My Stand on the American Gun Control Debate!

How I feel about gun control?  Let me illustrate with a couple of stories:

It would have been 15 years ago that old friend Vince had his first big Art Exhibition. I won't tell you where this took place, except to say that it was in Australia where there are strict gun control regulations.

His exhibition was wildly successful. We were at the Opening -- and it was the greatest fun.  Very interesting paintings and lots of good buzz from everyone, lots of art-lovers, media coverage, newspapers, TV, photographers and the resultant publicity resulted in a great many important sales. Kudos Vince.

Anyway, around lunchtime, a bunch of us, including an elated Vince, decided to go somewhere pleasant to eat, so we hauled ourselves down to a very nice river-side restaurant where we sat out in the winter sunshine in the courtyard at a big happy table and ordered ourselves lots of great food and wine.

You can visualise the scene: a very pretty bougainvillaea-filled courtyard with a low wall overlooking the river sparkling in the sun, lots of big white yachts, palm trees all along the river-banks, views of the surrounding parks, cool breezes off the water.  The tropical dream, right?

It was a glorious afternoon with lots of fun, laughter, many bottles of good wine, good mellow company, great stories. Then, around 4pm, it felt like it was time to go so the usual wind-down conversations began.

And it was right then that a big policeman in a S.W.A.T. flack-jacket came up to us saying "Do you mind moving away.  There's been a man shooting at you for the past two hours.  We're just about to take him out so I suggest you get out of our way."

Surge of adrenalin.  Looked out where the S.W.A.T. man pointed and there was indeed a man on a yacht with a shotgun taking potshots at all the people on the river-banks around. A lone yachtsman from somewhere else in the world who'd spent too much time alone at sea and had lost the plot being in a city full of people. His shots were pinging in the water immediately in front of us.

We all wanted to see what happened next so, not quite steady on our feet, moved enbloc into the restaurant and the party continued as we watched through the windows.  There were about a dozen men in that S.W.A.T. team and since they had significantly more powerful weapons the yachtee surrendered quietly and was taken away, much to the disappointment of the bunch of very funny children already in the restaurant, who'd obviously seen too many movies and immediately started to act out what they wished they'd seen happen.  Hilarious stuff and, along with Vince making a lot of very good jokes about irony, definitely a happy ending.

It would have been a very different story, yes?, if that man had been allowed to keep his more powerful weapons that had been confiscated for the duration of his stay in Australia.  Nothing, perhaps, would have changed what happened inside his own head but having no access to serious fire-power the outcome of that melt-down was pretty much harmless.  Maybe, at most, just the deaths of a great many barnacles on the rocks that lined the river.

So that's one story, and there's another more recent story along the same lines.  Last month in Hong Kong, which also has very strict and well-enforced gun control, a man had a similar melt-down and went on a shooting spree, hitting a great many people.  The S.W.A.T. team turned out and, yes, he went quietly, and his victims were raced to hospital where the doctors popped out the bullets, put in stitches and sent them all home.

It would have been a very different story, right?, in any country that didn't have such strict gun control in place.

So that's how I feel about gun control.  You cannot change what's in the hearts of men and you cannot stop strange lonely folk having these melt-downs, but you can significantly reduce their fire-power by NOT selling powerful weapons and by strictly enforcing these controls, and that alone has the effect of pretty well limiting the damage these men can do. 

Universal gun control everyone.  PLEASE?

I am still around!

Honeys, if you wonder where I've got to these days, I'm writing a novel.  It's a bad novel, sure, but with a Masters in Literature I feel I've paid my dues to the Higher Arts, and besides I've always thought bad literature was so much more fun.

Lots of stuff happening around me but I'm mostly not paying attention.

2013's HK7s starts in 27 hours but I haven't got tickets.

We are off to Osaka in a week for a week and I will try to blog the holiday.  Hopefully the novel will be finished by then and off on its journey, and my almost pathological need to write something/anything will again surface.

Fingers crossed for the poor sad wee thing.  My novel that is.

Oh, and we're also planning on being in London during July.  I am longing to see the "David Bowie is ..." Exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

And Fiji is having its own Exhibition which has me almost breathless with excitement.  All the universities and museums are putting their entire Fiji collections into one place and it's all stuff that hasn't been seen in Fiji for well over a century.  These foreign collectors took all the best stuff too so it's just going to be sublime BIGTIME!

So that's what's going down at the moment.  All is well.

In fact, all is so well, let's listen to that song again:

A Magical Molly Moment.

Yesterday, I'm sitting in a street cafe in an unnamed part of Hong Kong, waiting for Keith and watching the passing scene when I start to wonder "Why is everything all so sane?  Where are those Magical Molly Moments?  What happened to those Hong Kong moments of absolute enchantment that used to happen everywhere around me all the time?"

Just as I was thinking this, two police cars and a police van pulled up beside me, and eight policemen jumped out and raced into the building next to me.  It had to be something important and serious, yes?

Ten minutes later they all run out again, each one carrying a cheesecake on a plate.  They leap back into the cars and van and drive off fast.

Hong Kong, how much do I LOVE you!

Not Matisse!

I went last night to see that gorgeous film "Anna Karenina".  Very beautiful and very strange and clever as all get-out.  Sort of a Tolstoy-meets-Baz-Luhrmann-meets-Dali that would have been so difficult to pull off but which works and is simply sublime.

Anyway, I got a huge thrill towards the end when I thought ... well, I thought I saw Fiji's own Matisse Brown playing Princess Sorokina (a name which I thought must have given her a private laugh since it's very like Fijian for "You'll be sorry!")

However I checked it out today and no, Princess Sorokina was played by a British model called Cara  Delevingne ... but gosh those two ladies look alike.  Let me show you:

Matisse Brown!

Cara Delevingne!

OK, that's the best I could find on-line, but I'm sure you can make out just how alike the two are!

Anyway, this mix-up was a nice buzz while it lasted. I've known Matisse since she was a winsy little baby so I'm totally on her side ... but Cara seems like a real sweetie too, so I'm happy for her too.

Hey, I found a clip of Matisse in youtube:

Anyway, here's the trailer for the film "Anna Karenina" which is just gorgeous and which I highly recommend: 

We're Baaaa-aaak!

Back from NZ after a wonderful holiday and a fabulous Christmas and New Year.  Gosh, Keith's family is lovely.  Really exceptional.  Dealing with most families usually feels like taking an Express Train to Crazyland, but these lovely in-laws of mine have their roots firmly planted in Incredibly Sane Place and never go anyplace else.  Love 'em.

I wonder if it's something about being raised by a bone fide war hero that's the reason for this.  My dad used to say that about John, Keith's dad: that he carried around the mana of a man who has been tested beyond the levels of human endurance and found nothing in himself lacking.  My dad, who always had a low opinion of everyone and everything, thought John was a very special man indeed.

Oh, and I should also tell you that I've eaten more pavlova that you'd think humanly possible.  Gosh, that has to be the greatest dessert ever invented ... and no, I'm not taking sides as to which country invented it, New Zealand or Australia.  All I know is ...

... OK, several years ago I wasn't feeling quite up to par. This feeling persisted for many months,until I went to Christmas lunch at Keith's sister Helen's place where, for dessert, she served pavlova.  I had a big slice with ice cream and within minutes the feeling of unwellness left me and as the moments passed I just began to feel better and better until an hour later when I felt on top of the world.

And I've never had that unwell feeling since so I've told myself that pavlova is really a medicine and I'm allowed to eat as much of it as I want.

Mind you, it could have just been the combination of blackberries, strawberries, blueberries and kiwi fruit on top that wrought this miracle but where's the fun in that. 

Let me see if I can find a photo on-line of a pavlova just in case you don't know it:

Mmmmmm!  Yummy!

And if you want to know how to make one of these all-round tonics ... you know, for HEALTH reasons, there's a site here: http://www.joyofbaking.com/Pavlova.html

Anyway, we're back in HK now and looking forward to Chinese New Year where ... mmmm, Georgetown in Malaysia with a visit into the Cameron Highlands (although Ron and Patty are talking about taking this trip in August and suggested we join them then.) or else Chiang Mai in Thailand to check out the Sacred Caves? Hard choice, right?  I want to go to both of them so much so let's toss a coin and let The Universe decide it for us!

More stories and photos of NZ to come, but not today.