Skinny tastes bad

Weight is once again a burning issue. Kate Moss declared in a recent interview that “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels”. The remark drew the furious response – covered in last Saturday’s Guardian - that Moss was spreading a pro-anorexia mantra and that her words would have a damaging influence on vulnerable women. Her critics are probably right, even if Moss’ comment was taken out of context. People dream of being her and her word on beauty, fashion and style is gospel, right?

Without meaning to gloss over the complex and painful subject raised by Moss, or suggest that the situation in terms of media pressure is anything like as heavy for men as it is for women, the Moss furore got me –as a man, and a skinny one at that – thinking about the male flip side of today’s body image obsession. If, for some women, nothing tastes as good as skinny feels, then it’s the opposite for men. These days, the worst thing for a man is to be thin – unless it’s being cultivated as a look. Weight and size get carried by men as confirmation of their masculinity, even as cool. Why? Is it because traditionally male domains – work, white-hot competition, drink, hunting-gathering – are open territory in our age of equality and women’s lib? Is body mass the one defining feature left?

OK, so more men are taking out gym membership and bulking up. Fair enough (except when it involves using steroids). But the striking thing is that flab and gut poundage are now flaunted – admittedly often in a tongue-in-cheek way - alongside abs and biceps (as in this youtube slideshow, for example – one of many!).

 Hell, it may even be that fat is taking over from muscle as the male uniform of the moment. According to Guy Trebay of the New York Times, many of NYC’s hipsters were this summer sporting a lightweight but definitely-there beer belly called the Ralph Kramden. Apparently it’s a reaction against superman Barack’s hit-the-gym-first-thing-save-the-world-economy-by-lunchtime work ethic. Seems the preening men who spend hours in the gym sculpting their bodies have also become a bit of a turn-off. Jackie Gleason must be turning in his grave…

People ask me why I’m so skinny all the time. ‘Weed’, ‘chicken legs’…I could go on. A good friend of mine from Germany – who often remarks on my meagre frame with concern and, at times, genuine alarm – suggested during a recent visit to her home near Munich that I might have an over-active thyroid gland and urged me to get it tested.

Shortly before flying out to visit this friend I had an unsettling, late-night conversation with a prospective date that went something like this:

“You’re cute, but you’d be far cuter if you gained some weight.”

“Oh? How do I do that?”

“Eat crap…kebabs and things. Eating late at night is good – that always helps to pile on the pounds. And make sure you eat plenty of liver sausage and wheat beer in Bavaria…”

Which I did, idiot that I am. The only thing I gained was bad indigestion. The date, when it finally happened, was a total disaster. No surprise there.

I got back to Edinburgh and had an opportune conversation with a generously proportioned work colleague who’d been told by this guy she liked that she had a nice face but that it was “a pity about her body”. I like to feel I have a fair idea of what she was going through.  

Just want to add that I have absolutely no problem with weight. Weight is cool and looks good if the individual is happy in his or her own skin. But I always smile to myself when I read about women wanting to be thin and realise I’m after exactly the opposite.

Breaking Into Bollywood

OK, so I’m stretching the ”newcomers to Scotland” line a tad. Or maybe you could see Bollywood as a relative newcomer to these shores. Can’t say I remember many Hindi-language movies gracing cinema screens near me when I was growing up. Now a globe-straddling cinematic colossus, Bollywood has well and truly made its mark in our little corner of the world. Hell, they’re even using it to sell Irn Bru.

Weighing in with a budget of just over £17m, Anthony D’Souza’s Blue is small compared to its Hollywood counterparts. Yet it’s one of the most expensive Bollywood flics to date and confirms the ever-growing reach and power of India’s most high-profile cultural export.

Not that it’s all been plain sailing for Blue’s creators. Despite the presence of stars such as Akshay Kumar and Katrina Kaif, the film was released to distinctly mixed reviews, reputedly struggled to find distributors and was in serious danger of going straight to DVD. And the less said about Kylie Minogue’s debut contribution in “Chiggy Wiggy”, the better (here it is - decide for yourself!). 

Happily, initial wobbles were overcome and, in Scotland, the film has prime-time slots until Thursday at the main Cineworld complexes in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

For want of anything better to do and having never seen a Bollywood film, I went along to Saturday night’s screening at Cineworld Renfrew Street – and what a revelation! This has to rank as one of the most uplifting and enlivening cinematic discoveries I’ve made this year! No, seriously…

A brief plot synopsis: Sagar and Samir Singh (played by Sanjay Dutt and Zayed Khan) are brothers living continents apart. Sagar works for fishing and shipping magnate Aarav Malhotra (Kumar) in the Bahamas while little bro is a bike racer in Bangkok. A bit too cocky for his own good, Sam accepts a dodgy assignment from the shady Gulshan (Rahul Dev). He fails the assignment, losing a precious package and landing himself with a $50m debt he must repay if he wants to stay alive. 

After high-tailing to his brother’s home in the Bahamas, Sam proceeds to large it with Sagar and Aarav on the beach and in the local nightspots. Always on his mind is Nikki (Katrina Kaif), the beautiful love interest he left behind when he fled Bangkok. Unfortunately for Sam, Gulshan soon catches up him and a desperate race to avoid death ensues – one that culminates in the brothers and Aarav risking life and limb to find a teasure trove imprisoned in a sunken ship.  

OK, so Blue is plagued by clunky, redundant plotting; credibility isn’t just stretched, it’s snapped over and over again.

But there’s this silly, infectiously unabashed joie de vivre about the film that I couldn’t resist - I was sucked right in. Sam’s on the run from a ruthless crimelord but, hey, he’s also in an elite Bahamas nightclub and Kylie’s buying drinks at the bar - so why not live for the moment and get her up to dance with all the other gorgeous guys and gals? Bloody good life philosophy, I say. Aarav – what a character! Starts out as a smug, self-serving twat with too many burnt pockets. But, thanks to a series of twists and revelations, he shows it’s possible to be filthy rich, morally upright, just a bit sleazy and happily married to a beautiful, strong woman - all at the same time! Credibility be damned when things are this fun. And there are some great action sequences. Sam’s roadchase on a Bangkok highway is impressive given the film’s budget - lots of flying metal and spectacular explosions, with only passing evidence of CGI.

Have to say I was a bit unsettled by some of the scenes involving animals. The producers dutifully proclaim during the opening credits that all animals were treated with care and concern in the presence of veterinary surgeons – but some of those sharks, stingrays and sea turtles looked pretty distressed (wouldn’t you be if some camera-seeking Bollywood actor was trying to ride you?)   

That minor quibble aside, I left the cinema in fits of laughter and feeling refreshed and renewed. Roll on my next Bollywood fix. Hell, even “Chiggy Wiggy” is growing on me…

Publishing on the edge of the world

We all know something about the pernicious effect of corporate power on freedom and diversity of expression in news media.

Well, spare a thought for the brave individuals striking out by themselves in UK book publishing. It’s a David and Goliath world out there - without the miraculous sling! Yet some are taking the plunge and doing everything they can to publish serious work and remain solvent enough to feed, clothe and house themselves. The struggle, though, looks set to become even harder. Many smaller, experimental and alternative-minded publishers – no matter how determined and innovative – will go to the wall or be forced to scale back their ambitions. 

Some facts to put the situation in perspective: there are around 8000 book publishing enterprises in the UK, yet four

firms – Hachette Livre, Pearson, Bertelsmann and Harper Collins (property of News Corporation and owner of  Fourth Estate, the imprint that brought us Hilary Mantel’s 2009 Man Booker Prize-winning Wolf Hall) - have more than half of all UK domestic sales. Commercial plurality, it seems, has been well and truly shunted to the sidelines. For complete numbers, click here.

UK book publishing has in recent years enjoyed healthy growth rates which have put it ahead of counterparts in the rest of Europe. Earnings have increased from roughly £2.5bn in 2001 to almost £3bn last year (complete stats here). The 2009 recession, however, has sunk its teeth in. Current sales are down around 11% on 2008 and deteriorating conditions have forced some of the industry’s most powerful names to make tough choices: Penguin announced 100 redundancies earlier this year and – shock, horror! – the Richard and Judy Book Club made its last ever recommendations (actually more serious than it sounds - R & J did loads to raise the profile of reading and they didn’t just promote guff). See Cahal Milmo’s feature in The Independent for the full picture.

For Scottish independent Two Ravens Press, market concentration and declining demand have conspired to make life pretty much intolerable. This is sad and serious. Forget Canongate - TRP is far more deserving of the epithet ’on the edge’. Run from a lochside croft in the north-west Highlands by Sharon Blackie and David Knowles, it has garnered praise as one of the most radical outfits in Scottish and UK publishing. Its aims are simple: to provide a home “for writers of original, innovative and challenging work” who are having difficulties ”in the increasingly conformist world of British publishing”. Its authors include Alasdair Gray (who has a new collection of poetry out next year), Suhayl Saadi and Kevin Williamson (founder of Rebel Inc and the man who can claim most credit, after Irvine Welsh, for giving the world Trainspotting). 

Last year, Sharon and David found themselves having to deal with the prospect of losing Scottish Arts Council “block” funding (larger allocations from £15,000 upwards that usually fund an entire publishing programme) and make do with smaller grants for individual projects. For a firm like TRP, whose titles typically make little or no profit, the news came as a hammer blow. Happily, it seems that particular danger has passed, with the SAC recently indicating it would reinstate block funding for this year. Nevertheless, the announcement, together with the penury-inducing reality of publishing cutting-edge material in a weak market dominated by a handful of massive transnational corporations, forced TRP’s founders to consider downgrading their company from “literature-only” to “hobby” publisher. It’s the last thing post-devolution, possibly-soon-to-be-independent Scotland needs. We should have more, not fewer, artistic voices.     

I’m hoping to talk to Sharon and/or David at some point in the near future about what it takes to survive as a small, remote publisher of material with little or no mass market appeal. How do they do it? [Read more]

Thai Tapas

It would seem Edinburgh’s restaurant scene is weathering the recession better than most. Yet there’s little evidence of resilience on the city’s Brougham Place. A usually cheerful street curving from the Meadows to Tollcross, it enjoys a steady throughflow of students and professionals, and has offered a wide range of international cuisine – from East African to Thai to French – for years. Sadly, it’s suffering from a severe outbreak of toletsignitis and has clearly seen better days.

I went to Brougham Place  earlier this week to meet Cindy, a Thai friend of mine who’s about to open a “Thai tapas” restaurant there (minimalism in food portions is all the rage these days). She wants her establishment – which will be called Passorn (Thai for ”angel”) – to be “cosy” and “warm” but also hopes it will attract a “smart, contemporary” clientele. 

Things are pretty much full steam ahead at the moment. Having only recently agreed to take on the premises, Cindy will pick up the keys and sign a new contract this Friday. She tells me she feels “stressed” because of a new UK Border Agency rule requiring her to obtain a special permit before she can sponsor workers from Thailand. “My business has been put back by about eight weeks because of it,” she sighs.

Cindy - Sirapassorn Srisotorn to family and friends in Thailand - is 35, single and a native of Bangkok. She arrived in Scotland about six years ago with her fiance from Edinburgh (they’ve since split up). If anyone can help revive Brougham Place, it’s her. She’s a brilliant cook. She’s also ambitious, determined and smart, and holds a degree in Communications from one of Bangkok’s top universities. Previously, after studying English at Telford College, she worked for the distribution arm of a well-known Scottish social affairs magazine, helping to increase sales by 40% in the first half-year of her employment.

She has vivid memories of her father protesting on the streets of Bangkok in support of ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra,

whose deposition in a coup in 2006 sparked riots (for more about him, read The Times’ in-depth interview) . While praising her mother as someone who’s “absolutely thoughtful” and “always smiling”, she makes it clear that, in matters of work and business at least, she’s her father’s daughter. “I learnt from my dad,” she tells me. “I inherited the business thing from him. He’s very accurate – like a soldier. He disciplined myself and my brother. He taught us how we should behave in public. I am stubborn and impulsive – just like my dad.”

As she peers enthusiastically through the window of her restaurant, discussing new furniture she hopes to buy, it  seems that Scotland has treated Cindy well. Sadly, this isn’t the case. She’s certainly quick to acknowledge the warmth of the individuals she’s made friends with. However, having worked for DTAC, one of Thailand’s biggest mobile phone companies, and enjoyed numerous employment perks, her ambitions for life in Scotland extend well beyond the restaurant trade. She feels there is little prospect of realising them.

“I wanted to go abroad, speak English, see things,” she says. “I wanted to do a postgraduate marketing degree at Strathclyde – but it wouldn’t have worked.

“Scottish people are quite conservative. It’s not easy to affect their social life. You have to do something that Scottish people like. If you do something they expect, that relates to their social life, you can succeed.

“I know some Thai people who tried to run furniture import/export businesses from Scotland but they never succeed. It seems Scottish people can’t accept something that’s unusual to them.”

Being female hasn’t helped either. “I know I am a business woman. I have much determination to run a business. I am accurate; I can drive things. But life’s not easy here. Not many British people accept a South East Asian woman as leader of the team.”

A new opening with new possibilities. Yet the decision of this woman to open a Thai restaurant also feels like a restriction, an indictment, a waste. What would Cindy be doing now if she’d decided to make her home in London or America?

Welcome

Hello everyone - welcome to my blog!!  

A bit about me to kick things off. I’m 30 and a journalism student at Glasgow Caledonian University. It’s been a roundabout sort of journey so far. I was an undergraduate student in English Literature and Italian at St Andrews University from 1997 to 2002 (yep, occasionally had the privilege of sharing oxygen with the future king – pretty difficult to avoid in a town that size). I thought the scholarly life might be for me so headed down to London to do a postgraduate degree in Comparative Literature at University College. Things didn’t really work out. Perhaps unsurprisingly after four years in a bubble-town like St Andrews, concentration and focus didn’t come easily in the Smoke. And then the academic life, particularly in the arts, seemed too cut off from the surrounding world.    

I think I can date my interest in journalism from an encounter with a bunch of hardy, hearty souls camped out in the woods next to my home town of Dalkeith. It was the middle of a pretty foul winter at the beginning of 2006 and the ’wood people’ were protesting against the construction of a bypass that would cut through the meadows and forests of a centuries-old country park.

I wanted to be involved somehow – partly because of ego (the protestors had attracted a fairly vigorous media scrum and I wanted a piece of the action); partly as a result of almost falling off the side of a hill during a night-time trek with food to one of the eco-camps. I remember feeling deep admiration for this small group (numbering at most a few  dozen) for making their stand in such exposed, gloomy conditions. I wanted to investigate, interview and write about them. At that point I didn’t have the time, wherewithal or courage.

Things have built from there and I now have the beginnings of a track record in journalism, particularly arts journalism. This is my first ever blog so don’t expect wonders. Most of it will be random, rambling nonsense about nothing in particular. However, there will be plenty of posts about writers, books and related issues. I’m also hoping to write about the many individuals I’ve been privileged to meet who have come here from across the world. I’m interested in what their individual experiences – good and bad – say about today’s Scotland.

And I’ll try not to be too serious - maybe there’ll even be a bit of humour once in a while…

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