If you could watch any movie on the big screen right at this moment, what would it be?
Hitchcocks Rear Window
It's the way in which the whole picture is continually busy and thus the big picture magnifies all the smaller stories that are happening around the main theme.
Brilliant!!....
How many places have you lived in your life?
UK - Ipswich, Colchester, Holyhead, Seaford, Weymouth, Poole, Bournemouth, Luton, Cambridge, Middlesbrough, Chichester, Bognor Regis, Brighton and London
London surburbs as follows - Wandsworth, Camden, Crystal Palace, Kingston and currently Hounslow
Greece - Megalopolis, (Peloponnese)
Australia - Sydney, Brisbane and Byron Bay
New Zealand - Nelson, Christchurch
Brighton and Sydney were my favorite places, they just ROCK!!.....
Brisbane, Bognor Regis, Luton & Hounslow were the worst places, hence why I've decided to move again. One day I hope to live somewhere that is both profitable and a pleasent place to live.
Its official Pluto is no longer a planet, it's a dwarf. On the one hand I thought oh well, its only a name, this revelation will pass us by. But then i thought well hold on a minute, what about all those text books which clearly depict Pluto as a planet.
Now ok, in the days of Galileo we all thought the world was flat, but we all soon adjusted to the idea of it being round. But to be told something was something, that it clearly seemed to be, is not what it is, but something else now. I'm at a loss to concur, clearly Pluto looks like a planet, not that it's easy to see mind, maybe it doesn't exist at all. After al how many people have seen it? I know of no one that's ever seen it. Not that that's a prerequisite for its existence. I rely on others to confirm this. However, even when I analyse the Hubble pictures of Pluto, I'm still considering it to be a wayward cloud.
I might well imagine that people have seen all manner of things they thought to be true, but just weren't. So how does calling Pluto a dwarf reflect its true identity, I'm not sure, does it really matter? After al according to scientists it's the most in-hospitable place in the Solar System, so i don't see humans landing there in the far future, if ever.
In the immutable words of William Shatner, 'Space, the final frontier'. It cast an eerie but exciting glow of possibility for us all, an aeon of adventure and new discovery. But what now? I think our love affair with space has diminished considerably. We are all to often left with that sinking feeling of the impossibility. By that I mean, that we are constrained by the sheer enormity of the task in hand. We just about have the technology to land on the moon, than to go much further. We would require a huge leap in engineering to enable that, which presently doesn't seem to be anywhere on the horizon.
Now I'm no scientist, and hell these possibilities may well be just around the corner. But the current sea of thought is generally a robotic future of space travel. In other words not to dissimilar to what we have been seeing ever since the first Voyager took off. The next generation of manned flights post 2010 will be of almost identical design to that of the Apollo missions, i.e. booster and module (capsule).
Now frankly, where is the excitement in that? Has technology gone in reverse? I doubt it, but the psychology of excitement in these projects has certainly dwindled as a result. The Space Shuttle was seen as a marvel of space engineering. It was a new modern looking craft that inspired greater possibilities than before. Now to go back to a booster and module technology would surely seem to be a backward step, psychologically at least.
Now sure, in reality the Shuttle seemingly achieved a lot less than the Apollo missions. In less, I refer to our expectancy, no doubt it achieved enormous things for the scientific community. Of course this revival of an old technology wont be the same. No doubt these rockets and capsules will be more efficient, responsive and adjustable than their predecessors. But the fact still remains that in general, space technology hasn't changed for almost 40 years. Maybe we expect too much of technology, I think that is true somewhat, indeed we are in an era where we are seeing the limitations of technology. This is why I currently lack enthusiasm for future space projects.
As with computers that are now seeing the limits of silicon chips, we are seeing the limits of rocket technology. We need a new form of energy that can harness far higher speeds than ever imagined. I have no idea where this will come from, no more than my Grandfather knew where nuclear energy came from, when it did. But unless we have a major breakthrough in newer unimaginable technologies I can't see the world jumping up and down for space travel in the near future.
Sure, man landing on Mars will be seen as a great feat of human endeavour, much like Edmund Hillary reaching the peak of Everest under great odds. However the achievement would be purely individual, something that takes us not much further than we already knew. But reaching more faraway planets within our Solar System, albeit merely orbiting around them, would be far more exciting. Having coloured high definition pictures streamed on the Internet live, 24 hours a day. This is where, 'Space the final frontier', begins to emanate once again.....
I wanna do this with my photo Ipod...
But I need help....
TESOL, TEFL whatever they call em. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but I always thought those qualifications was for people who imagined foreign streets were paved with gold. In other words, people would be begging them to work in their schools from Paris to Sumatra....
What I do remember about these cursed certificates was when I lived in a remote town in Greece, when I was 22. My humble job was assistant pasta maker to an aging ex soldier for the communists in the Greek civil war of the 40's. I got more acquainted with his past, as he used to wake up in the night screaming 'PARAKOLA!!', imagining he was still there, the poor sod. Anyway I digressed, but I got a Saturday job with his daughter’s school, teaching kids English. This comprised of me, sharing my then, comic collection with them, so it was hardly intellectual stuff. But I remember being allowed a brief introduction into the TEFL fraternity, in the local large town of Tripoli.
There I was astoled the sheer wonders of TEFL, the places that people have worked.... ‘ooh Vietnam’... cooed one... Oh yes and my cousin worked in Guatemala... 'How exciting', they all said, whilst sporting smug grins while they nodded in approval of one another. Then one girl asks me, 'So where did you get your TEFL?'. Now something my Dad taught me when confronted by a situation of uncertainty. Firstly admit your ignorance calmly, and then express a keen interest in the subject (whilst smiling of course). This I did with vigour too, as the peer pressure was quite high for this new boy on the block. Having explained that I knew nothing about TEFL and possessed nothing but a CSE in money management (grade 2) but was keen to learn more. A deafly silence fell in our little corner of the bar, mouths dropped even. Then a stuttering voice from one of the girls asked, 'so... how did you get the job then?', with eyes that seemed to plead, 'tell me it’s a mistake'. At this point I ordered a round, I could clearly see they needed it. I explained simply, that I had been offered it, whilst working for the owner’s father. She said, 'so you didn’t organise it from England then?', looking even more horrified, no, I said. They asked me these questions twice again, just to make sure they'd got it right. I by this time had finished my beer and quickly ordered another with a distinct feeling of the Spanish inquisition coming on. 'Are you registered with the local municipality?', they asked, no, I said. 'Ahh, you do know that is illegal, don’t you', no, I said, again. By this time I'm feeling that all the positives that should follow a negative, (ie the ignorance preceded by keen interest) were rapidly depleting. I was thinking whiskey now, but couldn’t catch the waiter’s eye. This guy then said, 'Yes, they could fine the school heavily for that', really?, I said, trying a different tact, bad idea, it only emphasised nonchalance. 'Well he can’t get registered, he hasn’t got a TEFL' one guy utters to the girl next to him. Phew I caught the waiter’s eye, 'yes' she says, 'your school is taking a big risk, they can only employ TEFL teachers you know'.
Realising I was cornered here and that they were obviously pissed off that I had got a job, without going through the necessary channels, I tried to make light of it. 'Well its only on Saturdays', I said, 'well OUR friend Richard, (DICK for short, no doubt) he's still looking for work and he has a TEFL'. This was then followed by the most ridiculous statement of all, 'You are depriving people of jobs, who've genuinely worked hard for their TEFL', said one guy with a curled lip, who insisted on drinking bottled Guinness, in a vain attempt at trying to bring a bit of England to his part of Greece.(now even I was dreaming of a good old fashioned English pub quiz) 'Yes', piped another, 'Do you know how much it costs?', well I said, (trying varying tact’s now..... Help!), 'more than this whiskey I guess', trying to humour them, not good, DOH! Even.
Anyway I'm not really sure whether I told them all to 'fuck off and die', as things were bleary by then. I did wake up in bed with a pounding hangover that I will never forget mind.... I try to avoid whiskey at all costs now. I never got invited to any more TEFL frat parties’ mind, so I guess it must have ended on a sour note. Some weeks later my boss comes into class, explaining that she has to take over, as the man from the local municipality was arriving... Hmmm....
So there you have it.... I have had the pleasure of meeting various tosspots that've possessed this qualification, all over the world from time to time, although never quite as awful as that incident. These people clearly thought they could buy themselves a ticket to jobs throughout the world, never having to demean themselves by washing dishes and serving food. They were the most sanctimonious bunch of dickwits I've ever met, with about as much adventure as an ass sat watching Tricia, whilst slurping Nescafe gold blend and smoking 20 Regal....
