Ulla’s Amazing Wee Blog

So I have been wandering around the local area – not too far from home – and ended up in the library reading the Which? consumer magazine during a little rest.

non-compostable teabag remains

I got shocked by two articles:

• that most teabags are not anymore 100% compostable, as they include a polypropylene plastic netting in order to heat-seal the bags. These include fairtrade and organic brands like “TeaDirect” and “Clipper”, too. And astonishingly, also fruit and herbal teas.
  Which a quick dig in my wormery confirmed – for several hours I had to sieve out the left-overs of teabag netting to put into landfill instead.
  Here is a picture of some of the remains from the wormery, which my partner described as ” [The teabag leftovers] Looks like the alien in Dr.Who from whom you hide behind the sofa as a kid!”

And that my new and proudly acquired Ecoballs have made it into the top ten of money-wasting products that the world doesn’t need, according to Which? .  Whilst I was first thrilled to have found a product which promised to soften the washing without the need for fabric softener and the balls to be a hypoallergenic alternative to perfumed washing-powder, Which? claims that in tests the washing balls seemed to make little difference as in just doing the washing with water alone.

Another “Greenwash” article promised to research the ecological benefits of eco-products, like Ecover laundry powder in comparison to main brands.

The baby is still not there. We are waiting for him to make an appearance now every day.  My midwife has already talked about inducing the birth, but I am very much against it after reading about the possible side-effects.  I am very grateful to have been made aware of the AIMS (Association for Improvements in the Maternity Services) publications as they research these issues very well – from possible mistakes in calculating the due date to flawed research regarding home births and breech births.
Ina May Gaskin‘s book “Guide to Childbirth” is also very recommendable and empowering as based on the practical outcomes of over 2000 midwife-led home births from the 70ies till the new millenium. It is showing how easily one medical intervention in childbirth can lead to another: with quite disempowering results for the mother and consequently also unsettling the newborn baby.

I am on my third day of maternity leave and its great, I can sleep how much I want, which is a lot. I haven’t yet got my nesting instinct as the flat still looks a mess. My parents have furnished the nursery though and the little one is kicking around in my belly and loves music,  the baby is supposed to be a boy.  For some strange reason he seems to like in particular Opera and choir music, both not my favourites, but I just put the CD player under the duvet and let the little one wriggle away.

I found the Pregnancy and Parents Centre in Edinburgh so far a really helpful resource to prepare for the birth and parenthood.
The Yoga for pregnant women is not just about stretching your limbs, but we always have good talks about what happens to us and other members of the group in our pregnancies and its also in particular helpful for the members of the group to come back after the birth with their little ones and talk to us about how it went. The babies are always so gorgeous to see, too.
My partner and me also went to one of the Birth Preparation workshops, which was very helpful as the free workshops offered by the NHS, the National Health Service,  were only offered during the day and my partner could not attend.  Also I really liked the practical, hands-on focus on being massaged, although I nearly fell asleep after lunch as I got suddenly so tired.
I would really like a water birth, and first I was very keen on a home birth but that seems a bit unpractical in our 14 floor tower block with little sound-proofing. Also my mum is coming for the birth and she was insisting I go to hospital, in her opinion that’s where the best care would be available especially in case something goes wrong.  I thought a little bit about it and then decided for the hospital, mainly because so many women and babies in the world actually don’t have the option to be under such excellent free medical care during birth.  So we are actually quite lucky to have the option to decide whether we want to go to hospital or not, and we choose the smaller, quieter hospital a bit further away of which we heard good reviews, as the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary tends to be a bit overcrowded.
In Britain in theory there is also the option to go to a midwife-led birth centre – a compromise between home and hospital birth, but there is none yet available in and about Edinburgh, they have been  in the process of building one, but it won’t be ready for us this month, I suspect.

I haven’t been blogging for the last months as there are so many new developments in my life.

First of all: I am pregnant! And totally excited about it! So we have been trying to get ready for the baby, by searching for lots of baby items second-hand, getting a load of stuff from the former freecycle recycling group “freegle” and my partner’s work colleague even handed down a cot bed to us, too, which was fantastic. There seems to be quite a bit of discussions and disagreement amongst mothers and mums-to-be about whether its better to get baby items second-hand or new; my mum is a fan of used items, especially clothes as she fears residues of pesticides and chemicals, whereas other mums don’t like any potential transfer of bacteria or germs.
There might also be an issue of pride here, as some prams seem to hold a status symbol reputation, like cars, too! Especially MacLaren!
So the last months and the following ones are going to be taken up with such exciting topics like reflecting about nappy types, breast-feeding’s potential pitfalls and how to keep the bump in check as well as hunting for further baby and maternity accessories.

Second of all: My guinea pig Guinea Lee died start of March because of a lung infection. Now Minilli is all alone and I have to find either a good new home for her or a new partner. Guinea Lee was such a cuddly, charming, curious and happy guinea pig, very attached to humans and food, and he is sadly missed.

Thirdly I have got friends visiting me in Edinburgh at the moment, it is quite fun to be a visitor in your local city although the recommendations of the tourist guide are sometimes not quite understandable. In Dumont’s Compact little travel guide a highlight of Edinburgh is the Traverse Theatre, Stockbridge and Dean Village and a pub called “The Dome” as well as the National Gallery and the Modern Gallery. I would have rather added Rosslyn Chapel, the Forest Cafe and South Queensferry with the Forth Rail Bridge and a trip to Incholm Island with the abbey and the small fish restaurant as a highlight. Yesterday we went to “The Real” Mary Kings Close, a five star tourist attraction, and were quite disappointed because of the lack of original features in the underground vaults. Most of these seemed to be painted white and plastered with added wooden flooring. Though the costumed tourist guide was quite entertaining, everything was conveyed in the format of little tales and stories, many of whom I had heard before on other tours. Its a good underground tour for children and the average American tourist as the main purpose of the attraction is to entertainingly bring alive medieval times, but historians and intellectuals will be a little bit disappointed. The remainders of the Close is only about 20m or so long and dimly light and you just have a quick walk through of about 5-10min at the end of the 90min tour.
We had the best fish’n'chips I ever had in the Doric Tavern, unfortunately we did not frequent the bar menu area as I got a bit confused with the rooms, but we sat down in the restaurant bit, which was much more elegant, had a bit more of an expensive menu and lacked the pub charm my friends were so looking for. Never happened to me before that I was dragging guests into a too elegant establishment!
On Sunday we had a look at the beach and a walk along the sea, where we found thousands of starfish washed up dead on the beach. It was quite shocking!
My friendly guests invited us to a meal and we chose the Indian vegetarian restaurant Kalpna. It was brilliant as ever and even the meat-eaters were delighted. I loved being able to share the dishes and have so many different tastes, and the dishes were also all quite unusual compared to the typical Indian restaurant. Afterwards we had quite a big discussion about the added service charge of 10% to the bill – how to deal best with it. If an additional tip for the waiter would be appropriate or not, if so how much, if the service charge is enforceable and if it actually goes to the waiter or the staff or just directly to the restaurant owner.

Just looking at the stats for this blog.

One of the most often viewed and linked to entries is the unique article about the “Wild West” in Edinburgh, summarising the history of the cinema at Springvalley Gardens. Its also  linked from a website about the  buildings of  Scotland’s Cinemas ,  which includes a lot of historical entries like the Springvalley Gardens Cinema, with pictures from inside of the building. I always loved this house for its character, its surroundings and its atmosphere, it is something really special.

The other most popular entry is of course “How to catch a lost hamster”. It seems like in the whole wide world of the Internet nobody else has tackled such an ordinary but yet difficult problem. Fluffy would be proud of his contribution to hamster welfare, would he still be alive. The entry has 72 comments all of people chasing after their little pet. I never really replied to any of them as all the principles of catching a hamster escapee are either in the article or in the video and I don’t have the time unfortunately, either, for personal hamster catching advice.

At the moment this personal blog has about 150 visitors looking at the site per day.

This morning I smelt a disgusting stink when getting up, quickly dismissing it as “the kids have set the rubbish chute on fire – NOT AGAIN“.  So I wasn’t too alarmed when three firetrucks pulled up in front of the house. But quickly it turned out to be much more, as the ladder was brought up and the firemen wore gas masks and oxygen bottles, and the smell became more, not less intense.

fire brigade in front of Fidra Court

We got a bit more alarmed when a fireman on his ladder rushed by in front of our window on the way up.

The rectangular squares are part of the anti-pigeon netting, obviously   .

Anyways, the firemen knocked on our door several times and asked us to stay indoors, open the windows and the balcony doors and if we are all okay.  I asked where the fire was and was told it was on the ground  floor, but still they are all zooming around here as if there would be something more going on in the upper regions of our little 14 storey skyscraper.

At the moment – a few hours after the first signs of the fire – the fire brigade still are around and seem to check that nobody passed out or got too affected by smoke inhalation. It seems they are breaking into a flat upstairs at the moment – I can hear the noise.  There will be more detailed reports in the papers later I assume, as there were quite some press photographers around.

Wednesday was an incredible bad day for me with nearly everything going wrong which could go wrong. The only highlight was that I finally was able to make it to report from the protest at the Edinburgh city chambers, against the privatisation of the social care and support services. Report and pictures as usual on Indymedia – UK for pictures and Scotland for local report and networking. I even brought the camcorder along but it was a bit too dark for filming. Nevertheless, hopefully I’ll have time to produce a little video, but not more than 2 minutes length with voice-over only.

Deaf Action in action

Reading the local Bavarian paper on the internet, my attention was drawn to a video clip about the cold war nuclear bunker in Nuremberg.  I did not know there was a nuclear bunker in Nuremberg at all, let alone underneath the main pedestrian  shopping zone.  Compared to the secret bunker in Crail in Fife it is a civilian not a military bunker though.  In 2006 the German government decided that it was unlikely that the bunker would be needed anymore in future and therefore gave up its maintenance, handing it back to the local authorities. In the case of Nuremberg, the local the fire brigade ended up with the obligation to look after the building.

I just got into watching old movies with the 1981 Australian “The killing of Angel Street”, describing a community struggling against commercial property development in the 70ies in Sydney. It is based on the history of activist Juanita Nielson , who was murdered because of her opposition to the high-rise developments. The film is now hard to get.

Yesterday I watched marxist (?!) filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard’s “Alphaville”, a classic 1965 film about a totalitarian, de-humanised and computer-controlled society.  It came with a pack of videos some artist dumped on us in a tidy-up action, along with Luis Bunuel’s 1964 “Diary of a Chambermaid”. I found both films quite hard to watch, they are quite intelligent and heavy, definitely challenging and disturbing the audience more than any current Hollywood superficial blockbuster.  Especially the Luis Bunuel film shocked me. Unbelievable that such films were made in the early 1960ies.
Jean Luc Godard’s new film “Socialisme” will be released next year, will try to catch up on his other movies till then.

“This Revolution” could be subtitled as “Indymedia goes Hollywood”; and is a hommage to the 1969 film “Medium Cool”- half documentary, half movie. Unfortunately it seems that not much exciting protest action happened at the RNC convention to document, except that the police accidentally arrested the leading actors as a suspective subversive group, contributing to a sudden end of the movie.  Still quite nice to watch though therefore not that much action included.