Priceless Paintings from W7

Ah, the Jubilee Greenway cycle loop: http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/429490.

We took the train to London’s Waterloo and started by crossing Westminster Bridge, then via the Palace, Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens to Paddington and Little Venice. Lunch on the canal in Maida Vale. Onwards through Regent’s Park to Camden Town, The Angel in Islington, Victoria Park in Hackney, then to the Olympic site. Crossed the river vie Woolwich Ferry, then back along the river to Greenwich, Tower Bridge, Southwark, and back into London.

We had just missed our train, with the next one almost an hour away, so we pushed on, across Waterloo Bridge, through Covent Garden, down Shaftesbury into Piccadilly, through Hyde Park and into Paddington, where trains run every few minutes.

55km (Waterloo to Waterloo), and a very nice trip on a very gorgeous day. Too bad so many people were about, in spite of the World Cup match England : Germany. The tour is more like a steeplechase in large parts, dodging pedestrians and other cyclists, and having to slow down to walking pace or even less.

It’s not perfect for cycling, but it got us all the way into the East, even beyond the Thames Barrier, with sights on many famous and infamous London highlights. Very good!

(Photos are being uploaded as we speak: http://gallery.gauweiler.net/cities/London/Jubilee%20Greenway/)

Out and About cycling, london

Did you know London is on the brink of a cycling revolution?

I didn’t, but according to Transport for London, it’s imminent: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/cycling/15459.aspx. I had heard about the cycle hire scheme (see here for details), and can only hope it doesn’t fall victim to vandals. Too bad the cycling superhighways are up to five years away from completion. We should have introduced those a very long time ago.

(Today’s image should have been a little video. It shows an animation on a big display that we saw somewhere – was it the Canary Wharf Shopping Centre? We took four different pictures, and http://picasion.com/ turned it back into an animation for us.)

Out and About, Thoughts cycling, london

It appears that every local area improvement committee, at least in our area, is ruled by conservative people. I recall that we couldn’t prevent the vote for heritage design in a Hanwell Steering Commitee meeting that we attended some while ago, but the outcome is now visible to everyone, and makes me cringe every time.

Does it make sense to mount brand new street lights that follow a 130 year old design?

Yes, it might, wherever there is similar heritage to protect.

Hanwell, however, is no such place. If anything, Hanwell should display an air of Modernism and a forward-looking attitude.

A clean, elegant, modern design could have done a much better job at improving the looks of Hanwell Broadway. Note that I didn’t even discuss the fact that the chosen light use outdated luminaries technology, and are ill-fitted for modern street lighting control, supervision, and energy management systems. Surely, thinking beyond heritage design would just be asking too much.

Thoughts Ealing, hanwell, london, society

Did you see the now unveiled mascot for the 2012 London Olympics?

Something tells me that this was bound to be a disaster, and guess what? It is.

The paper writes don’t fret. The children love them, but I wonder how much they paid those children. And, shockingly, those designers. Apparently, it’s all got to be a whirlwind mix of 3D rendering software and Teletubbies, rendered into larger-than-life plastic figures (and merchandise).

Maybe I don’t know what makes the 21st century’s children tick, but I thought a mascot ought to be something loveable. I guess that’s not true. I guess the truth is that the mascot ought to be good for merchandise and printing onto goods (within a sponsorship logo).

Anyway, I took a peek, and find one worse than the other. Check out the BBC’s Olympic mascots through the ages, or The Independent’s breakdown of Olympic figure heads. In my opinion, there are two clear winners, ahead of the field by orders of magnitude: 1972’s Waldi (Munich), which is said to have started the whole craze, and 1932’s mascot (Los Angeles), which doesn’t appear to be listed in most lists of historic Olympic mascots.

You’d think they should know by now to ask me first.

Current Affairs, Thoughts london, Olympics;

One of my favourite past times on a Sunday afternoon here in London is city drifting. We’d drive somewhere, more or less anywhere within the city, then walk without destination until the rain starts or the legs hurt.

This past Sunday, we took the train to Paddington, then walked up Edgware  Road to elegant Maida Vale, then along Regent’s Canal through the Zoo and into Camden Lock and the markets, where life is as abundant and as colourful as life can be. Browsing the markets, a drink somewhere, then onwards to Tottenham Court Road, from where the Central Line brought us back home.

A lovely afternoon city walk at any time of the year, but preferably on a Sunday, so that traffic is reduced and Camden Lock Market is open and busy.

Here are some pictures from this past weekend.

Out and About, Thoughts hiking, london

Well, hello there, and welcome to 2010. Two thousand and ten. Who would have thought.

I hope you have all arrived safely, healthy and happy in the new decade. While we enjoyed nice, quiet and stress-free Christmas and New Year celebrations with lots of food, drink, and a few friends, we are now back to normal, like it or not.

Since that involves travelling to California once again, and keeping me busy there for a while, I shall not post until the second half of this month.

Take care, and behave yourselves while I am out. You might as well take a look at some nice new photos taken at the Winter Wonderland fun fair in London’s Hyde Park (click).

Thoughts Christmas, london

We are members and fairly frequent visitors to our favourite, local, and pretty good quality amateur theatre. Every once in a while, however, we venture into town for a professional production. Last weekend, we went to the National Theatre’s Lyttleton Theatre for The Pitmen Painters.

This is a play about the Ashington Group, a group of North England miners, who started to paint and rose to fame in the 1930s. How nice. We are already making plans for a long weekend in Northumberland.

I can’t really say this is the ultimate play to see – it’s good, but doesn’t deserve a place among the top twenty plays of all time.

I can’t really say this was the best acting ever – it was good, but again, not extraordinary.

What made this play so fascinating is that the playwright, Lee Hall, understands the process of discovering art through the process of discovering painting extremely well. I could find myself and my own experience in this matter many times over during the play.

The worst thing was that the play describes a painfully slow process, that took many weeks and months, in little over two hours, with a vast amount of key events and personal development crammed into the first act. Those events had to come all too quickly and in rapid succession within the time permitted for the play; maybe the play should have told a shorter part of the Ashington Group’s story.

A very good evening though. Enjoyable and recommended.

Thoughts london, theatre

One of the many noteworthy aspects of life in London is that people don’t normally greet. Most people avert their eyes and speed up their step as they cross my path –and believe me, I do not look very dangerous,- and they appear to wish to get back into the safe heaven of home or office with the smallest possible interaction with fellow humans.

So, I make a point of greeting people in the street, especially of course those whose path I regularly cross. A middle-aged lady in my neighbourhood now enthusiastically offers greetings, even shouted over long distances when necessary, whenever she spots me. I exchange brief greetings, friendly smiles and friendly waving of arms across the street with several other women, too, and each time, I hope I brought a little smile to someone’s face.

Men are different though. Men hardly greet, at least not in one or more actual words. They grunt a friendly ‘Oh-oh,’ or they make a very minimalistic gesture with hand or head. Some greet by some form of first-to-fist or fist-to-shoulder contact, but that’s not my thing. At any rate, men’s greetings are almost like a secret society’s secret signal, and I like it just because of that minimalistic approach.

I talk to the women, and exchange a knowing look or brief head or arm movement with the men. I just hope that I haven’t given away the best-guarded secret of the secret society of men with this confession.

Thoughts human, london, society

Following a campaign started by a local resident, the town elders have decided that the western part of Ealing needs a skate park, and have made plans to build it not far from us. Apparently, £200,000 are now set aside and consultation is open for a new skate park in Elthorne Park (http://www.westealingskatepark.net/).

You won’t be surprised to hear that those who are against everything (the “Hanwell Community Forum” in this case) also oppose this plan, with a series of the usual arguments. It’s too loud. It’s too remote. It’s too close.

Basically means to say “Yeah, skate park, right, well, if it cannot be avoided… but not in my front garden.”

On the upside, their leaflet doesn’t issue a blanket accusation of expected antisocial or criminal behaviour. Better than similar previous campaigns (by different groups).

I am not sure if a steel and concrete structure is the best possible way to provide young people with a means to bond, relax, grow-up, find purpose in life, but it sure is better than hanging out at the bus stop and smashing a phone booth for fun.

I suggest opponents of this plan should immediately remind themselves they were once young and might have children themselves, or grand-children soon. It’s hard enough growing up in the big city, nobody needs to be repeatedly told that he or she is unwanted on top of it.

Current Affairs, Thoughts Ealing, Ealing council, hanwell, london

In the 2008/09 financial year, Ealing Council has spent less than what they have rightfully earned (through direct and indirect taxes), so they came up with the clever plan:

All eligible households will automatically receive a £50 cash refund in December.

This was announced in the council’s monthly pamphlet for August 2009 [pdf – see page 5]

A popular move for sure, especially in light of future elections. When the time comes, I am sure we’ll hear all about it over and over again.

I call it proof of failure. Failure by neglect:

First, there is a minor failure in that they fail to explain which households are eligible for a payback, which ones aren’t, and why. A good example of transparent government and accounting.

Second, they decide to spend the cost of the administrative overhead for the populist payback scheme, rather than opting for holding back the surplus riches, and asking for smaller council tax contributions next year. Surely this would have been a more cost-efficient way to deal with a surplus?

Third, and most worrying: They must think they have done a perfect job all around the borough, and nothing else needs doing, so that they simply don’t know what to do with the money. There’s a gazillion small and big jobs around the borough, and all they can come up with is a refund? That’s like throwing hands in the air. Jesus. Lord. Almighty.

Although I didn’t vote for the current council (as you probably guessed), they are charged by everyone to spend the tax money wisely and for the better common good of everyone in the borough.

Apparently, they can’t be bothered to do what they were elected to do. I hope most people will see through this expensive populist move and can’t be bothered voting for them again.

Current Affairs, Thoughts Ealing, Ealing council, london

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Delores.

Delores who?

Delores my shepherd…

It wasn’t Delores, nor was it an African Christian missionary. Instead, it was the guy from down the road. And he didn’t tell any knock-knock jokes either:

Do you know about the planning application for the Red Lion, he asks. No, I say. (The Red Lion is a derelict pub at the end of my street). He explains that this is the last day to object a planning application to convert the derelict pub into (his words) “an African church.”

Oh, that’s good news, I say, why would I want to object replacing a derelict pub with a church?

Because, he tells me, we have parking problems here already. There’ll be hundreds of cars every Sunday.

You’d have been proud of me, how I stayed calm and cool, and in the friendliest possible way explained that I’d much rather have car parking problems on a Sunday morning, compared to nightly drug and knife-crime issues (as we used to have with the Red Lion).

I should have also informed him that, even though car parking space can be tight late in the evening, in comparison with most of suburbia, we do not have car parking problems at all.

I welcome “the African church” to my area (and plan on a lie-in Sunday mornings anyway). Some people just have to object anything. Ealing Council doesn’t have a great track record at showing common sense, but I sure hope they dismiss this objection.

Current Affairs Ealing, Ealing council, hanwell, human, london

Dear Lord, give wisdom to the men and women of Ealing Council, for they know not what they are doing.

When they don’t spend their time –and our money- on expensive chest-beating self-advertising campaigns around the borough like big ages, they spend their energy on reverting what was done right by the previous council, as it seems.

The latest ingenious idea is to reduce some of the bus lanes around the borough in order to relief traffic congestion. By that, they do of course mean congestion by cars. (Not a new idea though.)

When bus lanes were extended a few years ago, a route was created to support free and swift flow of busses, and to support a comparatively safe heaven for cyclists. Removing some bus lanes now, or reducing the hours of operation of 24/7 bus lanes to standard peak hours, is a very regrettable step back to the dark ages of individual transport.

If the good lord hears my prayers, surely he’d advise the councillors to spend all the above money, and more, on efforts to reduce individual traffic throughout the borough rather than allowing for even more. Attractive offerings of public transport, and optimum support for alternative means of transport, are the obvious first choices.

Falling back to the petrolhead wisdom of the 1950s might suit a conservative council, but it certainly doesn’t suit a congested 21st town in the 21st century.

Current Affairs, Thoughts Ealing, Ealing council, london, Traffic

Heads must roll in light of the expenses scandal. Absolutely (but only figuratively speaking, of course). Heads must roll for intentionally liberal interpretation of the rules. Heads must roll for dropping all morale standards and intentionally milking the system. Heads must roll for denying first, then paying back some amount of money. Heads must roll for paying back that money and claiming all was well and in perfect order, while making laws with the other hand at the same time for crying out loud.

Heads must also roll for angrily resigning from the cabinet and thinking that’d be the first step to a career re-launch, neatly avoiding tax investigations or, indeed, criminal charges, in the process. Disgusting.

But.

But when I said the heads must roll, I didn’t mean that the head teacher of the Cardinal Wiseman School in Greenford ought to be arrested, charged with expenses fraud, dragged through the mud (full story here). I had asked for different heads.

The headmaster might have hand his hand into the petty cash kitty or not, and he might have fiddled with expenses, or not. That must, and will, all be found out of course. I can’t help thinking scapegoat though.  I sincerely hope he doesn’t end up being one.

There are some more rather interesting people to arrest and release on bail on allegations of expenses fraud. If you can’t find them in Westminster, make sure to check all their first and second homes.

Current Affairs, Thoughts Britain, expenses, london

You know me. I have a soft spot when it comes to workers’ unions. We all owe them tremendous accomplishments regarding work conditions, employment laws, health and safety, and of course also regarding the pay. Without Friedrich Engels and his friends, and the workers unions’ actions over all those years since, I am sure things would be much worse.

However, the RMT going on strike for a 5% pay rise and guarantees of no redundancies, this at times when most people are happy to keep their job at the current salary levels, or happy to keep their job at all, doesn’t really get my sympathy.

According to one web site, the average salary for a tube driver in 2008 is £40,000. This doesn’t compare too badly with the 2008 UK average household income of just under £30,000, does it? Another source claims an average London salary of £42,302, which would be in line with the request for a 5% increase from £40k (assuming these figures are actually correct), but the whole thing still doesn’t make much sense to me.

Employers shouldn’t be allowed to blame just about everything on the poor economy and get away with an obscure thread of the company’s uncertain future, but still, the coin’s got the employee’s side, too.

I am sure the job, that of a driver and that of station and platform staff, has physical and psychological rigors, and life in London is expensive. So is almost everybody else’s. Go back to your sense, and go back to work!

Thoughts london, rmt

Did you ever drive around in London’s suburbia? No? Well… let me just say that some streets are so narrow, with cars parked all over, than cruising Naples in the rush hour seems like a piece of cake in comparison.

You cannot, for example, drive to Waitrose West London through Felix Road without stopping, giving way, backing out. Or take Maunder Road, of many others.

Fascinatingly, some queer brain at the council still chooses Felix Road to be the main access into Hanwell coming from the busy Argyle Road, and some super-whacky planners agree that Maunder Road should serve as one of the two main access paths to the new Cambridge Yard five apartment block development. There is no limit to insanity, but I am drifting off my main subject today…

Well, the point is that many drivers are unwilling, and, presumably, unable, to back out. Some of this might be a genuine inability to be considerate drivers and considerate people(see insanity, above), but I think many simply cannot drive back in a reasonably straight line for more than three inches.

I am proposing that each driver must show the ability to navigate a curved course backwards as a mandatory part of each driving test. I’m serious.

Thoughts car, Ealing, london, Traffic