*Embarrassed cough* Happy (extremely belated) New Year all! I'm not even going to insult you all with lame excuses. Hope there are some of you still out there reading. This year just doesn't seem to be starting off great for me and I sincerely hope I'm in the minority here. I hope everything's going wonderfully for all of you anyway.

I was having a random conversation with Nsoromma last night about the punishments people used to receive as children and she related a story of a girl who was a couple of years below her in secondary school and I just had to share.

This child (she must have been about 13) had been giving her Nigerian parents the stereotypical teen girl trouble of staying out later than her curfew, hanging out with unsavoury boys etc. etc. and I guess her father just snapped. She came home late from school one too many times and her father frogmarched her to a barber shop in the middle of Peckham and clean told the barber to shave her hair off! Think less Amber Rose and more this:

What makes this whole story worse to me that she lived in Peckham! You're always bound to bump into somebody you know in Peckham amongst the thugs, aunties, and fine boys. This poor child had to get on a bus from Peckham to Elephant and Castle everyday with her shining head until her hair grew back. As punishments go, I thought this touched the heights of genius.

This then lead to a conversation I saw on twitter asking if anybody else was 'gingered' as a child. Now I remember two or three of my friends having this done to them when they were about 10 or so and even now it horrifies me. For those who don't know, getting 'gingered' involved having ginger (or hot pepper) inserted in your vagina or anus as a form of punishment. In other words, total and utter child abuse.

The nastiness of 'gingering' aside, this leads me to the whole point of this post: what is the worst punishment you've ever received? It can't possibly be worse than having your hair shaved off in the middle of Peckham can it?...

Firstly, I apologise for the fact that we let the past couple of months go by without any kind of blog post and I hope you forgive us. Life is getting in the way of blogging it seems and we just can't have that now can we?

Well those of us currently stuck in the UK are experiencing a weather emergency. For the third year in a row, the UK seems to have completely shut down in the face of a little snow. Airports have been shut, train schedules have been completely turned on their heads, some buses aren't running and there's nary a bit of grit or sand where Nsoromma and I live. Yes I even busted my ass on an icy patch whilst attempting to pick up Nsoromma's foster brother from his school. We were effectively snowed in for three days while the rest of London struggled to get around. I know we like to pretend that this weather is 'unusual' but after three years, it looks as though it's here to stay. Other countries seem to manage it fine and I think we're all running extremely low on patience.

What makes all of this worse was that they knew there was snow coming well in advance. Why are local councils caught out again and again even with advanced warning? What are they doing with our council tax? Funny thing is I used to love snow but now it feels as though nature's having a big old laugh at our expense. How have you been coping with the snow? Love it? Hate it? Comment away!

(What I wouldn't give to be in Ghana right now...)

http://bnp.org.uk/2010/04/bnp-legal-officer-lays-criminal-charge-after-ghanaian-origin-rap-singer-urges-murder-of-nick-griffin-2/

I was randomly chatting with Afrocentric and Nsoromma the other day about going out for dinner when we all remembered one of the most excruciating dining experiences ever! How it ever slipped my mind I'll never know but of course it had to be blogged about.

So sometime last year, this restaurant (which shall remain nameless) was doing a promotion where you'd come and have lunch or dinner from a menu with no prices on it and then in lieu of a bill, you'd pay as much as you think the meal was worth. Sounds like a great deal right? So of course, being the cheapskates and lovers of eating out that we are, Afrocentric, Nsromma and I trekked down to Farringdon looking for the said restaurant. Ah screw it, the restaurant's called The Little Bay. So after going up and down Mount Pleasant and Farringdon Road we eventually find the place right by where we first started. Isn't that always the case? By this stage we were cold, hungry and irritable and the fact that we had to wait for a table didn't exactly help manners.

We were finally seated and by this time we had warmed up enough to take in our surroundings. Woooooooow! This place was rocking velvet flipping ceilings! Add to this the huge frieze (or whatever it was) of Poseidon, the random gold trimmings, and the portly Mediterranean bloke who was wandering through the tables singing shrill opera. The impact of the décor was so powerful that I actually don't remember much about the food. It was perfectly fine I suppose but nothing to write home about.
 The real excitement began when it was time to pay the bill. We'd already decided to pay a fiver each before even entering the place but when it actually came down to it, the pressure was unbelievable. The three gloating women who had happily trekked halfway across London in search of an (almost) free meal disappeared. Beads of sweat appeared on our top lips and surreptitious glances were made towards the door. We eventually came up with a plan that we'd pay 10 pounds TOTAL between the three of us and Nsoromma and Afrocentric would take the lead out of the door whilst I stayed to paid the bill. This seem like a great plan in theory but the execution was another story. My nerves began to fail me when the waitress came to ask if "everything was okay" as she saw us trying to slyly slip on our coats and scarves. It also didn't help that we were the only black people in there as well. Way to disprove the stereotypes about black people being stingy girls! Nsoromma and Afrocentric "conveniently" found something fascinating on their phones and sidled out of the door. I sat there for about half a second before grabbing my bag, throwing down the tenner and practically sprinting out of the door. We collapsed in fits of giggles as soon as we put daylight between ourselves and the restaurant.

This restaurant had a genius marketing plan. Enough people were probably so terrified of looking stingy that they overpaid on their meals, therefore offsetting cheapskates like us. Nevertheless, this was definitely one of the most painful dining experiences I've ever had. So it's over to you. Can you beat our experience? Let's hear it!


(On a side note: there's a Jamaican Restaurant in South Norwood called "Rastarant" and I've always thought this was the greatest name ever! Any good restaurant names to share?)

Ever since I first stepped foot on English soil, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the whole country falls into a two-minute silence in order to honour the British men and women who have died for their country since the First World War. The build-up to Remembrance day is inescapable and on Remembrance Sunday, chapel services are held all over the country in order to give due to all those who have died in the name of Britain and the Commonwealth.

I remember being barely out of primary school when I discovered that other brown faces, aside from South-Asian ones, were also part of the First and Second World War effort. Imagine my shock when I discovered that West Africans, East Africans, Southern Africans, and men and women from the Caribbean had also joined the allied powers and laid down their lives for the good  of the "Great British Empire". Some colonial soldiers voluntary joined the British forces because they genuinely believed they were British and needed to protect their mother country. Others were forced to join via conscription. Whatever their reasons for joining, these men and women fought just as hard as white Brits in the quest to defend Britain and her allies. However, although South-Asian contribution to the wars has been well-documented, with support for Nepalese veterans from famous faces, I feel that African and Caribbean contributions to the two World Wars have been chronically ignored. The number of Africans that were part of the war effort is truly astounding:

The accompanying article from the BBC does a far better job than me in illustrating just how much Africa did for the allied forces and it's definitely worth a read. All I'm asking is that tomorrow, when your hand is below your red poppy in that two-minute silence, spare a thought for the hundreds of thousands of Africans whom the British would like to gently erase from the history books.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young.

Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow.

They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,

They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,

We will remember them.

I was having a conversation recently with Afrocentric and Nsoromma about travel in London and it was interesting to say the least. Travel in London has the potential to be soul-destroying or life-affirming. Hopefully, it'll lean towards the latter if you take note of some of these general observations. Now place your tongue firmly in cheek and remember these the next time you venture out with your (increasingly expensive) travelcard!

1. If there are empty seats available anywhere on the bus/ tube/ train, DO NOT SIT NEXT TO ME! You have just given your thanks to God above when you get on a half-empty tube/ train carriage or bus when a leering man decides to park himself right next to you. Never mind the 15 other empty seats available. It's Boris Johnson's law that somebody must sit uncomfortably close to you, stinking of stale cigarettes, whilst trying to rub himself against you. With that goes your 27 minutes of thinking up what excuse you're going to give work about why you're late (again), instead, begins the game of how far away you can edge away from the person whilst they're trying to physically sit on your lap....

2. It is not proper transport etiquette to stare at your fellow passengers during the daily rush hour. Yes we're a city of people watchers but one must be subtle with it. So when the 6"3 man wearing a tartan dress, bovver boots, and sporting acid pink hair steps onto the Northern line at Camden, feel free to stare at him all you like but only via the reflection of the windows! I can't vouch for your safety once the words that strike fear into every Londoner's heart are uttered: "What you looking at?!"

3. One must remember that the South Londoner is a different breed of Londoner, in particular those that hail from the South Eastern region. Eye contact is seen in one of two ways: a declaration of war, or an indication of willingness to marry a person. A personal music player and an engrossing book are your only friends in this part of town.

4. There's no point running for the bus. Really. Most bus drivers take malicious pleasure in watching you frantically waving at them to stop via their side mirrors. 171 bus drivers in particular take great enjoyment in waiting until you're a a mere metre away from the stop and then zooming away into traffic with enough skills to rival Jenson Button. If you're lucky and a driver takes pity on you, by the time you pant and heave your way onto the bus winded by the whole 20 metres you had to run, the hostile stares of your fellow passengers will be enough to ruin your morning. They'll have to wait a whole 36 seconds as you simultaneously hunt for your Oyster card (you probably left it on the kitchen table) whilst trying not to display just how unfit you really are.

These are just some of the few recurring travel observations we made. How's travel different where you live?

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