The Boy and The Coconut Tree

I have just spent the past 6 weeks working for a major UK charity and I truly admire the work it does and I am amazed at its ability to deliver services to people as it undergoes a major change to its structure. I witnessed the complex changes, it is undergoing, first hand. I didn't stay longer than 6 weeks as my role was one of the things chopped and changed during the restructure and luckily I had another contract to go to.  What did shock me about the charity was the way some of the senior people spoke to their juniors.  During a very senior level meeting one of the trustees referred to me a a 'Nazi' and 'Dr Mengele' and this was the first time he had met me and was part of his 'getting to know me banter' .. I was shocked and if we had been alone I would have let rip on him but as he is also the Lord Lieutenant of London I thought it best to stay quiet and simply make some sarcastic comments about him forgetting to close car doors for the royals (it is ...

As politicians on the right make profit from the terrorism in Manchester last week (but do deals with the spreaders of hate in Saudi Arabia) I wanted to say why they don't speak for me, a British man, not a flag waving patriot but someone who likes what this country is despite its flaws (flaws which have nothing to do with migrants or religions), flaws that politicians could fix if they were not simply interested in feathering their own nests and profiting from the suffering of others. Last night I was drinking with one of my friends who was born in Spain, raised in the UK, for me that is a typical weekend. He is straight, the rest of us were gay, again a normal night out in London.  Next week I will be having dinner with my American friend married to an Indian man, his best friend and his sister, again, a normal event in modern Britain. This morning I was served coffee by Simona from Italy and later today I had my eyes tested by Sanya, a British Muslim and was served in ...

During my recent trip to Florence my friend Sally introduced me to street art/graffiti and this is a collection of photos taken in London, Naples, Florence and Budapest of different forms of street art I've seen in those cities. Sally was able to meet her favourite,  Clet  Abraham when we walked past his workshop in Florence by chance. He signed a postcard of his work and gave her a freebie and seemed quite the gent. His art is vibrant but cannot compete with the capital of the Renaissance . Florence Florence Budapest Naples London Florence A Clet piece in his Florence workshop London February 7, 2017

It is August and it is raining and reminds me of Winter and this is the English summer in action. Yesterday was 32c and sunny and I have the farmers tan to prove it. My arms and lower legs are reddish brown and my upper arms and chest are as white as they day I arrived on earth (that makes me sound like some alien visitor when I should have just said "born") As I sit here waiting for one of my Spanish students, Davinia, I am reading her account of a Spanish novel, El Tiempo Entre Costuras,  and it makes me want to travel so much.  I was feeling all sentimental today. I arrived back in England 1 year ago this week and that first week was an interesting week of good and bad.  My dad's brother, uncle John died after a long battle with lung cancer but I was lucky enough to see him a few days before he died and have the usual, uncle taking the piss out of a nephew, conversations. That week I also spent some quality time with my parents, my sisters and my nieces and ne...

The school holidays have now started here in the UK and it shows.  The crowds in central London today are far bigger.  Parliament  Square and Whitehall were a scrum of people with selfie sticks and maps.  I am not quite sure of the logic of using a selfie-stick for every photo, maybe its an age thing. I was recently in Amsterdam and watched, aghast, as 4 American girls took their photo, grinning outside Anne Frank's house. No doubt their tour of Europe included grinning selfies at Belsen or topless shots on the D Day beaches. Some people are idiots.  So summer is in full flow though it feels like Summer arrived in late May, fell flat, got up again in late June and has stopped and started since then. For me, summer is still the 6 weeks school holiday, especially as my nieces and nephews are now on holiday, my sisters and my parents will be stressed out and my teacher friends will be happy and less stressed.   Here is my song of the summer (Song of Jul...

Does flattery get you anywhere and does flattery work with you? I ask this as something funny happened to me today and I shouldn't have been shocked. I was swimming at my gym and minding my own business as that is all you can do when you are face down in a swimming pool when I paused at the shallow end for a drink of water. A female personal trainer was standing at the end of the pool watching the swimmers. She introduced herself and told me she thought I was a good swimmer. Of course my ego was tickled and we chatted a little about how I love swimming, I used to swim in a team a long long time ago (I was 14 or 15) and swim a lot. She invited me to join the gym's swimming club on Thursday evenings. It sounded good, a bit of competition and coaching etc and she asked for my contact details. She then slipped in at the end that there was a fee of £5 per week to join in. Now my gym is not the most expensive in London but it isn't cheap. I felt a little cheated and rea...

It is Halloween on October 31 st , it has always been on October 31 st . Try telling that to the crazy people I encountered on my evening out in London last night (October 27 th ).   On my train journey to central London, people were dressed as Vampires, Zombies, blood stained nurses and doctors (though they could easily have been real and simply finishing a shift in A&E). There was a woman dressed as a crazed zombified Bette Davis, a guy dressed as a vicar with blood stained face yet there were no Jimmy Saville costumes? Too soon perhaps? This is a little gripe about the need to celebrate everything early.   Halloween is one example but Guy Fawkes Night is another. There have been fireworks going off in my area for weeks now and I doubt there will be any left by November 5 th and as for bonfires, this area of London has seen enough arson and fire so you would wonder if the locals of SE London are giving Bonfire night a miss? And Christmas, well Oxford Str...