The story covered on the Handy Shipping Guide News Page today outlines various allegations regarding corruption in and around the Port of Mombasa.
What is even more worrying are the hints carried in other media sources that elements within Kenya may be in contact with Somali pirate groups who now routinely attack unguarded ships off the East African coast.
Here follows the full series of Videos made by the Kenya Television network which have caused the latest furore.
There is no doubt that the Kenya Revenue Authority has taken substantial steps toward cleaning up the port evidenced by increased revenue levels.
What is plain from the tapes is that they may well have some way to go yet.
We present the report shown without taking sides.
There is no dispute that revenues for the Kenyan Authorities have increased massively since the inception of the Kenyan Revenue Authority and it is in the media's interests to produce sensational programme.
KTN say they have been threatened with legal action over the films.
If there’s one thing worse than being unprepared for the recent bad weather in the UK it’s the sound of everybody having the same perennial conversation; you know the one,
“Why weren’t we prepared for it? 6 inches of snow and everything comes to a full stop, my road’s impassable Boss, I can’t…”
As you can see, some of the head office staff weren’t too keen on getting on regardless
(despite the fact that because of the breaking news more people read the Handy Shipping Guide news than any other day).
Well this time the effects of a few inches of the cold white stuff, was enough to stop the entire Eurostar service for several days. At least it wasn’t the old British Rail “wrong type of snow” argument this year.
Nope this time it’s too warm in the channel tunnel.
Now everyone who ever bought a DVD for their Gran in the deep midwinter knows you can’t walk straight in the house and open it up.
If you do the condensation will be running around its internal organs the moment the cellophane comes off.
It has the same effect as dropping a fish in boiling water – it stops working.
Now even though we all know this, apparently the blokes who designed the Eurostar didn’t, and in a way, I have some sympathy.
No one probably ever thought that a sudden cold snap could turn the outside world into a frozen hell whilst the tunnel remained as snug as a polar bears cave, in fact a good deal warmer.
One dose of that heat and Thomas the Tank Engine’s electrics started to look like a fat man in a sauna, with unsurprising results.
Unfortunately the “severe” weather we’re having gives us no credibility with those in the outside world. Our Thai office delight in telling us how this is the “best time of year, it hovers around 26 degrees” whilst in explaining to a contact in Canada that “it really is jolly cold old boy” (have to maintain the colonial image, they expect it) merely results in a stony silence which is actually the sound of his hand over the phone whilst he snorts in derision.
So if I may I’ll use this brief piece to explain and excuse us British for our ambivalent attitude toward snow and weather in general.
We get a lot of weather.
That basically is that. It changes day to day and often hour to hour and that’s why it is an Englishman’s favourite source of conversation.
A Frenchman or Italian will discuss his love life, or possibly his dinner, an American his Church or his vacation or how big something is, but, first and foremost, the English talk weather.
Snow, it has to be said, rarely figures on our radar. It represents a tiny percentage of the vast morass of changing meteorological conditions we endure and enjoy and so, frankly, we generally pay it no mind.
Until it arrives. Now if you own a hill farm somewhere north of Invergarry you will sneer at the southern ponces (about 98% of the British population in your case). You will have your Land Rover and snow chains and shovel as you tour the hills after October.
Even the midges wear Barbour jackets.
But for the average, town dwelling, man in the street the only time he puts a shovel in the boot of his car is when he is burying his cat
(or more likely next doors cat)
in the woods (or possibly on the beach).
So on behalf of my fellow countrymen may I apologise for the fact that every time it snows South of Dundee the population staggers round muttering under its collective breath with a glazed look like they’ve just been given an eviction notice.
And may I also point out that, at some point leading up to and during the weekend, the ferries stopped running.
That is to say, yours truly (the Captain) thinks the technology is now available.
What’s he wittering on about now I hear you say? (metaphorically).
I’d best explain; regular readers are aware that this blog frequently drifts far from the home turf of freight and shipping matters and allows deviation through the back alleys and byways of other diverse subjects.
That said, there is often a logistically based starting point, often not revealed to you, dear reader, being only in the author’s head, which starts the whole composition process off.
The starting blocks for this particular rant were, as so often the case, forged after a conversation In the Handy Shipping Guide UK office, once more a discussion centred around the rapidly declining standards of spoken and written English from many with whom we mere scribblers come into contact, job applicants, delivery drivers etc.
Now I should firstly make this clear, this is not a complaint about the way language naturally evolves, if it was socially unacceptable, nay illegal, to change and vary the way we speak, write and punctuate (to some extent) then your Captain, for one, would currently be serving a long stretch at HM’s pleasure (God bless her).
No, I’m not speaking (or writing actually) about the natural alteration of language over time, I might scream at the spell checker on occasion when the lunar eclipse causes it to switch back to default ruddy English (U.S.) from the Queens own perfect script, that time when then moon causes wives to hurl plates at innocent menfolk and whales beach themselves to the mournful howls of werewolves.
Although I still insist colour should always carry a “u” our cousins across the pond still speak and write consistently in their own way and I shout “vive la difference” (if you’re American that means I’m OK with it). After all it is in fact we English who cannot spell aluminium (see), dropping the second “ I” puts it closer to the original name after all.
The objection I, and many, many others have, is that our language is being corrupted by people who simply fail to grasp that it has reached its present form from necessity.
No matter how the tabloid crud dumb it down it is essential to retain a wide variety of expression, to attempt to avoid clichés, to use language that says precisely what one means.
“Well what can we do good Captain?” I hear you ask (that may be a voice in my head again)
“How can we possibly save society from the social leprosy, words falling from our vocabulary like rotten fingers?”
Relax Oh Reader, we have the answer.
And that is where the technology comes in.
Mobile telephone’s, or as our US cousins would say (so much more succinctly) cellphones (see that’s good verbal evolution, despite the fact my spellchecker is painting the word cherry red – obviously securely good old English(U.K. - As She Should Be Spoken mode).
Let’s face it, people bastardise our language because they’re lazy.
Text speak, what bloody rubbish!
Y dnt U C tht Kds R wld abt Txtin. Fstr thy cn spk bttr fr thm.
If we wish to save our language then technology and education provide the simplest of answers.
Like the cigarettes producers of my youth, mobile phone manufacturers want the young to be introduced to their product as soon as the umbilical is severed, and equally, as parents wanted to prevent those of us who thought it cool to puff on a Woodbine, so parents today want to ensure little Jimmy or Louise don’t end up with brain cancer at 31 because their brats are all cell phone mad.
Now nobody has proved there is any link between phones and cancer, but, like MMR vaccinations no sane mum or dad is going to expose their kids to any threat, no matter how long the odds.
OK, OK, that’s a fake produced by a Blue tooth headset company to scare you into buying their gear but I bet it got you thinking?
Which brings me back to my spell checker. Curse or blessing?
Well with little ingenuity we can turn this into a win, win, win, win situation.
How? I (imagine) I hear you ask.
Simple.
Nokia, Motorola whoever ring up Bill Gates and arrange a meet.
Nokia tell Bill they are going to produce a range of funky cell phones that come with games etc. only they aren’t phones, yes, you can ring maybe one number plus the emergency services but apart from these all calls are barred.
Bill gets to load a programme of his spellchecker on the phone, one countries language, no frills.
Well just one, the phone has a QWERTY (blimey that was easy to type) keyboard and (here’s the kicker) if there are any spelling, punctuation etc. mistakes in a message then the text can’t be sent.
Genius.
Nokia flog a cheap introductory phone to kids, Microsoft supply language software, Ma and Pa get an easy to choose, relatively cheap present for Christmas, Birthday etc. that little ‘un actually wants and youngster get to text all his mates for free (didn’t I mention the cheap rate package that dad signed when he bought it).
Can you copyright an idea?
Somebody let me know please.
Going back to the Woodbine theory just like fags (American citizens adjust spell checker to English (U.K. Gods own language) please) the make of phone the child starts with might well prove to be his brand for life.
Marketing agents can call the captain at the Handy Shipping Guide UK office.
Big UK story of the week surrounds Dick Denby, no not a character from a 1930’s adventure story a la the 39 Steps or Eagle Adventure for Boys Annual, but a 74 years young, old school, road haulier (or trucker, he types, knowing our US readers have no idea what a haulier is and me desperate for more Google kudos).
Now Dick has, you may well know, a long standing beef with those in high places in the Ministry of Transport (assuming they still call it that).
Dick reckons that he should be allowed to run his brand spanking new 83 foot road train, known in governmental circles as a LHV (Longer, Heavier Vehicle). Bit of a misnomer that because as I understand it weight doesn’t play much of a part in this particular equation. Dick says that the regulations as they are written under the 1986 Traffic Act state that “Special Vehicles” up to 85 feet are fine on British Roads.
He further says they travel all round Holland, Finland etc with no problems.
No problems Dick unless you get stuck behind one in a 12 year old Ford Mondeo 1800 and you want to go faster than 50mph, that is you, and the 200 new friends behind you.
Oh, and the escaped psychopath in a green and yellow Evo smallmanspenismobile who has to be 5 miles up the road in 3 minutes or his mum won’t let him inherit the earth.
Now please don’t think I’m dead against big vehicles.
DD’s points make sound sense from an economic and environmental point of view.
Yesterday I had to do a Clarkson and stop the car when I started shouting at the radio.
Some NIMBY, Friends of the Earth spokeswoman was arguing semantics with Denby about percentages of empty running, damage to roads etc.
No, I’m also not anti FoE, quite the opposite but as I told the lady politely whilst parked
“IT’S THE WRONG ARGUMENT YOU SILLY COW”.
Dick Denby is right. If you are carrying, as he does, commodities like breakfast cereal, toilet tissue, foam etc bigger vehicles make very sound economic and environmental sense.
To have an environmentalist arguing that “transport should get its act together, be more efficient, use the trains more….”etc does nothing to resolve the situation. Those of us who have owned and operated haulage (drayage to you US truckers – thanks again Google algorithms) companies, well you silly mare what do you think goes through our heads….
“Oh, no work about today, I’ll just let the lads circle Birmingham for a few hours and see if any jobs pop up, maybe they’ll be flagged down on the motorway by a punter desperate for a spare wagon.”
Trains darling? (yes patronising) run to stations. If everybody runs into Waterloo in their car to collect their morning cornflakes don’t you think that’s a bit more environmentally hostile than a seven and a half tonner delivering to the shop?
Who do you think worries more about inefficient, empty running than you?
Perhaps the poor man who has all his money plus his marriage staked on ensuring he makes enough out of his lorries to pay next months mortgage?
Any road up, Dick decided he’d throw a hundred grand or whatever at a very big shiny motor from Jumbo in the Netherlands who make very nice, very big and very shiny motors. Now if Dick owned Tesco and he proposed to run his new toy straight out of the depot in Glasgow or similar, directly onto the motorway system and there onto another identical depot, situated on a similar motorway adjacent site, then I for one would say thumbs up Dickie boy, capital idea.
But folks, that just ain’t how the world turns. For all my support let’s have a look at some pertinent facts.
Dick doesn’t own Tesco.
Dicks Denby depot isn’t on the motorway in Glasgow or anywhere else.
It’s in Lincolnshire. For our foreign readers this is fen country. The most common road accidents in the fens is people get bored and fall asleep and drive off the roads into ditches.
Some say they don’t get bored at all, they just would rather drive into ditches than across the fens.
True fact - most cars fail their MOT’s in Lincolnshire because the handbrakes are seized up, this is because nobody ever uses one, endless miles of flat country roads mean – no hills. No hills – no slopes – no handbrake required, I kid you not.
Dastardly Dicks depot is in a lane, far from civilisation. On the satnav it simply states "Here there be Dragons”. The roads are the width of a private drive in Surrey.
Dick doesn’t immediately access the motorway network when he sets off for the simple reason Lincolnshire hasn’t got a motorway network.
So unfortunately Richard I have to come down on the side of the mad women with the sandals and no make up.
You’re wrong on this one. Well intentioned and possibly technically correct, but wrong nevertheless. The UK isn’t Finland, we have 60 plus million people and they have 9. They also have twice the acreage.
But that isn’t the main reason for disagreeing with you.
The fact is simply that these vehicles, for all their green cred, the fact they can stop 20% quicker than an artic with equivalent load, lower fuel cost per mile etc. they’re just so bloody BIG. Even if we only allowed them on motorways you and I know that isn’t what will happen. If a driver can drive half a mile down a river because “the satnav said it was a road” imagine where your new lorry is going to end up when it crosses the mini roundabout in built up townshire.
Sorry DD but the rest of them out there don’t possess our common sense, the reason we have so much ruddy ‘elf and safety legislation is that textspeak rules, MP’s are more worried about their salaries than the education policy and the man in the street is about half as intelligent as he was thirty years ago.
Don’t agree? – take a look at this group, all trying to prove Darwin right.
Anyone want to buy a mobile warehouse? One careful owner.
So Barack has nipped round to Wen's place this week to have a little chat about good neighbourly relations. Black/White guy lives next to Oriental bloke with a name that sounds like a question. Reminiscent of a perfectly acceptable 1970's English TV sitcom.
"Michelle Honey, I'm just off to see Wen."
"What?"
"No, Wen"
"I know when Sugar, why?" (That's quite enough. Ed.)
Now these two have several things to discuss, and we're not talking about dripping gutters and dog dirt on next doors lawn here.
There's the smoke from Barney's truck and rubbish dumped by Haamid and who pays to clear it up
There's a question about Benjamin and Armydinnerjacket and their hoodie broods who fight all the time and are threatening to break all our windows.
There's the Ozzie the bin man whose crew live in Mr Patels back yard.
But all the time theyr'e having their chat at the back of their minds is one overriding thought.
Barack's family owe Wen and his chums seven hundred billion dollars.
I'll say that again. 700, 000, 000, 000 dollars. and another 36, 000,000,000 every month on top.
And that's not actually true.
In July 2008 the US said "Blimey, by next year we could owe the Chinese $490 billion."
WRONG.
This month, whoah, hold on it's just gone up (again) now it's $772 billion.
So let's have the Captains run down on what happens next.
1) The Chinese write off the debt - Ain't gonna happen
2) US raises exports and the Chinese/Rest of the World all buy them (US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke says he's having a bang at that with a trade push - love a push do the Yanks).
3) The Chinese re-evaluate their currency - great idea, can someone let the Chinese know though.
4) There's a War - Aah, the traditional solution, trouble is lately politicians have just aimed too low, little provincial wars, not like the good old days, WORLD wars, now that was more like it. Bloody nuclear weapons, took all the fun out of it. For my part - no, lets NOT have a war, hopefully even Wen and Bazza will concur on that one.
5) US and China join up and have a war with someone else - not as unlikely as it once seemed, certainly as far as the Somali's up the street are concerned, not likely to help the problem though.
6) Do nothing. Bit of protectonism - tit for tat - no real change.The economies balance out as America runs out of money, the Chinese get richer, they spend money on cheap US goods and holidays in Florida and California. US becomes an ageing fallen empire, third world country.
Yes, my money's on number six. B & W will talk and talk, nowt much will happen and they'll all hope they're dead or at least out of office when it falls apart.
Sorry kids, looks like you get this one too. We could of course appoint good old Gordon as a special advisor to sort it all out.
At least we won't have to wait for disaster, he can deliver it in weeks.
(Apologies forthe usual negativity - the Captain is out in the Thai Office "on holiday" but still sitting writing this for you dear reader).
