Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself....

This week I find myself in Madrid, the very pleasantly sunny capital of Spain. As I write these words, I am enjoying a very tasty 'desayuno' consisting of coffee, fresh orange juice and a bocadillero (which seems to be a very large chocolate bun) at a local cafeteria, restaurant and cervezeria that glories in the title of "El Restaurante Jordan Gala". Having spent a month shivering and quivering in the unseasonably cold UK (it's been the second coldest April on record, apparently), I decided that it would be expedient to set off on my peripatetic perambulations once more and head South for sunnier climes (as it happens, a heat wave hit Britain three days after I left - que sera...).
Madrid in the last week has enjoyed temperatures in the mid 20's centigrade, occasionally spiking to the low 30's if the local wall-mounted thermometers are anything to go by. These sort of temperatures just about qualify as pleasant for me these days – one becomes somewhat spoilt by the constant 35 plus of Thailand, a little too hot perhaps, especially when compared to the UK, but surprisingly easy to get used to.
The UK, at the time of writing, is caught up in an ongoing campaign prior to a referendum on remaining in the European Union. The actual vote is still nearly two months away, but the tactics employed by the remain campaign seem like an echo of those used to win the Scottish referendum of last year. At the time it was known as 'Project Fear', dire warnings of all the terrible consequences that would befall the Scots if they dared to leave the Union. The current EU campaign feels like deja vu all over again… every piece of bad economic news that emerges is blamed on the possibility of exit, or Brexit as it has become popularly known.

Unemployment was up last month – because of fears of a British exit apparently.
The growth figures were down last month – because of fears of a British exit.
The second coldest April on record – no doubt because of fears of a British exit…
We are told that house prices will drop, wars are more likely, the UK's security will be threatened, industry will suffer, prices in the shops will raise and every family will somehow be £4300 worse off by 2030 (a rather magical figure, as it turned out, produced by projecting figures that the treasury have rarely managed to get right over three months out to fourteen years, then using a completely fictitious method to calculate household income - et voila, £4300!).
 
It seems that anything and everything negative that happens in the UK at the moment is down to fears of a British exit from the EU. Oddly, the opposite effect seems never to be observed. Whenever good economic stories emerge no reference at all is then made to the possibility of Brexit being at the root. One wonders why?
At the start of the referendum process, and as someone quite pro-European, I was leaning towards the notion that staying in the EU was the better option. I was aware of the relatively peaceful state of affairs since the inception of the Common Market and was inclined to believe that at least some of that peace and prosperity was down to the sharing of the economic interests of the central European powers.
Unfortunately, the more I looked into the matter, the more I realised that the EU is an institution that stands for almost everything that I perceive as being at the root of the problems that plague our World today. One of the most egregious of these is the pernicious effects of globalisation, the process whereby fewer and fewer multi-national companies come to dominate the World's economy, usually undercutting and ruining local communities and small businesses in the process.
Two days ago, I spent a delightfully sunny afternoon in the centre of Madrid. I alighted from the metro at Banca de Espana and made my way up to the Calle de las Infantas. I found this narrow street to be thoroughly charming. I had gone in search of a local shop that specialised in juggling equipment (unfortunately closed recently – yet another victim of the process it seems), but found numerous small and very colourful shops, each unique, each very individual and very Spanish in character. I spent nearly an hour wandering in flaneurial fashion from shop to shop enjoy the imaginative décor, the shop windows and the goods on offer. For someone such as myself, well disposed to strolling through the World's more interesting cities, this was a pleasant experience indeed.

Unfortunately, it did not last long. Pretty soon I was in the Calle del Clavel, leading down to the Gran Via. This pedestrianised area was packed with the likes of Nike, New Balance, Starbucks and various other American based multi-nationals selling exactly the same stuff as they do in Hong Kong, Beijing, Bangkok, London, Paris or New York. The type of corporation that turns you from being a customer into being a consumer. The type of corporation that is killing local business everywhere. The type of corporation that pays rock-bottom rates to their staff and their suppliers, whilst at the same time avoiding tax whenever and wherever possible. Given their influence in the seats of government and in the EU, barely ever are they brought to book for their nefarious practices. All this results in an enormous competitive advantage which makes it nigh on impossible for small, locally run business, paying their fair share of tax and their employees a reasonable wage, to compete.
Small, as E.F. Schumacher pointed out in his 1973 book, is indeed beautiful. It is also somewhat more fragile, especially when opposed by the power of multi nationals backed by the might of trading blocks such as NAFTA and the EU. Such blocks reach well beyond government, well beyond the democratic process to impose their standardised, homogenised, de-individualised World upon us all. 

 
Such trading blocks are little influenced by notions of social responsibility or democracy. They are there to be lobbied by corporations and multi-nationals, often to the mutual benefit of the corporations and the likes of the EU Commissioners. As regards the EU itself, it is interesting to note,that the most powerful part is not the parliament, but the totally non-elected Commission. The politicians come and go, but the all-powerful Commission remains, unreachable, untouchable, unchangeable by the electorate, yet lobbied (often a euphemism in itself) and influenced by big business and the forces of globalisation.
This lack of accountability of the EU Commission is one aspect of the so called 'democratic deficit'. There is lip service to the needs of society, but when it push comes to shove (think Greece, Spain, Italy, Ireland and Portugal) it is the needs of the financiers, of the banks, of the corporations that are catered for, no matter how severe the effects of the austerity imposed on these countries are. In effect, what we have is a massive transfer of money from national governments and tax payers into the hands of corporations. The EU itself is at the very heart of this process.

Back in the Jordan Gala, I find myself enjoying the very sociable atmosphere  and the general conviviality of the place. The Spanish, fortunately, seem to have lost little of their appetite for good living, for enjoying themselves, for friendliness, despite suffering for years now under the cosh of austerity imposed via the EU. The effects in the smaller suburbs of Madrid are all too readily apparent; high rates of unemployment, buildings in need of repair, streets needing to be cleaned. Beneath this though, and despite the ravages of draconian and ineffective austerity, the spirit of the people shines through. Spain, like the UK, like many countries in Europe, needs to free itself from the shackles imposed by the EU or face ever more austerity and ever steeper decline in living standards for all but the select few.
 

Same old, same old...

This week I find myself feeling somewhat grounded, back in an old hunting ground which scarcely seems to have changed since the last time I saw it. I am presently spending some time in the UK and finding that no matter how much time one spends away from the place the same old inertia and ennui seems to prevail here. Life in South East Asia was sometimes frustrating, often annoying, even dangerous on occasions, but always colourful and intense. Back here in the UK, there is a strange deadness to proceedings. It's as if the last five months never happened and life has gone on in essentially in the same way as it always does in the UK. Moderate and mediocre, the UK feels like a wet blanket of a country that squelches those who dare to show a little eccentricity, those who dare to be a little different.
Although one would struggle to realise it, there is a general election coming up in the next month. I listened to a commentator on the BBC explaining how the choice this time was starker than it had been for many an election. He then went on to explain the choice that was before us. We had the Labour party, who advocated austerity but at a slower rate than is currently the case, the Liberals, who advocate austerity at about the same rate, the Conservatives, who advocate austerity at an increased rate and, finally, the United Kingdom Independence Party, who advocate austerity at the fastest rate of the lot! At this point, I find myself struggling to work out exactly where this 'stark' choice was, as far as I could see it was just a matter of how severe the austerity would be.

.A few, completely interchangeable, UK politicos..

Still, I suppose, that unlike Thailand at least the UK has a civilian government and a form of democracy, of sorts. And unlike China, you do at least get the chance to vote for a party every few years, even if the parties you can vote for are essentially saying very much the same thing. It does feel like a very clear demonstration of something the redoubtable Ken Livingstone said many moons ago: 'If voting changed anything, they'd abolish it!'
On a more personal level, I find myself already yearning to experience different places, different cultures and different societies once more. Spain is a distinct possibility, with the idea of spending a few weeks in the Girona or Barelona areas. I have had, for several years now, an ongoing love of the architecture of Antoni Gaudi. The man lived and died before the appearance of the surrealists in Paris in the 1920's, but one can view him as something of an architectural precursor to this movement. Oddly, he lived a life of fairly extreme abstinence, but his buildings have a joyous exuberance that has to be experienced directly to be believed.

The gorgeous, and slightly mad, surrealist architecture of Antoni Gaudi...

Spain is particularly tempting at this juncture because of the current strength of the pound against the Euro. Travel on the continent has once more become an attractive proposition. At the same time, and rather against economic fundamentals, the US dollar has become quite expensive. Fortunately, this is not too great a problem as the temptations of America, or at least the United States, do not exert a particularly strong pull on me.
I have, at various times in the past, spent some months in the US, but on each occasion I found the society to be one of the less interesting, dominated by commercial interests and a fascination, almost an obsession, with getting rich quick. I travelled through about a dozen different states, but essentially found that the same multi-nationals dominated wherever one went. A McDonalds in Maine feels very much the same as a McDonalds in Delaware (and, for that matter, anywhere else on the entire planet).
There was also an extraordinary parochialism to the attitudes of many of the folks I met and conversed with there. With a few notable and interesting exceptions, most of those I spoke to seemed to harbour the most extreme US-centralism, the notion that the one and only place to be was the US, and that somehow other countries were of much lesser importance. To be fair, I have come across similar attitudes in many countries, but perhaps nowhere else was it as pronounced as it was in the US. I remember one lass who wished to assure me that she had travelled widely. When I enquired as to where she had been she responded with 'Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington...'

A villainous selection....

Of course, and to be fair, the rather unfortunate effects of the influence of multi-nationals and globalisation have not been confined to the US. It was, however, the place in which I first became aware of the process as a day to day reality. My first visit to the US was some 25 or so years ago now, and that rather depressing 'sameness' was already apparent in many of the places I visited back then. That same process, because of globalisation, can now be experienced almost anywhere one goes. From a personal point of view, I feel that I want to go out and experience other places and other cultures before the cold, dead hand of globalisation has flattened the whole planet into an acceptable but very boring 'niceness'.
As I write these words I realise my own participation in the process. I am sitting in a branch of Costas in Buckhurst Hill on the edges of London. It is one of many such branches one can find all over the UK in this day and age. Much like Neros, like Starbucks, like Pret a Manger, etc. There are the some very pleasant non-chain cafés sprinkled about here and there, but they are largely swamped by the overpowering ubiquity of these huge chains. The lack of this was one of the joys of Thailand. The multinationals had infected the larger cities such as Bangkok and Chiang Mai, but in the smaller towns there were all manner of interestingly individual cafés. China was interesting in a different way, spawning as it does almost endless imitations of the likes of Starbucks.
For now, in this particular branch of Costas, I find myself spending time planning the start of the next venture. I am not sure of exactly when and where but it is hard to conceive of living in the UK for any more than a few months in the next year or two, the temptations of travel and the advantages of alternative lifestyles are far too tempting to be ignored. My own particular brand of flaneurial activity seems to lend itself very naturally to enjoying other places and other cultures. Such pleasures are so diluted in countries such as the UK as to be scarcely definable as a pleasure at all. I find myself longing for warmer climes and the greater intensity and variety that is available in other parts of this beautiful planet of ours.

I still love the occasional peach and gingersnap tea. Man cannot survive on coffee alone!

Text mad...

          Today my flaneurial duties have drawn me to the luxurious and highly impressive surrounds of a brand new Mall of four floors standing on the edge of the main junction into Chang An. It seems very salubrious and swanky, decorated tastefully with hanging sculptures dangling from the type of roof one that would have made Frank Lloyd Wright proud. Indeed, the whole design of the mall reminds one of the Guggenheim Museum in New York. No doubt this particular architect owes much of his inspiration to the genius of Mr Wright. So close are the features to Wright's design that one could be excused for imagining that the designer in question simply copied the ideas...perish the thought!

          Circumstances dictate a limited choice of watering holes in this monument to commerce, so I find myself taking an Americano and a glass of water in a franchise of a particularly global, tax-dodging American enterprise. Oddly, when I asked for 'yi bai shui' (a cup of water) the waitress proceeded, as per normal, to put ice cubes in the cup, followed, as is usual here, with hot water (the Chinese rarely drink their water cold). Very strange....

          Fortunately, this particular shopping mall seems to be equipped with a very efficient air cleaning system as normally, on this particular junction, one does well if one can refrain from coughing for more than three minutes. I have had the misfortune of having had to wait for buses on several occasions at this particular environmental black-spot. It could not be defined as a pleasant experience.

          Getting to the bus stop in the first place is a life threatening experience in itself involving, as it does, the crossing of eight lanes of traffic. The traffic is 'controlled', and I use the word in the loosest possible sense, by traffic lights. For many drivers the prohibition of the red light seems to be merely optional, for taxi drivers it is like a red rag to a bull. They are more likely to accelerate than slow down in response to such a provocation. Added to this, it would seem that no law at all applies to the bicyclists (many electric powered these days, silent assassins ...) and motorised rickshaw wallahs who quite happily proceed in the opposite direction to the main stream of traffic – quite comical at times... if it wasn't quite so terrifying. This trepidatious pedestrian feels himself in mortal peril each and every time he has the misfortune to have to cross that particular road.

          Inside the café, I sit and chat with a friend whilst observing a group of five youngsters, probably around 15 years of age, sitting around a table together. None of them though is actually talking to another but all are absorbed in the process of texting on their smart phones. This is a very common sight in China and, to be fair, almost everywhere else one goes in the World these days where these devices are readily available and affordable. By the look of things, these youngsters seem to be involved in earnest text conversations with friends not currently present. I often wonder in such circumstances if, when they finally meet up with the friend they are texting, they will then spend that time texting the friends they are currently with!?

          Apparently a whole new form of etiquette has formed around the question of the answering of text messages,  American youngsters in particular being prone to its demands. It seems to receive one and not to respond is considered the height of rudeness. The fear of being accused of such a social faux pas has lead youngsters to going to bed with their phones next to the pillows, ever ready to answer such profound enquiries as 'Are you  still awake?'

          Once more, it seems that the thing we think we own somehow ends up owning us...

          It is a decidedly odd paradox in modern life that seems to occur with alarming regularity: devices described as 'labour saving' or 'time saving' commonly have the opposite effect. Mobile phones were touted as saving us time and the need to be near a static phone – the reality has been that there is now nowhere to escape to if you have such a device (I often leave mine turned off ...).
 The wealthiest societies around the world are equipped with many such 'time saving' devices and yet the more they own the less time people actually seem to have. The opposite is also true, if you look at the 'poorer' societies in the World, the lack of such devices as phones, cars, computers, washing up machines, etc., etc., actually seems to magically leave them with more time. A very curious state of affairs.

          This paradox also applies to town and country. The places where most time saving devices are concentrated, i.e. cities, are at one and the same time the most frenetic and often least pleasant places, where people seem to be in a headlong rush to get ... where exactly?

          I take another sip of coffee and observe one of the youngsters now staring at the screen of his device whilst swishing his thumbs back and forth across the surface as it makes little beeps and whistles. He is strangely absorbed and yet at the same time agitated, gradually getting more and more animated in his reactions, his lips curling into agonised grimaces, limbs occasionally jerking to one side or the other in an attempt to control some process or another. One feels like telling him, if my Mandarin were good enough (which it is not) that he is looking at flashing lights on a tiny screen which is making rather silly little noises ... it really doesn't matter that much. I would guess the reaction would not be a pleasant one!

Wiser to keep my counsel methinks...

          This coffee shop is quietly efficient but could be located anywhere on the planet. Indeed, much the same could be said of the shopping centre itself. A mall, is a mall, is a mall – this one a particularly fine example of the flattening effect of the globalisation. It is clean, anonymous and ... completely without character, other than at the most banal and superficial level.  The idea of 'Globalisation' itself has become one of the sacred cows, much like such erroneous and socially damaging ideas as subjecting every aspect of life to 'market forces'. Its effects have created a world wherein, once one finds oneself in such a mall, one could be anywhere on the planet.

          As someone who considers himself something of a nomad, I tend to treasure the differences between places, peoples and cultures. In this way, it is sad to see the world getting smaller and smaller and less and less diverse. The whole planet appears to be settling into a globalised culture that is increasingly fast but equally, increasingly shallow and terribly anonymising. People reduced to being mere consumers, forever rushing around, whipped into a frenzy by manipulative and ruthless advertising, fearful that they will lose out on the latest 'bargain'. There seems (fortunately, only seems ... ) to be but one game in town, and much like the computer game that is obsessing my fellow customer, it is a pretty superficial and banal game at best.

          My young fellow customer has finally finished swishing away at his screen and now has returned to his texting duties. I have been writing for quite some time now but scarcely have any words have passed between the group of youngsters sitting at the nearby table.

          Ah, the joys of the dizzy social world of modern youth...