published on hodgers.com

Robert Burns at the BBC [revisited]

Tom Hodgkinson — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 23:42:00 +0000

This is a companion piece to Robert Burns at the BBC from January 2009. Where that marked the birth of a project to publish audio readings of all Robert Burns's works, this marks its maturation.

The three year project is now complete. Surprisingly – and very pleasingly – the information architecture work put in at the end of 2008 stood the website in good stead throughout its growth. Very little additional behind-the-scenes development was required to take the archive from 100 works at launch to a mighty 717 now.

A total of 66 readers contributed recordings: an average of 11 each, some epic, some tiny. The overwhelming majority of pages also feature information about each work's history & meaning, written by proper Burns experts. These explanations and (embeddable off-bbc.co.uk) audio are, of course, what make this particular Robert Burns project unique and therefore distinct from other Burns websites (& iPhone apps).

The solitary, humble XML document which powers the whole thing is now over 12,600 lines long but, amazingly, it still validates. Google indexes over 1,000 URLs from the site (a homepage, a biography, a page about Burns Night, a page for each work and listings pages by first letter, reader, theme, year and (just added) location.

Other new features include being able to embed the audio on non-BBC websites, 'Share on Facebook' buttons on each page and Previous & Next links to skip quickly from work to work.

One hilarious side effect of uploading all the works of the bawdy Bard is that I now have the dubious honour of having published the most pages to bbc.co.uk featuring the 'C' word. I think I'm actually prouder of that than I am at having finally got the A-Z listings dealing correctly with works beginning 'A ' and 'The '...

The website was nominated for a BAFTA^(Scotland) award in 2009, too.

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles — a review

Tom Hodgkinson — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:43:38 +0000

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles has just reached the end of its second season. The whole show has kept me reasonably well entertained, but the themes it has tried to tackle have occasionally delivered nuggets of real greatness. So I decided to write my thoughts down.

Benign human endeavour x Connectedness x Time = Killer freakin' robots!

T:TSCC is a TV show about the march of progress; about evolution. We learn that the Skynet and its terminators we knew from the original Terminator movies weren't simply the creation of some evil or misguided movie-style baddies. Instead, they evolved from thousands of innocent little joined-up coincidences: a chess program here, a traffic monitoring system there; a nuclear power station here, a heat-resistant alloy there. As sure as human beings learn, so they'll teach that learning to their computers. And the more powerful and connected - neural, if you will - such computer networks become, so the odds of Skynet forming tend towards 1.

The bold evolutionary metaphors and dire warnings about the human race developing into the architect of its own downfall are, however, frequently lost in the empty lowest-common-denominator plotlines that dominate most episodes. The welcome increase in focus on John Henry (capably portrayed by a well-restrained Garret Dillahunt) later in the second season is in stark contrast to the tragic underexploration of Summer Glau's saucy Terminatrix Cameron. Although regularly employed for action sequences and eye candy - neither of which draw complaint from me, let's be clear! - her quirky fish-out-of-water relationships with humans (particulary John) and quest to develop a role for herself in a strange world are what make her fascinating. She occasionally breaks, betraying her original programming, but rarely does the impact of such malfunctions burst beyond the bounds of a single episode.

James Ellison's interesting story is his relationship with John Henry, not his bumblingly expositional and expressionless pursuit of the Connors. Sarah's interesting story is the threat of cancer and its impact on her son, not her relentless drive to prove how determined and dull she can be. Both characters suffer, sadly, from monotone and directionless performances (Richard T. Jones and Lena Headey).

Thomas Dekker as John is a ray of light, however: surprisingly believable as a young man with the weight of the world on his shoulders - a burden placed on him both by his own growing senses of self-awareness & responsibility and by surrounding characters who drum it into both him and us every step of the way. Very Anakin Skywalker.

Overall, though, too much of the show bears the hallmarks of ratings-chasing television which, perversely, may backfire when it comes to a DVD boxset-buying public who may be its only hope of getting recommissioned. It needs a Phantom Edit before it'll catch me wading through the lot in one sitting. Creating a primetime TV experience that documents how Artificial Intelligence gains and then interprets knowledge isn't easy, but neither should it be. In the internet age, this goes down as a missed opportunity in my book.

Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress has an excellent write up of season 2's finale (contains spoilers) and his postscript is spot on. I'd watch a third season.

UPDATE (19 May 2009): Cancelled :-(

Photos from Barbados

Tom Hodgkinson — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:25:46 +0000

See 'em all on Flickr!

Spotify playlists

Tom Hodgkinson — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 16:53:07 +0000

I've built this little application to allow publication and sharing of Spotify playlists. There are others like it on the web, but this one is mine.

Features

an RSS feed for all playlists
pagination to avoid long pages
a record of the number of clicks for each playlist
the ability to sort by number of clicks or most recent click
a very poor search function
a page for each user that submits a playlist
an RSS feed for the same

Enjoy!

Citizen journalism

Tom Hodgkinson — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:08:02 +0000

The recent Buffalo plane crash has thrown up some interesting nuggets of public investigation that I've so far yet to see in the news:-

An mp3 of air traffic control communications (start at about 15 minutes in; from a distasteful blog post by Michael Crook to which I shan't link)
A Google Maps street view of (supposedly) the house hit (from this Facebook group)

The Fat Duck's Tasting Menu

Tom Hodgkinson — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 00:39:51 +0000

For his 60th birthday, my brother and I took my dad to Heston Blumenthal's restaurant The Fat Duck. We ate the Tasting Menu and had a jolly nice time.

Nitro-green tea and lime mousse (2001)

Our first course was prepared at the table: a spoonful of mousse swirled around in liquid nitrogen until it kinda turned into a fun-looking meringue. One dash of green tea powder and straight into the mouth, where it just about melted straight away with a burst of palette-cleansing wonderfulness. What a start!

Orange and beetroot jelly

Two small but delicious squares of jelly to be eaten in a specific order... with a clever twist, of course. Never had beetroot before; not terrible.

Oyster, passion fruit jelly, lavender

Hmm, the first of the slimey ones. Oysters were new to me, but I'd tried passion fruit before and not liked it. However - and this was a theme for the whole afternoon - things that taste odd or unpleasant or scary on their own somehow just work together in Heston's world.

Pommery grain mustard ice cream, red cabbage gazpacho

The mustard ice cream tasted hot, but felt cold. The gazpacho cleverly took the edge off (from both angles) enough to let the flavour do the talking. Tasty and refreshing.

Jelly of quail, langoustine cream, parfait of foie gras and oak moss and truffle toast

A box full of oak moss sat in the middle of the table. Liquid nitrogen was poured in, which let its smell pour out and over the table throughout this course. First, there was a PocketPak-style strip of flavour to put on the tongue. Very oaky and earthy. Then, four layers of frightening new things in a pot with some wafer-thin truffle toast to add much-needed crunch. Very clever; very woodland; very impressed.

Snail porridge, Jabugo ham, shaved fennel

Never in my life could I have imagined I'd eat a meal called “Snail porridge”, but this was a surprisingly delicious course. The whole snails weren't pleasant to look at (nor, on reflection, was green porridge!) and it took me a couple of minutes to pluck up the courage to tuck in. By the end, though, I was almost disappointed there wasn't more. It was much meatier than I'd imagined with bags of juicy flavour.

“Sound of the sea”

So then three giant shells arrive at the table with headphones sticking out of them. Playing on the iPod Shuffle concealed inside were the sounds of waves crashing onto a beach and seagulls circling overhead. We were encouraged to shut our eyes and listen, during which time a big box of sand was placed in front of each of us. The food sat on a glass plate above the box, like it had just washed to shore: foam, sea weed, eels, mystery gravel. Brilliant presentation aside, taste-wise this was all a bit too much for me. Felt a bit queasy afterwards and was grateful for the break that followed.

Salmon poached in liquorice gel, artichoke, vanilla mayonnaise and “Manni” olive oil

Liquorice?!? On salmon? Sounded ridiculous and was pretty sharp on its own, but the mayonnaise and artichoke (another new thing for me) settled it nicely. My inexperienced palette thought the salmon was a bit underdone, but I'll put that down to me almost certainly always overcooking my own. Another very soft course though.

Ballotine of Anjou pigeon, black pudding “made to order”, pickling brine and spiced juices

The black pudding tasted right but was smooth and brown: the consistency of melted chocolate. Bizarre, but pretty cool. The pigeon practically fell off the bone - a taste sensation. Could have eaten the whole bird.

Hot and iced tea

Most incredible thing I've ever seen. Looked like a cup of tea, but the right-hand side was hot and the left cold. Stayed that way right through sipping to down in the stomach. Words don't do justice to such peculiar-yet-brilliant execution.

Mrs Marshall's Margaret cornet

We were then given a little booklet about pioneering work in the field of ice cream over a century ago, followed by an example of what it was talking about. Such a delicious ice cream cornet in miniature, like a scale model.

Pine sherbet fountain (pre-hit)

A slightly underwhelming sherbet fountain. Very refreshing and pine-y, but not very much of it. The vanilla pods we used to extract the sherbet were a nice touch.

Mango and Douglas fir puree, bavarois of lychee and mango, blackcurrant sorbet

Cold, sharp and the perfect follow-on from the sherbet. The sorbet was particularly tasty, reinforcing (where the other bits didn't) that this was definitely a dessert.

Parsnip cereal

“Good morning. Time for breakfast.” And what better way to start the day than with a bowl of cereal? Parsnip flakes in a little box (like the old variety packs) with a wonderful cream. Wanted more.

Nitro-scrambled egg and bacon ice cream (2006), pain perdu and tea jelly

Once again, the liquid nitrogen was brought to the table and poured into a big silver bowl. Then special eggs were cracked open - it looked like they contained custard - into the bowl and swirled around. Spooned around until scrambled, the rest of the course arrived just as the perfect-looking egg was lifted out. The pain perdu was just the right sort of stodgy for a 'cooked' breakfast, the bacon was wafer thin and the egg on top completed the perfect breakfast. Weekend mornings will never be the same again.

Petits fours, carrot and orange lolly, mandarin aerated chocolate, apple pie caramel “edible wrapper”, violet tartlet

I suspect the Aero-like aerated chocolate was made using some sort of vacuum chamber. It was very mandarin-y, but a great accompaniment to the wafer thin lollies. The apple pie caramel (and wrapper) was very clever, but didn't taste much like apple pie to me. The violet tarte - the bit I expected to like least - was out of this world. That was the last thing I ate and not far off being either the nicest or most surprising.

Rid and dad had the wine throughout and loved it, but I know less about wine than I know about playing the clarinet so shan't attempt to describe the couple of sips I took.

Overall, this menu was much more about the taste than the texture. I shouldn't have been surprised, what with it being called the 'Tasting Menu' 'n' all. But that's not to do it down. I've never experienced anything like it in my life and probably never will. Amazing flavour combinations, a quite remarkable imagination and utter creative genius, I'd say. Shall be dining out on this for years to come.

The pictures used above were taken by nako and feature in the set Fat Duck 2009; some rights reserved.

Robert Burns at the BBC

Tom Hodgkinson — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 21:19:39 +0000

Seeing as how it's Burns Night tonight, here's a bit more information on my latest website launch at work.

Last year, BBC Radio Scotland commissioned a project to record of all Robert Burns's works. My job was to publish them as a permanent online archive: The Complete Burns.

There were already plenty of places around the web where one could read Burns's works, but these new audio recordings - by some very familiar Scottish readers - were something a bit special and deserved some thought to avoid the less famous ones getting lost or forgotten about once 25 January was over for another year.

Metadata

With over 600 works to Burns's name, adding value to the website had to start right at the beginning of the project to avoid a nightmare. What sort of value? Data about the works themselves: they year it was written; whether it's a poem or a song; what sort of themes it discusses; links to related resources elsewhere online; and many many more.

We were determined not to write any new content management software, but were equally mindful that those entering this data were not used to seeing or working with any sort of interweb-style markup. Eventually, we realised that the answer was good old-fashioned XML, conveniently edited in - of all things - Microsoft Word, which does a fine job of turning anything between < and > into friendly purple flags.

Generating our pages then became as simple as running the XML through a selection of XSL templates before checking and publishing. With all this data at our fingertips and the freedom to generate any number of outputs, our thoughts turned to exactly what to make.

Nice URLs

For now, we've kept ways of discovering Burns's works pretty simple:-

Alphabetical listings (a bunch of text links - woohoo!);
Lists by reader (pretty picture of famous people - check!);
Lists by year (and a pretty graph to finish - yay!).

From the outset, we tried to use simple, guessable URLs. For example, listing works from 1785 is as obvious as ... works/years/1785/; a list of epitaphs would be ...works/types/epitaph/; and an individual work is simple: ... works/a_mans_a_man_for_a_that/.

In abiding by the principles of semantic markup, easy & permanent URLs and plenty of juicy linked data, my hope is that visitors come for the famous stuff and manage to lose themselves in a breadth of unexplored masterpieces.

Other than the publishing of even more than the 100 works already live, the future may also see additional navigational pathways (by location or theme, perhaps) and the release of the metadata in its raw XML form for other developers to play with.

You may also have noticed in the news that Prince Charles has contributed two readings. He insisted on involving himself in an earlier project of mine, too. I'm going to have to take out a restraining order at this rate...

Negotiable instruments

Tom Hodgkinson — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:23:51 +0000

Man pays fine with toilet paper (from Metro Weird) has finally given me an excuse to link to what is possibly my favourite Wikipedia page.

School Performance/ 2 weeks until shivery misery

Jenny Whitham — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 07:59:39 +0000

Yesterday we had the school performance, something that music and performing arts department here (aka, Mike, Sydney and myself) have been working hard for now for weeks. The biggest concern was that it might rain- although oddly it hasnt for a few days now, which is making it a bit uncomfortably hot. It didnt rain, we used the amphitheatre and everyone worked hard to make it look really pretty which it did (I took lots of photos which I will upload once I get back now) and the place filled up with kids, parents and some of the special invited guests. I was a bit dissapointed that most of the guests I rushed around town madly to invite didnt come , although some texted their apologies, and I know it was fairly last minute. But some people from the social ministry came and the guy from NATAAZ which is the performing arts society that host competitions that our kids take part in (and are 3rd in the whole of Zambia in traditional dancing, by the way) so he got up and said a few encouraging words which was nice.
I don't know if I'd explained before but the school has never really had a proper drama club, so the ones who performed are really the school's first ever proper group- 16 of them ranging from Steve in pre school aged 4 to Yvonne who's 14 in Grade 6. They worked so hard in the final few days to learn all their lines and even put in improvised lines and made bits up, and they were so entertaining. Everything I'd worried about them not maybe understanding the play I'd written for them ('The Crazy Mayor of Livingstone') fell away as they completely got it and made it really funny, the audience said they really enjoyed it. The dancing was as amazing as ever, the kids look so good in all their outfits and traditional paint on face and stuff, and they can sure move!!! The school band, well, Adelaide would be so damn proud of them. They had worked so hard and I think there was about 17 in the band at the end, singers, keyboards, guitars and drums. Mike and I played onstage with them too and he brought a PA system which was actually really helpful as the kids had been straining their voices a little, it certainly helped the keyboards too to carry the sound (a PA system AND a performing arts department, this school is the luckiest for hundreds of miles) but all the kids did such an amazing job and I was so happy to have been able to come here and be part of all this.
So, in two weeks time I'll be sitting in Heathrow, hopefully eating croissant first thing in the morning with Kate if she get pop by still and be a bit darn cold as its 33 C here and 0C in the UK. Although last night I just COULD NOT get to sleep, I even ended up annoying myself, which is bad. I had grabbed Gordon Ramsay's dreadful autobiography but even that didnt help me to get to sleep. And it's a really crap book. REALLY crap (the last book I read was Lucky Jim, that is a good book)
I've learnt alot of things from being out here, which I'll try and write about when I get back. But I know that I couldnt have done this when I was younger, and that it was exactly the right time in my life to come out here. I don't know how I'll cope leaving, as the kids have made a huge impact on my life.
I spent this morning making animal ears for the nativity play we are doing at the kids party at the end of the week, I need to finish the costumes too but have lots of willing kids to help out, they are just going through exam results now and the next few days have lots of time. We are also going to sing lots of carols (this school LOVES to sing) to practise them for the party.

Church

Jenny Whitham — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 13:03:57 +0000

This weekend I did alot of playing the violin in a church! Daphe who is a friend of Vanessa's and owns a big fabric shop here in Livingstone had a spare violin and invited me along to play. I don't know the ins and outs of what exactly is 'New Apostlic' but they do hymns and sermons and stuff so a bit like Methodist which I what I grew up with. I was shocked to enter the rehearsal and find a HUGE choir of over a 100 people, and an orchestra of about 30, complete with violins, violas, cellos, clarinets, flutes and brass!!! They had all come from Livingstone area but we were using a church in Danwbe which is just off from the town centre. It was a huge church, bout the size of the C of E one that was atttached to my primary school. The orchestra knocked the socks off any other church orchestra I've come across in the UK (up yours, first world) and the violin playing was REALLY GOOD, even though they'd only been learning for EIGHT YEARS!!! I could not believe it, you see, when people tell you to practise for hours that's how advanced you can be in a short space of time. We did a bit of jamming being practise too, it was lovely to play 'oh danny boy' in the exact same key as I usually play it. The service today was PACKED, most of the congregation had to stand outside (and in the rain, that's dedication for you) as the choir had pretty much taken over the entire church anyway, The singing was stunning , really beautiful and we say a nice arrangement of 'Panus Angelicus' or whatever its called but with religious texts. The 'district apostle' as they call them visited from his base up north and did a lovely sermon, with jokes and everything, luckily I got them because it was all in english. Plus I feel like a local now after understanding the joke about 'Plan B', something Zambians always refer to (there's always a Plan B for everything apparently) it was quite a formal service with everyone in black and white who was performing but it was really sweet and despite having to get up really early in the morning , I enjoyed it. It's really strange as I was the only white person (token M'Zunga as they say here) but I don't even notice that any more. People are very friendly and welcoming. They are preparing for a bigger concert for the BIG CHIEF (he's called the chief apostle) who is the equivilant to the Pope basically in this section of the church, which they are all very excited about in a few weeks time so I will hopefully go with Daphe to the concert. She said theyll be EVEN MORE musicians. Blimey.

It's been raining tons here again, all through the night but then gorgeous sunshine in the afternoon, such crazy weather.

Only two more weeks left until school closes so a VERY busy week this week. Still rehearsing the play that I wrote my drama kids, doing about 4 songs with the school band and some poetry about World Aids Day (which is also 1st December) with Innocent and Esther who are poetry whizzes. Also, now bought all the material for the costumes for the Nativity which we are performing at the christmas party on the last day of school, going to rope in some of the teachers to help me with that as I've got my hands full!!

Chobe National Park, Botswana and Skype-ing with the school band

Jenny Whitham — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 11:34:03 +0000

On Saturday , me and Leo (who is here working with a german development agency and is a lovely man) and two other girls from Germany who were travelling around Africa, took at trip to Chobe National Park in Botswana, just across the border from Zambia. I was very excited although it did mean getting up very early- we got driven down to the Pontoon ferry to get a lift over the very short river crossing. Its crazy down by the Pontoon crossing, people everywhere and huge queues of lorries- they can only fit on 1 lorry at a time so I have no idea how long people wait. It's free to enter Botswana, unlike Zimbawe- at the Pontoon ferry you can see Zimbawe, Namibia too, where the four of them meet.
Took a game drive first through the park, our enthusiastic driver wanting to show us as much as possible. The park is HUGE, I don't know facts and figures but its a lot bigger than Glasgow Green and Golden Acre Park put together. There were Impala's everywhere, a common animal in this part of Africa but also different types of deer too, the Pukoo (probably wrong spelling) which is only kept in this park and other types. It was the shock of being so close to the elephants that got me- really amazing. They don't attack cars or even seem to mind them (seen as our car was one of those open sided ones, that was a lucky thing) - it was a hot day so quite alot of elephants were down at the riverside. Which was great on the afternoon boat trip. Saw crocs too, quite and un nervingly near to the boat, and hippos (what a crabby animal that is) , lots of beautiful birds, warthogs and their babies but no giraffes or lions. The park has lions but they tend to hide much further inside the bush, off the tracks, probably to avoid tourists pointing their cameras and shouting 'oooh look there's a lion, roaaarrrrr' and other bad impressions.

Friday at school we brought all the instruments into the computer room to send a performance via Skype to the UK- Adelaide found us on the Skype which was so exciting, the connection was a bit dodgy but we could all see her, and her family and we played her 'Lord I lift your name on high' - when I saw Ads crying I started too, pretty emotional. Hopefully we can try it again with better sound quality next time, or I may try film it with the camera and put it on YouTube. We had 14 of the kids here, the full school band and I was so proud of them. They were AMAZING. Such a talented bunch.
Tried to Skype to my folks too but the connection went down, all they got was a echoey sound, huge shame.

Last night the rain fell on my head through the ceiling in the night so I crawled into another dorm in middle of the night so I could get some sleep, although I was already a bit soggy. The storms have pulled down the power cable to the school and our houses here, so we have no power and no water which has meant afternoon activities are cancelled and the school were only able to feed the younger kids which is really sad. I guess its cheese sandwiches for tea then.....

Very excited about my nativity play we are doing last week of term now Ive written it all out. Chosen two of the best readers in Grade 5 and 6 to narrate and have to get material to make costumes now! One of the Grade 8's (who left last year) Mischeck who goes to St Raphaels will come and help me that week, which is fantastic. He even offered to help make the costumes, hurrah!

Books i have read so far and offers of a pet monkey

Jenny Whitham — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 14:08:21 +0000

Someone was just telling me that their friend had a pet monkey- apparently you can buy them for 100,000 kwcha which is CHEAP, its 6,000 kwcha to the pound. Actually, I don't really know what the going rate for a monkey should be (and also what brand, i mean 'type of' the monkey is) but I've been told that if I want one for my remaining 5 weeks, its only a phone call away......this place is nuts.

I've read ALOT of books since I've been here which doesnt neccessarily mean I'm having a naff time its just that you can get alot done without a tv or radio (thank god I'm missing the X Factor) here's a list in case anyone fancies reading them, Ive already sent this to my book group back 'ome;

Sushi for Beginners (Marian Keyes) fluffy and quite predictable. Good to read on a holiday or when you are poorly. A women's book

Catch 22 (by,erm,can't remember) Took me a while to get into, but its good, if not a little confusing. Read it, its a bit like Thomas Pychon, you want to throw it on the floor when you've finished

Belching out the devil (Mark Thomas) UK's version of Michael Moore takes on Coca Cola. It's very good and deals with the way Coca Cola are quite an evil company, threatening and even killing workers who join unions in South America and also how they managed to leave an entire community without a water supply in India. I didnt drink Coke for a whole week after reading it.

Ps I Love you (Cecila Ahern, I think, daughter of Bertie, related to some Westlife dude too) This was from the bookswap at JollyBoys which is EXCELLENT but am not sure why I picked it as I wouldnt have watched the film they made out of it in a millon years (a girly sob fest bollocks) it didnt take me long to read it. Don't read this book.

Bad Karma (cant remember who wrote this) book about a girl who goes off travelling to South East Asia with her mate, they go to all the dodgy bits and its quite an easy read but enjoyable. I read it during my stomach bug days when all I could manage was lying in bed- I thought Heather had bought me this book but she hadnt. So thank you to whoever bought me it. It made me want to do ALOT of travelling.

Personality (Andrew o Hagan) I wanted to read his stuff after going to a Q+A he did last year at Edinburgh Book Fest, he's quite connected to London Review of books - i thought it was going to be alot more heavy going than the book actually was but it was written beautifully, really nice characters and NOT a predictable ending , so I liked this book quite alot. I hope some of his others show up in the bookswap here else I would like some of his stuff for xmas please.

Dont Look Back (MILLS AND BOON) - Jo bought me this for my trip. Jo- I love you dearly but this book must have been written by a total muppet. Surprisingly though, there was no sex until page 71.

Currently reading 'The Devil Wears Prada' which, so far, is rather good.

In other news-SCHOOL WAS GREAT when I managed to get in this week when I wasnt keeling over and almost passing out, especially yesterday , Dad set up Skype and I got some of the kids to say hi to him and Mum, the kids loved it and it was nice to chat. One of my music kids Malambo said (unprompted) that he was really happy I was here helping them with their music stuff (less said about my social studies/ mime classes) which kinda makes it worth it when I know the kids are actually enjoying my presence rather than wishing I wasnt there. They also met Everisto, our head boy and all round wonderkid, Bright my 12 yr old neighbour (who, bizarrely, asked me to bring him back a present from town this weekend- he must think Im some kind of Yorkshire Santa) , little Steve, Hope, Mutinta, Soniya and Febian (some of my drama kids)

An election, a bug, a back, a zebra and many many interesting characters...

Jenny Whitham — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 10:02:29 +0000

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7704859.stm
Thursday was election day in Zambia. Excitement has been mounting ever since I've been here, people reading newspapers on the street early in the mornings, rumours flying about corruption and policies and there was a brief tear gas incident last Tuesday in the town. As in the article above, the results were announced yesterday and THANKFULLY Rupiah Banda got it, rather than PF (Patriotic Front, with a leader more offensive than Alex Salmond) who would have turned Zambia into Zimbabwe, possibly.

So, back to last Wednesday, I packed some things and headed back into town after school to Jollyboys- Helen from Manchester who I'd met on my flight here and hung out with at the start of my trip had emailed to say she was returning from her 3 week mud-hut building project so we met up and caught up on the last few weeks. The kayakers had left in their truck which DID eventually turn up, Steven the kindest South African in the world was also back from fishing and the wedding party were still revelling. So nice to see some familiar faces. Stayed up late Wednesday singing with some guy and a guitar which was nice and relaxed. Thursday everything in town was shut, and Helen and I were trying to avoid the cottage pie option for dinner so I headed to a market quite far away in the middle of a field (which , as it turned out, was also an open sewer, mmm) where I also bought a cheap white sheet for my zebra outfit. Bumped into Mike music teacher who was out and about voting and had a very random squashed bus journey with an over excited older lady who had spent time in Derby, I do like adventure though.
Rest of Thursday was spent catching the Jollyboys bug that was sweeping the place- effecting those who had been spending too much time there the most. And we still suspect the cheese toasties were involved. Was very, VERY poorly, had nothing left in my body by tea time and couldnt eat a thing. Played cards with Helen and Olly (amazingly fantastic Irish man with a wicked sense of humour) and didnt stay up late...
Friday was Halloween party, but I literally woke to find I could hardly move. I felt SO poorly still and drank alot of water. Had about 5 cold showers to try and shift the sweats and then gave up and drank some red bull with a crazy woman with one lung. Helen had caught bug too- just in time for her flight back to the UK.....nasty.
The Jollyboys staff put on traditional dancing entertainment for us at night, I couldnt manage food STILL so sat swaying in my feeble state whilst I watched it. Then we all got dressed in our costumes (pictures to follow) and headed to Fez Bar- I have no idea how I managed to go, but I didnt end up staying for that long. All the regular characters were out, there's quite a bunch now that Ive been chatting to- including Pete the man with a peg leg from Warrington who likes to say 'its not in Lancashire cos Thatcher moved the fuckin' border' alot. And he knows the most filthy limericks. Steven the south african and James the lovely aussie guy from my dorm came out to join us, they'd both felt awful too in the day. Got a fairly early night, for me. And most of the costumes ended up discarded due to the crazy heat.
Saturday was mooching around, playing with ball in the pool to cool down- and then mooching a bit around town. Had a quiet-ish evening. I think.
Sunday the RAINS CAME- not just rain but THUNDER and LIGHTNING. It was a bit scary.
Stayed on at Jollyboys for an extra night as was worried it may have been flooded, but apparently they didnt get it as bad in the rural areas as we did in town. Also we had sad news at the hostel as James the lovely aussie had an accident, fainted off the back of a stool and broke his back- luckily he was with saviour of illness Steven the South African who flew with him to Jo'Burg as they just dont have the facilties here to deal with that. Awful too because he'd been all over Africa, doing all these activies and then one freak accident.
I decided I needed to DO something Sunday so I tried to book onto every leisurely activity available- elephants were full, so was High Tea at Livingstone Island and so I ended up taking a HELICOPTER ride over the falls!!! I didnt realise the copter would be so small so it was quite terrifying but I got some amazing pictures and the captain kept pointing things out. Was well worth it, although bit scary when it rained.
Back to school today, things are going well although I still feel like I'm about to pass out. At least I havent had Malaria yet.....

Total number of Giraffes seen : 0
Top of Hippos now seen: 50
Rest of a Hippo seen : 0
Bottles of Mosi lager drunk : erm....
Sad good byes to hairy unsuitable men: 1
Welsh girls who think Get 100 is a crap programme : 2

Kitchen Parties

Jenny Whitham — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 14:09:58 +0000

Friday was Independance Day in Zambia. After being strapped to a lampost and made to apologise for the British I was helped down and straight off to a Kitchen Party (I might have made that first bit up...) with Choolwe, Iness and Irene who teach at the school. We met up in town and played 'how many zambian women and a muzunga can you fit into a very small car' to get there (answer is 8, 3 in the front, 5 in the back) and I swear the petrol was actually cans of Tab Clear which I recently discovered you can buy here. Arrived at Kitchen Party to total chaos queing to get in- now, I am not sure I even KNOW 300 women but this party had 300 women there. All drinking, dancing 'cept the old ones who were mostly 'tut-tutting'. We were in the lairy corner, Choolwe's relatives were excitable, and there was a lady there who kept grabbing one of my bum cheeks (Ive checked local traditions and its definitely not one of them) - the event itself took place in a courtyard of some kind, we all sat round like a football match style, and there was a makeshift kitchen in the middle. Then, the relatives and friends of the bride to be bring the woman out and she sits down and the man presents flowers. But as she is covered up it is customary for them to 'ho ho ho' bring out a different woman and cover her in a veil. So the whole proceedure takes bloomin hours. A few hours and more beers on, we were to present the gifts to the bride, and Iness and I had to get up and do a traditional dance that I was taught before I went up. Now, as traditions go, this one has to be more humiliating than most, we had to go up and you do this slow hip girating dance (readers of this blog over 40 may look away now) as if you are teaching the bride how to please her man. Cue embarassing ness all round. And then you kneel down and present your gift to the bride , unwrapping it and I had to say 'urm, these are some pots and pans, urm, you , urm, cook with 'em'. She probably didnt understand a word of it. The bride also has to sit looking down the whole time, and she looked sodding miserable. She wasnt allowed to enjoy it out of respect. I spoke to her right at hte end of the party, she didnt say much but was exhausted from not being allowed to enjoy it. Random.
Jollyboys was more than lively to say the least this weekend. But we ALL went to the local nightclub Hippos after I got back from Kitchen Party, it was quite fun as tons of folk from the hostel en mass trouped down to Hippos, with a mix of local folk too who seem to want to protect us all wherever we go which is very kind of them. So dancing, drinking and generally silliness until the small hours went on. Much of the same on saturday but with a slight hangover- chatting to everyone and having a really good laugh. There are some folk sticking around for another week or two and we are having a Halloween party Friday at the hostel which will be very much fun I hope.
Back at school today was good, but I had to take some classes with Grade 6- English was good but then I had to do a social studies class which was quite tricky, explaining why people should stay in rural areas and develop it instead of moving into towns. Not being a proper teacher I do find it hard but I think I managed to keep them quiet and attentive by doing impressions of pickpocketers and fishermen.
Some of my drama group came up to me today to tell me they'd already learnt their lines for the play! I am VERY impressed.

A few weeks on....

Jenny Whitham — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 14:18:48 +0000

It's a VERY hot wednesday afternoon...there's a PTA meeting going on (which I don't understand as its mostly in Lozi or Tonga and my understanding of either stretches to hello, I am fine and thankyou) so I've grabbed a computer.
Things are very busy here- the music teacher has malaria so isnt able to come in much so taking more lessons and planning for school performance next month and doing drama, poetry and random classes on transport and communications. I wasnt very good at the last one and the class had trouble understanding why I didnt really know what a pontoon was. Still reading every morning with Grade 5 class (10/11 yr olds mostly) and their reading is coming along very well, we are also doing lots of poetry which they love (Bears in the Night and The Crocodile by Roald Dahl which I'm sure will make sure they keep away from the river) and we will be writing our own 'animal' poetry next week.
It's Zambia's Independance Day on Friday so no school- today the performing arts group went to the Livingstone Museum (I visited that on Sunday, its quite good) to perform their dancing and drumming again, but I stayed here to do music classes. So, on Friday, I will be attending my first 'kitchen party' which is the equvilent to our hen parties back home. Except no manky male strippers. The man even get's to attend!! I've been invited by Chloowe who teaches Grade 1 class here, and two of the other teachers and coming along too- we are to take something that you would find in the kitchen and traditionally we teach the bride to be how to use it. It all sounds very nice and better than a piss up in t' town.
I am trying to add more photos as I have some of Vic Falls, the kids here and the house I'm staying in next to the school (which is very nice but I feel bad as I rattle around in it and I even get help cleaning it!) and the lizard who likes to stalk me at night.
I've been back to the Radio Station to talk about building them a website (thanks to Tom) and how to get more local people involved in the station. The station itself is very good and is randomly sponsored by people in Finland.

I'm also trying to read Catch 22 under my mossi sheet at night.

First few days at Tujatane School.....

Jenny Whitham — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 14:47:00 +0000

This is the entry that I wrote last week- it has re-appeared!

Tujatane - the Tongabezi Trust School is an amazing place. Vanessa (who built it, and is the director of the school) picked me up from Jollyboys on Tuesday morning to take me there,show me round and introduce me to everyone. I was really taken aback by how beautiful the school and its grounds seems, there must have been nothing there before, and now there are over 6 classrooms, kitchens, toilets, staffrooms, library, computer room, 3 teachers houses and Adelaide's stunning addition of the Music Room built last year. I have to say, walking into the Music Room I was taken aback at what Adelaide and Rob achieved in such a short time, and reading the dedication to Adelaide's late uncle William who the room was built in memory of really pushed me over the emotional edge! The first lesson I sat in on Tuesday was unfortunately my worst subject- Maths. The kids knew more than me, and in English could explain fractions and percentages. In the afternoon I went to listen to some of the children who study music practicising in the music room with Sophie who looks after the room (and is leaving the school in January which is a shame for them but she is going to study to be a teacher herself) we ended up all jamming together, with some percussion, some songs in their language and also English and some crazy dancing from Sophie and I. She can dance, I can shuffle around looking hopeful.
Yesterday at the school I sat in the Grade 5 class most of the morning where Caeser is the teacher and the kids are aged 9-11. There are some exceptionally bright kids in that class, and some who can read better than some 9 year olds back at home. We did English, then Maths (I could almost manage it this time) and then they did some singing which I joined in, and I can't now get the tune out of my head and woke myself (and possibly the other 3 in my dorm) in hte middle of the night singing it. I met Mike Zulu for the first time, the music teacher who is very enthusiastic that I've come here and has lots of ideas of things we can do- we played some tunes together and I sat and watched some of his keyboard classes.
Today we took the performing arts group to a competition- traditional dancing and poetry, The dancing was surprisingly saucy for such young kids but someone explained what it all meant. The poetry was about street kids, written by the children and performed very well. I think we may win the trophy, there were 3 germans at the judging table, they looked quite impressed.....

I also managed to fit in a visit to a community radio station who need some help, our Deputy Head David lives near it and presents one of the shows so introduced me to the programme manager Andrew so we are going to meet up next weekend and see how I can help them raise their profile and sort out their programmes! I'm very excited about this. Oh and also if anyone would like to build them a website, on the house of course, please let me know, they would love it.
It's bloomin' hot here but today someone asked me if I would miss Winter- you can imagine my answer. At least here I don't have to wear gloves and a hat- inside.
Oooh today was World Post Day in Zambia and the post office gave me free air mails to write and post out. That got me very excited.

Tuesday 14th October
More Pictures!

Sunset Cruise/ Top of the Hippo

Finally arrived in Zambia....

Jenny Whitham — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 17:11:25 +0000

I'm here.

After quite a long flight, some odd Bulgarian men who called me 'LADY' alot and some faffing Norweigians who made my fight from J'Burg to Livingstone late I arrived yesterday about 3pm. Went to the hostel along with a Manchester lassie who was travelling and working too- Jollyboys is lovely. It is very friendly (someone already asked if I was married=desperate men) and my room is nice, I was sharing last night with a lass from Chester who was going on Safari today. We went into the main town bit during the day, I wasnt sure what to expect but we got a mix of people selling anything they could, some people campaigning for the elections at the end of the month outside the Zambian broadcasting company (nothing like PQ- its a hut) and people just wanting to taxi us anywhere. As it was Sunday most of the shops were shut so we wondered back to the hostel where we met some drunk south africans who weren't so nice (one was very rude to me but I went to bed to avoid any more crap chat, apparently he sent his apologies via a friend today) but i had a good nights sleep.
Today I mooched around, went down to the town again and then booked onto a sunset cruise. SAW SOME HIPPOS but only peeping out of the water. The drunk Australians on the cruise upset a big Canadian family so wasnt too peaceful but it was eventful.
get's surprisingly dark VERY early here, it goes pitch black by 7pm. I'm starting early at Tujatane school tomorrow, so early night for me.
But let's just finish on this- Zambia is a very beautiful place but there is alot of poverty here, and this is from me seeing one of the main towns. Things seem quite pricey, and quite westernised. I feel weirdly guilty that nearly everyone in the town can speak English. There are 72 different languages people speak in Zambia. I hope to learn at least bits of 2 others before end of December.
xx

ALMOST THERE!

Jenny Whitham — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 15:18:08 +0000

One day until I leave for Zambia.

It's been a crazy couple of weeks since leaving the BBC nearly a month ago now, then spending a week packing up the flat in Glasgow, having some lovely parties and nights out with friends, saying some teary cheerios, then driving my 'life in a van' back to Leeds and emptying its contents between Horsforth and Rawdon. THEN I managed to squeeze my first ever visit to Howden to visit Natalie, a quick hello to Manchester to see my brother (known as the rat to many) and Big Jen, then to London to work at Whizz Kids (www.whizz-kidz.org.uk) to do a marketing research project and meet some lovely hardworking people (less said about the scary hotel manager with his 'no heating till October' rule) then to Oxford to catch a lift with Nathan up the M6 to Adelaide and Robs engagement do at their beautiful cottage near Dumfries in the middle of nowhere surrounded by hills and animals. Oh, and a quick stop (or 'tour' if you were asking Nathan) of Warrington on the way back to Leeds. Then a visit to Helen who I went to school with who has a lovely daughter Sophie who's just started school, she's just a lovely mini version of Helen and she just adores her new guinea pigs! It was in Mytholmroyd- I got lost on the way there and on the way back. Hopeless. Last night a dinner party chez Melissa in Armley. Today- shattered, almost packed and re-located lost passport (it was with my underwear, of COURSE)

I'll mostly be using this blog to put photos on and some quick updates. I hope to become as good a blogger as my old uni flatmate Jonny who has lived in Taiwan and blogged for years. His is rather good, Made in Taiwan
(quick thankyou to Tom for setting up mine)

Back to the last bits of packing and saying more goodbyes.....

Holiday snaps from France

Tom Hodgkinson — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 16:49:55 +0000

See the whole set »

New websites at hodgers.com

Tom Hodgkinson — Wed, 21 May 2008 11:09:19 +0000

Quite a few websites have joined the hodgers.com family recently:-

Karen Brookes: A beautiful hair salon in Giffnock
Presenting Property: Some really stylish Interior styling services and solutions
Craufurdland: A country estate specialising in ecological woodland burials
Bismarck & Herring Photography: The photography portfolio of longtime hodgers.com collaborator Steven Jones
Joel Kafetz: The personal website and showreel of the budding TV presenter