A Piece Of Cake

I was strolling around in W.H.Smith when I noticed an unusual looking book. It had a black girl on the front; it was all grey and white with ‘A Piece Of Cake’ written in bright pink letters. This type of book falls outside my usual range so I had to be extra weary. I picked it up and read the blurb on the back (I had to make sure it was good, I wasn’t willing to waste £6.99 on a crappy disappointing book!).

It wasn’t crappy. I wasn’t disappointed.

'A Piece of Cake' written by Cupcake Brown is a story of a young girls struggle with growth in a world without parents or any sort of legit form of guidance. I suppose it can be called a Bildungsroman although it’s not fiction. I learnt a few things from it such as what certain drugs are, why they’re used and their repercussions - OK so not the best of things to know but learning is learning. ‘A Piece of Cake’ is a true encounter of Cupcake Brown’s life from age 11 to present. I won’t go into detail but I will give a brief summary.

At age 11 Cupcake Brown found her mum dead in her bedroom. Her mum had had an epileptic seizure and unpleasantly choked on her tongue. From here on in, things seemed to just go downhill. Taken away from their uncle, the only male figure her and her brother Larry knew, Cupcake and Larry were handed over to their biological father Mr Burns. Mr Burns who never paid child support or even saw his kids took them in with the assumption that a large trust fund settlement was waiting for him (somewhere around the amount of $50, 000). When this didn’t prove true he ushered them into a foster home run by a violent woman who was rumoured to have killed two of her other foster kids. With the foster system turning a blind eye, Cup suffered a copious amount of abuse at this foster home and decided her only other (safer) option was to run away. She encounters a lot of different people and is eventually led into the land of drugs, gangs, alcohol and prostitution. We follow her through her encounters for most of the book but what’s interesting is her remarks about God. There are moments in the book where she states that she doesn’t trust, believe or like God, after all, if there was a God why would He let all this happen to her? (I’m sure, if you admit to yourself, there have been times when this thought has crossed our minds...even though we do always revert back eventually.)

There comes a time where Cup is on the brink of death and decides to try this ‘talking to God’ thing. She simply says something along the lines of ‘If you help me, I’ll stop doing this’. Simple. God keeps His side of the bargain so does Cup. Here is just the beginning of her new found relationship with what she sometimes termed the 'higher power'. As the novel progresses she develops a stronger bond with God as he continues to help her through her desperate times of need.

While the book was a great read, there were sections which came across as slightly unrealistic and predictable. For example, there was a continuous section within the book where Cup would pray for something as small as plates and a TV stand and get it within a couple of days. Coincidence? Probably not. I’m sure you’ve heard the term ‘God works in mysterious ways’ but I wouldn’t mind having all my prayers answered within a couple of days, it just never seems to happen like that…

Nonetheless the book opens up an underground world, one I’m sure not many of you reading this have experienced. It isn’t just a drug addict living on the street sort of book but takes you on a roller coaster journey by showing us the good and bad. Her feelings and thoughts are intertwined into the narrative of the story making it a lot easier to understand and is also written in a very simplistic form.

‘A Piece of Cake’ is worth the read if you’re looking for something different. She ends the novel with one of the most inspirational quotes of the book.

“When God knows you’re going to battle, He sends his best warriors”

Enjoy!

So....What Now?

It seems like the issue about Shilpa Shetty has grown into a big debate. Now everyone wants to know about racism. Whenever the media are involved in an issue it suddenly becomes very important. Before the media picked it up, it was not at all cool to talk about the issue. I believe racism of this sort has been around for a very long time, in fact, ever since the process of colonisation but that's for another post.

The future prime minister, poor lad, has been ‘forced’ to speak on the matter. Well, what else can he say other than ‘this is very intolerable, we do not accept racism in this country’…

Well of course that’s how it SHOULD be, but is it?

WE know racism ISNT obsolete. And when I say ‘we’ I mean those who are of the ‘minority’. If you look at the meaning of that word ‘minority’ you will notice that it depicts connotations of ‘small’ , ‘marginal’, ‘alternative’ and they all connote ‘the outsider’. So, as long as the word ‘minority’ is used, those who fall into the ‘minority’ category will always be an outsider (...)

A friend of mine asked how I work in the office I'm currently in. Being the only black person I don’t tend to fit in with the others as much as they do with each other - and that's the truth. Why? It’s definitely NOT my colour but more the culture associated. While I do not have a noticeable Asian or African accent like Shilpa, there are still many cultural differences which tend to distance me from the other people in the office. They are not obvious differences but honestly, they are there. For example in Big Brother, Shilpa was criticised for cooking her chicken to long and Science in an episode before was criticised for cutting the rear end off a chicken. THESE are examples of cultural differences that are not so apparent first hand.

As for Big Brother, the culprits are allegedly bullying Shilpa simply because she has a different accent and name. Yea I’m sure a lot of you have been teased about your name just because it’s different. Either that or you’ve had a few people find it hard to pronounce. I admit, when I was young I use to cringe when they came to my name on the register at school. Now when I tell someone my name they say ‘o that’s an unusual name’ to which I reply ‘not in my country it isn’t’ then add a ‘mate’ if I'm feeling extra cockney.

The point I want to get to here is; are the culprits on Big Brother reflecting the general public? Are they not just saying what most people think?

I was discussing this with work colleagues (why they feel they should discuss it with me I don’t know, I can take a guess though) and one of them pointed this out. He said ‘Well unfortunately, the people in Big Brother reflect the general public’. He may have said it in passing but I picked up on it. He’s right to a certain extent. How many times have Black/Asian people out numbered the White British people in Big Brother? Then think of the proportion of Black/Asian people to White British people in the UK population. The same applies to anything but athletics and hip hop. I am also aware that it's not a simple divide of 'black' and 'white'. Maybe they’re (the Big Brother contestants) being racist but they are expressing their true opinions. They are saying what they think and I appreciate that. Why? Because I would personally prefer someone to tell me they’re racist so that I know what I’m getting myself into rather than make snide comments relating to my race or the culture associated.

So…what now? Because racism is now a cental issue, does that mean something will be done about it?

I don’t think so.

Climate Change Eh?

According to pessimistic environmentalist, the media and the government to a certain extent - we’re all gonna die!

Turn off your lights, turn off your TV’s, wear a jumper, don’t eat chocolates, walk to work do this don’t do that! Moan, moan, moan. Yea I know its all for a good cause but it’s a bit OTT don’t ya think?

So the next trend is now Global Warming (the caps are used to portray authority). Things need to change and they need to change fast, today if possible. Tony Blair was criticised for refusing to give up vacation flights because of global warming - click here to see the article and try to avoid the advert showing an overweight man shaking hair off his hairy chest (if you dont see it, count yourself lucky). So, he’s being criticised for not conforming to what may be the majority view and has been dubbed a hypocrite because of it. Of course he’s a hypocrite, he’s only speaking his mind and being realistic. He’s trying to fight the causes of global warming whilst taking flights while on vacation. So what’s he suppose to do? Swim?

I think once again, I’m missing something here.

I wonder whether the future is so doom and gloom. Are we really causing as much damage to the environment as they (media, government etc) make out? Or is this just another morale panic tactic to raise the price of everything in the name of ‘the environment’?

I heard quite a while ago that the Earth’s climate changes drastically every millions years or so due to the changing temperature of the sun, the details were vague so I decided to try and check it out a bit (I had time on my hands). This made sense to me. If I break it down, there was an Ice Age on Earth all those years ago and now there isn’t. So for this to happen the ice must have melted which means that there was a point in time where the sun was hot enough to melt the ice, is this not what’s happening now? Aren’t we just going through another of the Earth’s environmental cycle? I’m obviously not a scientist and haven’t done major research in this but it doesn’t stop me having an opinion.

No doubt, CO2 emissions are making things worse rather than better but its not the ONLY reason and some have claimed that it is not the MAJOR reason. Apparently there has been some data ‘fondling’ to make some cases appear a lot worse than it is. Of course the effects ARE worse now because of numerous reasons. Encouraging people to be more environmentally conscious is fine. I suppose we can wear a jumper or completely turn off the TV and not leave it on standby but when it comes to things like charging people for throwing away rubbish and not recycling, it’s not so fair and it becomes something else…maybe bullying. We should have a 'save the earth' day where we minimise C02 emissions as much as possible by not using public transport or cars and therefore, no work!

O well! The only message I’ll leave here is for you to make up your own mind whether to follow the trend or challenge it. Personally challenging it is a lot more fun.

Work Update

Just another short work update for those who are interested, even if it’s a tiny bit.

I spoke to my manager – or rather she spoke to me – about how long I will be in my current job. She told me that I would be here for at least a month so I suppose that’s till the beginning of February. As for beyond that well, she’s not too sure so I’m not sure. I’ve been looking on the intranet to see if there are any jobs available but the only one I think I can scrape through is one where the hours are between 11pm and 7:30 am. Now I can do those hours because I’m a night person anyway and plus I can avoid all the rush hour etc etc BUT no night life and obviously no night sleep. The closing date is today so it’s not like I got time to think about it. It’s either I want it or not…should I apply?...

Bliss

I was searching around on the internet and I found this poem called “The Island”. I’m not one for poems, I actually found them quite boring but this may be due to overanalysing them while at university. This one however, is lovely - the last line is the best:

The Island

If I had a ship,

I'd sail my ship,

I'd sail my ship

Through Eastern seas;

Down to a beach where the slow waves thunder-

The green curls over and the white falls under-

Boom! Boom! Boom!
On the sun-bright sand.

Then I'd leave my ship and I'd land,

And climb the steep white sand,

And climb to the trees,

The six dark trees,

The coco-nut trees on the cliff's green crown -

Hands and knees

To the coco-nut trees,

Face to the cliff as the stones patter down,

Up, up, up, staggering, stumbling,

Round the corner where the rock is crumbling,

Round this shoulder,

Over this boulder,

Up to the top where the six trees stand ....

And there I would rest, and lie,

My chin in my hands, and gaze

At the dazzle of sand below,

And the green waves curling slow,

And the grey-blue distant haze

Where the sea goes up to the sky....

And I'd say to myself as I looked so lazily down at the sea:

"There's nobody else in the world, and the world was made for me."

A.A. Milne

Lets Talk About Friends.

Happy New Year and all that.

I was reading an article off the internet about friendship. It turns out that someone has one million friends on their “MySpace” friends list. ONE MILLION FRIENDS? Wow now that is sad. Can you really relate to one million people enough to call them your friends? I don’t think so! A good 90% of that one million are probably what I call, “periphery friends”, those who are around but not really around if you know what I mean.

What is a friend? I like this definition made by the “Life Coach” Carole Ann Rice: “You don't have to be anyone other than yourself. Up, down, funny or sad, they just want to be around you. A good friend offers support, understands your character and how you tick and relishes it. They should be on hand to give you the odd reality check too.”

Having a friend doesn’t mean speaking to them everyday or every two days but knowing that when you need them, they’ll be there if they can. So when you break it down, how many REAL friends do you have? Probably not that many. Quality is more important than quantity, isn’t that what they always say? And I suppose it’s true, unless you’re having a house party then that’s when you need both. Init.

I also think we make friends with people who are similar to ourselves – note I said similar and not exactly alike. We connect with people we can relate too, or else, what would we talk about? My friend group consists of quite straight forward, kind hearted, funny with a certain level of Nigerian (if they’re from Nigeria) rudeness. I must admit I don’t have a wide selection of friends from all over the world but I’ll work on that I think.