Richard Peters -in the Sai Kung Country Park

Easter Hols and Lethal Booze

'Tis but one day away until the school holidays -yippee!!

We of the chalk-dusted teaching profession, like everyone else, cannot help but count down the days -the release of tension on the last day of term is clearly palpable! Bye-bye kids (at least for two weeks).

As a kid, the Easter holidays was always a bit of a strange fruit -obviously a welcome relief from teachers, times-tables and sums, but it always seemed a 'reasonless' holiday. Yes, we'd all feel sad when listening to the story of 'pore Geesis hoo died... nailded on the cros... four are sins...' but I could never quite work out the necessity of these two weeks off school.

I mean, the summer holidays were made for you to go away to Margate, Weston-super-Mare or Hastings, and Christmas holidays were so that you had enough time to play with your toys. Easter, however, remained a bit of a mystery. It was always too muddy in the garden to do an  easter egg hunt, so was it made for us to shed tears watching Robert Powell playing a poor, suffering Jesus of Nazareth? Was it for scoffing Easter eggs or roast legs of lamb? Was it for going to church -a whole holiday so we could go to church even more? Blimey -a grim prospect! I'd rather be back at school...

Whatever the real reason, we blissfully entertained two fun-filled weeks with the Six Million Dollar Man without early get-ups, much as we as adults do now. Given the chance, I'd like to have the option of remaining in bed a few more hours. In truth, even if I have the option to stay in bed I rarely do so beyond 6.30, unless a taxing evening's enjoyment preceded and therefore precludes it. I think you call that ageing.

Easter remains a sweet time of year, especially here in Hong Kong. By now many of the trees have flowered and even a short walk will fill the nose with a blend of really delicate perfumes. I simply adore it!

Back in the UK it was about this time each year I used to make Beech Leaf Noyau -an astonishingly strong alcoholic concoction from the pages of Richard Mabey's excellent Food for Free. This old French recipe is so easy:

• Pick very young beech leaves (so young that they are practically transparent)
• Place in sweety jar with a lot of good gin
• Steep for a few weekx (three is best, or untiil  it turns a luvley green)
• Strainnn off the gin
• Boill sugar in water to make a sryrup
• Add a glash (or two) of brnady
• Bottle -if theresss abny of the sthuff lefft

S'lufffffly!!

Japan One Year Later...

The news pictures here and here that began to flash before our eyes were truly astonishing, catastrophic scenes we found hard to comprehend. Somewhat inured to Hollywood-style doomsday special effects, our eyes searched for truth in what we saw; the dirty, black water tumbling on and on across the fields engulfing farms, glasshouses, roads and cars, ports and ships, people –especially the terrified, panicky people. It was hard to believe.

It is a schoolteacher's job to educate and inform students about the world and ensure they are prepared to face the challenges of life. There is little in the job description that could help make sense of the Japanese tsunami of March 2011. There is little anyone could do to help younger people understand the gravity of such a situation and what response they might make.

Thus, largely in silence did I show students the footage available on YouTube and let them try to comprehend what was happening, the horrifying deaths, the innumerable disasters that unfolded as the waters kept rushing in. 

But it's difficult for children to understand, even with a video such as this, the true devastation of this event –that word is over-used, but it is the most appropriate. 

The exploding Fukushima nuclear reactor added to the trauma and made us all uneasy, as is evident from this article by Simon Parry. It completed the transformation of our understanding of a tsunami from Katsushika Hokusai's iconic, beautiful image of the Kanegawa Tsumani to that of the ugly, truly terrifying and unstoppable force of nature

The memorial video by OnlineSchools.org, Japan One Year Later, uses poetic and poignant visualisation projected onto whitewashed walls to bring to the eyes:

• 15,846 people dead and 3,320 still missing
• The restricted area around the Fukushima plant is larger than Los Angeles
• 25 million tons of trash now in the ocean
• Food is contaminated and people will live shorter lives as a result
• Only Hiroshima was a bigger disaster

It concludes with a last, perhaps more constructive image which transforms the devastation to something new and the words, 'The Sun is Rising'. In another time those words would be ominous –now they are perforated with hope. Japan suffered, but Japan is rebuilding –that is the message.

All the drawings are taken from images found on The Atlantic, that visibly demonstrate the transition one year can make.

Last Sunday was the commemorative anniversary. I forgot all about it –as if it had never happened. I suppose because I didn't see the waters wash away my family and my home I could be forgiven, but I did see the footage in all its horror.

It's never too late to remember.

Peace on Earth, good will to all men?

I suppose nearly all of us, and I'm making a great supposition about the blog readership here, are quite happy to yet again enter into that familiar season of Christmassyness which is all jingly bells and babes in mangers. It's a cosy time of year where most of us can be grateful for great and small mercies –health, wealth, family, friends, x-boxes and Harry Potter merchandise.

At the end of December, we are oft-times reminded of the needs of others and to be generous in considering those without. Back in 1984, I dug deep into my meagre pockets and gave all of £5 to Band Aid after having bought Do They Know It's Christmas. I felt I was doing an absolute good: them poor buggers surely needed it even more than I (even though at the time I was never so poor and five quid pretty much summed up my worldly wealth). Maybe my money helped save someone's life.

In this Chinese part of the world Christmas begins and ends mercifully late: in fact, the fuzzily-named 'Winterfest' lasts from about the beginning of December to a few days after Chinese New Year. Christmas songs are everywhere –in early January the supermarkets subtly change from carols to festive Chinese New Year firecracker noises and ubiquitous lion dance music. During this time every shopping mall and many of the tall buildings around the renowned Hong Kong harbour glitzily convey a decidedly un-religious and somewhat confused neon message of happiness without a meaning. Any symbolic significant or festive poignancy is shmaltzed and suffocated to death beneath a cotton wool and candy cane drapery.

Whatever your beliefs, the birth of a baby Jesus refers to a deeper, more meaningful idea about bringing hope into a dark, sinful, wintry world, the benign conveyance of good will to all men through the power of pure righteousness. But this is just too dangerous and revolutionary a message for our ruling elite and their supportive mercantile classes who prefer the current harmonious social order the way it is thank you very much. Thus, unto us is given instead a ridiculously childish Santa who spills his presents upon the worthy and unworthy alike –an avaricious indicator of society's belief in the equality of cash with personal fulfilment.

So, does the old Christian message heralded at Christmas actually mean anything any more? What do the seeemingly-heedless masses that do not profess any sort of faith get out of Christmas carols, sending cards and watching their kids perform in Nativity plays? It would certainly be difficult to prove that the myriad Christmas carol concerts held in every conceivable location is some sort of indicator that the attendees hold beliefs that Good King Wenceslas really did go out on the feast of Stephen or that Shepherds really did wash their socks and were visited by non-physical heavenly messengers. One could level the accusations that these outdated cultural relics remain only to pander to the overt sanctimonious self-satisfying middle-class attitudes of piety and that their original contents are now meaningless. But I would argue that the reasons people continue to sing and actually quite like carols, is they are so comfortingly familiar. At worst they are harmless –carrying with them that positive message of peace on earth and good will to all men. Uneasy indeed would be the mind that decided after hearing Away in a Manger the most appropriate religious response would be suicide bombing.

For most of us Christmas may mean family togetherness and fun, an opportunity to celebrate life the same way we did last year –especially the Turkey-fuelled snoozing through The Great Escape. It is also a poignant time to remember those that are no longer with us. It may be a garish, mad and often monotonous festival, but it is one in which we can recall with fondness other happy, simple childhood Christmasses. It brings the merriest cheer to those with whom we now live as we rather incongrously party hard whilst singing religious hymns. It also promises a future that might contain that elusive peace on earth and goodwill to all men.

Hmmm... I like Christmas.

Breaking Bad

I suppose we all have our standards about just what constitutes a bad person -a drug dealer, a gun runner, a thief, a murderer. We like to feel that we're doing pretty well in terms of morality and, in truth, there are probably few amongst you that would fall into the 'really, really bad' category. After all, there's been little need for you to break the law, the rules and the conventions of society.

Piaget observed that children under 5 understand that they have done something bad because of punishment. Breaking crockery, regardless of motive, must be wrong because getting caught breaking plates will result in undesirable punishment. In truth, children under 5 simply do not have the mental equipment or control to follow a coherent and established morality. They simply have to be told what is right or wrong. For many adults, however, the recognition of punishment still underlines their morality in the 'if no-one gets hurt then it's not wrong' line of thought.

Children gradually develop a less egocentric perspective of morality. They eventually establish morality as a system of moral codes in the same way they understand rules in a game like football; charity is good, selfishness is bad. In turn, children develop empathy as they become part of a social order and eventually have a vested interest in knowing the system that sets up rules about themselves and others.

There is another more advanced stage in which the individual sees that the rules of the system, no matter how compelling and coherent, may not always be universal. In this case the individual might chose not to obey some of the rules, not because he/she is naughty, but because the rules and the order may not be right. This, of course, is where great things are done, where the individual's role in society, in law and in conventional morality may create new thinking and codes of behaviour.

Breaking Bad, now in it's 4th Season, is a American series that deals with this issue. What is excellent about it is that the acting, script, production and characterization are excellent conveyors of the issues that surround the moral question of what would you do for your family: Dallas this is not. From the first moment we are drawn to Walter White, chemistry teacher who is diagnosed with lung cancer. The sometimes hilarious road to hell he starts down begins when his desire to secure financial care of his wife and family through the proceeds of making crystal meth and selling the product via one of his old students, Jesse Pinkerman. Being familiar with the method, but unfamiliar with the means of disposal, the hapless Walter and Jesse immediately get on the wrong side of the law. Murder and misery ensue and we are left in no uncertainty about the effects of this product on those less able to resist heightened levels of endorphins. The net result, indeed, is that the very thing he seeks to protect and care for is destroyed and Walter loses his family.

At the outset this might sound like a miserable thing to watch and there have been moments where I have felt troubled by the direction of this series. But, along with the immensely enjoyable acting and magic detailed moments, important questions are raised; can we really do anything to protect our family -can we kill, break the law, threaten others, lie, cheat and steal? The answers are neither immediately forthcoming nor easy. Leaving to one side the issues surrounding supplying drugs to a highly-structured and highly-individualistic society, as well as the moral minefield that rings legalization, the implication appears to be that public and private morality are not such very distinct and divorced things. Break either and you attain nothing more than unhappiness.

Many, of course, have broken conventions in order to reach higher goals. Religious founders, philosophers and freedom fighters have each been celebrated because they have done things the rest of us could not or would not have done because of our fears of punishment, rejection or death; Socrates chose to drink hemlock rather than submit himself to inferior moral subjugation by the law-makers of Athens in the belief that his act help establish true Justice, Jesus accepted death rather than compromise his moral teachings with his society's moral teachers -I'm certain you all have your favourite freedom fighter who chose not to run away and endured much in their quest for liberty. What is different in the case of Breaking Bad is that the higher cause (of caring for the family) is so quickly subsumed in the unbearable moral compromising that comes from making and selling Class A, Schedule II (Schedule I in HK) drugs.

We're half-way through Season 3. Season 5 is set to conclude this emotional roller-coaster ride -I'm looking forward to see more of what happens to poor old Walter White.

Babylon's Burning

By now we've all had time to review the pictures of London on fire and the sense of emergency this has engendered. The immediate shock value of these salacious images of civil disorder may well have been replaced by anger and even outrage -how dare these 'orrible kids be allowed to get away with it!

I'm old enough to remember a series of serious inner city disturbances that occurred in the UK back in 1981. These particular riots stick out in my mind because of the intense apocalyptic mood they created in Thatcher's Britain. In my early teens listening to the Ruts' Babylon's Burning, the rough and ready pop culture of frantic punk and stylish ska appeared to rule supreme -to walk the streets of London felt like skating on ice not knowing when something violent was about to burst out of control. And unless you were looking for trouble or were a teacher, you kept away from skinheads, punks, rockers, mods, rudeboys and the rest.

In truth, the riots of the early 80s took place only in seriously deprived areas of Bristol, London, Manchester and Liverpool. They were largely connected with serious racial issues of the time and served as a wake-up call for society at large. Measures for better social housing and integration were implemented, but it took until after the Broadwater Farm and Handsworth riots of the mid-80s for the hopelessness experienced by many in inner ghettos to be fully vocalised. Police became a little more cautious about using 'stop-and-search' powers that were rightly seen as discriminatory against black youths, the Scarman report indicated the causes of deprivation and the increasing prosperity of the later 1980s and 90s meant that folks were less keen on serious street protesting for political purposes. Riots still erupted every few years largely in response to social issues, such as the Brixton riots of 1985 caused not only by the death of an arrested black man in police custody but also at the perceived gentrification of Brixton -the Dogstar boozer was smashed up and burned having recently been refurbished as a yuppy pub: serious working class anger could not be assuaged.

What is significant about the recent unrest has been the way it has been portrayed. They have clearly not reflected struggles against an uncaring society as seen in recent French rioting in Clichy-sous-Bois and Villiers-le-Bel. Neither are they the release of years of pent-up hostility against aggressive policing or any other aspect of poor government. They appear to have simply been a blatant disregard for any form of law and order. In an on-line BBC article many-a pundits' fourpenceworths indicate 10 possible reasons for the disturbances including lack of fathering, gangsta rap and opportunism. These, of course, may be right and if you interviewed each 'rioter' I'm sure you would find any number of sad reasons behind their antisocial behaviour, but were it not were ever thus? The broken angry mentality of de yoof is a response to their debilitating dependence on aspects of a prosperous mainstream culture which they may aspire to be a part of, but because of a lack of personal ability, competency, race or opportunity will always be beyond their attainment. Even the politicians knick stuff and claim it on expenses, so why not go and grab it?

Two girls interviewed by the BBC's Leana Hosea on the street said that rioting was "good fun" and that it was the "government's fault". They were showing the police "we can do what we want". And the targeting local businesses was a targeting of 'rich people', clearly seen as another cause of why all this has happened. At no point did they question their means or motives -the enjoyment of being beyond the control of society's conventions, the prized looting of shops and the wreckage done to other people's property were merit alone.

So when society finally does take notice, through the smoke of burnt-out shops, does it expect anything from these disaffected yoofs? Not really. Take, for example, Daytime TV with a succession of prosperity-linked programming such as Homes under the Hammer, Cash in the Attic, Bargain Hunt and A Place in the Sun and the increasing number of teleshopping channels. These may, of course, be what people want to see on TV, but they also imply that anyone without the ability to do these things (the vast majority of the daytime TV audience) are failures and therefore not as good as the rest of us. Wayne and Waynettat Slob can stay in their council houses and 'smoke fags'. The angry underclass of have-nots therefore have nothing to lose taking from the smug haves -all they needed is the opportunity for a bit of class war in the shops.

Riots from ancient Rome and Byzantium to the Boston Tea Party are nothing new. What is new is the way each sensational image of burning buildings and violent assaults is added to a seething cauldron of media excitement -a news viagra to keep you up all night. I'm sure that the people who own looted shops and the poor coppers receiving well-aimed bricks are not enjoying the spectacle half as much as the rest of us.

As for the cause, much hand-wringing can be done about the effects of government cut-backs and community policing. Brendan Barber, TUC leader, indicated back in 2009 that the consequence of "prolonged mass unemployment will have terrible effects on social cohesion, family break-up and the nation's health." This was clearly a prediction of direct political reaction, but I didn't see many union leaders carrying Tolpuddle Martyrs banners in the vanguard of the carpet warehouse burners. David Hartshorn 'super' at the Met's Public Order Branch also predicted in the Guardian of Feb 2009 that middle class people would take to the streets. Indeed, they may have been so with the teachers on their strike of 30th June, but there clearly weren't many trendy lefties in Palestinian keffiyehs rifling through JD Sports for the right sized trainers or shell suits. Although a few well-heeled opportunists took part, they were much more likely to be amongst the riot wombles tut-tutting as they swept up the glass.

So the current riots are a means by the disenfranchised underclass of gettin rich(er) quick(er) simply by being nasty(er). And, if the last few nights are to be believed, it has clearly worked. Forget politics, religion, race, culture and any noble cause that may have started a riot at any time in the past because rioting for rioting's sake is now on the cards. I imagine many rioters are asking themselves why they didn't do this sooner!

Burn the Qur’an, burn the Bible and Dr Who

The (Reverend) Terry Jones [surely no relation to the Python below who is clearly a nicer bloke] relented and the Holy Qur’an remains un-cindered. A victory for public opinion? A direct result of national and international anger and political and military pressure? Happy with his 10-minutes of airtime? Thanks to Mr Jones we peered over a very steep cliff down which protrude many jagged rocks upon which we could crash (and probably no bottom either). There are but a few activities that whip up the passions more than book burning. Extremists know this and have used it in the past to rouse the great and generally unmoveable populace.

Book burning for religious and political reasons (and for sheer vandalism) is nothing new. In 2008 in Or Yehuda, Israel (and in 1984 in Jerusalem) Orthodox Jews burned any copy of the New Testament that came into their hands. Only 77 years ago, the Nazis proudly built bonfires containing all works connected in any way to Jews, such was their racial hatred. In 1204, the Crusaders barbarically destroyed the amazing library in Constantinople. In 48 BCE, troops under orders from none other that Julius Caesar burned the great and historic library at Alexandria, a loss that amounts to the most severe broken link between the ancient works of the classical and our modern worlds. Sadly, there are hundreds more examples of such literary abuses.

In the long and bloody history of book burning, or libricide, no religion or nation seems to been spared. It is, of course, a form of censorship, the banning not so much of the books, but of the ideas within. Anyone with a modicum of intelligence will know that the world changes when minds change and for that many books have been responsible. Books are, therefore, dangerous things. History, it is said, is written by the winners, but the losers often lose not just their place in the world but also their thoughts. The Inquisition of the middle ages waged a crusade against the Cathars in the Southern Europe and burned not only their heretic bodies, but also nearly all of their heretical Gnostic literature. They were successful. There are no more Cathars.

So, what would have changed had the Qur’an been burned on 9/11? Well, everything and nothing.

The everything is simple –the sight of the holiest aspect of Islam going up in flames would further arouse anti-American sentiment across the Muslim world. By further, I mean that where that is already demonstrable it would be seen even more. Even the moderate masses with TV images of a burned Qur’an fresh in their minds would take to the streets of the capital cities. Some with violent intentions would target anything overtly Christian or Jewish and the police would directly receive their anger. Undoubtedly people would be killed, further exacerbating the situation for many governments who would then be seen as siding with the offence. Crackdowns would ensue and thousands jailed. There’s nothing like a dose of prison to set minds rock-hard and for such to readily accept the black and white fundamentalist religio-political thoughts of those such as Sayyid Qutb or Abul Ala Maududi: our way or the highway! The world would be even-more rent by religious extremists. Actions of the Defenders of the Faith against soft targets, such as tourists, would be justified, celebrated and imitated… and so-on.

The nothing is also quite clear. For some, a clearly defined external hate-figure is more important than internal reflection or, God-forbid, intellectual development. Thus, those that despise the Great Satan and all of his works are already out there hating, conspiring, demonstrating and propagating their polemics and invectives. Yet one more example of rampant anti-Islamism in the West further confirms their self-righteous zeal. Yes, there would be demonstrations and killings, but there already are. Do the extremists need another excuse? Nope. Do the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan need more hostility? Nope. Are they expecting it? Of course.

Religious and political books are not the only things burned. The infamous Bonfire of the Vanities in 1497 saw wonderful medieval works of art perish in the flames because of the priest Savanarola’s firebrand preaching. The straight-laced New York Society for the Suppression of Vice sought an end to pornographic publications and saw itself as a guardian of public morality. It took to smashing plates and presses that produced ‘objectionable’ books long before anyone thought of using the First Amendment. Quite clearly it failed. In the United Kingdom Mary Whitehouse of the National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association similarly disapproved of increasing public lewdness on TV not only of such comedic luminaries as Benny Hill and Dave Allen, but also Dr Who! Dr Who? Not quite on the order of burning a Qur’an, I know, but perhaps the thin end of the wedge…

Whatever you think, the threat to burn a book says more about the burner than the book. If your world is spiralling out of control and the enemy is at the gates, perhaps a symbolic pyre of pages is a cathartic act or a sanctimonious offering. Do folks really feel better after the immolation of ideas? If so, perhaps we should all do it. First choose your opponent (preferably a dead author or one who belongs to a minority), gather all their works and torch away. You could even sing a little song to celebrate your virtuous position in trampling their nefarious outrages. But be careful: as Ray Bradbury described in Fahrenheit 451, books can also be remembered. Now that’s downright dangerous!

 

Life in the 80s

Last night we attended an 80s Party. For clarification purposes, let me state that this was not a celebration of octogenarians, but a remembrance of all things circa 1980-90.

A decade is a long time, of course, and there’s a lot that went on during the 80s. Jigging about to Spandau Ballet's Gold and Marc Almond’s Tainted Love got me reminiscing. But instead of trawling through the golden oldies of yesteryear, here’s my review.

I remember when the 70s were finally over: An insufferable romantic, I stood in the yard of our North Audley Street basement flat and, like some moron, looked sorrowfully up at the ever-pinkish London midnight clouds and plaintively wailed as Big Ben clanged, “Oh 70s where hast thou gone?” I remember the strange sensation that we were onto something new, modern and exciting: Who knew where it would take us.

So, I started the decade living in Mayfair. My Mother, sister and I were living in such splendid surroundings courtesy of my Uncle Bruce who at that time was a rising star in property development. I attended the Purcell School of Music in Harrow-on-the-Hill, so each day walked up Baker Street to get the near-empty Metropolitan Line trains out of the heart of London (everyone else was packed into trains going in the opposite direction). Mum worked at the big Marks and Sparks at the bottom of Baker Street (now gone). My sister worked at John Jones Frames just off Bond Street framing the pictures of the great and glorious including the large portrait that appeared behind the opening doors each week on This Is Your Life (but she could never tell who and was sworn to secrecy).

We had moved to Knightsbridge and then to Chelsea before Mum moved to Lynton in North Devon in 1983. I stayed with my mate Dan’s family in Harrow for the last few months of school. These were great summer days full of cricket, girlfriends, naughty lunchtime trips to the pub and partying. We were young, free and penniless!

I remember thinking that 80s fashions were really crap. Part of that was my highly opinionated adolescent appreciation of all things under heaven, but part of that was the plain obvious. Pixie boots? Off the shoulder dots and stripes t-shirts? Asinine ‘Frankie Says’ sloganeering? I mean, come on…

There are, of course, those for whom this was their best time of it. Not I. I was trying to make something of it in London when my mother broke her arm and she asked if I would come down and help run the creaking ghostly guest house she had at that time. A fiery autumn turned into a bleak dreary winter of daytime TV and long tramps across Exmoor. Although this aspect was nice, having no money wasn’t. I hitch-hiked everywhere. Or walked.

The 80s were momentous. Thatcher began her process of privatisation and the Miners went on strike. President Reagan deployed nuclear weapons across Europe and the Greenham Common lesbians struck camp: the Cold War was in full swing, the Soviets fought a terrible war in Afghanistan, the Ethiopian famine provoked Live Aid (I gave £5, ya know) and Zimbabwe became independent. Mount St Helens erupted, Chernobyl poisoned half the world with lethal radiation and the Challenger Shuttle exploded live on TV! Communism crumbled across Eastern Europe and the Tiananmen Square protests were mercilessly crushed. And much, much more...

I took Flavia to see Life of Brian, Sam to The Meaning of Life and Rosie to Gandhi (and Amadeus with me Mum).

I met Brenda at Tim Welch’s 21st birthday party. I don’t think we thought much about each other at first. We both liked Jethro Tull. She said she had some friends who’d like to see them at the Albert Hall, I thought I could get tickets. Time elapsed. I wrote and explained my fiscal embarrassment which meant I couldn’t get tickets. She replied that her friends were thinking twice about an expensive trip to London. And so began 7 months of letter writing during which we realised we would be married. We knew we had to wait until we had both finished college in Hull and that was difficult –Hull’s terrible! For some reason getting married is an extraordinarily important and urgent thing to do when you’re young. But wait we did and on November 1st 1987 we finally got hitched in St Albans (because it was the most central spot for our families). Phew!

I got my first computer –an Atari ST! This baby enabled me to put together electronic music: Wow! Many nights were filled with little compositions, big band moments and quirky electronic ditties that pleased me at the time. Sometimes they completely disappeared into the eternal nether-regions of "disk error", sometimes they saved. I still have a tape somewhere.

By the end of the decade Brenda and I were living in Hastings expecting our first baby. I remember watching the terrible news of Tiananmen in 1989 with a tiny Rachel Peters on my lap and wondering if there would be some sort of connection –us and China. How strange life can be.

We bought our little basement flat at the height of the housing price hike and it immediately fell into negative equity. Our first rung on the property ladder snapped under us. Brenda went off to do her Masters at Manchester University. So, we said goodbye to the South and lived with Brenda’s Mum in Bolton for a little more than a year.

And that was the 80s. We came downstairs in our dressing gowns to watch the countdown on telly. At 5-past midnight Brenda’s mum popped her head around the door to wish us a Happy New Year and caught us in flagrante –our first act of the 90s!