Outsider


I grew up in Northern Ireland and have been a teacher and lived in England, Ghana, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Malawi, Mexico, Colombia, The United Arab Emirates, Australia, Brunei Darussalam and Malaysia.

These are my memoirs which are arranged chronologically by year. Much is social commentary.

Aside from narrative recount, the style is often anecdotal, aphoristic and ironical. I try to soften the heavy social commentary with humour. Some friends have said I tend to 'rant' at times. I don't deny it! Perhaps it is the Irish in me. I apologise in advance then, if that is your impression too.

I do not intend to stereotype various nationalities but inevitably I will generalise for dramatic effect.

In a globalised multicultural world there is an urgent need to identify and face up to our national idiosyncracies and shortcomings. Nationalism has always seemed to me to be a bogus substitute for a genuine sense of connectedness and community. It is a highly dangerous concept when manipulated by politicians to get citizens to do things that are unpalatable to them-like going to war for instance.

If we don't begin to see ourselves as others perceive us - and not as we would like to see ourselves, then catastrophe looms.

I contend we can be comfortable with our heritage and still be able to criticize and even laugh at ourselves at the same time.


The two are not mutually exclusive.

Outsiders are in a unique position to show us our shortcomings because we simply cannot see them ourselves.

I believe that no culture has found the ideal 'solutions' to the challenges of life. Every culture I have lived in has both positive and disturbing characteristics.

In which cultures do people appear happiest? (notwithstanding natural and man-made disasters such as war and famine)

What question can be more profound than that?

The results may be surprising. In my experience, the happiest cultures were Ghana, Malawi, Mexico and Colombia. At the bottom of the list would be England, Ireland and Australia.

I think we need to learn from each other-not try to 'teach' each other...there is a big difference.

Please send me an E-mail if you would like to comment on anything.


Outsider


Outsider1952@gmail.com









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Sunday, October 4, 2009

The Mantras of Dementia?

Recently, each day when I wake up I seem to have a mantra running through my head as I dress, shower and have breakfast.

The mantra continues to play in my head usually until I arrive at work.

Today's was "Povo Skanks" from the Australian TV drama "Summer Heights High"

Other mantras consist of snippets of songs from my favourite musicians such as Leonard Cohen and Christy Moore.

It's more than just humming to myself.

I also appear to be doing odd things like washing the dishes before I've finished my breakfast and reusing them!

To explain ..I might eat my boiled egg on a plate, wash the plate, and then reuse it for the toast.

It might be because I'm scared of being reprimanded by my formidable landlady or one of my formidable female housemates.

Or could it be the beginnings of Dementia?

Does this happen to anyone else out there?

...Povo skanks...Pove skanks...
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3 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 5, 2009 at 1:23 AM

    Dementia? Sounds more like an active mind than one in disuse. My own is full of pop music fragments and odd phrases, many from television advertising - not so much the brand names as the absurd vocal poses that voiceover people strike in their line of work. I mutter them to myself like someone quite mad. A friend who lives overseas reported an acquaintance who was aggrieved by newcomers on his social scene - Thai guestworkers I think. He called them 'chink sluts', a phrase so brutally offensive in several directions at once that it made me and my friend giggle in embarrassment and still does. 'Chink sluts, chink sluts', I mumble... call me easily amused.

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  2. OutsiderOctober 6, 2009 at 3:59 AM

    Do you mean TV Ads from the UK like

    "All around the house , all around the house, spring clean with 'Flash'!" (a soap powder.)

    Yes, I have that one too. subliminal advertising no doubt!

    Although I am an "English" teacher I wish I had your command of the language.

    Your comment was highly amusing and very much appreciated.

    I hope you are making use of your language skills and writing somewhere where your thoughts can indeed be appreciated by a wider audience.

    I am reading 'Steppenwolf' at present and moved more by it than a 'Born again Christian' would be by the Bible.

    Outsider

    Thank you very much

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  3. DCOctober 21, 2009 at 11:24 AM

    Not dementia. It s the early stages of whatyamacallit - when you have a phobia about having to clean everything 50 times. Wait till you start washing the dish twice before using it the second time. then you will know irt's whatyamacallit. Trouble is I can't remember whatyamacall it. Does that mean I am suffering from dementia or whatever its called.

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