Wetwang...

Licenced today: a road sign to the village of Wetwang, East Yorkshire…

Broad Leys...

Licenced today: Broad Leys, the lakeside HQ of the Windermere Motor Boat Racing Club…

Great Dun Fell...

"Are you an individual? You have a different body, a different name, a bank account, maybe a disease – but are you an individual? You are conditioned like everybody else, and within that limited area that you call the individual, everything arises: your miseries, despairs, jealousies, fears. Everything comes from that limited, narrow, fragmentary existence that we are so proud of, with our individual souls and individual wills. With this messy, little stuff, we want to proceed to uncover God, truth, love and all the rest of it. You cannot. All you can do, if you are attentive, is to be aware of your fragment and the struggles of the fragment. The fragment can never become the whole. Do what you will, the spoke can never become the wheel. So one has to find out, inquire into this whole problem of the separative, narrow, little existence we call the individual" (Krishnamurti, from a public talk in 1964).

Another licencing infringement for this pic of the RADAR station of top of Great Dun Fell, near Cross Fell, North Pennines...

"Respect"...

In just over three weeks the football World Cup will start in Qatar: a country with lots of brand-new stadia, but no tradition of football. God only knows how many manilla envelopes had to change hands for this tiny oil-rich country in the Persian Gulf to have won so many votes. Qatar is run under sharia law, which means that both apostasy (leaving Islam) and homosexuality are capital crimes. Other crimes, such as adultery or the consumption of alcohol, are punishable by public flogging.

The migrant workers who constructed the football stadia worked long hours, for low wages, in searing heat, often in conditions of involuntary servitude. In short, being more interested in their repressive religion than in human rights, Qatar should never have been awarded a major sporting competition in the first place.

There have been “reassurances”, by the Quatari government, that gay fans will be welcome. Not all gay fans are convinced, of course, and Quatari jails are full of people who have drunk alcohol, worn skirts considered too short, or showed any public display of affection. Our foreign secretary, James Cleverley, suggested that fans should “respect” the cultural and religious norms of the host nation. What would this “respect” look like, exactly?

I hope this vastly expensive exercise in “sportswashing” backfires spectacularly, by revealing this repressive regime in its true colours…

Black-tailed godwit...

A juvenile black-tailed godwit has set a world record for marathon bird flights by flying 8,435 miles (13,560 kilometres) non-stop from Alaska to the Australian state of Tasmania. The migratory flight took 11 days. These beautiful birds are regular visitors to the Humber wetlands; I saw a pair yesterday.

Pic by Charles J Sharp (Creative Commons)…

Hark to Bounty...

Licenced today: the Hark to Bounty pub in Slaidburn, Lancashire…

Bittern spotting...

Had a couple of peaceful hours at North Cave Wetlands: like a motorway service station, with skeins of geese arriving to feed, then flying off in formation. The highlight was spotting a bittern in the reedbeds. It was so well camouflaged!

Pic by Imran Shah, Creative Commons...