Scene on a train: a short play

On Platform Two of Seven Sisters overground station. It’s seven twenty-two on a crisp December night. It’s dark and cold and there’s a buzz in the air. Christmas is but days away and, what with the bleak economic outlook and the exertions of the riots, it seems everyone is looking forward to a well-deserved break. People are in good spirits but there’s a hint of edginess in the air.

The platform is crowded. The 19.14 to Enfield Town is eight minutes late. People are checking their phones and watches with increasing frustration. They’re speaking into mobiles loudly and berating the unreliable service. Some of them have come from West End, having taken the Victoria line from Oxford Circus to Seven Sisters. Many of them are black, many of them are young.


Finally, the train pulls in to Seven Sisters, ten minutes late. It’s already full and those waiting to board are laden with shopping bags, making the usual jostle for position fiercer. When the doors eventually open, the usual etiquette is done away with. Those wanting to get off the train are swamped by those desperate to get on as everyone crowds in in a mad rush for seats.


People deposit themselves wherever they find space. Passengers shuffle in their seats to make way for those who are determined to sit down despite the overflow of people and bags. Some place their goods in the overhead luggage racks; others place them on the floor or even on the seat beside them.


In the four seats nearest to the door in the first carriage is a white woman in her mid-thirties, who is sitting against the window facing the direction in which the train is travelling. Resting against her arm is her son, who is about eight or ten years old. He is asleep. Opposite her is an older white woman, in her late sixties or early seventies. Her head is deep in an Evening Standard, although she is aware of the commotion going on around her and the scramble for seats. Her bags are placed on the seat beside her. She makes no attempt to move them to make way for someone to sit down (and feigns blissful ignorance with the aid of her paper).


An old white man in his late seventies gets on the train at Bruce Grove. He’s stooped but nimble on his feet. He’s wearing a grey flat cap and a fur-lined, camel coat. He shuffles into the carriage and hunts for a seat. All eyes are on the old woman with her bags on the only free seat.

This time, she reluctantly concedes and moves her shopping bags on to the floor in order to let the old man sit down.

Old man: Thank you. Thank you, dear, that’s very kind of you.

He takes a seat as the train starts to move off. There’s a brief silence. Rubbing his gloved hands…

Oooo, it’s cold today, innit. Freezing! Still, not as bad as last year. Last year was terrible. This year’s been quite good.

The old woman sitting next to him briefly averts her gaze from her paper and fakes a smile while the mother sitting opposite produces a genuine grin.

Mother: You wouldn’t think that Christmas was only a couple of days away.

Old man: Oo, Christmas. Doesn’t feel like does it. I remember when I was a kid it would be guaranteed snow. Now everything’s changed. You can’t tell whether you’re coming or going.

The mother smiles and there is a brief moment of silence as the train pulls out of Bruce Grove and Tottenham High Street comes into view as the train passes through it.

Old man: It’s terrible. I used to go to that post office in Bruce Grove before they burnt it down. Now I have to go all the way up to the post office at the Sainsbury’s in Edmonton. It takes me ages. Do you know the one?

Mother: No, I don’t.

Old man: The one by the big Sainsbury’s. I have to take the bus or get the train up cos I could never walk there. It’s too far to get to by foot. I used to like walking to the old post office in Bruce Grove. It was a nice bit of exercise, you know. Now, I don’t really get out much.

Silence.

There was a lovely woman who used to work at the Post Office in Bruce Grove. A little Indian lady. Do you know her?

Mother: No, I’ve never been there.

Old man: I wonder what happened to her? She was lovely. Really good at her job. I haven’t seen her since. I thought they might have moved her up to Edmonton but I haven’t seen her there. She’s the kind of person I feel sorry for. She didn’t deserve to lose her job cos some no-good kids decided to burn down her place of business.

All eyes shift towards the old man. The tension is palpable. Lowering her paper…

Old woman: That’s just an excuse. They would have closed them down anyway. The government was planning to shut down most of the Post Offices around here. The rioters did them a favour. Gave them a get-out clause.

Old man: Is it really?

Old woman: Yes it is. The government don’t care one bit about the likes of you and me. They were going to put you out of your post office regardless.

Old man: You’re right, you’re certainly right. But that’s no excuse for them burning down all those buildings.

Old woman: It wasn’t all of them. Some of them are good kids but the media tarred everyone with the same brush. None of the kids where I live were involved.

Old man: Fair point, fair point.

Hastily changing the subject…

Mother: Are you doing anything nice for Christmas?

Old man: Nah. My daughter lives in Essex and she’s got her kids to think about. She’s divorced, see, so she’s got her hands full. I’ve got a son too but he’s taken his family off on holiday. Gone off to the Caribbean for some winter sun, Gambia, or somewhere, he says, so he’s doing better than we are. It’s all about the kiddies anyhow. Got any plans for the little lad?

Mother: Oh, he’s spoilt enough. Nothing special. But he’ll know it’s Christmas.

Old man: That’s right, he deserves to be spoilt, don’tcha lad?

He ruffles the sleeping boy’s shoulder playfully, rouses the child but doesn’t wake him. The mother smiles.

When my kids were little ‘uns we used to really treat them at this time of year, me and the wife. We never had much but we made sure that they knew it was Christmas. We did our best.

Mother: I’m sure you did.

The train stops at White Hart Lane.

Old man: I’ve lived here going on fifty years. Used to take my boy to watch the football every Saturday when there were home games. It was safe as houses then. So much’s changed but I wouldn’t live anywhere else. This is England, warts and all.

The train passes behind a house with a huge St. George’s flag billowing in its garden. They all look at it.

Old woman: In all its ugliness and its glory.

Small acts of kindness

I’ve been back in London less than twenty-four hours and I’m heartened to have borne witness to small acts of kindness that exemplify that, in north London, at least, we really are all in it together. Whether or not we’re part of the Big Society as expressed by the prime minister is another story but we’re certainly part of society as it exists for us in our local communities.

It’s been interesting to compare today with this time last year. The scenes that I recorded in my diary last winter were of a Dickensian gloom, a very individual despair. Times are harder than they were twelve months ago yet spirits are definitely higher. There’s been an almost imperceptible sea-change that has not gone unnoticed.

As my friend and mentor, Natalie, observed, we’re currently on a spectrum of extreme intolerance and small acts of kindness. At the opposite end, we, and millions around the world, see what transpired on a tram in south west London and a similar event on a bus further east. Some people no longer feel the need to conceal what they’re thinking when it comes to race and pointing the perceived finger of blame at people of colour and immigrants, whether they were, in fact, born British or whether they were newly arrived last week. At the other end, it is a pleasure to watch a stranger help a blind man board a busy Victoria line tube train. Not only did the sighted man discretely assist the blind man, but he also stood chatting to him for the length of his journey as if they were old friends. I only realised that they had just met when the sighted man helped ‘his friend’ off the train when he reached his stop and steered him in the right direction. It was at this point that the blind man thanked him for keeping him company and shook his hand saying, ‘Nice to meet you.’ Hardly Miracle on 34th Street but notable, nonetheless.

The following day, another incident occurred that restored my faith in Londoners. A man held a bus for me, a bus that I was certain to miss had he not intervened by standing half in and half out of the door as insurance while asking the driver to wait as I ran. It’s been a long time since that has happened since everyone is in a perennial rush these days, Christmas notwithstanding. But this gentleman didn’t stop there.

As we both ascended the stairs to the top deck of the overcrowded bus, we – and everyone else – noticed the shadowy, hunched figure of a young male stood on the stairway. He wore a dark hoodie and loose, cotton trousers and his face was covered by his hands, which were small and gloved. He was clearly distressed though silently so. We all ignored him, including myself. When the bus reached its terminus, everyone passed this figure on the way down, just as we had done on the way up and no one said anything.

It was at this point that the man who stopped the bus for me put his arm around this enigma, who turned out to be a young boy, no more than fourteen, and asked him, ‘Are you alright, brother?’ The boy looked up at the stranger, perhaps fifteen years older than himself, and said, ‘I’m alright, thank you.’ He clearly wasn’t but he looked grateful that someone had taken the time to ask. At a time when young people are falling prey to all kinds of temptations and tragic fates, sometimes all it takes is a small show of interest to reassure them that someone cares. I felt quietly rebuked.

These were the main episodes that struck me but by no means the only ones, including the young mother in a store in a notoriously deprived area who informed me that my bag was torn and offered me a carrier by way of substitute lest I fall victim to a thief. A small thing but then in our twenty-four hour, consumerist society every little helps, including small acts of involuntary kindness.

Sunday praise: Giving thanks for Amiri Baraka

Amiri Baraka and Saul Williams

In yet more evidence of God fulfilling dreams that you didn’t even know you had, last night saw the realisation of a latent desire to be in the company of great men who have contributed significantly to our world and our lives today. 

Last night I had the privilege to spend time with legendary poet, playwright and activist, Amiri Baraka formerly known as LeRoi Jones. 

I was honoured to be able to see Baraka perform with legend-in-the-making Saul Williams at the Black Power of Speech event at KAAI Theater as part of the brilliant Spoken World Festival. I even dared to hope that I may be able to get my book signed, which would have been good enough. Watching Baraka, age 77, interacting with Williams, 39, was a lesson in contemporary black history and intergenerational dialogue and taught us all just how much we can learn from our elders and wisers. 

To be able to sit down with the great man over a beer (his) and in the collected good company of old friends and a new one was an education and a privilege. Baraka spoke to us about his life and times and expanded on some of the topics he’d raised in his performance and during his conversation with Williams and Flemish journalist, Frank Albers.

He spoke about how he was kicked out of the US Air Force and thrown in prison for one of his poems; about how he and African-Americans in the civil rights era looked up to African leaders back in the day but now there’s no one left to look up to; and about how African-Americans need to learn to be more sophisticated in their critiques of the first black president (although he's not feeling Tavis Smiley and Cornel West at all!). 

He told us how, in the Sixties, he empowered his New York community by sending out buses loaded with books, art and music to make culture accessible and engender pride in culture; his experiences of speaking his truth around the world and performing his poetry to diverse and, on rare occasions, hostile audiences; and his run-ins with the establishment even to this day.It was a revelation and a pleasure and we talked long in to the night, eventually leaving the theatre at just after one in the morning. The show officially finished at ten forty-five. 

I’m often asked why I don’t go into politics given that the political interests me. My reply is always that I’d like to contribute to changing the world and engaging in the political discourse in ways that are more natural to me. Last night, Baraka and Williams reinforced for me that my way is through words, written and spoken. Not that I was in any doubt but they served as a timely and powerful reminder. The event also reminded me - us - that living in Brussels has its benefits. The opportunity to get close to renowned international artists is definitely one of its lesser known advantages.

I thank God for the opportunity to engage in conversation with someone who has lived a life and did something with potent it and I pray that I take from this encounter the lesson I was meant to take. I pray that there are many more opportunities to learn from the wisdom of elders.

Read Somebody Blew Up America, the poem that got Baraka fired from his Poet Laureate position in New Jersey after 9/11.

Africa rising: The hopeful continent

From this week's Economist:

THE shops are stacked six feet high with goods, the streets outside are jammed with customers and salespeople are sweating profusely under the onslaught. But this is not a high street during the Christmas-shopping season in the rich world. It is the Onitsha market in southern Nigeria, every day of the year. Many call it the world’s biggest. Up to 3m people go there daily to buy rice and soap, computers and construction equipment. It is a hub for traders from the Gulf of Guinea, a region blighted by corruption, piracy, poverty and disease but also home to millions of highly motivated entrepreneurs and increasingly prosperous consumers.

Over the past decade six of the world’s ten fastest-growing countries were African. In eight of the past ten years, Africa has grown faster than East Asia, including Japan. Even allowing for the knock-on effect of the northern hemisphere’s slowdown, the IMF expects Africa to grow by 6% this year and nearly 6% in 2012, about the same as Asia.

The commodities boom is partly responsible. In 2000-08 around a quarter of Africa’s growth came from higher revenues from natural resources. Favourable demography is another cause. With fertility rates crashing in Asia and Latin America, half of the increase in population over the next 40 years will be in Africa. But the growth also has a lot to do with the manufacturing and service economies that African countries are beginning to develop. The big question is whether Africa can keep that up if demand for commodities drops.

Read more...

Where are our Walker Evans?

Much has been written over the last few months about the lack of writers documenting the human impact of the financial crisis. The names most often brought out in these debates are Steinbeck and Orwell, two towering figures in the literary-documentary tradition against which no writers today justifiably compare.

But it occurred to me while walking around the Jeff Wall retrospective at the BOZAR in Brussels that, not only is it legitimate to question the dearth of literary chroniclers, we might also pause to consider the absence of photographers capturing the essence of the new great depression. Where are our Walker Evans? Where are our Cartier-Bressons?

The argument could be made, as it has about writers, that in the midst of the worst financial crisis in a generation, people don’t want to read, or see, their suffering reflected in their entertainment. The purpose, they argue, of literature and film and any other of the arts, is to take the consumer into the realms of fantasy not force them to wallow, to live, in their reality. This is a one-dimensional analysis. Surely, the job of an artist is to capture reality as well as help create it? And if, as is often said, the media set the agenda, then surely our writers and photographers are in a unique position to document the social and economic decline at the human level and give voice, shape and form to the suffering.

While many striking images have come out of Detroit, and there have been inevitable accusations of 'poverty porn', the new voyeurism, it may only be years from now that we come to rue the consequences of the suffering we chose to ignore.

Giving help and hope to children in need

From The Courier, Sept 2011: Safeguarding the rights of Ghanaian children is the preoccupation of Afrikids, a unique British charity which aims to put itself out of business through the development of sustainable enterprises.

Georgie Fienberg and Afrikids Ghana director, Nich Kumah

When Georgie Fienberg visited Ghana on a gap year fifteen years ago, she couldn’t have known the impact it would have on the rest of her life. Not just hers, but those of thousands of children in northern Ghana whose lives she would touch through the work of the charity she would create. Now, fifteen years later, Afrikids is a salvation for many young people who would otherwise be living without hope.

In 2001, Fienberg started Afrikids, a child rights organisation based in Ghana’s Upper East region. Inspired by the resourcefulness of those she met while travelling around the country, she felt compelled to do something. Contrary to the images shown on television of helpless natives, Fienberg found a creative and determined people who were making the best out of difficult circumstances.

Rather than go in and tell them how to do things, Fienberg worked with local people to help them improve on what they were already doing. In the process, she created an organisation which now employs 150 staff in Ghana with just a small, supporting team of four in London.

What distinguishes Afrikids from other development charities is its approach. It works to solve the root causes of children's problems, by improving community support services and by providing access to basic education and primary health care. “Our mission has always centred on children,” says Andy Thornton, Director of Afrikids UK. “We recognise that, in order to change the lives of children, you have to work with all of the surrounding factors. So we work very inclusively and holistically.”

Read more...

Beautiful Thing: Inside the Secret World of Bombay's Dance Bars

Beautiful Thing: Inside the Secret World of Bombay's Dance Bars by Sonia Faleiro

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is a wonderfully engaging and elegantly written book that tells the story of Leela, a teenage bar dancer in Mumbai’s seedy, barely-concealed underworld of dance bars and prostitution.


I forgot that I was reading a work of non-fiction. The author has so skilfully crafted the story and the characters that you feel you know Leela intimately from the very first page. Later characters like Priya and the cleverly constructed Apsara are also brilliantly drawn.


Although the book covers a fairly short time span and is relatively short in length, this adds to the pace of the narrative, which was gripping throughout. Beautiful Thing is a page turner. The twist in the tale in Apsara’s story, in particular, was unexpected genius and the somewhat sudden and frustrating ending left me wanting more. If ever Faleiro was to produce a sequel I’d be eager to read it. Leela is a character that stays with you long after the final page. There are many questions that remain unanswered, many fears for Leela that remain unassuaged.

Faleiro is subtle in her revelation of the prejudices that exist within the world of the dancers themselves. While it would be easy to focus on the obvious injustices the dancers face in the outside world, Faleiro succeeds in highlighting the bigotries that consume Leela and her cohorts, revealing a moral hierarchy within an immoral world.

My one criticism about the book would be the use of long strings of Hindi, which had the tendency to disrupt the flow of the narrative rather than add to it. But this is minor. Faleiro has created an endearingly solid work that was five years in the making and is as beautiful as its title implies. Beautiful Thing is a sensitive, often shocking and moving insight into a world that most wouldn’t want to be a part of but one which we’re hooked on discovering more about, however uncomfortable it is. That’s the writer’s ultimate talent in producing this gem of a book.

View all my reviews

Goodreads review of Siddhartha Deb's latest book

The Beautiful and the Damned: Life in the New India by Siddhartha Deb

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


An intriguing journey through the India you don't see in the Incredible India mass tourism marketing. Deb goes behind the veneer of life in the New India and lays bare the contradictions that exist between the image and the reality. Told through the lives of five main characters, these well-researched and well-told stories together make up a narrative says more about 21st century India than anything I've read to date and in such a subtle and darkly comic way. Deftly constructed and thoroughly engaging, Siddhartha Deb's first foray into long form non-fiction is highly recommended.



View all my reviews

From SiP: Starkey doesn't think imitation is the finest form of flattery

Historian David Starkey looking very much like...?

From Stupidity is Painless:

Starkey and his peers live in a segregated world. A collective culture with people bound by economic circumstance where race once used to divide, is confusing to him. Whether you call his views racist or dismiss them asmerely  a ‘senior moment’, you have to call them plain ignorant and wrong.

 Read more.

An anthem for our times

In these times of global social and political unrest, here's a little gem of a tune to soothe fraught minds.

The fallout: Michael Gove and Harriet Harman sparring on Newsnight

Classic!

The Repatriate Generation

From Time magazine.

By Vivienne Walt

The oil-rich African nation of Chad has rampant corruption, unclean water, few tarred roads and patchy electricity. It ranks as the world's second most dysfunctional country, after Somalia, according to the 2011 Failed States Index of the Washington-based nonprofit Fund for Peace. In short, Chad seems a nightmare location for business — unless, that is, you are Papa Madiaw Ndiaye, 45, or Patrice Backer, 44, of Advanced Finance & Investment Group, a private-equity fund-management company in Dakar, Senegal, that has so far invested about $72 million in African financial institutions, agriculture and mining. Ndiaye, the fund's CEO and founder, and Backer, the chief operating officer, have been plotting how to get rich ever since they became best friends as freshmen at Harvard University and worked together at JPMorgan. Decades later, their most lucrative prospect last year was a bank in Chad. "It's like low-hanging fruit," says Ndiaye, describing the investment climate in Africa. "There is no competition. If you know what you're doing, it is a bonanza." 

Such bonanzas — opportunities in troubled places with huge needs — are increasingly being sought out by a fast-growing group: Africans who have returned home after years of living, working and studying in the West. Though still a small subculture, African executives who have abandoned high-flying careers on Wall Street, in the City of London and in other financial hubs are becoming a force across the continent, their impact far outstripping their numbers. By moving home, they and others are bucking the trend of generations of Africans who headed west in search of brighter prospects, better education and decent jobs — and stayed abroad for good. Millions of African families have been kept afloat for decades by remittances from relatives working abroad as everything from street cleaners to physicians. Now with economic prospects and, in some cases, political stability improving in Africa while both are declining in the West, some of those relatives have concluded they are better off back home. "There is a momentum among young, upwardly mobile people to come home," says Rolake Akinola, a Nigerian business analyst with years of work experience in London. "We call ourselves the Repatriate Generation." 

The generation is a product of two colliding forces. The first is the global economic crisis of 2008, which resulted in millions of lost jobs in the U.S. and Europe and dampened employment prospects even for the best and the brightest. The other is the rocketing value of commodities, many of which are found in Africa. This has drawn new investment to the continent and pushed up growth. The upturn has been helped by deregulation in several countries, which has opened new industries to private investment, and also negotiations to end violent conflicts in places like Liberia and Rwanda. A report last year by McKinsey & Co. found that Africa's annual growth rate averaged 4.9% from 2000 to 2008 — more than twice the pace in the 1980s and '90s — and was likely to continue for some time as its middle class grows. Consumer spending on the continent could reach $1.4 trillion by 2020, the report claims. "If recent trends continue, Africa will play an increasingly important role in the global economy," it notes. 

Read more here.

Riots, racism and reporting: The Katrina Comparison

The leading article in yesterday’s Independent claimed that the English riots are Britain’s ‘Katrina moment.’ Others have drawn the comparison too. The media’s desperately trying to make sense of these unprecedented events. But having thought about it, I’ve come to the conclusion that the analogy to Katrina is deeply offensive to the people of New Orleans.

While I take the article’s point in terms of the potential impact of the riots, the comparing of the aftermath of a wholly natural disaster that was a life-and-death situation to that of what amounts to no more than common criminality and opportunism is unfortunate.

If there’s any comparison to be made to the aftermath of Katrina, it’s in the way in which the media reported both events. 

Just as displaced and marooned New Orleans blacks desperate for food were deemed ‘looters’ while whites were simply ‘foragers’, so too the English Defence League, racist thugs, were referred to as ‘groups protecting their communities’ without any analysis of their motivations. 

The BBC interview with Darcus Howe, in which the presenter was hell bent on painting the distinguished, veteran broadcaster as some kind of rude boy apologist for criminal disorder, is also a case in point.BBC Radio 5 Live didn’t cover itself in glory either. The tone of The Victoria Derbyshire Show, which went out live from Tottenham yesterday, was wholly questionable and revealed the presenter’s clear bias about who was to blame and why.

To their credit, those media you would expect to take this kind of line haven’t done as badly in their own reporting.

The Daily Mail and The Sun have sought to highlight the diversity of those involved in the criminality, across race, class and gender. Both papers have focussed on societal moral decay rather than pointing the finger at specific communities.

The McPherson Inquiry following the murder of Stephen Lawrence highlighted the extent of British institutional racism. At the time of its publication, I wrote an article for the British Journalism Review which argued that the media, as much as any other institution, needed to review its employment practices and its lack of diversity.

This week, it’s again been pointed out that the only time we see black people on British TV (such as on Newsnight and other news and current affairs programmes) is when something like this happens. Indeed. The media plays a large role in dictating how we see things. Until they make a concerted effort to balance the scales of representation – behind the scenes and in their overall output – we’ll still be talking about ten years’ from now, just as we are about the missed opportunities of the McPherson report.

Click below to watch the Darcus Howe stitch-up.

Why can't we face the famine?

Oh, what the starving masses of East Africa would give to trade their life-or-death existences for those with bigger problems, like not having the latest trainers, mobile phones or laptops to pose with! You get me doh! In the midst of the madness in England’s cities, let’s not forget that people with eminently more critical problems are on the brink of starvation. 

Aid agencies have been saying for weeks that international governments have not been forthcoming with the much-needed assistance to alleviate the suffering of millions in Kenya. While they’re happy to stump up the money for the markets, as we’ve seen time and again in the last two years, when it comes to the people who are so often the victims of the market it’s a completely different story. 

Though the anguish of the people in the aid camps is due, in large part, to war and corruption, that doesn’t let the West off the hook. It’s rarely the fault of the people at the bottom that countries without governments or those with fraudulent leaders are where they are. The worst drought the region has experienced in 60 years has the potential to claim the lives of 13 million, two million of whom are children, according to reports. Thirty thousand have already starved to death.

Events of the last few days, if not months, have shown that governments, like those they purport to govern can’t always be trusted to do the right thing. Individuals, and communities of individuals, need to step up to the plate and take ownership of these causes that, in the midst of a global recession, are likely to be met with much resistance. That doesn’t make them any less worthy.

Unfortunately, many people don’t like to feel that they’re giving, especially to causes they have no natural affinity with. They’ll happily buy a charity single featuring their favourite artists without sparing a thought for the real reason they’re being asked to part with their cash. But that doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason people part with their cash, it’s the cash that counts. We can all take inspiration from the 11-year-old boy from Ghana who’s determined to raise an ambitious $13 million for famine victims in his school holidays and has so far raised a laudable £300. Compare Andrew Andasi to another 11-year-old who appeared in a London court this morning on riot burglary charges and it really is a telling story.

We need to come up with creative ways to raise funds for those in need, whether they’re our next door neighbours, as in the case of the donations that have been made to those displaced in English riot areas, or whether they’re further away. I don’t have the answers but the debate is necessary. That being the case, all contributions in the form of ideas are welcome. Actual donations can be made here.

Cry, the beloved country: Why London's burning

What was Allied Carpets, a georgraphic landmark in Tottenham, destroyed

I can't tell you how it feels to watch London implode from the distance (and sanctuary) of abroad. Not only my hometown but my home boroughs have been destroyed by the mindless thuggery initially fuelled by legitimate concerns. My daily London life stretches from Enfield in the north through Tottenham to Hackney and Tower Hamlets in the east. All have been the scene of senseless, destructive violence and looting.

But what I can tell you is that it’s been both interesting and sickening to watch how the news of the riots has been reported abroad, and how it’s been presented as a race war of unruly black youths – the implication being ‘immigrant’ youths – against the British authorities.

What is true is that there’s a real problem with urban youth. And ‘urban’ isn’t being used as a euphemism for ‘black’ as is so often the case. Inner city youths today have extremely limited ambitions. There’s an undeniable culture of low aspiration. Their whole world consists of the boundaries of their borough and, perhaps, slightly beyond. And, unfortunately, the opportunities that exist within that borough are often few and far between. So, they retreat into the community, speak in tongues using a bastardised street language that won’t help them get a job and withdraw into a world in which the only rule of law is that of the streets. They’ve taken the worst from rap music, upon which much blame has (somewhat rightly) been heaped, while ignoring the message that rappers always aspired to transcend their circumstances through their music not stay in them. Add to this the chasm that exists between the politicians and the people and you have an incendiary situation, the flames of which will be fanned indefinitely if serious measures to extinguish them aren’t taken.

The political divide

People don't trust politicians. And no one has trusted this Coalition since it was hastily cobbled together just over a year ago. Three days of rioting highlight what’s long been obvious. MPs are nowhere to be seen in the darkness of night but are all over the place when the illumination of flashbulbs and television cameras appear: holding brooms aloft in Clapham to be seen to lead the clean-up charge, showing solidarity with the police whose salaries and numbers they’re irrationally cutting and fronting press conferences where more questions are asked than are ever answered. Outside of these photo opps, these politicians are invisible in the communities they’re supposed to be serving.

When I was growing up, our local MP, Rhodes Boyson, a Conservative (Brent North), knew every family on our street by name. We’d regularly see him in the local community (not just at election time) and he’d stop and greet us and chat and it was all very cordial and genuine. Even the neighbouring MPs - at the time Ken Livingstone (Brent East) and Paul Boateng (Brent South) - were always around, on the ground, highly visible and ready to talk to the people they represented.

But when was the last time Boris Johnson, David Cameron or Theresa May was seen walking the streets of Tottenham, talking to people and listening to their opinions, gauging their concerns?

This week, I heard that a friend was on the train with David Lammy, the MP for Tottenham. She asked him to talk to a young man she was mentoring, who was also on the train and slightly in awe of the MP. She said he declined.

The BBC reported a Hackney resident as saying: "When you've got bankers taking their bonuses and MP's taking money off people like me for their moats, and their chateaus and their castles, this is the result." This is no excuse for criminal behaviour. But the gulf between politicians and the people has become almost unbreachable. 

They just don’t get it

Hearing politicians pontificating on TV saying that parents should know where their kids are and get them off the street shows just how out of touch they are. The parents already know where the kids are because they're looting the city with their kids. The parents are part of the problem, not the immediate solution. Worklessness is endemic in parts of London. Generational joblessness has been bequeathed from father to son and mother to daughter. By calling on parents to get their kids off the streets reveals massive ignorance on the politicians’ part.

A classic example of the lax parenting that exists in some communities is this: One day, while walking through Edmonton, a young (white) mother was out with her two infant children, one in a pram and the other, a toddler, walking beside her. Out of nowhere, this woman launched into a foul-mouthed tirade against the elder child saying: ‘Come here you f*&!ng c@nt. I told you to stay near me, you b@st@rd!’ Her son was no more than four years old. What hope for that child?

The failure of regeneration

Millions of pounds have been poured into regenerating poor communities in the hope that economic investment will produce a human capital return. But when the majority of the investment is in the form of Bettfreds, Ladbrokes and knock-off KFC chicken-and-chip shops the prospects for urban renewal aren’t quite as good as the multimillion budgets and fancy architectural designs make out. Since leaving Edmonton twelve months ago, I’ve noticed over time the complete decimation of the high street. Where once shops competed for business, they now sit empty. And instead of using the vacant space for community projects at a time when libraries across the borough are being shut down, the empty shops serve to remind the community that they’re not worth investing in. When even the pound shops won’t come, you know you that the powers-that-be see people like you as ten-a-penny, worthless.

The class war

This from my friend Athena in relation to the audio of young female rioters boasting about their criminal activities:

I think there is an anti-intellectualism movement in the working class youth of today and this audio is an example of it. Rather than have aspirations to improve oneself through education or work, they aspire to destroy others and bring others to their level. It’s a combination of entitlement and jealousy. There is no connection between work ethic and success - they believe everyone has inherited wealth, rather than worked for it. It's probably New Labour’s fault. Bad schooling, lack of discipline, lowering of academic expectations, materialism etc.

Also, imagine the parents of these girls and what they must have learnt from them. The parents are probably giving them a negative message e.g. they think they're poor because of society, and not because of a lack of discipline/education/manners/class etc. So rather than teaching them to have ambition, they say "this is your lot, live with it". So the kids riot because they think they have nothing to lose.

I would say these girls are quite typical of low income youth in this country. So many of these kids don't have life/work skills by the time they are 18 they are worthless to society, so society is worthless to them.

A woman leaps from a burning building into the arms of police officers in Surrey Street, Croydon. Photograph: Amy Weston/WENN.com

Ed said it best

On a visit to Peckham, Labour leader Ed Miliband said what the government is afraid to admit. "The issue of deeper underlying causes of some of the activity that we have seen, of why people indulge in this criminal behaviour, is something that, of course, needs to be looked at," he says. "We need to look at issues of parenting, issues of aspiration, issues of prospects for people, but there can never be any excuse for the kinds of things we have seen."

There is no excuse for the wanton violence on the streets of the great city that is London, my home. But politicians must recognise their role in creating the conditions for mayhem if not the mayhem itself. It’s not just the cuts. It’s the rhetoric. Multiculturalism hasn't failed. This is nothing to do with multiculturalism and everything to do with opportunistic criminality and class. To deny that would be to deny the fundamental facts at work. And that, too, would be criminal.

Watch the clip below for a more eloquent voice of reason.

Faster than the Eurostar: London to Brussels direct

Word on the street

This appeared overnight and was spotted and photographed by my eagle-eyed colleague this morning on the streets of Brussels, 'the capital of Europe.'

A bright idea from a Bellray

The wonderful Bellrays

Justin, the really cool guitarist from the California band The Bellrays, came up with this great suggestion yesterday over a delicious dinner home cooked by our very own dynamic diva, Dorrie D.

As a voracious reader who’s on the road a lot, Justin’s become a big fan of the Kindle (or, rather, Barnes and Noble’s version of the Kindle, the NOOK). He told me that the Los Angeles Public Library, of which he’s a member, loans books digitally just as they do physically. The books are downloaded onto your device and are available to read for a specified period, say, three weeks, after which time the book becomes inaccessible from your reader. Presumably, you can renew the books just as you would in the real world.

I’ve been thinking about how I can incorporate new forms of publishing, e.g. e-books and digital devices into the library and this is a great idea. Users will also be able to borrow books digitally therefore being allowed to take them off the premises (dependent, of course, on them having a digital device of their own in the first place). On a side note, I’m currently considering options for bulk purchase and distribution with partners. All ideas welcome but thanks, Justin, for this one.

Check out The Bellrays (motto: Soul is the teacher, Punk is the preacher) at www.thebellrays.com.

Dinner with new friends

It’s been almost a year since I arrived in Brussels and how time has flown! In the last twelve months I’ve met many interesting and creative people from all over the world, the kind of people it’s been a pleasure to learn from and to know. They’ve all been generously encouraging and personally inspiring in their individual ways.

Last night, I was lucky enough to be in the company of such a group of people thanks to my new friends, Lies and Sulaiman, who hosted a lovely dinner party with a creative, engaging, caring collective: Cleve, Lee, Anne and Tim, Omar and, of course, Tamara, who introduced me to Lies and Sulaiman in the first place.

At several points in the evening, the discussion turned to ‘my’ library idea. During the course of numerous conversations, the assembled intellects pointed out the following:

• Reading is a form of escapism.
  I recently interviewed Andy Thornton, Director of AfriKids UK. He told me that people, in their generosity if not in their wisdom, would donate toilets to villages in Ghana where there was no plumbing. And yesterday when I remarked that people in the north were too poor to worry about reading books Cleve pointed out that that wasn’t necessarily the case, that reading can often be a form of escapism for those living a harsh reality. Later on, Sulaiman told me that when he was living in a refugee camp as a child, he and his brother would voraciously read copies of month-old newspapers to stay in touch with the world and maintain their knowledge but also to escape into other worlds. Moral of the story: Never underestimate the importance of books and reading to anyone and never underestimate the value of knowledge. Books (and newspapers / newsmagazines) may age but the knowledge contained within them never dates, even if the world has moved on, the world contained within their pages still has a value.

• Get members to donate books.
  I was telling Lee about my plan to charge for membership to subsidise other/rural branches and the various levels of benefits associated with each membership. He suggested that one way to subsidise membership would be to get people to donate their old books in exchange for a reduced rate. This hadn’t occurred to me before. By offering this incentive, it encourages books to be recycled as well as growing the collection. Or, even better, get people to donate a book in addition to their subscription. Both great ideas!

• Facilitate the move from an aid economy to a knowledge economy.
  Omar, who has spent his life working for the UN and is now retired, said he had two big regrets about African development: the failure of African leadership and the dependence on aid. Omar has a lot of knowledge gained from vast experience of development around the globe. He’s passionate about Africa moving from an aid-dependent economy to a knowledge economy and books, of course, play an important role in this.

• Developing a reading/writing culture.
  At the end of the night, Tamara, my Malawian friend and South London homegirl who’s lived in Nigeria - Lagos, no less - became my Socratic interlocutor. ‘Will people be willing to pay to read books?’ ‘Who will your market be?’ ‘How will it make money?’ ‘What sidelines can you add on?’ All extremely valid questions which need airtight answers in order to firm up the idea. Then she raised my biggest bugbear – the lack of (internationally renowned) Ghanaian authors, especially in comparison to Nigerian authors – Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Ben Okri, Chimanda Ngozi Adichie, E.C. Osundu, Teju Cole, the list goes on… This is, of course, very true. The aim of the library is obviously to encourage and develop a reading culture but, through this, develop a writing culture too. Almost every successful writer is an avid reader. The two go hand-in-hand. As well as a repository of books, the library will also hold writing workshops, host writer events with visiting authors and, over time, develop a publishing arm as an added incentive to encourage budding writers. She pointed me to the wonderful Cassava Republic Press, a Nigerian publishing house whose mission is to change 'the way we think about African fiction'.

‘My library idea’ is now ‘our’ library idea! Thanks to everyone for their generous input. I look forward to many more dinners where ideas are shared and refined in the company of talented, creative and caring people.

In conversation with M K Asante (CNN Inside Africa)

Tumi and the volume - Asinamali

Cool new music straight from South Africa courtesy of A. Neun. Thanks for the tip!

A bibliophile's paradise

This morning, I set out to discover the legendary Brussels second hand bookshop, Pele Mele and, boy, did I discover it. 'Cavernous' doesn't do it justice. High shelves stacked with books of every genre, edition and format with a vast selection in English. Serious fellow bibliophiles with baskets full of classic and contemporary literature.

In my own basket was:

• Aminata Forna, Memory of Love
• Andrea Levy, Small Island
• Zadie Smith, On Beauty
• Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger
• Hisham Matar, In The Country of Men
• Karen Blixen, Out of Africa
• Greg Mortenson, Three Cups of Tea

...all for the paltry sum of just €13! And hardly a cracked spine in sight! I fear a love affair is just beginning...

The beautiful Boston Athenæum

A tale of two lefts

During last night's audience with Nichi Vendola, a completely un-scripted, two-way engagement between the politician and his supporters, I couldn't help feeling dismayed at the contrast between the Italian left and the British left. Yes, the left in Italy has been dismal over the past twenty years, barely able to rise above the chronic in-fighting and ideological divide between the various factions. However, at a time of real crisis, they've seen their opportunity and are doing everything to seize it. Who would have predicted, just six months ago, that Silvio Berlusconi would lose his stranglehold on Milan or suffer a humiliating defeat in three successive referenda? Not many.

By contrast, the British left, supposedly bouyed by the election of a new, young leader less than a year ago, is in uncontrolable freefall. I felt embarassed when asked about the situation in Britain in relation to the left by Italians excited at the prospect of change in their own country. As someone politically non-aligned, I believe that a strong oposition only benefits the democratic system, regardless of which side of the political spectrum that opposition is on. And bearing in mind that the LibCon coalition does represent a change from thirteen years of Labour government, it could be argued that we in Britain have had our evolution, if not revolution, and, for once, are freakishly in line with our European cousins in our swing to the right.

But my nagging feeling of disillusionment was only compounded when I returned home to read on the Twittersphere about Ed Miliband's bizarre performance in a television interview. The video of the interview has since become an internet sensation and added fuel to the fire of those calling for Ed's head. If Ed had nine lives before the infamous interview, now he must surely have at least six fewer.

Yesterday's Guardian boldly predicted that France will turn to the left at next year's elections. That seems  outlandish even by French standards. Assuming the esteemed leader writers at the Guardian are right, though, and given the turn of events in Germany and Italy, in this respect, at least, Britain is lagging behind the rest of Europe. And if things don't change soon, it could take another generation, another Blair, to reignite the spark that the British left has all but lost.

The man who would be PM

The Italian Obama? Nichi Vendola

Last night, in a trendy bar in Brussels’ beautiful Parc Cinquantenaire, three hundred young, professional, Italians crowded into a room, each vying for space. Elbows were sharpened. The atmosphere was electric. You'd think it was an intimate gig by a big rock band. There was a buzz and an energy. There was passion and determination. There was beer and there were burgers but neither was of any interest to this crowd, who’d hurried to the venue after work to secure themselves a prime spot. They were all here to see the man who would be the next prime minister of Italy and they hung on to his every word.

Nichi Vendola has been dubbed ‘the Italian Obama’. His following has been called cult-like and his politics ‘all things to all people’. But for these people here, many of whom left Italy because they saw no future for themselves in their native, he is the best hope they have for a revival of their homeland. A former communist, openly gay and devoutly Catholic, he may seem an extreme choice but, after two decades of Berlusconi, it’s Vendola’s extreme difference that makes him such an attractive proposition to many.

Three topics dominated the agenda: ‘precarious’ jobs, the stability pact and the bankruptcy of the European left. Vendola didn’t have all the answers but he was honest enough to admit it and humble enough to invite free thinking on the issues.

Young Italians, like young Spaniards, young Egyptians and young Tunisians are desperate for change. Who knows? Come 2013 they may finally get it. Fingers crossed.

The good, the exceptional and the downright disastrous: Couleur Cafe

Kooky and credible: the super-talented Janelle Monae

I take it all back. The indifference, the ambivalence, the dismissiveness. All hail Janelle Monae! This girl rocks! Not only does she rock, she does it gracefully, too: artistically, creatively, theatrically, dramatically. Having seen her bring the house down at this year's Couleur Cafe opening night, I'm now a believer, converted by an engaging, consummate performer delivering a stellar show, including her whole band. An hour long set that was a monochrome riot of energy and talent that was matchless on this particular night. I can't wait to see her again in a better setting i.e. where the sound mixers actually work.

Seun Kuti and Egypt 80: taking over from where Fela left off

Seun Kuti played on the same stage as Janelle Monae and gave a good performance. But something was missing. Can't  put my finger on it.  Nothing wrong with it but it didn't compare to his performance at Cargo some years ago, which came on the back of the release of his debut album, the politically potent Many Things. For one thing, he didn't make good use of the stage. You could barely see his dancers, who were hidden away at the back. But that wasn't it. Perhaps it was the lack of connection with the audience or jet-lag, who knows? The highlight of the set, though, was a rendition of a song called Rise, taken from his latest offering, the wonderfully-titled From Africa With Fury. Definitely one to download.

Purveyors of true hip-hop: I Am

The other day I told my multilingual colleague how lucky he was to be able to enjoy music from around the world whereas us monolingual English speakers are confined by laziness to consuming the commercialism that the industry inflicts upon us. What prompted this comment was the Couleur Cafe line-up. I knew a few of the artists but not nearly as many as the non-British seemed to know. And everybody else was raving about seeing one group in particular. Now I know why. I'd never heard of I Am until a few days before the festival and now I'll be joining the masses in singing their praises. I Am delivered a tight hip-hop set that combined a tight, lyrical flow over heavy street beats with consummate professionalism. These guys are veterans and ground breakers on the French rap scene and, though they've been around since the 1990's they haven't lost any of their fire. Unlike these two...

Legends dishing out old rope: Method Man and Redman

Method Man and Redman were supposed to be the highlight of our night. The 10.30pm billing was testament to that. But I'll leave it to my equally bemused friend to sum up their 'performance': 'This is like a parody of a hip-hop show. I've invested my life in this music and they're pissing on my memories.'

Nuff said!

Antwerpen Centraal Station: A magnificent destination

This is hilarious!

Lisboa (June 2011)

Lisboa (June 2011), a set on Flickr.