The clear and present danger of irresponsible cyclists

The bane of powered vehicles

Beyond the terror of devil dogs that I wrote about recently, it is electric-powered bicycles and scooters that have become a menace on our roads. That fact that the human-powered element of pedalling or scooting means that the concentration of thought and process in the engagement of muscle is diverted elsewhere and that, in itself, becomes a kind of distraction.

Blog - Opinion: Public safety is paramount regardless of your cuddly dog

The bicycles or scooters whiz off at speed with the riders literally oblivious of the responsibility and due concern that comes with being in charge of such a vehicle. That and their inclination to ignore traffic and road usage rules along with pedestrians being terrorised on the pavements makes them a clear and present danger to others and themselves.

An uncaring cohort for safety

What baffles me and I have written about this having lived in Amsterdam is how riders can ply busy streets or pavements at night without lights. Usually, the riders are in dark clothing, and you are usually unaware of their proximity to you until they are so close, you have to avert a collision if they are totally uncaring.

I could go on about my concerns and bugbears, but the reason for this blog is a rather close encounter for which I should curb the urge to be dramatic even as my recollection of it leaves me in a shudder as to how it could have been a lot worse and it does not bear thinking of apart from lifting up hands in gratitude for being spared an inauspicious ending.

What just happened?

I was at a bus stop leaning on the inside wall of the enclosure with a foot out speaking to my friend on the phone, when suddenly I had a knock on the outside of my left knee and sudden surge of pain over the top of my midfoot, the shock with a directed gaze to a young man crashing off his bicycle as he came to find out if he had hit me.

“Are you crazy?” I shouted out at him, a bystander who saw everything was totally nonchalant that I wonder if I had taken the full impact of that collision whether she would have bothered to help or call for any help. She was in a Tesco supermarket top, my views of that are best left off this blog.

An entrenched lawlessness

However, the lawlessness of the whole encounter and how one was ill-equipped to find any sort of redress and sanction just left me wanting to nurse my bruises than do much else as very little would have been learnt by the cyclist as I upbraided him.

He was riding a hired electric bike on a busy road against the traffic, and he decided to cut away unto the wide pavement to take another shortcut over the pavement to ride against the traffic avoiding an intersection or junction. As he tried to mount the pavement, he hit the kerb, lost control, and ran into me and crashed some 10 metres further on before coming over to find out if I was okay.

He would have done this weaving through obstacles and dangers, hardly slowly down to assess the full risk of any manoeuvre, a young exuberance overwhelming any sense of caution or responsibility to others, daring to do rather than caring at all, I could have lost it and decked him, but that was unnecessary.

But for the grace of God

As he left to pick up his bicycle and ride away, I remembered I was still on a call with my friend and continued the call. However, when I thought about it this morning, this chap is probably doing an electrically propelled 30 mph or 48.2 km/h. A full-on collision or if I had been pinned against the wall of the bus stop could have wiped me out, needing hospital care. It was a close shave.

There is no doubt that the law has to catch up with this the road usage of electrically propelled bicycles and scooters, I also wonder of a new set of rules need to be written and there is no doubt that policing with the strict enforcement of the said rules is essential for adherence and deterrence. There have been too many accidents, some resulting in fatalities and many attributable to irresponsible road usage. It needs to be addressed with alacrity.

You can be minding your own business and out of nowhere danger invades your space, it is the grace of God that keeps us. For that, we are very thankful.

Cleaning the patient off

Unplugging for disaster

In a moment of technical mirth, a colleague suggested a problem on his personal computer on-site had been resolved by the cleaners probably shifting something, cables or dirt came to mind, but it reminded me of the danger of office cleaners and what cost might come with it.

In the late 90’s our data centre housed a number of critical computers but we could not determine why the service had to be restarted in the morning. The server had apparent switched off itself. It was later that we realised cleaners who had gone in to clean the centre after hours needing a socket to plug in their vacuum cleaners yanked a plug out for their device unaware that they had unplugged the server and then plugged it back in after they had finished.

Then, we set aside a socket for the cleaners and put protective tags and notices on the critical power plugs strictly forbidding them to be touched except by authorised personnel.

Cleaning to the heavens

In a short film starring Omar Sharif as a taxi driver taking a young man for a cosmetic procedure, he related a story about a hospital closed for its incidents of unexplained deaths. It then transpired that at night the cleaner went into the Intensive Care Unit and unplugged the life support system for their vacuum cleaner, thereby killing off the patient. However, too many of those incidents had occurred before they found out and it was too late to save the hospital.

Blog - Turn your lights down low, I need to see your liver (Last section – ‘A short story.’

Now, we have all heard it said that cleanliness is next to godliness, what you do not expect is the cleaner dispatching the patient off to God.

Opinion: The wild can have you for dinner

Not for role reversals

I was in South Africa for two weeks last month and one of the activities my hostess thought I might enjoy was a day out at Lion Park.

It took one look at the pamphlets at the hotel where people were in cages and lions roamed free for me to decide that was not my idea of fun.

Courtesy of Mukumela Shuttles (Lion Park)

The concept of zoo for me whilst I am no proponent of taking animals out of their natural habitats to be imprisoned in cages for human-being to gawp at, is that at least there is enough of a barrier between me and the wild animal if I am ever in close proximity to it.

It is no chicken coop

What has become disturbing is the sense with which people visit animal or safari parks and suddenly forget that most of these animals are not tame, docile or harmless.

This reminds me of a young man who won a competition to be a park ranger in East Africa from the UK. Whilst walking through the bush, a venomous snake spat at him and that hit his shin. Rather than leg it at the rate that would break a world speed record, he bend down to wipe the venom off his shin and the aggressive snake lurched him, biting his face, leaving him with lost sight in one eye and 50% loss of sight in the other eye.

He returned home to sue the adventure company, though, beneath the veneer of the pity and sympathy that I had for him, I could not ignore his foolishness.

Wild in the wild

Almost 18 months ago, it was the case of an elephant in Kruger Park, charging a car and toppling it. Now, three days ago, an Emmy award-winning editor on the Game of Thrones was mauled to death by the king of the jungle in Lion Park. She rolled down her window where instructions clearly state customers must never do so and the lion got her.

Cute as a lion cub or any wild animal might seem on television, even from afar on safari, they are no respecters of persons and your vehicle or cage only provides enough protection if you follow all the safety notices to the letter.

And whilst a majority of those who go on safari to see wildlife do return home safely, one cannot ignore the fact that a few never do or when they do, they return with radically life-changing experiences that leave an indelible mark on them.

Africa can change your life

Africa, vast as it is with all its nature and wilderness is no playground, much as the Australian outback is no walk in the park. The animals out there can be dangerous, aggressive, predatory and lethal, a close encounter with these animals might well be a very last encounter in life.

There is no reason why one’s story should become a tragedy because of some foolishness or stupidity, and that is the cause of many of these preventable attacks, injuries or deaths.

If animals kill in the wild, there is no court to charge them for manslaughter or murder, they would have acted naturally as supposedly smarter human beings would have acted stupidly. One will not expect that animal to be put down, but we can afford the victim the dignity of a burial if anything is left of them.

One is saddened to have to write this, but the truth must be told and reiterated. When out in the wild, take every precaution to ensure you do not become another story of the wild having you for dinner.

Opinion: No Time to Pat Mr. Fox on the Head

I believe

I do believe that animals need to be cared for and treated humanely; they have a place in this world as much as any of us who live on earth. We must however distinguish between pets, domesticated animals, exotic animals and wild animals, properly categorising them and handling them in their appropriate habitats.

However, I also do believe that man by reason of providence immemorial is at the top of the hierarchy of the animal kingdom and for that we have a responsibility of husbandry of the earth, the inhabitants and its resources.

Sensible usage

More pertinently, we have come to the understanding that there must be judicious and fair use along with conservation to ensure that we enjoy the fruits of the earth but not exhaust them that those who come after us end up living in a barren world.

We can use but we must be careful not to abuse, we can manage but resist the licence to plunder; there should be a balance in the way we work the system for the benefit of all.

The fox has moved

Now, I was not one in favour of the ban on fox hunting, my opinion was it had been an age-old tradition though at the same time a celebration of the class system which is patently British and it is something we cannot divorce ourselves from for the sake of modernity.

There might neither be consequence or causality but the news that a four-week-old baby boy was attacked in his cot by an urban fox was as terrifying as it is troublesome that it needs to be addressed before a more unspeakable event becomes the news.

The fox has somewhat moved from the counties and the shires into the home, our homes and that is just so not right.

Fox on the throne

What is quite bothersome is the fact that the fox did not scare easily when the mother of the child approached it; she literally had to fight off the fox that had the literally bitten off the finger of the child as if it felt it was being denied its well-earned meal.

The fox had gone on the hunt, albeit in an urban area, gained access to a building, found a baby and sunk its feral rabid teeth into the child without any consideration – as if foxes have the powers of consideration that human-being have.

This is just an unacceptable development, a rise of urban fox numbers helped by the way we discard our rubbish and the lack of a natural predator to keep the numbers down.

What to do

In the longer term, we do need decide how we secure our homes, to manage better how we dispose of our food waste that foxes do not see our urban areas as easy places to feed and be fattened, our encroachment into the usual habitats on the outskirts of town needs to be curtailed but as a matter of urgency, this issue is one of vermin, a pest and the need for a controlled process of extermination to rid our cities of thousands of foxes.

It is impractical to have them relocated and they are not necessarily exotic enough first for domestication or for mass deployment into zoos, the hard truth is they need to be culled, we should make no bones about that.

Before some animal rights advocates rise up in arms about the need to pat the fox on the head as it makes chicken drumsticks and chicken wings of the thighs and arms of our vulnerable babies that we have simply left to sleep peacefully in their cots, there is no reason for foxes and us to live in the cities, they belong in the bush, in holes that they by nature used to dig to live in and must either by management or otherwise be sent back to the bush where they belong.

My simple view is this – this is no time to pat the fox on the head.

Hello Hamid, it's George - see you in 5 minutes

Welcoming surprises

Easy communications serve a purpose of informing and arranging for visits and events.

Many a time when I was in Nigeria, we had guests arrive out of the blue; we joyously exchanged greetings and feted them with food and drinks as they stayed on for hours on end – that however, is the community spirit of friendship and camaraderie.

As for the more professional Nigerian, arrangements were made a foretime usually through the office communications network because mass telecommunications never thrived until mobile telephony pervaded the market in the last few years.

All different in London

However, moving from Nigeria to the UK, one’s time is pre-occupied with goals, purpose and the arduous rigour of survival, that unplanned and unannounced visits are just not on.

This comes as a surprise to people who have just arrived from Nigeria who retain the convivial and miscellany; but the re-education is brutal and swift – we all learn how to live in the West. What a life!

Hamid, it’s George

Then, just imagine the shock Hamid Karzai had yesterday when a very important guest dropped in on him out of the blue.

At least, we all knew that he told the world that he was off to India and then to Pakistan; I suppose Afghani soothsayers might have prognosticated that Hamid should expect a surprise on the First of March.

Afghanistan is now Bush Democracy – the people voted and elected who the American expected to be elected – as opposed to a real democracy – the Palestinians electing who they want, albeit Hamas who the American considers terrorists.

Afghanis pulled it off

Seeing the elaborate preparations that go into planning state visits, the Afghanis must have had to cobble together a good few of their scarce resources to welcome the liberator.

I could not help but notice the quality of the red carpet that lead up to the news conference lecterns. That might sound frivolous, with all protocol thrown away; low-flying helicopters and security so tight that the visit had to be unannounced – this democracy has a long road to travel.

One can wager that Afghanistan is only second to Iraq in everyday violence and carnage, even though they are both occupied with superpower troops.

Alas! Guns and overwhelming firepower can only do so much. The Nemesis - Osama bin Laden is probably hiding in the West wing, because they cannot seem to find him anywhere else and nobody is looking back home.

Unannounced inspection

I can remember when I was in boarding school; every once in a while there was a surprise inspection which included a complete search of all the premises as we were gathered in some other location answering the roll call.

Fear, terror, anxiety written on our faces as hearts pounded like a new Tora-bora event; just in case the house master discovered something seriously out-of-order or rule-breaking.

Then, I think of the protectors of the President as he arrives secretly in Afghanistan, then the Afghani president is told; multiply that with the embarrassment of having guests arrive in Nigeria when you have completely run out of drinks – I think the Afghanis handled it well.

The one question that remains is when any important political figure would be able to announce well ahead of time that they are visiting Afghanistan of even Iraq; that concern is however, moot; the people who live there suffer a lot more.

Afghanistan is what it has become, but Iraq is what we made it.