Fly-by post

[blamebrampton]

Have been hammered by deadlines this month. I am juggling a few different jobs, and appear to be the only person left in publishing who can understand a range of craft patterns, which means that I am still miles behind wth everything that is not hitting print deadlines. Not to mention slightly cross-eyed from mental knitting ...

I am not ignoring your comments, I am appreciating them and internalising them before answering. It's different.

So, very briefly, Fiji has had another coup. Fiji has these semi-regularly and they are relatively civilised for the most part. This time, the 'government' has decreed that no media will be allowed to broadcast news that is critical of the current political situation and has put censors in many of the major outlets.

For the first few days, editions of broadcast and paper news were skipped. Then the journos decided that Gandhi was right and that passive resistance could make its point gently and pointedly. So they went back to publishing the news. Nice, safe news. Completely uncritical news. News such as: "Paint has apparently dried on his old couch, Max reports. Given the job of painting the couch, Max was excited at the prospect of the paint drying. But when asked how it dried, he was nonplussed.

" 'It just went on wet, but after about four hours, it started to dry. That was when I realised, paint dries,' the young scholar observed."

Find a few more here at the SMH coverage, or, for the full story, go to the Fiji Daily Post site and check out their local news. While the laid-back pace of Fijian life may trick you into thinking a few actual news stories are satires, the real comedy will soon be obvious to you. I curtsey respectfully in their direction.

In completely different and very sad news, the vicious and deadly Marysville fire, one of the fires that swept through Victoria in February, has been ruled arson and the police say they are close to charging a volunteer firefighter with lighting it. I have no words for this, and so go back to admiring the Fijians.
 

PS Thanks, Cal! You know why.

Comments

[i-autumnheart.livejournal.com]

Sadly, the arsonist-in-brigade thing is more common than it should be. The instances I've heard of, though, have all been people who had problems of the ooh-fire-pretty, or I-want-to-be-a-hero variety already, and so joined an organisation that would let them indulge that :(.

I know in NSW these days, you have to go through interviews and a background check and so on before you can join, but that's pretty new, and even then it doesn't pick up the latent ones.

I am loving the Fijian news articles, though! I'm really rather awed that they've been brave enough to resist censorship this way: in full view of the internet, no less. A definite mark on the plus side for the information age.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't know anyone who has had much experience with firefighting who is surprised to hear about arsonists. In NPWS there was the other type, too, the we get paid huge overtime rates for firefighting sort. At least they had the 'sense' to mostly come out over winter.

The Fijians are fabulous! I am so impressed with them. Their government is not vicious, and this upholding the letter of the law, so I think it will be fine, though they can probably say goodbye to any parliamentary press party this year ;-)