Its Time To Hang Up The Disco Shoes

I am caught between a rock and a hard place. Staying in Kuta on the  coast of Bali, its  surrounded by an assortment of bars, 
eateries and nightclubs. You can the hear pumping and vibrant  sound of electro music, R&B and soul from your room.

In my advancing years I should of listened to the rational side of me. That I am a man whose best dancing years are behind him and not very much in front of him. The age of disco and the moonwalk is over. But no, my immature, irrational unconsciousness won through. I wanted to impress the Balinese with my body-popping skills. So I put on my tight jeans and dancing shoes and headed for Ecstasy & Oblivion (the main nightclub in Kuta), which also aptly summarise my night. 

The club was packed with locals and young Australians getting down to some serious techno. I had nothing in common with these clubbers. I was the oldest one in the place by a country mile and more. Doing the funky chicken and robot was not going to cut it. Everybody seem to be twerking which was beyond my capabilities.

By 2am I was exhausted. The smoke, the noise and gyrating bodies was too much for me. All I could think of was putting my feet up in front of the TV whilst watching Countdown and enjoying a mug of Horlicks.

I trundled back to my hotel, avoiding the Balinese ladies of the night offering untold pleasures for a price. As I tucked myself in bed I come to the realisation that clubbing is a young persons pursuit. Middle aged people like me simply look out of place like a black man at a Ku Klux Klan convention or Kevin Pietersen  in the England cricket team. Like Liverpool's Steven Gerrard its time to retire with grace and dignity, and hang up those disco shoes for them to gather dust. I had my moment in the sun its time now to pass the torch (or disco shoes) to the next generation.

I had one thought to console me that at least a good number Balinese and inebriated Aussies were able to see me moonwalk from one end of the dance floor to the other. Michael J would of been proud of me.

No Bali Happy Ending For Me

The flight was not as onerous as I imagined. Twelve hours to Singapore and just two from there to Bali. Felt reasonably fresh
as I landed on this wonderful island.

As I handed in my documents to the Customs Officer he gave me a stern look and asked if I was travelling with family or on my own. When I responded in the latter he gave a smirk. His grin was even more pronounced when I informed him that I was staying in Kuta ( a place infamous for its night-life and massage parlours). I tried in vein to convince him that my vacation was for all the right reasons and not for lascivious purposes. I had not won him over by the time he stamped my passport and waved me to the exit, with a passing comment that he very much hoped that I enjoy my stay over the next two weeks. His tongue was firmly in cheek  when he said it.

The taxi drive to the Swiss-Belinn  Legion hotel was less than 30 minutes. It was nearing 11pm by the time I checked in. My deluxe room was on the 5th floor with balcony. The accommodation was small but modern. I  fondly imagined over the next fortnight consuming the local beer whilst watching the sunset go down.

Although nearing midnight, I thought I would venture out to have a brief taste of what Bali had to offer. A few minutes into my stroll I was accosted by several different locals offering massages by beautiful Balinese females who were experts in giving tourists like me "happy endings". I politely declined their offers as I was not interested in these young ladies, however skilled they maybe.

One chap  with barely any teeth and a huge pot belly enquired if I was interested in men giving me a "happy ending". He would do it himself for half the going-rate. I firmly declared that I had no desire for anybody male or female in dispensing any type of ending; happy, sad or otherwise!

I was able to escape to a local bar without further incident. Whilst sipping on a bottle of Bintang (Balinese beer) I reflected on my  encounter with the burly Customs Officer. If I ever see him on my departure I will have a smirk on my face as wide as the Bali Sea knowing that I was never tempted to have a happy ending even if it was from a toothless fat bloke at half price. 

David Lammy MP Cynical Ploy to become Mayor of London

David Lammy - the Labour MP for Tottenham gave a TV interview on boxing day warning that the ingredients of what caused the 2011 riots were still prevalent and that disturbances would again happen if these were not resolved by the present government.


David Lammy Tottenham Labour MP

 The Labour MP went on to say that disillusionment amongst white working class people, blacks and asians which the present coalition administration have not address will be the catalyst for the significant disturbances in the future.

I could not diametrically disagree more with the Labour former minister. The riots in 2011 were instigated by criminal gangs who saw it as an opportunity to loot, rob, burn and kill without fear of being caught by the police. It had nothing to do with young men having no hope or not having a stake in society and more to do with a sub-culture where greed, avarice, instant gratification and obtaining what you want at any cost is the norm. These so called disaffected people are not interested in getting jobs, if they were they would be able to obtain one if they put their minds to it. Remember we have had several million people mostly from Eastern Europe come to the UK over the last 10 years doing low paid jobs because employers could not find British people to fill the vacant posts. This story is the same up and down the country.

The reality is that this a cynical ploy from Lammy to be Labour's candidate for mayor of London. He believes if he can predict another major disturbance hopefully next summer, he will be able to come along on his white charger and be the saviour of post-riot London and telling anyone who would listen he foretold this and he has the answers. Riots may well happen again but the causes will not be the ones outlined by Lammy. The reasons will be gang related as the result of the breakdown of the black family which has given rise to the problem of drugs, crime and violence in the black community. It was this that led to the 2011 riots and I am afraid it will do so again. 

David Lammy and others prominent in the black community are aware of this cancer eating away in their communities but are in complete denial or worse they don't care. The MP for Tottenham must know that people were murdered in the disturbances in 2011. Why would he want blood on his hands for the sake of becoming leader of the most powerful and influential city in the world. Maybe I have just answered my own question.

Biggest Problem Facing Black People - Is Black People

Is name was Dwayne Douglas. He was only 15. According to his grieving mother he was good at school and aiming to go to university. He wanted to become a teacher. However, like many black teenagers before him he was stabbed to death by a group of other black boys. As the saying inevitable goes he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. This sadly follows a number of other stabbings of teenagers that have occurred in my own area of south London, which have become so frequent over the years that it hardly makes the local press let alone the national newspapers. You don’t have to be a contestant on Mastermind to know that the one incontrovertible factor that these violent incidents have in common is, as in the case of Dwayne, that the perpetuators and the victims are black. For me it is become clear that the cause of this escalating knife problem in London is due to the devastating social consequences of illegitimacy within the Afro-Caribbean community. The last official census figures revealed that lone parents form the majority of Afro-Caribbean families. The family structure is increasingly disappearing – where drugs, crime, murder and social anarchy are evaporating once stable black communities. Black commentators would argue that problems facing the black community can be laid at the door of Institutionalised racism as outlined in the Macpherson’s Inquiry into the Death of Stephen Lawrence. There is no doubt that there is a good deal of residual discrimination in society and in the police, but not enough to explain the over representation of black people in prisons, crime figures, and school exclusions. Racism in itself is not the sole explanation. The absence of fathers as role models for young black males is critically important in the genesis of delinquency. We know that some single mothers succeed better than some couples at raising well-adjusted children but the downward spiral of deprivation among lone-parent families is far more pronounced than among comparably poor two-parent ones. The stronger the family unit, the better the economic and social progress, as witness with British Chinese and Asian families. Today, Black people found themselves at the precipice, as a result of the unwillingness among its ranks to tackle this single most important issue facing the community – it is more critical than crime, drugs, poverty, welfare or homelessness because the disintegration of the Afro-Caribbean family structure lies behind and drives them all. The Black community desperately need a debate on this issue if we are to avoid repeated scenes of inconsolable parents like the mother of Dwayne Douglas appearing on our TV screens mourning their loss of their children in such a violent and appalling manner.