Back in the day there was a general feeling that one should never discuss politics or religion in polite company over dinner. Given that I have just finished a job which involved both those things no doubt I would not have had permission to speak about my work had I been your dinner guest (not that such protocols have succeeded in stopping me before!)

Here in Northern Ireland traditionally it has been hard to separate the two although the landscape is certainly changing. But we are not unique in experiencing this (un)holy alliance. The newly blogging upmytree pointed me to this post from the Wisbeys on politics and religion in Tanzania. It started with an exhortation to read the Sunday papers – a fine pastime and one which I’m enjoying with renewed vigour now that I no longer have assignments to write or other important Things To Do – and went on to consider the appropriate role of the church in the political processes. The Wisbeys conclude:

 The church, wherever it is, needs to standup and take responsibility for its role and its power. It needs to play a role in educating the public as to all the options, and so help them see beyond the short term benefits and look to the long term results of their actions.

The context is Tanzania but such advice rings true for us here too. Whether it is desparate attempts at Westminster to develop new policies to woo back an alienated public before another general election, or more locally policies emanating from a mixture of looking over one shoulder at who might be out to get you whilst looking over the other shoulder at political fixes to please a disillusioned electorate,  short term fixes are never going to provide any sort of long term solutions or stability.  

True we have come a long way here in NI, and the distance we have travelled took vision, determination and courage on behalf of many who will not be honoured in this lifetime for the contribution that they have made. But short-termism, whether to avoid the bogey man looking over your shoulder or to make quick political gain, is not a solid basis on which to rebuild a country or create courageous vision for the future.

However perhaps we get the political vision we deserve. As voters (or more accuratley non-voters…although i think friends are now too scared to tell me they didn’t vote in the election earlier this month) we complain and quickly get frustrated with those who have been elected to positions of power. But maybe we don’t give them the room to manoeuvre or the space to create the vision that is so badly needed. Not voting is one way of registering discontent but opting out seems to lead to an ever more desparate scramble to find something, however unrealistic or unsustainable, that might attract the voters back.

Some will argue that the church has no place in helping to shape the future. But the role of local churches in aiding the Roma families in Belfast last week highlights the significant role which churches can and do play in local communities and this can contribute to the bigger picture.

But the Church (collectively) also needs to step up to the mark and rediscover its prophetic voice. It will not always be popular, and may not always be heard, but until it moves away from solely protecting itself to looking out for the needs of others, perhaps even at its own expense (again as demonstrated in the aid given to the Roma), it will not make an impact.

All of us need to look past short term benefits and consider the long term results of our actions.

It seems that you cannot park a caravan over a gate providing access to a residence (although semi-obstructing my driveway seems to be OK). So a sort of solution has emerged due to the refurbishment of the house next door to the caravan. A hedge has been taken away and a garden transformed into a driveway bounded by a gate which means that they caravan has had to move back which means clear access for me!

It seems the answer is anywhere you like… so long as no one is living in it.

A man lives on a street and his house conveniently backs onto the corner of another street where he chooses to park his white work van (no longer in daily use); his blue work van (pretty much in daily use); and, a caravan (which seems to get towed away for one long weekend, if that, each year). He only has an averaged sized house so his Parked Things back up behind other people’s houses, who may have other things they would like to see there.

The Parked Things take up the whole corner and for the unsuspecting motorist can create a huge blind spot having to veer into the the wrong side of the road only to be met by some other unsuspecting motorist driving on the right side of the road. However it is the unsuspecting pedestrians who probably have most to fear.

The vans I can cope with but it is the caravan which succeeds in raising my blood pressure almost every single day (but especially on Fridays when the wheelie bin gauntlet must also be run). It is not quite close enough to completely obstruct the driveway but close enough to mean that it always takes me two attempts to get the car off the road. Granted this might have something to do with my own driving but no, really, it’s the caravan.

At one stage there was a small wooden boat attached to the caravan at the end closest to my house which caused me no end of concern. It seems he has now built a tardis-like shed in which the wooden boat resides, but it looks like he has dug up some of the pavement to make it look like the shed isn’t actually over the boundary of his house, so maybe it is actually that big.

Imagine my dismay when last night as I was heading out in my car, I found ‘Caravan Man’ (as he is affectionately known) moving the caravan closer to my house due to the arrival of a skip behind his neighbour’s house. Apparently this is a temporary measure… I hope it gets moved back again soon before my car meets it in an unhappy way.

There was a short period of ‘no-caravan’ in the interim between an older (and smaller) caravan and the new beast that is there today. Someone (and really it wasn’t me… honest!) was putting stones through the windows and letting the tyres down. ‘You just can’t keep caravans round here the way you used to’ Caravan Man opined one day… but it hasn’t deterred from keeping the new shiny one outside.

I phoned some official Government department to find out if there are any rules about parking caravans but it seems so long as no one is living it then it can be parked wherever it likes.

Which means I can’t really do anything about it… which means I’ll just have to rant to let off steam instead and pray really hard that I don’t hit it… accidentally or otherwise!

There are many things I dislike about flying so I’m not entirely sure what I was thinking when I boarded Yeti Airlines apart from the fact that the flight had been booked for me, it was the only way to get where I needed to be and therefore had little alternative.

On the same trip I also had opportunity to fly Buddha Air - a slightly more upmarket version of my Yeti experience complete with refreshments and inflight magazine. Most of the magazine was in Nepali but one article on building customer relations entertained me for the duration of the flight and in the months to come. Some of my favourite lines include:

• Relation doesn’t occur by birth, but by approach, expression, attitude and verbal manner.
• One can achieve high level of relation among the people but his or her relationship cannot gain long run unless it is love-oriented. Heartily expression, positive attitudes and good manners are always love-oriented. Love-oriented people can only gain good relationship.
• If you greet to a new person by his name or surname, it would be a great influence and he would remember you forever, because the sweetest word of the world is your name or surname.
• It is not what we talk but how we talk can sustain the long run relation forever.
• In an exceptional case sometimes customers may not feel maximum satisfaction due to some technical reasons. It may or may not be true…

And finally…

• Good relationship doesn’t exist as a single part, it is from the both side. Consideration the norms of every aspect from the both sides can help to sustain the long run relation.

Wise words indeed.

There is something delicious about opening the front door after a long day of work, especially when it’s not a rush-in-rush-out again evening. Sometimes it’s the lure of the sofa and the ability to curl up and lose myself in some inane television programme which requires no thought on my part whatsoever. Sometimes it’s the chance to make something very yummy for tea, the thought of which has generally occupied my mind for most of the day.

Sometimes it’s the prospect of exciting mail. Last Christmas two friends bought me subscriptions to two different magazines – it’s always an exciting day when they drop on the doormat. So there is always something to look forward to in between the bills and other dull grown up stuff.

Today however my only post was a letter from ‘Cats Protection’ with the following message on the envelope:

‘These mailings are designed as economically as possible. This one cost less than 18p to produce and is being sent only to people who we believe may care for the safety and well-being of cats’.

Now, it’s not that I don’t want cats to be safe or to ‘be well’. It’s just that these people mistakenly think that I actually care. I have a hate-hate relationship with cats. I have never met one I have liked or one that has liked me. Perhaps that’s where the problem lies. Or maybe my issue is more with the cats in my local neighbourhood that confuse my excuse for a garden as their litter tray… grrrr…

That’s not to say I lack complete compassion. When friends had moved to a smaller abode and talked about how ‘there wasn’t enough room to swing a cat’ in their new living room I was momentarily horrified at the thought of them testing out its spaciousness by actually swinging their cat. Thankfully I realised just in time they were speaking metaphorically.

But I am sorry that Cats Protection has spent their 18 pence on me and haven’t directed their fundraising to a more worthy and caring individual. I will however open their letter – looks like there’s a free pen inside!

I’m not one normally averse to surprise parcels or indeed surprises outside my front door.

At university one morning I opened the door of my room to find a double bass sitting in the corridor outside. After closing my door and re-opening it the double bass was still there and I realised I wasn’t  hallucinating. Who put it there? My best guess is the scary people who lived downstairs.

Then there was the time a friend had gone back to Belfast for the weekend and in the need of a taste of home I’d requested a bag of Tayto cheese & onion crisps. Can’t get a taste of home better than that.  (I really really want to visit that castle one day!) But he returned empty handed and I tried to hide my dismay… only to find a few days later I had an exciting green slip in my pigeon hole telling me I had a parcel… a whole box of Tayto Cheese & Onion crisps – far too big to carry back on the boat and which I duly shared around my fellow ex-pats desperate for that unique taste of home.

And just a couple of years ago I was settling on my sofa for some Sunday evening TV viewing when my doorbell rang.  Opening my front door I discovered 5 Lindt chocolate bunnies sitting on my little path, referring to a joke we shared. The perpertrators may have hidden themselves but they couldn’t surpress their giggles for too long and I enjoyed sharing my new found confectionery with them over a nice cup of tea.

Imagine my surprise this evening however to arrive home from work to find a large box sitting outside my front door. Now, I don’t know if it’s just because I’m at the end of the terrace row but a lot of rubbish seems to gather round my house from time to time, particularly on Thursdays and Fridays. But on closer inspection the box was intact and looked like it had been set there deliberately.

I have very kind and generous friends. Perhaps one of them had sent me something exciting – the box was big enough to hold a helium balloon but there was no obvious occasion to be celebrating. Perhaps there were flowers inside but usually those are left with a neighbour. I didn’t remember ordering anything that big from the internet… in fact I hadn’t ordered anything from the internet.

There was no label on the outside so the only option was to open it up to find out what was inside. It wasn’t sealed so this was easily done…

And inside…

many, many, many incontinence pads.

What was going on?

I delved in to the box to find the delivery note… only to find that they had been delivered to the wrong address – the right house number and first part of the streetname but someone wasn’t looking carefully – it said Gardens, not Park.

So I duly put the box in my car – it was bit too bulky to carry and the thought of accidentally spilling the contents all over the pavement was enough to make me ignore my carbon footprint – and drove it down my street to the rightful recipient.

I had set the box on the ground just outside the front door so that I could knock the door. A little old man opened the door and it looked like he was on his own. I was embarrassed that I didn’t know him but that he knew that I knew what the box contained. He didn’t lift it, just dragged it in as quickly as he could.

But he gave me a little wave as I reversed to turn and drive the few hundred yards back up the street.

And as I did so I felt rebuked that this man’s pain had become my folly as I had laughed when I first opened the box and hadn’t understood what was going on.

And more selfishly I wondered… when I am old and frail… who will look after me?

A prison cell, in which one waits, hopes … and is completely dependent on the fact that the door of freedom has to be opened from the outside, is not a bad picture of Advent.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer,
German pastor and philosopher (1906-1945) imprisoned and executed for his attempt to overthrow Adolf Hitler.

From: Sojourners Verse & Voice

I enjoyed the Christmas Market at St. George’s on Saturday morning. The amazing sights and smells of the various food stalls competing for our attention although it was probably a little too early in the morning for curry or the sight of a full spit roasted pig! There wasn’t much pig remaining when we finally left – wonder if another one will be back next week!

 Other stalls (like that belonging to Always Paddle)  that competed for our attention were the product of weeks, probably months of hard labour in grabbed hours of spare time.  Jewellry, paintings, cookies, cards, recycled clothes, fantastic felt and knitted creations all looking for good homes for Christmas.

 As we sat and soaked up the atmosphere I remembered about the first time I heard about St. George’s Market. It was GCSE History and we were learning about the Belfast Blitz. St. George’s Market was used as a temporary mortuary as the city authorities struggled to cope with the hundreds of fatalities. What different sights, sounds and smells would have assailed the senses then.

On the way to the market we passed the site of the old Sirocco Works, one of many historic landmarks in Belfast awaiting redevelopment. On holiday last year in Sri Lanka we visited a tea plantation. I love drinking tea and they make a lot of it there so it seemed an appropriate holiday activity. As we were being shown around we came across a machine, manufactured by Sirocco, that was being used to dry the tea at very high temperatures. The machine had a plate on it which although faded had engraved the words ‘made in Belfast, Ireland’. Thousands of miles away from home and there I was looking at a machine, possibly over 100 years old,  that had been made only a couple of miles away from my house, still in full working order.  The factory may be long gone, but its products live on!

On Saturday evening the sky was amazing. I couldn’t even begin to describe how the sun set over Belfast, a kaleidoscope of colours above Cave Hill. In perfect dual silhouette stood Samson and Goliath, the Harland and Wolff cranes, black and defiant against the early evening sky.  Beneath them the landscape is changing, the development of Titanic Quarter the lastest in attempts to revitalise, rejuvenate and rebuild Belfast. 

But last Saturday as dusk fell they stood strong and bold, a reminder of the way we used to be.

I’ve never quite got round to watching a full episode of the BBC’s Who Do You Think Are? series but any bits I have glimpsed have been fascinating. I doubt my own family history would make such an interesting programme but recently I’ve been reminded of how those who have gone before shape who we are, even when we don’t realise it.

Growing up it was (and still is) a running joke in my family that I am my father’s daughter and my brother’s sister. My response would be to cry ‘But I’m a person in my own right!’

Recently I had reason to be back in deepest, darkest Tyrone home to my family roots. Unbeknown to me at the time I was surrounded by distant family. One lady was keen to tell me that her daughter had married my dad’s cousin’s son.

Another cousin of my dad’s was there who really thought that my baby niece looked like her aunty (my granny) and as I’m told my niece looks a lot like me it follows that I look like my granny too.  She died when I was in P2 so I can’t really comment. This cousin also thought she saw something of my late uncle and late aunt in me too.

And there was general consensus that I was quite like my dad’s cousin’s daughter (my 2nd cousin? my 2nd cousin once removed? I’ve never quite worked that one out) but again as I’ve never met her I’ve no way of knowing.

Who do I think I am?  A mix of all those who have gone before, of people I have never met, of people completely unrelated who have shaped my life.

In the words of Orange I am who I am because of everyone.

I wonder…

• What the story is behind a handwritten sign saying ‘Leak reported. Do not use computer when raining’ stuck to a computer on arrival at Gatwick airport?
• When the person on the incoming flight from Valencia realised they had taken the wrong bag off the carousel… when they got home perhaps?
• Why you can’t take sharp objects through security at the airport but are free to buy them before you get on the plane?
• Why the man in the underground station had a Christmas present  that he was stuffing in to his jacket pocket? (It is only the middle of November after all.)
• And does he suspect, like me, that it might be a book?
• If the pilot realised he had actually reached the runway and did he really mean to be travelling at that speed when he landed?