When I read about the violence and killing in Kenya, I feel sad and confused. How can people do this to one another? I feel the same when I read about Congo and Sierra Leone. The scale and viciousness is incomprehensible to me, a Canadian, raised to believe in the goodness of my fellow humans and hope for a better world.

What really strikes me is this: That the killing is not with rifles or bombs or anonymous landmines. This is hand-to-hand combat, stabbings and burnings and pummelling. In this case, you see the whites of your enemy’s eyes, but also smell his sweat, perhaps get your hand moistened by his tears, you feel the warmth of his body and his blood. This killing requires ruthlessness, anger and conviction. There is hatred here, true hatred.

I notice that the crowds as usual are men. Men fighting men. Men killing men. Men killing women and men killing children. I cannot say that no women are involved - perhaps there are a few mothers who’ve left their children in the care of relatives to charge out into the streets and attack their neightbours. But I somehow doubt it. The BBC reports:

…hundreds of men from Kikuyu and Luo sides are being kept apart by only a handful of police officers, who are firing live rounds into the air.

I heard a caller on World Have Your Say describe the problems of youth violence as a problem of boys, of people suffering from testosterone poisoning. Is half of Kenya suffering from bad elections or testosterone poisoning?

Love this article: http://tinyurl.com/28pta9. It relates nicely to what I blogged at Sustainable Spain a few weeks back.

Exceprt:

Growing meat (it

That’s the essential message from Louis Bromfield, the author of the book I’ve recently finished reading, “The Rains Came” (1937). It was made into a movie and is billed as a sweeping romance, but I actually found it very existential in it’s nature, rather than romantic. There is lust and romantic attachment and even love, but it’s not a love story, that’s for sure. Half the cast dies!

It’s examination of the twists and turns of thought and the negativity and feeling of being lost in a ocean of misery without recourse is really quite profound. The main male character, Tom Ransome, is depressed, drinking secretly and has run away from the society that bred him, England. The various castes and races of Indians are sympathetically portrayed, but Hinduism, with it’s preponderance towards contemplation and inaction does not get off lightly. In fact, there seems almost to be a campaign to chuck out the terrifying weight of the past and surge forth into a new, modern India. Metaphorically, the Sikh Colonel Moti brings the pestilence uder control by setting fire to the whole city, leaving only the western-designed buildings standing.

The happiest people in the novel are the missionaries, the Smileys and Aunt Phoebe. They are too busy to be sad, too occupied to contemplate. The unhappiest and most wanton are Ransome and Lord and Lady Heston, the products of the decadent European society who have no need to work and no motivation to do anything other than drink, take drugs, fuck and then repent. (Hmm…I think I may have met those folk somewhere…)

Transformation comes in the form of human suffering, caring for those in need and selflessness. Happiness in achieved when navel-gazing stops. This message resonates strongly with me because it’s true. The best cure for sadness is to keep busy. Not only does achievement, however modest, bolster self-esteemm but business keeps the mind in check and the body strong. It’s a very Protestant message, but it holds some truth.

The book is available for reading online in the Internet Archive at: http://www.archive.org/details/rainscameanovelo009281mbp

Or how I learned to stop worrying and check my shoes.

This part of Spain is full of dog shit. I fail to understand how it is that people can be so ignorant as to take their pets out on a walk and let them shit on the sidewalk and choose to do nothing about it. It’s not only here - same in every Spanish city I’ve been to: Murcia, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Granada, Cordoba. It’s something in the Spanish national identity, I’ve decided. I think that they’re too proud to bend over and be seen collecting still-warm dog poo with their hand thrust in a plastic bag.

The funny thing is that after a while, the foreigners here - German, Swiss, English - soon begin doing the same. I guess it must seem futile to pick up your daschund’s little fruit when some big Alsatian has just cacked all over the seafront walkway or the children’s play area. When I’m out walking, I watch carefully all the dog walkers hoping, madly hoping, that one day I’ll catch them walking away from their pet’s steaming pile. Then I’ll catch ‘em by the scruff of the neck, rough ‘em up and smear their face in the turd. NO, no! No, I don’t contemplate violence, but it sure does get up my nose sometimes.

So this morning, at last, I caught a guy walking away from his dog’s doo doo. The animal had squeezed one out in the shrubbery surrounding the children’s play area near my house and the owner didn’t even look back. I called to him

“Oye, senor. No se puede dejar el perro cagar aqui. Los ninos juegan aqui!”

He was mighty embarrassed. His pale north European face reddened to the roots of his white hair. His reply? “Do you know how difficult it is to pick up the poop in the shrubs?”

Well, actually no, I don’t know how difficult it is because I haven’t CHOSEN TO OWN A FUCKING DOG. Excuse my language, but you get a dog, you’re making a pact to look after it, care for it, feed it, walk it and clean up after it. If it’s hard, get yourself one of those handy garbage picking sticks that the pros use, do what you need to do, but don’t leave it where my foot is going to get near it. We spend thousands on water and sewage treatment, then pet owners leave their festering messes all over the place. Sheesh.

So, then funny thing is that a lady across the road then joins in. The Spanish LOVE a fray and will take any opportunity to raise their voices at one another. She’s lambasting him while on looks a rather retarded neighbour of mine whom I told off for smoking the lift the other week. She hasn’t spoken to me since (do I care?) and probably now thinks that I am one of those people who go around telling everyone to behave and not to do this or to do that. And you know what? I am. After spending most of my life locked up tight in a prison of shyness and not wanting to offend, I now just say what I think. It really is the best way to get the ire out of you. Say it when you feel it, don’t repress it and let it twist and fester. Be calm, be polite, but tell it how you see it.

The Grammys are round the corner and nominated for the Best New Artist are both Feist and Winehouse. That’s Leslie and Amy, two girls who couldn’t be less alike if they tried.

Bone thin and wasted, Amy Winehouse nightly prowls the frigid London streets in singlets and mini-skirts and ballet pumps. Married in haste to Blake Fielder-Civil, junkie, jailbird, she counts Kelly Osbourne among her friends. Famous for cancelling shows or showing up late and wasted, she has been arrested for drugs on tour and now may be ineligible for a US visa, making success there near-impossible. She is regularly photographed with white powder fringing her nostrils and a mad look in her dark eye.

Feist, on the other hand, flicks her fashionable long fringe and bounces from gig to gig across continents positively emanating love for life and for her art. Always appearing stylish and somehow fresh but knowing in photos, she’s rarely in the press for anything but accolades and adoration. Without exception reported as intelligent, witty and just plain nice, Feist comes across as a likeable Canadian chick. And she probably is just that. Oh, with the voice of an angel and a huge knack for catchy riffs and vocal harmonies. I can’t imagine her snorting cocaine, but I can imagine her skinning up a doobie and chilling with her guitar.

Winehouse is stage-trained at the BRIT school for the performing arts, in Croydon, London. Her music is highly derivative, more black than white north-London Jew, and catchy. I must admit that I like her Back to Black album a lot, and liked her a lot when she first appeared all sulky and curvy back in 2004 before I left London. She paints a death mask of black eyeliner and pale foundation on her belle-laide face and is never without a towering beehive of scraggly, frazzled hair. It would be hard to recognise the girl if she covered the sailor tats and sallied forth in a sleek bob and natural makeup. She *is* Amy Winehouse, 24-hours a day. Her performances merit mixed reviews. Sometimes brilliant and other times bumbling, I’m sure that half the frisson of her live appearances in the wolf-like hunger of watching a disaster happen and hoping that it doesn’t teeter off the edge of the known world…just yet.

Feist is a self-trained musician who’s spent more time in collaborations and mate’s projects than on her own solo career. She released a solo album in 1999, but only became known in 2005 with a mixture of original and cover songs. Hangin’ out in the Canadian music scene since she was 16, she forged a strong cadre of musician friendships, many of whom perform on her highly collaborative records. The girl stuck it out and honed her craft and almost certainly lived a lot in the meantime. She shares a flat with Peaches, for heaven’s sake. Her live shows - which I’ve never had the pleasure of knowing - are reported to turn into a giant chorus as she leads her audience in a harmonising sing-along. Hallelujah!

Two artists more different I cannot imagine. I know who I’m rooting for. It’s not that every celebrity is a role model, but the behaviour of some people makes it hard to have faith in human civilisation. The depths to which we’ve sunk, oh lord, are fathomless. Overdoses and divorces and Scientology nudge each other in the gossip rags. Wealth and luxury manifest their opposites as depression and self-abasement. The bleak non-believer of the modern metropolis staggers from pub to club to after-party unconcerned with their liver or their psyche. That’s why examples like Amy Winehouse are not trivial. Her level of self-hatred is probably shared by the high school gunmen, tired serially shagging socialites and thrice-divorced plastic surgeons of this world. We reject the normalising influences of family and faith and end up hating ourselves for our excesses and appetites, all the while reading adverts for ice vodka and pink Champagne and holidays abroad.

We need more people like Feist in our mind’s eye and our public eye. Every time I listen to her music I have an insatiable urge to pick up my guitar and start playing. Her music inspires me, makes me feel happy. Feist deserves to win a Grammy for putting smiles on people’s faces, being polite and nice, for being talented and genuine and with-it. So, Leslie Feist, good luck on your adventure, keep your head and have a great time. I’ll try to make it to your Madrid or Barcelona show this June. Nice one, eh.

The winning photo in the yearly Unicef competition: an 11-year old girl and a 40-year old man in Afghanistan. Cry. http://www.unicef.de/foto/2007/english/index.htm#1preis

By the way, talking to no one and the void out there, I must state for the record that I miss Simone. He has been in Italy this week, buying our little slice of Tuscan olive grove and I miss him so very much. Luz is great company but dah dah daddle daddle is not the most inspiring conversation, even if it is incredibly cute!

Bless the BBC World Service. Like a chatty and intelligent friend, it fills the silence with worthwhile words.

In Spain they celebrate the Three Kings’ Day or Epiphany on January 6th. Children are given presents for “Los Reyes” instead of Christmas, although Santa Claus comes calling to more and more houses in Spain every year. The whole Reyes thing is actually a Franco-ism. He thought it mighty patriotic to NOT celebrate Saint Nick like all those Protestant commercial heathens up in northern Europe and so encouraged the Reyes.

Well, Los Reyes came to our house this year. Knut and Janine and Toby and Julie went home to Germany and gave us their surplus food as well as a lovely little red bucket that’s just perfect for soaking Luz’s clothes in. Then Nacho and Maria-Delia emptied their fridge in preparation for their trip to Thailand and gave us the lot! So, we are stocked full of stuff, have about 3 dozen eggs and are very thankful for the unexpected booty that came our way on the 6th.