IT'S DRIVING ME URBANE


When I was a student, we used to talk about what was going on in our souls. Now we make polite conversation. We used to "set the world to rights". Now anything of epic proportions is ventured tentatively, and to close friends only. To see if they're in the mood. We used to revel in exploring the mysteries of life and death and consciousness. We'd speculate wildly about radical schemes, and shout about love to the sky. Nothing was taboo. I know it was a bit strident sometimes, a bit direct and unhewn, but it was in some ways randomly philosophical. And I liked that. Now we're features journalists. Like Sunday magazine articles, each carefully hedged opinion is as unlikely to give offence as it is to raise a flicker of real excitement. I often find. I wonder what happened in the years in between. Did something change our minds?

END OF THE WORLD - BUT NOT IN HUNGARY

Saturday December 8th is the International Day of Climate Change Protests. It is, arguably, the most important protest in human history in that the issues concerned urgently affect us all, although doubtless it will come and go, and be forgotten. The latest IPCC Report warns starkly of "abrupt and irreversible changes" if nothing is done to reduce carbon emissions, and global leaders are meeting in Bali to cobble together whatever bland compromise they imagine their electorates can stomach.

We, the people, are gathering on the streets to urge them to go further, to let them know that we care about policy in this area, that we acknowledge the apocalyptic nature not only of the report, but of events occurring weekly in the News.

Although protests will take place in at least 83 countries, including Albania and Belarus, there is no action planned for Hungary. Presumably it will be isolated from the economic and social upheavals in the next decades by virtue of being well inland? I understand that people are dealing with seemingly more urgent and relevant problems here, but it is frustrating and bewildering that so few pay any interest at all in this era-defining issue that is ineluctably coming home to roost.

Global Climate Campaign

MALAISE


I'm thrown from pillar to post
Don't know what I fear the most
My escape plans are littering the ground
Broken window where the world came in
Stomach-churning dose of vitamins
Will help me make the right constructive sounds

I feel I've lost control
Got a riot for a soul
And they're looking for somebody to kill
All their faces are mocking masks
As my decisions are disasters
And the procession is winding down the hill

There's nothing I've ever done
Made a difference to anyone
Of my deeds, there's little to record
Now the river has burst its banks
And all its filth has filled my tank
And its noise will drown my final words