The weather here is lovely - just what you would hope for September 1st. Town is packed with last-minute Hen-Parties, weddings with vintage Rolls-Royces and dozens of school children with their parents. Foreign tourists are beginning to tail-off, but are still plentiful.
I love the hint of melancholy in September breezes. Trees are beginning to turn and the smell of Autumn drifts in from miles away. Two weeks ago was muck-spreading season and the town was infused with the delightful fragrance of pig shit.
In conditions like these, all sorts of scents and aromas drift up from the street. The underlying one right now is cooking bacon from the deli next door. As people walk past, their perfumes rise up the side of the house and briefly linger at the open window before continuing upward to make way for others. It is possible to identify the source of each by looking at whoever is a short distance up or down the street when you become aware of it.
My sense of smell has returned after about a week of cold, so I am appreciating this a little more than I might have done the week before. You hear of people having corrective surgery for blindness and how they become drunk on colour for days or weeks after their sight has returned. In a very small way, that is what is happening to me today. Like I say, the weather conditions help a lot.
I thought I would take a little break from world events and immerse myself in the here and now by leaving the radio in the kitchen and coming into this room with the wide open window, but H.I. has just come in to tell me that Trump has cut all U.S. humanitarian aid to the Palestinian schools and hospitals.
Today I heard a man say that every year he goes on a camping holiday in France and leaves his phone and any other devices switched off for the duration, also avoiding any T.V. or radio on the campsites. Maybe living in a tent in a crowded field and sharing poor facilities with dozens of cheapskate fathers with reluctant and miserable children is worth it, but I am not so sure.
The US is not the only country in the world. There are others.
ReplyDeleteI know. I just hope that Trump doesn't fulfil his threat to punish those others who refuse to go along with his policies on international aid and embargoes.
DeleteTrump and the Republicans are shaking in their boots at the prospect of the upcoming midterms. There are strong predictions of Democrats sweeping the House and taking it back, and if that happens Trump knows he's looking at impeachment proceedings at the very least, and plenty (more) of his closest people will be indicted in criminal cases. I'm afraid it's going to turn into a national crisis and I dread it, but at least there will finally be some check on Trump's behavior. Stopping humanitarian aid anywhere it's desperately needed is awful, and attempting to punish our allies for not going along with it is worse. I'm not sure we'll ever regain the trust and friendship of our friends around the world after this. :(
DeleteI am sure that once him and his cronies are swept away, the rest of the world will rally around the U.S. The biggest problem is going to be with the far-right, but I am sure that many ordinary Americans who voted for him will see their error, made in desperation. Ironically, 'draining the swamp' will probably be his lasting legacy after he has gone down the drain himself.
DeleteEurope is going through very similar problems by ignoring the problems caused by inaction from the top down, giving the far-right the perfect excuse (if there is such a thing) to attack foreigners and give nazi salutes in German streets.
DeleteYes, we've had a big resurgence of both Neo Nazis and their hillbilly cousins, in the KKK and similar white supremacy groups. I comfort myself with the thought that the most rabid far-right people are a definite minority and they seem bigger than they are because they make so much noise. Many moderate Republicans that I know who quietly held their noses and voted for Trump are, for the most part, saying nothing at all about him. I know there is a small but significant proportion of them that regret voting for him and won't the next time.
DeleteI have a lot of respect for many Republicans. John McCain in particular. How dare creeps like Trump accuse someone like that who has never done anything other than serve his country of being a lesser person for being shot down and tortured in that service? This may sound like I am jumping on a band wagon because of McCain's funeral today, but Trump was playing fucking golf during the proceedings, even when G.W. Bush was in attendance. Trump disgusts me, but I am sure you already know that.
DeleteYour "devices" were essentially switched off for a week. It's as if you have camped in a field in France for a week, sans poor facilities, etc. Now you are back. Not so awful a "camping holiday".
ReplyDeleteSome news - like bad smells - cuts through a cold, no matter how heavy.
DeleteI apologize for the stench coming from the current White House. The majority of us hope for better days to come and for him to get his comeuppance. I hope our friends are keeping tabs on the bad actors and the good. We will overcome.
ReplyDeleteI really wanted to keep this a Trump and Brexit free zone today, but I failed. Hey Ho, as they say.
DeleteThere's no such thing as a Trump-free day, I'm afraid. One day ...
ReplyDeleteHopefully soon, for all our sakes.
DeleteI've just been listening to a Radio debate about Trump's decision. In fact he hasn't cut off the money to the Schools and Hospitals; he's cut it off from Hamas. They are a despicable bunch who purloin most of the aid that's given to the poor 'ordinary' people of Palestine, and spend it on armaments. If a way could be found of making sure that the aid gets to where it's intended, I'm sure Trump would be as happy as the rest of us. The UN doesn't help!
ReplyDeleteNo country wants to send money to governments who are hostile to them. Why would they if they thought they were going to spend it on guns to shoot back at them? If Hamas are getting hold of cash from the West, then this is piss-poor administration. The obvious way around this would be to send actual food and medicines to countries with despicable regimes, but in the case of Palestine, none of it would be allowed in. As usual, it is the ordinary people and their children who will suffer the most from this. Hamas has plenty of other backers in the Middle East who will buy guns for them.
DeleteThe whole system of international aid needs to be reformed. Why does Britain send billions to countries which have their own space agencies and rocket programs, and who also have 20% of their own population starving for the want of a bowl of rice? The United Nations - like the E.U. - needs reforming so that the ordinary people benefit from aid programs.
DeleteUNRWA has (had) an annual budget of $1.25 Billion, which should have been spent on the ordinary folk of Palestine. I wonder where it went!
DeleteIf ordinary mail has been rotting in a Jordanian post office for ten years, then I expect you could find warehouses full of basic medicines, etc elsewhere. That is not to say that much money is/has being/been creamed off, but - like I say - blame the administrators. More people than Hamas are benefitting from that money.
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