I was not sure whether or not I’d do some entry for today and this is what I’m telling you. I could mention that Don and I had a good lunch at the Kingsland market. Don bought some produce, while I looked at the prices, which are the same at in the grocery store, but with more product variety here. I did buy two corn cobs at seventy cents each!

The food was so-so, I bit old I thought and not all that healthy - starchy that is - from what I saw people eat. Next time we’ll have to try the coffee and the cookies. The bread selection was very good, but five dollars for an eight hundred (800) gram rye loaf. I pay two (2) dollars for a four hundred (450) gram rye loaf that is baked in the store where I buy it.

However, the ambience and atmosphere in this particular market beats the grocery store hands down and that is what makes a visit there an enjoyable event. There is also some textile product available and moccasins even, which at eighty dollars compete with shoe prices!

I’m about half way through the book “Global Shift”, which I find a fascinating read for reasons I explained a few days earlier. The author, Mike Mason, shows the difference between the real reasons policy decision are made and countries are manipulated, which he contrasts with the pretences that are dished up for the media to be distributed to the public.

For example ‘development’ usually means ‘westernisation’ in the sense that the economy must become open to western commercial interests.

The slogan promoting ‘free-press and democracy’ is an other cover for westernisation, political this time. If the elected government parties are not pro-western, the results get ignored and a change of government soon follows as it did in Algeria and now in Egypt, not to mention Chile or Iran (1954).

However, today we can learn from the way the Syrian conflict unfolds and the diplomacy around it plays out, that non-western powers have learned to manage the public opinion and press with equal acumen. No more blanket approval of force or falling for fabricated evidence.

These are now replaced by small steps negotiated each time, by counter evidence and insistence on due diligence. This new process bolsters the functionality of the international community organisations, slowly moving our global community towards supra national oversight and international law.

For a guy who did not know whether or not to write, I did pretty good:)! I’ll quite while I’m ahead!
<9:22am~