Dawn’s Blogs

COLD FISH POLITICS

By Dawn M. Sanders

Yvette Cooper of the Labour party asks: “How can we turn our backs on pictures like these?”

She goes on to describe the stories covered by the media just in the last few days and our reaction in the UK, compared with the rest of Europe on the refugee crisis.

Well, I don’t like or support Cooper’s policies, but at least on this one, she stands in parallel with Jeremy Corbyn’s view in the huge migrant crisis, which has tidal waved the shores of Europe.

It could be understood yet not forgiven, why the Balkan states and poorer economies of Europe are not letting migrants in, yet nothing excuses them being treated like herds of diseased cattle, as Macedonia or Hungary have recently done.

The rich countries, such as Germany and Sweden are taking a much more human approach, so why isn’t Britain, an economic/political powerhouse and strong player within Euro-politics, taking a more pro-active role in sharing in the responsibility of providing refuge for people putting their lives at risk to get to safety and sanctuary?

Simple: our prime minister is a ‘cold fish’ and hell-bent on the brainwashing ideology that, asylum seekers will take our housing and jobs.

As Cooper points out, immigration itself is a different matter, yet it’s directly linked with Cameron’s fear-inducing rhetoric; rhetoric which barely cloaks the cultural prejudice underpinning the steadfast intolerance on such a humanitarian atrocity.

Cooper (as Corbyn did last weekend at his rally speech) points out how the UK provided a safe haven for tens of thousands of Jews during the onslaught of the Second World War – so why the change of approach?

It doesn’t take a degree or political analyst to work it out…

ISIS, the bi-product of the Iraq war, have an educated and resourceful infrastructure; they have crossed borders to take over and terrorise regions – not to mention an impossible lose-lose civil war in Syria, and Cameron wants to “get to the root cause of the problem” with dropping bombs in a continued cycle of puppetting the US?

The Middle East has been a hotbed of conflict, political unrest, ethnic/sectarian tit-for-tatting for decades, long before the arrival of ISIS and their twisted brand of extremism; a multiple/monumental human catastrophe, far outweighing the Holocaust, which let’s not forget, has manifested into what is now the Jewish state of Israel.

Cameron and his neo-liberal/conservatism, is so blinkered by his own ideological short-sightedness of unrealistic immigration targets; intoxicated with the unfounded notion based on paranoia that: immigrants come here to sponge off the NHS, benefits or housing stock, he’s further handicapping the UK from sharing in the responsibility we have within the international ‘community’.

In fact, he has no sense of community when it comes to Europe or at home. Therefore breeding an “everyone for him/herself” individualist mentality at micro level, hence the poison trickle down affect.

I also liked Cooper’s call for communities (at grassroots level) to come together in putting pressure on the Tories to take in refugees in our towns and cities up and down the country

Why should the rest of the nation adopt Cameron’s cold fish politics?

If a ship capsized off the coast in the English Channel and people were drowning, there would be rescue crews and people brought to safety; how could it be okay to ignore the same thing happening to desperate people from the other side of the world, drowning in a different sea?

If it begins to be okay, then we’re losing the ability to care for human beings other than ourselves.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/how-can-turn-backs-pictures-6370089

BRIGHTON?

By Dawn M. Sanders

After Jasper went off with Graham (his main support worker) I set about getting my own ass in gear.

Life had been too full on and stressed for far too long and I was at breaking point – I mean, reaeaeally ‘losing it’!

I had looked forward to just striking out on my own after the botched trip to Wichita in May, hassle free, with only “my needs” to think about and not surrounded with Jasper havoc…

So, got to London and, had the usual night of setting the world to rights with Maryanne and Lawrence – it pisses me off that, they always walk away without me in conversation though.

Maryanne and I surprisingly stayed up till 2 something in the morning, just gabbing – was great.

The next day I had to jump start from a sleepless night.

I was on the train though, clunky bag and all – on my way to Brighton – the city by the sea and my place of Pagan roots.

The hostel I checked into, was cramped and, the gay pride party outside, even at 5 in the afternoon, was already mounting.

I took a taxi to what was supposedly the nearest Co-op shop to get a few provisions and, on the way back, the uncaged animals in the street, really were like headless chickens – throwing themselves in front of the taxi, without an inkling.

The taxi driver bleeped and swore.

I was too tired to really go out. I just wanted to eat something, get somehow reenergised and then maybe…

After the curry and a couple of glasses of red, I walked the lanes I had so many years ago.

There was a funky street band playing and the pavement was thronged with people; sitting at tables, walking stridently in couples or packs or dancing in front of clubs.

The party was fully underway.

It wasn’t just Pride, it was bloody Saturday night in Brighton, mild and with every horney bastard out on the streets, gay or straight.

I packed it in after the dishevelled atmosphere at the White Rabbit pub fight, where the guy kicking off spoke right in my direction after I shouted for him to shut the fuck up.

“Come with me you fucking pussy!” he said directly at me, several times.

I went back to the hostel, the kitchen was locked and,

I was surprised to find two guys in the dorm where I was sleeping – they hadn’t told me it was mixed.

Needless to say, the next day I changed hostels back to where Jasper, Josie and I had stayed last December.

Met my first assistant, Pippa and had a blissful day.

She’s a warm down-to-earth lass and we got on instantly.

I took my stuff to the 2^nd place and then we just lunched out on the beach.

I spent the next several days looking at areas, had a massage at the Dolphin clinic where I used to take Jasper as a toddler.

The same receptionist still worked there and remembered me – sweet.

I ate lunch at the unemployed centre – again a blast from the past and there were only a few from when I knew it before.

I walked through the lanes several times, but this time I was determined to check out other areas out of town.

The hostel was just as I knew it would be; full of good natured Europeans, but all they do is eat – constantly in the kitchen, so I didn’t have a chance cooking, fucking no chance!

I spent far too much on eating out, because of the kitchen situation, but c’est la vie…

The most striking thing about being down there was how much they’ve whitewashed the place into some corporate capital.

I really knew this to be what was going on when I visited with Jasper and my mate last December for Jasper’s 18^th, but I think I was trying not to notice.

It’s hard not to notice though, you can ‘smell the affluence’ – bouncing from the pavement like the summer sun and sea air itself…

I was shocked to discover the old café, the Brighton Bi Standard near the train station, hadn’t been turned into a Costa coffee joint.

They’re building a tower to look out onto the sea and I was told families would be charged just under £40 – just to look out to sea from a bird’s eye view?

Blasphemy!

The woman I spoke to about it in the pub said: “It’s getting bigger and uglier by the day.”

The tourist trap mentality has gotten more blatant and, I was put right off how much the place has out priced itself (and the poor).

It really does now live right up to its name, little London by the sea, just now stylishly sports London prices, from everything to pub drinks to taxi fares.

So am I moving there after my Master’s is finished?

Well, I will if I can get a transfer within social housing to one of the nice suburbs I saw.

I’ll have to learn all the cut throughs and back streets to avoid the unruly, sheer numbers of people out on the streets every day.

The last day I was there I did some walking on my own (or tried) and the old familiar yet infuriating knocking my stick out of my hand happened – which used to happen all the time.

I’ll have to make a case that: my son isn’t getting the right support here and I’m struggling to get around Sheffield, because it’s true.

But, Sheffield has many things going for it – despite its crazy layout, incompetent local authority and somewhat backward/macho-ness.

It’s gritty, down-to-earth and has good universities.

The main thing is, it’s affordable and hasn’t been taken over by young urban professionals.

It celebrates its working-class heritage with pride and has preserved its industrial history, again with pride and in good taste.

While life is full of big dilemmas, this will certainly be one of those…

The age old tug-of-war between north and south, just manifesting in mine and Jasper’s own choices – weighing up the pros and cons.

Me and a smartly dressed Brighton busker

YET ANOTHER GLORIOUS GREEN GATHERING

By DAWN M SANDERS

Josie (my closest mate) got here just before mid-day and, w – kitchen stuff packed into two bags, camp stove and bedding slung into her treasured transit van, she calls Trevor, then we hit the road.

I thought we made such amazing time, but then I found out she was going 80 MPH down the motor way – wouldn’t expect anything less from a fast moving, quick thinking lass…

Tickets checked at the gate and, the usual Green gathering chaos glimmered, but only a little, as there was a mix up with mine and Debbie’s crewing codes – got her in as my PA.

We set about setting up and people were welcoming and warm – was such a relief to be back in the field, away from Babylon and all its trappings.

Eventually Jasper, that strapping lad of mine, Josie and I went out to play and check out the music – it was all of course happening and fully underway.

Predictably, we got back late and collapsed.

Then the rain came, down in sheets; everybody knew it was threatening, as menacing black clouds hung overhead and the humidity closed in on us all.

So Friday was slow-paced, but fine. I was already knackered by the end of the day, but couldn’t pull myself away from the fire.

There was no space for me to do my massage, so Carole, the main coordinator of the assisted camping, tried to rig up the accessible shower as a space, but as long as I had takers.

Well, I wasn’t going to stay tied to the place, so we left it until the full threat of rain went.

Somehow I knew it wouldn’t happen and, it didn’t – next year I’ll just bring my own space via a bigger walk-in two roomed tent.

Terry and Debbie’s kids ran around gleefully, as did all the others – it’s always nice to see, somewhere where they can run around and be free, be like children and breathe fresh air, which they can’t in Babylon…

I needed a topical something for the radio show on Sheffield Live for this week, so caught a couple of good workshops.

The most interesting, was the Reclaim Shakespeare theatre group and their ‘To BP or Not to BP acts – exposing British Petrol and their dirty sponsorship of Shakespearian plays at all the high flying theatres.

I had a much needed massage and Friday seemed to merge into Saturday.

Was seriously spaced when I heard from behind me: “Dawn, its Rona.”

I turned around instantly, because it was the moment I had been waiting for – I had finally ran into the friends of mine from Brighton who I used to hang with and knew really well.

We chatted and hugged – they were really happy to see me and I was chuffed to finally be seeing them.

I eventually got their phone numbers – giving Mike a rundown of the journey I’ve had since leaving Brighton.

He said some encouraging things and I just thought, this is yet another sign, another nudge to maybe move back down?

It could be wishful thinking, but then the tarot card reading I had over the weekend was promising, but it was slightly tricky to tell in which direction it was encouraging.

I think the gist of it though, was I would have to decide, weigh the pros and cons either way, but the cards as per usual, were shockingly accurate to mine and Jasper’s current crossroads in the ongoing journey.

I had the card of compromise, the card of silence (in contemplating my big dilemma); I had a card called ‘we are the world’ directly symbolising my relationship with the world and how it perceives me, my son or anyone who’s “different”.

The reader said something about needing to be more grounded and he’s right.

The most interesting cards I had were of a dove flying out of a cage to join some doves overhead, which were already free, then the letting go card; the one I wasn’t at all surprised to have come up. It nearly made me cry, because I knew it was speaking to me and telling me, I need to learn to ‘let go’; with Jasper and probably so many other things.

Sunday came and, I hastily packed and then got ready for delivering the talk on Sexability.

I stayed in my tent as long as I could, as sleep was intermittent and every inch of me ached or was just exhausted.

There were apparently 8 or 9 people at the talk, with a few stragglers outside – it went okay and the recording came out good apart from Debbie’s reading of the article being a bit too distant from the recorder and laced with a lot of background noise.

In the end though, I was relieved and got good responses.

I hated leaving, but I was exhausted.

http://www.greengathering.org.uk/

MY DATE WITH THE DOWNTRODDEN

By Dawn M. Sanders

A few weeks ago I had a notice drop into my in-box: Social care in Crisis in Sheffield, it read.

I thought, hmmm, so what’s bloody new?

Then I also thought, maybe I should just go along, with all the horrendous breakdowns, half-baked communication from the powers-that-be – coupled with all the harassment Sheffield has thrown at me.

Then again, it’s all too complex for me to even get my head around anymore, let alone a room full of people, banging on about they’re not getting this, they’re not getting that; in the same way the likes of ‘Dis-abled People Against the Cuts do, any time you see them out and about banging on about, they’re not getting their benefits or in danger of losing them.

But hey, I’ll give anything the benefit of the doubt within reason and, something told me – I just need to go, if anything to be clued up about what’s going on…

After leaving, I wasn’t gonna write anything, it was the most uninspiring thing anyone could write about, but as a writer/journalist – that’s just life, so thanks for sticking with it if you get to the finish.

It was all completely predictable – including the fact that I was twenty minutes late which, didn’t matter, cuz when I walked into the room it was chaos, with people getting into groups, pushing/pulling chairs around blab la.

So, got into this group at a table where, I couldn’t really get a word in. The idea was, to write down concerns then they would discuss them all at the end of the group session – bit like our seminar exercises at uni.

I had heard a lot of these stories before: the carers are this, have had six or seven in the last three months, zero-hours contracts mean, they’re not paid enough or reliable enough to “care”, but then it went further than that.

The chairwoman eventually read out someone’s story about her mother coming out of the hospital, having had a stroke and the home care would have probably been better in a third world country, where they didn’t have the choice to be driven by money or the lack of…

The woman next to me was on about: her dad’s carers coming in at all times apart from when they were scheduled and, she couldn’t take a holiday or time off, because they couldn’t even be relied upon for giving him his meds on time.

There were stories all over the room like this and I thought, ‘shit! If this is what we have to look forward to when we get older, totally dependent and ill?

Man, I’d rather just be shot or drugged as a safe escape from the inevitable descend into a forgotten scrap heap hurled into a ditch at the side of the super highway, dog-ee-dog trip of life!

People spoke of not having a human being at their disposal, but instead, a city-wide alarm system that, just didn’t always work – a girl gave the example of, if she has an epileptic fit at 3 in the morning, then what?

As ever, I piped up about my lad’s situation, again which was too complicated to put into words or try explaining in two mins to a room full of strangers, but I felt the overwhelming need to distinguish between ‘care’ which is too flippantly used, and support.

I as per usual, turned it on its head, because my issues aren’t about an elderly someone not getting the help with basics to continue living a dignified life, I had to stress, ‘it’s about my 18-year-old’ who has complex needs, not getting a coherent transition, not getting a support agency who is willing to make their staff learn the sign language he needs; which seem to baffle some people.

Then I had this 5 minute conversation during the tea break with some lass who works in sosh in the community and, she agreed with me that, if only more liberating language was used, what a difference it would make to the prevailing ‘dissing discourse of ‘dis-empowerment, ‘dis-crediting and subservience, which people keep allowing to define their entire existence; hence, milking that victim culture…

Sigh.

The meeting finished and people kept chiming in, determined to have their say and, rightfully so.

I guess I left with a better attitude than when I got their. At the very least, somewhere within the dysfunctional machine that is supposed to make sure an entire section of society gets help, there was a concerted effort to see what was going on or how people were suffering.

It was all the casualties you tend to hear on the news, gathered in some community forum room in the middle of Sheffield.

Upon leaving, I kept thinking, Man, other cultures really have it sussed; people look after their elderly within large extended families.

It was mentioned though, how, because these ethnically diverse families don’t bang on with social dis-services, in the way that most white people do, they still get no support/communication/recognition at all – all sometimes coupled with language barriers.

I distinctly remembered years ago, an ex-friend in Brighton commenting on having to look after her grandmother: “I don’t want to be burdened by her.” At the time I thought, whatta crap attitude to have to someone who probably contributed to your childhood…

The whole system is a mess and in disarray, because our culture can get away with not valuing the life of someone who is either elderly, long term ill or just bloody different – needing more help in life.

I just came away feeling, if people needing help with just the basics in life can’t get it and are subject to a parade of strangers coming through their home; not really caring as humans and even abusing, what the hell kind of chance does my son have?

He’s young, complicated, wilful and far too often misunderstood; so the world turns.

WE’RE ALL SINKING ON THE SAME BARGE

By Dawn M. Sanders

So, yet another secret trade deal (if you can actually call it a deal) is snaking its way out of secrecy.

The TPP (Trans Pacific Partnership) via the TPA (Trade Proposal Authority) is firmly in the news and out of the bag.

Thank the goddess for the likes of WikiLeaks, because it’s not just yet another dodgy deal in the name of ‘big business’ it’s an outright attack on personal freedoms – infringing on individual human rights.

So pretty soon, the West in all its coy, covert behind-the-scenes manoeuvres, will render us all as held to ransom and dictated to as those held hostage in the Middle East – with Western-propped up dictators and unruly regimes.

Anyone with two brain cells to rub together, knows we are living under a fledgling democratic system, which makes it easy for vote-rigging/manipulation to occur, the minute there is threat of revolt.

Okay, so this is a trans-Pacific deal and doesn’t include the UK, but they’re all one in the same – we have TTIP to battle against – the trans-Atlantic deal, which includes Europe, the UK and US.

I’m confused though, the article referenced at the bottom of this blog, says it was narrowly blocked, yet twitter trending said it passed?

If Obama wanted to create a legacy of pumping life into the US economy or giving adequate healthcare to the poorest, he is unravelling it all for a last ditch bid for victory, as an exiting has been – consigned to the throws of history.

As cultural and economic divide is ever-increasing, suspicion and hate are rife and the cap on personal freedoms (in the name of health and safety or duty-of-care) are diseases spreading like devouring plagues.

I don’t want to sound like, all doom and gloom, but as I sit in my garden, with a warm persistent breeze, the sun shining on a Saturday afternoon, I’m also sitting on a knife edge.

Bombarded with plea after plea in my inbox to: sign this petition to stop that, I can’t keep up with it all anymore.

What about my own personal battle for my rights and freedoms? Sounds selfish I know, but with my recent harassment, yet again from Sheffield social services (or ‘dis-services) as I like to dub them, I just about keep my head above water…

Being a single mum and visually impaired, with a kid with complex needs – I’m cursed by the authorities three times over – no matter how much I try to count my blessings.

It’s enlightening to hear of all the youthful gumption and enthusiasm of the student Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (CAFC) but right now I’m debating my own personal campaign and starting a petition.

You know the kind via thirty-eight degrees (that people-powered thing that’s going on, but I’m not too optimistic and, would local authorities really become more accountable and think before they harass or bully people, just because they’re ‘different’?

I strongly doubt it, yet I can’t sit idly by and just ‘let it happen.

I don’t hope to single-handedly change the world, because it’s an ongoing, uphill collective struggle and, the only ones “all in this together” are those of us who constantly fight, fight, fight for equality, human dignity, a slice at the pie; all the things the pigs, sitting around the top table, take for granted.

We’re all sinking on the same barge, so we may as well have a laugh, make it a party where, we all go down having the last laugh and fighting to the bitter end…

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/12/trans-pacific-partnership-explainer

RESTLESS AT SOLSTICE

– BY DAWN M SANDERS

21st June 2015

Yesterday I chose to go up to Nine Ladies instead of the anti-austerity demo down in London – not that I could have gone anyway, held back by my son’s bullshit inflexible support agency constricting my life to rigid time slots…

Having said that, I felt: I’d rather celebrate the season, which is just as important to me as standing up for my democratic rights and protecting all the livelihoods this regime is determine to destroy.

Yet, I also feel so damn jaded after the last 5 years of going to demos, sitting in meetings, being a part of organised resistance, yet pounding our heads against a wall of stoney indifference, coupled with fighting utter disempowerment on a personal level, I decided firmly against the demo.

Even the day up at the stone circle had to be cut short just as the party was heating up, because I managed to stretch being out ‘til 7, but then was late anyway…

The other factor of course, was my PA not wanting to stay the night, due to her two small kids and being put off the druggies and crusty vibe of the last time she was there, all fair enough, but it just meant I was held back by people and circumstances I have to rely on, just to supposedly make life function in the way I want it to.

I can understand the need to be sensible, but it doesn’t mean being there, you have to be a part of the bullshit brigade…

I’m still young enough to party and go mad from time to time, but…

As it stands, summer solstice has blustered in, grey and, although not dropping rain just yet, there was spitting-in-the- wind when I went outside to rescue the sofa throw from the washing line.

So today I’ll get some writing done, do my exercise routine I’ve abandoned all week, have a good long bath, make my Sunday omelette and re-pot the lavender plants I bought the other day, but not necessarily all in that order.

I said to my trusty assistant/friend yesterday, as we walked through the woods on Stanton Moore, I just feel stifled and caged in. It’s been such a bloody horrifically long winter and I feel so hemmed in, held back and constricted.

I want to ‘get out’! I need to be outside, be among nature, clear my head and reclaim my sanity – well I didn’t go as far as saying that, but she completely got it…

So, we drove back to the concrete jungle of Sheffield, back to my cage and sanctuary, where I made a simple dinner for my son and I and sat outside listening to the pigeons on the roof tops, the synthetic ting ting of the next door neighbour’s mobile phone/murmured conversation.

The chimes tinkled in the gentle breeze as I sat in my back garden, but it was a far cry from connecting with an old tree with a network of trunks and branches, or a rhododendron leisurely spread out amongst neighbouring trees, with it’s bright beautiful lilac, flowers in all their magnificence…

Blind on the Inside

By Dawn M. Sanders

I ‘see’ from the latest news headlines that: the judge presiding over the man who shot Michael Brown, a Black unarmed teenager in Ferguson, Missouri in the deep South of the US, has decided against all reason, not to indict the police officer who perpetrated the murder.

Michael was just eighteen when he was shot and apparently lay for four and a half hours in the streets – having died from the bullet.
He was just a little older than what my son is now and had his whole life in front of him.

No reason has ever been given as to why the young man was shot so randomly – he hadn’t committed an offense, but… His skin was black within a hotbed of long-standing, deep-rooted racism running through the deep southern United States.

Why am I writing about this and why can I empathise with the plight and struggle for people of colour and open contempt for them?
Because… I’m severely visually impaired and, when I went to school and grew up in Southern California, in what could be dubbed the “post-segregated era” of the ‘70s and ‘80s, parents still didn’t want their white kids hanging out with the black or Mexican-American kids.
Everybody tended to “stick to their own” and if you didn’t, you were seen as rebelling or some kind of deviant.
I remember when my mother freaked out when I was twelve and had a boyfriend who was black – Rodney was sweet and, why shouldn’t I – I just didn’t ‘get the blind prejudice’ especially from a woman who was half Mexican herself.
Yet my mother seemed to subscribe to the whole ‘white is right’ mentality of so-called middle-class America – even though, we were anything but middle-class, as she raised five of us on her own on welfare benefits.

Growing up severely visually impaired, shunned in the playground, at football games or at lunch tables, I always hung just about where I could squeeze in, which was with the kids of colour, be it black or Mexican, or just with the geeks and rejects…
I always secretly felt: I could relate more with the kids of colour, because they had it harder, they were disadvantaged and many of their parents too, were uneducated as my mother had been.

I’m constantly faced with people who are “blind on the inside”. People look at me and see a white stick before a woman; people presume I don’t clean my house – that someone else does it; people assume I need help getting on a bus, even though I bloody walked to the bus stop; people presume, I can’t make a cup of tea in a self-serve café; people avoid speaking to me and stick to people they can make eye contact with; people presume, the only way to communicate with me, is by “helping me”; yes, I only ‘need help’ – not love and friendship like the rest of society. I consider every one of these kinds of people blind on the inside!
Just as Bijan Stephen wrote about: I’ve been refused entry to nightclubs: “because of health and safety” the all-prevailing excuse of the twenty-first century, on the assumption that: if you’re severely visually impaired you “can’t see what’s going on and might get hurt.”
Yet, these people: from nightclub managers, to policemen to judges, use and abuse their power to systematically dis-empower others because they’re blind on the inside, but clever enough on the outside to get to where they are: in high places where they can look down atop the hierarchy of society with a bad sense of vertigo when they spot any form of ‘difference, person of colour or something that doesn’t blend in with the mundane mediocrity that constitutes what is “normal or okay.”

Inspired by
Bijan Stephen:
http://fastcolabs.com/3039094/today-in-tabs/today-in-tabs-i-will-only-bleed-here

Our Lucky Children

Night before last I walked into our open-plan living room/dining room and put dinner on the table for my son and I. Then I heard the story on Channel 4’s Unreported World: they were talking of a school for deaf children. I immediately plucked up my ears, as my lad is deaf, I wondered about what they were featuring. The journalist (I can’t remember who covered the story) said how she was inspired – having learned a few signs in connecting with the students. I wondered what school they were featuring – then she finally said, Uganda, and I thought: ‘oh’! She spoke of how many of the kids had come from abusive backgrounds and homes, just because they were deaf and the only safe place for them where they could communicate at all, was the school. I thought: that wasn’t too dissimilar from what I used to observe at my son’s old special school in Manchester – there were parents who had court orders not to see their kids and they had either been dumped there with no choice but to be inevitably institutionalised. There were of course, parents who supported their children at this school, but the clincher was, they had to take a rigorous exam to win tuition into a secondary school for the deaf. For the primary school which was featured on the programme, I didn’t catch whether parents had to pay for it or not – I walked in in the middle of the story. Some of the children had English names like Peter – some had African names. Many children in Uganda are too poor to go to school at all, so I’m assuming the ones which made it to this school were lucky to have been able to go. The reporter pointed out how, representatives from the school scouted the outer most villages in the countryside, for deaf children who were missing out on school and an education – not to mention the chance for communication through sign language. When my lad got the place at Manchester School for the Deaf (now Seashell Trust) although it was far from where we lived in Wales at the time, it didn’t cost me anything, as it was paid for by the local authority. In fact, the school had a lot of money to provide each student with their own room, towels, bed linen, three healthy meals a day with snacks and some state-of-the-art technology and expertise for helping them reach their full potential. I got the sense that, the school in Uganda thrived on some basic input, but it went a long way for children who would otherwise be stuck at home, not educated and stuck in an environment where no one could communicate with them. The reporter also pointed out how, in many scenarios, children or young people returned home to be beaten and bullied, because they were deaf. It was often thought they were cursed, so they were robustly shut out of society. The situation in the west of course is much more subtle in isolating people. The West is more advanced in that: people that are deaf or hearing impaired will have good healthcare, technologies and strategies to make day-to-day life better, but they’re more likely to be isolated from their communities or taken advantage of. I had to fight tirelessly for two years to get my son into the specialist college where he now goes and thrives. The local authority and some from the local health board are what jointly funds the high costs of his tailored education. So, this moving story of the school for deaf children and young people in Uganda; the bitter-sweet story of, whether or not they were able to go onto further their education, based on an exam and fortunate tuition (which would more than likely come from generous donations) just made me cry. I thought of the children who hadn’t been found or the parents who couldn’t afford to send their kids to school in Uganda’s poor villages. I thought of how, despite all the fight, my son has actually been lucky, loved and supported. Of course we don’t know what the future holds, as he’s on the cusp of adulthood and uncharted waters, but his opportunities are far better than if he was in Uganda. So this is why, when I hear one of those wining toddlers in the shops in town: “mummy I want…” – it really gets on my nerves. You want, you want, you want, child; but if you only knew how much you already have, have, have…

Unreported World is currently available to view on http://www.channel4.com/programmes/unreported-world

The Survival of Newspapers

I was listening to PM on radio 4 the other day and interestingly, the topic was ‘can newspapers survive in a growing online market’?

I personally think yes and, the opinion of the editor and others working at the Orange County Register (Orange County coincidentally being my former hometown in California) agreed that the newspaper industry would always be relied upon and taken most seriously in the delivery of the news.

While the days of printing presses may be becoming a thing of the past, it was pointed out how: people still rely on the newspaper being delivered to their door.

Something tangible, which can be held in one’s hand – flipping through the pages, can never be forgotten or rendered obsolete and producing hardcopy newspapers would be preserved for as long as possible, was the position of one of the participants of the programme from Orange County.

Globally, I ‘strongly feel’ the hardcopy newspaper will never die. Developing countries do not have the same limitless access to the internet that we take for granted here in the West.

When I visited the Middle East for example, printing presses were still very much in operation – often providing job positions for people who are deaf, as they of decreased job opportunities.

Further to this, as we are all swept by the phenomenon of the internet, all it teaches us and exposes, how do we know we will always have it at our finger tips?

Sailing

By Dawn M. Sanders

Have you ever tried sitting at the water’s edge on any given shoreline – watching ships of opportunity, your dreams and aspirations sail by?

I don’t have to try, it’s my life design. I’ve been in the lighthouse from a young, young age – watching life from a distance – with the occasional visitor.

Watching how people mingle, faff, fritter and frolic with their friends.

I’m just off the shoreline a few miles, so I have enough distance between me and those who are considered ‘social material’; the lucky ones, the loved, the desired and desirable. The ones who connect with ease – oh, let’s not forget for one second, the all-prevailing eye contact – over-rated as it is…

I watched from my vantage point, with my insight and powers of observation, those crowds gathered on the shoreline: at high school, sitting alone in the bleachers at football games, while they all were everywhere around me, with their friends, their boyfriends or girlfriends.

At lunch time, the pep squad girls would chant their cheers and pep songs – in heightened American raw raw enthusiasm.

I stood alone, at my vantage point, an outsider, with my nose pressed to the glass of the social periphery.

In pubs now, in cafes, they all eat together – it’s like high school again.

They all float in on banana or row boats – chatting and chuckling to their friends, family, kids or lovers.

Oh of course, you have the ones who come in alone, like me – the single-sailing boats, who are content to sit with their coffee or beer and read a newspaper.

You somehow get that, their okay; they have a wife, partner or girlfriend at home.

As the ocean stretches before me, I’ve grown older.

Ships of opportunity have sailed past, all lit up, like party barges, with their coloured lights glimmering and shining – lighting up the night sky.

My dreams are hatched, I nurture them and grow them with care, but as soon as they form – they die; like aborted foetuses, whimpering in the wind, still crying out, still desperate to survive and cling onto life, desperate!

Then, then the dying dreams are ships – sailing into the night, fading, with green glowing lights trailing behind them; leaving a trail of glowing green dusk into the inky black darkness, that is the night sky and open sea.

I’m left alone, with no light and only the shelter of the lighthouse, surrounded by open sea.

The ships have all drifted past: one by one, with waving arms and smug grinning faces: “I’m really, really sorry but…”

“Try ‘that one, over there’ other side of the bay.” Says a business-like voice.

Or, was it the robotically trained, disengaged voice on the phone, from the inside of a sterile, stiflingly stuffy call centre?

Whatever, whoever it was – it was, it’s gone, they’re gone – along with the barge they sail upon and my broken, dying dream left in its wake.

The dreams are fewer and further between. I have little left to nurture them with.

My fertility is running dry, I’ve been starved ‘for so long’.

Before I was put out to sea, I walked a long, long dry desert. It was a desert which offered few oases, yet the desolate landscape is all around – stretching further than my impaired eyes will ever see.

As I drift on this ocean, on the island that serves as my lighthouse, with its confining walls and rounded windows to view every ship sailing by: my spirit dies; with every dream, with every aspiration drowned or choked away, my spirit dies a little more.

So someday, it will fall to sleep, long, uninterrupted, unpenetrated or tormented sleep.

And I can only dream of the day, where the dawn is on the horizon and my small, damaged spirit, can vacate the island and I can finally drift ashore, land, bury myself in soft sand and, not have to observe from afar anymore.