Unlikely encounters

You find me sitting in my room, having snuck back from the stacks, toasty warm, tea in hand, raring to write. The more observant reader of this flawed blog will notice a gaping hole in the chronicle of Nellis in America: my trip to Chicago and St Louis. I owe you a report, no question, but the energy to start up on some sustained narrative eludes me. I'd rather peddle tidbits, if you don't mind. Easier and more fun.

Two things - people, character portraits - to begin. I was at a lecture given by John Major last week. The topic was totally exiguous - "Changes in the Modern World", I think was the title. Probably the same after-dinner speech he's be trotting out since 1997. For all that, it was masterfully done. Witty one-liners abounded. Like Major asks Yeltsin in the mid-1990s, "Tell me Boris, describe to me in one word the present condition of Russia." "Good," Yeltsin replies. Major, surprised by this answer, adds, "Well, okay then, in two words." Yeltsin ponders. "Not good."

Funny, eh? And you thought Major was boring!

I went up to natter with him at the reception for a few minutes after. All standard stuff: China, Wikileaks, labor laws. In approaching him, I had, naturally, only one topic of conversation I wished to pursue: EDWINA. Sadly the heart of an Englishman beats within me; I refrained from discussing what every single British person in the room was thinking, straining, begging, nay gagging to ask. My reticence at that critical moment is something I'll regret for the rest of my days.

What seemed to me a hilarious twist at the start of the proceedings wasn't picked up on by the crowd, and American friends seemed nonplussed when I relayed the anecdote to them later. But anyway, Major was introduced by Ernesto Zedillo, former president of Mexico (the last under the PRI regime), who now works in the Yale Business and Econ departments. Zedillo, in welcoming Major (or "Maior", to be faithful to the original pronunciation), officially presented him as the former prime minister of... England and, wait for it, Northern Ireland!!!! Faux pas, historical hatchet job, diplomatic incident - all accomplished in that one phrase! Amazing! On a serious note, it does appear to be empirically true that Americans, for whatever reason, don't recognize the Act of Union. (Cameron should bring this up next time he's in Washington.) I've even fallen into the habit of simply saying I'm from England.

Post-Major, work. Until Wednesday, when, walking along Wall Street (New Haven's Wall Street, that is, not the evil one), I bumped into none other than my old music professor, Robin Holloway. Robin's a very well-known composer and music commentator in Britain, in addition to being professor at Cambridge. He'd been invited to Yale to give a pre-concert talk at the Center for British Art, followed by a performance of his Gilded Goldbergs for two pianos. I rocked up to the concert. Robin and I met the next morning. I gave him a tour of the university. He's always a delight to be around. Truly the most knowledgeable person about music I have ever met, with a brilliantly florid, expressive manner of speaking. Perfectly inimitable. It was an unexpected joy, then, to have him here for a day or two.

From the exuberance mingled with coy calm of Goldbergs a la Holloway, I was plunged last night into the deathly world of a miserable new play at the Yale Rep - Bosso Nova. It was meant as an exploration of race, money and freedom, quintessential and weighty American themes to be sure, but too rapidly degenerated into Lear-like hell, and stayed there. For two hours. Unpleasant to watch and unedifying. Fun party after, with mainly English Lit grads in University Towers. House parties really do rule.

For those who may be a touch interested in my working life (though heaven knows why you would be), here's a short "interview" I ran off recently. Not an academic contribution, just a summary of current affairs for a French think tank a friend asked me to produce.

Orwell (whom I've been re-reading, having scarcely looked over a word since high school) once worked in a second-hand bookshop, don't you know. An essay about how and why he lost his love of books while gainfully employed there.

It also turns out that Wallace Stevens composed a long poem about my adopted city. Coming pretty late in Stevens's career, "An Ordinary Evening in New Haven" is a barren poem - basically musing on whether or not poetry can do away with imagery so as to communicate base ideas in raw form. The New Haven part is inconsequential, I discovered. Still, it exists. You might be intrigued.

I'm zonked now, so good night.

Phantasmagoria! "Harvard sucks"

Well, there's lots to report in today's newsletter. Before getting started, I have a question. Can people think of famous European writers, poets, thinkers, artists who came to America, were "inspired" by it in some special way, then returned home? Tocqueville is the best example I know. Dvorak is also a decent one. The "defining visit" though seems to be much more common the other way round: Americans sojourning in Europe. I'm curious to compile a small list in my head so please drop me a note if you have any brainwaves.

Usually when writing these blogposts I self-censor. By which I mean that I assiduously stop myself moaning about work work work, because that's boring for everyone. This week, on the other hand, has seen a phantasmagoria of crazy adventures. So the censor can place his big black marker back in his pocket.

On Wednesday I took the Metro-North down to New York at 4-35. Three hours later we were settled in our red felt seats at the Met - surely one of the plushest opera houses in the world - ready for the curtain to lift on Cosi fan tutte. Now I should qualify my praise for what is one of the funniest, sunniest pieces ever composed with a note of caution and disapproval: the plot is offensive. About as misogynistic as you can get, in fact. You could glean this from the title, which basically means "All women are like that". However, the slapstick is good enough to make up for this (rather serious) shortcoming, and the ensemble scenes are earth-shattering. I bumped into Rowland in the lobby. Didn't get back into Union Station till 2am. A spectacular evening.

Then last night was Steve and Jen's housewarming party. They have a *damn fine* apartment. In its combination of designer furniture and super-high ceilings it's a sort of cross between 5th-Avenue-penthouse chic and Versailles. (Possibly a slight exaggeration.) Altogether extremely nice. I'm a sucker for peer-pressure. Guess what happened? Drinking games are what happened. Something about throwing a ball in a cup from a distance and banging a quarter into a glass. I really don't know. It's all very hazy. I managed to stagger back home, to my mini fortress in HGS. Woke up today in a state of considerable agony - akin to what I image the martyred saints of the early Church experienced. Concentration has, understandably, proven a challenge. I picked up two volumes from the library: Of Rule and Revenue, and Divide and Deal. It's part of a new policy of mine only to read books with alliterative titles. Needless to say, I got through 50 pages of one of them, thought f this, and walked over to Stuart's for high tea - crustless cucumber sandwiches, small finger-cakes, scones with clotted Cornish cream, and Earl Gray in dainty bone china cups. OK we just drank Tetley's. I've never actually eaten, or should I say "taken", high tea. However, since America is positively overflowing with pro-limey bonhomie at the moment, on account of some minor royal wedding (!), now's a good time to play up these British eccentricities.

Thanksgiving break has started. New Haven's emptied out all of a sudden. This is partly because the Harvard-Yale game's being played in Boston this year. There have been a couple of awesome t-shirts designed for the occasion by ever-resourceful Elis. They read:

"Harvard sucks"
-Gandhi

and

Harvard
The Antisocial Network

Brilliant! Should you care to watch one of the greatest pranks of all time - a variation on a similar theme - see here.

On Monday I fly to Chicago to stay with Mike and Sharon. I'll report back in full after the event.

For other reasons too I'm chipper at the moment. The week's vacation will do me the world of good. And I'm excited about coming back to Yale next Saturday refreshed.

Over and out.

Peanut butter

...is not nice. Really, it's not. And even if it were (which it isn't, wasn't, couldn't ever be) spreading it over every animal, mineral and vegetable would still be, frankly, foul. Run hybrid cars off the stuff, sure. Just don't put it in your mouth.

It's Guy Fawkes Day back home. Among the lesser-known feast days in the calendar, I find. It's one of those things that tends to take you by pleasant surprise, usually when you're least expecting it. Then *WHAM*, fireworks, sparklers and burning popes galore!

An even more major festival - is that possible? - is also upon us. Diwali is the Hindu celebration of the return of Ram, along with Lakshman and Sita, from his long exile, for which lamps (दीप, pronounced "deep" in Sanskrit, hence the full name दीपावली, "deepavali") are lit in commemoration. There's a gathering in the President's Room here tonight I'll be attending. It promises to be very colorful.

I'm currently tinkering on a few pet projects, besides the normal routine. A study of how various political indicators affect fraud and corruption in India's food Public Distribution System. A book review of a small collection of essays titled "Democracies in Danger". And getting down to work on an article about medical tourism in South and South-East Asia with Mike. Hopefully my productivity levels will be equal to these manifold tasks; I have to admit my energy's waning a tad. Thanksgiving break can't arrive a moment too soon.

So, to merry Britons whose august parliamentary democracy and established religion remains in-tact, enjoy the bonfires. And to Americans (who, by the way, appear to have gone slightly bananas judging by this week's midterms), lay off the peanut butter, for no good will come of it.

Mars will be apple blossom

A relic of a bygone age, touching in its optimism. A Soviet song from 1963. The words are those of a cosmonaut.

To live and to believe - it's wonderful.
Before us - an unprecedented path.
Astronauts and dreamers believe
That on Mars apple trees will blossom.

Well, when you comrades and
The whole world are seen through the porthole,
Stars will meet the flourishing earth,
And on Mars apple trees will blossom.

I will make friends with the distant stars,
Do not worry about me and do not be sad.
For leaving this Earth, we are promised
That on Mars apple trees will blossom!


(Translation courtesy of Google, adapted - I can't vouch for it.)

Thinking about India

Hari and Anirvan popped round this evening after dinner. Anirvan and I were trying to remember a charming Urdu couplet, which I learned a couple of weeks ago:

Baat agar sakht bhi kahani hai to narmi se kaho.
Labz katon ki tarah dil me khatak sakate hain.

Loosely, Even if you have harsh things to tell someone, say them with tenderness. For words may strike in the heart like thorns.

A laudable principle to abide by, I think.

We ended the chit-chat with a disagreement about the relative historical worthiness of Nehru versus Sardar Patel - representatives of the defining ideological poles of modern India. Nehru, as is well known, was India's first prime minister. He was a Fabian socialist by temperament and upbringing, and sought to construct in India an economy whose growth was driven by state planning, while affording a good amount of space for private enterprise (on this, check out Chibber's info-packed book). From the Fabians Nehru adopted a cosmopolitan, internationalist outlook, and became the central mover in the Non-Aligned Movement in the mid-1950s.

Vallabhai Patel (commonly known as "Sardar", or Chief in Gujurati) was Nehru's doppelganger: a harder, realist personality, and a committed patriot, the Iron Man of India. With VP Menon, Patel was responsible as Home Minister for binging about the accession of hundreds of principalities into the new Republic. On Partition and Kashmir, he was a hawk. He pressed for the immediate use of military force to bring J&K (and also Goa) into the union, vehemently opposed recourse to United Nations arbitration, and was frequently accused of anti-Muslim prejudice - resulting from his less than conciliatory language around the traumas of 1947. Economically, too, he favored a freer-market model than his boss. Altogether, a right-winger - yet a man who sacrificed ambition and non-mainstream policy positions time and again to the greater cause of independence and Congress unity.

Critics accuse Nehru of weakness, stuffy intellectualism, excessive eagerness to play the big statesman abroad while neglecting brewing troubles at home. To adduce the most damning evidence, they point to the China-India border war of 1962. India's humiliation in this brief but miserable spat, they contend, was the direct result of India's military unpreparedness, which they blame on Nehru's lily-liveredness and naivete. It's said that Patel would never have allowed such a state of vulnerability to emerge. In a similar vein, many attribute the pathologies of corruption and the impossibly-slow-moving juggernaut of the Indian state to Nehru's grand designs - replete with five-year plans, an over-weening bureaucracy, and the like. Patel would have gone with something leaner and meaner.

We'll never know. Patel died in 1950, Nehru not till 1964 (in office). The counterfactuals involved in making the mighty case for Patel are so speculative as to be totally unverifiable. But given the attacks on Nehru's reputation - quite a voguish pastime now - his achievements bear restating. The consolidation of a peaceful, unified India was a signal political feat of the twentieth century. I don't think this would have been possible without a tolerant, thoroughly democratic philosophy such as Nehru possessed (and Sardar probably did not). For this inclusiveness, he was loved dearly at the time. Second, Nehru's strategy of fast industrialization is vindicated by India's current development woes. Of course growth is rapid right now. But the lion's chunk of that comes from the labor-unintensive sectors like software, call-centers and (increasingly) quality services. Manufacturing, factories, construction - what should usually be the fruit-bearing concomitants of modernity and urbanization - are under-advanced. Too many people still work in the fields or informally. This sorry situation, as it's turned out, was not for want of Nehru's trying.

Yes, Nehru could have be more aggressive with defense. The circumstances though were extraordinary. China's attack was unprovoked and unpredictable. In any case, it seems unlikely that even gigantic military investment in the 50's - which India could ill-afford - could have averted an attack from the Tiger to the north. Money was better spent on lifting the poor out of misery.

Nehru wasn't oblivious to the dangers confronting the state he did so much to establish - and which he hoped might become a gleaming city on the hill, an example to the world. In a depressingly prophetic jeremiad delivered on the floor of the Lok Sabha in September 1956 he ruminated, surely in sad tones:

"It is a difficult world, not a very gentle world; it does not care too much for the weak. And you have to be strong, in mind, in heart, in character and in technique, and in the modern ways of life. Otherwise you go down. I have no doubt about it."

Autumn songs

The sun's setting earlier now; leaves shedding their green garb for redder hues; colder, crisper mornings, as I take the short walk to the department each day, coffee-laden. A touch of homesickness too - reminders of friends and family back home whom I'd give much to be with, and a growing sense of the massive distance separating me from them. Even the internet's not enough to overcome that. In short, fall's here, and with it that warm sense of change tinged with melancholy - harsh impending winter, to be broken by holidays and snowscapes.

Cameron and HY were my distractions this weekend. After such a long time away from them both, I was overjoyed when they decided to visit Yale. We drove to the top of East Rock and took photographs, ate pizza and Thai food, explored the campus, but most of all just enjoyed each others' company. The evening before had seen Cameron at a fencing reunion (with banquet!). I ended up joining the gang at Mory's, a kind of gentleman's club cum rowdy sports bar next door to HGS, where drunk overdressed undergrads are to be found chugging trophies filled with a scary concoction. We had a lot of fun, though less so at a party in some guy's room in Trumbull College later on - the filthiest dive I ever did see! I'm told this is how American college students generally live.

I hit a bit of a low this evening. Class finished at 8.15pm (standard on Mondays). I had to wolf down food in Commons, then descend to the library (aptly called "Bass") where I began and completed a two-page memo on seven articles I'd barely had time to read on corruption - all within the space of two hours! Grad school sure teaches you to think and jot stuff down fast. One nugget of advice I was given before coming here was "Don't get it right, get it done!" For the first two years of coursework, that seems a wise adage. By the end of the writing-spree, I was knackered. But here I am now relieved to have everything out of the way, and increasingly less hung up about polishing each piece of work to perfection - there's simply too much for that. Balance is needed.

I have a great week ahead as it turns out, one peppered with little events and gatherings. I've been especially enwrapped in Hindi recently and think I'm making fast progress. Humming Bollywood songs in the shower, in bed, on the street ("bagoon mai bahar hein..."). I can't wait to practice properly again in India next summer!

With the unpleasantness of a work-heavy evening behind me, I now say good night.

Soon as midnight brought on the dusky hour
Friendliest to sleep and silence. Milton

:)zzz

Sleeping Giant

New Haven is set in sensational countryside, as became clear last weekend when Caleb and I hiked Sleeping Giant State Park - a traprock mountain that juts out of the Connecticut farmland, eight miles from Yale. We took the B-trail. As it happened, this wasn't so much a walk in the woods in the commonly understood sense as, well, Alpine rock climbing. Yet worth every twisted ankle. From the pinnacle you could make out a few of the nearby villages. But the greatest thing by far was the lush forest folded out below. Here, many miles from a road, total silence. Coming from the UK, where the white-noise hum of traffic is just about ubiquitous, that really is quite special. It was a reminder of what first enchanted me about America: the vast open landscapes, expanses of territory to explore, such variety. Of this, then, I plan to do much much more.

As weeks go, this was a productive one. I completed and sent off a book review - my inaugural publication. Watch out for Contemporary South Asia 19/1 (2010)! Survived a stats midterm on probability, bizarrely finding a covariance proof kind of straightforward, while scratching my head to bits over something I'm fairly certain we covered in pre-school (knew I should've kept my notes). And at last I got round to reading Robert Putnam's mind-blowingly well-researched book on civic life in modern Italy ("Making Democracy Work", the product of *25 years* of field work) in time for a presentation Monday. So hardly a second to spare for mischief!

Odds and ends, bits and bobs, this and that, to tie up over the weekend. And the domestic chores I'm congenitally abysmal at.

Next week: much less frenetic.

*Exhale*.

Outside the Green Zone; India not shining

Turns out New Haven's the wild west. To give you the short version, Rune and I were out Saturday night on Crown Street - essentially the hub of downtown pubs, clubs, and cafes. We left the bar at 1.50am. Wake up Monday morning, I hear there's been a shoot-out. On Crown. At 2am, the night we passed by. A bullet went through the window of a popular restaurant - customers dived to the floor. Two people hit on the street, now in hospital. My friends Steve and Jen, who left the bar 5 minutes later than us, ran from the noise of flying bullets. Their apartment overlooks that very same intersection.

New Haven is a city - some measure of bad stuff's to be expected. But this was a mere block away from campus, inside what's considered to be the "Green Zone" in Yale terms: where it's safe to walk and socialize. Nor was this a lone incident. Someone got killed outside a Crown St parking lot by gunfire less than a month ago. Not to mention the long, often daily, list of muggings. People feel shaken up, there's no doubt. All of a sudden, the town got a lot less friendly.

I'd prefer not to harp on themes blue. But I did want to mention news from the subcontinent. Studying Indian politics, I've been pretty depressed by recent goings-on. The first, more trivial (albeit high-profile) debacle is the Commonwealth Games, set to begin in Delhi on October 3rd. As the front page of the Times of India read this morning - and I'm not kidding - the shit has hit the fan. Over the weekend, a bridge collapsed in the athletes village. A ton of work remains to be done on the venues. There's been an outbreak of dengue fever - a result of holes dug for pot plants left unfilled, providing the perfect breeding-ground for mosquitoes. And the project's ten times over-budget. I'm not alone in reckoning $2bn could have been better spent.

To put it diplomatically, it's an embarrassment for a country with grandiose ambitions and a craving for international respect. The more so because of the Games' obvious comparator, namely, the Beijing Olympics. An optimist might hope this farce will prompt self-searching on the part of Indian officialdom. Corruption has been terrible by any standards; the project's management a case-study in incompetence run amok. Contrary to the BJP's celebrated 2004 election slogan - India Shining - the whole fiasco lends reinforcement to every bad stereotype about the world's largest democracy. The BJP lost in 2004 - its rallying cry rang hollow with voters. With annual growth since averaging 8 percent, you'd predict positive change within state institutions. Alas, no. Six years later, progress on core areas of governance - the goods that will ultimately free India to shine dazzlingly, as it surely must - has proven elusive.

And always there's Kashmir. Last week marked the worst violence in thirty years. The proximate trigger was the threat of Rev Jones and his band of hateful - if media-savvy - idiots to burn Korans in Florida. Back in Srinagar, a wave of street protests flared up, worsening an already fiery situation. (Kashmir has had a horrible summer.) New Delhi is stuck for what to do. An all-party meeting's been convened to "generate ideas". That's when you know things are desperate.

Sorry for being downcast. There's much that's good to report, and I will. Yet occasionally, the world in all its irrationality and wantonness appears a less-than-happy place - especially when its darker side encroaches on home. No jokes today then. But I'll perk up tomorrow.

East Side Story; Moleskine

Too much time has elapsed, I realize, since my last encyclical. What can I say, I've been busy! Reading load now verging on the crazy ridiculous. All gripping stuff nonetheless. My classes this term involve Comparative Politics, Statistics, Intro to Politics, Hindi, and Corruption, Economic Development and Democracy. And the prize for sexiest title goes to... yep, got it in one! CEDD - an acronym I've just coined - is a joint course with the Law School. I'm hoping to ingratiate myself with a few future Supreme Court justices over the coming months, in the expectation, of course, of legal favors down the road ;)

Apart from the lowlights of many hours festering in the library, the week's seen some sky-scraping peaks. Number one: a super-cool-totally-awesome Saturday spent in the City. With Mike, Sharon, Pia and Christoph, I brunched at Beth and Dave's apartment on the upper East side. If you haven't yet participated in a New York Brunch (capital letter mandatory), you, my friend, have barely scratched the surface of living. From banana bread to booze, chorizo to Colombian coffee, maple syrup to mimosa, all of life's excesses come together in one rip-roaring consummation - think Bacchus and Epicurus hooking up on saturnalia and you're almost there. It's - well - a trifle indulgent. Actually, indulgent like a huge trifle. And the best thing ever conceived by human kind.

OK, my stock of superlatives is pretty much exhausted. The Met (bamboo jungle on the roof), Central Park, guitar man, surprise visit by Mike and Jess - these minor-to-major encounters made up the rest of our day. Obviously M&J's drop-by was the X factor on this conveyor belt of happy happenings. Only, it's always painful to say goodbye. As a sign of my affection, our picture together becomes blog post photo.

Last noteworthy event, I heard Karl Rove [*boo*, *hiss*, *throw a shoe*] speak here Wednesday. The subject? "Obamacare". So far so predictable. And he was, mainly. Except for his introduction. We'd just sat through an hour and a half of non-stop pomposity from the student leaders of Yale's "political parties" - selling and strutting their (indistinguishable) ideological goods using what they clearly believed to be inspired verbal gymnastics. Rove, in all his girth, strode to the podium, and, in deep Texan drawl, hollered, "I have ne'er in ma whole GODDAM life come 'cross en-thin' so goddam PRE-TEN-TIOUS as wha' we jus' heard there". At this moment he lunged to the nearby desk of the president and chairman, and grabbed three notepads from these suit-clad Union notables. Waving the offending items in the air, he roared: "Jus' y'all look at this, jus' take LOOK: M-O-L-E S-K-I-N-E, goddam MOLE-SKINE!" We were, I think, initially taken aback by this left-field assault on an object we'd never before considered particularly blame-worthy, or a mark of social distinction. But most began nodding heads, laughing appreciatively, coming round to Rove's side. I couldn't help suspecting, though, that somewhere in the region of 90 to 110 percent of the audience had a cheeky moleskine notebook stashed in a drawer at home - like some guilty secret. In my case a one-time impulse buy at Staples last summer, thinking I'd fill this fine-looking, beautifully bound pad, for which a mole presumably gave the last full measure of devotion, with interesting quotes from the classics (oh the shame). So Rove had a point, QED. Unfortunately, he then continued into his hackneyed healthcare talk. And the rest - so far as humor or intelligent argument's concerned - was silence.

Chicago mafia

Brace yourselves folks, hurricane ho! Yes, in what looks to be a fleeting visit, a Mr Hurricane Earl of North Carolina will be dropping by New Haven tomorrow. In doing so, our guest is expected to knock some Yalies around a bit, zap a few leaves off the elms, and, above all, leave us very, very wet. The severest gale to strike the East Coast since 1991, experts allege. I've started banging old planks of timber to the windows. Come the morning I'll decamp to the basement with canned soup, an old radio set, and a bottle of Scotch. Just like I learned in the movies.

Speaking of blustery things, Chicago. For reasons I've yet to fathom, pretty much all my friends in Yale hark from the windy city. I'd heard before that natives tend to laud the Big Onion in extravagant terms. But my first-hand account attests to a whole new level of adulation. They simply *revere* the place. The people? Pioneering polymaths, modern-day Adonises! Cultural life? Like Medici Florence. The university? Best in the country, duh! The streets? You could eat your dinner off them. And so on.

Now, you might think the city's crime record, comically endemic corruption, and barely-fit-for-human-habitation climate (akin to living, in a freezer, on the South Pole for 10 months of the year) might give Chicago-rooters pause, and invite qualification to these fulsome plaudits. Not a bit of it. Shrugged off like pesky flies. Maybe they're right - maybe Chicago is the city of dreams. I don't know. I guess I'll just have to conduct ethnographic research - social science code for a good long holiday - of my own to weigh up the city's virtues and demerits :)

Courses have begun in earnest. On available evidence, Hindi will be the hardest grind: hour-long sessions every weekday - no time off, even for good behavior - and plentiful homework. We have to keep a diary outside class to build vocab. I considered switching this blog to Hindi for that purpose. But on reflection I decided such a move may dramatically limit a) my ability to write anything beyond listing the items of furniture in my room, their color (so long as they're not brown), and my preference for cats over elephants; and b) audience reach. It stays as it is.

The hurricane and rain will pass soon enough; I hope to be in New York on Saturday, when, in Central Park, we may again salute the sun. Plus brunch with Beth, shop with Michael and Sharon, reminisce with Jess. Much, as ever, to revel in and savor.

Matriculation and all that jazz

I matriculated from Yale in style. Thursday began with breakfast in the Hogwartian Hall of Graduate Studies, incidentally my home sweet home. We'd been released from math camp for the day, and so, in the highest of spirits, my political scientist buddies and I - momentarily spared from death by calculus - chomped muffins and guzzled coffee with abandon. Next, a march to Sprague Hall for the set piece ceremony. With blazing fanfare, the Yale nomenklatura processed on stage, modeling technicolor (and slightly kitch) academic dreamcoats. Richard Levin, the President, delivered opening remarks. He left us without a trace of doubt that Yale represents the lofty pinnacle of the great edifice of western scholarship - from Athens to the present day.

Levin introduced the incoming Dean of Grad Studies, Tom Pollard. This is a man of phenomenal accomplishment. The highest honor within the gift of the university is the Sterling Professorship, which Pollard holds. I reckon the title sounds a tad glib - like "Dude, that's some really sterling work there. Honestly, top notch. You did great. You know what, we should call you something. How about, a STERLING professor!" (For the record, John William Sterling's largess helped establish the chairs, but the pun's sweet.)

In a quiet, prepossessing voice, Pollard gave a warm, focused talk on "finding the right question". As a founder of modern cancer research, he'd clearly picked his pretty well. Now, he said, it was our turn to make an impact - and to beware of blind, fruitless alleys. His message: the solemn responsibility of advancing human knowledge devolves upon you!

All in all, some great pep talk, with jolly musical numbers in the middle.

A reception at the president's house supplied a civilized coda to the day's formal matriculation events. I shook hands with the man himself, and his wife. Nice crib, I thought as I milled through their art-encrusted mansion. Free to borrow from the encyclopedic Yale collection (on which more another time), they'd selected Renoir, Gainsborough, Roy Lichtenstein, Matisse, Sisley... you get the picture. Coffee and cake in the lush landscaped garden to finish; string quartet nestling somewhere in the bushes; weather: perfect. I was a happy boy.


[In the photo, by the way, from left to right: Nikhar, Steve, me, Lionel, Beth and Dan. Fellow poliscis and wonderful people.]

Wild Strawberries

As a respite from orientation week, I watched one of my favorite films. Bergman's Wild Strawberries (1957) recounts one day in the life of an aged physician: the day he's to receive an honorary doctorate in Lund for his service to medicine. Setting out for the drive to the ceremony with his daughter-in-law, Isak comes to a fresh understanding of the coldness that's seeped into his mood, relationships and mores; a selfishness cloaked in "old-world manners and charm". The long-denied failure of his own marriage he at last confides - as well as a never-lost love for his childhood sweetheart. Snapping out of these sad reflections, Isak pledges to renew himself - to rebuild his family over the few remaining years.

Wild Strawberries is a gentle, intelligent film - a meditation on old age and the regrets that accumulate in its tow. And it got me thinking about what it will be like to be old. There's nothing worse than realizing, too late, the bankruptcy of a life ill-led, ambitions unfulfilled. We all know that. Yet perhaps Isak's shortcomings are more to be feared: how careless habits of thought and action, which everyday mean little, shape our character, and eat away at our capacity to change.

I guess staying alert to this looming danger of inertia is the way to avoid Isak's twilight pangs. Stubbornness grows over time. Maybe, with supreme effort, that's not inevitable. So Bergman believed.

"Know thyself," read the inscription above the entrance to the oracle at Delphi. Easier said than done.

McChrystal, Afghanistan and Jimmy Reid

An introductory meeting with my advisor on Friday threw up one surprise. "Hey Gareth, guess who's moving into the next door office. Stanley McChrystal! Plans to teach a grad seminar on leadership this semester." Yale likes to pull in big names - Tony Blair makes guest appearances for a course titled Faith and Globalization (though not with great aplomb, judging by the Youtube clips). Having the ousted general wandering the corridors of the polisci department, presumably in full combats, will be profitable. The counterinsurgency strategy devised by McChrystal remains the mantra of Petreus, his esteemed replacement. What's more, he's still in touch with Pentagon policy wonks, as the war reaches a critical stage in the ever harsher court of public opinion. Nixon's silent majority - the broad-based support for Vietnam, even amid the clamorous protests of the early '70s - simply isn't in evidence when it comes to Afghanistan.

Like others on this issue, I'm caught between two impulses: win the peace with whatever it takes, or think seriously now about withdrawing. That discounts the option of lingering aimlessly, which represents the present scenario (including the indecision about whether to scale down troop numbers in mid-2011). The justifications for pushing on, whether humanitarian or security-grounded, are powerful. It'd be pretty appalling to see the Taliban waltz back to Kabul to reinstate what rates among the most barbaric regimes of the 1990s. The regional implications of a pull-out in terms of India-Pakistan are worrisome. And it needs to be demonstrated to rogue states that giving bed and breakfast to terrorists won't go unchallenged. Taken together, then, I'd stay the course. Yet clear goals for establishing national and government strength must be set, with checklists, so voters can gauge the effectiveness of a war they're paying for dearly - in lives and treasure. The status quo can't be sustained.

To change the subject, Chris sent me a speech delivered by Jimmy Reid, the Scottish trade unionist who died this month. Here, in an address to the University of Glasgow, he sets out his philosophy for education and politics. This brilliant part, one of many, I thought was spot on:

"I am convinced that the great mass of our people go through life without even a glimmer of what they could have contributed to their fellow human beings. This is a personal tragedy. It's a social crime. The flowering of each individual's personality and talents is the pre-condition for everyone's development."

As lucid a statement as ever there was for what the state, through education, might ultimately accomplish.

Green pastures new

Since one reader described the content of my last installment as 'meta' in scope, my ambitions for this entry are more modest. Really I'm quite elated; I want to express as much. Headline banner: my sister Kathleen got into Leeds University. We're all immensely proud of her. She leaves home for northern pastures new in mid-September. It's going to be a testing time for my parents - the last child gone and a big empty house. But they're quickly adjusting to the idea. Perhaps a little too quickly!

Also today, I concluded that Yale will make a mighty fine home these coming years; that the PhD program will be stimulating beyond compare; and, best of all, I'll be among some outstanding individuals.

The friends I've made so far fall into groups. The main one consists of my sixteen classmates, whom I'm gradually getting to know. They're a deeply impressive bunch, about half American, springing from a range of backgrounds. We're plodding through the math together: a two-hour lecture each morning, coffee-shop banter about the assigned problems late afternoon. This evening four of us wound up in Temple Grill. With balmy, Mediterranean-esque weather [note to self, dislike the word balmy, almost as bad as moist - ewwwwww - avoid in future], we tucked into burgers and supped beer, all the while arguing education policy, development aid, films, homelessness. By 8 o'clock, we'd set the entire world and his dog to rights.

More strangely, I attended a leaving party on Wednesday. Odd, since I'd only bumped into Keturah once! She's off to Rochester to work toward a PhD in cognitive science. Sushi and Froyo were her last requests - and judicious ones they proved too. Anirvan and I were totally stuffed after munching on what seemed to be four million curried cauliflower California rolls. Fortunately, our pudding stomachs - an anatomical reality, there's no question - kicked into gear and bore the brunt of the candy-laden frozen yogurt that followed - 'froyo' being another New Haven delicacy extolled by locals (who may not be wholly trustworthy, claiming full credit - as restaurateurs here do - for the invention of pizza and the hamburger).

Yale possesses the most extraordinary gym known to man. Anirvan is keen to scout out its delights - or, depending which way you look at it, instruments of torture: a 50m indoor pool, ten squash courts, indoor running track, fitness center, basketball, tennis center, etc etc ad infinitum. In a foolish bout of getting-to-know-you repartee, I apparently signed onto a tri-weekly fitness regime that should have me running a pace or two faster than Ussain Bolt before the year's out. Those who've witnessed my previous attempts at such get-fit-quick shenanigans will doubtless be chuckling in derision. Ye of little faith. Well, OK, let's be honest, my record on that front's not exactly stellar. But this time will be different! Be sure to check up on me ;)

Those, then, are my few scraps of news, to amuse and divert you in a spare moment. Altogether less weighty than before, I hope.

To end, I should insert the disclaimer that most of these posts are written very late at night (it's hitting 2am now). That might explain any eccentricities that creep in! Something I like to do before nodding off is listen to music. One especially affecting piece I stumbled upon recently is Bach's Christmas Oratorio. At the still core of this magnificent, otherwise uplifting work lies the aria, Schlafe mein Liebster - Sleep my beloved. If, like me, on a hot summer's night you find yourself restless, absorbed, wanting to be lulled, listen to this. It'll surely do the trick.

Math camp

...has begun. Prior to the first semester, polisci ('political science') grad students are required to take a refresher course in mathematics. For many of us, you could read refresher as 'the only math I've taken since kindergarten. Lagrange multipliers? You gotta be kidding - subtraction's a stretch!' Or that's how it feels anyhow :) The topics happen to be fascinating. I'm constantly thrilled - and more often befuddled - by the beauty of logic and numbers. Which is lucky because we're being taken on a whistle-stop tour these next two weeks. It's like an all-you-can-eat restaurant: except, all-you-can-cram. The aim is to get everyone to a similar base level. Digestion can wait until the proper stats and modeling courses begin in September.

I whiled away the weekend in New York City. A Saturday-afternoon outdoor rave at a MoMA outpost in Queens, replete with beach, bar, contemporary art, and a surpassingly attractive clientele; my jaw hung in gobsmacked awe. Ignoring a slight glitch on the train back to New Haven, my adolescent dream - that the Big Apple might one day become a second home - wasn't shattered. The city's definitely close enough for a fun-filled evening stopover.

Since arriving, I've tracked the main American news religiously. I pick the word with care, for two crucial ongoing debates do hinge on questions divine rather than secular. One is the furore surrounding California's Proposition 8 - the law, enacted by referendum, which struck down gay marriage in the Golden State last year. P8 has just been declared unconstitutional by a federal judge. Supporters are girding themselves for a Supreme Court tussle whose outcome would seal the fate of gay marriage across America. There's a twist: Arnie Schwarzenegger, Governor and guardian of his state's laws (if not its economy), doesn't even want to appeal Vaughn Walker's tightly-reasoned, and maybe irrefutable, judgment. Under rules of standing, this could affect whether the nine justices decide to hear the case at all. Whatever happens, polling shows a heartening shift in public attitudes. A majority of Californians now support full marriage rights - a sign of popular penitence. Most think this great struggle for due process and equal protection under the law, in the eloquent language of the courts, is close to being won.

Which is sadly more than can be said for the planned construction of a Muslim community center near Ground Zero. (Actually a full two blocks away.) Despite Obama's iftar speech approving the go-ahead, eighty-something percent of Americans say they're opposed. Much commentary spewing from the right has been hateful, crass, border-line racist - up to and including that of the House Minority Leader, Newt Gingrich. If you want to know what a mob sounds like, take a listen. Thankfully, NY Mayor Mike Bloomberg is committed to the project and the noble ideal it embodies. But the forces arrayed against him are daunting. Their ranks may yet prevail.

And so the world is awash with contradictions. A group, once marginalized, painted as a threat to national identity and a decent way of life, is embraced into the mainstream waters of this totemic democracy. Gay rights look soon to be secured. At the same moment, Muslims, the new great threat, are more vilified than before - less able to practice their religion openly.

It would be very wrong to suggest the United States is exceptional in these respects. Relative to any other country, America is special only in how free individuals remain to do as they please. Yet politics here accentuate group trends, highlighting extremes of class, ethnicity and creed. For a budding political scientist, I guess that's what makes the US so compelling.

Time for me to wrap up and snuggle up. Good night from America. The place and the people grow in my estimation, which was already high, every day. And right now there's nowhere else I'd rather be.

Math class at 10am sharp!

Slowly slowly

For me, the hardest part about moving to a new town is not knowing where to buy the basics - without, that is, having to pay in limbs. For reasons of survival, food is a top priority. The canteen doesn't resume here for another week, so I've been reduced to eating an *awful lot* of sandwiches. One lady took pity on me last night and upgraded my sorry-looking BLT to a deluxe (a brazen abuse of the word, as it turned out). Surely I can't look so emaciated after two days as to be labeled the New Haven basket case!

Today I set out on the winding road to the Dixwell shopping mall to pick up t-shirts. People dress more casually around campus stateside; wearing dress shirts each day isn't the done thing. Although what *is* the done thing - donning clothes with YALE emblazoned on every single item, and you should probably accept that as literal - doesn't really appeal either. I'm opting for the middle ground.

In other news, I've figured out how to use my coffee machine, following a protracted battle. Met up with several great classmates to-be yesterday, and seeing another bunch of newbies later on. Exciting times! The octane levels are expected to rise further as more grads land on Connecticut's sunny shores.

For the meanwhile, can someone please point me to the laundry :P

My grandmother

Enid Rosamond Jones was my maternal grandmother. She died in February 1987. A gifted yet troubled woman, Enid won a joint Fulbright and English Speaking Union Scholarship in 1952 for study in the United States. She attended Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts - one of the 'Seven Sister' colleges, then considered the women's ivy league. Aged 21 and hailing from mining stock, she had never before left Wales.

We had the opportunity on Monday to visit Smith's library. Two incredibly kind archivists rummaged through the major publications for that year and hit upon some real gems. Enid's picture, taken from the 1953 yearbook, is shown above. Their other discovery was a short write-up in the student newspaper, The Smith College Sophian, on the front page of the October '52 edition:

'The first Welsh student ever to come to Smith is Miss Enid Jones, G.S. [Graduate Student], who is from South Wales near Cardiff. She passed her law degree at the University College of Wales at Aberystwyth in West Wales. Miss Jones will write her thesis on comparative administration law under Mr. Chapman. In another year she will be able to take the Bar exam back in England. Miss Jones thinks that the house system is "a jolly good idea" and that the singing at Smith is very good. She assured us that as much singing goes on in Wales as at Smith.'

On completing her course - not with any great distinction on account of the rollicking fun she had! - Enid embarked on a speaking tour of the United States, a condition of her ESU grant. She returned to Britain physically exhausted. Though never going on to become a barrister, she taught law at Hendon Technical Institute (present-day Middlesex University) before multiple sclerosis, diagnosed when she was just 30 years old, put paid to her fledgling career. A remission from the disease provided the chance to raise a family. But for the final ten years of this all-too-brief life, my grandmother, wheelchair-bound, suffered painfully.

The tragic unfolding of later events set into sharper relief for us the joy Enid so easily found in America. She often wished she'd stayed here; South Wales appeared unbearably glum and parochial by comparison.

While I didn't know her, it touches me to think that some of Enid's best and happiest years were spent only a couple of hours away from where I too now live.

Divine Providence

Ties of affection and loyalty to my new alma mater bubbled to the surface yesterday. We'd made the short trip from Newport to Providence, the capital of Rhode Island noted for Brown University. Two excessively enthusiastic tour guides fell within earshot as we entered Brown's reddy leafy campus (rather Harvard-like). Surrounded by earnest teenagers and fawning parents, the speakers looked more than a little flustered as their every word was analyzed furiously by these anxious-looking guests. In fact everyone was on edge. It was college open day.

We stuck around to listen to the spiel. But next to us, one parent was heard by your correspondent to mutter to his wife: 'Well, this sure does beat New Haven'. Punk, thought I, feeling a sudden yet overwhelming urge to break into 'Bright college days' with its rousing finale: 'For God, for country, and FOR YALE'. I held back.

While Providence isn't brimming with things to see, the College Hill/Brown district is exceptionally pretty, and the State Capitol area downtown imposing in that municipal kind of way. The laid-back feel of the place and its cleanliness are what struck me most. And a brilliant exhibit on Roger Williams - the Cambridge-educated man who established Rhode Island having fled religious bigotry in the Massachusetts settlements - left a very favourable impression. (I'm really growing to love these local history museums.)

Warmly recommended.

My toodle around New England takes us to South Deerfield MA today, and Boston tomorrow.

Love to all back home. I miss you very much.

Of lobsters, yachts and sunsets

Newport, for those who don't know it, is the East Coast stomping ground for the super-rich. The prime attractions in this town - sailing, yachting, and mansions - might give a hint of that. For the not quite so prosperous, the Nellises among them, watching boats a la Deripaska float gently by in shoal-like formations is a very pleasant pastime. At least for a few days. With lobster every which way you turn - plain old lobster, lobster salad, lobster sandwiches, lobster bisque, lobster ice cream - the food ain't so bad either.

One episode at our hotel last night ranks among the stranger vacation experiences I've had: a champagne toast to - wait for it - the sunset. Yuk, I hear you vomit.

Many of the historic sights in Newport are quite lovely. It's home to the USA's oldest synagogue - a reminder of the religious tolerance which motivated Newport's founders. Slavery played a not insignificant part in the town's development, and the country's first free black church can be found in the colonial centre. Jackie and JFK were married nearby.

An excellent guided tour by the Newport Historical Society - not as beard, socks and sandals as it sounds - will tell you all this and more, should you ever decide to drop in.

We go to Providence tomorrow. Boston next. Along the way we also hope to visit Smith College in Northampton where my grandmother spent a year as an English Speaking Union Scholar in early 1950s. Apparently her records are still accessible in the College library. She died the year I was born of MS. It will, I think, be very moving for the three of us.

Turning a house into a home

It's true what they say: portions are bigger in America.

The flight was pants (I'm going to retain a few anglicisms for the time being). Having been served Chicken Tikka for breakfast, I made it through half of the Dark Knight and about two thirds of Dr No - my attempt at an escapist binge. Graphic violence and spicy Indian food at 40,000 feet don't mix - I think I blacked out for the middle portion of the journey. Soggy sandwiches accompanied by *no alcohol* - not a drop - defined the remainder. Is prohibitionism on the rise over the mid-Atlantic? Miserable. I'm surprised that British Airways lost only £164 million in the last quarter!

We rode direct from JFK to New Haven. The horses weren't spared. We pulled up alongside the Hall of Graduate Studies around 3pm, grabbed room keys and unloaded. The dorms are strange. A 'semi-private bathroom' set-up means two rooms with a bathroom in the middle, connecting doors on both sides of the shower. In principle there's really nothing to stop someone walking in on you butt naked and on the crapper. I guess that's how the firmest bonds of friendship are forged.

A tad dejected by my new abode (it was grimy when we arrived), I trundled to my parents' hotel.

But then...

We saw Yale. And stunning it is. The Beinecke Library, Harkness Tower, Hillhouse Avenue - Oxbridge meets Disney. There seems to be a penchant, verging on fetish, here for cathedrals which aren't actually cathedrals. They just can't get enough of them. The Sterling Memorial Library: a cathedral. Yale Law School: a small cathedral. Payne Whitney Gymnasium: erm, a cathedral (and one modeled on Liverpool Anglican of all places). How my old joke about turning King's Chapel into a block of flats has come home to roost!

Come Monday evening I'd made my first friend. Stuart, of Ramsgate, has just arrived from Cornell to start his second, yes second, PhD. With plenty in common, we knocked back a few in an Irish bar then hit a watering hole off the Green (mugging central, he tells me). Tequila shots to finish. As a barrister I heard in Southwark Crown Court (only observing!) last week put it, with rank disapproval, there were some sore heads in the morning. My first night in the New World was one to remember :S

Yesterday was spent fixing up the room. Walmart served its all-encompassing purpose admirably; Britons take heed: that shop *will* consume the planet. Also, I am the now proud owner of a Blackberry. With a new phone, I am born again. Text me numbers! Mine's on Facebook.

This ends, devoted reader, my first update from the State of Connecticut. Not exactly an Alistair Cooke missive I'm afraid, but give me time. I'll improve my game.

Forgive me too for not emailing much yet. With family around I've had only sporadic access to a computer. That will change soon.

Next stop, Rhode Island!

Farewell Cambridge - Leal souvenir

So this is farewell. My dad and I expended joules of muscle power this morning in shifting my belongings to Bedford. My head was not in great shape. The final night in the 'bridge was spectacular in every sense. It began in the Fellows Garden where Chris presented me with an original 1847 aerial-view print of Cambridge, commemorating a visit by Queen Victoria. This will be placed at the very top of my luggage on Monday - I can't imagine a more perfect memento. HY and Aurelie cooked a scrummy dinner (I've been lucky in befriending excellent chefs while a grad!) and we managed a Skype chat with Cameron - himself moving this week to take up a post-doc in the math(s - see future post) department at Notre Dame. Next to the King's bar, and some chat about old times. I persuaded everyone that it would be a good idea to walk on the back lawn, and actually perform some cartwheels too. This, not unreasonably, drew the chagrin of a duty porter, to whose entirely feeble injunction ('oi, you, stay where you are!!' as if he was about to come and cuff us or something) we responded by legging it pronto. Damn feds!

Quite a few tears escaped over the course of the evening. Two things, really, combined to make the departure a terrible, difficult wrench.

The first is the specialness, indeed uniqueness, of Cambridge. I often ponder wistfully the university's 801-year star-studded history. There is, I've concluded, literally no other institution in the world that's made a parallel contribution to human kind. Accept a mere sprinkling of noteworthy examples: In the last century King's College produced Alan Turing and John Maynard Keynes - the fathers of computing and modern economics. The Politics library, site of my frantic annual dissertation-writing, once housed the Cavendish laboratory where, in 1897, Thompson discovered the electron; Rutherford was to first split the atom there in 1932, and, a decade later, in those same dusty labs, Watson and Crick unearthed the secrets of DNA. Christ's College can boast Charles Darwin and John Milton; Trinity, Isaac Newton; St John's, Wordsworth and Wilberforce; Queen's, Erasmus. The name 'Pakistan' was coined at Cambridge. From the university as a whole, 15 prime ministers and 87 Nobel Prizewinners have emerged - not a bad trawl.

Across the globe, storms of ideas and ideology rage; people are cured of disease and draw comfort; they find themselves ever more free to pursue their leisure through great feats of technology; they understand liberty; and, steeped in the arts, they have come to know love and beauty better. For this frenzy of progress, and some occasional backsliding, Cambridge bears enormous responsibility. To have participated in this awesome tradition, even in a tiny way, has been a matchless experience.

But, more important, Cambridge is the place where I grew up. School is a blur in my mind - a not-so-happy period of work and feeling out of place. At university I hit upon the best people practically in an instant. Brilliant, liberal, easy-going, they took me under their wing, and during thousands of hours of conversation (and over probably many more thousand beers), I gradually figured out the things that matter to me. The buildings of King's have been my home - the idyllic Cam for a long time the view from my window. Few can be so contented or fulfilled as I've been these past few years. I'm grateful. The days truly were halcyon.

And so I'll never forget the moment on the 2nd of January 2004 when I clicked the refresh button and a fateful 'G Nellis: Accepted' appeared on that pixelated old screen. To the admissions tutor whose big mistake has had such fantastic, unforeseen consequences, a hearty hug - I owe you one. To Cambridge University, keep working hard, for there's much to be done. And to the rest of you - the unforeseens who've made me so very happy in that glorious place - well, thanks :)

Countdown

Two days remaining. I leave Cambridge on Friday morning, Bedford for the weekend, then an 08.55 BA flight to JFK on Monday. This time next week, I should be well and truly ensconsed in my new pad.

Close as that may seem, one vital element in this otherwise masterful plan has yet to be set in motion: namely, packing. I hate putting things in bags and boxes with a visceral, all-consuming passion. And having to lug them around after that intensifies my (already severe) revulsion tenfold. Dad's arriving with a van at 10am (sic, perhaps literally!) on Friday morning, which, since I'm predicting a heavy night tomorrow, is unlikely to land me in the best of moods. If you see a sweaty, stressed, hungover-looking lout in the Causewayside area early Friday, it's probably wise to steer clear.

That said, staying busy is helping keep my mind off leaving. I hope to write a few things about Cambridge over the weekend. Watch this space.

Zong

The blog needs a picture. I don't yet own a digital camera - that's next week's purchase. When I do, expect illustrations galore!

For the moment, Turner's Slave Ship (full title, 'Slavers throwing overboard the dead and dying - typhoon coming on') will have to suffice. I was discussing abolitionism the other day - my friend Josh is an expert - and it reminded me of Turner's astounding picture.

Painted in 1838, some five years after the landmark Slavery Abolition Act, the Slave Ship depicts the jettisoning of diseased and impaired slaves en route to the Americas. The intention, when docked, was for owners to claim the slaves' value on insurance - only redeemable for those 'lost at sea'.

The practice was made known following an inquiry into the actions of the captain aboard the slave ship Zong in 1781. (Incidentally, only civil charges were ever brought against the ship's Liverpool-based owners.) Public uproar surrounding the 'Zong massacre' was a catalyst to the early movement for the trade's abolition.

John Ruskin wrote: "If I were reduced to rest Turner's immortality upon any single work, I should choose this."

The paining hangs in Boston's Museum of Fine Art, a place I'll be visiting in a couple of weeks.

Hijacked punts and super-concise writing

Last night a punt was stolen from King's. I was sitting with the vice-admiral of the punt committee at the time, so three of us made a dash in pursuit of the stolen ship, first by bike, then by - er - punt (not the speediest means of transport ever invented). Three hours later, we hadn't located it. A complete mystery. My body got some much-needed exercise in the process, though.

In other news, I'm writing a book review. In fact I've been working on it for almost a week now! It only has to be 600 words, but summarising and critiquing 300 pages in that tiny space is proving a VERY tall order. The book's called 'India and the World Bank' and it essentially does what it says on the tin (albeit tediously). Can't wait to get the damn thing finished. Writing super-concisely is more like completing a jigsaw puzzle than stating an informed opinion.

Q: Which country has been the recipient of the most World-Bank aid since 1944?
A: India! About $74bn in total.

how to make grown men cry: Toy Story 3

This is the film, it's said, to make grown men cry. Having seen Toy Story 3 at the Picturehouse last night, I can testify to that.

By the end, I was all mush.

The plot's standard Disney fare, and actually not at all dissimilar to the original movie. But, like its recent Pixar brethren, Up, the tale contains moments of almost heartbreaking melancholy. (Plus, the premise - heading faraway to college and leaving old friends behind - has more than passing resonance for me right now.)

Kids films are getting markedly more serious. No bad thing, since it means we soppy adults - this blogger included - can watch them without shame or embarrassment!

Milton Keynes - some thoughts

It's been announced that the Milton Keynes shopping centre is to become a Grade II listed building. The centre's owners are, predictably, hopping mad: the building's new status makes any future changes to the structure a bureaucratic kerfuffle. And given the rate of growth in MK recently, it's likely a good number of tinkerings were in the pipeline. These may no longer be possible. To that extent, their frustration is understandable.

But there is another view.

In many ways, the history of the shopping mall (now ickily called 'the centre:mk') and the mixed feelings it evokes, mirror the history and reception of Milton Keynes itself. Constructed between the mid-1960s and 1980, the city is the newest of Britain's major post-war urban developments. Its hub and spoke design, with village-like residential communities jutting out from the high-modernist town centre, is generously peppered with lakes, parks, trees and cycle tracks.

Occasional visitors to MK and passers-through tend to be fairly scathing, I've found. The labyrinth of roundabouts doesn't exactly endear ever-dizzier motorists to this apparently nondescript staging post between Oxford and Cambridge. The sight from the road only helps confirm the city's reputation as a concrete nightmare.

Long-time inhabitants, however - those who walk beneath the road bridges - frequently sing MK's praises. In weighing its virtues, they point to the gamut of shops and restaurants, the theatre, the indoor ski-slope, the sailing, the transport links.

And MK's modernism is not of the cold-blooded variety. The town was never just conceived as a 'machine for living'. The shopping centre at its heart is dazzlingly bright and spacious. Marble benches line the main thoroughfares, enclosing palm trees and other exotic grafts. The covered square is a site of regular street entertainments. Bustling stalls stake their place outside - even while markets elswhere sink into decline.

More generally, I think the construction of a city from scratch - one that meets people's day-to-day needs, while striving to lift their quality of life to a higher plane - is exciting and commendable; a form of exploration, if you like.

Other cities, it's true, have failed miserably in this endeavour. Chandigarh and Brasilia spring to mind.

Milton Keyes has done better. Much better.

Before commercial expediency pulls apart this minor masterpiece, then, let's protect not only a part of Britain's heritage, but a fine icon to an idealistic vision of city planning.

For Culture Minister Jeremy Hunt, the very thought of listing a shopping centre in Milton Keynes must have seemed barmy at first glance.

In the end he took the tougher, less obvious decision - and the right one.

A HUGE thank you

Yesterday, a number of friends from Cambridge and beyond came together to mark my going away. It was a fantastic surprise, for which I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to everyone involved - and above all to Aurelie, the party's main instigator. I was deeply touched.

After meeting on King's Parade and a leisurely drink, we spent most of the afternoon on the Millpond by the Cam river. Punting ensued, followed by a stopover in the college bar to catch breath, and finally Fez club.

Several travelled a long way to be present. Chris D came from Norfolk, Henry and Charlotte from Bedford, Becca from Bristol, Brian, John and Luke from London, and Chris S from Edinburgh (!). To all those from Cambridge too who gave up their afternoons to celebrate with me, a HUGE thank you - it was an event I won't forget, and a reminder of how very fortunate I am to call such an extraordinary group of people friends.

the best Congressman for a district that ever was

Lyndon Johnson was a repellent character. Election fraudster, misogynist, miser, workaholic, inveterate liar - the list of damning labels that could be pinned to the lapel of America's 36th president is pretty much unending.

Having recently completed the first tome of Robert Caro's four-volume epic - The Years of Lyndon Johnson - I am, more that anything, awed by this consummate politician: a man who fought from the very abyss of poverty in saloon-town Texas, who rose at breakneck speed to become US Congressman at the age of 29, and thereupon confidant of FDR, de facto boss of the DNC machine, master of the Senate, vice-president, and, oh yeah, commander-in-chief 1963 to 1969.

Few in history have commanded the waters of politics so supremely.

Maybe Canute was wrong.

Caro's magisterial biography relates more than a narrative of one man's profoundly complex life, however - much more. LBJ's career weaved in and out of the seminal events which fashioned the modern United States. The Great Depression, the New Deal, a world war, Korea, Communism, the Great Society, Vietnam. You name it, Johnson was there. And he wasn't just involved: invariably he stood at the dead centre of this whirling action.

What this book does brilliantly, in the midst of upheaval, is to carry the world of high Washington politics down to grubby earth, capturing the human, and often tragically afflicted, subjects of these tough times. In the most touching passage of The Path to Power, Caro pauses to describe the daily grind of women on a Texas Hill Country farm prior to the coming of electricity. The physical chores young women were compelled to endure - carrying gallons of water, scrubbing and beating clothes, lifting unwieldy hot irons - left young mothers hunched over, in constant pain, their wills broken by the drudgery of this near-medieval existence.

Help was at hand. For this was the era of the New Deal. Electricity had illuminated cities twenty years earlier (refrigerators first went on sale in 1912). At last, the great dam projects of the 1930s held out the prospect of cheap power for rural America.

Yet the utility companies initially demurred. Into their coffers poured money fast and furious from the densely populated conurbations; sparsely-settled countryside, on the other hand, presented no such ready profits. Capital had to be invested, and with price-fixing pervasive, there was no competitive motive for firms to take on this burden. They had to be kicked into gear.

To make this happen - to move and shake the monopolists - Hill Country farmers neeed an advocate. Lyndon Johnson was their man.

By flattery, cajolery, subversion and dissimulation - techniques he relied upon throughout his career - Johnson achieved the unthinkable for those poor farmers: he forced the hand of the utilities. In 1939 pylons began to dot the landscape of the Texas tenth district.

Electrification, in fact, was just the tip of an iceberg of federal cash that loomed ahead. Over eleven years in the House of Representatives, Johnson channelled upwards of $70 million in transfers to his constituency, far far more than any other district had ever dreamed of extracting. He gained a reputation in the process: 'the best Congressman for a district that ever was', in the words of Tommy Corcoran.

This, then, was the essential story of Johnson's years in the House.

What about before that? The start was, let's say, inauspicious. Johnson's father, once a squeaky-clean Texas legislator, sunk into poverty and took his family with him. Lyndon would never forgive his father's dereliction as paternal breadwinner. Moody teenage rebellion followed, and the domineering hubris of character, which suffused all his later dealings, surfaced at this time.

Johnson's political precociousness shone while at college in San Marcos. Campus politics was reinvigorated under his covert guidance. He departed San Marcos an eminence grise - bizarrely in control of appointments to a swath of sought-after student jobs and manipulating faculty (who willingly bestowed favours on him) with ease.

Thereafter, a stint as Washington secretary to Congressman Kleberg, and then director of the Texas National Youth Administration, convinced influential Democrats (Roosevelt included) that this genius of political organisation was going places.

Johnson won enough support to carry a surprise victory in the Texas 10th in 1937.

A larger assessment of LBJ's achievements in these early years is troubling. This was a man without an ideology. His diehard promotion of New Deal programmes had nothing to do with conviction - if anything, his inclinations were conservative. Johnson craved power in its rawest form. The rest, to take the title of Caro's next installment, was simply a 'means of ascent'.

What struck me about the catalogue of Johnson misdemeanors, though, was not so much their pernicious impact. Quite the opposite. Remarkably, the stratagems Johnson used to lubricate his inexorable rise ultimately contributed to the public good - and not only that of his constituents, but the whole progressive agenda.

As conceived and mediated by LBJ, party politics, the people's prosperity, and the machinations, paranoia and almost incredible ambition of Caro's lead protagonist aligned.

Perversely, democracy worked.

Welcome

For those who haven’t heard, I’m leaving for the United States in two weeks’ time to begin a PhD in New Haven, Connecticut (a state whose name I've just learned to spell!). Since the programme is set to last five or six years, I thought it might be worthwhile to start a blog to keep friends and family at home up to speed with my activities.* Feel free to tune in at any time and, of course, provide comments. I anticipate writing mainly about fun and games (detailed posts on long days holed up in the library will be avoided!). But reflections on politics, books I’m reading, and more existential matters are also bound to make the odd appearance. Overall I hope you might find the blog entertaining, and perhaps occasionally a little thought-provoking.

Please stay in touch. And travellers to the East Coast, beware: you’ll have your arms twisted into paying me prolonged visits whenever you pass through from Boston to New York City!


*For the idea I'm indebted to Thornton Thompson, who's done pretty much the same thing during his MPhil here at Cambridge: http://thorntonpondcrossing.blogspot.com/

Potluck Dinner Party

Mike, Jess and I hosted a dinner party at the flat last night - a dinner party, that is, with a twist. We invited three people. Each guest had to prepare a dish to bring along. The only condition? That nobody confer with anyone else about what dish they intended to make. So we COULD have ended up with six puddings! As it turned out, the selection was just about perfectly balanced. One starter - devils eggs; two mains - chicken salad and cabbage meat rolls (an east German speciality lovingly rustled up by Martin); and two desserts - peach pie and Kaisserschmarrn (a popular Austrian sweet loosely translated as 'king pooh', according to Steffen).

Accompanied by wine, rum and coke, it was a great evening all round.