Snippets and gleanings - from a small island

Saints above!

One of the small pleasures of being in a Catholic country is checking the calendar each morning to see whose saints day it is. They often come in pairs and today it's the turn of Agatha and Alice. Saint Agatha of Sicily was a virgin martyred during the era of the Roman persecution of Christians. Alice, aka Adelaide of Guelders (don't ask), was a pious medieval royal who features on three dates in the year, two as Alice and one as Empress Adelaide. This might seem a trifle greedy for a saint but, then, she was a rather grand one. Tomorrow it's Saints Dorothea and Paul Miki. I can't wait.

Hug a hoodie

At least David (now Lord) Cameron got one thing right in his political career. Although he never actually used the phrase which has dogged him ever since his 2006 speech in which he called for more tolerance and understanding of demonised youth, the sub-editorial shorthand stuck. For me, though, it's the garment I've embraced. Aged seventy-one I've taken to wearing a hoodie for the first time and wouldn't be parted from this eminently practical item of clothing. Let the yoof mock. In the words of the late-lamented Janis Joplin, "fuck 'em if they can't take a joke".

No shit, Sherlock

Only yesterday I visited an area of outstanding natural beauty, one of the last unspoiled coastal stretches of Tenerife, the Rambla de Castro at Los Realejos. Today, Mirame TV brings news that a proposed giant sewage works could destroy this delicate and unique ecosystem. I must admit the quality of the seawater on Castro Beach didn't look too enticing but protecting the marine environment by destroying the coastal one seems counterproductive. The scheme is being funded by the EU. Say no more.


Popular posts from this blog

Looking to Africa - long read

As I sit here on an island just off the coast of North-West Africa I can't help pondering the future of that vast and seemingly unknowable continent, so near and yet so far. I'm writing this in Tenerife, one of the eight Canary Islands forming an archipelago off the coast of Morocco and Western Sahara - tantilisingly close and yet a world away from the 'mainland' of continental Africa. As an Autonomous Community of Spain, the Canaries form an outpost of the European Union (EU). Yet, despite their proximity to Africa, their outlook, politically, culturally and economically, is resolutely European. Africa may as well be Mars, though only a narrow gulf of the Atlantic Ocean separates these offshore islands from their continent. I say resolutely European but that resolve may, little by little, be weakening. There is a growing sentiment, especially, though not exclusively, amongst young Canarians, that they have been sold a pup. True, the economy is superficially buoyant, du
Read more

On old age

"The fact is that when I come to think it over, I find that there are four reasons for old age being thought unhappy: First, that it withdraws us from active employments; second, that it enfeebles the body; third, that it deprives us of nearly all physical pleasures; fourth, that it is the next step to death."  Writing his essay,  De Senectute (On Old Age), in 44 BCE, Marcus Tullius Cicero went on to refute these four supposed reasons in characteristically robust and forthright manner. Cicero wasn't one to sit about moping in his own old age; he remained actively engaged in the political life of the Republic whose survival, in the face of tyranny, he championed so fiercely.  Cicero was nine years younger than I am now when he met his untimely end yet he considered himself already an old man; or, rather, his society judged him to be so. His second point about age enfeebling is more germane. Physical decline had not yet impacted him but, six years on from my retirement, I
Read more

Born to rule

When, ten days ago, I posted my piece about the manipulated image of Catherine, Princess of Wales, and her children (see Snap Judgment) I didn't know of her cancer treatment. Had I known, I would have adopted a gentler, though I hope no less critical, tone. But I didn't know, and nor did any of us outside the immediate royal circle, which rather goes to strengthen the case against the monarchy. For Kate and her family the diagnosis of cancer (as yet unspecified) will have been a devastating blow, as will the chemotherapy she is currently undergoing. On a human level, of course I sympathise and extend my best wishes for a full recovery as, indeed, I did at the time of her father-in-law's diagnosis. It is particularly cruel, then, that on top of all this she has been obliged to record a video statement to reassure the public. As if she didn't have enough to contend with already. But such is the unpalatable obligation placed upon any royal personage - noblesse oblige. Whic
Read more