Plots on the Victoria Jubilee Allotments in Handsworth

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A second Newsletter from Birmingham City Council reporting progress on the laying out of the new allotments next to Handsworth Park – the Victoria Jubilee. There are already in the last week of June 2009, forty two people on the waiting list for 80 plots - each 200 square yards, or 20 by 10 yards.

To apply to be on the short list go to Birmingham Allotments team on 0121 303 3038 allotments@birmingham.gov.uk We're told rents will be £15 p.a. with concessionary rents down to £9.00 a year for men and women over 60. See Newsletter 1.

Here are some images - old and new with text - telling of the campaign to save the green fields next to Handsworth Park for allotments and playing fields. Plots can be shared and it is hoped that some will be adopted by local schools.

We've been told that there will a meeting room for gardeners with storage. Plotholders can have a shed up to 6' x 8' on their plot. Water supply is at hand and gardeners can have a greenhouse or a polytunnel. The Allotments Team have told us that they will guide new gardeners to become self-managing via a site committee with responsibility for collecting rents on behalf of the council and stewarding the site. Further help is available from Birmingham and District Allotments Council who can be approached via their website at any time for advice and support. Plots can be shared.

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The trial, following the death of two children visiting Corfu with their families in October 2006 was to begin in Corfu on Thursday but has been delayed until February 2010. While staying at the Louis Corcyra Beach Hotel at Gouvia, 5 miles north of Corfu Town, the children allegedly died of carbon monoxide poisoning.

* * *

We've been running the first part of a five day course on scrutiny on campus. I've been riding to and from campus partly via canal towpaths. Going home, just before six, I noticed even more cyclists, walkers and joggers along the Birmingham-Worcester Canal. Ever so slowly the numbers of people commuting without a car (see the flickr group I help administer) seems to be increasing in Birmingham. I felt almost resentful, having been so used over the years to having the towpaths of British Waterways almost to myself.

Watching PMQ and George Soros

"...if we do the wrong things, it will be more painful; if we do the right things, it will be less painful."

Government and the crisis - a sober American discussion between Bill Moyers and George Soros (transcript extract):

BILL MOYERS:So let's think about those people down at Neely's Barbecue going home tonight having heard you. What they've heard you say is the system is really disfunctioning right now. It's out of control. Nobody's in charge. They've heard you express your own worry that in the next three months it could get much, much worse. And they've heard you say that you don't see much good news immediately on the horizon. So let's leave them something to think about as they go home. Let them go home and say, "Mr. Soros said here are three things we can do, simply." One?

GEORGE SOROS:Well, deal with the mortgage problem. Reduce foreclosures. Recapitalize the banks. And then work on a better world order where we work together to resolve problems that confront humanity like global warming. And I think that dealing with global warming will require a lot of investment. You see, for the last 25 years the world economy, the motor of the world economy that has been driving it was consumption by the American consumer who has been spending more than he has been saving, all right? Than he's been producing. So that motor is now switched off. It's finished. It's run out of — can't continue. You need a new motor. And we have a big problem. Global warming. It requires big investment. And that could be the motor of the world economy in the years to come.

BILL MOYERS:Putting more money in, building infrastructure, converting to green technology.

GEORGE SOROS:Instead of consuming, building an electricity grid, saving on energy, rewiring the houses, adjusting your lifestyle where energy has got to cost more until it you introduce those new things. So it will be painful. But at least we will survive and not cook.

* * * [Back to the future - Obama's 'rescue plan' 13 Oct '08] * * * We've switched - from lecture and discussion at Hornton Grange at the University Conference Park with my Japanese students and friend and colleague Chris Game - to watching the BBC live feed from the House of Commons - a wide screen image, with good sound, of PMQ - Prime Minister's Questions. (YouTube extract) It's an especially useful example of being able to watching significant political moments, as the House considers the government's decision to spend even more money than was approved by Congress on Friday, in the form of a 'rescue package' - £250 billion in the hope of improving the 'general liquidity' - about £4000 per person across the UK - to give a feel for scale. In the States it was $70 billion (£394 billion) for a population of 301 million. Technology having become more versatile in the last year, we watched the Diet of Japan and other political forums - as three years ago I sat at the kitchen table in Birmingham watching Katrina - in repetitive stills - hitting the coast of New Orleans, ravaging the city and the lives of those unable to drive to safety, marking the start of European familiarity with the phrase 'sub-prime lending'. [Back to the future 2/11/08: on this matter of using WiFi in the classroom I know it's only the start of something quite different whose form is still unclear 'where the teacher can respond quickly and flexibly to students by tapping into a rich repository of learning gadgets relevant to the class and the syllabus to build a classroom experience that changes as fast as the students inquisitive minds.'] * * * Last night I had supper at Henry's in St.Pauls Square with my old friends, Kim and Tanya. It was so good to be together again after so long a break in our 8 or 9 month reunions. This time it was over a year so we had lots of chat about families, friends and the state of the world as it seemed from our homes and our different institutions, Birmingham University, Cranfield University Business School and private consultancy. "This is such a mess. It's so depressing. People are getting hurt or expecting to be. I cheered myself" said K " by thinking this may at least kick us into saving the globe" "And it may stop banks forcing loans down my kids' eager throats and then short-selling their debt to your eager kids as real money" I said. Didn't someone say "We're leaving Planet Finance: returning to Planet Earth; Wall Street becoming like Venice from the 19th century on - primarily for tourists...." * * * A rather astonishing and quite pleasing thing has happened. Out of the blue someone I've not met for half a century has e-mailed me suggesting a visit next month to the grounds of Ashfold School - where I was between 1949 and 1954, from age 7 to 12. Shortly after I left, the school moved to a place near Aylesbury. The old school was demolished. I've not been much interested in school reunions, but I know I'm not gold glazing my childhood in affirming that Ashfold was a happy place - liberal without ideology. I'm sneezing from dust raised sifting through unvisited files, digging out black and white images long unseen. The astonishing thing about the part of my brain that stores my past is that so much has lain there, as untapped as my old school photos. Unlike ones of me as a baby or toddler - in the secret garden of infancy - these photos record a time when I was poised between haloed clouds and common day. While the photos are faded, memories surface with astounding freshness, in colour with echoes; faces, words including school slang, (a sacred stubby - a pencil sharpened, at both ends, to the last syllable of available lead, respecting habits of scarcity from the war) events, personalities and now, in a trickle, stories of long ago - as others begin to chat via e-mail with images shared on the web about our forthcoming get-together. In the school photo from 1953 I'm eighth from the right, third row up. * * * Pushbikes arranged a public meeting with Birmingham City Council on 9th October at the Birmingham and Midland Institute to discuss cycling issues. I couldn't go. The photo shows the start of what became a standing room only event. Centre foreground is Howard Boyd, who's quietly done more for cycling in this city than anyone, and whose research - 12 years ago - into the health benefits of cycling got me taking up cycle commuting, and - last October - to divorcing my car. * * * The court case over the deaths in October 2006 of two children at the Louis Corcyra Hotel is due in November on the island. There's another worrying piece of news from the 'freelance one man band' Brabant on local concern about the EU subsidised landfill at Lefkimi - in this case a film on YouTube about its effect on the local water table.

From Corfu Malcolm Brabant reports: Environmental campaigners -Spiros Pantis, taverna owner, Dimitris Fanariotis, Eco Corfu and Stephanos Kouris, Environmentalist - on Corfu accuse the EU of wasting subsidies on a new rubbish dump that, they allege, fails to meet waste disposal standards laid down by Brussels. The campaigners claim the landfill site, near one of Corfu's most popular tourist beaches, is going to cause serious pollution because Brussels does not monitor how its money is spent.

Albanian turbo-rock

Radio 4 is reporting work at Butrint, over the Corfu Channel from us. A shore based disco has twice been disabled by the Albanian authorities but there remains, according to the BBC correspondent, the possibility of the "thrusting beat of Albanian turbo-rock" being wafted across the waters to the homes of the Rothschilds, Packards and other patrons of Butrint National Park * * * * * * E-mail to Lin:

Greek Hell. A man dies and goes to hell. There he finds that there's a different hell for each country. He goes to the German hell and asks, "What do they do here?" He's told: "First they put you in an electric chair for an hour. Then they lay you on a bed of nails for another hour. Then the German devil comes in and whips you for the rest of the day. The man doesn't like the sound of that at all, so he moves on. He checks out the American hell, as well as the Russian hell and many more. He discovers they're all more or less the same as the German hell. Then he comes to the Greek hell and finds a long line of people from all nationalities waiting to get in. Amazed, he asks, "What do they do here?" He is told, "First they put you in an electric chair for an hour, and then they lay you on a bed of nails for another hour. Then the Greek devil comes in and whips you for the rest of the day." “But that's exactly the same as all the other hells. Why are so many people waiting to get in?" "Because the maintenance crew is always on strike, there's no electricity so the electric chair doesn't work. Albanians have stolen all the nails from the bed, and the devil's a former Government employee, so he comes in, signs the register and then goes to have his cafethaki and eat kourabiedes all day." Lin's to Corfu: Hi. Thanks for 'Greek Hell'... much appreciated. Hope you are all well and enjoying the temperatures in the forties! Here we've had rain, rain and more rain. You've probably heard about all the flooding. It's got a bit better now, with some sunny spells between the showers. Regarding the floor, we're quite happy just to have it done with ordinary polyurethane (satin finish). We don't really want to be bringing varnish out from England. Don't think we'd get it through customs under present circumstances, anyway. Only about 9 weeks till we're coming out - time seems to fly by. Must be my age! See you soon, Lin

Portentous addition from me: 'Greek Hell' is, in part, a side swipe, circulated in overseas Greek chatrooms, by an ex-pat who loves Corfu, works in the local economy, and has taught me much about the island, at the circumstances that led to the deaths of two children from Yorkshire - Robert and Christianne Beatson - at the Louis Corcyra Beach Hotel in Gouvia on 26 October 2006. An op-ed in Kathimeri – International Greek news in English – on 29 November 2006 said that these deaths were no accident, but a tragic result:

‘of the unhealthy and dangerous national habit of disregarding laws, including those rules and regulations that are meant to promote public safety. Such disregard borders on contempt when we consider that in not a few cases the motive for doing so is financial. There must be accountability and there must be punishment not only to reassure those foreigners who after this event may reasonably have doubts about visiting Greece, but also to bring home to the citizens of this country that there is always a cost. It is hubris to imagine that no price will be paid by our ignoring those laws that have been in place to protect us, whether this involves reckless driving or ensuring that gas boilers do not leak. It is high time that the state fulfills its obligations and does something to bring about an end to this culture of contemptible carelessness that for far too long has been allowed to run rampant, putting all our lives at risk.’

[Back to the future: 9 Sept 2008 - Thomas Cook employees on trial in Corfu ] One more thing: The AOL forum to which I traced the joke also mentions the dangers of xenophobia and deplores the alleged mistreatment of Albanian immigrants by a Greek policeman in a recent incident. Exchange with the joker:

In a message dated 7/7/2007 s.j.baddeley@bham.ac.uk writes: Herete. I hope you don’t mind me using the ‘Greek Hell’ joke on my blog to make a point. I was wanting to be sure that this was a self-deprecating joke told by Greeks about Greeks as I would share in jokes about UK or about being English or Scottish. This sounds so pompous but I was making a serious comment on the deaths in the hotel in Corfu last October.Yours sincerely, Sibadd

Reply 9:23:41 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time:

no problem

One fine day ...

There's a fine comparison from America on 'Open Source Blog" quoting passages from Thucydides' Peloponnesian War and how it marked the end of Athenian Civilisation.

'Thus every form of iniquity took root in the Hellenic countries by reason of the troubles.' Thucydides The Peloponnesian War Book 3, 69 - 85, The Civil War at Corcyra.

* * * levarsi un fil di fumo sull'estremo confin del mare. E poi la nave appare. Poi la nave bianca entra nel porto, romba il suo saluto. Vedi? È venuto! I love America in a generalised way and in a more specific way I respect the scholarship I was taught at the Universities of Pennsylvania and Michigan in the 1960s and 1970s. At 9/11, mine and the thoughts of hundreds of thousands were with America. In Bristol, where I was that day, there were English men and women crying in the streets as they spoke on their mobiles to friends in America. I shall continue to sympathise, respect and love the USA because nobody has been more eloquent than American's in criticising and campaigning in legitimate ways against this B.F Pinkerton who's conspired with our unwise Prime Minister in this feckless vicious illegal adventure in the Middle East and its consequences in collateral damage - psychological, spiritual and physical. My relatives who fought in WW2 were among the good guys. These squanderers of the instruments of peacemaking, who never served in war, have made us the bad guys, telling us - the irony of it - that strong leaders must make hard decisions. One day this will pass. One day US power, for which of course, its government must take responsibility, will exercise the statesmanship that sent its bold young men to be bloodied against the beaches of Normandy, who with their allies, saved Europe, produced the Marshall Plan, conducted the prolonged mental battle of the "cold war", who reached the moon, who nurtured democracy in Japan, forced through civil rights against murderous domestic resistance, whose lawyers studiously seek out past sins and aim at their redress (the lynchings of the south and other cruelties today.) One day things will get better for a country which, with all its teaming contradictions, was still a model of learning, culture and civility and hope for law and justice. One day...one fine day...America will come back to us. One fine day we will witness A smoke plume in the distance Far away on the blue horizon And then, a ship upon the ocean And the ship is painted white It sails into the harbour The salute booms, cannons roar He’s returned once more [The animated interpretation of Madame Butterfly by Pjotr Sapegin with its tiny background sounds amid the music of 'One Fine Day', sung by Natalie Choquette, portrays a smiling sexual predator who respects 'homeland' values but trespasses on elementals, wholly incapable of comprehending his complicity in the eviscerated wasteland he so cheerfully invades and abandons. Film plays through Safari but not Firefox on my laptop 20/07/07)]

From my friend in LA. Thank you for the kind meditation. You know, of course, that we here in the US are extremely frustrated over the high-handedness of the imperious baboons who have hijacked our government. Even the Great American Middle is beginning to realize that they have been robbed of their country. Unfortunately, as I once wrote the appeal of fascism is always strong, and we must constantly struggle against the inner coward who seeks a Strong Man's coattails to ride on. The current crew deserves the fate the Spanish government suffered in the last election. The Spanish were at least fortunate in not having a Republican operative controlling the voting machines. The cynicism and dishonesty of these thugs is disgusting, and I appreciate your words of support. They have largely turned the world against us, and turned Israel, once a true egalitarian democracy, into a goon-state puppet and a trial run for right-wing theocracy. They would turn the United States into a mirror of the Muslim theocracies they claim to fight. In truth, the Christian fascists here and the Muslim fascists there have much the same goal - only the labels differ. * * *

I was thinking about the film The Contender, screenplay by Rod Lurie, in which Senator Laine Hanson, nominated to run as Vice-President, is asked to testify in front of the confirmation committee, having been assailed by the information dredged up by Congressman Shelly Runyon. He asks about her religious belief:

Mr. Chairman -- ladies and gentlemen of the committeee. Remarkably enough, it seems that I have some explaining to do. So...let me be absolutely clear. (takes a drink from a glass of water) I stand for a woman's right to choose. I stand for the elimination of the death penalty. I stand for a strong and growing armed forces because we must stomp out genocide on this planet and I believe that that is a cause worth dying for. I stand for seeing every gun taken out of every home. Period. I stand for making the selling of cigarettes to our youth a federal offense. I stand for term limits and campaign reform. And, Mr. Chairman, I stand for the separation of church and state and the reason that I stand for that is the same reason that I believe our forefathers did. It is not there to protect religion from the grasp of government but to protect our government from the grasp of religious fanaticism. I may be an atheist but that does not mean I do not go to church; I do go to church. The church I go to is the one that emancipated the slaves, that gave women the right to vote. It gave us every freedom that we hold dear. My church is this very chapel of democracy that we sit in together and I do not need God to tell me what are my moral absolutes. I need my heart, my brain and this church. (takes another drink from the glass of water)

[Back to the future 13/01/09: I just read on Alternet, David Hilficker's post 'Now I Understand Why They Hate Us' posted January 12, 2009. 'How a middle-class white guy came to accept the evil embedded in American political and military might']