Back on the road tomorrow, heading for Vienna to give some Israelis and Palestinians some training in basic mediation techniques. Back on Thursday if I survive. Maybe knowing next to nothing about the Middle East will help… While I am away treat yourselves to watching Appleseed: Fierce beautiful warrior babes […]
Renewed talk of changing the core EU Treaties, this time to strengthen sanctions against countries which show themselves unworthy of being in the Eurozone? The problem with changing one part of the EU core structure (this time to meet German demands that Germany and its banks be protected from being […]
The TEDxKrakow event yesterday was fascinating as an opportunity to watch a series of short live presentations before an audience of some 600 people and spot which public speaking techniques work – and which don’t. My conclusions on the Art of Oratory. First, if you want to create a really eccentric […]
So, here I am at Krakow airport, my life ruined because of Fog. I may get back home today. There again, I may not. For now I sit and forlornly watch my laptop battery run down… Yesterday was the first time I had seen a TED event in action. TED […]
UK Foreign Secretary William Hague is in Moscow. Some thoughts. One of my earliest blog postings from back in 2008 described some of the issues arising from the Russian authorities’ beastly treatment of the British Council. It recorded something said to me by a senior Russian diplomat in 1996 […]
There I was happily dictating into my PC via Dragon voice recognition software some elegant thoughts about the state of UK/Russia relations and associated existential issues, when some or other sound I uttered caused the whole lot to be deleted without trace. Just when it was getting interesting. Aaaargh. I […]
Having wasted an evening watching that truly lamentable apology for a football match at Wembley, I have been moved to Tweet my rage in my best available Serbo-Croatian-Bosnian-Montenegrin: Glupost. Sramota. Engleska je bila besmislena, slaba, kompromitovana. Crnogorci su igrali pomalo grubo ali i ponekad dobro. Ih cestitam. Take that, Capello. Now […]
Is hosted by Mr Eugenides who through no fault of his own links to some depressing material. He leads us to Philobiblon reporting on A Female Future discussion. Baroness Kate Parminter (LibDem) noted that in looking at secondary schools for her daughter, she found that one she had otherwise liked offered cheerleading […]
As the full horror of our impending house move comes into view, with the first cardboard boxes insinuating themselves into the house for some advance packing, Mrs Crawf and I have been seeking solace in new IT equipment. Thus Mrs C has made a quantum leap from her lumpy Tesco […]
Sorry folks. Fewer Crawford thoughts than usual gushing forth these days. Demand for Diplomatic Training for senior government officials and international organisations is accelerating nicely in popularity, requiring me to start working on preparing a number of different courses such as Networking with Impact, Speechwriting, Crisis Management and so on. Being […]
