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Friday, October 31, 2008
Posted at 08:38 pm by aroberts
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Posted at 03:16 pm by aroberts
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Next Sunday on Wanstead Flats: Epping Forest Festival
The Epping Forest Festival is taking place next Sunday, the 4th September, on the Wanstead Flats!
I'm quite surprised; I don't know that this has ever happened down in the South, and I haven't seen any advertising for it, except that I happened to look on the Corporation of London's Epping Forest Website. And even then, the PDF is rather minimal.
It's nice to have an Epping Forest event down south. It might help to educate the newer arrivals that the Wanstead Flats is actually part of the Forest, and its fragile nature needs protection. Posted at 12:53 am by Gerard S
Saturday, July 16, 2005
There's a Drought, a Water Shortage, and Fires
A grass fire just flashed within minutes on the Wanstead Flats this morning. There's a drought in Southern England. There's a water shortage in Southern England. There's a new Desalination Plant in Beckton.
Don't waste water. Time to control the Demand for Water, just like in all the ads on the radio. The supply is limited, and even an idiot economist or a daydreaming scientist can't argue that Desalination Plants are the solution.
Posted at 11:12 am by Gerard S
Sunday, June 19, 2005
Photographer Clive Power
Creative Commons License - some rights reserved. Posted at 07:45 am by aroberts
Saturday, June 04, 2005
Newham has a waste "recycling" scheme all over the borough now. They deliver rolls of orange plastic bin bags to each household every 3 months. The orange bags are for cardboard and plastic packaging, newspapers, and tins/drink cans. You can't recycle anything else - not glass, for example.
" The recyclables are collected in a separate vehicle to normal refuse and taken to a MRF (Materials Recycling Facility) for sorting." I wonder. I worry that these orange bags are all being piled wholesale into container ships and sent to China and Bangladesh.
When the orange bag scheme was introduced to my area, the bags were unceremoniously dumped on our doorsteps, with no instruction or prior warning. Few people knew what to do. My next door neighbour, who generates 1.3 Wheelie bins of rubbish per week, can't even be bothered to pick up the orange bags from her doorstep. I myself have little to no use for the orange bags, since I hardly have much cardboard/plastic/newspaper waste, and the local street recycling bins are easy enough for me to take these individual items. So I'm generating a pile of unused orange bags. Which will probably have to be thrown away, in an orange bag.
Reduce, Re-use and Recycle is the slogan of Waste Management, these days. But "Reduce" doesn't seem to be getting through to the population of Newham, who tend to be more concerned with expedience and economic survival by their wits. "Reduce" has never really gotten through in its message to people for whom English is the first language, let alone to the varied international peoples of Newham.
I much prefer the saying "Waste Not, Want Not". Although that would probably not get the message across. Probably better to use both the following slogans together "Don't throw it away" or "Don't make so much rubbish".
Try to find a computer to re-use? Or used spare parts? Or just get rid of an old spare computer? Here's a nicely written intelligent article about computer waste. But where do you go to do those things in Newham? They say the Wombles, but I've given up trying to find out what is available from them. I think they call themselves the West Ham and Plaistow NDC these days, and their website seems a bit sleepy in the areas of Re-using and re-cycling. What's going on? The world has become so wasteful.
Posted at 04:33 pm by Gerard S
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Manor Park Community Forum Walkabout Sat 14 May
The Manor Park Community Forum (note they have their own sites now) has a Walkabout this Saturday 14th May.
Meeting at GreenHill Centre, 464 High Street North
Start at 10.00 AM
Finish at 12.00 PM
Route = The length of Church Road.
Organised by: Community Participation Unit
Contact: Stella Ikanik (020 84330 6311) Posted at 10:31 pm by Gerard S
Manor Park comes under the East Ham constituency.
The election result was a complete surprise. Nobody would have expected it. A Labour MP was elected. Here in Manor Park. In East Ham Constituency. In Newham. I'm not capable of sarcasm - I'm just a dumbass.
It's like football where there is ony one football team.
It's like a horse race with only one horse.
Labour, Labour, Labour. Democracy doesn't have a chance here, does it?
The BBC website has the most beautiful results and in case that doesn't live forever, here is the beef of 2005:
| Name |
Party |
2005
Votes |
% |
+/- % |
| Stephen Timms |
Labour |
21,326 |
53.9 |
-19.2 |
| Abdul Khaliq Mian |
Respect-Unity Coalition |
8,171 |
20.7 |
+20.7 |
| Sarah Macken |
Conservative |
5,196 |
13.1 |
-3.6 |
| Ann Haigh |
Liberal Democrat |
4,296 |
10.9 |
+3.9 |
| David Bamber |
Christian Peoples Alliance |
580 |
1.5 |
+1.5 |
| Majority |
13,155 |
33.2 |
|
| Turnout |
39,569 |
50.7 |
-1.6 |
It's nice to know that there are still so many people in Newham who will vote for the same party until the very day they die, no matter what that party does. It's almost like being in China's pseudo-communist One-Party State.
The big whoopy-shit excitement in this election was the "Respect" party. Respect, of course, is a beginner's option on how to deal with so many different types of people in Newham. So many types, that since you will never be able to speak all their languages, you can try observing them with "Respect", even if you can't conduct a more sophisticated human transaction, one that might enrich both of you in Spirit, Love, Wealth, and Health?
In a population which is less rich (than most parts of Britain) in money, education, inteligence, sophistication, and other Blessings of birth, all we could hope for was "Respect" from a George Galloway-led Party?
Honestly, if you're the dominant party (i.e. Labour in Newham), and you're going to have a protest vote, at least be intelligent enough to groom your opposition by nurturing them until they're an effective and worthy competition. Because that's good for everybody, good for democracy, and not just being selfish, selfish, selfish.
It's useful to compare 2005 with the previous result in 2001, which is available from the Electoral Commission, in a dowloadable PDF, which will tell you that the results then were:
| Name |
Party |
2001
Votes |
% |
+/- % |
| Stephen Timms |
Labour |
27,241 |
73.1 |
+8.5 |
| P.J. Campbell |
Conservative |
6,209 |
16.7 |
+0.6 |
| B. Fox |
Liberal Democrat |
2,600 |
7.0 |
+0.5 |
| R. Finlayson |
Socialist Labour |
783 |
2.1 |
+2.1 |
| J. Paridhal |
U.K.I.P. |
444 |
1.2 |
+1.2 |
Posted at 10:31 pm by Gerard S
Monday, May 02, 2005
It was with great distress that I learned only yesterday of the passing of Joe Hogan. I understand that it was over the Easter Weekend, after a short and unexpected illness.
Joe was a long term resident of Manor Park. a fine man and a fine neighbour to all. He was worldly, yet faithfully devoted to the memory of his wife who passed away some twenty-odd years ago. He was a helper at St Nicholas Church, and helpful to all kinds of people regardless - even if he didn't like or accept everything about them. He spent most of his life working for a large automobile manufacturer in East London, and refused promotions that were easily available to him and that would have given him easy wealth and power - he refused them because they were expected to be taken with corruptions and temptations that he did not approve of, ones that violated his clear sense of Right and Wrong.
He was industrious, hearty, energetic and full of life. He would fight, for example Newham Council, against apathy and complacency if there was something that was blatantly unjust.
Joe was steadfastly independent and himself never asked others for help and seldom demanded the return of a favour. But unlike some caricature of holiness, he could criticise people for their failings. He was a consummate human being - real, alive, intelligent, and as earthy as you would expect of someone who made East London his home.
Joe was Rock Solid.
Joe will be sorely missed, by myself and many others, and even those people who might have taken him for granted. There are few people about of his character and nature. They don't make people like that anymore, but as he was a model and inspiration in his life, I hope the memory of him shall in some small way remain as a model for how people should be, in these modern times when selfishness and uncaring are too easily left unchallenged.
Posted at 12:44 pm by Gerard S
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Posted at 11:43 am by aroberts
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