Tour de France - srage 2. An Italian cycling hero. Children without beds - in the UK! Gaza.m

Well, it seems that Mark Cavendish has got back on his bike again this morning, which is good to hear. i did wonder if he would manage it. 

They’re riding from Cesanatico to Bologna, described as a ‘hilly stage’. I should think so too with 6 climbs in the almost 200 kilometres the riders will cover today. 

Here are some action reports:

11.12 British time

Mark Cavendish seems chipper at the depart, saying he’s thankful for the blinds in the hotel and for the “incredible group of people around him”. He says “every metre you do is one less metre you have to do” and that Le Tour is about suffering. “If you have my body type, don’t start climbing now…I’m just hanging on by a thread as a sprinter and that’s by experience, really”.

11.46 British time

190km to go: It’s baking hot out there, and a series of attacks in the first 10 clicks has resulted in an 11-man breakaway. The main bunch, Bardet in yellow is dropping 20 seconds behind.

11.52 British time

185km to go: It’s a hilly stage, nothing too daft but tough enough in the heat. The peloton is dropped back close to 1’ 30” at this point.

12.02 British time

The peloton sitting back after Saturday’s shakeup, the cruelty of such a long chase over such tough terrain. Cavendish is off the back of the group but smiling.

Fingers crossed he makes it to the end of the ride!

Today’s stage is dedicated to the Italian cycling hero Marco Pantani, nicknamed “Il Pirata” because of his shaven head and the bandana and earrings he wore. 

He recorded the fastest ever climbs up the Tour's iconic venues of Mont Ventoux (46:00)[2] and Alpe d'Huez (36:50), where he  won in 1995 and 1997. Impressive! 

He was born and grew up in or very near to Cesanatico. Despite his having been tested many times for doping, he never tested positive and is very much the hero of his home town where they have a statue of him. On February 14th 2004 he was found dead in a hotel room in Rimini, possibly from a drugs overdose. A sad end for a great cyclist but twenty thousand people attended his funeral in his hometown

I confess to getting a little obsessed each year with the Tour de France. So there will undoubtedly be more of this over the next few weeks. 

Now for some more serious stuff. I read this morning about a primary school in Hartlepool where classrooms now have spaces in which children can sleep. “We see little ones coming in worn out,” said Dave Turner, the school’s headteacher. “Sometimes they are sharing a bed with siblings. Sometimes they share with different families.” The cash-strapped school gives all its children free breakfasts, PE kits and stationery. 

Another Hartlepool headteacher has launched a charitable project which aims to deliver 10,000 new beds to children in the Tees Valley in the next three years. We’ve seen a huge growth in food banks. And here’s an article about a “baby bank”, where young mothers in need can get help finding the equipment needed for a new, or not so new, baby. As the article tells us, it is having trouble staying open! 

The beds issue is another aspect of the problem. Barnardo’s estimate that almost 900,000 children jn England had to share a bed or sleep on the floor. Good grief! Here we are in the 21st century with children who don’t have a bed of their own to sleep in. I remember reading about families in the past where children slept two to a bed, head to toe, with a pillow at each end of the bed. (And to think that I considered myself unfortunate because didn’t have a bedroom of my own but shared it with two sisters. At least we each had our own bed!) But that was, as I said, in the past! We should be doing better than that now! 

And elsewhere there is this: 

“A UN spokesperson said she had just returned to central Gaza after four weeks outside the territory and “it’s really unbearable”. Louise Wateridge said by video link that the situation had “significantly deteriorated”. “There’s no water there, there’s no sanitation, there’s no food,” and people were returning to live in “empty shells” of buildings. In the absence of toilets they were “relieving themselves anywhere they can”.”

It’s a good job I have the Tour de France to take my mind off things!

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!

Tour de France - le grand départ. And a quiet hero.

I delayed going out for a run this morning until the rain had eased a little. It wasn’t raining when I set off but my weather app said it would drizzle for the next hour. So I tied my raincoat around my waist. The closer I got to Yorkshire, which, after all, is only a few miles up the road, the more drizzle there was in the air. But it wasn’t seriously wet. 

Later the day improved considerably, although not quite June weather. So it goes. 

Today the riders in the Tour de France set off. The grand départ this year was from Florence, Italy, riding over the hills to Rimini. Checking the weather online, I see that they had a warm, no, a hot but dry start. I haven’t watched any of it but I’ll catch highlights on television this evening. We have a long tradition of keeping track of the Tour, watching it on French TV and Spanish TV as well as here in the UK. Ten years ago I sat on a hillside in Holmfirth, not far from here, with my son, his wife and their small baby daughter, and watched the riders stream past, so I can say I have seen some of it live. 

This is the first time they are setting from Italy. They will not finish in Paris because of the Olympic Games. Instead they will end the Tour in Nice. Maybe I’ll spot some landmarks from when we had a holiday there many years ago. 

Mark Cavendish, from the Isle of Man, was forced to drop out of last year’s tour with a broken collar bone. That was apparently meant to be his swan song. He was persuaded to have another go this year, hoping to beat Eddie Merckx’s record for the number of stage wins. Earlier today I read that he was feeling positive about it but just now ai read that he has really suffered in the heat and may need to drop out once more. I’ll find out later. 

I was reading the other day about the Italian Gino Bartali, 3 times winner of the Giro d’Italia, and winner of the Tour de France in 1938 and again in 1948. 

In between times it seems that he quietly saved the lives of large numbers of Italian Jews. Among other things there is this story:

“As a young man working at the bike shop, Bartali had become close friends with Giacomo Goldenberg, a local Jewish man. After the implementation of anti-Jewish laws, Bartali sought out Goldenberg’s family and offered to harbor them first in his apartment and then, when things became to dangerous, in a neighboring basement. There they would stay until Florence’s until in August 1944. Bartali was taking an incredible risk; the crime, if discovered, would have earned him (and, in all likelihood, his wife and young boy) a bullet in the skull. What’s incredible is that Bartali never spoke publically about what he did; the story coming to light only as researchers started sifting through his diary in 2010, 10 years after his death.”

Even his wife was unaware of this activity. I also read that he used the excuse of cycle training as a means of riding around unmolested and unchecked by fascist forces, transporting photos of Jews who needed false passport to the people who provided such documents. A quiet hero who didn’t regard himself as such, he said, “Real heroes are others, those who have suffered in their soul, in their heart, in their spirit, in their mind, for their loved ones. Those are the real heroes. I’m just a cyclist.”

Born in Ponte a Ema, Florence, on July 18, 1914, he died in his native city in 2010. Cycling must be good for you! 

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!

The end of summer! A trip down memory lane. Chess for displaced children. Election fun and games.

Winter’s back! Our brief foray into summer is over for the time being. So it goes. At least I managed to run round the village this morning before the rain started. It could be worse, of course. In Switzerland and Italy heavy rain has been causing flooding. This is not quite the sort of view we expect of places in Emilia-Romagna.

According to Facebook memories, five years ago we were enjoying the sunshine in Sanxenxo, Galicia, Spain, where Phil was playing in a chess tournament. 

Indeed nine years ago, Phil was winning prizes there. 

We went to that tournament for years on the run. While Phil played chess, I enjoyed the hotel pool and walked on the beach, went on boat trips to the Islas Cíes. Unfortunately that tournament was stopped by Covid and has not been resurrected since.

Meanwhile, children at a camp for internally displaced people near Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo are being taught to play chess by chess-players from Goma. They set up using a waterproof, foldable chessboard and pieces supplied by Chess in the City, a local initiative to introduce children to the game. Brilliant idea! 

Fun and games continue with election fever here and on the other side of the Atlantic. 

Here it seems that Reform UK campaigners have been making racist and homophobic comments. What a surprise! According to a Reform UK candidate interviewed on The World at One, the person who has been mainly making such comments is an actor, possibly employed by Channel 4 to bring his party into disrepute. His party, he declared, expels anyone who expresses such heinous opinions. According to Mr Farage himself, this might well be a stitch-up! 

According to Mr Starmer Mr Farage’s failure to deal with it is a sign of his weakness as a leader. He said:

“This is a test of leadership …

You have to ask the question, why so many people who are supporting Reform seem to be exposed in this particular way? It’s for a leader to change his or her party to make sure the culture is right, and the standards are understood by everybody within the party.”

Well, I suppose that’s what he’s been doing with the Labour Party.

Over in the USA, Mr Biden made a poor showing in his televised debate with Mr Trump. Maybe he is on his way out. Will they replace him before election campaigner starts? Who will they choose?

We seem to be a little short of statesmen worldwide! 

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!

How we appreciate (or not) the weather. Election debates. Dangerous creatures.,

Granddaughter Number Two will be happier today. For most of this week she has been complaining that it’s been too hot. I agree with her that travelling on public transport is not the most pleasant experience when the weather is warm and she does take a bus and a tram to work in central Manchester every weekday. On Tuesday when I was also in Manchester we tried to meet for lunch. However, my hair appointment went into her ridiculously short lunch hour (can you still call it a lunch hour of it lasts only 30 minutes?) and we were at opposite sides of the city centre. We managed to meet and chat for about five minutes! Today, as the weathermen promised, it is cooler and so she will be happier. 

She is one of those odd people who relishes cold weather so that she can wear big jumpers and curl up in a duvet with a good book. While I can appreciate the appeal of that, there comes a point when I really want to get the lighter-weight clothes out and sit comfortably outdoors in the shade with a cool drink and a good book. We have the good books in common.  

We missed another pre-election debate last night, the last one before the election a week today. By all accounts we did not miss much. This time it just Sunak versus Starmer. Apparently neither has said anything new or enlightening. We’ll see what next Thursday brings. 

Here’s something that has appeared on social media: 

“Everyone getting in a flap at having Reform UK leaflets delivered by Royal Mail.

***TOP TIP***

Simply pop the leaflet in an envelope and send it to:

Reform UK Co Ltd

5 - 6 St Matthew Street

Westminster

SW1P 2JT

Just don't put a stamp on it, the surcharges are very expensive...”

Some people have commented that we should just ignore Reform UK as a minority party of no importance. My fear is that they could sneak into a position in parliament where their voice could be heard more often. Some pundits say that voters disillusioned with both Labour and the Tories might well turn to Reform UK as a kind of reaction! We shall see!

Meanwhile, a German friend of mine tells me that Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has promised to shorten the waiting time for new citizens to obtain a German passport to five years but has introduced a tougher measure of loyalty to German values. “New test questions have been added on the topics of antisemitism, the right of the state of Israel to exist and Jewish life in Germany,” and new German citizens must declare Israel’s right to exist. Of course accepting Israel’s right to exist does not preclude believing in Palestine’s right to exist but that is not mentioned. 

Citizenship tests are a thorny matter; how many of us would pass muster if we all had to go through the test today? How many of us simply do not have the knowledge? And if we had to take the test and failed, what would the government do with us?

 

Thinking of changing populations, (animal populations), on more than one occasion I have expressed my opposition to the proposal that wild wolves should be reintroduced into the UK. I can appreciate that they are beautiful animals but I don’t want to risk running into one when I am out and about. I feel the same about bears. Anyway, this week I read about a Frenchwoman who spent a night with her family at Thoiry Zoo, about 25 miles away from Paris. They have safari-style lodges in the zoo where you can stay for between £185 and £640 a night. Lodges in the wolf zone promise “silence, rest and disconnection”, according to the zoo’s adverts. They offer “a one-of-a-kind, very intimate experience with the arctic wolves you’ll be able to see from the living room”. 

In the morning she got up and went for a run, the kind of thing I might well have done. Somehow she ended up in the “wolf zone”, an area where access is limited to visitors on cars. It’s not clear whether she made a mistaken or if the trail was not clearly marked but somehow she got through   “security systems, a trench and an electric fence supposed to keep the animals in”. Three wolves attacked her and her injuries are life-threatening. 

That’s the kind of thing that makes me wary of reintroducing wild wolves into the UK. They are, after all, dangerous animals! 

We should be wary of all dangerous animals! 

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone! 

The stuff of science fiction. Banquets and food aid lines and food banks: a bit of a contrast.

 It has been reported that China has successfully collected rock samples from the dark side of the moon. I wonder what they will learn from them. And today I came across a report that sounds like the stuff of a science fiction story: two US astronauts are stranded in space on board Boeing’s Starliner capsule.  Nobody seems too worried about it at the moment.

Back on earth, yesterday King Charles hosted a state banquet for the emperor of Japan. On the television news I saw the ‘great and good’ progress into the banqueting hall: King Charles accompanying the empress, the emperor accompanying Camilla, and other royal folk and less royal guests following behind, two by two, in a positively medieval procession.

Anyone really interested can google information about what they ate, no doubt sumptuous fayre (an appropriately medieval word for food!).

In contrast I remembered a video I saw recently of Palestinian children lining up, small bowls in hand, to receive a ladleful of food - another almost mediaeval, or at any rate Dickensian scene.

Then there are those food banks. I read an article this morning about the singer Taylor Swift. I can’t say I am acquainted with her music but I am told she is talented. Prince William and Paul McCartney, according to some a prince of the pop music world, have been seen dancing at her concerts. I just wonder why she feels the need to perform in her underwear, but maybe I’m just growing old. Anyway, it seems that she has been making huge donations to food banks in every city of the UK where she has performed on this tour. Good for her! Maybe others should follow her example. 

Here are a couple of photos: 

one of items that are banned from entering Gaza 

and one of the much smaller number items permitted to enter Gaza. 

Interesting!

And here is another item from Michael Rosen’s ‘The King and his Tutor’:

'Tutor,' said the King, 'can you think of a situation in which everyone is the enemy?'

'It's possible,' said the tutor, 'what do you have in mind?'

'What if, for example,' said the King, 'we need to liquidate the enemy over there?'

'Go on,' said the tutor.

'Well, won't we find that part of the problem we would face with a job like that is that all sorts of busybodies would want to monitor what we're doing? said the King.

'Yes, that's a good point,' said the tutor. 

'And these busybodies spread bad news about us...' said the King.

'Yes indeed, they do,' said the tutor.

'Well what do we do about that?' said the King.

'If I get you right,' said the tutor, 'you're suggesting that we have to regard these busybodies in just the same way as we regard the enemy itself.'

'What concerns me though,' said the King, 'is that people will say that busybodies have rights of some kind or another and if we're seen to be eliminating these busybodies, it will reflect badly on us.'

'Oh I don't think you would need to worry about that,' said the tutor, 'our systems of sharing information are much more widely distributed than anything that the busybodies (or their supporters) can muster.'

'Oh that's alright then,' said the King.

'Yes,' said the tutor.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!