To bikini or not to bikini

Its so often referred to a s the battle of the bulge. Yes the spare tyre, the thunder thighs, and the double chin. In modern day society it is all about how we lose weight. How to avoid those chunky peanut butter kitkats, the takeaway menus, and cram those 5 a day vegetables into our convenience ridden lifestyles. Its a constant battle.

The battle of will:by LauraLewis23

With a persistant media stream  focusing on how best to achieve ‘perfection’ are we doing the right thing by following it?

Eva Wiseman, writer for the Guardian could not have put it better when she wrote; “The real-life equivalent of fasting for a [film] role is the pre-wedding diet. Both involve shedding weight for a single photo call; both require you to change your appearance to show your commitment to the part…But these moments are meant to be celebratory – the camera is there to document the occasion rather than be the occasion.”

Who are you? By CodyAHoffman

 

When women and men think about holiday snaps merely the word causes and involuntary sucking in of the stomach. Shortly to be followed by a whole body assessment in the mirror. Yet when we’re asked how the holiday went do we ever comment on how the person lying next to you looked in that two piece bikini? No. Instead we speak about the vibrant culture, the hotel staff, the…fantastic food.

Ok, Yes the UK does have a crisis on it’s hands, our girths are growing and its for this reason only that we should be addressing the issue of how to drop those pounds. However confidence, fun –loving, vivacious characteristics are far more attractive than any flashing thigh bone. They reflect what we all wish we had the guts to do – strip off the self-conscious constraints we hide behind like a shield, and just get on with life. Enjoy occasions for the luxurious meals out complete with gooey dessert. More over enjoy them without the need to cram in months of fasting (which we all know won’t work), or endless nights spent plodding along on the treadmill.

It seems we need to spend more time building our inner confidence to truly impact on our happiness with our outer being. Then maybe the camera would remind us of the fun rather than the frantic panic leading to the photographer’s flash.

Confidence shining through By Deannster

A simple delish dish!

Try it they said, it’ll be easy they said…and they were right!

Home from university for a weekend and of course I conformed to the epitome of all student habits – making the most of the free food available. Free, branded, quality ingredients at the pull of a handle. During an errand trip to Sainsbury’s I browsed their catalogue lapping up the delicious looking dishes neatly displayed on immaculately dressed tables, with matching cutlery, and a fitting backdrop. Merely the images alone have your saliva swirling. Being as I was at home, and the food in the trolley doesn’t require wrestling with the tight strings binding my purse, I decided to try out their prawn, pea and rocket risotto.

Sticky risotto rice and prawns infused with garlic, a smattering of lemon zest, and crunchy rocket – it screamed Yummy!

My excitement at cooking on a shinning hob which works at the single click of the  ignition button, using a le creuset, (For the student readers – this is an oven prof dish – no melted handles in the process!) and with acres of work top space on which to prepare the ingredients, reminds me how long I’ve been a student!

The flames lept to meet the bottom of the pan and I was cooking on gas! A splash of oil, diced onions and a generous helping of garlic simmered for a few minutes.

As the kettle boiled, the chicken stock and  rice swirled into the pan, the kitchen windows began to steam up.

Using a clean, freshly laundered pair of oven gloves I opened the oven door and placed the le creuset on the shelf allowing the rice to absorb the liquid, thickening into the fluffy creamy risotto. The oven timer is surprisingly a lot more accurate than estimating it using the length of a television episode!

As the pot cooked in the oven, I defrosted the king prawns by running them through cold water and portioned out the peas, and rocket.

As the oven bleeped the dish was nearly done. Clicking the ignition once more I  returned it to the hob, added the pink prawns, and green peas it was becoming as much of a feast for the eyes as it was for the belly. The sent of onions and garlic wafted around the house.

the colours creeping in:
jenniferjuniper92

Dressing my table with matching knives and folks, avoiding the usual awkward balancing the plate on a cushion, added to the sense of occasion as the culinary endeavor was working! Dare I say it was almost looking sophisticated!  The smells wafting around brought everyone to the table and silence ensued – a good sign I am told, for a chef.

Who says students can’t cook!? This simple yet sophisticated dish would have any celebrity chef eating their hat!

From my point of view: Asylum seeking first hand

“If you can’t run, walk. If you can’t walk crawl, but by all means keep moving.”
The words of Martin Luther King Junior are what motivate, Isa, the brown-eyed, six foot something Azerbaijani

,with a glint in his eyes as he talks about change and his homeland.
Despite his impressive stature Isa is bashful and self-deprecating, constantly apologizing for what he calls ‘terrible English’. If I was anywhere near as accurate in Azerbaijani as he is in English, I would be far from apologetic. He stumbles over a few words but largely his pronunciation is clear and charmingly tinted with his native accent. His efforts to learn the English language have certainly been successful.
Isa is an Asylum Seeker. Originally from Azerbaijan he fled prison where he was sent for teaching his mother tongue, Azerbaijani Turkish, to his community. Whilst in prison he was tortured. But it was on a visit to hospital for the wounds he sustained, that he seized the opportunity to escape. ‘A young boy helped me he gave me Kurdish clothes and took me across the border in his lorry’. ‘I had no intention to leave Turkey, but I was given some drugs, sleeping tablets, and the next thing I woke up in the back of a lorry on the English motorway.’
The long feud between Armenians and Azerbaijanis in 1988, in which some 30,000 people died, reached a ceasefire in 1994. The bloody massacre saw thousands of native Azerbaijanis displaced. Today the teaching of anti-government material is still prohibited and lead to Isa’s arrest. ‘I was teaching culture, dance, and [our] mother tongue to my people, but the government didn’t like it and arrested me’. The constitutional rules in Iran are frequently
misinterpreted and harshly enforced resulting in severe penalties for those considered to be going against government ruling.
‘The Iranian regime presented many charges against me including being a spy. I was sent to prison and would have probably been killed if I hadn’t escaped. The Home Office gave me leave to remain in the UK, without having to go to immigration court, as it would be too dangerous to send me back home.’ He said.
Being in the presence of someone with such a shocking background makes you feel in awe of his modesty. In spite of the sensational detail of his life so far, he does not come across as angry, but instead is respectful, charming and even shy. He has a desire to positively impact people’s lives.
His past makes his present accomplishments all the more humbling.
The man behind the glinting brown eyes and teddy bear smile has quite a résumé. Since arriving in Leeds in 2007, Isa has set up a community support group for asylum seekers, helping them with their own transition into English culture. He also teaches Azerbaijani Turkish to those who, like him, have fled Azerbaijan. He has organised community meetings with the Mayor of Leeds Judith Elliot, and president of the world Azerbaijani congress; Professor Tabrizi, and is an active campaigner.
‘I am a political activist I believe change can only come through education…giving people the knowledge to make their own minds’ he explains.
His ambition to see equality not just politically but for women, children, and religion creates the feeling, I can only imagine, being surrounded by the likes of Martin Luther King Junior, and Nelson Mandela might provoke. Isa is determined to stop the impact of the Iranian regime in his country escalating. As he talks his hands are those of a puppet on a string, animating his biography. ‘Together with Amnesty International Leeds we launched a petition and organised a demonstration to stop the Iranian regime stoning women in Iran. Any society that does not recognise women’s rights…is doomed’ he says.
Soon we come to the sensitive topic of family. Much like a conductor in a calm segment of music his gesticulating stills and he strokes his beard thoughtfully. Isa’s family and friends are in danger for merely being acquainted with him, and his brother is in jail. ‘I feel terrible because I know after my experience in prison he will also be experiencing the same…my mother and father tell me not to come back I hope one day, in a few years I can bring them all over to England’ he said, his body language reflecting every emotion.
But he is hopeful that Azerbaijan will one day be free.
‘When the Mullahs are toppled, hopefully by my kind contribution,[and] a democratic regime is installed…when it becomes safe for me to go back, I would love to go back and help build the country further.’ He says.
For now he must continue in the UK, something that hasn’t been without its challenges, during his interviews with the Home Office there was no one to interpret Isa, which he described as an alienating and vulnerable feeling; ‘I was worried because I wasn’t understood’. A short while after moving into his home the BNP also sent a ‘disturbing’ leaflet through his door defaming Turks.
However, thanks to his inner strength and those working in asylum and refugee organisations he dealt with the challenges.

‘I also had the support of LASSN’ he said. Leeds’ Asylum Seekers Support Network (LASSN) offers a range of support including hosting and befriending the destitute and homeless, teaching English, and rectifying the many misconceptions surrounding asylum seeking. Indeed Research suggests 72 per cent of people overestimate numbers of asylum seekers entering the UK. In reality Britain receives only two per cent of the overall population of those fleeing their country. Four-fifths escape to their neighboring state.
With the help of LASSN, Isa has enrolled on college courses for community development, English, and IT. Isa helps out as an Azerbaijani Turkish interpreter for fellow asylum seekers at the Home Office in Croydon, and is hoping to progress to university to study cultural development.
Isa’s gesticulations start up again and the broad teddy bear grin spreads once more across his face; when I ask if he is enjoying life here. His reply is suitable eloquent and apt ‘In my own country I feel suffocated. Here I feel I can breathe’.

Coffee and cake mmhmmm

I love a good coffee, the pungent smell, clinking of china on wooden tables, chit chatter filling the air, newspapers spread across laps, and the world travelling along outside. My ventures into coffee shops of any nature are always filled with good conversation, slurps and sighs of satisfaction.

My favorite spot?  without a doubt the stools looking out onto the street ahead. The condensation dribbling down the window only slightly blurring my vision of the world outside. Although coffee is usually for a good catch up with an old or new friend the window spot is for thinkers. Those taking the time out to reflect, and evaluate their predicament – plan ahead, think,  some time to themselves, all enabled by a cup and saucer.

The sofa, now this seat is for the chatters, the ones who are meeting and greeting. With their big chunky arms to rest back on, and deep squishy cushions to rest the derriere on it provides the perfect environment on which to immerse in conversation with a cuppa and a tea cake. Simple trinkets providing such satisfaction, a cup a saucer, and a side plate for the cake.

The tables. These small yet perfectly formed pieces of furniture provide the perfect arena for a meeting between business partners, surfing the web, and of course for those who like to push the boat out – eggs Benedict on toast needs a little more height to be enjoyed adequately.

A slurp, a nibble, or a luncheon the humble coffee shop is a relaxing custom one should could get all too used to.

 

“Time is just memory mixed with desire.”
courtesy of Thingo

The Help: A review

Kathryn Stokett’s ‘The Help’ transports us back to 1960’s southern racially segregated America.

Skeeter is a white, unorthodox, ambitious journalist. Her radical attitude to the injustice of social segregation between black and whites provides a refreshing spin on this infamous period. Through her character we access the perspective of a white woman critical of, and willing to stand against,  small town judgements of Jackson. Dominant ideology shuns ‘coloured’ folk, yet expects ‘the help’ as they’re called to bring up their children.

Amidst the madness of bringing up white women’s children, under the restrictions of ‘coloured’ boundaries  Skeeter pitches an idea like no other…

Mini a black, feisty maid and her companion Abileen soft, gentle and loving tell the struggle of racial segregation with such dignity. Sharing the maid’s experiences of bringing up white women’s children in Jackson cherishing each child, fully aware of the fact the child will one day be their boss, condemning them to the oppression of  segregation.  Every emotion conveyed by the maid’s tugs at the heart through the heroic nature of Stokett’s characterisation.

The competition for status and image perfection is a must for the white women of Jackson, and luncheons, galas, and committees are the way into such sororities.  But as sorority leader, a miss Hilly Holbrook heightens the stigma against the help and puts not only her friendship with Skeeter on the line, but her status too. Stokett contrasts the events of each character’s role brilliantly, placing the novel on a knife’s edge and highlights the courageous nature of the trio’s exploration.

Abileen’s tragic loss epitomises the injustice of the racial divide, relayed triumphantly throughout the novel.

By providing insights from both races, black and white, the accounts expose this significant period of time from level perspectives, enhancing the realism of the novel’s events to the modern day reader.