I must say I am an animal lover. Most of the time, I feel they are much more innocent than human beings. I am normally upset when I see animals are suffering. Lately an advert on sky attracted me. It was about to adopt a polar bear for only £3 a month. So I did check their website WWF. It is interesting and the amount of money is affordable for me. So I decided to donate £3 a month for these amazing creatures.
Basically, I have an old noodle bowl into which I put the 1P and 2p change after coming back from shopping. When it is nearly full, I go to supermarket where coin star machines exist. It counts automatically and I choose the instruction to donate for UNICEF and WWF in nearly equal amount. It is my regular thing. Cash amount is not too much, maybe £ 6-7 in total. But I think something is better than nothing. Here is the message from WWF.
Adopting an endangered animal is one of the best ways to protect it, and the whole species. You’ll be providing help to an animal in great danger of extinction, and making a connection that lasts.
You can adopt from as little as £3 a month and we’ll send you an animal adoption pack which includes:
- A gorgeous soft toy of your animal
- A fact booklet about your adopted species
- A print of your adopted animal
- A greetings card
- WWF’s tips on reducing your own environmental impact
- 3 issues of Insight magazine, with updates on your adopted species
Please visit WWF @ http://www.wwf.org.uk/index.cfm
Today is Boxing day, so most shops are closed. But a few shops are trying to clear unsold items with so-called discount prices. For example, I bought a pair of discount shoes (£55) from Jones bootmaker. It’s original price was £85. In fact, people are talking about Boxing day discounts much more than actually it happens.
Well, today I popped in Canary Wharf which is business and shopping complex in East London area and bought above shoes. I took a couple of photos as my hobby.
You may notice a CCTV in the photo. The news papers claimed that everyday, average Londoners are filmed by CCTVs for over 200 times on the street, on the bus, on the tube, in the stores and so on. In public places, your activities may be recorded from different angles all the time as millions of CCTVs are working 24/7 across the UK. If you parked your car on the double yellow lines or restricted area, nobody does not seem to be care. You would be happy as no police man and no traffic warden disturbed you. But you will get a £60 penalty notice in next few days. You car has been framed by local council CCTV. Definitely.
So a lobby of people have a concern about a matter of privacy issue. But the number of CCTVs has been increasing all the time across Britain, especially after 7/7 terrorist attack in London. Since then, all London buses have got CCTVs. In fact, I also fixed a couple of hidden security cameras at my place. One is for my car and one is for the main door. But these are not CCTV. I record only when I need.
This is the view from Poplar rail station. HSBC tower, Bank of America building and Canary Wharf tower. I just took this photo in time before ?changing ownership after credit crunch. In fact, whoever the ownership is, those buildings sprang up by means of British tax payer’s money, I think.
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Lately, I moved to south west England from West Yorkshire. It is Dorset. For me, I haven’t got a chance to explore it. Struggling with new job, new environment and new people. Everything is different here. Many doctors start working from 8:30 AM till 6-7 PM. (9-5 is normal working hours if we don’t have any on-call duty).
Basically, I can live in Yorkshire while working in a very friendly and flexible atmosphere. But after sometime, I felt really bored. So started checking to move somewhere else. I found this post which is really exciting. Chest medicine. So I applied and attended an interview. I was offered the post. I took it. As a consequence, the tiring business starts running despite salary is only £1000 different a year. But it is only 130 miles away from London, my fav place.
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Some thing about Dorset
It is claimed that Britain is one of the best countries in terms of making and implementing a good system. Take the example for British road signs .
Well, each action has its own reason. Clearly new British systems and laws have been emerging as these are required for British people. On the undergrounds, people are kept reminding by tube workers “Mind the gap” “Mind the gap” in addition to showing such signs on the pavements. Something these made me annoyed with the thought that what kind of idiots need such repeated reminders. Similarly, on the pedestrian crossing, you can see “Look Right” “Look Left”. What does that mean? Obviously, a considerable number of travellers are unable to look after themselves or lazy to check both sides, ending up in unnecessarily injuries and even deaths. As a result, those signs have to be printed.
A couple of months previously, I saw a 76 year old man who came in with the broken bones and bruises to the hospital after a fall. It happened while walking in the dim light after he went out with his wife at 10:30 PM. (in my old country , people with such age have been around with supportive children and grand children all the time). While his stay in hospital, unfortunately he contracted chest infection. Later, antibiotic induced diarrhoea happened and died after 4 weeks duration of suffering. Of course, there is a debatable wide issue about hospital acquired infection. But if that man with such age did not go out in the late evening, he would not have suffered such consequences.
It is very difficult to restrict the freedom of people in the democratic countries. But I suspect new law or system needs to be imposed to prevent similar events, such as “Old people no going out after what time without what precaution” . A few months ago, the government has already tried to introduce a curfew for some age group of youngsters in some parts of a city not to go out in the evening after a serial events of knife crimes and killings.
December 11th, 2008 :posted by steve.Who am I?
Sometime Britain is confusing with different names and usages. For example, many people from far east would not be so clear between the UK, Great Britain, Britain and England. Basically, the United Kingdom is mainly formed by four countries, England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Some Books say Britain usually refers the main island, but in case of Great Britain, more territories, that is, Northern Ireland, Channels Islands and the Isle of Man are added (Ref: Life in the United Kingdom).
But more logical approach of explanation according to a web site is that the UK means a combination of 4 countries. The Great Britain means England, Wales and Scotland. Britain means England and Wales. The name Britain was derived from Britannia. Romans who ruled and introduced the civilization in the British islands during approximately 55BC and 400AD named it “Britannia Major”. “Britannia Minor” was in France.
According to the book (Life in the UK), if Scots and Welsh are asked “What is your citizenship”, they will answer “British”. and if asked “What is your nationality”, they will reply “Scottish” and “Welsh”. For the native-born English, they will answer “British” to both questions.
I ask myself what my citizenship is and what my nationality is.
Could a kiss result in dementia?
The majority of people would answer “No”.
But according to the latest research in Britain, cold sores, mainly transmitted by kissing, link to Alzheimer’s disease, a progressive disabling and irreversible memory problem, which is the second commonest form of dementia. The DNA structure of the HSV-1, a virus causing cold sores, is found in the brains died of Alzheimer’s dementia. As this finding is based on a small research , more works are still in need to confirm the discovery.
At this point, we should have an awareness of cold sore, I think. What is cold sore?
Some facts are as follow:
- -a very common illness caused by herpes simplex virus type 1
- -characterized by groups of fluid-filled blisters on and around the lips
- -transmitted by close body contact, mainly kissing (involvement of private part if having oral sex with infected partner)
- -tender and painful
- -reactivation (recurrence) happened when body resistance falls (as virus could stay inside the body for a long time or for life long )
- -Zovirax cold sore cream helps to some extent
More detail on Netdoctor
I came across this interesting sociology topic, cross-sex friendship and I learnt a bit more.
What is cross-sex friendship? It is having a friend of the opposite sex, that is, a man has a female friend and a woman has a male friend.
Cross sex friendship is historically rare in many societies while partnership is better acceptable model. There have been many social territories where such kind of relationship has been prohibited on the ground of religion, tradition and culture. Even though there is no such restriction, many people would not need an opposite sex as a friend. For example, a man with a full of family commitment would not pay attention too much on his old and new friends.
On the other hand, there have been a few societies in which cross-sex friendship is well accepted as part of a social life. In this point, it can be seen that there is less discrimination between genders, treating both sex as the same.
It is suggested that it is a sort of social freedom. But it would bring some drawbacks. For example, cross-sex friendship could ruin the existing partnership or even harm the marriage life. It would force to stop a potential long term partnership. It is also inevitable that members of society often presume a sexual involvement. Further more, it is not uncommon that there is a possibility of the existence of sexual tension. Some believe that cross-sex friendship occasionally acts as a start of adultery.
However, having a friend of the opposite sex would have some benefits. Basically, one can get an emotional support which is not available from the same sex friend. Besides, it would be a very useful approach for someone who is meticulously choosing his or her future partner. That friendship could be transformed into a partnership at any time if circumstances are right.
To conclude, cross-sex friendship is one of the social models despite its variable incidence depending on individual person and society. Some one would create this relationship for one or more purposes. But it can be said that it would be an unacceptable condition if someone claim
