“No Hay Luz”

Dear readers,

Tegucigalpa has just been rattled by a healthy storm; a real electronic romper-stomper, the ones you can only find in the tropics, where you feel literally metres away from bolts of lightening. I’ve seen worser storms, to be honest, and I don’t think it was strong enough to have a name or a category storm. Saying that, this isn’t a challenge to the Gods to give us a more heaftier storm, yet this one did cause several flash floods throughout the city and knocked the electricity out for a few hours. Not only that, it left our dog Vicente a little anxious.

Nonetheless, the city needed a good rinse off, after the weather reached unbearable temperatures, causing several fires especially in the nearby areas to the city. Some of these fires were started by land owners burning rubbish or clearing bush. One fire cost the lives of two firemen, which has left the city in mourning for the last couple of days. Unfortunately, I can see many more perishing if the authorities don’t do more to punish this type of behaviour, or the people don’t change their mentalities who start fires which grow quickly out of control, especially in the dry season.

Therefore, thank God the rains came. The people wanted water; they got aplenty.

It was nice having the lights go out, apart from the fact that it stopped me having a late lunch. My mobile phone was already without juice, so I got to go back to basics of writing under candle light with pen and paper. I enjoy having no electricity, being in a state of inconvenience (not for too long, mind). Being disconnected from the web and social media and the miserable news of late felt refreshing; so refreshing that it inspired a poem, written after the storm had passed.

The digital silence soothes the senses.

Devices dead and lights blanked out and telephone conversations ended with no goodbyes.

Coupled by the looming darkness; the city illuminated only by moon and starlight, after thuggish clouds moved on to pulverize other lands.

And cars struggle on down streets converted into temporary rivers, given birth by a petulant, stroppy storm.

The noise, oh that noise, of life chirping, happening, rebuilding its strengths in the aftermath.

Voices of nature, of geckos bickering in the candle flicker and the rain dropping its last drips on window panes and tin roofs.

And impatient moans and groans of neighbours, “No hay luz“, obsessed with being reconnected to that woven web.

Away from the narcissism of Facebook and the feuds on Twitter and marathons on Netflix and games that kill time from more fulfilling joys;

I embrace these lonely moments, disconnected from news and WhatsApp and the idioces of humanity.

Simplicity, a route to a natural joy, with candlelight and pen and paper and cup of water.

No music, no radiation contamination from cell phones, no obsession to look at surplus updates.

Life wins.

Tigs the Grasshopper

Dear readers,

I now work at Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos, an NGO that works with youths at social risk. I’ve been here for almost three months, although I will talk about the NGO itself in a later post. However, I have written about it before. Watch this space.

The Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos Santa Fe Ranch is 36 kilometres due north east of Tegucigalpa, on the road to Olancho. It’s very dry, with rolling hills of pine trees, although some folk in surrounding towns are hell bent on burning these trees to use the land for other means, burning up the atmosphere and leaving a dirty feeling in the air. Not in the ranch though. It’s kept fresh and beautiful, preserving nature, making it a lush environment for children to grow up in. You can see colourful birds thriving, as well as insects, just like the fella in the below photo.

We found the fella in the office this morning, and I’m calling it Tigs due to the Tiger like stripes. I think it’s a type of grasshopper or cricket, although I’m no David Attenborough and I’ve not idea if he or she bites. If there are any entomologists reading, maybe you can enlighten me (or us).

Tigs is now outside in a grassy area. He looks happy. Although I’m no expert in grasshopper emotions either. Either way, he’s back in his own environment with loads of nosh.

Knowledge is power

Dear readers,

Memes. There are billions of ’em. Probably more memes than the world population a couple of times over, meaning there’s a meme or two for everyone.

With social media and communication platforms they spread like a wildfire, especially if they’re evocative in some way. I must have received a couple of hundred during the political flare ups in recent months in Honduras, and doubtless more during Brexit and the US elections. All languages and all cultures have them, and you receive double if you bi- or tri-lingual.

They come in a rainbow of topics, too. Humor, political, religious, educational, sexy, sad, sick … we’ve all seen them. I often think the funny ones give comedians a run for their money; humour of the people, so to speak. Someone with wit and a knack at Photoshop is usually the recipe.

As I said earlier, everyone has a meme or two; which you have an affinity with for whatever reason. I saw one today which was shared on Facebook by an old Spanish friend a met a couple of times during my time in Madrid. She loved the English language and I loved the Spanish, and I still do, as you may know from past posts. We also shared a passion for literature, understanding full well of the benefits of knowledge from books, and how the powers that be are scared of it being shared around, unless it’s their own propaganda.

I won’t go through the effort of translating the below meme. It speaks for itself. Sure, there are more powerful memes. Although I just like the message.

I want this meme to inspire Hondurans, for obvious reasons.

Annie Hall – Dead Shark

Dear readers,

Less about Honduras today, and more about showing off my movie nerdness.

Woody Allen. There’s a lot to say about this little yet very odd man, and a lot has been said in recent years. He’s been accused of some very sick things, although I don’t know if he’s been formally charged for them. I don’t really want to go into depth about the accusations which I’m sure you’re aware of anyway, nor do I want to become an apologist for someone who’s accused of such things.

Yet what does one do if they love someone’s work? Are they supposed to hate it over night? Should they disregard the memories and hours of enjoyment they had of watching and reading their work, just like my case with Woody Allen? What are we supposed to do?

I think there are millions of Woody Allen fans just like me, who feel uneasy about admiring his work so much. I suppose Michael Jackson fans feel similar.

His Complete Prose I also loved, and it remains one of my favourite books. Neurotic and weird but you just read on, laughing your head off at his wittiness and bizarreness; the situations he gets himself into and his take on it.

I have wonderful memories of watching Annie Hall and Manhattan on grey Sunday afternoons with a hangover back in the UK, giggling to myself over the witticisms of a mentally ill and insecure man and other characters; bleakly hilarious norms in surreal situations.

One of these witticisms remains with me and inspires me. It comes from Anne Hall, and its probably Allen’s most famous quote in all his movies; not just in this movie. Allen’s character comes out when dumping Annie Hall, or finding an excuse to terminate the relationship, mid-flight. He uses a dead shark analogy. Please read below:

I told my wife about the quote over lunch and we both ended up feeling a bit strange about being fans.

Help: what are we supposed to feel about Woody Allen? Is there a hotline or a shrink? I think I’m beginning to sound as neurotic as him. I better stop writing now.

Francoise Sagan

Dear readers,

This weekend is Feria de Libros in Tegucigalpa, one of my favourite weekends of the year. To those not in the know, libros means books, and those who know me well will know that I think books are more interesting than the majority of people on this planet.

It’s an opportunity to see local writing talents, as well as buy books. I added four to my collection, three of them by Honduran authors (one was actually a box of poems by an assortment of local poets, which was given free of charge by CCET – the Spanish cultural centre). The two other books were:

• ¡Complot! by José H. Blanco, about certain Honduran characteristics and behaviours.
• Virgen y Otros Cuentos by Kalki Martínez; short stories centred around domestic violence.

I also bought La Tregua by Mario Benedetti, the Uruguayan writer. I’ll review the books at some stage.

I would like to turn your attention to the French writer, Francoise Sagan. She’s the fifth female author I’ve read this year and I adore her sense of humour and flow. She has a witty philosophy, with an arrogant French charm which is kind of like Marmite; you love it or hate it. I’m one of the former. I’m reading Bonjour Tristesse and a Certain Smile, or at least an English translation of it. I regret I’m not reading it in French, although it might take me a few decades to finish it if that were the case. Translations are different books, in my experience. You lose so much voice and sense of the characters in foreign intrepretations. I often feel I’m cheating the myself and the writer by reading the translation. Can you imagine Irvine Welsh or Roddy Doyle books in a different language? Begby in Italian? Can’t see it working, somehow. They often just don’t, in my experience.

I’ll write a review once I’ve finished reading it. I’ll just add that Sagan was just 18 when she wrote it. She wrote many others and got involved in drugs and scandals; life was something of an interesting narrative in itself. She died almost 30 years ago.

I’ll finish with one of her famous quotes, to whet your appetite, if you fancy reading anything. The quote; typically Sagan…witty arrogance. J’adore.

“Hits the spot”

Dear readers,

I don’t like all street art. Some of it is ugly. Sometimes it’s vandalism and abuse of public/private property.

However, other times it’s artistic and colours up stark grey structures. Occasionally there is some political statement which I might or might not agree with, but it symbolises acvoice of anger or frustration. Sometimes it’s grissly, with gangs using symbols to mark territories.

It’s the case in nearly all urban areas across the world during these polemic times, especially in Tegucigalpa, as well as many other Latin American cities, where graffiti is known to be colourful.

Sometimes street art makes me chuckle and stays in my head. One I remember in Birmingham is close by to the Small Heath train station junction, “Velvet Underpants”, with the little drawing. I don’t know if it is still there. I used to see it everyday to and from work and it would always reassure me that no matter how shit the day was, there was always this epic piece of street art to make me grin. It’s not the prettiest or most colourful, but I felt a strange affinity with it, and I’m guessing many Brummies from the south side of the city feel the same. I looked on Google Images although it didn’t appear. A shame. Shame on you, Google!

Today I saw this one by Palmira, on the way into the Downtown area of Tegucigalpa. For those who don’t speak Spanish, balas means bullets. The rest you can work out for yourself. It’s not the most profound pearl of wisdom, nor is it a rainbow of colours. But who cares (apart from the owner of the property). I like it. Excuse the pun, but it kind of “hits the spot”.

How important is patriotism?

Dear readers,

I’ve always wondered about this question. It baffles me how ridiculously proud we can become when we read too into our country, and how discriminate and xenophobic we can get when talking about others.

I’m guilty of it myself, especially if England or Honduras are playing football. The opposite team become your worst enemy yet you’re not even on the pitch playing, but sat on the sofa with a beer in your hand, lancing insults and using negative stereotypes against a whole nation of people that you’re probably never going to meet.

You walk away thinking, why. Why did I say that? Why am I using it as an excuse to be obnoxious? Why am I behaving so out of character and irrational?

Don’t get me wrong; it’s so wonderful when your country wins something and you want to be part of the celebration. Seeing Honduras qualify for the 2014 World Cup was one of my most memorable moments I’ve had, seeing the waves of euphoria on the streets. Although the realisation comes crashing down when you realize that you played little part in your country’s victory, apart from getting stupidly stressed about a game which you lost your voice shouting at the TV screen over.

Patriotism also makes us feel foolishly offended when someone says something ignorant or xenophobic against the culture or people; pent up energy over an idiot’s comments. It’s a honeytrap, and we fall for it. Of course, some bigots use negative stereotypes to be discriminating against another nation, which the Hondurans often feel when they travel to the US or Spain, but I then feel like an English snob labelling the Spanish or Americans bigots, when I know plenty of people from those two countries who aren’t like that. It’s a patriotic mess.

Those who don’t show their patriotic duties (not singing the anthem or waving the flag high enough) are often accused of being a traitor, a lack of passion or in some cases stupidity, but then someone who isn’t that patriotic often sits back and laughs at the idiot who falls for the powers that be, flaming the fires of nationalist sentiments to manipulate its people to behave or react in a way that suits them. It’s sometimes funny. It’s sometimes disturbing. Look at Brexit. Look at Trump. Look at Putin. Look at Hitler. Propaganda uses it all the time.

The one thing I feel patriotic about is English culture. For a small island, we’ve left our mark on the world. Literature, music, art; we’ve exported it well. Then I start comparing it with countries and I think it’s better than the rest, and then I realise I’m falling into the trap, knowing the intelligent thing to do is appreciate art for what it is, and not the nationalist narrative about where it’s from.

I know readers might disagree with a lot of what I’ve written. Please leave your comments below, either way. In the meantime, I’m going to end with a quote by the comedian Doug Stanhope, who greatly inspired this post.

Syria and UK’s involvement: a rant

Dear readers,

A short post. I’ll try to keep it short. Kind of difficult when the subject is so complicated. These are just some lose thoughts on Syria. I think so sad morphs into so angry to so helpless, or maybe all three emotions. All adjectives seem so futile when talking about the situation.

Needless to say, the Syrians are going through possibly the darkest period of the country’s history, and even that is an understatement. The recent conflicts have left 350,000 dead, I’m not sure how many homeless and 50,000 plus feared dead. Even before the current crisis I’d met many Kurdish refugees while working at the British Refugee Council, and that was almost 10 years ago. I always remember the one phrase they taught me in Kurdish, which phonetically sounds like Am katu bash, meaning What’s up? I greeted them with this phrase every morning.

First they had Bashar Hafez al-Assad, then Isis, then The West and Russia getting involved, dropping bombs in the name of combating terrorism and then to stop Al Assad who had allegedly been using chemical weapons on his own people. Meanwhile the narrative has been Trump flexing his muscles to Putin, who has also been beating Syria like a piñata; the two who seemingly want to nuke the world to pieces.

A country, maybe planet, destroyed due to decisions of so few powerful people. Politicians acting on our behalf of everyone. Like everything the US does, the UK seems to follow, especially where military is concerned. It’s the same narrative. It’s an embarrassing narrative, and one that affects the UK’s reputation.

It’s important when you live abroad. When live in a country where everyone thinks you’re a gringo and you have to repeat like a broken record, telling people that you’re not, you’re different. You don’t want to be lumped with US imperialism and its abusive model. Your culture is different and your compariots are different. Your thoughts and your upbringing. Different. I’m not wanting to come across as snobbish. You just want to protect your roots. I’m sure people in the US feel the same. I imagine Hondurans feel the same when they are called Mexicans.

It’s tiresome.

It feels like a losing battle. And you can understand people not believing you the different rhetoric, especially when your country’s politicians stand so closely to the US’s. There’s not much you can say, other than “Your politicians actions don’t reflect your country’s people’s sentiment. After all, do all Hondurans agree with Juan Orlando?” I doubt it.

The below image I found from somewhere on Facebook. It struck an accord with me, for

I must end this by making this less about my own predicament, and more about the Syrians who are being attacked from all sides. The problem is, I don’t know how to. The situation is out of everyone’s hands and, to fear repeating myself, helpless.

I’ve nothing but angry and negative adjectives to describe the situation, and my regret it is, it does nothing to change anything. Just a ventation of emotion. So I’ll stop there.

Cats v Dogs – part two

Dear readers,

I take back what I said about dogs being more intelligent than cats. Then again, the idea is there, but the execution needs some work on.

See picture below:

Trump and Putin: A bizarre love affair or a bromance turned sour?

Dear readers,

A short post, although a confusing one. Because, as you can see from the title, the subject is a confusing affair.

Trump and Putin. What’s going on? Is it love, hate, or a power struggle to see who’s wearing the trousers? Or the biggest trousers? The more powerful trousers? Or the richest? You know there is depth to that relationship, but it’s one full very slippery red herrings that we’ll never get to the bottom of.

Putin is smart. We know that. Truth means everything to him, because he doesn’t want anyone to know it. He’s an expert at propaganda, chucking out smokescreens and various narratives to confuse the public. Many other governments do the same, you might say, yet you know Putin has turned it into an art form. For more insight, see this snippet from Adam Curtis about Putin – click here.

Trump has a similar method by rattling his Twitter rattle to distract the world while he gets on with dubious policies, such as demantling programs for immigrants like Dreamers. He has copied Putin’s smokescreen tactics, almost making the term fake news synonymous with Trump, which he has used to bat scandals out the arena. He can walk through walls, it seems; getting away with everything, almost an act of genius.

Be clear though, I don’t like it, nor them, but I found it ironic that the presidents of countries that were at each other during the Cold War had developed a bromance, it seemed.

It seems that Russia had some involvement in the US elections, handing quite a big favour to rumpy Trumpy, although it’s one we’ll never get to the bottom of, despite what the FBI and co publish. It certainly looked like Putin dropped his hat in the ring and Trump gladly picked it up; the first flirt in this courtship. However, you knew all along Putin had a card up some sleeve. What sleeve it was hard to say. Was it Putin at all? Oh, he loves a riddle, doesn’t he!

The relationship then hit the rocks last month. First when the US claimed Russia was breaking international agreements after Putin boasted about buying nukes. Then, the two countries had a bigger tiff when they began dispelling each other’s diplomats over the James Bond-like affair of Sergei Skripal, a double spy for the British who was poisoned along with his daughter using chemical weapons in the not so James Bond town of Salisbury in the southern regions of England. On second thoughts, it seems more John Le Carré or Agatha Christie than James Bond. Whether it was Russia remains to be seen, however.

This, obviously, left the relationship a little heated. Who slept on the sofa wasn’t disclosed, but it seems they weren’t speaking for a few days until Syria kicked off, when the US accused Russia of using chemical weapons on the city of Douma. Russia claimed it was fake news, but they have been backing Assad, and the Syrian leader is quite a fan of using chemical weapons on his enemies, and innocent people.

Russia then claimed they’d shoot down any US missiles coming for Syria. Trump, who broke the first rules of any relationship (and adult behaviour), by taking to social media to blow off about his domestics (and diplomatic relations); a daft thing to do, especially when the other half is Vladimir Putin. He began warning Russia “To get ready” for ‘smart’ missiles; on Twitter.

Like in all rocky relations (this one is been labelled Cold War part deux by the media), there’s always someone, usually a child, who gets caught in the middle. The child here is Syria (although it could increase to the majority of the world population if they start firing nukes at each other); neither country wants custody of Syria. No. They just want to blow it up and claim they’re doing bit to combat terrorism, and that’s the sickest thing about the affair. Two power houses want to flex their muscles while innocents die horribly.

What happens now? What do people think of this messy relationship? Are we edging towards another world war? How will it unravel? Is this all a mass exaggeration from the media? Or should we be more worried?

Leave your comments below.