NightHawk

Over the last six weeks, I've done an unusual amount of travel: Sarajevo for a short break with my sister, Prague to attend the graduation ceremony of a dear friend, Inverness for a meeting of the Ofcom Consumer Panel, Zagreb to give two presentations at a conference, and now this week Manchester mainly to attend number of events organised by Ofcom's Advisory Committee for England.

Now I lived in Manchester until I was 23 and my brother and his family still live there, so I went up early to visit them before embarking on the Ofcom events. I was able to make short visits to an exhibition centre called Urbis and to the Museum of Science & Industry.

Once I left my brother's place, I moved to the Hilton Hotel which is located in the Beetham Tower. At 171m tall, this is the tallest building in Manchester. It has the UK's highest living space and it is the UK's tallest building outside London.

One of the highlights of my return to Manchester was a visit that Ofcom Committee made to the outdoor set and indoor stages used by the Granada television series "Coronation Street". The "Street" is the longest-running soap on British television and has been running since 1960.

Standing second from left - that's me outside the "Rover's Return"

Pulling a pint in the "Rover's Return"

Posted by Roger Darlington at 06:22 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

An index measuring the level of press freedom in 169 countries throughout the world has just been published by Reporters Without Borders for the sixth year running. You can check it out here.

The top 14 countries are all European with all the Scandinavian nations featuring. Some of the recently Communist countries of Europe - such as Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic - score very highly. The UK is 24th. The USA is only 48th.

Of the 20 countries at the bottom of the index, seven are Asian (Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Laos, Vietnam, China, Burma, and North Korea), five are African (Ethiopia, Equatorial Guinea, Libya, Somalia and Eritrea), four are in the Middle East (Syria, Iraq, Palestinian Territories and Iran), three are former Soviet republics (Belarus, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan) and one is in the Americas (Cuba).

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It's like those buses - you wait for ages and then two come along ... For decades, I've travelled the world but I never went to former Yugoslavia or its newly-independent components. However, last month, I spent a long weekend in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina [my review here]. Then, last week, I spent several days in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia. I was there for a seminar entitled "Consumer Issues In The Electronic Communications Market" and I gave presentations on telecommunications and the Internet. Since I've never been to Zagreb before, I flew out a little early and stayed on a little later, so that I could see a bit of the city.

Croatia is very different from Bosnia. It was never part of the Ottoman Empire and does not have the ethnic and religious mix of Bosnia. The vast majority of its 4.4 million citizens are Croat and Catholic. It has a long Dalamatian coastline which helps define its character and results in a good deal of tourism, whereas Bosnia only has a very tiny coastline and still experiences relatively little tourism.

Both Croatian and Bosnian - which are very similar - are Slavonic languages and I speak a little Czech, so I was able to use a few Croatian words and (with the aid of a delightful woman called Andja) even opened my first conference presentation with two sentences of Croatian. A strange fact: even though Croatia is such a small country, there are several distinct Croatian dialects.

Zagreb itself is like a small Prague or Budapest. The architecture of the inner city is heavily influenced by its former membership of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, while the outer parts of the city display plenty of evidence of the stark, utilitarian style of its decades as a Communist state. Like Prague and Budapest, there is an old town with historic buildings, a hill with an imposing cathedral, and cobbled streets and lots of cafes. The city is particularly blessed by some splendid parks.

At one point, I was reminded of Krakow. There a trumpeter in the cathedral tower announces the arrival of noon, whereas in Zagreb a cannon is fired from a tower in the Upper Town (the old bit). Although it rained every day that I was there, I did a lot of walking: I took a guided tour of the Upper Town with a very able guide called Neven and did my own walking tour of the Lower Town. I even managed to spend time in three museums: the Zagreb Museum, the Arts & Crafts Museum and the Mimara Museum.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 11:38 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

As I reported in an earlier posting, jailed Iranian labour activist Mansour Osanloo faced the loss of vision in one eye while the regime refused him medical treatment. A massive online campaign, involving Amnesty International, the International Transport Workers Federation, and many thousands of LabourStart readers, resulted in Osanloo receiving the medical treatment he needed last weekend. The more than 10,000 messages sent to the government in Tehran had a great - and immediate - impact.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 09:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I won't be blogging for a few days now because I'm off out of the country. I'm attending a seminar in Zagreb and Croatia takes the number of countries that I've now visited to 48.

I'm participating in a seminar entitled "Consumer Issues In The Electronic Communications Market" and I'll be giving two presentations.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:58 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Regular visitors to NightHawk will know that I'm a big movie fan and love going to the cinema. One of the smaller and most unusual cinemas I've ever visited is called Kinema in the woods and is located in Woodall in Lincolnshire.

However, my attention was drawn to a report this week of the closure of an even smaller cinema. La Charrette outside Swansea seated just 23.

The smallest cinema I can recall visiting was in Monterey in California when I was travelling around the United States as student in 1970. This place was so tiny and so casual that there were no seats; one simply reclined on huge cushions on the floor ...

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I had an interview for a public appointment today (I'll let you know more about it if I'm successful). As part of my preparation, I read my own advice on how to have a good job interview. This is a page on my web site as part of a broader section on life skills which attracts a lot of supportive comments from users. The list of advice is as follows:
How To Be Happy
How To Be Healthy
How To Recognise A Stroke
How To Resolve Conflict
How To Use Time Well
How To Remember Things
How To Think Critically
How To Use Punctuation
How To Have A Good Job Interview
How To Have A Good Media Interview
How To Make A Good Speech
How To Make A Good Presentation
How To Be A Good Listener
How To Have A Good Meeting
How To Be A Good Leader
How To Build A Team
How To Produce A Strategic Plan
How To Work At Home
How To Achieve A Work/Life Balance
How To Travel Wisely
How To Be A Top Secret Spy
How To Save Water
How To Save Energy
How To Save The World

Posted by Roger Darlington at 04:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Three months ago, I blogged here about a project called "The World In One City".

This is a project that Owen Powell (who posted a comment on my blog) and Alex Horne started on 24 October 2006 (United Nations Day), and which they hope to finish in just a few days' time, on the same date this year. Their aim is to prove that London - where I've lived for for 36 years - is the most cosmopolitan city in the world, by endeavouring to meet and chat to a citizen from every country in the world who currently lives and works in London.

They reckon that, according to the UN, there are 192 countries in the world and so far they have contacted and interviewed people in London from 184. I wish the guys well in trying to hit their target but, whatever happens, they have demonstrated how cosmopolitan London is and I bet they've had some fun and made some friends along the way.

Of course, even better than meeting someone from every country in the world would be visiting every nation on the globe - but that would take more than a year. At the venerable age of 59, this week I will be visiting my 48th country.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 09:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

It's not often in life that one meets someone who is truly charismatic and inspirational, but this week I was fortunate to hear Nicholas Negroponte speak at an event in Westminster entitled "Parliament & The Internet " and he totally capivated his audience with his enthusiasm and sincerity. He flew over that morning from the United States and was flying back that evening, but that afternoon he was with us to talk about his project for One Laptop per Child (OLPC).

The mission of the OLPC movement is to ensure that all school-aged children in the developing world are able to engage effectively with their own personal laptop, networked to the world. This has involved developing a unique computer with very special characteristics and an incredible price of around $100 a unit. It does not require a power source, it can be powered up by a child, it works in the sun, it connects to the Internet, and it uses open source software.

For me personally, the story started in 1995 when I read "Being Digital" by Negroponte [my review here]. Then, in 2000, I actually met the guy at a dot com launch in London and he signed his book for me. Then I blogged about the One Laptop per Child project when it was first launched two years ago [my posting here].

In his fluent and unscripted address, Negroponte called the laptop "such a cute and sexy device" but insisted that "We are not a laptop project - we are an education project". The laptop will be launched in the next few weeks, but he brought one along to the meeting and passed it around for us to play with. The plan is to ship 5-10M computers in 2008 and 50-100M in 2009.

I took a photograph of the laptop with my mobile:

A colleague took a picture of me trying out the laptop:

An interesting story: Negroponte was asked about the green colour of the laptop which it was assumed reflected his wish that the project was ecologically sound. Well, no, said the man. Following support at a critical time from the then President of the Nigeria, Negroponte decided that the laptop would bear that country's national colours of green and white

There's a lot of cynicism around but, if this project succeeds (as I believe it will), in a few years time Negroponte will be collecting the Nobel prize for peace.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 08:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Mansour Osanloo, the jailed leader of the bus workers' union in Tehran, faces the possible loss of his eyesight unless he receives urgent medical attention - which the Iranian authorities are denying him. As a former trade union official who has myself had severe vision problems in the past, this case resonates especially with me - but I hope will also concern you.

Amnesty International has just now launched an online campaign calling on the Iranian government to allow Osanloo to receive medical attention. I urge you to sent off your message today. The Iranian government must be made aware that the world is watching.

The International Transport Workers Federation (ITF), which has spearheaded the international campaign in defence of Osanloo, has now produced a short film entitled "Freedom Will Come" which tells his story. It can be viewed online on YouTube here.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 06:20 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

In the week that Britain yet again insists on taking a different position on a key European Union proposal - this time a new Treaty to replace the failed proposal for a constitution - in this column, "Guardian" reporter Michael White puts his finger on why this country has not just an insular geographical position in relation to the rest of Europe but an insular psychological attitude in relation to all our EU partners:

'A pub quiz question rarely asked is "How many of the EU's 27 member states were occupied by foreign armies and/or terrorised by dictatorships, domestic and foreign, in the pre-EU 20th century?" The answer is a surprising 25, all but Britain and Sweden. It may help to explain the contrast between the formerly oppressed EU majority and the cussed scepticism, merging into downright hostility, so evident again in Britain as Gordon Brown sets out this morning for the Lisbon summit.'

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I was a Special Adviser with the Labour Government in the mid 1970s when inflation briefly reached around 25%. We were told by the media that a society could not survive an inflation level of this order.

I remembered this as I read a report on the current rate of inflation in Zimbabwe. Currently the official figure is now a staggering 8,000% - but unofficially it is even higher and it is going to rise even further.

I was technically inside Zimbabwe a few years ago during a holiday in South Africa when I visited Victoria Falls [my account here] and I feel desperately sorry for its suffering people.

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I've returned from a couple of days in Inverness where I was attending an out-of-London meeting of the Ofcom Consumer Panel. This is the furtherest north that I've ever been in the United Kingdom.

The local constituency goes by the catchy name of Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey and we met the constituency MP, Liberal Democrat Danny Alexander. He is walking evidence that it is not just policemen who seem to be getting younger.

Although II didn't have the opportunity to go searching for the Loch Ness monster, I had a little time to wander round the town and found that the wave of immigrants from Eastern Europe to the UK is reaching to every part of the country. I met Poles and Lithuanians and they were suitably impressed when I could say "Good morning" in their language.

I am not surprised - but pleased - by the report this week showing that these migrants are making a positive contribution to our economy.

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On my return from my first visit to China seven years ago, I concluded my web site account as follows:

"The 19th century was essentially the century of Britain; the 20th century was unquestionably the century of the United States; the 21st century might become the century of China. It depends on many factors.

It depends on the quality of the political leadership and, in the short term, Jiang Zemin is due to be succeeded by the younger Hu Jintao. It depends on the extent to which the economic changes are followed by political changes, including the development of a civil society with a free media, pressure groups, independent trade unions, and ultimately political parties.

It depends on how capably and rapidly the economy moves from the bricks and mortar of the industrial society to the clicks and bricks of the information society. It depends on how China uses its growing industrial and military strength at home, specifically in relation to Tibet and Taiwan, and in the global marketplace."

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Twenty years ago this morning, Britain suffered the most ferocious storm since 1703. In the South-East of England, 19 people were killed and 15 million trees were uprooted and damage ran to £1.5 billion.

I always sleep soundly and we had new double glazing, so I slept throughout the entire storm. However, when I rose, I found that we had lost all electricity, felt from the dorma roof and guttering from above one of the side windows had been ripped off, and the back garden was littered with branches snapped off from the spinney behind us.

My line of the London Underground was not working and so I did not manage to reach my place of work until 10.30 am, only to be told that the building was being closed at lunchtime.

There's a story in today's "Mirror" newspaper about that infamous broadcast by weather man Michael Fish assuring us that all was well.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Most people who know me will confirm that I love travelling and I'm a pretty friendly sort of guy. This combination causes a major dilemma which was taken up this week on the BBC's web site, namely this: when a man meets or leaves a woman, does he simply shake hands, give her one kiss, kiss both cheeks, give three kisses or even four?

Now, obviously it depends on the context of the meeting: is this a business or a social event? has one met the woman before or not? But, as the BBC makes clear in this report, there is also a strong cultural dimension because what is deemed right varies from country to country and even from city to city.

Here's a rough guide to the appropriate number of kisses:

None: Japan, China
Close friends and family only: Germany, Italy, Middle East (except between male friends)
One: Belgium
Two: Spain, Austria, Hungary, Greece, some parts of France
Three: Brittany, Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium (if other person 10 years older), Egypt, Russia
Four: Paris and Geneva

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Wow - hours after I go on radio and television urging Royal Mail and the CWU to settle the postal dispute (see previous posting), they reach a settlement.

I'm now thinking of going on the media and calling on the Israelis and the Palestinians to agree a solution to the Middle East conflict ...

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In the year and a half that I've been at Postwatch, the consumer watchdog for postal services, I've done almost 50 radio and television interviews for the organisation, but I've managed to stay clear of industrial relations issues. After all, I worked for the Communication Workers Union and its predecessor unions for a total of 24 years.

However, the current dispute between Royal Mail and the CWU has been going on so long and has hit customers so hard that this week I've had to do my duty in speaking out for customers and urging a resolution of the strike. The Postwatch blog now has over 60 comments from customers [see here], while the BBC web site has attracted a staggering number of comments now approaching 8,000 [see here].

So today I've found myself doing three media interviews on the dispute, making the case for the consumer.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 04:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

However hard I look at this image, I can only see a clockwise movement - which apparently makes me totally right-brain. What about you?

AFTER you've tried it, read this explanation.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

"Although fewer than 3 percent of modern English verbs are irregular, this number includes the 10 most common verbs: be, have, do, go, say, can, will, see, take, and get. Lieberman, Michel, and colleagues expect that some 15 of the 98 modern irregular verbs they studied -- although likely none of these top 10 -- will regularize in the next 500 years."

If you want to avoid both conjugation of verbs and declension of nouns, try leaning Mandarin. The trouble here is the pronunciation. Every character can be pronounced in one of four tones which give utterly different meanings to the same symbol. You can read my take on the 'Chinese' language here.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 09:47 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Over the centuries, it was placed at the Canary & Madeira Islands, the Azores, the Cape Verde Islands, Rome, Copenhagen, Jerusalem, St Petersburg, Pisa, Paris, and Philadelphia (among other places) before it finally settled down in London.

What is it?

It's zero-degree longitude - and I've just read an interesting book about the solution of the problem of identifying precisely one's longitude [my review here].

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

In 1889, the Konopiste Castle just outside Prague was obtained as his home by the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferndinand d'Este, the heir to the imperial throne. In 1907, he employed an English botanist to cross-breed roses at Konopiste in order to produce a black variety. It seems that he was warned that black roses bring death and war.

Apparently it took until 1914 to cultivate the rose. Later that same year, Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo, leading directly to the outbreak of the First World War. Coincidence?

So what has all this got to do with me? Well, last week I was in Prague for the graduation ceremony of a friend [see my blog posting here] and I visited the castle at Konopiste which is walking distance from where my friend now works as a newly-qualified doctor. A few weeks previously, I was on a break in Sarajevo and saw the exact spot where the Archduke was assassinated by a Serb extremist [see my account of the trip here]. More coincidence?

I only ask because I've met some people who argue that there is no such thing as coincidence and that instead everything happens for a reason. So should I be worried?

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

According to this interesting article, it is not simply retaliation against the West for alleged injustices but it is more fundamentally an interpretation of Islam that sees non-Muslims as infidels. If this is the case, then the West alone cannot stop the terrorism; the theological justification for such terrorism must be challenged by mainstream Muslims.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

As recorded in this item on the BBC web site, today is the 40th anniversary of the summary execution of the Argentinian revolutionary Che Guevara following his capture the previous day by Bolivian army forces. Today Che's body lies in the town of Santa Clara in Cuba.

The next holiday for Vee and me - not till Spring 2008 - will be to Cuba and our tour will visit the mausoleum and museum in Santa Clara. Vee has always had a special affection for Che which has nothing to do with his politics. Her brother died of asthma when he was only 21 and Che was asthmatic.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

A friend has drawn my attention to this story on the BBC web site which appeared while I was away in Prague last week. It seems that some British teachers are finding it harder to explain evolution because of the view that creationism is not simply a metaphor for construction of the universe by a supreme being but an historical fact that is to be preferred to the evidence base of evolution.

According to the Head of Science at London's Institute of Education Professor Michael Reiss, one in 10 people in the UK now believes in literal interpretations of religious creation stories whether they are based on the Bible or the Koran. If we do not relate belief to evidence, then all sorts of 'truths' become possible. It was concern about such a development that led me to write my web essay on "The Reason For Truth".

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Vee and I have just returned from five days in Prague - her 16th visit and my 21st. This time, we were there to attend the graduation ceremony of our dear friend Vojtišek (Vojta) Horváth whose family we have known for 22 years.

Vojta has recently completed a six-year degree in medicine and his degree ceremony was held in the Magna Aula of the Karolinum of the Charles University of Prague. This is a very old establishment: the first university in Central Europe established in 1348. We didn't understand a word of the event - what wasn't in Czech was in Latin - but we were delighted to celebrate Vojta's success after so much hard work.

The graduation ceremony in the Magna Aula of the Karolinum

Our Czech friend Vojta with his Slovak girlfriend Zuzanna

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Thirteen years ago, one of my closest friends - a Czech doctor from Prague - died of leukemia here in London. You can read my tribute to Pavel Horvath here.Vee and I have retained a deep friendship with his family who are like our own and we exchange visits between London and Prague on a regular basis.

The family's eldest son Vojta has just finished his six year degree to become a doctor like his father. His graduation ceremony in Prague is later this week, so Vee and I now are off there for a few days to help celebrate this event.

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This week - actually on Thursday - sees an interesting anniversary. Sputnik 1, which was launched by the Soviet Union on 4 October 1957, was the first artificial satellite to be put into geocentric orbit. This really was the beginning of the space age and this week we commemorate the 50th anniversary of that event.

At the time, I was nine years old and immensely excited by this huge leap of human endeavour. It seemed that every few months we had a new first: the first animal in space, the first man in space, the first woman in space, the first duo in space, the first orbit of the moon, the first landing on the moon. At the time, we were convinced that trips to the moon would become commonplace and that there would be a permanent base there.

However, space exploration seems to excite little interest these days and we hardly notice the latest human excursion into space.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 07:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

This is a dangerous activity in turbulent Burma and effectively blogging has stopped as the authorities have simply cut Net connections with the wider world. This "Times" article acknowledges the vital and brave efforts of the bloggers so far.

Posted by Roger Darlington at 02:01 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

If you are outraged by the action of the army and generals in Burma and would like to show your solidarity with the protesters, visit this web site.

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