Internet: free or controlled? and Loch Katrine

Sharp eyed readers will note that this is being written on a Wednesday (or Thursday if you are in Australasia) and that the promised Monday entry did not materialise. This was due to a hotel wanting to charge a ridiculous amount for Internet access. There has been a series of articles in The Guardian newspaper recently. The articles cover a range of issues, including what Google knows about our internet use, how Facebook and Twitter are essentially restrictive in how we use the internet, and questions such as ‘Can the internet be civilised? This question looks at how much porn there is available and whether it should be curtailed, and also whether tools such as Facebook and Twitter can be made part of the laws of different countries e.g. in relation to libel. So, this covers a great deal of ground. In relation to schools, I think that it’s important that we raise these questions with our students and one role the TL or SL can play in the school is to try to ensure that debates on the internet take place or that students are taught to question their own use of the web e.g. in relation to ethics.

Just back from a visit to The Trossachs (which is from the Gaelic [Scottish version pronounced Gallic] for ‘A bristly place’) in central Scotland. This is an area of extensive woodland and large lochs (aka lakes). The most famous is Loch Katrine (pr Katrinn) which was made famous by Sir Walter Scott in his poem ‘Lady of the Lake’. On the day of our walk, there were a host of threatening clouds moving funereally across the sky but our 5 mile walk along the loch side was only briefly interrupted by a shower. When we were leaving, the rain came down in what Thomas Hardy referred to as ‘silken strings’. The views across the loch to the mountains and hills are stunning and in the summer, 2 boats take loads of tourists across the loch and back. There was only one boat on the day of our visit, with a multilingual chatter coming from the queue as we  passed. One of the features of the walk along the loch side at this time of year, is the new leaves on the silver birch trees and the photos below shows the trees lining the loch, with Ben Venue towering above them, and looking up to the trees with the mountain behind.

Now the Monday blog, west of Ireland and Australian poet

Retirement has brought a certain lack of routine, and this blog has suffered. So I have changed the title of this blog to James Herring’s Monday blog and this means that I will post an entry each Monday – come what may.

In March, I went to the west coast of Ireland for a week with my wife, for a bit of a family reunion. We stayed just outside the bonnie town of Westport in County Mayo. It’s a picturesque little town and I think that for many people, it might be a bit of a step back in time, especially with some of the shops which have changed little over the years. The other distinctive of feature of Westport and towns like it in Ireland, is the number of pubs. This will change over the next ten years as th recession bites hard. The most famous pub is Matt Molloy’s which is a traditional pub, untouched by the plasticisation which many pubs have suffered. Inside the wall are covered by old mirrors and publ signs, as well as a plethora of photos of folk groups, including The Chieftains of whom Matt Molloy is the leader. Inside the pub, you can see that in former times, like most rural pubs, this pub was a grocer’s store at the front with the bar at the back. The Guinness of course, is wonderful here, as it’s poured slowly and you have to wait for the beer to settle. The photo below is of Westport House a 300 year old mansion set in beautiful grounds and well worth a visit.

Westport House

 I have just finished reading Armour by the Australian poet John Kinsella. The book is a fascinating (and sometimes bewildering) look at many aspects of the Australian landscape. For those of you who are Australian or who know rural Australia, the poems relating to the animals and plants and the recent droughts in Australia, will bring some startling images e.g. “Every year the bright tremor of wattle/yellow light/yellow rattle/ of stamens and pollen”. Kinsella also takes a mystical view of the land and questions what modern Australians are doing to the land. Sometimes I felt that some poems were hard to understand but Kinsella’s flow of words are always meaningful i.e. full of meaning.