AUSTAUSCH (2)
My wife runs the exchange programme at her school. Each of the five classes exchanges with a school abroad; this year, one from Poland, two from Belgium and two from Germany. The children spend a week there and welcome the foreigners to a week here. All communication takes place in English.
Three classes have been here in Denmark this past week, while the other two went visiting. At the weekend, each child goes home with his/her foreign partner, so the teachers are at a bit of a loose end. Last night, we had two Polish, two Belgian and two German teachers to dinner, plus three Danish teachers and me. Each time this happens, we have very traditional Danish food, prepared in advance by the school kitchen; herring washed down with beer and schnaps, some sort of pork dish, cheese and coffee. Since the guests often bring with them assorted forms of alcohol from their home country, it usually ends up being a pretty boozy affair. Last night was no exception.
Two things always strike me about these events. First, they are great fun; despite all of our differences, we share a common interest in getting to know people from other countries. As a native speaker and joint host, I have some sort of responsibility to make sure that everybody has a good time. But it is not very difficult.
Secondly, it is amazing how much interest and effort people will put into speaking English. If the Brits had half as much enthusiasm for learning foreign languages, then the country would experience real gains, in my view. Sadly, however, it ain't going to happen.
Walter Blotscher
Sunday, 31 October 2010
Friday, 29 October 2010
MORNING COFFEE
I love that first cup of coffee in the morning. Even though I drink coffee throughout the day, that first cup is always the best. It has to be real coffee, in a big cup, and very strong, with milk but no sugar. One of the best decisions I have made in my life (along with the outsize shower head) was to put on my Christmas wish list one of those espresso or mocha coffee pots, the ones where the water in the bottom boils up through the ground coffee and into the top compartment.
Given that I am a Brit and my wife is Danish, it is perhaps surprising that I drink coffee in the morning and my wife drinks tea. I like tea at teatime; and I have taken to drinking it late at night. But in the morning, it has to be coffee.
I am reminded of all this because my trusted coffee pot has got a crack in it, so the water trickles out of the bottom. I went to the local "Isenkram", which otherwise tends to sell everything, but they don't have them. So I'll have to use a cafetiere tomorrow morning. OK, but not quite the same.
Walter Blotscher
I love that first cup of coffee in the morning. Even though I drink coffee throughout the day, that first cup is always the best. It has to be real coffee, in a big cup, and very strong, with milk but no sugar. One of the best decisions I have made in my life (along with the outsize shower head) was to put on my Christmas wish list one of those espresso or mocha coffee pots, the ones where the water in the bottom boils up through the ground coffee and into the top compartment.
Given that I am a Brit and my wife is Danish, it is perhaps surprising that I drink coffee in the morning and my wife drinks tea. I like tea at teatime; and I have taken to drinking it late at night. But in the morning, it has to be coffee.
I am reminded of all this because my trusted coffee pot has got a crack in it, so the water trickles out of the bottom. I went to the local "Isenkram", which otherwise tends to sell everything, but they don't have them. So I'll have to use a cafetiere tomorrow morning. OK, but not quite the same.
Walter Blotscher
Thursday, 28 October 2010
INCEPTION
There is a cinema in the small town near where I live. Being a small town, it is a small cinema, with around 100 seats. It is run by volunteers, both the projectionist and the ticket lady. It is open every day except Saturdays.
But small and off the beaten track doesn't mean that they only show films that nobody else will. This evening I went with my wife and daughter to see Inception, the new blockbuster with Leonardo di Caprio. It was a perfect cinema experience. We arrived at 7.28pm to find no queue, and only four other customers. I munched my Danish Rolo's while we watched the local ad's and then lots of previews (I love the previews). Then came the film itself, with nobody in the next row blocking the screen, or talking in the quiet bits.
Inception itself was great. It's all about going into a person's parallel dream world, and then into a dream world within that, a bit like a Russian doll. All nonsense, of course. But good nonsense, very well done with lots of action; and surprises that more than matched the fact that my daughter had paid for my ticket.
Walter Blotscher
There is a cinema in the small town near where I live. Being a small town, it is a small cinema, with around 100 seats. It is run by volunteers, both the projectionist and the ticket lady. It is open every day except Saturdays.
But small and off the beaten track doesn't mean that they only show films that nobody else will. This evening I went with my wife and daughter to see Inception, the new blockbuster with Leonardo di Caprio. It was a perfect cinema experience. We arrived at 7.28pm to find no queue, and only four other customers. I munched my Danish Rolo's while we watched the local ad's and then lots of previews (I love the previews). Then came the film itself, with nobody in the next row blocking the screen, or talking in the quiet bits.
Inception itself was great. It's all about going into a person's parallel dream world, and then into a dream world within that, a bit like a Russian doll. All nonsense, of course. But good nonsense, very well done with lots of action; and surprises that more than matched the fact that my daughter had paid for my ticket.
Walter Blotscher
Wednesday, 27 October 2010
NEWS ABOUT THE NEWS
Is it only me, who is irritated by the trend in which television newsreaders tell you what they are going to read about in the news, instead of just reading it?
When I lived in New York in 1980-81, I used to get intensely irritated by having films interrupted for advert breaks (something which, until that point, never happened in the U.K.). Particularly when such interruptions were of the "five die in fire in the Bronx, more at 10" kind. I reluctantly accepted that American TV trends often crept their way into European programmes x years later; and that has duly happened. Many TV news stations nowadays have dual anchors, where the interplay between the two is supposed to add spice. There is now also that intensely irritating banter between the anchors and the reporter out at the scene, where they do this "over to you, Brian", "back to you, Ted", "thanks Brian" routine. But although Denmark's state-owned but commercial TV2 succumbed to all that sort of thing long ago, DR1 seemed mercifully old-fashioned, with a single anchor talking to the camera, and relatively few Brian and Ted phrases.
Until now. DR1 have a daily programme called the "Evening Show", from 6.00-6.30pm and 7.00-7.30pm, the two halves sandwiching the early evening news from 6.30-7.00pm. At 6.28pm or thereabouts, the co-anchors on the Evening Show cut to the newsdesk in order to ask the newsreader what is going to be on the news that evening. This drives me nuts, not least because two minutes later, after returning to the Evening Show for a wrap-up, the news starts in traditional fashion, with headlines. The effect is that we get news about news, then headlines, and only then the news itself.
Call me an old fogey, but what was wrong with the old system?
Walter Blotscher
Is it only me, who is irritated by the trend in which television newsreaders tell you what they are going to read about in the news, instead of just reading it?
When I lived in New York in 1980-81, I used to get intensely irritated by having films interrupted for advert breaks (something which, until that point, never happened in the U.K.). Particularly when such interruptions were of the "five die in fire in the Bronx, more at 10" kind. I reluctantly accepted that American TV trends often crept their way into European programmes x years later; and that has duly happened. Many TV news stations nowadays have dual anchors, where the interplay between the two is supposed to add spice. There is now also that intensely irritating banter between the anchors and the reporter out at the scene, where they do this "over to you, Brian", "back to you, Ted", "thanks Brian" routine. But although Denmark's state-owned but commercial TV2 succumbed to all that sort of thing long ago, DR1 seemed mercifully old-fashioned, with a single anchor talking to the camera, and relatively few Brian and Ted phrases.
Until now. DR1 have a daily programme called the "Evening Show", from 6.00-6.30pm and 7.00-7.30pm, the two halves sandwiching the early evening news from 6.30-7.00pm. At 6.28pm or thereabouts, the co-anchors on the Evening Show cut to the newsdesk in order to ask the newsreader what is going to be on the news that evening. This drives me nuts, not least because two minutes later, after returning to the Evening Show for a wrap-up, the news starts in traditional fashion, with headlines. The effect is that we get news about news, then headlines, and only then the news itself.
Call me an old fogey, but what was wrong with the old system?
Walter Blotscher
Tuesday, 26 October 2010
A TRAGEDY
I am gutted, as footballers would say. Paul the psychic octopus, who correctly guessed the outcome of 8 games in the recent football World Cup, including all of Germany's wins and eventual defeat, has died aged 2. Which is apparently a fair age for an octopus.
I had been counting on the prophetic cephalopod to help me bet during the European Championships in 2012. Now I'll have to find someone - or something - else.
Walter Blotscher
I am gutted, as footballers would say. Paul the psychic octopus, who correctly guessed the outcome of 8 games in the recent football World Cup, including all of Germany's wins and eventual defeat, has died aged 2. Which is apparently a fair age for an octopus.
I had been counting on the prophetic cephalopod to help me bet during the European Championships in 2012. Now I'll have to find someone - or something - else.
Walter Blotscher
Monday, 25 October 2010
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
As the world gets ever smaller, the number of people choosing foreign partners gets ever larger. From a legal point of view, marrying is the easy bit. The difficulty comes with divorce, and the possibility of international disputes about child custody and/or the division of financial and property assets.
Which makes last week's judgment by the U.K.'s Supreme Court in Radmacher (formerly Granatino) v. Granatino an interesting read. Ms. Radmacher was, and is, a very wealthy German. She fell in love with Mr. Granatino, a Frenchman who, although an investment banker, was not in the same financial league. One of the conditions for her inheriting more of the family estate was that the future husband sign a pre-nuptial agreement under German law, waiving any claims to the wife's assets if things went wrong; which he duly did. After marrying, they settled in the U.K. , and subsequently had two children. He got fed up with investment banking, and enrolled as a postgraduate research student at Oxford University. However, after 8 years, the marriage fell apart, and Ms. Radmacher went to live abroad with the children. In the divorce proceedings in the U.K., Mr. Granatino asked for more money than simply enough in order to support (his share of) the costs of raising the children, essentially asking the High Court to disregard the pre-nuptial agreement. The Court did this, and awarded him £5.5m. Ms. Radmacher appealed to the Court of Appeal and won. Mr Granatino in turn appealed to the Supreme Court, asking for the original verdict to be reinstated. Sitting as a 9-man court (instead of the more usual 5) in view of the seriousness of the issues involved, the Supreme Court essentially decided 8-1 that the pre-nuptial agreement should be upheld.
Pre-nuptial agreements are common (and valid) in many Continental jurisdictions and elsewhere (eg in some U.S. states); most people seem to agree that if the Granatino's had divorced in Germany, then the pre-nuptial agreement would have been legally binding. The problem for the Supreme Court was first, that the U.K. has chosen not to sign the relevant legal convention which resolves documentary disputes under the law of that document (in this case, German law). And secondly, that the common law of England and Wales evolved from a very different starting point. Historically, when a husband and wife got married, they became one person, and that person was the husband. Wives lost control of their property, which was unilaterally managed by the husband, and they could not contract with third parties, let alone with their husband. Although, beginning in the late 19th century, Parliamentary legislation began to eat into this essentially paternalistic starting point, it remained a rule of public policy that pre-marital agreements which envisaged married couples getting divorced were null and void. This was on the grounds that they might be seen as "encouraging" couples to avoid the legal duties involved in marriage, such as living together. One result of this was that loveless couples rarely divorced, but merely lived apart, if they could afford to do so. If they could not, they usually had to just grin and bear it.
With the move to "no-fault" divorce and other things, the Supreme Court clearly felt that these historical principles were out of date, and time to go. Whereas a pre-nuptial agreement will not be totally definitive, neither will it be null and void, as was previously the case. If it was freely negotiated and entered into, with a clear understanding of the consequences, then the starting point is that it should be upheld, providing that there are no extenuating circumstances (eg financial penury for the children). In short, it will be a valid contract like any other properly drafted contract.
So, a welcome modernisation of English family law that puts it on a par with other countries? Well, maybe. The most interesting part of the case was the lone dissent, interesting because it came from Lady Hale, the only woman involved in the decision and the only woman ever to have been appointed to the House of Lords/Supreme Court. She pointed out that pre-nuptial agreements are often used to favour the economically more powerful partner at the expense of the weaker. Although, in this particular case, that more powerful partner happened to be a woman, in general it would be a man. Secondly, she said that overturning long-standing principles should not be done in this way, through the decision of a single case, but through Parliamentary legislation (as, indeed, the changes to the law of divorce itself were made). Everybody agreed that the law of marital and divorce agreements was in a mess, the Law Commission were reviewing this whole area, and it would be better to await their proposals, and then get them enshrined in legislation.
It strikes me that Lady Hale's worries have more than a little merit. The Granatino's are, by any definition, wealthy people who can afford the vast expense of having their personal, private dispute handled by hotshot lawyers and settled by the highest court in the land. That they are also both foreigners merely makes it more complicated and more expensive. But the majority of people divorcing, whether within or across borders, are not like that. They need simple, clear, strightforward rules that the average local solicitor can understand, and then advise their client accordingly. It is a moot question whether the Coalition Government, obsessed with deficits and other financial matters, will find the time to address something which might well end up affecting around half of all married couples. But like Lady Hale, I think they should.
Walter Blotscher
As the world gets ever smaller, the number of people choosing foreign partners gets ever larger. From a legal point of view, marrying is the easy bit. The difficulty comes with divorce, and the possibility of international disputes about child custody and/or the division of financial and property assets.
Which makes last week's judgment by the U.K.'s Supreme Court in Radmacher (formerly Granatino) v. Granatino an interesting read. Ms. Radmacher was, and is, a very wealthy German. She fell in love with Mr. Granatino, a Frenchman who, although an investment banker, was not in the same financial league. One of the conditions for her inheriting more of the family estate was that the future husband sign a pre-nuptial agreement under German law, waiving any claims to the wife's assets if things went wrong; which he duly did. After marrying, they settled in the U.K. , and subsequently had two children. He got fed up with investment banking, and enrolled as a postgraduate research student at Oxford University. However, after 8 years, the marriage fell apart, and Ms. Radmacher went to live abroad with the children. In the divorce proceedings in the U.K., Mr. Granatino asked for more money than simply enough in order to support (his share of) the costs of raising the children, essentially asking the High Court to disregard the pre-nuptial agreement. The Court did this, and awarded him £5.5m. Ms. Radmacher appealed to the Court of Appeal and won. Mr Granatino in turn appealed to the Supreme Court, asking for the original verdict to be reinstated. Sitting as a 9-man court (instead of the more usual 5) in view of the seriousness of the issues involved, the Supreme Court essentially decided 8-1 that the pre-nuptial agreement should be upheld.
Pre-nuptial agreements are common (and valid) in many Continental jurisdictions and elsewhere (eg in some U.S. states); most people seem to agree that if the Granatino's had divorced in Germany, then the pre-nuptial agreement would have been legally binding. The problem for the Supreme Court was first, that the U.K. has chosen not to sign the relevant legal convention which resolves documentary disputes under the law of that document (in this case, German law). And secondly, that the common law of England and Wales evolved from a very different starting point. Historically, when a husband and wife got married, they became one person, and that person was the husband. Wives lost control of their property, which was unilaterally managed by the husband, and they could not contract with third parties, let alone with their husband. Although, beginning in the late 19th century, Parliamentary legislation began to eat into this essentially paternalistic starting point, it remained a rule of public policy that pre-marital agreements which envisaged married couples getting divorced were null and void. This was on the grounds that they might be seen as "encouraging" couples to avoid the legal duties involved in marriage, such as living together. One result of this was that loveless couples rarely divorced, but merely lived apart, if they could afford to do so. If they could not, they usually had to just grin and bear it.
With the move to "no-fault" divorce and other things, the Supreme Court clearly felt that these historical principles were out of date, and time to go. Whereas a pre-nuptial agreement will not be totally definitive, neither will it be null and void, as was previously the case. If it was freely negotiated and entered into, with a clear understanding of the consequences, then the starting point is that it should be upheld, providing that there are no extenuating circumstances (eg financial penury for the children). In short, it will be a valid contract like any other properly drafted contract.
So, a welcome modernisation of English family law that puts it on a par with other countries? Well, maybe. The most interesting part of the case was the lone dissent, interesting because it came from Lady Hale, the only woman involved in the decision and the only woman ever to have been appointed to the House of Lords/Supreme Court. She pointed out that pre-nuptial agreements are often used to favour the economically more powerful partner at the expense of the weaker. Although, in this particular case, that more powerful partner happened to be a woman, in general it would be a man. Secondly, she said that overturning long-standing principles should not be done in this way, through the decision of a single case, but through Parliamentary legislation (as, indeed, the changes to the law of divorce itself were made). Everybody agreed that the law of marital and divorce agreements was in a mess, the Law Commission were reviewing this whole area, and it would be better to await their proposals, and then get them enshrined in legislation.
It strikes me that Lady Hale's worries have more than a little merit. The Granatino's are, by any definition, wealthy people who can afford the vast expense of having their personal, private dispute handled by hotshot lawyers and settled by the highest court in the land. That they are also both foreigners merely makes it more complicated and more expensive. But the majority of people divorcing, whether within or across borders, are not like that. They need simple, clear, strightforward rules that the average local solicitor can understand, and then advise their client accordingly. It is a moot question whether the Coalition Government, obsessed with deficits and other financial matters, will find the time to address something which might well end up affecting around half of all married couples. But like Lady Hale, I think they should.
Walter Blotscher
Sunday, 24 October 2010
SIN LIMITS
You have to be 18 in order to buy cigarettes from a supermarket in Denmark, but just 16 in order to buy alcohol. Why the difference?
(The difference was even bigger, until the Government raised the alcohol limit from 15 a couple of years ago.)
Virtually everybody knows that alcohol and cigarettes are bad for your health. And, at the same time, that they are pleasurable (though personally, I have never been a smoker). Since the latter means that they can never be eradicated, Governments address the former by regulating, licensing and taxing them. They also have special rules to protect children by banning their use under a certain age. One can agree or disagree about where that age should be, but it does seem odd that one is higher than the other. Indeed, the U.K. Government accepted that very argument when it raised the cigarette age from 16 to 18 in 2007 in order to match that for alcohol.
Most Governments seem to align the age at which you can smoke and drink with the age at which you become an adult; which seems reasonable. Looking ahead, I believe the next test will be marijuana. Having tried it myself, I would put it on a par with alcohol, and regulate it in the same way. That increasingly seems to be the view in the U.S., where a number of initiatives to legalise (or, at least, decriminalise) marijuana are on the ballot box in next month's mid-term elections. European Governments seem less likely to countenance such changes, so I don't expect any change soon. But then we don't have murderous Mexican drug gangs just over the border.
Walter Blotscher
You have to be 18 in order to buy cigarettes from a supermarket in Denmark, but just 16 in order to buy alcohol. Why the difference?
(The difference was even bigger, until the Government raised the alcohol limit from 15 a couple of years ago.)
Virtually everybody knows that alcohol and cigarettes are bad for your health. And, at the same time, that they are pleasurable (though personally, I have never been a smoker). Since the latter means that they can never be eradicated, Governments address the former by regulating, licensing and taxing them. They also have special rules to protect children by banning their use under a certain age. One can agree or disagree about where that age should be, but it does seem odd that one is higher than the other. Indeed, the U.K. Government accepted that very argument when it raised the cigarette age from 16 to 18 in 2007 in order to match that for alcohol.
Most Governments seem to align the age at which you can smoke and drink with the age at which you become an adult; which seems reasonable. Looking ahead, I believe the next test will be marijuana. Having tried it myself, I would put it on a par with alcohol, and regulate it in the same way. That increasingly seems to be the view in the U.S., where a number of initiatives to legalise (or, at least, decriminalise) marijuana are on the ballot box in next month's mid-term elections. European Governments seem less likely to countenance such changes, so I don't expect any change soon. But then we don't have murderous Mexican drug gangs just over the border.
Walter Blotscher
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