a lovely day

london monday 2014

Many will be working today and some may be looking out at the fine weather and wishing they are out there. imagining themselves sitting in the sun and enjoying it. whereas here i am, all the time in the world and i am not sitting out in the grass bathing in the sun. hmm. why? i ask myself too, and wonder am i missing something?

i walk about in the sun, chosing to walk on the sunny side of the street, but i have noticed that i do so when it is in the early morning, as i walk to the library at about 9.30am. but later in the day, i find myself gravitating towards the shadowed side of the road.

I have to make a conscious effort to keep to the sunny side.

this makes me realise that just because a bit of something is good, a lot of it need not be better. well, i know that allready, so i should correct myself and say it reminds me rather than make me realise … 

and that is something that the world do not realise. that you hear of something that the world values, in this case the leisure time to sit out in the sun… and you put a high price on it. because so many work and can never do it. and you hear of these people spending a huge amount of money taking the plane to fly to places with the sun, and spending a fortune. and you dont appreciate that u allready have got all this … you can sit in the sun all day, and it is free… but u dont appreciate it. you think it is not worthwhile… because u have not spend thousands of £s to get it. the world do not value something that it can get free, but put a big price to it and they all want it… fight for it even. and there is a twist to this… you begin to feel u should value it, but then realise that it is not really that valuable, the sun is not all that great to sit in it… especially if there is a lot of it and it is very strong, and can burn you. so now u not only can pay a lot of money to get it, but it is not really very good for you .

like chocolate.

I saw in my wordpress reader a quartz article showing a video of some african cocoa farmers given chocolate to eat as they have never tasted the finished product of their harvest. the author laments that he finds it a disgrace that they are unable to afford the chocolate, that they cannot afford to eat the fruits of the end product of their harvest.

i was minded that if u grow something to sell, it is not wise to eat the end product.

i was thinking of heroin producers , the poppy farmers may well be wise to keep clear of the end product of their opium harvest. you might say now, now, that is taking analogy too far, but generally it is wise that producers dont get to be addicted to their products…  or there will be none left to sell.    

the interesting thing about the whole video is this… instead of saying how delicious the chocolate is, the first thing they all say when they taste it, is that it is so sweet. i think they got it right. it is sweet, you never can taste the cocoa in chocolate, because it is so sweet. u can taste cocoa in a drink, but that is only if u make it yourself and not add suger… otherwise a normal shop bought chocolate drink is very sweet and it kills any taste of chocolate. u can never get the taste of chocolate. what  u will like is the taste of sweet. give someone who says they like chocolate a cocoa drink without suger, and i can guarantee that they wont like it.

I have tasted cocoa without suger, i make it myself from cocoa powder, and believe me it is an acquired taste. it is slightly bitter. i enjoy it, as i feel i am getting the real taste of cocoa, but i bet not many will like it.

it is the same with coffee. a real coffee drinker will drink it neat, no suger, and as an espresso. any others who drink it with suger are simply drinking coffee for the suger in it. maybe u will say hang on, that is being rather harsh… harsh but true.

I have a feeling that those farmers are not so deprived after all, at least as far as not tasting cocoa is concerned. they should quietly thank the stars that the west is so brainwashed to value cocoa so much in their sugered drink, that they are willing to pay for the cocoa. And quietly thank the stars that they  have a product that finds ready buyers from the west.

 it seems to be  real easy to grow the fruit, as once the tree is mature it does not seem to take much looking after, and only need to be harvested once a year. they should use the rest of the time to find other work, or enterprises. or seek work elsewhere. then come back once a year at harvest time to get the fruit. and take it as a nice supplement and easy way to make some money. and if they have other sources of income, they wont be so desperate to sell the fruit too any middle man , and can hold out for a higher price.

so that if there is a low rainfall and less fruit, they can hold out for a higher price. and so poor harvest  wont be so devastating to them. there was talk of people getting rid of the cocoa trees and planting rubber, but if i were a cocoa farmer i will hold on, because there will be a shortage of cocoa if they all change to rubber and i should be able to sell my cocoa at a huge price. 

it is the desperate people who cannot hold out for a higher price for their cocoa that is spoiling the market for every cocoa farmer. that is what happens when u are poor, and have no other source of income. that is why low paid jobs are low paid, because there  are too many desperate people who want the job even though it is low paid. if enough people dont apply for these low paid jobs they will have to raise the wage. that is why all those who are waiters or macdonalds servers or lowly paid staff, they are in a market where too many people are willing to work , even though the wages are too low to make a living. those jobs are not a good jobs to seek work in. they are unskilled jobs. which is why it is generally not a good thing to seek work in those. it is better to find some skills and upgrade the kind of jobs you can get. jobs that not many can do, and so u can get higher pay for it.

i am thinking of nurses working for temp agencies… they can get a lot of money for each shift as they are skilled and in demand and there is a shortage. any locum work in jobs that demand is high will be good jobs to go for. look for any jobs where not many people want to do them, either because of unsocial hours or shortage of skills, or even jobs prone to wild swings of demand. if u are starting on the road of working, look carefully at what is in demand and chose those rather than just go for the low skilled jobs that everyone is fighting over.

what are the jobs of the future?

london

I have to say i wont want to be a career adviser to the youngsters now. a lot of jobs are being replaced by robots and machines. the bank cash machine is one. the supermarket self service tills are another. and we are talking of driverless trains, and ticket readers that do away with the ticket collector. 

I am thinking of this because i am looking at a tv program talking about this … called man and machine. Things are getting automated. the program ended without much hope for people, concluding that jobs will be lost from automation, but not saying what will replace it. 

I am guessing the future jobs will be in the service industries, police, shop assistants, catering jobs which will  include restaurant work like chefs, kitchen staff, waiting staff, because those jobs wont be easy to replace with robots. and the hotel industry will still need people to clean the rooms and laundry and needed in reception. 

hairdressers, and health staff, nurses, doctors, dentists, etc. will be still needed in future and robots wont take over those.

maybe office staff may still be needed.

care workers may be the biggest growth industry. but it is such a thankless job with long hours dealing with old people, it wont be very nice and wont be well paid either. nursery staff will also be booming i guess. what about education? teaching will still be needed at all levels, primary, secondary, college and university. but it is rather a dreary prospect to be a teacher. 

construction will be another people business, i think. 

oh, electrical , gas, workers will always be needed. plumbers too. so those will be safe jobs to go for. and vehicle( car) mechanics will also be needed , i guess.

but these jobs sound rather low paid with long unsocial hours. maybe not gas , electricity and plumbers. they certainly charge a lot just to come to the home on a callout. 

what jobs are there for us to take in future??? 

maybe with the rise of technology in future there will be jobs that are not even heard of now for us to take. I am glad i dont have to advise future generations about what career to choose. 

i go swimming and i go to the library and i enjoy both very much but it seems they have calculated the monetary value of it, in terms of making us happy, and it seems it is equivalent to a pay rise of £1300 a year. and guess what… going to the gym is not the same. it does not make u happier. of course they dont know if the reason for this is because sad people go to the gym, and happy people go swimming and to the library, and not vice versa. 

battersea power station open house

London
It’s the London open house weekend so I thought I shall see the Battersea power station site. It seems I am not the only one, when I arrived , there was a queue stretching all round the block to the beginning of the queue.

When I saw the long queue, I decided not to bother to join it, and made my way to Chelsea bridge.

There were two queues converging on each other and on the bridge I met a group of women who were talking about all those queue jumpers. When I told them that was the queue stretching all round the block, they said they were on the correct queue, one that stretched along the river back to the peace pavilion in the Battersea park. They had been waiting 1.5 hrs they said.

Ah well, what surprised me was that there were not more queue jumping because it was quite easy to do at the steps leading down from the bridge.

I did not reckon on the popularity of anything in London. People here are kind of desperate for anything to do, as witness the long queues that form waiting for food at the pop up eating places that temporarily get put up all over the city. People here will queue up at the opening of an envelope , it seems.

That is why people flock to London to do business, it is so easy to get customers.

I asked the women who said they have been in, what is inside. it seems it is just a shell inside. They said ‘it is not the point, it is historic…’

There was a guy there who I asked if he had gone in. he said no , and doubt if he would bother. I said there is not much to see inside.

The guy said pink floyd and the flying pig was featured over this station. So really the outside is what u want to see, I said. No need to go inside. He said they do make films with the inside featured. I said, it is easy to make a mock up of the inside in a film studio. So it is not necessarily the real inside that is featured. He did concede the point.

I asked him if he was from London. He said he is irish, and had been to germany but now lives here.

I asked ‘u been to germany and yet chose to come here? Why?
He said he did not like germany.

The germans are too unimaginative and dont appreciate what he do. he is a circus performer, and he finds they are not interested in hiring him. whilst companies here  would pay him £350 for a 15min performance.

Here in uk he said companies hire people like him for their functions. He does dance and choreography whilst performing  on a vertical wire and hurl himself down unfurling from a banner all the way to the bottom, saved at the last minute by the unrolling banner. I can see how it can be quite thrilling. I mentioned how come you can do that without health and safety stepping in to stop you?
He said, ‘u would think that, but no, they don’t stop me. I laugh sometimes when I see they allow me to do this stunts , no restriction, whilst health and safety officials have all sorts of restrictions to stop people from doing things on the ground.

Well, perhaps that is why people flock to London and make it so vibrant.

On the way back walking along the river opposite the power station, I took some pics and videos.
I put the video in dropbox, but for some reason, could not get it to work. nevermind, it is only showing the outside of the station as i did not go in. 

where the two queues meet

here is a video about the first flats for sale in jan 13. £340,000 for a studio. compared to that price for a 2bdroom in the lower floors of the st georges tower, it is pricey indeed. with so many flats to sell off until it finishes in 2026, and another powerhouse development in lots road near fulham, i think there will be a glut of expensive housing in future. 

more inane ramblings

London

The tube closes at about 12.40am now… and that is rather early for a big city that purports to be trendy and vibrant.

Clubbers will have to go back by bus, or taxi, which does not sound great if u are a tourist to London.

I think if I were to be clubbing I too would be rather miffed at not being able to take the tube. It is quicker to get back on the tube than on the bus which stops so often.

When I was younger, I drove into London for a night gay clubbing, and I could do that because traffic was so much less than now. Now I think of it those were really great days, where it was a pleasure to drive into London, easy to park, free too, and I can just hop into the car after the club and drive back . I don’t drink so I could drive back.

But now … if those who drive are telling the truth, it is murder to drive into London for a night out.

So if they succeed in getting a deal with the unions about closing the tube 1 hr later it would be lovely.

It wont affect me of course as I live in the centre of London but also I don’t go late clubbing anymore.

It is one of the paradoxes of life, where when I was younger, I live in the suburbs of London and have to drive in to go clubbing, and don’t mind doing it.
Whereas now I am older, and not interested in clubbing, and just when I live right in the centre and can walk to all the gay clubs, I could not be bothered.

The times have moved on also. Before, gay life centred round gay clubs and pubs before the internet made it so easy to meet guys now.

 

But bear in mind that I am a minority in not liking clubbing.

I think when you are young, clubbing is an important way of interacting with others and with friends. And you will build up friends in the clubs if u club often enough. The buzz of being in a big club, dancing among so many, with lots of others all enjoying themselves is tremendous and being young u have the energy to stay up late.

And if u like to drink,or take drugs it is more fun doing it with others.

And you now have the drug taking to enhance the experience. I mean not only alcohol , but the others like ecstasy, meth crystal etc. I am no expert in those other drugs, or even alcohol, haha. Just getting what I know from reading blogs about it and talking to friends who have taken these things.

Sarah who commented on my blog says she finds it funny that I jump from topic to topic without any rhyme or reason. I am glad she is not put off by it.

This blog is a random and meandering blog of my thoughts and doings. Hope it provides inadvertent amusement, even if it shows me in a poor light, and people find it amusing to see me blundering around re inventing the wheel, as when I find something that everyone knows for ages, and which I have just discovered and getting so excited about it. Haha.

I am sure readers will be indulgent and just be amused at it, and realise that we all get excited when we find something, whether it is shoes, or beanies, or ideas or insights, and want to tell everyone to find they all know it already. Haha.

For eg, a friend recently told me that volunteering is not all it seems. He tells me that many organisations are using it as an excuse to lay off their paid workers, and replacing them with unpaid volunteers.

And these organisations don’t pay their workers all that much either and because they are short staffed, they impose on their workers. Asking them to come in on their days off because there is no one to do it. And not pay overtime either.
I have a friend who told me he had this friend who works for an old folks home, and is constantly phoned on his day off to work because they are short staffed. And he don’t get paid overtime either.

Maybe everyone knows this. Haha. But it is only now that I became aware of it.

Things are never black or white , are they? Here u are thinking u are doing good by volunteering and u find that u may have put someone out of a job, granted it is a low paid job and maybe u might be doing a favour to that person in that they might be forced to go find another job which pays better, but that is unlikely to be the case for most of these laid off workers.

It is a paradox of life that people want to work in jobs that don’t pay them enough to live on. U would think if the job does not pay enough for you to live on, you will refuse to work there and get a job that pays u enough. But that is not the case. Instead u work in 2 or 3 low paying jobs.

I see all the supermarkets are reducing their check out staff and adding more self help machines, so that source of jobs is going to go. I think it a real cushy job being a check out person. U don’t even need to think, just swipe the goods and the machine will even tell u want change to give back. Haha. But that kind of job is going to go.

People in new york have 2 or 3 jobs. At least that was what I found out when I used to go there regularly(in the late 90s) for Christmas shopping long ago. I met a guy there who told me that was what he does to make ends meet, because each job pays so little. Now I know u must not generalise from just one encounter but I figured that these people with 2-3jobs cannot be so rare that I can meet one of them in my visit to new york. Right? So it must be common to have 2-3 jobs.

If that is the case so long ago, I think it must be more so nowadays in new york. Is it so in London do u think? I have not met anyone who works in 2 or 3 jobs in london. And this is living here for more than 20yrs. So maybe it is not so dire in uk , because there is the safety net of social benefits unlike in usa. Or maybe more likely, I have not heard from these people because people here don’t talk about it.