Mintball wrote:It was an article in a publication that frequently lies, that profits from the sexualisation of underage girls... Indeed, as a service, let's point out their latest efforts, as they publish pictures of an eight-year-old child attending a gym class, and comment on her 'shapely' legs etc. This is a link to a pice about it – not a direct link, so not adding to the rag's hits. It's really about time people stopped quoting this piece of trash as some sort of reputable newspaper – let alone something with a shred of morality.

Mintball wrote:It was an article in a publication that frequently lies, that profits from the sexualisation of underage girls... Indeed, as a service, let's point out their latest efforts, as they publish pictures of an eight-year-old child attending a gym class, and comment on her 'shapely' legs etc. This is a link to a pice about it – not a direct link, so not adding to the rag's hits. It's really about time people stopped quoting this piece of trash as some sort of reputable newspaper – let alone something with a shred of morality.

Mintball wrote: Absolutely. And The whole Whitechapel area of east London is that situation in a nutshell. In the last few years, the demographic has started altering – again – with the arrival of more eastern Europeans. You see it perhaps most obviously in the opening of new shops; Russian and Polish food stores. Mind, I can get matjes herring and proper little pickled cucumbers now. Just to pull a few loose threads together, when doing some research into my fathers family (I may have written this before) I knew that his grandfather had owned a large pub which at that time was in an area of Leeds just outside of the city centre but still not "suburbs" which consisted of rows of terraced houses and your usual mix of small corner shops etc. What surprised me when I got the census return from 1911 and 1901 was the fact that in the street of my great grandfathers pub were twenty or so terraced houses and in at least 50% of those were Eastern Europeans reported as "Russians" or "Polish"mainly working in the various tailoring sub-trades and many of them were self employed craftsmen working from home, and as I write here http://jerrychicken.wordpress.com/2010/10/08/rolling-back-the-years-part-two/ my great grandfather was probably a minority in his own pub in his own country

Mintball wrote: Absolutely. And The whole Whitechapel area of east London is that situation in a nutshell. In the last few years, the demographic has started altering – again – with the arrival of more eastern Europeans. You see it perhaps most obviously in the opening of new shops; Russian and Polish food stores. Mind, I can get matjes herring and proper little pickled cucumbers now. Just to pull a few loose threads together, when doing some research into my fathers family (I may have written this before) I knew that his grandfather had owned a large pub which at that time was in an area of Leeds just outside of the city centre but still not "suburbs" which consisted of rows of terraced houses and your usual mix of small corner shops etc. What surprised me when I got the census return from 1911 and 1901 was the fact that in the street of my great grandfathers pub were twenty or so terraced houses and in at least 50% of those were Eastern Europeans reported as "Russians" or "Polish"mainly working in the various tailoring sub-trades and many of them were self employed craftsmen working from home, and as I write here http://jerrychicken.wordpress.com/2010/10/08/rolling-back-the-years-part-two/ my great grandfather was probably a minority in his own pub in his own country

It's all fascinating stuff – particularly when we get past the nonsense.

My family are utterly hopeless at having kept or related much in the way of family history. But I've been able – just about – to sketch out a number of things.

One – my father, is a pretty typical Cornish Celt (with some Devonian blood, bit let's try to keep this reasonably simple).

Two – on my mother's side, it would appear that there is Saxon blood, based on the meaning/history of a name.

So in other words, I'm actually pretty 'old English'. But that is a result of long-distant swathes of migration.

And as an almost total aside, when we visited the Continent for the first tome – Amsterdam, back in the summer of 1998 – I was staggered by how much I felt that I 'knew' the place. It was same when, a few years later, we visited Germany for the first time. And at core, it's what, later this year, will take me back to Germany for my first ever travels-on-my-own adventure. I cannot easily explain it, but something makes me feel connected to these places – the latter, one that my parents spent my childhood deriding.

Suggestions from my pschoanalytical department:

1. Amsterdam - you watched van der Valk on telly when you were a child.

2. Germany - you are at heart a racist.

3. Cannot easily explain - delusions. Do you see ghosts in hotels too?

Steady on, Mintball, you sound like my late mother who, upon hearing that I had traced back to a great great grandmother of hers, who was Irish, said "Aaaah, so that's it, I always knew I was celtic".

But many people do venture abroad and feel a "connection".
My best guess is that it's just a place that suits them.
I used to have neighbour who described himself as a Canadian-born Londoner.

I did get the most enormous amount of fun telling my parents the background to a name on one side of the family (the probable Saxon connection). They were quite hilariously horrified.

It's as much my country as anyone else's country. But it IS my country. I'm English. If I was American it wouldn't be my country, America would.


I am aware your stupidity is, that's for sure.

Okay.

In which case, it's MY country too. At least as much as yours.

Where does your family come from, originally?

I can work mine back a few centuries from naming conventions and one or two other things, but what about you?

Y'see, once you get into that realm, perhaps the best way forward is to examine who is more – or most – English.

Obviously, as a teacher (IIRC) you're an incredibly intelligent and educated person, so you must be odds on to 'win'.

So d'you want to play?

Which is what I said. If you want this country to be your country then it's your country. Not everyone wants this country to be their country. People who move here, for example, may love it here but they still feel like they are of the country they came from. Others have different experiences. Me, I was born here, so were my ancestors as far as we have traced them (400 years so far) and so I am English, and England is my country.

I am ignoring the rest of your post because it is playground stuff, not worth the bother.

Oh diddy widdums. But you STILL don't want to answer the question properly, in a grown-up way!

Why am I not surprised?!

You're a religious fundamentalat. You see life through such a prism. Well, that's okay, but plenty of people are actually rather more grown up about the issues, as opposed to maintaining a state of continuing childhood.

You play a game - an infantile one. That's fine - that's your choice. Enjoy.