Wu Wei

Reasons why I can't go back to living in England no 1 (a series)

Branwen and I decided we needed breakfast in the sun before I caught the plane back home. So we headed for Covent Garden and a cafe, but most places were in the shade. Thinking that the Market itself would have more sun we found a cafe with seats there and sat down in the sun.

The manager came up and said we could not sit there, even though they were putting out more tables in that corner. When we asked why, he said "Because of health and safety". Sun stroke at 9.00 in the morning in April? Inconvenience for the waiter to move three feet across from one table to another? When we expressed some incredulity, he repeated his mantra, with a take it or leave it expression. We left it.

Anywhere else in Europe knows that customers want to sit in the sun early in the morning.

Unexpected fallout from troubles in Libya

The Director of LSE (now known as the Libyan School of Economics) has had to resign over accepting funding from Libya.  Not just funding for the school, but personal funding.  What was he thinking of?

No details yet about how Said Gaddafi got his PhD.

Rumours are that he will be replaced by Tony Blair.

Downhill all the way

Khachapuri Index

Bear with me while I make a long explanation of why I am writing this.

Our only  attempt to make khachapuri (Georgian cheese pizza) at Christmas Eve 2009 went badly wrong.  This was partly because for some reason Bee bought brown flour and had to go back and get some white and start again.  There is no way khachapuri could pretend to be healthy food so brown flour is out of the question. The repeat was better but not really authentic.  But that didn't matter as we had the other eleven dishes of the Lithuanian Christmas Eve to get through. 

Since then we have been looking for a better recipe.  One was finally provided by one of my work colleagues on her friend's food blog here, so I whizzed it off to Bee to try.  This time she seems to have been successful in making the simplest type of khachapuri, according to her new blog.  

In order to identify the ones she shows there, I went to my own blog only to find that I have hardly blogged at all about Georgian food.  So I was forced to resort to Wikipedia which managed to identify 8 types of Khachapuri, of which I have only met 4. My favourite is the khachapuri rolled round a skewer and cooked on the barbecue, which is really delicious. 

While on Wikipedia I was reminded of the Khachapuri Index, invented by  the Intenational School of Economics at Tbilisi State University.  Unlike the Economist's Big Mac Index, which compares the price of a Big Mac in different countries as a measure of purchasing power to see whether the exchange rate to the dollar is over- or undervalued, the KI measures the local inflation rate. Over the last six months the khachapuri I usually buy from the bakery opposite my office has gone up from 1.30 GEL to 1.50 GEL a rise of 15%.

As the university says:

Because khachapuri is so popular in Georgia, changes in its price would provide a good picture of inflation in the country. We have, therefore, created the "Khachapuri index" for tracking inflation in Georgia and, in the longer run, exploring the differences in the costs of living in its cities and regions. As opposed to other indices used for calculating inflation, our "basket" includes only those ingredients that are needed to cook one Imeretian khachapuri - flour, cheese, yeast, eggs, and butter. It also includes energy costs - gas and electricity.

Here you can see the index, bang up to date with Jan 2011 figures:

It seems that the price is so volatile. Also it seems the price drops in fasting seasons: Lent, before Whitsun, before Christmas. 

 

 

Non-violent protest actions about the cuts in the UK

Check out the new non-violent direct action forms of protest against cuts in the UK:

Bail in: after the banks had their bail outs and didn't pay much tax,  the result is going to be huge cuts in local services and nurseries.  So the UK Uncut campaign is holding "bail in" sit-ins in local banks, taking them over to set up libraries and childcare facilities on Saturdays see report here by Channel 4 News.

Still Hitler supporters in Lithuania

From the title "Triumph of the Third Reich" and the photos, this book seems to be promoting Hitler.

Depressing to see a book like this on full display in what I always thought of as a respectable book shop  in Vilnius along PIlies, the main tourist street.

It carefully stops at 1942.   It does say Part I but with a title like that, one wouldn't expect Part II.

 

 

 

Tweetdeck support (lack of)

I had been operating fine with Tweetdeck, for about six months, with Facebook and LinkedIn columns.

Then I noticed some columns were not updating properly.

After checking on their website and reinstalling, including the Adobe Air patch, Tweetdeck wouldn't load at all.

I sent a support ticket asking for help.

In the meantime I decided to try Seesmic, and got on fine.  Forgot all about Tweetdeck until I saw a Tweet from them.

When I read the answer to my problem, there was no answer. They had abolished support tickets.  Too many required, huh?  Now you can only communicate with Tweetdeck using twitter if you want support.

Then Tweetdeck told me to change my browser to Chrome and use Tweetdeck there.  Why should I change my browser just to use Tweetdeck?  Seems a lot easier to stick with Seesmic. 

When I decided (politely) to DM them that I didn't think much of their attitude, it seems I couldn't DM because they weren't following me.

So tough luck Tweetdeck, my complaints will have to be public.

Putin the consumers' champion?

Slightly different New Year messages from Putin and Medvedev, with Putin telling airport staff not to take a holiday and the usual stuff from Medvedev.

Can we hope to see more of Putin the consumers' champion in 2011? Or was someone he knew stuck waiting for a flight?  The cronies can't all have private jets can they?

But did anyone take any notice of Putin? 

Just another load of reasons for hating Citibank

It's bad enough to lose your debit card and have to cancel it.

But Citibank then makes it impossible for you to log onto your bank account and see if anyone has stolen money from your account.  It also makes it impossible for you to pay any bills.  What's more they do not tell you this, merely putting up some error message which makes you believe that Citibank somehow has decided to prevent access to its website over Christmas for everybody.  Of course this is unlikely but by now I fail to be surprised by anything related to Citibank and bad service.

Not only is this bad enough news, but Citibank will not send you your card by airmail or courier, no matter how dire the emergency. They also will not help you get emergency cash, but think it is helpful to repeat ad infinitum that you should go to a Citibank branch in your country, even when they do not know where you are, and imagine that Citibank branches are scattered all over the world.

Of course with service like this, it is not surprising that there are few branches of Citibank in other countries. 

Recommendations for a better bank please, so I can implement a long standing New Year's Resolution?

 

 

 

Gatwick chaos

I can understand why flights can be delayed by snow, but why is there no heating at Gatwick? 

And why does the website not update properly so you can find out what's going on?  It seems to have lost all interest in providing live flight information.

Surely Gatwick should be prepared for flight disruptions by now.  I can't believe in an excuse along the lines of "wrong sort of snow on the internet" 

Bee complaining of kettling at the airport now.  With Gatwick staff going round with handwritten placards (?).

Thank God AirBaltic send text messages otherwise she wouldn't know anything.

British justice

Just as Assange's release was announced as breaking news on BBC World, someone decided to let off 5 mins of fireworks just below me by the river.

A good thought, of course it must have been coincidence, but well done that Lithuanian.

It's interesting that there is so much faith expressed in the British justice system, just at the time when students are busy complaining at the policing of their demonstrations.

It seems to me that the police have lost their institutional memory of how British demonstrations work, just as recent students have never done much demonstrating. 

On the first demo outside the Tory party HQ, they got a sudden shock and have overreacted since.  Kettling seems such an infringement of civil liberties when we have hardly got to the petrol bomb or even brick throwing stage.  Of course there was some violence, there always was, and the police should know who causes it and round them up out of the way.  Or are they scared to do that?

Instead they corral people for hours in the cold, without real reason, so that people become angry and want to get out.  Being kept against your will in a kettle is not much different from being arrested.

Stories of police photographing people as they were released show that the police are really over reacting.  And there are stories of ripping of their identification number so they can't be identified.

These stories come from what Bee saw herself so I am inclined to believe them.