Bins

Wow, I just witnessed one of my English neighbors, a nice plump and rather loud man, yelling at one of my other neighbors for a full 15 minutes because he did not line up his trash bins appropriatley. The offending neighbor is from the Carribean, and he would not give in, he listened to the man and then pointed at him and stated his case, mainly that there is really no room for any of the bins anywhere. Then, a skinny little man with a Groucho Marx mustache, probably German, came over to diffuse things! They diffused, everybody shook hands, the Marx man walked away, and the English man started right at it again. In fact, it is still going on now.
This to me just highlights the blind eye English turn to the reality of their population demographics. There are more brown people, from India, Pakistan, North Africa, and the Caribbean, than there are English in most cities. Only the farming villages retain the English dominance, and I reckon it won't last for long. While some of the Cambridge profs. simply don't believe me when I say that in 30 years it may be hard to find a Shakespeare play, I have seen the example in America. The "minority" culture becomes the dominant culture, and the "English" kids two generations from now will be demanding reggae bbqs instead of fancy dress discos. What strikes me most is, changes like this simply don't have to be traumatic, if we engage them and talk openly about them there is a chance that a wide mix of cultures flourish simultaneously. Sometimes I wish I had gone into urban planning or public health, because I really would like to help these transitions. And I would like more flowers and fountains in our public spaces, and grey water to be put to good use, and for corporations to provide excellent childcare on premises, every single one, as a matter of course. The bins today are just an outlet for a deeper tension. In hope,