to me to be on the verge of vomiting and who is intelligent enough to know even at the age of two or three what a sympathetic grandfather is already thinking. I have never really understood this compulsion in women to force their children to eat!

It could be of course that nature and evolution has inculcated into women the feeling that since food is a scarce commodity the tribe may not eat again for many days. We must eat as much as possible as quickly as possible. Who knows when we may eat again!

My method in teaching children to eat is quite the opposite - at great personal sacrifice (in gaining weight) to myself. If a child does not eat in the time allotted, I eat their share instead. They then have to wait to the next meal. This sort of competition teaches children from an early age that they will go hungry if they complain too much or seem too reluctant to eat. Even in evolutionary terms children need to learn how to look after themselves early on. Male lions after all always get the lion's share, and cubs need to learn this quickly or die.

I am not a doctor, but I can't help wondering whether people who suffer from anorexia must have developed an unhealthy dislike for food at a very early age. All those extra spoonfuls forced into their little mouths at the age of two or three may have lasting and harmful effects.

Certainly using my methods, my family has never suffered from not wanting to eat. Indeed so successful is my method that I now need to introduce a counterbalance - we do seem to eat too much chocolate, cream and cake! I am working on it. At least we are not thin!

War and Violence

In 12th century England, William Marshall, as a little boy, was given by his father to King Stephen as a hostage for his good behaviour! The King rather liked the little boy and eventually returned him safely to his family - instead of hanging him from the battlements in reprisal. How brutal and uncivilised people were in those days - prepared to execute a little boy if it became necessary! Chivalry was tempered by an acceptance of violence.

There was even a time (the peace of God) in the 11th century when the Christian Church was close to banning the use of violence on a Saturday or Sunday, and even the carrying of weapons at all. How far we have regressed since those times!

I apologise to all those who undertook war in past centuries if I once thought them brutal and uncivilised. We are worse! Today I am very unclear what rules apply! Indeed what rules apply to anyone contemplating the use of force. I took it for granted that in war, the Geneva Convention applied. I am surprised to find that in certain circumstances the Geneva Convention could be overruled by the say-so of top politicians. I was 12 years old when the Nuremberg trials set a new standard for the punishment of international genocide and crime. In 60 years since, we have forgotten already what Nuremberg meant and it looks as if those making decisions today however bad will get away scot free!

We seem to have lawyers arguing as public affair Representatives that even torture is acceptable in certain circumstances and that perpetual imprisonment without trial is possible if we dislike those enough, who fight for an alien idea. Evidence these days is merely constructed to obtain the desired short-term solution. Being economical with the truth is thought to be the right way to win and how they must roar with laughter in the privacy of their conference rooms at the naivety of the rest of us.

Isolated and badly educated politicians are making 'personal decisions' without regard to what expert advisers and consultants might be saying. If nothing else, it suggests that government is not any more based on democracy - that need to pay heed to what an electorate might think. For a long time, I was impressed by the idea of a rule-of-law that even nations had to obey. Now I am not so sure what is happening! International affairs have nothing to do with democracy at a time when the world has become a village.

Perhaps it is a time of transition. The last two thousand years supported many different religions and philosophical ideas because because they were separated by huge distances and we scarcely knew what other alien peoples thought or why. Sadly the 'death of distance' brings us face-to-face with each other in a way that was impossible over the last two thousand years. Sunnis and Shias now kill each other only because they have just realised they both exist.
Now the moment of truth is that we have to learn to live with each other, and our politicians are not helping much at a time when many of us are sympathetic to the strange and alien peoples we meet all the time! Where are we going?



Iraq is a catastrophe, the consequences of which may be with us for the next century. I am not so much against the pragmatic objective of solving global problems, but against the incompetence, ignorance and inefficiency of those that try. Much needs to be done to make the world a better place but there is hardly any point in trying if hundreds of thousands have to die. What is going to happen in Iraq is that eventually the armies and politicians will slyly announce "victory" and go home with their tails between their legs.

Is Modern Politics Democracy?

The Press are often inclined to talk as if democracy as originally defined is working wonderfully well in modern times, and as if it is self-evident that what we have in the United Kingdom, the USA and many other countries is pure unalloyed democracy. The tragedy of Iraq has been brought about by a naive belief that 'democacy' is working well at home and should therefore be spread around the world. It is fairly obvious that democracy as understood in 2007 is failing us and many other nations too. If for no other reason, the original definition of 'democracy' has very little to with the modern reality of rough-and-tumble politics actually practiced. How has this come about?

The international sphere impinges directly on nations livelihood and economic success. There is so little evidence of democracy in the United Nations, The World Bank, the IMF, global development banks, the WTO or even the EU in Brussels. Decisions in these organisations are decided by representives appointed by governments. Or to be more explicit, by top government leaders who would never consider asking a voter for an opinion. In this way wars are undertaken on the say-so of individual politicians without consultation and famines kill off many in Africa although problems have been identified long ago. Whatever it is, it is not democracy. It is a pity that disastrous decisions are being made by politicians who have scarcely ever left home and have limited knowledge of the world.

Of course, politics has always been the province of the influential and the rich. Your chance of becoming a successful politician is greatly enhanced if you are a lawyer (and they say a teacher) where the gift-of-the-gab is critical. Lawyers are trained to put forward (bad) arguments orally in open court. The UK parliament is such a debating chamber and only those able to debate in public are likely to succeed. Perhaps once an excellent way to ensure we are governed well with transparent arguments made in open forum. Unfortunately, politicians have to be lawyers, who seem to have more regard for the law than the truth, and have become public relations managers for their clients. How can democracy flourish in the old sense of the word.

Voting systems are manipulated by politicians to the extent that the results of elections are by no means clear. In the UK we often have government by a minority who neverthless get more seats in parliament than anyone else. Amusingly machiavellian, but surely it cannot be democracy!

The world of education has changed in the last 50 years. Many of us have university degrees in science, engineering and business,and are quite capable of looking after ourselves. However there is no path in the UK from one profession to another, and many of our experts who one might have thought were needed in this technological age seem unable to move into politics. No wonder many technical decisions fail and billions of pounds are lost when the politicians involved come from a different non-technical world. In fact it seems that many senior politicians have only succeeded by joining a political party at the age of 20! Leave it too long, you are barred from political life for ever.

The world has become globalised - as they say; we live in a global village. The odd thing is that there many hundreds of thousands of administrators and international executives who have lived their lives overseas in many different countries. They know the politics and cultures of the world well. This contrasts greatly with most of our politicians (and civil servants)who have very seldom ever lived overseas and who one suspects are inclined to believe their own propaganda about how terrible foreigners are - except of course one must not discriminate against them - already a contradiction in terms!

Many modern diplomats and ambassadors now have less experience of the world than international business. Even those diplomats with experience of and empathy for the world are hamstrung by the need to get every decision rubber-stamped by their own government, only 5 seconds away by telephone or e-mail. It is clear that the diplomatic world is frozen into immobility most of the time when confronted with difficult decisions. If in doubt, do nothing!

Politics needs money and large amounts of it. Recent reports from the USA suggest that presidential candidates are already collecting a few hundred million dollars - a month! This may be a practical way of succeeding in politics, but it surely is not democracy when so many people are excluded from ever trying.

It may be human nature to compete for positions at the top of society, and we are still very much at the evolutionary stage of being 'red in tooth and claw' as we jockey and fight for status. A few hundred thousand dead in Iraq is just part of the price we pay. Integrity and honesty are not a great help in reaching the top in politics - which of course excludes many of our best people at once! There is already a great contrast between the intelligent and thoughtful people we see on television every day and the shifty, uneducated stare of the average politician trying hard to be economical with the truth.

It would seem we are in a transition stage globally. It is clear that we cannot long endure a situation where ignorant domestic politicians rule the roost while at the same time there are increasingly many well-educated people from all nations, who know the world intimately and yet have little influence on what happens. This situation has no balance and one might predict that major changes will have to take place if we wish to have a world ruled by democracy, especially in the USA, the UK and Europe. We don't have it at the moment!

This all sounds pessimistic! I suppose it is. We are killing people deliberately and by neglect. One way out is to introduce a new political idea - democracy! Perhaps it should be tried one day.

UK Pensions

A UK pension it is said is not enough to keep a couple in old age. It is about £7000 per year in 2007, much less than in France or Italy. Of course, it is said the British government has been prudent in the long term and continental pension funds will go bankrupt quite soon. It is not quite clear how socialists have allowed this to happen! But perhaps these days 'New Labour' and the Communists are turning into good capitalists because they have no choice.

It is a different argument on private (company) pension funds. Many of us get two or more pensions, one from the government and one from our employers. When Chancellor Brown removed surreptitiously £5 billion per year from private pension funds, it was done so cleverly that no one noticed for a decade. Now many private companies are shutting down their old pension funds which paid pensions on final salary and this implies less money for company pensioners years into the future.

One factor no one likes to talk about is that for many years the government allowed companies to take 'contribution holidays' as their pension assets were above 105% of their liabilities. It is said companies saved $19 billion over that period due to buoyant stock exchanges.

An intelligent observer might have assumed that this £19 billion would have been put aside for a rainy day. For it is clear that rainy days do occur over the forty year period which must be spent accumulating assets to pay pensions. But no! The UK government insisted that this £19 billion should be paid out to shareholders as profits (dividends). Again I am suprised that it is a Labour government which rewards the shareholders in preference to the future pensioners.

Of course, a future British government could reverse the decision on the £5 billion per year tax on pension funds, but don't count on it. The fact has become evident over recent years that there is a disconnect between governments and their ability to plan for 40 years ahead. I imagine for the average politician it is hardly worth the trouble with sea levels rising and carbon Dioxide levels out of control. We have to fight our own battles over 40 years, but as in the past it will be the 'rich that gets the pleasure, and the poor that gets the blame'.

The problem for government is how to hold the ring between those of us who do not save for the future, either because we are too poor or too careless over that 40 years and the prudent who believe that they have to look after themselves- but don't wish to see their savings taxed away by profligate governments.

Public Schools

I suppose I have to admit I went to a preparatory and public school in England a long time ago 1942-1952! I suspect all that hardship and discipline has not changed me very much. I am more sorry for my parents who only saw me sometimes! You will say I am cold and ruthless, but at least I am still a gentleman.

The arguments in the UK are strange. Perhaps our politicians are helpless. Over my life time we have had a number of Labour governments, but they have not abolished Public Schools. One wonders why! At one point in my life (1945) I was going to be looked after from 'cradle to grave', but no one talks like that any more. Public schools seem to give a good education, but presumably to the wrong people.

The basic argument for reasons of equality is that we must allow individuals to decide for themselves. I would argue that interference from on top eventually leads to disaster as one serious ignorant political mistake affects everyone. Perhaps that is what I mean by freedom - to be left alone within the law to do what I want.

There is also the question of using earned money well. What is noticeable is that many people send their children to State schools and are consequently quite rich (nice cars, nice holidays, nice hospitals and nice houses). Others who seem to value education (or perhaps it is indeed status!) spend their money on education, discipline and civilisation. Was it not in Communist States that everyone was going to be paid the same?

I notice recently that many of the (well-educated) boys I was at school with do not live in the UK any more. Their addresses are in Australia, Canada, the USA and indeed many other places. Those against Public school must be pleased to hear that so many have left England already. Standards in England will have risen!

So what is the problem? It surely must be that even the most socialist or communist leader finds that there is a limit to what they can do - short of revolution. There is not enough money to change the UK educational system. Public Schools have grown up slowly over the last 200 years and to abolish them will cost too much - even our Socialist and Communist leaders send their children to Public Schools (although they try to keep it secret).

Just think what might happen if Public Schools were abolished! Parents freed from this burden would be able to spend £25-50,000 per year on something else. Would the rest of society approve and would taxes subsequently rise on everyone, who did not send their children to private schools.

I suspect that as long as we value individual freedom it will be impossible to abolish Public School. Politicians, especially successful New Labour politicians, like them for their children and perhaps it is better that some of us spend our money on education rather than wine, women and song! I dread to think what I might do if I had an extra £25,000 per year to spend on myself instead of on education!

Music

One of my 19 year old students continually has earphones in his ears and I asked him how often he listened to music! His reply was 'all the time', every hour of every day. Now that surprised me as I only occasionally listen to music - I almost wrote 'hardly ever'. I did read recently that music helps develop the brain, but as a teacher this is not as obvious to me as the theory might imply.

I was drummed out of the school choir whem I was 7, which may not have given me a feeling of welcome, particularly in church. God seemed only to like children who could sing!

This lack may be due to my coming from another age long ago. After all my growing up to the age of 15 covered the years 1939-1949 when perhaps the second world war prevented much music being practiced by anyone. I do remember the hymns in church, the songs of Vera Lynn (Harbour Lights), patriotic songs from America sung in school (John Brown's Body), German military songs (Lili Marlene), but these made little impact on me. I was quite intrigued to hear that perhaps King Henry VIII wrote 'Greensleeves'! It made him sound more romantic that the history books implied.

Later in my teens at school, we listened to Brahms and Bach during afternoon tea, but these were much too difficult for me to enjoy at the age of 14. It was only when I started work in London that I was able to go to the more popular concerts at the Albert Hall and Royal Festival Hall that I began to get a feel for music. But I found nusic too emotional and upsetting. Where others seemed to get profound enjoyment, I became depressed. Chopin conjured up visions of Polish Cavalry bravely fatally charging German 'Tiger' tanks, Tchaikovsky visions of Napoleons 'Grande Armee' perishing in the snows of Russian winter, and even of Viennese operetta with its military balls and beautiful countesses showed me a world that I could never hope to aspire to. So on the whole music can depress me. Even the beauty of the "Pastoral Symphony" is tinged with sadness in a countryside gone beyond recall. My reaction does not seem to be the case with other people.

The only music I really liked was Venezuelan folk music - Hugo Blanco and Simon Diaz - which I met on going to Caracas in 1961. The Venezuelans knew how to dance and I was entranced at the age of 26 by the sensuous, sinuous dancing of the 'meringue' by the prettiest nubile girls in the world (apart from the Philippines!). Unfortunately my own dancing was not good and most young people in 1962 were transfixed by American and Italian music. Folk music was not popular! I watch the young dancing in 2007 and am afraid it all looks rather primitive to me - a mating rite put on for the benefit of the tribal elders, of whom I am now one. It all certainly looks more fun and primeval that the dancing of 1950, but not so very civilised.

Then about 1962, the Beetles emerged from Liverpool. It was another ten years before I realised who they were and I had generally assumed all pop music must be American. I have never understood why the Beetles were so popular. Then as I travelled more, I began to feel the rhythms of Indian and Arabic music, but no one from the West seemed to hear what I heard! It was switched off before I had time to listem.

So I wonder. Is everyone uplifted by the sound of music or are there some people around who, like me, get depressed. Recently I have come to the conclusion that the reason I do not listen to music much is that it paints a sad picture of the world, or perhaps a picture of the world as it should be, but is not. No wonder I get depressed! My interest in music is related to society, history and human behaviour, and not so much to sound!

Scientific Research

I took a degree in sciences in 1958, which is now 48 years ago! My career was indeed in industrial chemistry all over the world. Over all that time I was never approached by anyone in authority to give an account of what dangerous basic research I might have been carrying out. It might be that my employers submitted a secret report as to my activities but I doubt it. Indeed chemistry lends itself to many other scientific disciplines such as medicine, pollution, botany, or biology. How would I prove that I had never done any research at all on these in my little laboratory in the corner of my kitchen and made terrible new discoveries.
I suspect therefore that the ability of any or all government authorities, who are mostly lawyers anyway, to keep a track on what is really happening in science is vain. Of course perhaps everyone with a degree in any way related to science should submit an annual return - similar to a tax return- which would explain the wonderful discoveries made in a year. I still can't quite fathom why that apple fell on my head yesterday, but I am working on it!

Religion & Holy Week

I noted the recent correspondence on the existence of God, and am giving it more thought this Holy Week. It seems to me that the great weakness of all religions is that they accept the existence of God - the blind watchmaker, the computer in the sky, the revelation of a good book etc - but they all quickly agree that God does exist, but are very reluctant to undertake any real research or discussion - because that comes very close to blasphemy or heresy. We all know how we punish heretics. I wish they would agree! There is always the problem about what happened before God existed and why he felt so lonely. My own conclusion is that my powers of analysis are quite the equal of the priests I have met in Riyadh, Tokyo, Caracas, Seoul, Manila, Lagos or even Canterbury, but they still prefer to pretend that the others are wrong and they only are right. I can see I may be wrong but not that all the others are equally right. I suppose I do think that there is an absolute truth somewhere even if I have not found it yet.
I spent 10 years going into a Christian church every day, and must have been brainwashed quite well for a time. I have always been fond of history and find the first 350 years of Christian history fascinating. But what Jesus, as a wonderful philosopher, is reported to have said in the New Testament seems to a have little to do with subsequent ritual and dogma invented yars later. I wonder why no one wanted to teach me the history of the early Christian Church in any detail? I only discovered the books of Josephus recently and was amazed they were actually suppressed at school! Nag Hammadi and the Dead Sea Scrolls seem important, and yet so-called holy men want to pretend they do not exist. This shows little faith in God! I am also not clear why religious rules change with time. I would have thought that rules would have been timeless and applicable to all time. I am slightly surprised in Manila to find Catholic services in English quoting the King James Bible, when in the 16th Century many Englishmen were burnt at the stake for using English at all! It was a surprise that Joan of Arc became a saint in (was it?) 1927. It seemed a long 600 wait to find out! I can understand the historical and political reasons, but not a religous justification for a volte face merely to please the French. The other aspect of religion is that it has depended on cultural isolation to protect the faithful. Religion in the Philippines has only a limited truth, because it has inherited a Spanish way of thinking. Many British and Americans tend to be protestant for much the same historical reasons. Islam in the Middle East depends more upon history than truth. All this is falling apart in 2007, and I would predict religious authorities are already have great difficulty in preaching one truth when the din of other truths can be heard all the time. The young are going to be confused!
I always fondly greet the stutue of Philip II of Spain here in Manila whenever I pass by, and consider that but for Divine Providence Philip II might have been King of England - and of the Philppines at the same time. My recent researches show that San Beda is indeed the Venerable Bede, Anglo-Saxon if not English - and there are number of schools in Manila dedicated to St Thomas Moore ("I am the King's good servant but God's first"). They still belong to me culturally, even if I have strayed somewhat from the fold in the last 500 years! Eostra (Easter) is of course the Anglo-Saxon Goddess, and even the days of the week in English follow the old Norse Gods. Surprising that no one has changed them yet in Easter Christian services! Happy Easter!

UK Leadership

This week there developed a discussion on 'leadership' in the press and why we don't have any good leaders any more. I do not think we have less potential leaders than we did in the past, but our society has changed. More indeed are better educated. Many of us are alone and independent financially and politically in possession of the latest news. At the same time globalisation has created a newly educated international business class (of which I am one), who are not well-regarded by the politicians at home. It still troubles me that I am not allowed to vote in the UK as if I am not really English any more.

Politicians themselves to be successful stay at home in small parochial districts that do not lead on to any understanding of international affairs. The broad Scots accents of our government confirm this! How many of our politicians have ever lived abroad in other cultures? This is a terrible handicap for good global governance. The people who have been overseas for many decades are not normally part of the democratic system. The UN, World Bank, IMF, the EU, Regional Development Banks etc are not democracies either.

The modern competitive market system which encourages economic success and freedom,with which I might agree in some respects, also has its downside. For example it seems to me that many of our best university graduates, once it is recognised they won't reach the top (in politics or business) to eliminate competition are retired early on adequate pensions: It is 23 years now since I retired. There is little interchange in the UK between one profession and another, so these potential leaders are lost to society. Indeed it also looks as if to be a successful leader in modern society either in politics or business it is necessary to cut corners and practice dubious moral practices. This has resulted in people reaching the top - such as Bush and Blair - whose eyes are to the main chance with very little grounding in morals or ethics. I would not be invited, but would I want to be part of such a system?

Modern instant communications have also destroyed individual independence and initiative. Decisions - and the leaders making them - really need to be spread as widely as possible throughout society with many decisions delegated to the lower levels. Yet the advent of the computer means all decisions have to be sent to the top. There is no point in having 'leaders' if they are prevented from making decisions by some higher authority some 5 seconds away by telephone, but 10,000 kms by distance. This last week we have the Captain of a formidable British warship 'Cornwall" abandoning his own sailors and soldiers, and letting them be captured on the orders of Tony Blair in London. What is the point of training leaders in the British Navy when they are not allowed to make decisions for themselves?

This is symptomatic of modern politics that leaders are not wanted because orders are reserved to the very top. It is one of the problems of modern society that a few politicians at the top demand to be in control while at the same time more of us than ever before are free to do our own thing. We have therefore a void opening up between domestic politics and the fact that millions are no longer attached to the countries they originally came from. In these circumstances, leadership is downgraded
and yet one might suspect that eventually the global democratic pressure cooker will explode in unexpected ways as the old concept of national sovereignty loses control

Savoire Faire

I have great difficulty in fitting into modern social life! I am quite happy in jeans and a T-shirt, eating when I am hungry and drinking iced-tea. Appearances seem to matter and if you cannot dress in silk shirts, linen suits, and eat at French restaurants, you are obviously a misfit. But why do appearances matter if God (or Allah) knows us already? I tried all this when I was in my twenties (fifty years ago) down to gold cuff-links, Saville Row suits, white dinner jackets, Italian shoes and oval Turkish cigarettes. These days it seems to help to have a 'Porsche' too.

Yet I have been travelling and living in many different cultures for 45 years, and fit in well - because I can eat anything that is put in front of me and indeed I can become delightfully mesmerised by and excessively polite in a new culture. This is not because I am civilised, but because I would have made a good academic anthropologist.

I have to pretend to like a myriad list of modern foods and wines when I would be perfectly happy with a tuna sandwich and iced-tea. I once said at a dinner party that the food was nice, but not to worry as I could always have a sandwich when I got home! I was very young and honest in those days, and have learnt to be more circumspect as the years have gone by - although my sense of humour tends in the direction of deliberately making a 'faux-pas' in polite society - such as swearing. Actually I never swear unless as a joke or to upset someone! Those who know me can get very angry with me for deliberatly passing the wrong message!

I was once in Bangkok many years ago and was entertained well by my Thai colleagues. They seemed very nervous to receive an Englishman from London until I said I would be delighted to try Thai food. A wonderful evening! Sensing their relief I asked why. "Ah", they said, "The last Englishman from London had insisted on bacon and eggs all week". I am not like that.

I attribute my present attitudes to the old-fashioned, out-of-date, circumstances of the first 23 years of my life 1934-1957. My education was based on the Bible and Shakespeare. I was a good student and imbibed a lot rules and regulations from the New Testament, which remain with me still. Why this is so is harder to explain. These rules seem to have had singularly little effect on the rest of boys from my school. Strong drink, night clubs, women of doubtful reputation, and gambling were particularly to be damned in those far off times(but not today!).

The advent of the world war, which in Europe started in 1939 (for my American friends) meant I think that food, drink and appearances were of very low priority. That is what I learnt until rationing ended in 1957, when I was already 23! Beer seemed to be the English drink, first (warm) 'bitter' beer and then when I was at Cambridge exotic, cold, foreign 'lager' beer from Denmark. I drank beer all the time for 20 years because that was what 'real men' drank. It was only later that I realised how weak I was to conform when in fact I liked whisky or rum and coca-cola, or better still iced-tea! I rather liked drinking Chivas Regal and Coca-Cola just to upset my Scots friends! They seemed quite lacking in any sense of humour regarding whisky!

Then wine and cheeses from France and Germany began to appear about 1950. I rather like the white Algerian and German wines, but the heavier French red wines were far too bitter for me. It was fun ordering cheeses of goat, sheep or camel without quite knowing why. I am a stickler for 'port' and 'stilton' of course. That seemed to be important to British Army colonels who had to be impressed! However I persevered and for the next 40 years put up a good show at restaurants in the Chosun or Mandarin hotels while ordering wines for my customers.

So it is hardly my fault that my knowledge of how to live the 'dolce vita' is sadly lacking in sophisticated detail. I was born at the wrong time. Spaghetti should be 'al dente' and I can make a terrible fuss if it is not. But really I don't understand.

These days I maintain a facade of elegance and sophistication by a stroke of luck. I like Japanese and Korean food, and can argue those who eat French and Italian food are bit passe or declasse (no accents!).

Official Information

I have been following the Iraq situation now for 15 years! I was actually in Riyadh during the Gulf War. The British military attache told us that we were too far away in Riyadh from Iraq to be threatened by missiles, but a scud missile from the Iraqi desert was then launched shortly after - and then almost every evening thereafter just after sunset: the launchers came out of their holes after dark. These official briefing meetings in Embassies either demonstrated the ignorance of government officials or alternatively that they knew the truth but wouldn't tell the truth in order not to alarm anyone. But that seems silly when a missile was launched anyway. Eventually a scud landed quite close to me, and for the first time I thought perhaps I ought to defend myself!

Saddam Hussein was badly advised! I would have fired 30 Scuds at Riyadh on the first night, and the whole of Riyadh would have decamped to Jeddah that very night! Luckily our leaders do not understand.

Seeing Saddam Hussein go to his death left me in two minds. Admiration that he went to his death with some dignity: A rueful acknowledgement that if someone fires a missile at me, I would reluctantly retaliate. My reaction is a measure of how uncivilised I am.

My objection today in 2007 four years after the second invasion of Iraq is that British and American politicians are mouthing excuses for their gigantic incompetence, ignorance and lack of imagination. If we are to undertake some great task, we owe it to all people to do it well. Worse, it looks to me that the people who are making these awful decisions on our behalf are not properly educated or trained in the realities of global power, nor have any real sympathy with the displaced Arab peoples, who indeed do need our help - but not this sort of help. Why is it we can spend $10 billion on war at the drop of a hat, and yet money is not available for development? If we really wish to apologise to Africa for the slave trade, then the money spent on war should be diverted to a better cause.

Beggar the thought that I could contribute to any solution to the problems of the Middle East. But sometimes I do wonder whether after 12 years in Saudi Arabia and a total of 17 years in Moslem countries, I might not have some glimmer of understanding on how to find a solution. Our existing politicians surely could not have made it worse, and yet the world is full of people these days who know the world well and sympathise in a way that our politicians do not.

So what I think is happening is that there is a disconnect between our politicians who stay at home and an international diaspora, growing ever larger and influential, who so far serve no useful function in international politics. My only consolation is that Tony Blair knows what he has done, and it shows in every new wrinkle on his face!

Dscrimination & Private Education

As an Englishman, and as the Welsh ploughboy I would have been 200 years ago, I have always been a bit confused at the British class system: especially as my father unaccountably paid for my education. I suspect I live in two worlds - the world of privilege and the revolutionary world of the peasants.
Many top Republican Americans also seem to have been to private schools in the USA, although why this is different from the British system I am not sure. Perhaps many WASP Americans never quite escaped from King George III after all and remain faithful to an aristocrat class system without quite realising it.
Then there is the caste system in India! Again I was never quite clear why apartheid was wrong in South Africa, but the caste system in India seemed quite acceptable to British and American governments. Certainly the high-caste Hindus I met were very pleased with their position in life and very affable people. Perhaps the British were a bit ashamed of saying anything at all against their old Indian Empire?
In some countries, old feudal systems still seem in operation. This seems to consist in a top-down authoritarian system whereby orders 'must be obeyed without question' and retired generals are often government ministers.
Now quite where democracy fits into this sort of description of modern society is also obscure. If those in command in the old democracies of America and Britian depend on large sums of private money and private education to reach the top, it suggests most of us do not get much say into what happens. I hear many British governments get elected on a minority vote of the total electorate, and then claim a mandate. It is a puzzling old world.

Scotland

I never gave it much thought fifty years ago. Scotland was a cold country far to the north, apparently usually allied to France, but my inclinations and destiny lay in other directions to the south and east. Clearly the Scots benefited from their link with England!
I have never been to Scotland, although once attached to the Pembroke Yeomanry I did fire field-guns live across the border but without any malice.
Today I see that Tony Blair has laid the groundwork for Scottish independence, and it is not altogether surprising that our predominantly Scottish government should hanker after independence. Perhaps they cannot tell us but this was part of New Labour policy all along!
I have had many Scots colleagues over the years all over the world and very able they proved to be. They do often seem to have edged out the English, which is surprising when one considers what a small population Scotland has.
So we must congratulate the SNP in advance on the success of its May campaign and look forward to a time when the English will once again assume their rightful position - if only by population numbers - in the British Isles. FREEDOM!

Manuelita Saenz

My last and final play called "Manuelita" on Venezuela was never published as I ran out of funds after my other plays ("Sibylla", "Titus and the Gates of Syon", and "My last Farewell") found few buyers. I received some advice that I should be writing novels, and that at any rate historical plays did not have much of a global market these days. That has left "Manuelita" on the stocks, perhaps never to see the light of day. Someone may in 300 years time come across a dusty copy and reflect it mirrors 21st Century attitudes. Who knows? It might also form the basis for a spectacular South American movie!

From my years in Venezuela, I became rather fond of Manuelita, and indeed of the support that the British Legion gave for the liberation of South America from Spain! British governments these days lack imagination and don't much support freedom fighters!
Manuela was the mistress of Simon Bolivar, the Liberator of South America. As a young girl, she had a rather dubious reputation, and her father could only find an English doctor to marry her. The English often seem to be quite flexible in such intimate matters when a Latin family would have put her beyond the pale. They may have been right, but poor English Dr Thorne would have taken her back years later through all the scandals. They had no children and that may have been the root cause of what happened. Manuela was barren.
After the battle on the slopes of Mt Pinchincha in Ecuador, Manuela - Mrs Thorne - attended a ball in honour of the victory and Simon Bolivar attended, even though the battle was won by his able Venezuelan lieutenant - Jose Antonio Sucre. Simon and Manuela danced all night and eventually disappeared together into the dawn.
It was scandal, but Manuelita remained faithful to Simon Bolivar for the remaining years of his and indeed her life, and looked after his papers and his legacy.
She was disgraced by the politicians of Great Colombia and Venezuela after his death in Santa Marta on the coast of Colombia eight years later. She was sent into exile and eventually died some 30 years later of diptheria, an exile in Paita on the Peruvian cost. To live she sold cigars and sweetmeats from a small shop to the American Pacific whaling fleets, but for those who had known her in the glory years of the South American fight for freedom she remained a special friend. She is special still today! Sadly all her valuable papers were burnt after her death as diptheria was a contagious.
In 2007, I am not sure that I entirely approve of Hugo Chavez socialist policies in Venezuela, but Hugo does at least inherit this idea from Simon Bolivar that freedom is worth fighting for however you wish to define it. British troops still are entitled to march through the streets of Caracas with fixed bayonets for without the British Legion the liberty of South America might not have ever been achieved. I at least have not forgotten that, nor the Venezulan fight for freedom nor indeed Manuelita herself! It is after all only 180 years ago.

Education and Competition

Society at least in the Uk seems confused! Today it was said said that children of those who have university degrees will in future be put at the bottom of the list in selection of new undergraduates. What fun! Someone somewhere is assuming that it is university education that bestows advantage and not family back ground and early fascination with life. I am beginning to think that my grandchildren before they get to the age of 5 already have a tremendous advantage in life. Perhaps babies should be removed from family control and put into a state creche to level the playing field. I am not even sure that a university degree makes much difference, and it would be something of a paradox if in 2027 most pampered university graduates were failures, while the middle class was wildly successful have been freed from the chains of conventional education. Graduate grandsons (such as myself) of Welsh peasant boys who never went to University find this all very intriguing! What exactly is the message to the children of recent graduates? I suspect the ruling classes in the UK will in future be educated in Australia and the USA. Try and stop that!
But I also thought that we tried to promote people on merit. What do we do to the unfortunates who pass entry exams and then get disqualified because of an accident of birth? Like me they become international outlaws (after only one generation of university education), not so bad for them but perhaps not good for the UK in the long run.
This then brings me to another thing that I find confusing. How far in our society can you go in wanting to win in politics or business while at the same time avoiding using one's innate education or character to tread down the competition. I do not think Tony Blair has got to the top by playing down his advantages (public school and university) but by a rather single-minded ruthlessness for the main chance. Come to think of it, it is a good idea - Children of politicians should not be allowed to go to university for two generations after reaching political power! There's method in their madness after all!
A free market system cannot operate if we tinker with underlying social trends. Clearly anyone who fights his way to the top ought to be hindered as much as possible in this brave new world. AS always who is going to do the hindering - Tony Blair, the most ruthless of all.

Carrying Arms

I was an expert in weapons and explosives in the UK from about the age of 15 to the time I left the Royal Artillery in 1960; perhaps I still am. I have often wondered why revolutionaries do not use more heavy artillery in their coups! However, I always felt that for me to carry arms implied I would use them if I had to. That did not seem right or Christian, so in about 1956 I sent back my last .303 Lee-Enfield rifle and some ammunition to school, and have never carried an arm since anywhere in the world. I did not keep any artillery at home! It seemed the civilised thing to do and avoided my using a weapon, rather than logic, to win an argument. I still think at the age of 72 I could take out most of the armed policement and soldiers I meet if I had to. They do not generally seem very well trained! I am also told how wonderful special forces are, and no doubt they are in good physical condition, but I am not entirely convinced they help very much from a strategic point-of-view. Anyway I suspect that being unarmed, people are nicer to me! This point-of-view perhaps also comes from an old idea in the UK that the police should not be armed, except for a truncheon, a very civilised way of running any society. Recently governments have been changing the rules on the use of violence and 'habeas corpus', and I cannot help worry that weapons training may after all be coming back as a means of self-defence.
All the above applies to the UK, but I have observed my American cousins from afar for many years and never quite understood the logic of the National Rifle Association. It may seem to protect the ordinary citizen, but also suggests Americans can be gunned down by foreigners more easily because that's what the rules say is allowed!
But of course, the rules in the USA do not say that all citizens can carry weapons, and I have never understood how Americans can argue based on the Constitution for the use of weapons by untrained ordinary citizens. I seem to remember in my own weapon training it was openly admitted that most bullets (especially from revolvers) did not hit their target!
The American Constitution actually says and I quote "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed." I would agree with that preamble " a well-regulated militia", and indeed recollect that I too was an officer in the Yeomanry for six years - undoubtedly a UK militia.
So my worry today might be that it is not wise for me to be pursauded to carry arms by governments, but that seems to be the drift of the argument at present - rough justice is better than the law. I do not like the argument that says I can use force to win, perhaps because I would be very good at it!

Computer Instructions

At the age of 72, I am of course not expected to understand what is happening in the technical world of the computer. I am ashamed I cannot program. I am always worried when my younger friends often seem at a loss to answer my questions when an unexpected collapse occurs! I always suppose it is all my fault and sometimes spend hours going through my laptop to see where I made a mistake. This week I had some frights:
My laptop would not project my powerpoint slides. This seems to be the fault of the projector, but I am not sure as the technician was quite silent on the matter. He took away the laptop and returned it. Then my wifi would not work! I assume WiFi has always been'ON', but on this occasion I had to find how to switch on my wifi. Depress Fn and F1! But why should I know this when this is the first time I have ever done it! Why did he switch off my wifi without telling me?
Then suddenly I got a Hotmail message "Account closed/ Access denied"! What about all my recent work? Anyway I filled in a form and 24 hours later everything was restored without much explanation. I am still mystified!
With all this activity, as usual thinking it was my fault, I did a "system restore" without losing my info, and it all worked wonderfully and the laptop is so fast now. But I seem to be in a 2005 limbo where I am getting free 2005 offers, almost as if the programmers of 2005 and never foresaw a situation where anyone would go back to 2005!
I seem to be receiving free offers from Norton 2005. I am not quite sure what this means! I in fact discontinued Norton a year ago because I ordered some $18 update from the USA and could never load it as I got message saying "you are on the wrong circuit". This suggested that my laptop, bought in the UK and used in the Philippines is somehow 'persona non grata' in the uSA. I never got my $18 back. I could not find a way of communicating in writing with Norton even after many hours of trying.
I now suspect that I understand computers very well but that there others who do not! But I cannot program!

Moslem Face Veil for Women (Niqab)

I, as a a man, recently spent 17 years in Moslem countries. In Malaysia, women did not cover their faces, and perhaps more surprising, even in Saudi Arabia women did not have to cover their faces. When I asked why, I was told that the Koran did not say that faces of women had to be covered. Most Saudi Arabian women did cover their faces, but this seemed more to do with local tribal practice, culture and the dominance of men than any religious precept. Bedouin women out in the deep desert did not cover their faces and drove camels (not cars).

I am not sure it worries me one way or another how women dress. However I would like to know what rules really apply! From my years in Saudi Arabia and Malaysia, I thought I had a clear statement of the rules. But recent arguments in England suggest many Moslem women in England are applying rules of dress that are not accepted by many Moslem countries. It looks as if whether to wear a veil or not is purely a personal decision obeying a personal rule - not clearly set out in the Koran (rather like choosing the colour of a lipstick). It therefore looks as if religious rules are being formulated that cannot be justified by reference to Koran - or if so justified by personal interpretation not supported by scholarly study. All this might also demonstrate the excessive English regard for enforcing rules in society; when in many societies rules are very flexible and not always enforced. Why should a global discussion on wearing the 'niqab' take place in England when the proper place ought to be in the Moslem world?

I also note one or two recent incidents where Moslem men have disappeared abroad by air, wearing women's clothes and the veil in order to evade arrest while under criminal investigation. This also suggests rules change according to circumstance. Are Moslem men really allowed to wear women's clothes if they want to and why does no one protest if they do so?

I was brought up 60 years ago under a rather British 'gentlemanly' code of conduct where women were to be treated with considerable respect. I need to be informed today as to what Moslem women are being protected against in a Moslem society which at first sight seems to have strict rules for relationships between men and women. Why does a veil help in all this?

In order for those of us in the West to understand better what rules are being applied across the whole Moslem world, I think we need much clearer guidance and explanation. What is happening at the moment appears to an outsider to be a matter of purely personal choice, ungoverned by religious rules that we can can understand. (or am I betraying an English cultural attitude that puts too much emphasis on strict interpretaton of rules which really don't matter much elsewhere!).

Excessive Global Population

I started corresponding on the subject of excessive global population about 10 years ago with a letter in an Asian Magazine! I argued then and argue now that the problem of the world population reaching 6.6 billion people in 2007 is not that a large population of itself is bad, but that human beings are negligent and even ignorant in bringing so many extra mouths to feed and educate into the world when the resources are not available. It is partly an argument on contraception, but stated plainly, men and women should not have children that they cannot look after and plan for. How they do that is their own affair The fault lies not in a mere statistic of 6.6 billion, but in the inability of human beings to plan ahead for all those extra children.
The (Christian) religious view seems to be that we are ordered 'to go forth and multiply'. We seem to be good at doing that! But another translation say 'go forth and replenish the earth' (after the flood?). There is a great difference between 'multiplying for ever' in an already crowded world and 'replenishing' an empty earth.
Now I am assuming that I have some personal (protestant?)responsibility for putting things right and leaving the earth a healthy and prosperous place. But it has slowly dawned upon me that I am arguing at cross-purposes with my Roman Catholic friends. I think they take the view that God's plan is unfolding as it ought to do, and they are not going to interfere at all with what happens - even if millions are to die in the meantime. That must be a part of God's plan, mustn't it. That is an excellent argument for doing nothing.

There is the rather more sophisticated Christian (theological) argument that an omnipotent God has no need of us at all and no amount of good deeds can save the individual - only God' grace can do that and in that we have no say at all. He will save whom he wants to save for reasons of His own. This view is not expounded very clearly to the faithful on most Sundays, who often remain in ignorance that good deeds do not help very much!

Similarly, one might argue that death is a minor incident on the road to eternity, so even a few deaths from negligence or indeed from assassination do not deserve much punishment, as God at any time can restore the status quo ante! In certain hands this must be perceived (by guilty governments?) as a licence to use violence!
So when I worry that very soon the global population will reach 7 billion souls and feel I ought to do something about it, I represent a tradition that is at logger-heads with Roman and Anglican Christianity - I think we are not helpless while they think that what happens is God's will and there is nothing they can do except obey the rules. (and however wicked they may have been, there is still a good chance they will be forgiven because forgiveness has nothing to with behaviour and conduct, but with 'grace').

So while my idea is that I have a responsibility to solve problems, I am faced with a contrary argument that if there is an excessive global population, God's remedies will be brought into play - pestilence and plague, famine and drought, and finally war and violence. These weapons to be deployed by God for solving excessive population are certainly very effective and will indeed solve the problem. I am left feeling a certain sense of horror (in the real meaning of the word) that I am free to watch millions upon millions of children die without a qualm of conscience. I hear the theological argument that the responsibility is not mine but God's!
And then I have the practical problem of my own conduct. I look after seven grandchildren of my wife. I love them even though I have no blood relationship with them. On the arguments presented above, I get the nmessage that I could abandon them at a moment's notice as money dwindles away. What happens to them will be God's will. I need not to worry - whether they live or die, I have no responsibility, -------or do I? I am my brother's keeper!

Slavery, Employees and Servants

When a large company spends money to take over another, it acquires all the employees and managers at the same time. Well, of course they are free to resign so it's not really slavery, but even so no employee is consulted, and so one might imagine at first sight that people are being put up for sale - without compensation.

Many people in Asia, South America and Africa have servants. Why do rich countries have no servants while servants are in abundance in poor countries. At first sight a bit of a paradox. Servants are paid very little - may be US$100 per month - and some are too ignorant to want to escape. Are these people happy at living such a life. I don't think so! But the people who employ servants are quite pleased with their standard of living - all cleaning, cooking, driving and washing are done by servants. It is a wonderful advantage, not usually available to most people in the USA or Europe. I confess I do like having my laundry done every day! One of the reasons the developing world does not change is that the standard of living of the top 20% in any developing nation is much higher than in USA and Europe. Who would want to change in such circumstances? I suspect this lack of interest in change also stems from the international community which supports the status quo. Governments and diplomats do not support change and after 50 years of waiting I still detect a reluctance to change. National sovereignty is still the guiding light for international affairs - whatever disasters may occur. Originally I used to think that change did not take place because of incompetence, negligence and ignorance. Now I am not sure! The third world does not get better because that's the way the rich and powerful like it!
I would agree that when the British abolished slavery and used the British fleet to supress the trade, they at last recognised that slavery was a stain on human nature. I am less sure that apologising for events more than 200 years old really helps much. It seems that men of all races were engaged in the slave trade. It was a feature of how uncivilised we all were only quite recently. One wonders how Tony Blair can apologise for the British participation in slavery when he steadfastly refuses to apologise for the chaos that has occured in Iraq. A future British prime minister undoubtedly will apologise, but not yet! Indeed I do take the argument that Romans rules Britain for 300 years, and the Normans made England a French colony for the same time. The English came from North Germany and perhaps should go back, and what about the Americans returning to Europe and apologising too. It is all too utopian to mean anything. So if the world is like it is, it is because that's the way we like it. It has not happened by chanc!

Destruction of Jerusalem AD 70

Another play I wrote in Riyadh was called "Titus at the Gates of Syon" - ISBN 0 75410 572 5. My reading of history had often brought me up against the 'diaspora' of the Jewish peoples, and my interest in the film 'Ivanhoe', the pogroms of the Crusades, and then the expulsion of the Jews (and Moslems) from Spain in AD 1492 kept the idea alive in my mind. And then I suppose the (fiction) book 'The Da Vinci Code' also revived interest in what exactly happened in the years after the crucifixion. It is such a complex and terrible story that even now is not yet over. I had also become interested in Vespasian and his son Titus! Vespasian was in command of the Second Augusta Legion in AD 43 for the invasion of Britain, and I, as an Englishman, have stood on the ramparts of Maiden Castle in Dorset, England where Vespasian himself must have stood after the assault on the British (Welsh) stronghold had succeeded. (What happened in the first 300 years in the development of Christianity is still a fascinating question and may not have much to do with the austere teachings of Jesus himself).

In AD 66, the XII Legion under the command of Cestius Gallus were set upon by the Jewish army outside the walls of Jerusalem and routed with stragglers eventually getting away to the coast at Caesarea. This affront to Roman honour could not be accepted. The Emperor Nero sent - who? - of course now old Vespasian to settle matters with the Jewish people. On Nero's suicide, four men became emperor in a single year, but Vespasian won out, and became emperor

Titus won the war against the Jews with five legions deployed in the field, dismantled Jerusalem and sent its people into exile. Only Massada held out heroically for another three year before all its garrison committed suicide. My play is the story of the fall of Jerusalem and to some extent the story of Josephus, the Jewish general, who went over to the Romans and wrote extensively on the history of the period! (I have always wondered why I was not taught this at school. Perhaps it was too sensitive a subject for young Christian boys to be allowed to read!)

I find all this fascinating as it seems to me we are reaching a watershed in world history where the events of the last 2000 years were always safely separated by distance. This cannot continue as distance now has no meaning and disparate ideas and faiths are now coming into close proximity to each other (eye-ball to eye-ball!). These will have to fight it out to find out where the true faith really lies - it is by no means certain that anyone knows the answer to such a question.

Democracy Today

I have never really understood what we mean by 21st century democracy. It seems a far cry from rule by the people. I was treasurer once of the Kingson-upon-Thames local Liberal party. But I am not sure how I could have risen in the UK system once overseas! I have always done my best to ensure that the people suffer the consequences of their decisions. But perhaps I am taking too harsh a view of my own responsibilities!
Recently I have begun to wonder whether our politicians are really properly educated to the realities of the modern world - or even that I might not do it better! They may be quite expert on what is happening in Sunderland (where is that?) but I have the impression that they have very little experience of South America, the Middle East, or Asia where they are expected to make grave and difficult decisions for all of us. Indeed the world is full of people with the most wonderful education and overseas experience who do not seem to be consulted at all. Not surprisingly things go wrong when our politicians know nothing about history, science, foreign cultures and globalisation.

When I first sailed in 1955 (to Barfleur to a very foreign France), I had thought I was following an old tradition that the British travelled and I called myself British in those days! Fifty years later after living in Venezuela, South Korea, Philippines, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia - and of course England, I now have the feeling I am not really wanted in the UK. Certainly when I retired in 1984, no one offered me a job back home.

This feeling has been reinforced by the British government discounting any idea of British culture (for those of us who go back 1000 years) and the withdrawal of voting rights, of access to education, medical help and a new definition that only residents of the UK (not citizens) have any rights. The water is muddied of course because we in the UK are not sure whether we are citizens or subjects of the Queen (subjects have no say in going to war while citizens might have).

It troubles me that loyalty and patriotism now count for so little. Not for myself, as I am quite able to defend myself almost anywhere, but for the impact of the increasing numbers who do not know where they come from. I sympathise with the young Moslems in the UK, who live culturally in mostly Pakistan, but are expected to be British all at the same time - they get little sympathy from a confused government!I feel the same. How wonderful it is that only very small groups actually engage in violence in a hostile world (of 6.5 billion peaceful people). If there was widespread active enmity, there would be hundreds involved when in fact it only a tiny minority of disturbed boys not sure what to do with an excess of testosterone, who are violent - very few indeed.

But the situation cannot improve if those who become contaminated by foreign cultures become outlaws in our own countries at a time when our politicians are quite ignorant, and yet promote an international rule in their own interests where they do not want democracy to exist. Recent developments in international law where suspects are held for 5 years without trial or governments, where limited torture is permitted, and where they go to war without the support of their own peoples is worrying. What does a convinced democrat do in a world where the international world is lawless?

I call myself English these days, but that is just a pleasing fancy in the last decade of my life. The last 2000 years of history are coming to an end for the Anglo-Saxons. My children and grandchildren are partly English, Venezuelan, Italian, Mexican and Filipino. For what just causes are they going to fight and what force are they entitled to use to achieve a better world? I am training them now. You must tell me.

Access Denied

I am two days late in writing because I got an unexpected message from 'hotmail' saying "account closed/access denied"! I filled in a form and 24 hours later I got another message saying; please carry on, no problem. Being me, by then I had gone through my laptop with a toothcombe and "system restored", checkdisked and am now back to 2005! If I have a heart-attack at age 72 in the next two days it will be due to the stress I have undergone!

I see also that my username is in fact my email address. For days I have been putting in my own name. No wonder I could not connect, but feel instructions are not very clear. I must now collect my thoughts and go back to the real world.

Sibylla - A Play on First Crusade

While working on petrochemicals in Saudi Arabia and having a lot of spare time in the desert, over 1996-1998 I wrote a play called "Sibylla" (ISBN 0 75410 117 7). This came from my overall interest in history which perhaps I ought to have studied at university in 1955 instead of natural sciences. My interest was aroused by a book by Professor Norman Golb of the University of Chicago on the Dead Sea Scrolls where he mentioned the discovery by Solomon Schechter in 1898 of many very old letters and documents in the store room of the Jewish Synagogue of Fustat in Cairo. This treasure-trove of documents is now at Cambridge University.

One of these letters was 900 years old and had been written by the Jewish Rabbi of a town in Provence after what seems to have been a massacre of Jews by the passing of the Crusading Army en route to the Holy Land in 1096. The letter asked the Jewish community in Cairo to look after the destitute wife of one of the prominent citizens - I call her Sibylla - with her last remaining son, as the community had been decimated and the husband killed. The town may have been 'Monieux' but the name had been obscured on the document and may have been somewhere else. Monieux would certainly have been on one of the routes of the Provencal army.

Who was Sibylla? Apparently she was the daughter of a Norman knight in Normandy and therefore Christian. How was it that she had married the scion of a Jewish family from Narbonne in the south? I assume in the play a love affair, an elopement and the bad luck of moving to an obscure town, which just happened to be on one road to Jerusalem.

I went to Monieux in 1997 and spent four days wandering around the old village and climbing up to the medieval watchtower on the hill, with most of the town within fortifications on the hillside itself. I was quite moved to relive some of the history of a family now dead for 900 years. Anyway my play tells the story as I imagine it to have been. The country side was beautiful and I was struck by the color of the lavender fields, so dark a blue that they were almost black!

This ancient story is quite relevant to today when we have yet again sent a crusading army into the Middle East with our own leaders showing considerable ignorance of Arab and European history. In 1096, the Normans justified their massacre of Jewish communities by saying 'We desire to attack the enemies of the Lord after travelling eastward over great distances of land, while before our very eyes are the Jews, who of all people are the greatest enemies of the Lord'.

How sad that it is still all so familiar 1000 years later! We have not changed very much.

Life and hospital Insurance for 50 years

My father insured ne for hospital insurance when I was 18. Over the last 50 years I have spent some $200,000 for global family hospital insurance and only claimed twice for varicose veins, a dog bite for a daughter and long ago an ectopic pregnancy for my wife. I gave up hospital insurance three years ago and already have saved myself £12,000. There can't be many operations that cost much more than £12,000 so Iam already ahead! Since the children left home 20 years ago I have claimed very little. The same applies for comprehensive car insurance for 40 years. I had one accident in tropical rain in 1965. Now the experts will surely say that statistically I am just lucky amongst all the others. But I can't help wonder whether I might not just be more careful than others - drive carefully, asleep by 11 pm, rather healthy at age 72, and rather fond of iced tea. I begin to suspect that I am statistically atypical and in fact always knew this. I have the horrible feeling that I ought to have put this money into a saving account every year from 1952 for the last 55 years and not insured myself at all.
I also noted that when my mother was ill in England, we never claimed on her hospital insurance ever, but felt it was our duty to have her insured. The NHS always sent an ambulance and refused to be paid! One of my friends recently said to me that the Insurance Companies are very good investments as profits are high! He may be right!