Blog – Jack Sanger

Fancy an Affair?

Notes on Japan: 7 There are outlets in some of the major Japanese cities, called Alibi shops. These are purveyors of apparently innocent goods. They comprise the full range of city souvenirs – from any destination but the one in which you may be shopping! In Kyoto, for example, you can buy chocolates, mugs, paper… Know More
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The Neanderthals and their Nuclear Clubs

Notes on Japan: 6 In my last post I raised the question of how nations could become psychopathic. Why take this despicable, cruel alternative rather than a more benign route? Each year, on the anniversary of the dropping of the atom bomb, the Mayor of Hiroshima sends a telegram to every head of state, reminding… Know More
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Gotcha! 250,000 killed in American bombing!

Notes on Japan: 6 When you have been to the Peace Park in Hiroshima you wish that every politician in the world could be dragged to its museum and made to look at the images of devastation following the dropping of the atom bomb on the city. A quarter of a million people died here… Know More
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Tips for eating

Notes from Japan: 4 One of those irritants that keeps me consistently inflamed in life, is tipping. In our UK, class-ridden society the argument is rarely about the principle of tipping, it is about the degree: whether ten percent or fifteen percent, usually. I have a non-mathematical friend who argues that inflation means that it… Know More
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Zen garden, Kyoto

Notes from Japan: 3 Outside Kyoto, up in the hills, there is a Zen garden some 500 years old called Riyoanji. I saw it at a fairly early hour – that is, before the tourist buses arrived. The setting is peaceful, in the middle of hectares of lake and trees. I viewed the rectangular artifact… Know More
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Not just a load of old bollocks…

Notes from Japan: 2 In Innsbruck there is a memorial to the Emperor Maximilian in which a series of statues, larger than life, clutter the side walls of a little church. They all represent heroes of one kind or another and are cast in gunmetal black. Curiously, one of them is our own – or… Know More
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Bums on seats

Notes from Japan:1 Cultural differences have their honeymoon period in the eye of the visitor, during which there can be a clarity of detail that, over time, melts back into the flux of the every day. Living with family members rather than as a tourist enables one to stay clear of the well worn grooves… Know More
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In praise of NCIS

I don’t like fictional programmes based upon current or recent events. I squirm from a disgust at what we humans do and also because these productions feel like exploitation. Dramatisations of 9-11 or soldiers lives in Iraq or Afghanistan, for example. I wonder about family, friends and acquaintances of those who have suffered. When it… Know More
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Im-Putin-g the Russian Bear

The appalling death of Alexander Litvinenko, amid a trail of polonium-210 residues has led many commentators to talk of a new Cold War. Fortified by its gas and oil, Putin’s Russia is chesting it out with all its clients, neighbours and global partners. Its hard-nosed attitudes and complete lack of empathy for other traditions is… Know More
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Carbon guilt

Is it just me or is this continual barrage of guilt-making publicity about how each of us is killing the planet beginning to pall? The ordinary person appears to have become the major target and repository of cause and effect syndrome. I catch a plane. Have I planted a tree as a consequence? Do all… Know More
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