SEA AND LAND AND SKY by Abigail Docherty at the TRON

The blurb on the website states the Nurses whose diary entries feature in the Word War 1 drama were sent from Scotland to the Russian ( not the Western) Front as stated in the description:

"1916. Three young women from the Scottish Women’s Hospital are sent to the Russian front to support the war effort. Ailsa is working class and determined to make an impression on her superiors, Millicent is a self-confessed hedonist and Lily is searching for her lost husband. Unprepared for what they witness, each must find a way of coping as they fight to survive an experience that will change them forever..."

This does not seem to be the case in the play itself where they very much feature in the Western Front with English officers and Scottish loafers.This disorientation does take the intrigue factor and culture clash of the story away , from then the play does not quite recover.

The nurses switch from ordinary civilians out for escapism and adventure to completely incurable grade A nuthouse mad in an instant without any graduation of the accumulation of stresses and strains whatsoever thus cutting any dramatic effect out the production instantly and leaving the audience more baffled than pertubedly sympathetic, this is entirely due to the abandoning of the real hook of the play , a story meshed around the diary entries of the three nurses featured , the play rolls along fine until this device is disregarded and the plot is literally lost from there onwards , as well as the audiences sincere attention.The play could have done with more diary entries taking the lead in the narrative throughout the play, especially when the Nurses arrive at the battlefront sectors rather than leaving the diaries when they are still on the ship taking them over , by far the best part of the play , and jettisoning the diary interest for "raw" emotional drama which does not quite work , the main reason being two out of the three nurses are instantly so "mad" as to not have any control of their lost faculties , thus becoming more morbid implausible curiosities than characters with an engaging story to tell.

Certainly a re-visit to this play with more diary entries and less effects could make this excellent idea into a quality production with lasting appeal.

This review from The Guardian is fair , but unsatisfactorily ungenerous in that it does not suggest very slight adjustments which would make the play a long lasting success.

BONNY SCOTLAND v SPAIN

This match had sentimental and nostalgic appeal , the very first match i went to was Bonny Scotland v Spain in 1975.The crowd was 90,000 in the days football allowed drink , copious amounts at that , into games.At half-time there was something as famous as the great "Hampden roar" , the great pissing ceremony , the crowd would go to the large wall at the top of the stand and pish on the wall.This would release a cascade of rich warm steaming liquid flowing down to the bottom of the stand.If you were a skilled veteran you could pish at the top and be back in your seat to see your own pish seeping past your shoes like the river of gold going though the supporting pillars of a bridge.At night the floodlights would turn blue to cut through the fog.This light gave a multi-toned kaleidoscope of rainbow colours to the pish rolling down, thus giving an early science lesson on the diffuse nature of light as well as the properties of gravitational motion of liquid.Strangely , being a wee nipper i remember the lessons of pish and its properties more than the game.What little i remember of the match was the crowd would stand as soon as Scotland got anywhere near 30 yards of the Spanish goal in swathing heaps of animated anticipation.Being small i could not see a thing when that happened ,eventually Scotland scored , all i could do was look at the floodlights and get lost in a passionate reverie of triumphant noise.Spain came back to win 2-1 , thus introducing me to the other aspect of Scottish/Celtic culture - the glorious and brave failure , heroism without the unnecessary inhibitants like success that just increase your responsibilities, which spoil the romance.I remember nothing of the Spanish goals , only one which was given offside - a philosophic lesson which i learned for the first time , that it could always be worse.So that was laws of science , the culture of a national identity and a philosophic lesson , and the humbling aphorism that success is fleeting as well as the value of devoting a life to pish and its many values , not bad for a 90 minute game of football.

This time my Son pestered me to get tickets to see Scotland take on the popular and deservedly highly acclaimed World Champions.Being a good Scottish lad of the 90s reared on La Liga football there was only one team he wanted to see.As the time of the game approached he was somewhat disappointed when the Spanish and Barca genius creative midfielder pulled out of the squad due to injury , worse was to come only days before when Fabregas and Torres were also ruled out , and then a crestfallen Son reported Pedro was also out.The only consolation was we might see Casillas ass , the same view that the infamous Real Madrid Ultras see of him front behind the goal at matches in the Bernabeu.Casillas has also a special attachment to Hampden , this is the ground in which he made his first appearance in what is shaping up to be one of the best careers in World Football.

The game itself was highly entertaining with a typically brave nearly-nearly effort from Scotland.The match seemed to be over in the 55th minute when the World Champions went into a 2-0 lead through the worlds most gifted midfielder Iniesta.The Spanish must have believed they could pass out the game to a comfortable close and the players could then concentrate on domestic challenges in the La Liga.Bonny Scotland had other ideas , they came storming back into the match with 2 goals , the Spanish composure turned into scurrying about in a most unseemly manner of organised panic before they took the lead to a loss of concentration by the Scotland defence.In the end the game , instead of being a glorified training session for the World Champions , had them working up to the last moment to secure the win.It must be a long time since Spain conceded 2 goals in a competitive match.

All in all honour was saved for both teams , Bonny Scotland got there brave heroic romantic win , and Spain got the 3 points.A very Tartan win-win situation.

But Scotland most impressive win was the allegiance of my Son , he started out wanting to see his Spanish La Liga heroes hammer some minnows , he left the ground sad he has witnessed the first time "his" team had lost a match that he attended.But , as a true Scottish lad , it was a defeat to be celebrated and savoured more sweetly than a mere win.And not everyone can claim they have seen Casillas arse with their own eyes.


Iker Casillas Arse , as seen by the Ultra Sur and my Son

Europe-Japan Dialogue Public Lecture 'International Aid for a Water Project'

Director for Development Planning at the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, Mr Okaniwa was responsible for Japan's "Water and
Sanitation Broad Partnership Initiative" announced in March 2006.Consequently, he was posted at The Embassy of Japan in Jakarta in charge
of Japan's aid programme from 2006 till 2008. Dr Dorea was also engaged
in activities in Indonesia through a humanitarian water aid programme
(with Oxfam GB) when the country was hit by tsunami in 2004 and more
recently through his research activities (Bali, 2009).

The good thing about this joint teaming was the potential for conflict of interests from the government to government ( via corporate and IMF filters) resourcing and the experience of NGO operatives on the ground liaising with the target communities.But the whole thing did not really manifest.

Firstly , Japanese Government aid is only 14% in grants , 86% is in the form of loans ( which by their very nature are to be paid back with due interest.).This fascinating article on the two major factors which makes Japan the largest donor of water "aid" in the region of Africa reveals the two prongs of the prime motivations 1) it allows Japanese corporations to enter Africa in areas of development other than military hardware which is denied to Japanese Industry and 2)It is a vehicle for projection of Japanese government "soft" power for Japanese Financial and Banking Houses , ( you will notice that Japanese "aid" has been given over to the private sector).

The conflict of interest is that it is in the interest of the Japanese program is to encourage either large macro-projects which provide its corporations with big contracts or to promote expensive systems of clean water generation which may not be the best cost efficient option for the unique requirements of the recipient communities.The other major disadvantage is the option for the aid receiver to shop around for the most cost-effective generic products on the market can be over-ruled in favour of products made by the corporations which have a major say in the wording ; terms and conditions and ultimate renewal of the aid package.

ARDAL O'HANLON at the PAVILLION

Ardal is a skilled and accomplished comic offering good clean entertainment all Family Members and ages can enjoy.You get the impression he could easily step-up and get into a political mode with a seamless gearchange.

A generous , though accurate review in the telegraph gives a semblance of the seemingly light paced though taut and controlled performance.

This review from The Festival Magazine points to the lack of depth in the routine , though making a critical error of believing Ardal could not raise the game if he was playing to a more political audience.The references to a lot of Zaltzman lurking within the surface of the routine is highly accurate , the Zaltman connection was even more obvious in the maternity sketch in which the male protagonist increasing the longevity of labour by pressing the babys head back into the womb.

The irony is the whole performance could be turned into a highly comical satire with great philosophical weight if the end references to the difference in Celtic fairytales of fighting against adversity to the optimistic English ones and Hopeladen American was to be a starting point to the show with an extrapolation of these divergences in the handling of modern challenges making the full body of a theme which challenged the likes of Wagner for many decades.

The video below gives a good example of his show:

DIRTY PARADISE by Leann O'Kasi at THE TRON

Based very loosely on a short story by Nobel Prize winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez called "i only came to use the phone" this play written and performed by Leann O'Kasi is part of the cultural and artistic contribution to the Scottish Mental Health Week 2010 Arts and Film Festival going on in many venues across the city.

The background details of this delicate and touching performance is given The List article by director Alison Peebles.

When we read about people who hear voices inside their heads, it is usually in grim news reports involving severe psychiatric illness. Like many medical complaints, however, ‘auditory hallucinations’ exist across a whole spectrum of intensity. This was a revelation to director Alison Peebles and writer/performer Leann O’Kasi when they came to prepare for Dirty Paradise, a play about a woman trying to escape her voices.

‘You’d think that people who hear voices are all schizophrenic, but they’re not,’ says Peebles. ‘Some people just hear these voices – they sound as if they’re in the room or in the street with you, speaking to you, shouting at you or arguing with each other. There can be a whole conversation going on. It’s just extraordinary to think that people have got that going on in their head.’

The quality and depth of the play could be seen in the faces of individual audience members as they would tense up when a feature of the troubling observations of the character would hit a personal aspect of their private internal struggles and then , like a psychological spotlight,suddenly ease with relief as the spotlight veered away to another person who would go through the same short;sharp; shock turmoil.The lesson to be learned is that Mental Well Being , if not Health is a spectrum , not a demarcation.

Unlike the trend in stories of stress and anguish of Mental Health issues this story finishes in a resolution and uplifting ending , to the relief of the character and a large part of the audience as well.