The Mexile

I left Mexico 15 years ago last week. That blows my mind. It seems like…well, maybe not yesterday. But not 15 years ago. I don’t keep in touch with many of my Mexican friends, I’m sorry to say. I guess life is too busy here to worry about there. I do have an annual-ish catch up with Daniel , a former student. He worked for a plastics company that I gave classes to on Wednesdays and Fridays, 7am to 9am. It was one of the first classes I ever had, and it lasted till the week I left. There were usually about five or six in the class. Daniel was about my age. A couple of years older. We would go out mid class for a smoke together. And we both kept turtles. When I left, I gave him four of mine, including Bob, my favourite. Once a year, more or less, we’d have an online chat. And on my two visits back to CDMX, we met up for breakfast, along with Maria Elena. She was also in the class. They lived near each other and drove in to work together. One time he messaged to let me know Bob had been k...

I’ve just spent a total of five nights in Bangkok, and my verdict is this - I overstayed by three nights. I wrote a disparaging post on Threads about the city, which got me a lot of hate from the Bangkok Massive. But I stand by it. The city is much like Jakarta (or many other overpopulated Asian mega cities) but with temples and a mountain of litter. It’s worth little more than 24 hours of your time. First night, go see China Town. Next day, see Wat Arun, cross the river and tour the Grand Palace and finish off with an evening in Khaosan Road. Take in an overpriced Mauy Thai fight or a Ladyboy cabaret if you must. Flee Bangkok the next morning. The floating market and train street tours are shit. There are other fabulous temples, and the temples are all fabulous, but temple fatigue is real and it sets in quickly. Once you’ve seen one…you know how this goes. And if you’ve taken my advice and seen Wat Arun and the Golden Palace, then you’ve seen the best and it’s all downhill from there...

I have a joke for you. George Santayana and Mike Godwin walk into a bar. Santayana takes a seat, rubs his head and looks at the bartender. " I'll have whatever it was that I had last night ". He chuckles. " After all, those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it ". The bartender nods and pours a double whisky. Godwin sits down next to him, sighs, and orders a glass of water. " I'd have a beer, but I've been here less that two minutes and I can already tell this conversation is going to end with someone being compared to Hitler ". Godwin and Santayana are the creators of two of the most beloved philosophical 'laws' on the internet. They are both pretty sound, as far as vague one or two line laws go. And yet, they cannot both be right. If we take George at his word, then eventually the wheel will turn full circle, comparisons gain validity and Mike will be stood at the bar supping his pint of water in a scene reminiscen...

I went to the little Eurochange currency shop in Bournemouth this week. I needed some Thai bahts. Alas, like most of the shops on that stretch of the town centre, it’s shut down. Although it turned out that Eurochange is closed because there was a fire in the flats above the shop. Some, probably most, of the several thousand gallons of water lobbed into the building by the fire brigade made its way to ground level. Unfortunate, but it’s another nail in the coffin of Bournemouth as a retail centre.  I could write a long piece about the decline of Bournemouth, but a chap called Peter Viney has already produced an exceedingly thorough account of the towns travails, so I won’t bother. I’ll just add that’s it got worse since his last update. Fat Face is also now gone. Starbucks in the Triangle too. Starbucks!! When coffee shops up-sticks and off-bugger….well, that is the retail equivalent of a fat lady singing, isn’t it? And Specsavers closed its doors for the last time on Christmas Ev...

Politics 2026 in the United Kingdom. Where are we at? To summarise: we have a far-right populist who is telling his fanbase, the rich and the racist, exactly what they want to hear. He’s not afraid of upsetting people, although his recent success means he is at least trying to pretend that he didn’t spend his youth advocating for Jews to be gassed. We have a far-left populist who’s is doing much the same but whose message is aimed fair and square at the poor, and folk who still think Jews should be gassed. Above Hadrians Wall is a bunch of folk with nationalist dreams, but I’ve no idea what they’re saying anymore, and I’m not sure they do either. The Welshists are all probably very nationalist too, but it’s spoken with that delightful, soothing sing-song Welsh twang from the valleys, so it sounds lovely. But in the big scheme of things, it doesn’t much matter. There is the natural party of government, currently on the opposition benches, and they say whatever the far-right populist say...

The US is lost. Not just for four years. For the foreseeable. Even if sanity is restored, a return of trust will take a generation or more. The fifth column within now has total power, taking orders from the fascist paymaster in the East. The fight for Europe will soon begin. The first battles that must be won are against the fifth columns within the UK and the EU. Personalities like Farage and Le Pen, with their overt Russian links. And leaders like Orban. Folk talk about the danger to democracy in the US. Too many dismiss it as idle talk. But I think it will likely come to pass that Trump will need to retain power, whether himself or through an obedient puppet regime, for the same reason Putin does. The scale and seriousness of his crimes – those committed and those to be committed – will dictate that he must. The US has gone from being ally to rival to enemy in less than a fortnight. There will be consequences to that. Who will be the first in Trump’s circle to be sanctioned by the ...

I thought it was   obvious in 2018   that we were in a state of war with Russia. Undeclared, unofficial yet undeniable. But we – like the rest of Europe – did very little about it. We failed even to really acknowledge it. For as long as tanks weren’t crossing borders, fingers in ears and ‘la la la la’ seemed to be official policy. The truth of the matter, I suspect, is that these were governments scared of inflicting upon their electorates the hardships required to confront this reality. Alas, Putin has no such fear. Here we are in 2025 with nearly a million Russians maimed or dead, their economy shattered and isolated, hundreds of thousands of their brightest have fled, and yet Vlad will happily continue to inflict untold further suffering and sacrifice on the people he supposedly represents, all in the name of his legacy. Even as tanks did start crossing borders when Russia invaded Ukraine, most of Europe did the bare minimum. And now there is surprise and alarm that the USA...