Hi from Chester, U.K.

Food is inherently linked with cultural identity.  Consequently, migrants will always carry their cuisine with them wherever they go.  In the case of sizeable migration, as inevitably as the new communities expand the society of the host country, so their food choices infiltrate native eating habits.

 This can be seen in Britain today in the prevalence of multicultural cuisine in the restaurants and takeaways of our high streets, and in our homes via exotic ingredients from supermarkets, and the plethora of international cookery books and TV programmes.  International cuisine has moved from the exotic to the prosaic, a fact that reflects the impact of and assimilation into British society of the waves of immigrants since 1945.

  ‘Acculturation’ is where both the host country and migrant populations adjust to the customs of each other’s culture .  Ordinarily, this is a two-way approach dominated by one cultural group, usually that of the host country; as a rule, migrants adapt their food habits to those prevailing in the new homeland.  However this suggests a conflict between the diffusion of cuisine into an alien culture, and the importance of retaining authentic cuisine in reinforcing cultural identity. 

 The adaptation of migrants to host cuisines can take many forms.  Migrants may recreate their traditional cuisine in the host country but purely through necessity have to compromise ingredients as to what is available.  This is evident in the migrants from the Indian subcontinent having to substitute fresh chillies with ground chilli powder.  Migrants may also bring important food and cooking equipment from their home countries.  The early Afro-Caribbeans arriving from the late 1940s onwards, smuggled food aboard in their luggage, whereas in the 1970s traditional tandoori cooking ovens arrived from the Punjab.

There are many other significant migrant contributions to British cuisine; the Chinese in particular.  Even a provincial town such as Chester shows considerable multiculturalism in offering Japanese, Spanish, Cuban, French, Greek, Turkish, Thai, and Indonesian food within a few short miles. Young generations now tend to think of pizza and curries as British food.  It will be interesting to see how new waves of migrants, such as those from the recently expanded EU, make their mark on British cuisine in the future.

Today, international cuisine is part of everyday life in the UK’s multi-cultural society.  The acculturation of cuisine between the British and Italian and Indian migrants does appear to have been dominated by the migrant cuisines.  Why was this?  Is British cuisine not a significant part of its culture?

Migrants have contributed more to our cuisine than we have to theirs. This is not to underestimate the cultural importance of British cuisine; perhaps it just lacks appeal to migrants.  If the British appear to have embraced many migrant cuisines, why has no one embraced ours?  There is little evidence to suggest that migrants have adapted to British cuisine. 

Did (and does) Britain have an identity reflected in its cuisine anyway?

Hands up – I walked out of the film ‘Red Cliff’ yesterday due to my short attention span:

Maybe my expectations were too high having recently enjoyed ‘ funny people’ starring Adam Sandler and that Ozzie bloke who played Chopper:

I just wasn’t in the right frame of mind to watch Redcliff and missed my chance to watch a ‘classic’.

Have you seen either of these films Any recent films you’ve not even watched until the end? Do tell.

How’s life?

Your one time give it a GO?

Just wondered! Comments welcomed but KEEP TO THE PATH! Cheers.

Hi from Oz flower folk.

Regardless of who you are, where you are from, your state of health or your upbringing, every single one of us has a Talent.

It is amazing how many talented people there is out there in the big wide world: kids, parents, office workers, executives, homeless people – all walks of life has something to offer – Talent doesn’t discriminate.

A Talent doesn’t have to be an Opera Singer, Einstein, or even Robyn Williams. It can be as simple as making people smile, a caring personality or a quirk that make people feel good about themselves.

Some have quirky little talents like this guy from last nights’ Australia’s Got Talent.

Our Talent, Our Personality, Our very Essence is ours alone and a Priceless Treasure.

We all wonder if we are special, even while we stand on a crowded bus with the rest of the herd, when we are cooking dinner for the family and performing those everyday tasks which seem so mundane.

But the truth is each and everyone of us is special, unique, a one of kind Individual.

There has never been another you and there will never will be.

Think of how many generations of Humans went in to make you, all the coincidences which brought your ancestors together to bring about you. Then you will begin to see what I mean. Since humans first stood on this earth, events have conspired to make YOU, a beautiful representation of what it is to be Human.

Your Talent, Your personality, Your very essence is Yours and a priceless Treasure.

What hidden talent have you been blessed with? Do tell!

We walk past them everyday, see them on the street and in doorways, we watch them on the Movie and on the news. When times are tough and recession hits their numbers increase, every country has them in varying numbers but not everyone cares.

‘Grubby faced, straggly beard and wild, unkempt hair. Drug addicts; alcoholics swilling methylated spirits encased in a brown paper bag and schizophrenics murmuring away to themselves or causing a scene in the streets. An old lady in a woollen hat struggling to push a shopping cart, complete with plastic carrier bags stuffed with useless junk.’

I am referring to the homeless members of our communities. Most people only see the fellow past out with a wine bottle in the shop doorway, or the drug addict on the Television. This is the everyday scene we encounter, but how true is it?
Have you ever stopped and spoken to your local homeless person, bought them a cuppa or even taken a minute just to smile and say G’day?
Most haven’t preferring to hurry past, and pretend they aren’t there.
You might be surprised, but a lot of homeless people you would never recognize given the stereotypical images we all have thrown at us.

Over the past months I have been visiting, reading and chatting to Matt. His story has been a wake-up call to many of us who have been following his voyage.

Read the rest of this entry »

Wow.

I mean, seriously. Wow.

I don’t mean to be a sycophant but he’s quite special isn’t he? Not your average special or indeed the type of special displayed by Dubya in RYK’s post but truly special. The kind of extra-ordinary that would not give up when beaten in the democratic primary run for the U.S House of Representatives, but instead run for the U.S Senate. And win.

He’s in good company as well. It was famously said that ‘Rosa Parks sat so Martin Luther King could walk. Martin Luther King walked so Obama could run. Obama’s running so we all can fly‘

Undoubtedly all of these people were and are special but what makes them so?

What makes these kind of people special/different/better/legendary?

Is it all pre-ordained? Or is it in us all?

Feel free to ‘define special’ and who you think should go on the list as well….

Last week on December 10th, it was International Human Rights Day. Celebrating the day all us Humans became equal, according to the United Nations. Pretty  darn good of them don’t you think.

I could sit here and go through all of them one by one or explain the history and why fores and hither too’s, but quite frankly its boring. Given the current state of play, it really isn’t doing us much good anyway. Between the terrorist picking on anyone whom they don’t think comes up to their standards, to rouge Dictators denying their people are really crook, to Idiots who think they run the world, it seriously feels like Human rights are fast becoming a mute point.

We all have a fair idea of what our basic rights are food, shelter, medical etc. We also have a fairly good idea that if we believe: the World is flat and made out of chocolate Mud Cake, that it is our right to do so and no person, government or official can stop us.

This is the way it is on paper, reality is a far different matter.

Given the recent events here at flowers, the calls by some for moderators, censorship, etc, Jim has stated and quite rightly so that we will Not moderate comments unless they breach the Number 1 rule of no public attacks. To me this is fair. Moderating the comments would stop us being able to say our view, if the moderator did not agree or was offended by a comment, they could simply remove it, therefore stopping our right to free speech. Besides we are all adults here, we can see when something is going to far and generally step in.

Here in the garden we do have great mix coming together. Some lovely flowers, a few well placed shrubs, and some thorny plants, (remember even roses have thorns), a nice balance of pretty, functional and compost building  All in all a good, but growing combination.  We have annuals, perennials, succulents and from time to time a few new species join in. That’s the way every good natural garden should be, no weed killer please, we like the snails.

I thought given the diversity of our ecosystem, the required habitat, climate, and nutrient requirements for each of our inhabitants, perhaps it is time all garden members, writers and readers, should state:

What rights the see for us?

What do you expect?

What would you like to see?

The Declaration of Flowers!

Why not?

The internet is such that you can do, say or show anything you like good, bad or otherwise. Maybe it is time we set the standards on the Web and started our own.

Just what do you expect? What do you see your rights are both here and on the web in general and what rights we should have.

This is not a binding contract of any sort, just out of curiousity.

Point of interest to see what we think, what we can do and get away with, before someone should step in and say Hey!

So get thinking, get typing, soon enough it will be:

International Flowers Rights Day

Get ready we are coming!

I don’t tend to get caught up in Television Programs, well not much anyways, I have a few which I watch, Bones, Heroes, Ghost Whisper Doctor Who, The Bill and who can miss Top Gear, but after a while it’s the same old same old with so many, excluding Dr Who and Top Gear (Clarkson favourite son of Lorry Drivers everywhere).  You know what I mean, they keep making them, mostly because we still watch even though the story has gotten rather tired, and they should have been retired last season.

Well a new Program hit my TV screen last night Eli Stone. I had seen the Ads for it, it looked like my kind of show, so I watched and although this is not a review, I must say, I was impressed.
One part of the Pilot Episode really got me, although the whole program I found rather inspirational in my sideways view of the world,  this just grabbed me.

Watch this short clip, towards the end is the part, my favourite slice.

“You might not believe in some guy turning water into wine, but that doesn’t mean you don’t believe in God. You believe in right and wrong. You believe in justice, in fairness… You believe in love. All those things, they’re God, Eli.”

‘Some People have a greater calling in Life! You just have to know it when you hear it.’

Some of us never know what we could be or even what we want to be.  Life takes hold and drags us along, before we know it we reach the point we think is that of no return. A safe comfort zone, which we niether love nor hate, we have grown to fit it or it to fit us, either way it is home and we know it well.

Others it seems are drawn to something, to reach out to some invisible thread on lifes conveyor belt, they take hold and their lives take on a whole new meaning for better or worse they are drawn to it, an adventure.

Destiny, Fate, or Wishful Thinking, which ever it is the results are all around us.
Just when we think we know what we want, what we need, where our lives are heading, just when we have it all planned out, life decided it has other plans for us.

Would you know destiny, your true calling if you saw it, if jumped up and bit you?

Would grab a hold with both hands and hold for the ride of your life?

Or would you turn away continue on your chosen path?

The choice is always ours, which would you choose?

The other day I was with the kids at the grocery store. We were walking down the aisles and I know I was just looking for something to buy. I had already blown my budget for the day so why not just make it worse? I saw the VitaminWater (which is new here in Canada, but really popular in the United States) … and then I saw it. The Pop Shoppe pop…

It hasn’t been around for a long time. When I was a kid in a really small town in Ontario (Literally there was only 7000 people there.)  we had this store the Pop Shoppe. Now most of my childhood has been blocked from about the age of 3 up until about 13. But I can remember this place. It was a store that just had bottles of pop in it. You would bring your plastic containers and fill them up with the bottles. When you went back you would bring back the empty bottles and get a credit to spend in the store. I always liked to pick out my favorites.

I loved the lime flavour. And when I drank it I remembered. My daughter tried root beer and if I remember correctly, she said it tasted like sh*t. I laughed and told her that it wasn’t like the root beer they have around now.

It’s important to point out that I love pop. I can’t go a day without one…okay three. I know that I have to cut down and sometimes I do and drink just water but when I go back to the pop I can’t stop. I like to think it helps me with stress. And there is nothing like a cold Coke on a hot day. But it has to be fountain pop. (The kind you get at McDonald’s with your meal.) I know I am bad…but I’m not perfect and this is my vice.

What are you addicted to that you can’t go a day without eating?

Hi there, Taylor Blue from western Canada here. I am a mom. Sometimes being a mom really conflicts with my job, I really want to sometimes say one thing but end up saying another because I am paid to write. Personal feelings aside.

I was going to write about something else mom related but why not just put this out on the table. My daughter was at school the other day and they asked her what her mom did for a job. My daughter answered the teacher that her mom stayed at home and wrote celebrity gossip on websites all day. Now, what the teacher said back is something I wonder if I should talk to the teacher about because to me it was quite rude. She said to my daughter…that’s something you shouldn’t be proud of.

The teacher’s reasoning was that the media tries to twist things to their advantage. I admit to that. I do it every day. But I don’t throw my morals out at the door. I’m also able to tell my daughter which stories to believe and which ones are fake when we stand at a grocery store and look at the tabloids. I am really insulted that a teacher would say that to my daughter without meeting me.

When I am writing a story I do try to word it to lead people on. But I never go through with it. I take the job really personally and I don’t like to make fun of people. But, people like to read mean. So sometimes, I have some celebrities that get on my nerves I may let go and be snarky. Now, there is a difference between the two. Snarky is being silly, mean is just being mean.

Somethings you just have to do…

What do you wish you could take back that you said about someone?