almostwitty

According to a YouGov survey, they’re all examples of the “widest range of sexual behaviours”, in an article for BBC News.

Wait till I tell the wife this…

Mirrored from almost witty.

According to Wikipedia, Hong Kong has 7 million citizens, 95% of whom are Chinese.

According to this BBC News report about Hong Kong’s Mid-Levels escalator system – the “longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world” – there’s not a single Chinese person who could talk about the system. The reporter’s Australian, who interviews another non-Chinese person about the escalators and how they’ve revitalised previously run-down parts of Hong Kong.

It’d be like going to San Francisco, doing a report on the trams there, and only being able to find one Chinese person to interview.

I know it’s not so much racism as the reporter, desperate to file a story, just using her personal contacts to find SOMEONE to interview … but when they said it was one country two systems, they should have said one country, two communities…

UPDATE: The evil former flatmate and Asian-ophile Mr. Fenn took it upon himself to lodge a complaint with BBC News on my behalf (while changing a few details. Like my gender) and the official word from the BBC is:

“There was no intention to give the impression that we were ignoring the views of the residents of Hong Kong. You are right that the reporter was
not herself Chinese – but she was used because she is the BBC’s reporter in Hong Kong and therefore best placed to do the piece. As you also saw we only felt there was space in the piece to hear from one other person – and as it happens, the best interview she obtained on the subject was with the chap who ran the restaurant chain.”

“However I take your point on board – and accept that we should perhaps have made more of an effort to hear something from Chinese residents about the escalator system.”

Mirrored from almost witty.

Lookie here! (Thanks, @zsk!)

and she has revealed that on Boxing Day, it got 21,500 hits. Now if only I had 1p for everyone who clicked…

Mirrored from almost witty.

Mirrored from almost witty.

loneliness london

Originally uploaded by sebiphoto

Just in time for December, the BBC has commissioned some research that shows that even the loneliest community in 1971 wasn’t as lonely as the strongest community in 2001, with Edinburgh and London being the loneliest cities and Stoke-on-Trent being the strongest community.

Purely coincidentally, I’d rate Edinburgh and London as being some of the best places to live in the UK, and Stoke-on-Trent as probably one of the less brilliant places.

I used to live in North Wales, which is undoubtedly one of the most “connected” places in terms of a sense of place, belonging and community. Their parents lived round the corner, their grandparents lived round the next hill, so there was definitely a sense of long-term continuity. And I hated it. The locals did their best and were warm and welcoming - far more than their counterparts would be in London, Edinburgh and Manchester - and yet all that did was exacerbate the feeling I had that I had very little in common with my neighbour.

The researchers are blaming the sense of loneliness and a loss in the community on a transient population, and note that community is less prevalent in university areas. Which means, in other words, that people who try to get “educated” are ruining it for the communities at large. If this is true, how long will it be before Britain’s “tall poppy” syndrome means we no longer value “brains”, but ignorance and staying home instead? Until, in other words, we end up like parts of the United States…

To count the sense of loneliness, the researchers based it on the number of single-people households in a given area. The more single-people households there were, the more lonely the community would be, went that theory. But I’m pretty sure that many areas are full of couples who don’t know their neighbours, their local butcher or even their local pub, whereas single people would probably make more of an effort to know their neighbour, butcher, or publican.

In other words, I’m not sure about this survey

Originally published at almost witty. You can comment here or there.