So the ‘debate‘ about whether Britain should hold a referendum on the EU Reform Treaty rumbles on. The Tories snipe from one side that this is indeed the same as the European Constitution, a document Blair was ready to put to a referendum. This is set against the backdrop of […]
It was suggested to me by a friend in Berlin that I should join a site called verwandt.de to put together an online family tree. Not much good as that’s all for people in Germany. But the English language equivalent – Geni.com – is now just taking off. The technology […]
Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture paints a rather bleak picture of a generation that is economically troubled and emotionally taut – essentially the post-Baby Boom generation. The term Generation Y applies to people coming after them – statistically speaking people born after 1978. But that term has not […]
Sweden is a great place in so many ways – excellent social system, great on gender equality, generally happy population… Plenty of positives can be found in the Sweden & Swedish category. But this blog has today been linked by a couple of blogs (here and here) of Swedish right […]
A small memorial to the Jews deported from Grunewald railway station in Berlin to the concentration camps in World War II. Each part of the platform lists a different chilling deportation. Here someone had put some candles in the shape of the Star of David on one part of the […]
I’ve been living a sheltered and abnormal life in London. In my everyday work almost all my colleagues are thoughtful and reflective, and the working environment generally supportive. I spend plenty of my free time with people for whom gender and equality issues are extremely important, and I’ve spent more […]
I’m staying in the Europäische Akademie Berlin, in the middle of the grand villas of Grunewald in western Berlin. An additional advantage is the huge forest to the south west of here, towards Wannsee. I’ve just returned from a 40 minute run through the forest and around the Grunewaldsee, the […]
I’ve just listened to a speech by CDU member of the Bundestag Eckart von Klaeden about the EU’s role in the world and how important it is to open up our markets. He stated over and over again that there were almost uniquely benefits to Germany to being open to […]
I promise I’ll get back to writing about politics sometime soon, but for the moment the only thing really worth writing about is Berlin. After posting a whole slew of pictures from this morning, I have spent a day doing website work sat on Bernd’s balcony in a very secluded […]
0609 on a Monday. What a thought. The forecast for the day was good; I knew that. The sun was just on the horizon behind the Fernsehturm as my train meandered through Gesundbrunnen and down into the underground platforms of Hauptbahnhof, stark fluorescent lighting and medical cleanliness in fierce juxtaposition […]
I’m heading towards Berlin this afternoon – on the X2000 to Malmö and then on the night train from there to Berlin, that goes on the Trelleborg-Sassnitz ferry. Have never been on a train on a ferry… The crossing is less than 4 hours – much better than the 26 […]
The last few weeks have been manic – far too much to do in the office, and all the preparation for eventually starting as a freelance website designer in the autumn. It’s all very exciting, but tiring too, and blogging has suffered as a result. But the crazy weeks are […]
