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Décadence Mandchoue

The memoir of Sir Edmund Trelawney Backhouse, 2nd Bt. (Backhouse /bækˈʌs/, which is appropriate) will be published this week , and a cracking good read it looks, even if it is a load of old cobblers. I wouldn't be so sure though. Reading the review I was reminded of my own time in China; if I published a memoir of life in Guangzhou in the mid-noughties no-one would believe it. I could tell of the divorcée who invited me to move in and offered to sweeten the deal by installing a concubine or two. The girlfriend who came over one night with her 17 year old, uninitiated, eager cousin. The unspeakably depraved practices of Mystic Meg from Hiroshima. T he policewoman who, upon discovering the effects of black resin on the male member, ensured that there was always a ready supply on the bedside table. T he millionaire's daughter who drove me to a nightclu b with one hand on the wheel of the Merc and the other not, at every traffic light her head bobbing down for a quick... As I s

Doha Days (7)

Exam resit week for the employees. The 'excellent' have passed and gone; the 'no-hopers' who cannot pass have also gone; I am left with the middling rump, who can still pass if they get off their Blackberries and do some work. The class is now fragmented, with the students  all  having different modules to get through, which means more work for yours truly in preparing separate materials for them. In the midst of the hurly-burly comes a call from the bank. "Mr. Simon, sir? It's X here from Al Khaliji." "Yes, yes, what do you want?" "Mr. Simon, sir, your new card is ready. Are you free to come to the bank to pick it up? "No, I'm busy. Call me at 1 o'clock." (fawning) "Yes, Mr. Simon, sir." 1pm : "Mr. Simon, sir?" "Yes, I have no time to come to the bank." "Where are you, sir?" I tell him. "So I will come there at 2 o'clock to give you the card. Is that OK for you, Mr. Simo

Levellers and Diggers

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For the land claimers by Gerrard Winstanley You noble Diggers all, stand up now, stand up now, You noble Diggers all, stand up now, The wast land to maintain, seeing Cavaliers by name Your digging does maintain, and persons all defame Stand up now, stand up now.  Your houses they pull down, stand up now, stand up now,  Your houses they pull down, stand up now.  Your houses they pull down to fright your men in town  But the gentry must come down, and the poor shall wear the crown.  Stand up now, Diggers all.  With spades and hoes and plowes, stand up now, stand up now  With spades and hoes and plowes stand up now,  Your freedom to uphold, seeing Cavaliers are bold  To kill you if they could, and rights from you to hold.  Stand up now, Diggers all.  Theire self-will is theire law, stand up now, stand up now,  Theire self-will is theire law, stand up now.  Since tyranny came in they count it now no sin  To make a gaol a gin, to starve poor men therein.  Stand up now, Diggers all

The Swill

The Swill is a journalist, of a sort, best known for stuffing his face on an expense account and writing about it. In a long and unvaried career he has managed to offend the Welsh - "loquacious, dissemblers, immoral liars, stunted, bigoted, dark, ugly, pugnacious little trolls", the English - "a lumpen and louty, coarse, unsubtle, beady-eyed, beefy-bummed herd", the Manx - "hopeless, inbred mouth-breathers known as Bennies" and Clare Balding - "a dyke on a bike".  Our hero has been married twice (once to a Tory MP), shot a baboon whom he wasn't married to and is an alcoholic. Worryingly, he has also sired four children and, like Hitler, is a failed artist. Restaurant reviews don't interest me; restaurant reviewers still less, and in the normal way of things the Swill's vapid meanderings would have passed me by, but when a man who makes a small fortune from modest talent has the cheek to call expats in the Gulf    " parasites a

Stand by your man

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Getting my students off their Blackberries and iphones is a never-ending struggle. I've given them an utterly fascinating exercise on memo-writing and what do you know? Half the ingrates are surreptitiously tapping away, hoping I won't notice. Sometimes I pretend not to, but it amazes me how wedded they are to the wretched things. I have visions of them waking up in a cold sweat at 3am, anxious in case they've missed the latest tweet. Anyway, during a break yesterday I heard an appalling screaming coming from a student's phone. I looked up; naturally it was Abdullah .  "What on earth is that noise?" I said testily. "Nothing, teacher, just a video of a girl." I looked askance. "Surely you're not watching naughty videos again, Abdullah? There's a time and a place you know." He looked chastened. "Oh no, teacher. It's not that. This is a girl being buried alive." "What?" "In Iran," he said helpfully.

Lenin on racism (1919)

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Leopold, the Abjad and Duck and Cover

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I could give you a list of the cognitive associations that led me to choose these three clips, in this order, but I shan't: with thanks to John Wells : and from the 2nd Red Scare :