This blog is now being hosted back at the mothership!
Go to philsmy.com
Sunday, 8 November 2009
Friday, 21 August 2009
bizarre note on amazon.co.uk
Books, Music, DVD and Video items
Most countries in the world. Please note that customers in the US and Canada may be restricted to one copy of certain book titles because multiple copies may infringe US copyright laws
Most countries in the world. Please note that customers in the US and Canada may be restricted to one copy of certain book titles because multiple copies may infringe US copyright laws
Saturday, 1 August 2009
dvdgo
Ok - we already know they are crap at customer service (looking back over the past 6 months I've probably sent 30 emails and had 4 answers)... but now they've broken their site - again - and left it while they all toddle off for the weekend.
They must have the worst IT department in Spain!
Wednesday, 29 July 2009
Beskine - Nicked!
Here are a couple articles about Donald Beskine - you can search my blog here for more stories about him.
Tuesday, 26 May 2009
Action Required - Spanish Dog Shelter in Risk
From ADANA
Having occupied the perrera for more than 10yrs, by formal agreement with
the Ayuntamiento, we have now been informed (by them) that we are there
illegally and that the order has been given for the dogs to be removed and
taken to Refugio (the place where all the strays are taken when rounded up
by the authorities)!
We will resist this with every strategy available to us, including
blockading the road if necessary. In addition, we will notify all the media
and press at the first sign of anyone trying to touch our dogs. We have 121
dogs in the perrera at the moment.
I am now appealing for volunteers to help us keep watch on the perrera each
day between 4.30pm and 8.30pm, which is when the staff are no longer there.
Volunteers would be required to notify us immediately if anyone arrives to
take out the dogs. They would not be expected to do anything else - no
confrontation etc. - but we need to be capable of mobilizing as many of our
volunteers & members as quickly as possible in order to stage a
demonstration and involve the media.
If you are willing to be involved in any capacity, either as a "watcher" or
as a demonstrator, please reply with your contact telephone number and
indication of availability.
Thank you,
Janet Greenstreet
--
President
ADANA
presidenta@adana.es
952 887 533
680 927 542
Having occupied the perrera for more than 10yrs, by formal agreement with
the Ayuntamiento, we have now been informed (by them) that we are there
illegally and that the order has been given for the dogs to be removed and
taken to Refugio (the place where all the strays are taken when rounded up
by the authorities)!
We will resist this with every strategy available to us, including
blockading the road if necessary. In addition, we will notify all the media
and press at the first sign of anyone trying to touch our dogs. We have 121
dogs in the perrera at the moment.
I am now appealing for volunteers to help us keep watch on the perrera each
day between 4.30pm and 8.30pm, which is when the staff are no longer there.
Volunteers would be required to notify us immediately if anyone arrives to
take out the dogs. They would not be expected to do anything else - no
confrontation etc. - but we need to be capable of mobilizing as many of our
volunteers & members as quickly as possible in order to stage a
demonstration and involve the media.
If you are willing to be involved in any capacity, either as a "watcher" or
as a demonstrator, please reply with your contact telephone number and
indication of availability.
Thank you,
Janet Greenstreet
--
President
ADANA
presidenta@adana.es
952 887 533
680 927 542
Tuesday, 21 April 2009
Shikoku Pilgrimage - Day 4
The next day we got up and before breakfast we had climbed the 75 steps (and 62 further steps) of Temple 23 and done the stamping, praying, incense lighting and photo taking!
So there and then we decided to spend the day here in Hiwasa and then head up back to Tokusima. We checked out backpacks at Hiwasa station. 100¥ per bag.
Hiwasa has a really nice castle perched on an impressive hill. It is well worth the hike up to it. And also you can follow a trail out around the far, ocean, side of the mountain and look out over the vast pacific. Pretty spectacular.
From there we went back down the mountain and over to the beach - turtle free for now - to dip our toes in the Pacific.
Temple 23 is impressive and all of this combined makes Hiwasa a hilight.
We had a lunch of bento from the stalls and shops around Hiwasa station, collected our bags and got back on the train (direct!) to Tokushima, pretty worn out - again - from a day of walking around Hiwasa.
We got back to Tokushima and showed up at the Toyoko Inn again! They had a room - and here was another bonus of getting the Toyoko Inn Membership card - Sundays are 30% off!
So there and then we decided to spend the day here in Hiwasa and then head up back to Tokusima. We checked out backpacks at Hiwasa station. 100¥ per bag.
Hiwasa has a really nice castle perched on an impressive hill. It is well worth the hike up to it. And also you can follow a trail out around the far, ocean, side of the mountain and look out over the vast pacific. Pretty spectacular.
From there we went back down the mountain and over to the beach - turtle free for now - to dip our toes in the Pacific.
Temple 23 is impressive and all of this combined makes Hiwasa a hilight.
We had a lunch of bento from the stalls and shops around Hiwasa station, collected our bags and got back on the train (direct!) to Tokushima, pretty worn out - again - from a day of walking around Hiwasa.
We got back to Tokushima and showed up at the Toyoko Inn again! They had a room - and here was another bonus of getting the Toyoko Inn Membership card - Sundays are 30% off!
Monday, 20 April 2009
Shikoku Pilgrimage - Day 3
The plan was to go out and do Temples 4 - 7, stay and Shukobo (temple lodgings) at Temple 7 and then continue on to 8 - 10 or 11.
So, I got one of the girls from the Toyoko Inn to phone out to arrange the accommodations. I am not a big fan of the unexpected when it comes to sleeping!
And boy am I glad I did.
Let me preface this next bit by saying that yes, I know the Japanese have this strange inferiority/superiority complex (thinking that they are either much better or much worse than the rest of the world). They normally err on the superiority side. I watch NHK World all day, so I know this. So I was not suprised, just disappointed, when I found out we couldn't stay at Temple 7 'because we didn't speak japanese'. (now, seeing as pretty much only the Japanese speak Japanese you can equate this to being 'you can't stay because you're not Japanese'). Now, because of this inferiorirt/superiority thing I know that they justify this by saying that it is for OUR benefit they are refusing us. They wouldn't be able to communicate and therefore we wouldn't have a good stay. Or that the ground would be shaking and they would be running around yelling 'Earthquake!' in japanese and we would be thinking they were asking about dinner because of course we wouldn't notice the shaking. Or whatever.
There aren't too many civilized countries on earth where such discrimination would be tolerated, or even accepted. Especially from monks! But there you have it. Luckily for the Japanese such 'rules' don't exist in Germany or Spain or they'd be sleeping on the streets.
Anyway.
So that scuppered those plans and we decided to get out of Tokushima for the weekend.and, ironically, continue on numerically with the temples! The kind people at Toyoko Inn let us leave our bags there for 2 nights while we went off.
So - it was a bus to Temple 18. There is a bus that leaves from Tokushima station, as referenced in the Shikoku 88 book. This bus goes all over... so don't be alarmed! It takes 40 minutes to plop you down at the bottom of the hill from 18.
18 is GORGEOUS! It is what we had dreamed the pilgrimage would be. If you see one temple this should be right up there. Set in the woods up a hill (or small mountain as Marcie would claim) it is incredible.
From 18 to 19 you first walk for 20 minutes or so through a bamboo forest. Again - amazing. This decision to leave Tokushima was looking to definitely be the right one. You slowly walk into more developed areas and Temple 19 is in a small town.
We'd decided before coming over to Japan to skip 20 and 21 (and 12). The walk from 19 to 20 is about 18km, which is a looooong way when it is hot (again, 23c or so) and up hill. Also, there is no accommodation up there, or at 21 which is a further 6km.
19 is 5 minutes from a train station that takes you to within 2km of temple 22. So we hopped on the train and chugged down there. Speaking of chugging, we wanted to move on to Hiwasa - Temple 23's town - because we knew there were hotels there. So we raced, with packs, from the Aratano train station out to temple 22, did our praying, book stamping, etc etc (it was crammed with 4 buses of bus pilgrims as luck would have it) and raced back. The train came 10 minutes later! From there it was 2 trains to get to Hiwasa. There are direct trains, I think, but we had to switch through Anan.
We arrived at Hiwasa at 4:56. Temple's close at 5. Buggers.
We walked across the street from the station at stayed at Business Hotel Cairns. I assume that Business hotel is a classification, not a function, but who would be doing business in Hiwasa on a Saturday is beyond me. It is a SMALL TOWN.
But a word about the Cairns - clean room and great bed. Really nice.
Fishing village really. During the months of June/July perhaps more people are around because Hiwasa is also the site of the sea turtle egg nesting/laying. (Which funnily enough I had seen directly across the pacific in Nicaragua in November 2006).
But for now it was desolate. We found what is one of few restaurants and had a great meal. I had a sashimi platter. Nice!
So, I got one of the girls from the Toyoko Inn to phone out to arrange the accommodations. I am not a big fan of the unexpected when it comes to sleeping!
And boy am I glad I did.
Let me preface this next bit by saying that yes, I know the Japanese have this strange inferiority/superiority complex (thinking that they are either much better or much worse than the rest of the world). They normally err on the superiority side. I watch NHK World all day, so I know this. So I was not suprised, just disappointed, when I found out we couldn't stay at Temple 7 'because we didn't speak japanese'. (now, seeing as pretty much only the Japanese speak Japanese you can equate this to being 'you can't stay because you're not Japanese'). Now, because of this inferiorirt/superiority thing I know that they justify this by saying that it is for OUR benefit they are refusing us. They wouldn't be able to communicate and therefore we wouldn't have a good stay. Or that the ground would be shaking and they would be running around yelling 'Earthquake!' in japanese and we would be thinking they were asking about dinner because of course we wouldn't notice the shaking. Or whatever.
There aren't too many civilized countries on earth where such discrimination would be tolerated, or even accepted. Especially from monks! But there you have it. Luckily for the Japanese such 'rules' don't exist in Germany or Spain or they'd be sleeping on the streets.
Anyway.
So that scuppered those plans and we decided to get out of Tokushima for the weekend.and, ironically, continue on numerically with the temples! The kind people at Toyoko Inn let us leave our bags there for 2 nights while we went off.
So - it was a bus to Temple 18. There is a bus that leaves from Tokushima station, as referenced in the Shikoku 88 book. This bus goes all over... so don't be alarmed! It takes 40 minutes to plop you down at the bottom of the hill from 18.
18 is GORGEOUS! It is what we had dreamed the pilgrimage would be. If you see one temple this should be right up there. Set in the woods up a hill (or small mountain as Marcie would claim) it is incredible.
From 18 to 19 you first walk for 20 minutes or so through a bamboo forest. Again - amazing. This decision to leave Tokushima was looking to definitely be the right one. You slowly walk into more developed areas and Temple 19 is in a small town.
We'd decided before coming over to Japan to skip 20 and 21 (and 12). The walk from 19 to 20 is about 18km, which is a looooong way when it is hot (again, 23c or so) and up hill. Also, there is no accommodation up there, or at 21 which is a further 6km.
19 is 5 minutes from a train station that takes you to within 2km of temple 22. So we hopped on the train and chugged down there. Speaking of chugging, we wanted to move on to Hiwasa - Temple 23's town - because we knew there were hotels there. So we raced, with packs, from the Aratano train station out to temple 22, did our praying, book stamping, etc etc (it was crammed with 4 buses of bus pilgrims as luck would have it) and raced back. The train came 10 minutes later! From there it was 2 trains to get to Hiwasa. There are direct trains, I think, but we had to switch through Anan.
We arrived at Hiwasa at 4:56. Temple's close at 5. Buggers.
We walked across the street from the station at stayed at Business Hotel Cairns. I assume that Business hotel is a classification, not a function, but who would be doing business in Hiwasa on a Saturday is beyond me. It is a SMALL TOWN.
But a word about the Cairns - clean room and great bed. Really nice.
Fishing village really. During the months of June/July perhaps more people are around because Hiwasa is also the site of the sea turtle egg nesting/laying. (Which funnily enough I had seen directly across the pacific in Nicaragua in November 2006).
But for now it was desolate. We found what is one of few restaurants and had a great meal. I had a sashimi platter. Nice!
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