Donald Doderidge Baskerville (1921 - 2013)

Granddad died this morning, in the city of my birth. Although I am twelve thousand miles away, I draw solace from being in the city of his birth. Wandering the landscape of his youth. Hearing the church bells which accompanied his childhood.

His was a world of hurt toward the end. And yet, his final conscious moments were painless, accompanied by the priest who took Gran’s funeral. I like to think he died at peace.

My most vivid memory of Granddad is an image of Granddad and Gran holding hands. Little else remains, blurred like an unfocused photo. Late nineties – Hilary was there, Marie wasn’t. Yet. The grass underfoot burnt to the mid orange brown of an arid Wairarapa summer. Above all, I remember Granddad and Gran holding hands. After six decades, each still wanting physical contact from the other.

This is what I aspire to. My memories will fade further over time, but still I will remember them holding hands.

Was it easy for each of their 60 years together? Hell no. Granddad had a horrific war, getting sunk twice in Operation Pedestal, and Gran hated moving to New Zealand. And yet they grew closer over 60 years. This is what I aspire to.

Granddad chose to move to New Zealand after the war. This one binary choice has resonated through our family for over fifty years. Gran was enjoying their comfortable life in 1950s England, and didn’t want to leave. Granddad was convinced he could give his family a better future, so booked a ten pound ticket to New Zealand. Gran missed her extended family horribly, but as Granddad was an orphan he didn’t look back. Moving to New Zealand was the single greatest gift Granddad and Gran were able to give Don and Delia. Granddad was able to completely alter his life, pivoting from growing up an orphan in the East End to seeing both his children graduate from university.

If Gran and Granddad had stayed in the East End of the 1950s, would their children have gone to university? Highly unlikely. If they had stayed in the East End, would their grandchildren have gone to university? I would like to think so, but the odds aren’t too high. Would I have sung my way around the world, and had so many opportunities available to me? Not a chance. Is there any single choice I have made, or am likely to make, which will enrich the lives of so many people so dramatically? I don’t think so.

Fare thee well Granddad. I hope I enjoy as many years with my soulmate as you enjoyed with yours. This is what I aspire to.

Complete genius

I wrote last month about a reprehensible Tory plan to restrict poor people's families joining them in the UK. Specifically, someone would have to earn 19k to bring their husband or wife into the UK, and more to bring kids in.

M and I were in a minicab a couple of days back, and somehow this topic came up. When Marie mentioned the 19k minimum earnings the minicab driver laughed, looked shifty, and replied:
"That just sounds like a bit of paperwork. No problem."
The paperwork, a scheme which he hastened to add he personally hadn't taken advantage of, goes like this:
Newly Married Man needs to earn 19k per year to bring his wife to the UK, but only earns 12k per year in a low wage job.
NMM goes to neighbourhood cafe, and cafe owner agrees to put NMM on cafe payroll, and report NMM as earning 8k per year.
NMM doesn't actually work in cafe, and doesn't actually get paid by cafe.
NMM pays tax on his imaginary 8k earnings, so pays approximately 2k real money to HMRC.


Net impact to cafe: zero
Net impact to NMM: -2k real money paid to HMRC, increase of tax assessed salary from 12k to 20k (due to 8k imaginary earnings). NMM can now bring his wife to the UK.
Net impact to the UK tax authorities: +2k tax collected. Tax authorities unlikely to look too closely.
Net impact to the UK Border agency: one wife brought to UK. Bahaha.


Completely brilliant. Who would think that people would defraud the UK authorities to pay more tax - that is what makes this scheme so ingenious. And because I think the original Tories' restrictions were so dastardly, I can't get myself worked up over the illegal overpaying of tax.
 

The Tories want to push through a bill which means tests the ability to bring a non-EU spouse and kids into the UK on a family visa. To bring over your wife you have to earn £18k, and to bring a wife plus three kids you will have to earn £27k. This even applies to British citizens born in the UK!

I can see the rationale for xenophobes targeting economic migrants who are seeking to bring their families over. I think such a rationale is despicable, and not just because I am an economic migrant, but at least I can follow the dots between the originating sentiment (‘They took our jobs!’) and misguided policy like the one above. But why target British citizens as well?

The only explanation I can think of is that the Tory party hates poor people. There is no other possible explanation for why they would introduce such a policy. Sure, the New Zealand national party might dislike poor people a little bit. Especially if they happen to be brown. Or yellow. But National are badgers on valium compared to the Tory party. Asset stripping tax cutting badgers on valium.

This Guardian column skewers the policy more wittily than I can. Which is to be expected, given it is by a comedian who happens to be the daughter of two migrants from Pakistan. An excerpt:

All my parents' relatives came here with nothing, with nowhere to live, let alone an £18,600 salary. Today most of them are millionaire businessmen in Birmingham and have contributed hugely to the economy by supplying kebabs to drunken people in the city centre on a Saturday night.

Friends don’t let friends vote Tory.

 

Letters of Note

I stumbled across Letters of Note today. Pretty much what it says in the title, a repository of letters by people who write good.

Imagine my delight at the following Bill Hicks letter, responding to an English priest's criticism of Hicks's Revelations TV special. That show is particularly profane, but the letter above is entirely clean, so please read the letter. And only look up the Revelations show if you are not easily offended.

5.02

I ran a marathon last weekend. My time of five hours isn’t particularly fast, and I was overtaken throughout by middle aged ladies who didn’t appear to be exerting much effort. But, I managed to run all the way. Hmm, that needs qualifying: I managed to run between water stations, and when I say run, after sixteen miles I had regressed to shuffling like a zombie on amphetamines. Brains!

There was a relay team of Indians called Sikhs in the City, which included a gentleman who is 101. Seriously impressive.

Things I learnt, which would be applicable if I chose to do this again (not entirely sure yet whether I can handle it again):
Try to keep your running style constant. If you need to slow down, continue to move your knees as per your faster running style so that your impact doesn’t change. If you start shuffling (which changes impact from a heel strike to a flat foot strike), this will give you sore soles after the race.
Apply sunblock. Even in Scotland.
Don’t pace yourself against someone who is running as part of a relay. Or against someone wearing a singlet from a different marathon. Even if they look old and frail, and you totally reckon you can take them. You can’t.
Don’t pour water down the front of your shirt, to cool yourself down. This water will collect in the groin area, and look like you have wet yourself.
Carb loading is an excuse to eat lots and lots of pasta. O for Awesome. And it works – I never felt low on energy.
Don’t pick a marathon immediately after a bunch of accounting exams. Whoops. I had to concentrate on my exams, and didn't run in the last two weeks before the race. On the bright side, this meant I was extremely relaxed on marathon day as I was no longer studying.

Around 90% of the runners in my pace cohort were running for charity. I don’t understand the English predilection for raising money for a third party charity via physical activity.
You want to run a marathon, as a private challenge to the limits of your physical endurance? Fine. You're a bit mental, but whatever. So why do people link this to fundraising for charity? If you want to contribute to a given charity, I can think of less painful and more productive ways than running 26.2 miles.
If you are primarily focused on the charity, why not cut out the activity, avoid the hours of training, and give a wad of cash to the charity directly?
Maybe I am ignoring people’s desire to socially affirm each other. Thus if I run a marathon and you donate money to a charity as a result of my run, you are publicly acknowledging my effort. This in turn requires acknowledgement by me of your donation, so everyone gets to feel socially affirmed. If you can’t earn social capital by raising money for charity, you can earn social capital by donating money to charity. And it gets even more circular when two people running a marathon donate to each other’s designated charity.
There could be social cues within English culture, as I haven’t encountered this phenomenon to the same degree in New Zealand. Whatever the cause, I don’t get the overall link between private activity and public fundraising.

Joe Biden: US Vice President on Grief

You may not be aware of who Joe Biden is, if you don't follow American politics. I do because I find the personality clashes are more polarised than those in NZ politics, but not everyone is that much of a political nerd.
Joe Biden is the current US Vice President. When Obama passed a form of universal health coverage, Joe Biden was heard on microphones saying to Obama "this is a big fucking deal." Awesome.
Anyway: The following clip is him talking to an audience of military widows and widowers, about his own personal experiences of grief and loss. It is twenty minutes, but well worth a look. I'm not a good enough writer to add anything to what he says, so all I can say again is just watch him. Seriously guy. I will post some humorous basketball clips later on, but for now just watch this...