Archive for December, 2007
It’s 2008 already
December 5th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I only take one monthly magazine and have it on a postal subscription. It’s called “Film Review” and the January 2008 edition arrived today. Pretty crazy, huh? I don’t know whey I’m complaining – the cover picture is of Angelina Jolie.
Posted in Miscellaneous | Comments (1)
Forgotten World (113): Somaliland
December 5th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
Following the collapse of the military regime of Siad Barre and of the Somali state, the 3 million people of the north-west region of Somaliland declared independence in 1991, but Somaliland remains unrecognised as a sovereign nation. However, in the eyes of at least some international observers, over the last decade and a half, the […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (2)
Problems for “The Kite Runner”
December 4th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I was enormously impressed with Khaled Hosseini’s novel “The Kite Runner” [my review here] and I am looking forward eagerly to the film. Today, however, it is reported that the boys who star in the movie have had to be taken out of Afghanistan.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
Forgotten World (112): Kiribati
December 4th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
Kiribati – the former Gilbert Islands – consists of 33 atolls that occupy a vast area in the Pacific. They stretch nearly 4,000 km from east to west, more than 2,000 km from north to south, and straddle the Equator. Many of the atolls are inhabited (the total population is around 100,000) but most of […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
Forgotten World (111): Armenia
December 3rd, 2007 by Roger Darlington
It’s time for another week of postings in my long-running series called Forgotten World – a look at parts of the world that hardly feature in our media or thoughts. You can check the previous 110 entries here. Armenia was one of the earliest Christian civilisations and its first churches were founded in the fourth […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
A Russian version of democracy
December 2nd, 2007 by Roger Darlington
As reported by the BBC and other media, today around 100 million Russians have the chance to vote for their parliament the State Duma. As background, I have written “A Short Guide To The Russian Political System”.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
Origin of “pie in the sky”
December 2nd, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I’m really interested in the origin of words and the use of language. A friend of mine who surfs the Net more than is normal (that’s Nick again) has discovered the origin of the phrase “pie in the sky”. Perhaps appropriately for a Sunday blog posting by a former trade union official, the phrase turns […]
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (3)
Some interesting islands and lakes
December 1st, 2007 by Roger Darlington
The things you can find on the web (or at least my friend Nick can) – such as the largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island!
Posted in Environment | Comments (0)
Have we proved the parallel universe theory?
December 1st, 2007 by Roger Darlington
The idea that there might be parallel universes out there as an explanation of the peculiarities of quantum mechanics is topical as we await the opening in a few days of the first film in Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” inventive trilogy [my review of the books start here] which has the notion as central […]
Posted in Science & technology | Comments (0)