An Eye For An Eye Or In This Case, A Nose For A Nose

You all know that I’m a total right-winger, calling for capital punishment to be reintroduced for certain crimes and in certain situations and I’ve previously advocated the ‘eye for an eye’ principle and much tougher punishments and jail conditions for miscreants (see old Blog posting below).

http://tomsfrenchblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/crime-and-punishment-this-might-be.html

So it was with a degree of self-satisfied fascination that I read about how a Pakistani court has ordered the noses and ears of two men be cut off after they did the same to a young woman whose family spurned a marriage proposal from one of them, a prosecutor said today.

The anti-terrorism court in the eastern city of Lahore said it was applying Islamic law.

The prosecutor, Chaudhry Ali Ahmed, said one of the accused, Sher Mohammad, was a cousin of the 19-year-old woman and wanted to marry her. Her parents refused.

Sher Mohammad and a friend, Amanat Mohammad, were accused of kidnapping the woman and cutting off her ears and nose in September this year.

Both men were jailed for 50 years yesterday and told to pay fines and compensation to the woman amounting to several thousand dollars, the prosecutor said.

Pakistan's legal system has Islamic elements that sometimes lead to orders for harsh punishments with serious crimes often referred to anti-terrorism courts in Pakistan because they move faster.

Here, here, or not, in the case of these two !

So What Do I Do All Day ?

So I meet somebody. After a few minutes the conversation goes onto what I do for a living. ‘I’m retired’, I say. ‘Oh goodness, what do you do all day?’ is the inevitable question. ‘Don’t you get bored?’ Here’s the story:

Assuming it’s during school term, I generally get up about 6.30am and prepare the kids’ breakfast before driving them down to get their school bus. The poor little souls need to get the 7.30am bus, which when you consider they generally don’t finish until 5pm, makes it a long day for them. And for me I hasten to add! There are however the usual battles with Kitty demanding to go to school looking like Kate Moss on a night out (yes – I know, I’ve used that line before) and Guy leaving the essentials until the very last second – you know the thing - putting shoes on, looking for his bus pass, making sure he's got his cigarettes etc.

Given it’s winter at the moment, I then return to bed with a cup of tea for J and switch the news on and check my e-mail. Thanks to the miracles of WiFi I can snuggle back under the covers and still peruse the messages which have come in overnight. I also do my blog at this time, ready for the editors of the major newspapers arriving at their London desks to see if I’ve written yet another stunning, incisive piece of journalism.

Once I crawl out of bed I usually get the fire ready for lighting that evening, chuck Shadow out and then have to face the mess left over from the previous evening’s dinner. J, whilst a wonderful wife, has a phobia common to most women, that of loading and unloading the dishwasher!

Thereafter, a variety of jobs around the house (despite it only being 3 years old) and a variety of jobs next door (despite it only being 19 years old) keep me going till lunch time. If I have to dash to the shops to get some DIY, it never takes less than a couple of hours, so whatever is happening, lunch time approaches and I’ve usually been pretty busy.

I have my ritual glass of wine and cigarette at 12.30pm and then a quick lunch in front of the telly if there’s some cricket on (which it is at the moment) and I’m ready for the lunchtime political and news programmes, followed by my one and only soap vice – Doctors. Do you know that there are millions of Doctors fans out there and none of them admit to it unless they’re questioned very closely? It’s almost as if it’s a crime to admit you’re a Doctors fan but as it’s the only series I watch (mmmmm Zara !!) and as it’s now part of my lunchtime break, I’m happy to admit it. So there!

Afternoons usually consist of doing a few bits in the garage or some work on the variety of vehicles we’ve collected (3 scooters – 2 cars), or if the weather is ok, a bit of external maintenance such as gardening or clearing the paths and the drive.

About 5.30pm I pick Kitty up from the (returning) school bus and make her and Guy some little snack to get them through to dinner. Guy and I may have a boxing match during which he will invariably knock me out several times (Wii of course) or we'll watch a documentary about building a never-before-constructed bridge over some American river.

And whilst I struggle through the day wondering if God has given me enough time to complete all my tasks, J has her morning tea , if not a beautifully presented breakfast, in bed, has a 2 hour bath, pampers her gorgeous little body and then retires to the kitchen where she works on her Open University Degree course in Kitchen and Fridge Management . This takes her to lunch when she invariably joins a friend at one of our numerous local Michelin starred restaurants. A light sleep post lunch and she wakes up to her beloved children returning from school. Her first question after waking is usually, ‘what are you making for dinner tonight dear’.

And so life goes on at Le Brin and before you ask, no, it's not me in the picture!

What The French Hated In 2009

I always try and keep people outside of France appraised as to what the ‘natives’ are doing and thinking, and what better way to do that than to re-produce some surveys carried out a few weeks ago. One is what the French hated and the other is the results of who made it big in the news in France in 2009.

What the French Hated:

1) Traders' bonuses (The word covers bankers and traders)

2) Jean Sarkozy's candidacy for EPAD (management agency for La Defense business district). This is Sarkozy’s son – see this blog….http://tomsfrenchblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/sarkozy-mark-ii.html

3) "Boss-napping" -- disgruntled workers' effectively kidnapping and keeping managers prisoners in their own offices. Strange – I would have thought the French public would have loved this.

4) The attacks against Frédéric Miterrand, the popular Culture Minister who caused a stir by defending Roman Polanski and for confessing to homosexual sex tourism in Thailand.

5) The arrest of Roman Polanski, the popular film director who was arrested in Switzerland to face 32-year-old sex charges in Los Angeles -- so France backs Polanski after all.

People who hit the news in France most in 2009:

1) Jean Sarkozy – Sarkozy’s son – see above.

2) Toni Musulin, the armoured van driver who made off with £10.3m without hurting anyone. See article if you don’t know this story. http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/55825,news-comment,news-politics,france-has-a-new-anti-hero-bank-robber-tony-musulin

3) Susan Boyle (Scottish singer) – I suppose she’s better than the French dinosaur Johnny Hallyday!

4) Octomom, the American mother who gave birth to eight babies.

5) Yann Barthès (Presenter of irreverent Petit Journal on Canal Plus TV) ????

And I suppose if they'd carried out a survey of what the French Loved it would have been as per the following:

1) Carla Bruni

2) Food

3) 35 hour week

4) Carla Bruni

5) Wine

I Behaved Myself! I Behaved Myself!

That’s it for another year. Although we probably had too much food and too much wine, we didn’t overdo it with presents this year so there aren’t all sorts of unwanted items lying around looking for an owner. Even Shadow took his ‘preserved bone’ (don’t ask) and was quite happy as he went off to bury it deep in the jungle which is part of our ‘garden’.

And miraculously, I have not been chastised this festive season for my behavior at parties and dinners we’ve attended. I’ve been the model of decorum which I suspect is due to Tan and Angie’s absence as they sun themselves in Florida this year. They are such a bad influence!

The ‘season’ started with an invite to Anita’s on Xmas Eve and what a wonderful array of food she’d prepared. A fine English ham, delicious quiche and mountains of prawns and sausages were on offer all washed down with gallons of champagne. It was a great start to Xmas. Guy who spent Christmas in Ireland with his father would have loved the prawns – he has been known to clear a whole seafood platter on his own after all.

Xmas day itself was pretty quiet. Kitty, upset at not being allowed to open her presents on Xmas Eve like the French do, tore into her parcels as soon as we gathered around the tree at midday. Then it was a delicious turkey dinner with all the usual accompaniments including rock hard brussel sprouts!

Boxing Day saw us at John and Linda’s just down the road where more delicious food was on offer.

Then a rest until New Year’s day. With J retiring to bed well before midnight on the 31^st with a headache, Guy was the only one to actually see the New Year arrive although J and I were both wakened at exactly midnight as the fireworks tore into the sky in Cannes and the surrounding villages.

With several restaurants we'd booked not opening on New Year’s day, J desperately started phoning around to try and find a place serving lunch for a group of us who wanted someone else to take the strain of cooking and cleaning and after a few false starts we gathered at the Casoulette in Vence. With only 16 covers and a room no wider than about 8 feet, it was certainly cosy. The food (and wine) was terrific and at €50 a head, not bad for New Year’s Day.

Then back to Le Brin where I organized a blind wine tasting. The red tasting threw up a bit of a surprise. The €2.50 Chilean Cabernet came out top just ahead of the €10 Cote De Bourg Thomas (pictured) and well ahead of the €18 Australian Shiraz. See – hide the label and people will drink anything!

The champagne tasting was a bit of a useless exercise with everyone immediately picking the champagne ahead of the Italian Prosecco.

Then a bit of Lady Gaga on the DVD where I continually stated that “she’s the new Madonna don’t you know” to the point where J reminded me that I was getting close to an ASBO (anti-social behavior order) whereupon I had another glass of wine and a cigarette and that was that for the evening.

I therefore managed to get through the whole festive season without upsetting anyone – especially J. What a triumph!

Hey - and what about that bottle of wine pictured? Cute or what? I suppose I could pass it off as my own - from my very own vineyard!

A Great Sunday

It was an odd day really. There was me telling J I did not want chips with my lunch but she seems determined to use MY Xmas present, my deep-fat fryer, to the maximum so chips it was. I’m sure she also offered me a glass of wine with my meal when she knows I’m (partially) on the wagon in my effort to reduce my 40 gallon drum to a six pack!

Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that as I settled down to watch the second Old Firm match of the season, my conditions could not have been bettered if I’d been in the hospitality suite at the game itself although as they call Celtic Park, Breeze Block Boulevard, that should give you some idea of the type of facilities they offer. Ibrox Park on the other hand – oops – showing my bias again!

And so to the game itself. Rangers went into the match having scored goals for fun over the last few weeks whilst Celtic have stumbled from one game to another, desperately trying to find some form and some way of adapting their usual ‘up and at em’ type of game to the more cerebral football dictated by their relatively new manager, Tony Mobray.

Match Report

Had this game been a boxing match, the referee would have stopped the contest at half time such was the punishment meted out by the Hoops. Celtic’s superiority was so overwhelming in those first 45 minutes that I wasn’t sure who was playing in their goal. Rarely did Rangers get past the halfway line and yet, as often happens in these intense local derbies, you know that anything can happen. A slip by a defender. A blunder by the goalkeeper. A stupid decision by one of the officials. Any one of these can turn the game on its head and indeed, when Fortune, the Celtic forward headed the ball into the net, having outjumped the Rangers goalkeeper, quite fairly as slow motion replays showed, the goal was chalked off, presumably because the official thought the Celtic player had led, unfairly, with his outstretched arm. A let-off for Rangers.

I lost count how many times the Celtic forwards squandered chances in the first half and as the players trooped off for half-time, the pundits on the TV summed it up perfectly. Celtic just had to score given their superiority and Rangers could only improve given their woeful performance in the first 45 minutes.

And sure enough, that wily old fox, the Rangers’ manager Walter Smith, made the required changes in the confines of the ‘away dressing room’ and spurred his troops to a much more cohesive game in the 2^nd half.

As soon as the 2^nd 45 minutes started, Rangers played the game further into Celtic’s territory with the Gers forwards and midfield quartet putting more pressure on their opponents. No longer was the ball being sprayed out to the wings. Those long through balls to the Celtic forwards were stopped and Rangers began to play.

On the game thundered and Celtic continued to miss chance after chance but Rangers too, were wasteful when they got sight of the Celtic goal. It was now anybody’s game albeit Celtic still had an advantage in possession and attempts at goal.

One of the talking points about the Celtic line up was the exclusion of Scot McDonald, the diminutive Australian who is their top scorer. Restricted to the bench from the off, he started to get ready to enter the fray deep into the second half and Rangers fans groaned. Diminutive, (and overweight some would say), he nevertheless made an immediate impact and started to cause trouble in the Rangers defence as soon as he strolled onto the field.

Rangers fans have a love hate relationship with the buzzing Aussie. They loved him when several years ago he scored for Motherwell against Celtic and presented Rangers with the title on the last day of the season (Barry Ferguson, Rangers skipper, dispatched one of the ball boys to get 20 McDonalds from the nearest ‘golden arch’ when he heard of the striker’s winner) but they’ve hated him ever since as he invariably pops up with a goal or two during these tight games.

And so it proved. On 79 minutes, McDonald ghosted in behind the Rangers defence and headed past McGregor. 1-0 and with only 10 minutes remaining it looked bleak for the Gers. But as often happens in the euphoria of impending victory, Celtic’s players took their collective eyes off the ball and from a quite preventable corner, the Rangers midfielder McCulloch powered in and rocketed a header into the Celtic net.

Rangers would have been happy with the point a draw would have given them but Celtic were not and continued to pound away at their opponents’ goal and only a wonder save from the previously fumble-prone Rangers keeper prevented the Celtic victory.

A breathless match from start to finish and a great advert for the Old Firm.