Greed is gruesome: Madam Miaow gets supersized

I'm just a girl who can't say no. No, not a popular breakaway hit from the musical Oklahoma, but a dawning realisation that I like to indulge. Which can lead to a peculiar leftist angst as my ascetic consideration for the planet and the holy temple of my bod does battle with my inner gannet.

A glutton for everything except punishment, I like to wolf down things that are bad for me. I recently stayed in the arty seaside resort of St Ives and found myself conducting a Supersize Me experiment as I relinquished my usual balanced diet for the regional Cornish produce of pasties, clotted cream and scones, clotted cream ice-cream with clotted cream and the local cider brew. I would have snaffled one of the marauding seagulls as well had I caught one with a nice ready-made stuffing of pasty and ice-cream purloined from unsuspecting tourists. It was only after two weeks when my skin turned to parchment and my eyes sprouted bags like luggage that I snapped out of it and into a mini-detox.

At these moments I'm more gorge than gorgeous. Take burgers, f'rinstance. Bad for the planet, bad for me, but every so often when the moon is full, I need my cholesterol indulgence. Okay, it may be largely connective tissue, fat and cancerous tumours, but mashed up with a dollop of ketchup or "relish", it slips down a treat, barely hitting the sides.

That's how I came down with dysentary as a kid, on the grand tour of China with a stopover in Karachi. "Drink bottled water, wash the fruit and DON'T EAT THE MEAT!" warned my mother. Hah! Mothers, what do they know? So I'm waiting for the taxi to take us to the airport when I spy a burger stall and come over all tunnel-visioned seeing nothing but the patty glistening in the 100 degree noonday sun. I'm halfway through when it occurs to me that this may not be the sensible thing to do and, sho 'nuff, a week later, I find myself convalescing in a Beijing hospital, the details of which I shall spare my sensitive readers.

And this summer, I did it again! In Scarborough for a concert, I dived off with the sound techie's partner for seaside fun on the beach, partaking of the seafood which included big fat oysters. One oyster tasted different. Not bad, but different. Ignoring everything I have been told about shellfish I still ate it with all my alarm bells screaming at once. Just as well I didn't feed it to the seagull lurking at my feet, as I was tempted to do ... he would only have flown off, exploding his guts all over the tourists, and that is so not a good look. In any case, he sensed something was wrong and waddled off. Animal instincts? Yes, please.

So that's why I spent 24 hours purging myself of toxins (don't ask!) before the gig. Not such a hot thang now, was I? Green in consumption habits, good. Green in face, doubleplusungood.

First published in New Internationalist magazine.

President Blair: The Great Escape

Which movie are we in? The final act of The Omen? Or maybe Goodfellas?

After heroically stalling the advance of Tony Blair by rejecting the Lisbon Treaty, which would (among other horrors) create the role of President of the United States of Europe, the Irish were told to vote again until the required result was reached. So they finally caved in and midwifed the birth of the monster like something out of The Omen and for a few moments it looked like only an act of God stood between us and a Blair shoo-in. Cue shrieking horror chords.

With his abasement before the rich and powerful, free holidays, dodgy dossiers and phantom weapons of mass destruction, dead government scientists, a mushrooming property portfolio, a million dead Iraqis and British soldiers returning in body-bags, first President of the US of E is not the final destination many of us find most appropriate for Blair, even if the imaginative demises in the Final Destination movies are suitably poetic.

Presiding over this country’s wealthiest decade ever, where the gap between rich and poor widened into a chasm with oceans of money siphoned off by various privatization schemes, millionaire status is hardly just desserts for someone who was supposed to be serving us as Labour Prime Minister. 

Garlanded with praise from powerful men welcoming the newbie into their club, swaddled in the warm embrace of the high-paying lecture circuit, honoured among the élite, the ego massage did enough damage for an army of wannabe Masters Of The Universe, and now they want to make him unelected President of Yurp? Move over, Pope Benny, 'cause soon he'll have his middle finger in your Big Ring. 

Blair has made his bones and claimed his dues. He's been having a high ol' time, travelling the world and hoovering up his rewards. Some £2.5 million a year from JP Morgan, the bank that co-ordinated the ‘revamping’ of Iraq’s financial system and made a fortune from the war he started. A million-dollar honorarium from an Israeli university for Britain’s Middle East peace envoy. Some might holler ‘conflict of interest’ and set the cops onto him but maybe they do things differently now.

When he looks in the mirror, does he know that it isn’t the beatific numinous aura of the martyr he’s beaming out? This is the thousand-yard stare of empty space. Blair may aspire to Gandhi as played by Ben Kingsley but he’s more like Sir Ben as Don in Sexy Beast.

If the unelected post of President had gone to this man, what would the rest of the world have made of our much-vaunted western civilization? ‘It would be a good idea,’ as Gandhi once said. Or is that the voice of Blair’s inner Don I hear, telling himself, ‘You got some fuckin’ neck, ain’t you? You should be ashamed of yourself. Who do you think you are? King of the castle? Cock of the walk?’

Feature also published at New Internationalist

President Blair: The Great Escape

Which movie are we in? The final act of The Omen? Or maybe Goodfellas?

After heroically stalling the advance of Tony Blair by rejecting the Lisbon Treaty, which would (among other horrors) create the role of President of the United States of Europe, the Irish were told to vote again until the required result was reached. So they finally caved in and midwifed the birth of the monster like something out of The Omen and for a few moments it looked like only an act of God stood between us and a Blair shoo-in. Cue shrieking horror chords.

With his abasement before the rich and powerful, free holidays, dodgy dossiers and phantom weapons of mass destruction, dead government scientists, a mushrooming property portfolio, a million dead Iraqis and British soldiers returning in body-bags, first President of the US of E is not the final destination many of us find most appropriate for Blair, even if the imaginative demises in the Final Destination movies are suitably poetic.

Presiding over this country’s wealthiest decade ever, where the gap between rich and poor widened into a chasm with oceans of money siphoned off by various privatization schemes, millionaire status is hardly just desserts for someone who was supposed to be serving us as Labour Prime Minister. 

Garlanded with praise from powerful men welcoming the newbie into their club, swaddled in the warm embrace of the high-paying lecture circuit, honoured among the élite, the ego massage did enough damage for an army of wannabe Masters Of The Universe, and now they want to make him unelected President of Yurp? Move over, Pope Benny, 'cause soon he'll have his middle finger in your Big Ring. 

Blair has made his bones and claimed his dues. He's been having a high ol' time, travelling the world and hoovering up his rewards. Some £2.5 million a year from JP Morgan, the bank that co-ordinated the ‘revamping’ of Iraq’s financial system and made a fortune from the war he started. A million-dollar honorarium from an Israeli university for Britain’s Middle East peace envoy. Some might holler ‘conflict of interest’ and set the cops onto him but maybe they do things differently now.

When he looks in the mirror, does he know that it isn’t the beatific numinous aura of the martyr he’s beaming out? This is the thousand-yard stare of empty space. Blair may aspire to Gandhi as played by Ben Kingsley but he’s more like Sir Ben as Don in Sexy Beast.

If the unelected post of President had gone to this man, what would the rest of the world have made of our much-vaunted western civilization? ‘It would be a good idea,’ as Gandhi once said. Or is that the voice of Blair’s inner Don I hear, telling himself, ‘You got some fuckin’ neck, ain’t you? You should be ashamed of yourself. Who do you think you are? King of the castle? Cock of the walk?’

Feature also published at New Internationalist

Who's Left?: how the Left failed the Big Test

In my latest New Internationalist column, Who's Left (May 2009), I wonder why the far-left has been so useless in putting forward the socialist argument when capitalism has been caught eating itself so spectacularly.

I watched stunned while over ten years the dominant strand within the Marxist left did over other leftists whenever a wave of solidarity manifested in positive action. Every time they welcomed someone with "talent", you gradually realised this was a ticket to ostracism, backstabbing and gleeful fantasies of Kronstadt-style discipline ("We should have shot them down like partridges", I kid you not).

It wasn't as if the movement was big or vibrant enough to withstand such losses. They may have stood on podiums lecturing the grunts about how every member is like gold dust in their "every sperm is sacred" spiel, but in practice they squandered the chief resource of any movement: its activists.

Corruption isn't just the preserve of bourgeois liberal politicians; it's a mindset. I was shocked to see the same motives of greed, power, fame and jealousy totally eclipsing the common cause in an Olympic bout of territorial pissing. Totally bonkers when they themselves had identified a limited window of opportunity following Blair's election in 1997 and the inevitable disillusion for anyone who hadn't been observing the upwards trajectory of the Tory creep.

Now that the public has seen through the political class the Left is nowhere. Today's local elections should have sent votes into the stratosphere, even if it was just in protest. But we know they won't.

It's good to see Independent columnist Mark Steel picking up on this at last, but as so many of them knew about this problem for ages and declined to help those of us who were trying to challenge such destructive behaviour, why has it taken so long? It's no good waiting until the axe is about to fall on you. That's not what comradeship and good politics is about. Anyone who's read the Pastor Niemoller T-shirt knows that: "First they came for the Communists ..."

I'd suggest that in turning a blind eye and failing to support dissenters those stalwarts of the left have been part of the very problem they now condemn. They can hardly complain now their own past practice is biting them on the bum.

Who's Left?: how the Left failed the Big Test

In my latest New Internationalist column, Who's Left (May 2009), I wonder why the far-left has been so useless in putting forward the socialist argument when capitalism has been caught eating itself so spectacularly.

I watched stunned while over ten years the dominant strand within the Marxist left did over other leftists whenever a wave of solidarity manifested in positive action. Every time they welcomed someone with "talent", you gradually realised this was a ticket to ostracism, backstabbing and gleeful fantasies of Kronstadt-style discipline ("We should have shot them down like partridges", I kid you not).

It wasn't as if the movement was big or vibrant enough to withstand such losses. They may have stood on podiums lecturing the grunts about how every member is like gold dust in their "every sperm is sacred" spiel, but in practice they squandered the chief resource of any movement: its activists.

Corruption isn't just the preserve of bourgeois liberal politicians; it's a mindset. I was shocked to see the same motives of greed, power, fame and jealousy totally eclipsing the common cause in an Olympic bout of territorial pissing. Totally bonkers when they themselves had identified a limited window of opportunity following Blair's election in 1997 and the inevitable disillusion for anyone who hadn't been observing the upwards trajectory of the Tory creep.

Now that the public has seen through the political class the Left is nowhere. Today's local elections should have sent votes into the stratosphere, even if it was just in protest. But we know they won't.

It's good to see Independent columnist Mark Steel picking up on this at last, but as so many of them knew about this problem for ages and declined to help those of us who were trying to challenge such destructive behaviour, why has it taken so long? It's no good waiting until the axe is about to fall on you. That's not what comradeship and good politics is about. Anyone who's read the Pastor Niemoller T-shirt knows that: "First they came for the Communists ..."

I'd suggest that in turning a blind eye and failing to support dissenters those stalwarts of the left have been part of the very problem they now condemn. They can hardly complain now their own past practice is biting them on the bum.

Madam Miaow's New Internationalist column: Hello Dalai!

Oh, yes. Nearly forgot to post my August column for New Internationalist magazine.

So here it is ...

How lucky we are to be born in the enlightened West where we eschew cults of personality in favour of merit. Not for us those mindless automata praying at the altar of Stalin, Mao or Simon Cowell. No, we sophisticates know when we’re being shimmied up the garden path. After all, we got rid of our troublesome clergy in the 16th century. Hey, we even decapitated one of our kings – only one, but it’s the thought that counts.

So what exactly is the lure of the satsuma in specs that is His Holiness, the Dalai Lama? In contrast to China’s trigger-happy capital punishment system he’s certainly seductive.

Celebrities and politicians – two cheeks of the same overfed bottom – flock to Dolly for enlightenment and the chance to soak up a bit of the transcendency transmitted by His Happiness without doing any of the work. Fame, glamour and power? Yum!

Caught with a rodent gnawing away at your fundament and in need of redemption and a bit of nifty PR? Hello Dolly! Owned a few human beings in your time like Dolly’s beloved mother? Forgiveness is yours.

But Sharon Stone, reincarnated as a moron, said the recent devastating earthquake in China was karma for Tibet. Seventy thousand people died as some sort of divine retribution for politics. What kind of a religion is that? Funny how when anything happens to other people it’s karma, or bad stuff they’ve earned through their own actions. Yet whenever bad stuff happens to the Tibetan ruling élite it’s so unfair.

Just a suggestion: maybe what’s happening to them is divine karma coz in their medieval feudal theocracy one tiny group of Tibetans used to own all the other Tibetans. Maybe it’s divine karma because those peace-loving Buddhists used the death penalty until 1920 and torture well into the 1950s. Dolly was overseeing CIA-funded guerrilla warfare from exile in the 1960s – even while he was publicly renouncing violence. What is that, anyhow? Extra backup just in case the divinity’s asleep on the job? It’s okay, God, move along. Nuthin’ to see, we got it covered.

Ooh! There I go being all Chinese and oppressive again. ‘Leave him alone, he’s mastered the art of being happy.’ Know what would make me happy? $180,000 dollars a year paid into my personal bank account by the CIA. I reckon I’d never be in a bad mood again.

On the other hand, look what China’s had in one year: freak snowstorms, earthquakes, flooding. One plague of boils and I will be hedging my bets.

[In 1998 the LA Times reported declassified documents showing $1.7 million a year paid by the CIA to the Tibetan independence movement in the 1960s, with $180,000 paid to the Dalai Lama personally until Nixon stopped US support in the 1970s. The Tibetan government-in-exile acknowledges the $1.7m but denies any went directly to the Dalai Lama.]

Madam Miaow's New Internationalist column: Hello Dalai!

Oh, yes. Nearly forgot to post my August column for New Internationalist magazine.

So here it is ...

How lucky we are to be born in the enlightened West where we eschew cults of personality in favour of merit. Not for us those mindless automata praying at the altar of Stalin, Mao or Simon Cowell. No, we sophisticates know when we’re being shimmied up the garden path. After all, we got rid of our troublesome clergy in the 16th century. Hey, we even decapitated one of our kings – only one, but it’s the thought that counts.

So what exactly is the lure of the satsuma in specs that is His Holiness, the Dalai Lama? In contrast to China’s trigger-happy capital punishment system he’s certainly seductive.

Celebrities and politicians – two cheeks of the same overfed bottom – flock to Dolly for enlightenment and the chance to soak up a bit of the transcendency transmitted by His Happiness without doing any of the work. Fame, glamour and power? Yum!

Caught with a rodent gnawing away at your fundament and in need of redemption and a bit of nifty PR? Hello Dolly! Owned a few human beings in your time like Dolly’s beloved mother? Forgiveness is yours.

But Sharon Stone, reincarnated as a moron, said the recent devastating earthquake in China was karma for Tibet. Seventy thousand people died as some sort of divine retribution for politics. What kind of a religion is that? Funny how when anything happens to other people it’s karma, or bad stuff they’ve earned through their own actions. Yet whenever bad stuff happens to the Tibetan ruling élite it’s so unfair.

Just a suggestion: maybe what’s happening to them is divine karma coz in their medieval feudal theocracy one tiny group of Tibetans used to own all the other Tibetans. Maybe it’s divine karma because those peace-loving Buddhists used the death penalty until 1920 and torture well into the 1950s. Dolly was overseeing CIA-funded guerrilla warfare from exile in the 1960s – even while he was publicly renouncing violence. What is that, anyhow? Extra backup just in case the divinity’s asleep on the job? It’s okay, God, move along. Nuthin’ to see, we got it covered.

Ooh! There I go being all Chinese and oppressive again. ‘Leave him alone, he’s mastered the art of being happy.’ Know what would make me happy? $180,000 dollars a year paid into my personal bank account by the CIA. I reckon I’d never be in a bad mood again.

On the other hand, look what China’s had in one year: freak snowstorms, earthquakes, flooding. One plague of boils and I will be hedging my bets.

[In 1998 the LA Times reported declassified documents showing $1.7 million a year paid by the CIA to the Tibetan independence movement in the 1960s, with $180,000 paid to the Dalai Lama personally until Nixon stopped US support in the 1970s. The Tibetan government-in-exile acknowledges the $1.7m but denies any went directly to the Dalai Lama.]

Non-Iron Lady: Madam Miaow in New Internationalist magazine

Anna Chen explores the battle of the non-iron lady vs the planet-hating peacock with an ode to crinkles for good measure.

May I say that I hate ironing? I don’t own an ironing board and, while others may sneer at polyester, I offer prayers and sacrifice small mammals to the scientific genius who invented it. Forget silk and wool: some of my favourite fabrics are by-products of the petrochemical industry. I’d have shares in the stuff if I could afford it. And if it wasn’t a total capitulation to capitalism, comrade.

What’s wrong with crinkles, anyhow? Characterful, and proof of a life lived in the tricycle lane. Or sleeping on the sofa in front of telly bingo which, I understand, is the preferred cultural activity for the modern student, according to respected pundits such as Richard Littlejohn – and we know how much his opinion counts.

No, I like to launder and wait for the creases to yield to the warm glow of perspiration during wear. I may be a sweatbucket by the end of the day, dampness being part and parcel of the synthetics experience, but I look perfect. It’s a marvel – the stuff practically maintains itself.

I bought an iron once. A super-duper mega-expensive one the price of the GNP of a small African nation done over by the World Bank and IMF, in the hope that such profligacy would encourage me to damn well use it. It was so fancy with its water-softening cartridge and turbo-charge whatnot that it soon became obsolete as the next generation of technology swiftly replaced it, and the cartridges disappeared from the shops. The last few times I tried to use it, I left a fossilized snail-trail of calcification across my (exclusively) black wardrobe. Not attractive. I looked like a health hazard and tasted of limescale.

So I don’t iron. I cook instead, a skill worth having in the dystopian post-apocalyptic nightmare staring us in the face. If I am to compete with the cockroaches then I’d rather be a sated slummock than a starving clotheshorse. Speaking of which, just how pretty do you think skinny supermodels are going to look in a world where there may be occasion to eat your Loved One the way polar explorers get maximum mileage out of their huskies?

Not owning a tumble dryer either, I can pride myself that my domestic slovenliness contributes to the well-being of the planet. So, next time you see an immaculately ironed frock, graffiti the planet-hating peacock for wrecking the environment. Only don’t use an aerosol.

New Internationalist magazine
Anna's latest NI column June 2008

Non-Iron Lady: Madam Miaow in New Internationalist magazine

Anna Chen explores the battle of the non-iron lady vs the planet-hating peacock with an ode to crinkles for good measure.

May I say that I hate ironing? I don’t own an ironing board and, while others may sneer at polyester, I offer prayers and sacrifice small mammals to the scientific genius who invented it. Forget silk and wool: some of my favourite fabrics are by-products of the petrochemical industry. I’d have shares in the stuff if I could afford it. And if it wasn’t a total capitulation to capitalism, comrade.

What’s wrong with crinkles, anyhow? Characterful, and proof of a life lived in the tricycle lane. Or sleeping on the sofa in front of telly bingo which, I understand, is the preferred cultural activity for the modern student, according to respected pundits such as Richard Littlejohn – and we know how much his opinion counts.

No, I like to launder and wait for the creases to yield to the warm glow of perspiration during wear. I may be a sweatbucket by the end of the day, dampness being part and parcel of the synthetics experience, but I look perfect. It’s a marvel – the stuff practically maintains itself.

I bought an iron once. A super-duper mega-expensive one the price of the GNP of a small African nation done over by the World Bank and IMF, in the hope that such profligacy would encourage me to damn well use it. It was so fancy with its water-softening cartridge and turbo-charge whatnot that it soon became obsolete as the next generation of technology swiftly replaced it, and the cartridges disappeared from the shops. The last few times I tried to use it, I left a fossilized snail-trail of calcification across my (exclusively) black wardrobe. Not attractive. I looked like a health hazard and tasted of limescale.

So I don’t iron. I cook instead, a skill worth having in the dystopian post-apocalyptic nightmare staring us in the face. If I am to compete with the cockroaches then I’d rather be a sated slummock than a starving clotheshorse. Speaking of which, just how pretty do you think skinny supermodels are going to look in a world where there may be occasion to eat your Loved One the way polar explorers get maximum mileage out of their huskies?

Not owning a tumble dryer either, I can pride myself that my domestic slovenliness contributes to the well-being of the planet. So, next time you see an immaculately ironed frock, graffiti the planet-hating peacock for wrecking the environment. Only don’t use an aerosol.

New Internationalist magazine
Anna's latest NI column June 2008

Lady of Letters: New Internationalist and SL Magazine

If you've been wondering where I've been these past few weeks, I'm pleased to tell you that I've been picked up by two publications with the view to my contributing to the gaiety of their readers.

The first is the New Internationalist which has taken me on as a columnist for their quarterly supplement, The Action ("Campaign news and events - supermarkets, Burma, penguins"). Check out my debut column in the March issue where I get punchy about China Panic in the year of the Beijing Olympics. "China - leading the world in toy manufacturing." Take that how you will ...

The second is the English language Chinese glossy, SL Magazine. I'm their Gurl Abaht Tahn, taking in the sights of the British capital from my own unique perspective as inside outsider. And anything else that takes my fancy.

As you'd expect, I will be full, frank and fearless in my observations. My integrity is sacrosanct. Jewels, holidays, expensive dinners, Johnny Depp - chuck them all at me and watch me remain true to my principles. No, please, do test me. G'wan, I dares ya!

Seduce me with a supermarket sweep at Cyberdog. Tempt me with your foul finery. Offer me Swarovski crystal and I shall point out that they make gunsights for evil imperialist forces. Gift me with diamonds and I'll tie you up, jam your eyes open and make you watch Blood Diamond. Snowdrift my mantelpiece with a blizzard of invitations to the swankiest of events or the finest products and you'll find me steadfast in my incorruptibility.

But I'm warning you, one hint of free Creme de la Mer samples and I'm a goner.

So, in advance, pay heed to everything I write on all topics other than the fabulosity of the aforementioned wondercreme. For in that I reserve the right to be as venal as any other journo with their junkets and bulging goody-bags full of corporate baksheesh.

Remember - I cannot be bought, only rented. For skin products.

Coming soon ...

No Country For Old Men, guest posts from Babeuf on The Wicker Man, sticking the shiv into The King And I and other orientalism.

Lady of Letters: New Internationalist and SL Magazine

If you've been wondering where I've been these past few weeks, I'm pleased to tell you that I've been picked up by two publications with the view to my contributing to the gaiety of their readers.

The first is the New Internationalist which has taken me on as a columnist for their quarterly supplement, The Action ("Campaign news and events - supermarkets, Burma, penguins"). Check out my debut column in the March issue where I get punchy about China Panic in the year of the Beijing Olympics. "China - leading the world in toy manufacturing." Take that how you will ...

The second is the English language Chinese glossy, SL Magazine. I'm their Gurl Abaht Tahn, taking in the sights of the British capital from my own unique perspective as inside outsider. And anything else that takes my fancy.

As you'd expect, I will be full, frank and fearless in my observations. My integrity is sacrosanct. Jewels, holidays, expensive dinners, Johnny Depp - chuck them all at me and watch me remain true to my principles. No, please, do test me. G'wan, I dares ya!

Seduce me with a supermarket sweep at Cyberdog. Tempt me with your foul finery. Offer me Swarovski crystal and I shall point out that they make gunsights for evil imperialist forces. Gift me with diamonds and I'll tie you up, jam your eyes open and make you watch Blood Diamond. Snowdrift my mantelpiece with a blizzard of invitations to the swankiest of events or the finest products and you'll find me steadfast in my incorruptibility.

But I'm warning you, one hint of free Creme de la Mer samples and I'm a goner.

So, in advance, pay heed to everything I write on all topics other than the fabulosity of the aforementioned wondercreme. For in that I reserve the right to be as venal as any other journo with their junkets and bulging goody-bags full of corporate baksheesh.

Remember - I cannot be bought, only rented. For skin products.

Coming soon ...

No Country For Old Men, guest posts from Babeuf on The Wicker Man, sticking the shiv into The King And I and other orientalism.