A country in chaos? Who’s to blame?

What in heaven’s name is this country coming to? I appreciate that it is obviously a different world from what I grew up in, but do parents have such little control over their children that the last few days are the results?

Where is the respect? I just do not understand how the youth of today think that it is ok to partake in the violence of recent days. Where is their sense of responsibility? Their sense of right versus wrong?

Who is to blame? Is this, as some are suggesting, a result of the cuts to the social infrastructure by the current government? I find that one hard to believe. If that really was the case, that the cutbacks are to blame, then surely there would be constant rioting, constant civil unrest by more than just the few hundred youths of the last few days.

I think that too many kids today have been held to such little account for their actions that they just don’t care about anyone or anything but themselves. Are we seeing the results of a generation of children with absentee parents? I heard on the BBC news this morning that there have been children as young as 7 who have been arrested! 7 years old! Dear god, what is happening? When I was 7 you can be sure that there would have been absolutely NO WAY that I would have been involved in anything like this. At 7 I was too busy being a child – playing with friends & way too scared (should the thought of something even remotely like this have crossed my mind) of what the consequences would have been had I acted on my thoughts.

How much of the blame lies with social media? All these young people are far more “socially” active these days – they have twitter, Facebook, text messaging – all things that in seconds put them in the centre of the action. They have their own language & what seems to be little or no regard for others. This is not the first time in recent history that these hard questions have needed to be asked. Recently, essentially the same thing happened, in the name of protests over the tuition hikes. It may have started that way, with a few people expressing their disgust at that situation in a lawful manner, but quickly escalated to shocking scenes of violence & a total disregard for other people & their belongings.

All too quickly this mob mentality has spread throughout the country – to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Nottingham – resulting in violent riots in each of these cities. How & when did it become socially acceptable (within the circles of people the ages of those committing these acts) to be a yob, to put yourself above anyone else & to destroy other people’s lives, livelihoods & futures, all in the name of…..well, what exactly?

I think there is something seriously wrong in this country, with our young people, but what can be done to fix it? And who’s willing to take it on?

 

Randomness & blog tags

Ok, quick post. I work in a job where statistics are important to me & vital to my industry. I like stats! Every day I come onto my 2 blogs looking to see what activity there has been – whether one of the other authors have written a post (unfortunately always a no lately) & to see what posts people are reading, what words people are searching for that bring them to the sites, etc.

Well, Rceee wrote a post about Creme Brulee & holy crap – the number of people who have searched for those 2 words & have ended up on this blog is astounding! Way to go Rceee!!

Click on the pictures for better views & a better understanding of what I am talking about. Wow!

Happy Canada Day!!!!

 Some things I miss from home…………………………

Beavertail

Timbits

Musical Ride

Poutine

Hopewell Cape, NB

 

Canoeing on the river

 

 

Mountie Moose in TO

My Family!

Happy Canada Day to all you Canucks away from home!

 

 

 

 

Bank charges are unfair regardless of court ruling, but now what?

So, we all know about bank overdraft charges here in the UK & the legal wranglings that have been taking place over the last couple of years. After several victories in lower courts the UK Supreme court has decided “… that the level of unarranged overdraft charges in personal current accounts cannot be assessed for fairness under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 (UTCCR). The Court decided that current account customers receive a package of services and unarranged overdraft charges are part of the price paid by customers in exchange for that package.” Interesting, and very scary! Take me for example. I have an account with the Natwest & genuinely managed to accidentally go over my overdraft limit. It has now become a vicious circle of payment & fees, never being able to get back under my overdraft limit.

Under new rules with the Natwest, I am charged a daily fee of £6 for every day that my account is over it’s overdraft limit. That has meant that for something that put me slightly over my overdraft, on an account rarely used, I have had £366 worth of fees in the last 2 months. I am in a single income household (of 2 people), we get no government benefits & my monthly salary barely covers our normal monthly expenses. So, I can make minimal payments, but that doesn’t matter as at £6/day, I can never get my account back under the overdraft limit, so I am caught in a horrible position. Natwest’s response? They don’t care.

What I want to know is how can this be fair practice? I hate Natwest, but somehow doubt that any of the banks are much better!

Canada Day in London 2011

Logo courtesy of Canada Day London 2011

Canada Day in London used to be a pretty informal affair. We’d start out the day at The Maple Leaf, have a few Mooseheads, chat with fellow Canucks, maybe have some poutine (albeit made with cheddar instead of curds). Then we’d amble down the Strand to Trafalgar Square & head inside Canada House for 2pm. Once inside, there would be the singing of O Canada & cutting an enormous birthday cake. They’d have free bottles of Moosehead, Labatts & Canadian Wine & Canadian entertainers would entertain us. Then, we’d all stumble back to Maiden Lane to The Maple Leaf, where several thousand Canucks (and friends of Canucks) would gather on the street & party into the early hours of the morning. It was a great time, lots of drunk Canadians telling each other stories of home, singing Canadian songs & every quarter-hour or so breaking into spontaneous renditions of O Canada! 4 years in a row I attended the Canada Day celebrations on Maiden Lane & we had so much fun, then on Canada Day 2006 they cancelled the party. England were playing Portugal that day in the Football World Cup & there was fear amongst the police that footie fans would riot if England lost, that Maiden Lane was where they would end up & that things would get ugly. So, they banned the street party & instead, the 1st “organised” Canada Day celebrations took place in Trafalgar Square.

6 years later the event is still going strong (though I hear that the poutine is still made with cheddar – something about the curds getting confiscated at customs, lol!), but I have yet to attend. Part of it was sheer stubbornness – what we’d had had been so great & what replaced it is pretty “commercialised” – and part of it was that I just wasn’t able to get time off work. This year I’m hoping I can make it there as I really would like a Timbit (or 2 or 3) & most important of all – Blue Rodeo are playing this year! Wow!! I’m also really excited to see the Inuit Throat Singers & the Great Plains dance performance.

I’m also thinking this is a brilliant opportunity to convince my OH that he really does want to move to Canada! I hope it’s going to be a great day & whilst I suspect it’s going to make my homesickness worse, it should be one of the best Canada Days ever!

Another Other Canucks Fans in London?

Even with the horrible time difference we’ve got to support our Canucks! (Sorry to any Leafs fans here….)

I don’t think anyone is a bigger fan than this girl though. GO CANUCKS GO!

The Royal Canucks – http://canucks.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=562714

In 30 years will you remember where you were on this day?

Almost 30 years ago the world watched while Lady Diana Spencer married Prince Charles, The Prince of Wales. Do you remember where you were? Did you watch the wedding? I do & I did! I was in Canada at the time & I do vividly remember watching the progression of the day. I especially remember the carriage ride back to Buckingham Palace & Charles & Di (& everyone else) going out onto the balcony to greet the public.

Now, 30 years later Charles & Diana’s first born, Prince William, is marrying & again the world is watching. I know that in this country there is a lot of debate over the existence of the Monarchy and a lot of people want the monarchy abolished. I have heard a lot of comments by people who say that the monarchy are an elitist organisation who are out of touch with reality & maybe they are. But, this is a historical day & I think that they number of people excited about the wedding far outweigh those who could care less.

While not necessarily a “Royalist”, I do find myself looking forward to seeing today’s events. I do hope that Kate breaks with tradition & protocol & wears her hair down (oh the shock horrors!) and that she does her own thing, that she stays true to who she is & what she likes. I do think that regardless of the current situation within the Royals, that William & Kate (I also hope she continues to go by Kate, rather than by Catherine) are the fresh future of the Royal family. I think that moments like last night (William went on a walk around of the crowds of people outside the palace to say thank you for the support that people are showing them) hold the Royal family in good stead!

So, in 30 years time will you remember where you were on this day? I know I will!

Happy Easter!

  I grew up in a pretty religious family back in Canada (church every Sunday, Sunday School, Church Youth Groups, Church camps – you get the picture), but somewhere along the way I lost my faith in organised religion. Still, Easter to me is filled with wonderful memories, growing up in a small Canadian community.

On Easter Sunday we went to church twice – the sunrise service, which was held outdoors & the regular Easter Sunday service. There was something so special about being  at our church, watching the sun come up, surrounded by the members of our congregation. After the service everyone would go into the basement & the Church elders would cook breakfast of pancakes, sausages, bacon, toast, fruit etc for everyone who had attended the sunrise service. There was one man named Stan Law, who every year would make the most wonderful yoghurt pancakes which we would devour, covered with syrup.

After breakfast we would all return home for a couple of hours, do our Easter Egg hunt, gorge ourselves on chocolate, then return to church for the regular Easter Sunday service.

One of my strongest memories was of the year my parents were unable to buy us any Easter goodies, as my Dad had been laid off from work for a few years. We went to the usual sunrise service, had breakfast at church, then got in the car to go home, only to discover that the back of the station wagon was filled with an Easter basket for each of us 4 kids, filled to over-flowing with Easter eggs, chocolate bunnies, etc & a lovely Easter cake. To this day that is one of my strongest memories of community, of us belonging.

Did this wonderful sense of community come as a result of growing up in a village of 3000 people, or was it because we were part of the church, which unless it is a church with a congregation of several thousand, is bound to happen? It is something that I cherish & still search for today here in the UK!

April Fools…….

So around 10 o’clock this morning I was in my office (ok, make that 10:30), working on our Christmas Brochure (yes, you did read that correctly!) & listening to the radio. Our local Radio station announced that it had just learned that Facebook was shutting down. They went on to say that Facebook was being forced to shut down by the US courts & would be closed down by 5pm today (well yesterday now as it is past midnight). Initially, my thoughts were – “oh, better call the OH & tell him to download our pics off my Facebook page.” – I wasn’t too bothered, to be honest. Then I got to thinking about it & the more I thought, the more I searched – google, Reuters, BBC, CBC – no one had any info on it, so being as I realised that today was the 1st of April, I figured it must have been an April Fools joke.

Now, not everyone went about it the same way & I have to say, I was really surprised (& maybe just a little saddened) at the reactions of people! For instance, one person put the following comment on the radio station’s website:

“im so sad to hear that facebook will be shutting down i basically live on it… please please try and stop this happening today.”

This was actually one of the more tame responses. There was one guy who went crazy, saying he spent 10 hours a day on Facebook – man, how do you manage that? I have to work 8.5 (minimum) hours a day, sleep at least 7 hours a day, get up, eat breakfast, watch the news, travel to work – that takes at least 2 hours, which leaves 6.5 hours for reading, ablutions, watching tv, travelling home from work, eating dinner, spending time with OH & oh yeah, surfing the net, or playing SIMS. Where does this person find 10 hours a day to be on Facebook? And, doesn’t he get bored? I sure do! Yeah, Farmville was good for a couple of months, then I got angry bored (they stole my fully expanded combine harvester & wouldn’t give it back! Jerks!) & gave all that up, which is when the boredom kicked in…

Now, Facebook is just something I check once a day to see if everything is ok in Canada-land (Family & Friends) & move on. I certainly don’t obsess about it & I’m definitely not addicted to it (never really was, I could take it or leave it except for Farmville, but lets not talk about that one again!) & quite frankly I don’t really understand people who do/are. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if we all just shut the computer off, went outside & actually had an honest-to-god, face-to-face conversation with other REAL 3 dimensional humans?

Spring is in the air

With all this great weather in London all I can think about are the upcoming festivals in the UK and Europe!

There are way to many to list but if Canadian Expats in the UK want to support some fellow Canadians you should check out Arcade Fire with Mumford & Sons on June 30th at Hyde Park!

http://www.nme.com/news/arcade-fire/54635

Tickets are reasonable for an all day event (available at ticketmaster.co.uk) with two of the biggest bands around (and winners of the Grammy for Best Album!)

See you there!

canada2011