Hi Everyone
The last time we had a holiday in the Lake District was about seven years ago and it rained every day. That meant that I drove every day for a week trying to find things to do rather than enjoying walking in sunny and warm weather. With that in mind, we decided to travel by rail with our son who was on holiday from his home in the Netherlands and the Main Contractors cousin so we had three approaching middle age being cared for by a man in his prime. To get to our holiday home we needed three trains. The first one was nearly ten minutes late meaning that we had a three minute dash to reach our second train. Now dash is not a word that applies to three of us any more but we just made it. After ejecting a couple from our reserved seats we were on our way to our third train which was there waiting for us when we arrived. The only problem was that there was no one to drive it so about one hundred people with cases were then waiting for a fifty seater bus which might arrive in five minutes or, more likely in five hours. Fortunately, we managed to get into one of the two taxis waiting to take us to our final destination. Even that did not prove to be straight forward as the combination of holiday traffic and roadworks. Then it was good news all the way with a modern clean holiday home in a central but quiet position and a whole week of warm sunny weather. Armed with our free bus passes we enjoyed the excellent local public transport as well as walking over 10,000 steps every day. We saw, met, and talked to people from all over the world, with many who were born here or have lived here for many years. I don't think that we have seen so many cultures happily enjoying the sunshine and scenery.
By contrast, this has been an awful week for racial harmony with the killing of three young children and six more very seriously injured by a teenage boy. That has sparked misinformation on social media, and violence in a number of towns and cities by a very small but dangerous minority of racists using a terrible event to pursue their twisted ideals. Now, as I write this, there are serious problems in our own city centre.
As I see it, many of the silent majority who have embraced our multicultural society, are concerned at the level of illegal immigration, particularly across the English Channel and the time it takes to deal favorably or unfavorably with them. Something has to change, and quickly.
Just a thought:
The most certain way to succeed is to try just one more time.
As a boy, I wanted to be a train driver, but sadly I got sidetracked.
When I was young black and white were in harmony, Unfortunately, that was only on the TV screen.
Brian
Comments