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Life In China, Part The Second

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  The Chinese have much the same approach to queuing as the French, they line up obediently until the bus arrives, or the door opens, or whatever it is they are waiting in line for, and then it is suddenly survival of the fittest, and the whole point of queuing becomes lost in a struggle to the death. Well, everyday I had to catch a bus to get to the place where the school’s bus picked me up and the daily experience of this “queuing” was a deeply depressing experience for me as a Good Englishman. It led to my actually punching a couple of guys on one memorable occasion, not something I am prone to do by any means, but on this day I hauled off and really clobbered a couple of guys. The situation was that the bus had arrived, and as normal, all hell broke out and everyone did their darnedest to get onto the bus, but this time there was a mother and her small kid also trying to get onto the bus, and the kid was forced off the bus whilst his mother managed to get on the bus, and I saw ...
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Some of the joys of hitching around Europe

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Way back in my youth - in the '60's of the last century - every summer holiday I used to wander from south England (where I lived in those days) to go down to Greece, via sundry other European countries. In the course of these journeys I had a number of experiences, both pleasant and very much less pleasant - though I am happy to say, that generally they were pleasant. One thing I did notice however, was the weird way in which men felt that they had an absolute right to touch women's bums and other parts of their bodies. On one journey I was with a girl (not particularly my girlfriend, simply a girl who was travelling with me) and we were in northern Greece and were offered a lift in a truck, so I sat next to the driver, and the girl sat on my far side, thus as far from the driver as she could get. This in no way interfered with the driver's attempts to grope the poor damn woman - he merely stretched over me and groped her groin as if I wasn't there. To be hone...
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Thoughts about living in China - All quite random - Part 1

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Between about 2006 and 2009 we lived and worked in Beijing, Lotty in one International School (Beijing City International School) and I in the Western Academy Beijing (WAB). I was employed as what they called their Production Engineer, which effectively was the equivalent of what I used to do at the Roundhouse in London, in other words, I functioned as their Production Manager, being responsible for the sound and lighting crew of the school. As we had something like 7 venues to deal with, and as they tended to start each morning at about 8 am and finish some time in the evening - with rock concerts, classical concerts, film shows or whatever, we tended to work for about 70 hours a week. I had a number of Chinese guys working with me, so I found it relatively easy to learn Mandarin (the Chinese dialect spoken in Beijing, and thus the official language of China), except that it is a tonal language, and the tone used can change the meaning of a word totally - for example, the word "...
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Some Curious Members Of My Family

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On my father's side I have the pleasure of having descended from a splendidly eccentric collection of odd-balls. My Great Grandfather and Grandfather, who were Grant Duffs, were variously governors of the Bank of England, Honorary Colonels-in-Chief of that wonderful Scottish regiment, the Black Watch, oh, and also The Baron Monkswell, the current holder of that title being my cousin Gerard, who upon entering the House of Lords made it possible for a bunch of militant feminists to abseil into the chamber of the House of Commons during a sitting. His father, Larry Collier - a splendid bloke who I was very fond of - was one of the very curious British things, a lord and a Communist, and only felt able to sit in the House of Lords as it gave him a chance to actively pursue his aims as a life long Communist.    Well, like many British Communists, he left the Communist party in 1956 when the Russians violently invaded Hungary and suppressed the move of the Hungarians to move awa...
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Namibia - Africa For Beginners. Part One

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Generally when we had holidays or breaks from our work at the Luanda International School, Lotty and I went and wandered around in Angola, since we wanted to come to grips with this fascinating and complex country while we had the chance.  But on one holiday, several of our colleagues asked us to join them on a holiday in the neighboring country of Namibia.   A proper African holiday complete with lions, elephants and all the other trappings of Africa - most of which were absent from Angola as they had all been killed during the civil war (Mostly by Generals shooting them with heavy machine guns from Helicopter Gun Ships - Ah big game hunting is such fun!). So in due time the great moment arrived, and we all boarded the plane to fly us from Luanda to Windhoek International Airport.  On arrival we were first somewhat stunned by the modernity and cleanliness of the terminal, and then even more stunned by the fact that the guys from the travel company we had ar...
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Thoughts On Living In Angola

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Our year in Angola was too short for us to really come to grips with the country, but we did our best to experience the place while we were there. As I have remarked in an earlier post on Angola, we arrived shortly after their dreadful civil war had ended. Well actually it was much worse than simply a civil war, they also had to contend with military invasions as well.   The South African working on behalf of the USA had invaded the country from Namibia (which at that time belonged to South Africa) and had wreaked bloody havoc wherever they went.  Not to be outdone, the Russians used the Cubans as their cat's paw, and sent troops and others to "help" the Angolans fight off the South Africans.  And to add to the confusion, there were also three Angolan armies all fighting each other as well.    All of this had been going on for something like 30 years, from the departure of the Portuguese colonialists. So it had been a very nasty three decades for the An...
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My Attempts To Be A Teacher - Not My Best Thing Really

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This posting will be an account of my experiences as a supply teacher! I know, its unbelievable, but it has happened! While we were working at Luanda International School, it was understood that in need, I could be used as a supply teacher.   Something that I had hoped would never occur, as I have never wanted to be a teacher, and looked upon the whole concept with considerable angst and fear. However, one day the worst happened.  I was walking through the school office whistling a happy tune, and I was grabbed by the principal as I passed,  and told abruptly that I would be put into a class of kids for the first week of the next term as the normal class teacher was getting married and would thus return to school 5 days after the start of term. There I was....Caught! I gulped and kneeling on the floor, begged to be spared this torment... but to no avail, she was adamant... and thus it was done.... I had been promoted to the ranks of my fellow Luanda c...
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