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alpaca-writes · 3 years

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Mystics, Chapter 4

When Arch becomes hired on at Mystics, by Lyrem, everything seems to be going well- their life nearly becomes perfection. Soon enough, however, Arch realizes that perhaps not everything is as good as it seems....

Directory: [chapter one] [chapter two] [chapter three]

CW: deadname use, sickness/nausea/vomiting, torture obviously, minor character death.

CHAPTER FOUR: SOMEWHERE BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH

Arch’s head lifted slowly from their pillow, in daze, they weren’t exactly certain of where they were, but soon they recognized the cheap wooden panels of their basement bedroom wall and closed their eyes again.

The alarm went off- not one that was programmed into their phone- as it almost never was- but the more reliable one calling their fake name from above.

“I’m up!” Arch’s own voice pained them to hear. Did they sneak drinks from their mom’s vodka stores last night? No, not last night...

Maybe they had caught the flu from somewhere. Thinking back to the previous night, Arch remembered an uneventful evening of low sales and walking home… Nothing amiss. They didn’t even remember catching a chill. They rolled over slowly, the room spinning above them to check their phone. It was 7:10 am. Their bus would be arriving shortly. The feeling of utter dread filled them as usual and then a sudden, unmistakable fear. The adrenaline alone was enough to launch them from their bed, but then Arch’s body fired back with an overwhelming nausea.

They were going to be sick.

Arch reached for the trash can in the corner as they fell with their knees to the floor and missed.

Puking up bile, and heaving, Arch heard the sound of rushing footsteps from above coming down.

“What on earth”-

Arch couldn’t reply, but their mother supplied them with a bucket and pressed a hand onto their back- as if that was supposed to help.

“What were you doing last night that’s got you so sick!?” She touted over them angrily. “Were you drinking? Doing drugs again?”

Arch was caught smoking pot once over a year ago- strange how they would never be able to live that down.

“For Pete’s sake, ----!” The alarm bell had been trilling for a long time. Arch was amazed that they could even hear it any more. “You were out past ten last night. Is it that new job keeping you late? That’s against child labour laws, you know! I’d like to have a word with your employer!”

Burping up an acidic aftertaste, Arch leaned away from the bucket and wiped their mouth slowly. The nausea was gone.

“Food poisoning.” They said breathlessly. “Must’ve been food poisoning.”

“Clean this up and then get back into bed!” Their mother snapped. “I’ll bring you some water, but then I’m going to work. Need to pay the bills here somehow!”

Arch took their mother’s advice, and cleaned up as much of their vomit off the carpet as they could. From the stairs Maleficent stared at the spot with keen interest as Arch looked at the cat with a disgusted sneer.

“You’re a nasty little creature,” they said.

Dropping back into their bed, they were teetering on the edge of a restless sleep when their phone buzzed next to them.

It was Lyrem. It still mildly amazed Arch that he was technologically adept for his age. The message read:

expecting delivery tonight so will be staying late. No need for you to come in if you’d rather catch up on schoolwork.

Ha. Catch up on schoolwork. Arch replied:

sure. much appreciated.

Serendipity was a term rarely used by Arch but in this particular moment, they were certainly thankful for how the universe seemed to be taking care of them. It certainly did a better job than anyone else they knew.

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The skull glared out from the showcase. The eyeholes seemed a little scratched from where someone had tried to clean it with the wrong instrument and the wrong solution.

Lyrem studied it from every angle he could. He had been at this for hours. The deliverers’ patience began to dwindle, along with that of their security guards. The seller had made it abundantly clear to give Lyrem as much time as he needed to decide how much he’d be willing to pay- so they straightened their back out, nearly forgetting their posture, and dealt with the man who seemed to be too nit-picky for their liking.

“You are sure it’s genuine Mayan?” He asked.

“A sacrifice to Quetzalcoatl himself,” the deliverer replied assuredly. “No others had been recovered in such pristine condition. Guaranteed.”

Lyrem breathed deeply and looked up at the deliverer. “Remove the barrier.” He requested.

The deliverer looked at him strangely. “I’m afraid that is against policy, sir.”

He raised a dark grey brow, his nose wrinkling with a sudden sour distaste that expressed his displeasure playfully.

“Your client knows who I am.” He spoke quietly. “Get them on the phone and explain to them that I will not make an offer until the barrier is removed.”

“Sir”-

“Now.” Lyrem interrupted, steeling his gaze.

The deliverer huffed, pulled out their phone and made the call outside the store. Lyrem watched them through the windows. After several minutes, they returned, shaking their head. He looked at them with a disappointed scowl.

“I don’t make deals on fakes,” he clarified. “Either remove the barrier or I will not make a deal- and I know that your client would love it if I made a deal.”

The deliverer frowned, and their eyes darted from the pedestal and back to Lyrem. He was standing there in the store, confident that they would make the right decision eventually. He approached them, and stared deeply into their blue eyes. His expression had a certain menacing charm.

“Think about the respect you could receive, the promotion, the splendor- if only I can know exactly what is behind this glass- it could all be yours,” he spoke softly.

This one had been broken well, but not well enough.

Retrieving a set of keys, the deliverer began to unscrew the locks from each side of the case; four of them in total.

Lyrem massaged one of his hands with the other as he watched the skull become uncovered. He held high hopes for this one. The security team moved in as he approached the piece, but were stopped by the deliverer in question. They had come this far. At this point, they had no choice but to trust Lyrem’s expert judgment.

The shop-keep closed his eyes, and in an instant, he was engulfed in shadow. The deliverer stepped away instinctively to avoid the darkening fog and watched on in terrified horror.

The shadows entered Lyrem until they were only visible through his eyes. Wisps of the fog slowly leaked from his orifices, and he approached the skull once more. He raised a hand, placing it over the top of the skull and spoke with a voice that belonged not entirely to himself:

“SHOW ME YOUR TRUTH”

The sound rung hollow through the store, as though it had transformed into a cavern for just those few seconds.

It only took a moment before the shadows drifted away, and Lyrem returned to himself. He pulled a napkin from his inside pocket and wiped away a couple drops of ectoplasm from underneath his eyes, and sniffed.

“Tell your client I will give him nothing.”

“What?” Forgetting themselves, the deliverer gasped, enraged by the decision. “I broke rules for you!”

“And aren’t you happy about that? Now you can race back to your little ‘client’ and tell them that the item they tried to sell me was a fake. I will not deal in a fake. I will never deal in fakes.” Lyrem stepped back from the pedestal, welcoming them to screw the locks back into the display. “This skull is Incan, not Mayan, and it’s certainly not a sacrifice- he was a fucking alpaca farmer for crying out loud.”

The deliverer shuddered. They couldn’t go back to their client with news like this, they wouldn’t live to see another day.

“This- this can’t be right.”

“It-it is, I am afraid.” Lyrem mocked ruthlessly. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind getting out. I’ll need to carry on a conversation with a few of my new friends- seeing as I’ve wasted much of my energy with you idiots.”

The stand was covered in a black cloth just as it had come in originally. Lyrem ushered them through the side door of the shop and followed them out, locking the door behind him.

The deliverer muttered to themselves, the confusion that had been dropped before them. Lyrem tutted with a fake sympathy.

“Before you leave,” he added, with just the slightest tinge of genuine wisdom to his voice, “Understand that I have my own bargains to uphold, just as you do. If your client is serious in gaining favour with my client, then cheap attempts to trick me, will not get them what they want. You can tell them that for me, if you wish.”

The deliverer nodded, and entered their black van as the object of interest had been secured into the back. They drove off slowly down the damp alleyway of reflected pools of streetlight. Lyrem turned, and unlocked the door to his storage area. He closed his eyes tightly, held his breath, and stepped over the threshold.

His eyes were opened the moment he heard the door click closed behind him. The darkness was unrelentingly thick. His footsteps sounded dull, and softened against the floor. Clapping his hands twice turned on some lighting from an indiscernible area.

The captives squealed as they hid away from the sudden brightness.

Lyrem smiled as he disturbed them. The shackles jingled heavily against the wall as they straightened out, pressing their backs further in, in the effort to keep away from the strange, looming man.

He looked to each of them fondly. None of them dared to speak. That was good. It meant that he had already left a lasting impression. It meant that they had already tried and failed to scream and be heard from someone outside. But this storage room was soundproof and built to perfection on the border between worlds; a mixture of celestial, earthly, and infernal construction. His absolute favourite style of architecture- besides Manueline, of course.

“Hm.” He hummed, and scratched the back of his head in thought. He only needed one of them to regain what energy he had lost. “Which one of you should I choose first?”

Marcus flinched backward. Lyrem shook his greying head at him.

“Oh, I will have to save you for last. I hope you don’t mind being locked away for weeks on end. In fact, I think I may save you for a more special occasion.”

He switched, turning his gaze onto the boy Kyle and met his eyes. The boy tried and failed to look away from him. His eyes darting back every second just to check if Lyrem was still studying him.

“What’s wrong? Having a bit of trouble speaking up?” Lyrem tutted. He angled his head towards the girl. “What about you? Will you pick up the mantle? Go on, sweety. Show these boys what true bravery is.”

Jess’ eyelashes had begun to fall down her face. Her make up smeared and ran down her cheeks from the constant tears, and was only worsened by Lyrem’s taunting hand, softly wiping them away as he squatted over her. He pouted, mimicking a sympathy that mocked her from head to toe.

“Don’t touch her!”

Lyrem lit up with joy.

“Finally! A winner!”

Jess sobbed as the attention was driven from her to Kyle. “N-no, no, no,” Her voice repeated incessantly. “Please stop- please. I’m so sorry for what we did. I-I promise, it- it won’t happen again.”

Lyrem stopped at Kyle, and moved his lips as he made his decision between them. He looked at Jess. He placed his elbow onto the back of his hand that sat across his upper abdomen. The other hand rested under his chin and it looked more like he was busy judging a piece of artwork, not debating who he would like to kill first.

“You really couldn’t make this decision easy on me, could you? On one hand I would love to make this piece of shit suffer,” He kicked Kyle’s manacled feet around lightly as he regarded Jess with gleeful sadism. “On the other hand, you are so adorable when you’re scared.”

Lyrem took another pause before fully making his decision. Pulling out a blade from his belt around his side, roughly the length of his forearm, he pointed it toward Kyle carefully and knelt down in front of him.

“This is for what you did to my Segovia album.”

Lyrem dragged the blade along the top of the boy’s cheekbone, giving him one smooth slice under his eye several inches long. Kyle whimpered, feeling the sharp sting linger for what seemed like an eternity and began to shout out as the blade continued into the more sensitive skin just underneath his eye. The jingling of chains around his arms and feet grew louder as he tried to ease the pain; too fearful to move his head, lest the point of the knife met his eye. The shouting cries and jingling ceased as Lyrem pulled the blade back.

“You scratched it, so now I scratched you.” Lyrem smiled lightly. “You see?”

Kyle’s eyes opened as blood poured down from one side. Sweat and tears mixed together to add to the stinging pain cut across his face. Lyrem cleaned off his blade onto Kyle’s shirt collar. He gasped as it reached dangerously close to his neck.

Lyrem stood over them again, waving his knife eloquently. His eyes rested on Kyle.

“Now, I do believe I have made my decision.”

Kyle closed his eyes tightly, knowing it would be him- certain of it. He heard a whimper, then a slice, and then gurgling.

He turned his head. Seeing Jess’ neck dripping a steady stream of blood down her blouse, he cried out; his mouth was left gaping as he had no hands available to cover it with.

Lyrem hovered over the body for a while, still gripping the hair that felt like nylon between his fingers. She was still somewhat alive- the expression was clear in her blue eyes that were beginning to look a glassier with each passing moment.

“The whining was already becoming a bit annoying, don’t you think?”

The boys didn’t answer Lyrem. They didn’t say anything as Jess’ spirit left her body. Lyrem licked Jess’ blood off the edge of his knife, grinning.

#mystics by alpaca #mystics #writing #writing blog #creative writing #whump #whump writing #nonbinary #whumpblr #torture #nausea #character death #minor character death

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v-thinks-on · 4 years

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Jeeves Gets Sick - Part 1

Next I would be the first to tell you that I’m far from the most chipper fellow in the mornings. It usually takes quite a bit of groaning and blinking to get myself upright at all, and I’m not fit for company until I’ve had my morning restorative in the form of a steaming cup of oolong.

I struggled one eye open, and then the other, and pushed myself in a bit of an upward direction. I had just started to have the presence of mind to begin to fancy a spot of tea, when to my distinct surprise, it did not appear. You may be thinking right now that this is a bit thick, that this Wooster fellow expects, just because he’s thinking of tea, for a cup of the stuff to miraculously appear in hand. But all I can say to that is that you have never employed a man like Jeeves. It’s like a sort of telepathy; as soon as I’m up and conscious enough to be thinking of tea, lo! It appears, and such has been the case since day one of his employment. How I’ll ever manage without the man is beyond me.

Given all that, you can imagine that I was rather put off by the non-appearance of the tea upon that particular m. I was just starting to wonder if I should give it all up as a bad job, go back to sleep, and try again later, or if perhaps my dinner the night before hadn’t been a touch too rich and was giving me strange dreams, when the tea did, at long last, make an appearance. It appeared in a sort of rummy way, however. The tea was there, of course, and Jeeves was there carrying it in, just as usual, but rummy, like the sort of dream where everything is normal, except you’ve forgotten you had a Latin exam the next day and when you go in to take it, it’s all in Greek.

Perhaps I’d do best to illustrate the rumminess of it all with some specifics. Jeeves, as you know, is a silent sort, I don’t mean in speech, though sometimes he can be so taciturn you forget he’s there, but I mean in movement. One moment he’s there, the next he’s not, or vice-versa, and you never hear the coming or going. But on that morning, I could have sworn I heard his footsteps whispering against the carpet as he approached. Or, for another demonstrative example, take Jeeves’s expression; he can give the best stuffed frog impression of the lot, I’m sure he’s won prizes for it at contests, but even when he isn’t wearing the mask, so to speak, there’s always a certain nonchalance to his bearing. I don’t think I’d ever seen a feverish spark dancing in his inky blacks, or seen him glassy-eyed like a fellow after a sleepless night.

I know it wasn’t much to go off of. In all other ways, Jeeves was impeccable as always, with his “Good morning, sir,” and “I hope you slept well, sir.” There was hardly a thing out of place, but between the late appearance and the aforementioned symptoms, I thought I had something of a case.

I was so badly startled by the whole upset to the usual routine that I was mostly coherent even before I’d had my first sip of the oolong. Still, I broached the matter cautiously as I took the cup from his tray, “Jeeves, are you quite all right. You seem a little out of sorts, what?”

“Sir?” Jeeves asked stiffly, with a bit of the air of an offended cat.

“A little peaky, I mean,” I attempted to clarify, “Like you’ve come down with something.”

“Is there something not to your liking, sir?” Jeeves said, as though he’d only heard every other word.

“Not exactly, I just-”

“Will that be all, sir?”

I sipped my tea, defeated. “Right ho, Jeeves.”

“Very good, sir.”

With that, he left the room. I could have sworn I heard him go.

I was not to be so easily contented. I ruminated as I readied for the day. You must understand that in all the years I’d known Jeeves, I had never seen the man so much as falter. He’s something of a paragon, if that’s the word I’m looking for; where other men fail, he invariably prevails. He gives an invulnerable sort of impression, as though nothing could ever knock him down. And yet, here he was, late, unsteady, and feverish. The signs were subtle, but I couldn’t deny their presence.

I didn’t like it. It was awfully feudal of Jeeves to keep a stiff upper lip and soldier on through rain or high seas and what not - or whatever the expression is exactly - but for all that I depend on the chap, I could last a day without his services. It wouldn’t be easy, but I could manage it, and for a cause as good as his speedy recovery from whatever it was that ailed him I would do it with pride. But the thought of Jeeves struck ill by some unknown pestilence shook me to the core. I can hardly begin to say how much I value the man and the thought of him wasting away was more than I could bally well take.

I strode out to give him a piece of my mind over breakfast. But where breakfast ought have been, there was nothing in its place.

I made like the cat in the adage, letting I dare not wait upon I would, as Jeeves would say, for but a moment before barging into the kitchen. There, I found Jeeves, a mere shadow of his usually impressive self. He was sitting down on the job before breakfast was out on the table, and he faltered in getting to his feet as I entered his lair. His eyes were undeniably bright with fever and his brow damp with sweat, a few hairs curled out of place. To be seen in such a state, the man was clearly on his deathbed.

“Sir?” he began.

I silenced him with a wave and cut him off besides. This was more than just one of those arguments that inevitably occur with two stubborn chaps living in close proximity; Jeeves’s very life was on the line and I daren’t falter.

“Not a word, Jeeves. You are plainly ill. Even a fool could see it, and I know you are no fool. Even I can see it.” My voice took on something of a pleading note all on its own accord.

“Sir,” he attempted to protest, but even his words came out weak.

“Dash it all, Jeeves!” I exclaimed, startled by my own vehemence. “I won’t have you working in such a state. Call for a doctor!”

He straightened his posture and seemed to strain against the fever. “That’s very kind of you, sir, but hardly necessary.”

I refused to hear a word against it. “Not another word, Jeeves! I’m going to get a doctor and I expect you to go straight to bed and rest until you’re back to your implacable self.”

“Sir, there is no need to call for a doctor; it’s nothing that a little rest won’t cure.” It pained me to see his resistance failing even as I chipped away at it.

Jeeves’s word is usually taken as law, but this was too serious a thing to trust to his stubborn insistence. “No, Jeeves, rest. I’ll be back with a doctor before you know it.”

Jeeves let out the barest suggestion of a sigh. His breathing seemed laboured. “If you must, sir, then permit me to recommend my family physician. I have his London address.”

I stared at the address Jeeves provided. “Are you sure? I could certainly find you a better man on Harley street.”

“He has my absolute trust, sir. I would see no other.” There was something steely in his manner, even glassy-eyed as he was, that made it clear he would make no further concessions, and I didn’t have time to argue. The man has an iron will when challenged and that I had managed to push him so far as I had was evidence of how far he’d fallen.

“Very good, Jeeves. And you’ll rest while I’m gone? None of this working rot?”

“Yes, sir.” He almost sounded relieved, which only confirmed my darkest fears.

He saw me to the door despite my instance to the contrary. I could see his mask cracking all the while. His air of exhaustion would not have looked out of place on me the morning after a night of revelry, but on Jeeves, it looked horribly wrong. I had half a mind to carry the man to bed myself just to be sure he kept his word, but then I doubtless would have had a revolt on my hands, and so I contented myself with finding him a doctor.

The place was easy enough to find. A shiny new plaque by the door boasted the residence of “Dr. John Watson, M.D.” With a name like that, a fellow can only think of Sherlock Holmes’s pal, but there must be countless men with the name John Watson in the metrop., certainly plenty of them doctors, and all tired of being asked how Sherlock Holmes is doing. For my part, I didn’t very well care if the man was the prince of Persia or a patch-coated street kid like one of the Baker Street Irregulars as long as he had the stuff for Jeeves.

I gave the door a pounding that could have been considered frantic, and a maid soon swung it open and ushered me into a parlour. I believe I managed to impress upon her the urgency of my visit, because it wasn’t long before a doctorly fellow came down to see me. He was a broad-built mustachioed sort, regarding me with the utmost seriousness.

I have been quelled by lesser gazes than his, but I had my mission and didn’t even let him get so far as bidding me a terse good morning before I exclaimed, “It’s Jeeves! He’s ill!”

A glint of recognition struck the fellow’s eyes. “Reginald Jeeves?”

“That’s the one! He said you were his family doctor.”

The doctor smiled a little at that, but quickly turned serious. “Then I expect we have not a moment to waste.”

We hurried back to the flat as fast as feet could fly and wheels could spin.

On the way, Dr. Watson asked, “Am I correct in presuming that you must be Mr. Wooster?”

“Right-o!” I exclaimed. “I mean to say, yes, I’m him.”

The doctor nodded as though everything was just as he expected. “I doubt Jeeves would have sent you to me unless it was something serious.”

I twiddled my fingers a little, suddenly realizing something awkward about my position. “It wasn’t Jeeves who asked for you - well, he said he wouldn’t see anyone else - but I was the one who insisted. You see, he was all out of sorts this morning!”

“What were his symptoms?” Dr. Watson asked, his manner suddenly businesslike.

“Well, to start with, he was late with the tea in the morning, and then I swear I could actually hear him walking around, when, well, you know how he usually appears and disappears here and there. And then when it came time for breakfast, I found him sitting in the kitchen before anything was out on the table, and his eyes looked absolutely feverish!”

I’m afraid I made a muddle of the telling of it, but Dr. Watson nodded along as though it was all clear to him.

It felt like ages, but finally we arrived back at the flat. The place was silent and to all appearances empty. I half expected to find Jeeves collapsed on the floor, overcome by a sudden spell of weakness, but I bravely led the doctor on, through Jeeves’s lair, into his quarters. And there the man was, lying obediently in bed, though I noted with some displeasure that he was already sitting upright when we arrived. Jeeves made to struggle to his feet, but I waved him down with the firmest look I could muster.

So he contented himself with a quiet, “Sir,” and “Dr. Watson,” each accompanied by a respectful nod.

Generally, as you would expect, I spend very little time in my man’s quarters. Therefore, I was a little surprised by the cramped spareness of it all. The fellow constantly rescuing me from all manners of soup deserved rather better than what could have passed for a closet furnished with a cot, some drawers, and some shelves laden with all manner of tomes. But alas that was a problem for another day. For the time being, the three of us crammed in to the best of our ability; Jeeves in bed, of course, Dr. Watson on a chair brought in from the kitchen positioned at the bedside, and I hovering at the foot of the bed by the drawers.

“My apologies Dr. Watson, I am afraid there has been something of a miscommunication,” Jeeves said, somehow projecting the very image of a valet, even though he was abed in his brown dressing gown, looking only a little less feverish than when I left him. “Mr. Wooster’s gentlemanly spirit demanded that my recovery be overseen by a doctor, however I assure you that my condition is not at all serious and I find it to be much improved even after a brief respite.”

“Dr. Watson will be the judge of that!” I insisted, drawing myself up to a considerable height - with Jeeves incapacitated, I was by far the tallest chap in the room.

The doctor glanced between Jeeves and myself, no doubt weighing our words, though the only expression I saw cross his features was the suggestion of a smile. “Yes, thank you, Mr. Wooster. May I have a moment alone with my patient?”

“Oh, certainly! I’ll biff off then, toodle-pip!” I hastily ducked out of the room with a final glance at a less than pleased Jeeves, and settled myself in the sitting room for the long haul.

I lit a gasper to ease my rattled nerves and let the soothing aroma wash over me. You may be asking why I would prefer a gasper when I have Italian and Turkish cigarettes close at hand, and to that I can only point to the fact that Jeeves always smokes gaspers, and so I find them to have a similar reassuring effect when the man himself is absent, though certainly nothing equal to the real article.

I confess, I was rather far gone. I kept glancing back at the door to the kitchen, expecting Dr. Watson to emerge at any moment with news that I could only imagine inevitably got worse with every passing second. I felt rather like those Greek chappies; like Damon wasting away in his cell waiting for his pal Pythias - or rather Pythias racing back to wherever it was, absolutely frantic about Damon wasting away in that cell of his, only hoping he wasn’t too late. Not that I had any illusion that Jeeves saw his mentally negligible young master as anything even approaching his Damon or Pythias.

It was difficult not to envision Jeeves like one of those damsels in the pictures, slowly and inevitably wasting away in the sickbed as her family cried around her. I thought I heard a distant cough coming from the other room; the first innocuous symptom before consumption set in. I was just beginning to compose a fitting eulogy for such a great man with a few tears in my eyes when at long last I heard a door swing open and shut, and a steady gait that could only belong to Dr. Watson approached through the kitchen.

I jumped up to greet him, almost as fast as Jeeves when I interrupt him when he’s reading. “Is he…?”

The doctor smiled. “Don’t worry, Jeeves will be all right. He merely has a fever.”

“It’s not consumption?”

“No,” Dr. Watson said gently.

“Right-o!” I exclaimed, significantly braced.

“He should recover completely in a day or two, but I’ve given him an order to rest until then.”

“That’ll be just the thing!”

I hastily bade Dr. Watson take a seat and offered him a drink to toast to Jeeves’s health and what not and the kindly doctor obliged.

I downed my glass perhaps a bit too quickly, but a bracing drink really was the thing to take the edge off of my lingering fears and the jitters of relief.

Just as the need for further conversation began to make itself known - I had some mind to bring it around to Jeeves - the doctor remarked, “Has Jeeves been working himself particularly hard of late?”

“I haven’t been giving him any more work than usual,” I said with some righteous indignation. This chap may have been a friend of Jeeves, but that didn’t give him licence to critique how I ran my household.

“No, I would think not,” Dr. Watson said with just a touch of exasperation. “It is only that I have often had the occasion to observe that when a gentleman is particularly intelligent, he may have difficulty recognizing his own limits and the limits of others.”

“And overwork himself, you mean?” I asked, a bit taken aback.

“Yes.”

“I don’t think Jeeves ever does that. He’s as hardworking a chap as any, of course, but I don’t think he’d over do it.” I hesitated. “Really, he always seems so infallible, like nothing’s too much for him to handle. I don’t think I’ve ever known him to get ill.”

Dr. Watson nodded sagely. “Jeeves has done his best to appear infallible for as long as I’ve known him.”

“You knew him growing up, what?”

“No, Jeeves was a young man by the time I made his acquaintance.”

“Jeeves’s cousin Bunny said he was always particularly intelligent.”

“Yes, he was a very personable young man, but always at something of a distance.” After a moment’s pause, Dr. Watson forced himself to his feet. “I should get on with my rounds, but it was a pleasure to meet you at last, Mr. Wooster. Jeeves is fortunate to have a friend such as yourself.”

“I say!” I exclaimed, jumping to my feet after him. “You mean it?” I’m usually not met with enthusiastic approval so much as weary disdain by the older element.

“Certainly. Jeeves was a friendless young man, but he seems to have taken a liking to you.”

I may have flushed at his words even as I protested, “What about his cousins? Bunny told me about the games they used to play. I’m just the hapless young master.”

To my surprise, the doctor frowned. “I wouldn’t call them friendly.”

I wanted to protest in Bunny’s defense - he’s not only a cousin of Jeeves’s, but a pal of mine - but then I remembered Jeeves’s cousin Dorian and his airy teasing that had a cruel edge to it, and instead, I asked, “Did Jeeves really say all that?”

“Not in so many words, but I’ve learned to observe a little over the years.”

“Well, I say! It’s really me who’s lucky to have Jeeves, with all he does for me. I only wish I could do enough to repay him.”

“I’m certain that you repay him in your own way.”

If my dubiousness showed, Dr. Watson didn’t comment on it as I showed him to the door. I bid him a cheery “Toodle-pip!” and retired to the sitting room.

Abruptly left to my own devices with no urgent mission at hand, I found myself rather at a loss. I puttered about for a bit, lit another gasper, finished off my s. and b., and even gave the book I had been reading the night before a cursory flip, but all the while my thoughts lingered on Jeeves. The words on the page meant nothing compared to the looming fear of Jeeves’s condition taking a sudden turn for the worse.

Finally, I decided enough was enough.

The floorboards creaked more than they’d ever before had the gall to creak as I toed it through the kitchen, toward Jeeves’s quarters, doing my best not to wake the man from his much needed slumbers. It was only as I stopped at the door, a hand upon the knob, that I realized the bally rumminess of it all. Whether Jeeves had really taken something of a liking to me or not, I couldn’t very well go peeking into my man’s quarters, ill or the very image of health, without a good reason.

And just as I was dithering at the door, my stomach came roaring to the rescue. It wasn’t so much a roar as a gurgle, but it made itself known and the next moment I had a plan of action fully formed. The first order of business was tea. The morning’s oolong had long since gone cold, and so I set about fiddling with the stove.

Perhaps thanks to my Aunt Agatha - that horrible aunt who howls at the moon and drinks the blood of the innocent - you may be under the impression that I have no ability to take care of myself without Jeeves acting as my keeper. That is not entirely true. I am certain I would waste away to nothing without him for a week, but, as I have said, for a day or two with just cause, I can manage. And to whomever has given you the impression that I cannot operate my own stove, I say “tinkerty-tonk.”

That is not to say that I am an expert tea-brewer or have in any way mastered the arts of the home at which Jeeves excels, but I can very well pull together a cup of tea. After a rather lot of prodding and waiting and prodding and waiting again, I emerged with a piping hot cup of just the stuff. It smelled about right, though it was difficult to tell after the steam burned my nostrils. It was with some measure of pride then, that I carried it ho, into Jeeves’s quarters, careful not to spill a drop - I shook some droplets off the saucer for good measure, before gently propping open the door.

Jeeves was, of course, alert and awake upon my arrival, greeting me with an ever formal, “Sir?” his tone just barely beginning to question what I was dashed well doing there.

“What ho, Jeeves!” I proclaimed, gesticulating somewhat more than I ought with the precious cargo in hand - I hastily put a stop to it before all the tea splashed out onto the floor. “Just come with a spot of tea, what?”

“That’s very kind of you, sir,” Jeeves said, sounding a little confused, the poor sick lamb.

Once the cargo had been carefully rested upon the bedside table, I took a good look at my man. His state was greatly deteriorated from his usual strength, propped up on a few threadbare pillows, his dark hair in wild disarray, and his eyes drooping. It took him a bit of effort just to push himself far enough upright to have a drink of tea.

I hastily bent over to assist him, but I’m afraid I rather more got in the way.

“Thank you, sir,” Jeeves said softly, giving the cup a tentative sip.

Despite all the chaos around them, his features remained impassive, those dark eyes with their inscrutable infinite depths, regarding me just a foot or so away from my own baby blues - a shiver ran down my spine.

It jolted me into self-awareness and I jumped the rest of the way upright. “Just thought I’d hop by and see how you’re coping, what?”

“Very kind of you, sir.”

“Is there anything else you need, what? A book to read, or any extra blankets or what not?”

“No, sir. As Dr. Watson instructed, all I require now is rest.”

“Oh, yes, right-o then! I’ll let you get back to that, what? I’ll just be popping down to the Drones for lunch then, unless you’d rather I stayed here, that is.”

“Not at all, sir.”

“Right-o!”

After bumping into the wall, I backed out the door and closed it behind me before taking a moment to regain my bearings. I had half a mind to wonder where Jeeves kept the cooking sherry, in the hope that it might quell my firing nerves, but thankfully it soon passed, my head righted itself, and I set off for the Drones post haste in search of a more appetizing apéritif.

You may be thinking that being overwhelmed with gratitude when Jeeves miraculously lifts victory from the soup of defeat is one thing, but it doesn’t become a fellow to get all in a tizzy like this over something so simple as bringing his man some tea, but it must be understood that the circs. were rather far out of the ordinary. For one, it was me bringing Jeeves the tea, rather than the other way around. And for another, this was no ordinary man, but Jeeves, the paragon of a valet who had gotten me out of the soup more times than I could count and was an inimitable man besides, and so I dashed well wanted to do right by him in his hour of need, even though it had me well out of my usual depths.

Under the aforementioned circs., it was a somber, serious Bertram Wooster that lunched at the Drones that afternoon. I tossed a bit of bread about with the lads, but my thoughts lingered back in the flat with Jeeves. As I finished my lunch - more picked at rather than devoured, as would have been expected of a Wooster short one breakfast - I asked for some soup to bring back to my indisposed man. As it so happens, the cook at the Drones is acquainted with Jeeves and happily obliged, and so I was sent home bearing his sympathies and a tureen of his own special recipe.

I hurried back to the flat with the precious tureen and carefully ladled out a bowl of still warm soup. With a lot of slow, awkward movements, I managed to maneuver the door to Jeeves’s quarters open, soup in hand, without making a spill, only to find the man himself fast asleep in bed. I felt a small pang of disappointment, shortly overcome by relief that he was finally resting. He looked awfully peaceful; every muscle usually kept at stiff attention, for once allowed to relax. The teacup I had left with him before departing for the Drones now sat empty on the bedside table, and so in its place I put the bowl of soup, ready for whenever he woke.

Just as I was tiptoeing out, I heard Jeeves stirring in the bed behind me. I glanced back to see him hastily drawing himself to attention - as much so as he could manage.

“Thank you, sir,” he said hoarsely.

“Not at all, Jeeves!” I exclaimed, my voice too loud for the sickroom. “Bon appetit, what?” And with that, I stumbled back out into the kitchen.

With nothing more to be done - my bearings quickly regained - I returned to sulk about the sitting room with a gasper in one hand and a glass in the other. I’m not usually a terribly busy chap. I live a life of leisure and I, for one, am content not to be running about at all hours of the day and night, as much as my Aunt Agatha and her ilk may believe I do too little of the former and too much of the latter. No, it’s the quiet life for Bertram W. on all fronts. But on this occasion, I was downright preoccupied and rather wished I had something else to hold up my mind.

I lay about, did a spot of pacing, and lay about some more. I would have poked at the keys of the piano, but if my light tread was enough to awaken Jeeves, the instrument would have been a sure thing. And I couldn’t very well leave the flat in case Jeeves’s condition took a sudden turn for the worse.

I threw myself back down upon the sofa a bit more loudly than I ought and made a half-hearted attempt to reimmerse myself in the mystery that had seemed so captivating the day before. Today, however, each clever remark made me think of Jeeves’s sly, understated wit, each foolish mistake of how he would have doubtless done better, and each description of a corpse inevitably called to mind the image of him huddled beneath the sheets, fighting off death’s icy grasp as I sat reading, whiling away the hours.

I could stand it no longer. I tottered through the kitchen to Jeeves’s quarters just to be certain he was getting his requisite rest and hadn’t been calling out to me, his hoarse voice too quiet to be heard through the walls.

Jeeves lay in bed, to all appearances fast asleep, not at all like a fellow fighting off the icy hand of death. The soup, now lukewarm, sat untouched on the table where I had left it. Jeeves’s eyes fluttered open upon my arrival.

Met with his sharp gaze, I hastily cast about for an excuse. “I don’t suppose there’s anything else you need, what? Any blankets or water or anything?”

“No, sir.” More gently, Jeeves insisted, “You are very kind, sir, but as you said yourself, what I need now is rest.”

“Oh, right-o.”

“Sir, if you would be more comfortable, I would have no objection to you remaining here.”

“I say! Rather! If that’s all right with you, I mean.”

“Certainly, sir. It would be preferable by far to the current arrangement.”

“Right-o! I’ll just get my book then.”

I dashed back to the sitting room, and in two blinks of an eye, I was back in Jeeves’s quarters, perched on the kitchen chair Dr. Watson had left by the bedside, book in hand. Jeeves regarded me a moment with something approaching a smile, before letting his head fall back upon the pillow and his eyes fall shut.

I sat silent and still, not daring to move lest the noise reach his acute senses and jar him from the dreamless. But I didn’t mind the stillness so much. There was something soothing about the sight of the man, peacefully at rest. I fancied I saw the trace of a smile lingering across his finely chiseled features. Even in sleep, there was something undeniably remarkable about the chap. You could see him gleaming with intelligence from miles away, his head sticking out a little in back just to accommodate all of that grey matter.

His eyelid flickered and I hastily turned my attention to my book.

It was much easier reading with Jeeves there beside me, sleeping soundly. I just made sure to turn the pages quietly and on a few occasions had to bite back exclamations, but on the whole, it was smooth sailing. Whenever a corpse showed up, all I had to do was glance down at Jeeves to be sure he was as life-like as ever, and looking healthier every minute for all the rest he was getting.

I don’t know exactly when I dozed off too, but the next thing I knew, I felt a warm hand on my wrist pulling me back into awareness, my back and neck sore as the dickens from sleeping where I sat, in that dratted uncomfortable kitchen chair.

“You may find a chair in the sitting room more to your liking, sir,” Jeeves remarked.

“You don’t say, Jeeves,” I retorted, still a bit groggy as I rolled out my neck and shoulders, and strained my back.

“Yes, sir.”

I rubbed open my eyes, still struggling in the bright light of day. Jeeves was still there in the bed beside me - not that I was so lucky as to have slept in the bed; I having been consigned to that dashed uncomfortable chair. He looked well, less feverish, I mean, his eyes back to their usual luster and what not, though he still seemed a little worse for the wear, tired and worn.

“Sleep well, what?” I asked.

“Yes, very well. Thank you, sir.” He certainly seemed refreshed.

Jeeves regarded me with a sort of rummy soft expression, if you get my meaning, nothing bad, just unusual for the chap, like he was amused by something, but without the amusement, or like I had somehow caught him off his guard, but with none of the startled look of having been caught.

“Feeling back to your old self, what?”

“Yes, sir.” Jeeves pushed himself upright, looking like he was about to get out of bed.

I hastily gestured him back down.

“Sir, your concern is gratifying, but I assure you that it is unnecessary.”

“Not necessary? Now see here Jeeves, you’ll get as much rest as Dr. Watson said if you know what’s good for you! I won’t very well have you suffering a re- what is it, Jeeves?’

“A relapse, sir?”

“I won’t have you suffering a relapse just because you’re fool enough to go back to work before you’re properly recovered and I’m fool enough to let you. And that’s final,” I added, seeing an argumentative glint in his eyes.

“Very good, sir,” Jeeves relented at last.

I was feeling rather pleased with my latest victory and it was with a bit of a Jeevesian flourish that I asked, “Now, is there anything I can get for you?”

“If you will not permit me to get it for myself, I believe a spoon for the soup would be called for, sir.”

“Oh! Yes, of course! Right on it, Jeeves!”

I hopped over to the kitchen, rummaged around a bit, and hopped back with the called for utensil.

I lingered by Jeeves’s sickbed for a few ticks longer, chewing the fat and what not, before finally biffing off to the Drones for dinner and leaving my man to his belated meal - the soup had gone cold, but he stubbornly refused my every offer to reheat it for him on the stove. Dinner was much like lunch; quiet and brief, occupied with thoughts of Jeeves. I saw Bingo and some of the other fellows, but I didn’t have the heart for more than a round or two, before hastening back home.

The flat was quieter than I had left it - silent, in fact - but the mouth-watering smell of something cooking wafted in from the kitchen. However, I found nothing simmering on the stove and, as far as I could discern, not a thing had been touched since I left for the Drones. Jeeves was awake, but not upright when I slipped into his quarters, looking still fitter than when I had left him mere hours before. I noted that the dishes on the bedside table were gone without a trace.

I beamed at the chap and proclaimed, “What ho, Jeeves!”

“Good evening, sir,” he answered with some suggestion of a smile.

“Rested and comfortable, what?”

“Yes, sir. I take it that your dinner at the Drones was satisfactory?”

“Rather!” Back in Jeeves’s company, everything took on a rosier tint, even my hasty supper. “But it’s good to be home, what?”

“Indeed, sir.”

Outside of Jeeves’s cozy little room, the sky was rapidly darkening. It wasn’t nearly a late enough hour for Bertram W. to consider calling it a night under usual circs., but these were hardly the usual circs. I was feeling a bit drowsy myself and I thought I saw Jeeves’s eyes beginning to droop. The chap needed all the rest he could get to make a full recovery.

“Do you need anything for the night?” I asked on a bit of a delay. “I can bring over some blankets from the spare bedroom. Or I could put up another pot of tea.”

After a moment’s consideration, Jeeves replied, “An additional blanket would not be unwelcome, sir.”

“Right-o!”

I yanked the blanket off the bed in the spare bedroom, gave it a quick fold, and carried it proudly back to Jeeves. It was a bit of a joint effort getting the blanket all set up and making sure Jeeves was comfortable for the night. I popped back into the kitchen to bring him a glass of water, and then I lingered, hovering by the bedside, unsure what else to do, but reluctant to leave the man’s side.

“Need anything else, what?”

“No, sir. Thank you sir.” He looked up at me, his usually keen or alternatively empty gaze again strangely soft and earnest, a gentle smile playing across his features.

I could only beam back. I had half an impulse to bend down and brush a stray hair from his forehead, which I hastily restrained, pocketing my hands to keep them from acting of their own accord as they are wont to do.

All was quiet, the square outside the window dark and still. We seemed to be very much alone in the world.

“Good night then, Jeeves,” I said at last.

“Good night, sir.”

“‘Till tomorrow, what?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good night, then,” I said again, and bumped into the door frame on my way out into the kitchen.

I paced about the flat a bit, picking things up, putting them back down, and what not, feeling rather at a loss - what Jeeves does in the evenings after seeing me to bed is one of life’s great mysteries. But the trials of the day were enough to wear down even the Wooster spirit, and so, with a great yawn, I retreated back into my own bedroom and hastened to bed, hoping the next day would herald a return to normalcy in the Wooster abode.

Part of The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves

#v writes #Jeeves and Wooster #The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves #Jeeves Gets Sick #Dr. John Watson

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fuckyeahdialectics · 6 years

Photo

Speech by David Lammy, Labour MP

I am here, because you were there.

We are here, because you were there.

My ancestors were British subjects. But they were not British subjects because they came to Britain. They were British subjects because Britain came to them, took them across the Atlantic, colonised them, sold them into slavery, profited from their labour and made them British subjects. That is why I am here. That is why the Windrush generation are here.

I quote Martin Luther King, who himself quoted St Augustine, when he said that an unjust law is no law at all. So I say to the Minister: warm words mean nothing. Guarantee these rights and enshrine them in law.

And 230 years after the Abolitionist movement wore their medallions, I stand here as a Caribbean, Black, British citizen and I ask the Minister on behalf of thousands of Windrush citizens:

Am I Not a Man and a Brother?

My speech from the debate on the Windrush petition today:

I am proud to stand here on behalf of the 178,000 people who signed this petition.

I am proud to stand here on behalf of the 492 British citizens who arrived on HMT Empire Windrush from Jamaica 70 years ago.

I am proud to stand here on behalf of the 172,000 British citizens who arrived on these shores between the passage of the 1948 Nationality Act and the 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act, including my own father who arrived from Guyana in 1956.

But it is a very dark episode in our nation’s history that this petition was even required.

It is a very dark day indeed that we are here in Parliament having to stand up for the rights for people who have always given so much to this country and expected so little in return.

We need to remember our history. In Britain when we talk about slavery we tend to just talk about its abolition.

The Windrush story does not begin in 1948. The Windrush story begins in the 17th century, when British slave traders stole 12 millions Africans from their homes, took them to the Caribbean, sold them into slavery to work on plantations.

The wealth of this country was built on the backs of the Windrush generation’s ancestors.

We are here, because you were there.

There is no British history without the history of the Empire.

As Stuart Hall put it: “I am the sugar at the bottom of the English cup of tea.”

And then 70 years ago as Britain lay in ruins after the Second World War the call went out to the colonies from the Mother Country. Britain asked the Windrush generation to come and rebuild the country. Work in our National Health Service. Work on the buses and the trains and as cleaners and security guards. So once again, labour was used.

They faced down the No Blacks, No Dogs, No Irish signs. They did the jobs nobody else would do. They got spat on in the street. Assaulted by the Teddy Boys, the skinheads, the National Front. Spat at in the street. Lived 5 to a room in Rachmanite squalor. They were called and they served but my God did they suffer for the privilege of coming to Britain.

And yet my God they triumphed too. Sir Trevor McDonald. Frank Bruno. Sir Lenny Henry. Jessica-Ennis Hill. National treasures.

Knights of the realm. Heavyweight champions of the world and Olympic champions wrapped in the British flag. Sons and daughters of the Windrush generation, as British as they come.

And after all of this the Government wants to send us back across the ocean. They want to make life “hostile” for the Windrush children. They strip them of their rights, they deny them healthcare, they kick them out of jobs, they make them homeless, they stop their benefits.

And they are imprisoned in their own country. Centuries after their ancestors were shackled and taken across the ocean in slave ships, pensioners are imprisoned in their own country.

It is a disgrace. And it happened here because we don’t remember our history.

Last week the Prime Minister at Prime Minister’s Questions the Prime Minister said: “We owe it to them and the British people”.

The Home Secretary said that the Windrush generation should be considered British. That they should be able to get their British citizenship if they so choose.

This is the point the Government simply still do not understand. The Windrush generation ARE the British people. They ARE British citizens. They came here as citizens. That is the precise reason why this is such an injustice. Their British citizenship is, and has always been, theirs by right. It is not something that the Government is now choosing to grant them.

Can I remind the Government of Chapter 56 of the 1948 British Nationality Act.

Every person who under this Act is a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies shall by virtue of that citizenship have the status of a British subject.

The Bill uses the term British nationality by virtue of citizenship.

I read this Bill again last week when reading over the case notes of my constituents caught up in the Windrush crisis.

Patrick Henry. A British citizen. Arrived in Britain in 1959. A teaching assistant who told me “I feel like a prisoner who has committed no crime” because he is being denied citizenship.

Clive Smith. A British citizen. Arrived here in 1964, showed the Home Office his school reports and still threatened with deportation.

Rosario Wilson. A British citizen. No right to be here because St Lucia became independent in 1979.

Wilberforce Sullivan. A British citizen. Paid taxes for 40 years. He was told in 2011 he was no longer able to work.

Dennis Laidley. A British citizen. Tax records going back to the 1960s. Denied a passport and unable to visit his sick mother.

Jeffrey Greaves. A British citizen. Arrived here in 1964. Threatened with deportation by the Home Office.

Cecile Laurencin. A British citizen. 44 years of National Insurance contribution letters, payslips and bank account details. Application for naturalisation rejected.

Huthley Sealey. A British citizen. Unable to claim benefits or access healthcare.

Mark Balfourth. A British citizen. Arrived here in 1962 aged 7. Refused access to benefits.

The Windrush generation have waited for too long for the rights that are theirs. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over. There comes a time when the burden of living like a criminal in your own country becomes too heavy to bear any longer. That is what we have seen in the last few weeks – an outpouring of pain and grief built up over many years.

And yet Government Ministers have tried to conflate this issue with illegal immigration.

On Thursday the Home Secretary said “I am personally committed to tackling illegal migration”, “making it difficult for illegal migrants to live here and removing people who are here illegally”.

Indeed, during her statement last Thursday the Home Secretary said “illegal” 23 times but did not even once say the word “citizen”.

This is not about illegal immigration. This is about British citizens. And frankly it is deeply offensive to conflate the Windrush generation with illegal immigrants to try to distract from the Windrush crisis.

This is about a hostile environment policy that blurs the lines between illegal immigrants and people who are here legally and even British citizens. This is about a hostile environment not just for illegal immigrants that but for anybody who looks like they could be an immigrant.

This is about a hostile environment that has turned employers, doctors, landlords and social workers into border guards.

The hostile environment is not about illegal immigration.

Increasing Leave to Remain fees by 238% in 4 years is not about illegal immigration.

The Home Office making profits of 800% on standard applicants is not about illegal immigration.

The Home Office sending back documents unrecorded in second class post so passports, birth certificates and education certificates get lost is not about illegal immigration.

Charging teenagers £2,033 for limited leave to remain every 30 months is not about illegal immigration.

Charging someone £10,521 in limited leave to remain fees before they can even apply for indefinite leave to remain is not about illegal immigration.

Banning refugees and asylum seekers from working and preventing them from accessing public funds is not about illegal immigration.

Sending 9 immigration enforcement staff to arrest my constituent because the Home Office lost his documents is not about illegal immigration.

Locking my constituent up in Yarl’s Wood so she missed her Midwifery exams is not about illegal immigration.

Denying legal aid to migrants who are here legally is not about illegal immigration.

Changing the terms of young asylum seekers’ “immigration bail” so they cannot study is not about illegal immigration.

Sending immigration enforcement staff to a church in my constituency serving soup to refugees is not about illegal immigration.

The Home Secretary and the Prime Minister have promised compensation. They have promised that no enforcement action will be taken. They have promised that the “burden of proof” will be lowered when the taskforce is assessing Windrush cases.

The Windrush citizens don’t trust the Home Office and I don’t blame them. After so much injustice they need justice.

And 230 years after the Abolitionist movement wore their medallions, I stand here as a Caribbean, Black, British citizen and I ask the Minister on behalf of thousands of Windrush citizens:

Am I Not a Man and a Brother?

#uk #windrush #racism #politics #race #empire #england #jamaica #colonisation #colonialism

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ibnuljawad69 · 2 years

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robertbassweb · 4 years

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How to Manifest a New Job Using the Law of Attraction

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So it is essential to be familiar with your power as well as assumed in all times so you can remain aligned with the Cosmos.

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How to Manifest a Job Quickly

With all that being said, there is a 5 step technique to manifest a new job I priorize.

It is really powerful if you apply it correctly. I said before that the first thing needed is the right sense of gratitude, the right intention and the right vibration.

In this way you will begin to put into practice the law of attraction properly aligned.

Your mental images will be in perfect harmony with your feelings, sensations, intentions and desires, which makes you vibrate at the appropriate frequency for your manifestation.

How to manifest a new job is a question of control of your senses, your thoughts and your emotions, like any other type of manifestation.

Now, you must remember that trying to manifest something starting from the feeling of lack is the worst thing you can do.That is why it is so important to establish a clear intention of what you can contribute to your manifestation and generate that feeling of gratitude and joy for what you are about to do.

It is not about fooling the Universe or worse, fooling ourselves.

You must be sincere and honest with yourself. It is understood that you want a new job to improve your income, your personal satisfaction and your lifestyle.

But you know well that this will be given in addition. Your goal is happiness so, from now on, create that happiness in advance.

How To Manifest A New Job Using These 5 Simple Steps

Now you are ready to start your manifestation labour.

Everything is in the right place. You feel the joy, you imagine all the good things you can offer to your new job and you are ready to start.

So here are the 5 steps to use on how to manifest a new job.

Decide what you desire

The initial step to manifest your dream job is deciding what you want.

It’s difficult to reach your goal if you do not have one. Start with your ” why. ” Why do you intend to make a career change?

What is it concerning your existing job that you don’t like? Shift your viewpoint as well as open yourself approximately new possibilities.

Brainstorm options so you can locate the intersection of what you appreciate as well as are excellent at.

This might be an excellent time to discover an advisor or coach to support you and hold you answerable.

Think of what you would certainly like your life to be like five or 10 years into the future.

Test out professions by offering, signing up with a board, or beginning a side hustle.

When you have actually determined your goal, compose it down, and share it with the individuals close to you.

There is a solid correlation between pronouncing our goals and also completing them.

Think extra deliberately

Manifesting your dream work making use of the Law of Attraction needs deliberate thought.

As opposed to just responding to your current situation, become more purposeful regarding what you think and also really feel.

Once you’ve determined your goal, technique envisioning how you’ll really feel when you’ve reached it.

For instance, if your dream job is to end up being an expert writer, imagine just how it will feel to finish that initial manuscript, authorize your very first publication offer or make the New york city Times bestseller listing.

These positive ideas will certainly aid you to create your future instead than stay embeded the here and now.

Emphasis on the future

To discover your dream task, you ‘ll need to concentrate on what you desire instead than what you don’t want.

When you dread your work life, it’s simple to be taken in with ideas like, “I actually dislike my job, ” “Why am I wasting my time at this firm? ” or “I actually wish to leave this harmful work setting.”

By concentrating on what you do not desire, you are actually enhancing your present circumstance.

Instead, focus on your ultimate goal. Change those negative photos with positive ones like, “I like my work, ” “I ‘m enjoying every minute at this company, ” or “I like working in such a supportive work setting.”

If you can move your thinking, you will be much more likely to manifest the future you prefer.

Construct a scene

A short mini-scene that might only take place if you’ve obtained your brand-new task.

You might jump out ahead into the future, and claim that you have actually been called by the employer to train the brand-new recruits since your work is remarkable.

As well as he wants more employees like you.

Or you could see on your own in your chair, enjoying yourself while doing what you enjoy. Maintain the scene brief so you don’t obtain shed in thought.

Either rest or relax, close your eyes, take a breath deep, luxurious breaths, enabling your body to relax.

Do it over and also over, on a loop, up until it begins to really feel actual.

Really feel the emotions, consist of all the senses you can, sight, odor, sound, taste, feel. Whatever relates to your scene.

Replay the scene till it starts to really feel so actual. You’ll know you’ve done this properly, when you appear of it as well as are shocked to find yourself still where you were physically.

Release

When you appear of it, allow go. You have actually done your component.

Let it go and enable the seed you have grown to take origin as well as expand in its very own method, as well as its very own time.

This is vital. It doesn’t matter exactly how much time passes. Time as well as room are nothing to the imagination.

So there ya go. Currently you understand exactly how to materialize a brand-new job.

Law of attraction job success stories

Back then when I dabbled in freelance screenwriting, I keep in mind someday, after an extended period of writing nothing,

I was unexpectedly gotten rid of with the desire to create. I had no concept what I was misting likely to blog about.

Only that it would certainly be something dark, abrasive, single place, marginal cast.

I stood there. Sure I really felt the suggestion take a hold of me. Indeed I really felt the enjoyment of having actually written something like that.

Moments later, I got a phone call from a customer, who had actually gotten my number off a person else who really did not also like my job.

Her words to me were “I need something dark, sandy, one area, just 3 personalities.”

Nearly exactly what I had claimed! Plus, the customer liked the ended up work.

It can be that very easy. As very easy as enjoying your wish when it turns up, knowing it’s done. I have had numerous experiences where I produced a brand-new gig on the area, or switched over tasks.

So you can trust me on this. I understand what I’m speaking about. Often it’s split second. Various other times it takes “time.” Yet one thing is specific whenever, this jobs.

Not real. I most certainly did. Keep in mind; I let the concept take a hold of my mind.

In my mind’s eye, I was already writing. I was delighting in the feeling of being associated with such a project.

I did all that with MY CREATIVITY.

Now you know how to manifest a new job using the Law of Attraction. Go get it now!

How to Manifest a New Job FAQ

How to manifest a new job with the Law of Attraction?

Just how To Use The Law Of Attraction In Your Job Browse Believe favorably.

Deep down favorably not simply externally. …

Rely on you. Do not allow others bring you down. …

Align what you think and also what you do to what you want. …

Know you are going to get a work. …

List what your perfect job is. …

Visualize doing that task. …

Do not allow yourself to end up being dissuaded.

Can you actually show up anything you desire?

” The simplest means to show up anything is to be clear about what you desire. Don’t offer the universe combined signals … as well as act. Pursuing your goals is essential.”

You ought to additionally stay receptive. Ask the universe wherefore you desire and also watch out for signs of accomplishment or success.

Just how do I ask the universe for a work?

7 Actions You Definitely MUST Take Whenever You Ask The Universe For Something

Action 1– Make Sure, Be Specific. …

Step 2– Ask And Let It Go. …

Action 3– Be Patient. …

Step 4– Expect Indicators. …

Action 5– Trust That Deep Space Knows Ideal. …

Step 6– Send Reminders Now And Then. …

Action 7– Be Thankful.

Resources:

If you are serious about the Law of Attraction and you want to manifest a better life of yours, download our free manifestation guide.

After reading the guide, I will send you information and exercises I never share on public.

Download Visualization for Manifestation Free Guide

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If you liked it, I would really appreciate it if you can share it using one of the social sharing icons.

Also, leave me a comment and let me know what you thought – I love talking to the readers, so hopefully will talk to you in the comments below.

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friend-clarity · 4 years

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Why work during the coronavirus crisis when you can earn as much — or even more — staying home?

The modern Left despises the work ethic. Unions (inevitably run by Leftists) are encouraging workers to stay home to be parasitic on taxpayers and to claim a free lunch like candy, rather than working in safe workplaces. That is bread of shame that will cause massive deficits to obtain selfish benefits now -- but will cost future generations. Is this moral?

Howard Levitt: There is now a powerful incentive to not work and employers are having great difficulty retaining their employees

Howard Levitt, Financial Post, April 17, 2020

One of my employer clients recently received a letter from its union stating, “With the launch of the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), the incentive for healthy workers to stay away from work has become a concern. In particular, our members — especially those who are part-time and those seeing reduced hours — want to know why they would go to work if the CERB payments would effectively provide them more money to stay home.”

The union is right. There is now a powerful incentive to not work and employers are having great difficulty retaining their employees, however safe they maintain their workplaces.

This same client had their workers abandon their jobs to take CERB instead.

Incidentally, more than half of Canadians killed to date by COVID-19 have been in seniors’ homes, with many linked to their employees abandoning their jobs.

When residents of Pinecrest Nursing Home in Bobcaygeon, Ont., became ill, the entire shift of employees failed to report. When public health officials arrived at Residence Herron in Dorval, Que., they found hungry and thirsty residents in soiled beds with the nurses and other staff having largely abandoned the building.

Those frontline and often lower paid workers — whatever their obligations — might have grounds for concern as they are required to work in close quarters with the ill, sometimes without adequate personal protective equipment. But the same is not true of many who are choosing not to attend work and applying for CERB instead.

People are confusing the government’s aspirational statements about the importance of Canadians staying home with the employment law obligations to attend, as required, at safe workplaces.

But what is a safe workplace?

If employers implement social distancing, maintain adequate cleanliness and hand sanitization stations, do not permit anyone who is ill or has COVID-19 symptoms to enter the premises and discipline employees who breach these guidelines, then employees asked to attend must do so or risk dismissal.

Employees can still game the system by claiming that they are not feeling well, particularly since new legislation in Ontario prohibits employers from obtaining medical certificates to verify such claims.

The process of determining whether an employee has to attend based on safety concerns is clear. If an employee has reason to believe that a workplace is unsafe, they can demand sufficient protections. If the employer and employee disagree as to the workplace’s safety, either can call a Ministry of Labour Health and Safety inspector who can declare whether a workplace is safe or requires modifications to make it safe.

Inspectors spend their careers analyzing safety issues, including now the risks from COVID-19, and their rulings are binding.

But some unions and employees are using safety guidelines as a political battering ram.

On Wednesday, after the Ministry of Labour inspector ruled the Toronto Transit Commission workplace to be safe, many workers still refused to return to work.

On Newstalk 1010 station, I said that, following such a ruling, such drivers should be suspended and then fired if they still refuse to work.

Responding to my remarks, the union president challenged the expertise of MOL inspectors, suggesting that its drivers presumably knew better than they did.

Once the lockdown restrictions ease, companies that are permitted to operate will have to begin functioning again to survive. The welfare of all of us depends upon their success.

Employees have a right to a safe workplace, but they have to be motivated to work. Plans such as CERB must be reserved for those laid off, not for those who choose to stay home when safety is not at issue.

Employees can’t simply quit to collect the CERB — or technically they can, because the benefit is handed out like candy, but based on the criteria they would be ineligible and thus defrauding the government by wrongfully collecting it. If they are audited, they would have to pay it back, which could be a financially devastating result for someone whose regular income is so minimal that they would opt to take the CERB for financial reasons.

With these weekly ruminations, here are some of the common questions and answers I received this week.

Q: Are there exceptions to obtaining CERB for people who live with seniors with compromised immune systems? I work at Superstore as a cashier and my fear is being in the line of fire and bringing the virus home to my 80-year-old diabetic mother.

A: Unfortunately, there are no exceptions for workers living with individuals in high-risk groups — in her current situation, she cannot collect the CERB.

Q: Some people have to stay home because their kids aren’t in school and they need to apply for CERB. Kids are able to stay home alone at a certain age, but what would that age be?

A: The legislation is silent, but there is no reason to believe that a child’s age determines their parent’s eligibility for CERB. The relevant question is whether the child genuinely requires care and supervision at home due to the closure of their school or care facilities as a result of COVID-19, that requires the parent to stay home.

So far, much of the COVID-19 benefits regime operates on an honour system, and this aspect is no different. Parents should use their own judgment to determine whether their circumstances qualify them, keeping in mind their child’s degree of independence and considering whether another parent or other trusted adult is available to offer some supervision.

Q: Is there an end date for the four-month CERB benefits? If someone is laid off, say, on June 1, would their four months start then, or would they have missed out on the first three months? A: The CERB program is scheduled to end on October 3, 2020. An eligible applicant can receive the benefit for a maximum of 16 weeks in the period between March 15 to October 3.

Q: My son has asthma but his company of 70 employees has been deemed an essential work place. He does not feel safe working there right now. Is there any recourse for him? A: Based on the information you provided, he may have legal recourse in his right to refuse unsafe work under the Occupational Health and Safety Act if it can be proven that the workplace is objectively unsafe.

Another strategy is to ask his doctor if it is safe for him to return to work. If it’s not, he may be able to get a doctor’s note stating he cannot attend work due to the asthma and COVID-19, and be able to access the CERB.

On a related note, the person could request an accommodation for his disability and invoke the protection of the Human Rights Code. While he may not succeed in being placed on either paid or unpaid leave which would theoretically qualify him for the CERB, he may be able to negotiate for safer working conditions.

I will be answering other questions each Saturday if you write me at [email protected].

Howard Levitt is senior partner of Levitt LLP, employment and labour lawyers. He practises employment law in eight provinces. He is the author of six books including the Law of Dismissal in Canada.

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bangkokjacknews · 5 years

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Thai cops having sex with hookers to 'prove' prostitution charges

Though no Thai government has ever conducted a formal survey, in 2014 UNAIDS estimated that some 123,530 sex workers operate in #Thailand, with sex industry contributing to 10 per cent of the revenue that the country generates from tourists.

Another study in 2003 estimated that Thailand’s sex industry generates an annual US$4.3 billion dollars. While sex work is evidently a pillar of the country’s economy and touches the lives of a great number of people, sex work remains outlawed in Thailand. This contradiction drives sex workers into precarity: they are excluded from government welfare and have no legal recourse if exploited by law enforcers or clients. In this investigative report, Prachatai spoke with sex workers, government officials and NGO representatives to find out how sex workers navigate their grey status under the law. How do they maintain dignity in a society that attributes little value to their work and lives? “Prostitutes just sell themselves” ‘Prostitutes sell only themselves, but wicked women sell the nation,’ a famous Thai Rat newspaper cartoonist once tweeted — as if the business of sex workers merely involves sleeping with clients and reaping the money. Such a prejudiced view overlooks the fact that sex workers who work the market best rely on well-practiced skills like any good businessmen, be that in negotiating, bargaining or advertising themselves well. All these factors are crucial in enticing customers to return. In this industry, standing out is crucial. For most sex workers, most clients come from low-income backgrounds such as taxi drivers, labourers, and young adults. One session may reap only 500-800 baht. Making a living then relies on being able to win multiple clients. Some sex workers operate in multiple locations to maximize client numbers, for example by wandering tourist spots when their usual base is quiet. Kam, a 24-year old independent sex worker, usually waits for clients at her usual spot in Bangkok from early evening until 3 AM. On a good day, she makes between 3000-4000 baht a night. But on a quiet evening where she has only one or two clients — or none at all — Kam turns to advertising her services online. Young and beautiful, Kam could likely find steady employment at a ‘massage’ parlour or even a high-class bar. But she explains that operating as an independent sex worker provides freedom. “It’s liberating. If on any given day I’m busy, or I’m on my period, or if I’m feeling lazy, I just won’t come. I don’t have to ask anyone for leaving. I don’t have to have my pay cut. Nobody else is directing my life. I keep every single baht that I make from clients. Nobody else gets a cut.” But with this freedom comes certain instabilities, least of all the risks of encountering authorities. https://bangkokjack.com/2018/11/04/truth-about-thai-prostitutes/ While images of police officers raiding brothels have repeatedly made headlines in Thai media, officials usually do not obstruct the industry. But at irregular intervals each year, public pressure on the police to show the fruits of their work escalates crackdowns on sex workers. Sex workers themselves have no way of knowing when these periods of heightened surveillance will come — that is, when they may inadvertently appear on front page news. Another inescapable risk in sex work comes in the form of undesirable clients. Sometimes a client may be intoxicated, refuse to use protection, or refuse to pay the fee. In dealing with these situations, workers sometimes risk physical danger. Without legal protections, the best sex workers can do is spread warnings of such individuals by word of mouth. In the face of the risks of working independently, many sex workers trade their freedom for the relative safety that comes with fixed employment in businesses such as ‘karaoke’ bars, ‘massage’ parlours or brothels. Though sex workers with fixed employment can be safe from undesirable clients as there is security staff in their workplace, the threat from state authorities still exists. Illegal trade and ‘legal’ operation So-called ‘karaoke bars’ commonly feature karaoke machines as décor, even though few or no customers visit such venues to sing, but rather to buy sex service. Why the farce? While prostitution is prohibited under Thai law, ‘karaoke bars’ and ‘massage parlours’ can be legally registered as normal businesses. When arrests of sex workers occur at such premises, authorities usually treat the act of prostitution as an exchange between the sex worker and the client — an exchange to which the owner of the premise was not a party. Even so, cases of clients being charged are few and far between, giving rise to the popular quip that, ‘employing sex workers is legal, being a sex worker is illegal, clients get off scot-free.’ Brothel operators are only accused of crimes when simultaneously breaking other laws, such as the employment of underage workers or illegal migrants. In June 2016, an undercover police investigation into a Huai Kwang district massage parlour, “Nataree’, resulted in the arrest of 119 employees, seven of whom were underage (of this seven, six were Burmese migrant workers). While the employees were accused of engaging in prostitution, the brothel owner was accused of crimes related to human trafficking. Undercover police investigations, where officers may pose as customers, have drawn criticisms for being hypocritical, if not themselves instances of illegal behaviour. Questionable behaviour has included the inviting of media to photograph sex workers during sting operations, and officials themselves persuading sex workers to engage in intercourse. Decha Kittwitthayanon, a lawyer and academic, has documented cases where officers have utilised the services of sex workers, before using the discharge and condoms filled with semen as evidence of illegal activity. “The Supreme Court reasoned that having intercourse with sex workers was a necessary and appropriate action for finding evidence of the activities of criminals. They pointed out that officials had no other choice but to use such measures.” Chantawipa Apisuk, the director of Empower Foundation, an organisation that has promoted the rights of sex workers in Thailand for more than 30 years, points out both the cruelty and lack of reasoning behind sting operations. “I don’t think sting operations should happen because things that were used to protect yourself from diseases become instead things that result in your arrest. They simply become wrongdoers.” “But officials say that if they don’t , they won’t be able to make arrests. But that makes me ask, why do they need to be arrested? Everybody has sex. I have sex. So why is having sex for work wrong?” Jet (pseudonym), a former ‘bar girl’ turned volunteer at Empower Foundation, tells a harrowing story where one official went as far as to solicit an underage sex worker. “Once a police officer posed as a client and asked a brothel owner whether there were any workers under the age of 18. When the owner said there weren’t any, the officer asked them to find one, and the owner did so. At first, the girl didn’t dare to go , not because she was afraid of the police, but of meeting a nasty client. “But the officer persisted, kept flirting, acted sweet to befriend the girl until finally, she began to trust him — began to feel that, ‘This guy is a good person. He probably wouldn’t hurt me’. Simply, she grew fond of the officer. In the end, when she agreed to go with the officer, she was arrested. “But do you know the saddest part? The officer that she trusted was the one who interrogated her. He took notes on the interrogation right to the girl’s face.” Unfortunately, arrests of sex workers can have far-reaching complications for their careers. Jet reports that most sex workers who are implicated in sting operations choose to leave the industry. Those who desire to keep working struggle to find work, since employers fear they will draw the attention of authorities. Jet added that sting operations at brothels have increased in frequency ever since the Trafficked in Persons 2016 report ranked Thailand as among those countries with the highest incidents of human trafficking. She also warns the government against blurring sex workers who voluntarily enter the industry with victims of human trafficking. Chantawipa argues that if the junta was committed to ending human trafficking, it would invest funds into exposing the networks of influential people and even state officials who benefit from the market — rather than chasing and arresting petty actors who may not even be victims of human trafficking, but rather voluntarily sell sex. However, the Thai Royal Police have proved unresponsive to criticisms of their sting operations against sex workers. During a meeting with the UN Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), a representative of the Royal Thai Police went as far as to deny the issue’s existence. “In the case of sting operations, I insist that the Office of the Royal Thai Police has never included them in official policy, and has never supported officers to use such measures,” claimed Maj Gen Kraibun Suadsong. This article was first published in Thai on Prachatai and translated into English by Catherine Yen. – You can follow BangkokJack on Instagram, Twitter & Reddit. Or join the free mailing list (top right) Please help us continue to bring the REAL NEWS - PayPal Read the full article

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labourpress · 7 years

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Labour calls on the Government to address the injustice and damage caused by their unlawful Employment Tribunal Fees policy

Richard Burgon MP, Labour's Shadow Justice Secretary has written to David Lidington MP, Secretary of State for Justice, following Unison's Supreme Court victory, where the Employment Tribunal Fees introduced by the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition were declared unlawful, to call on the Government to make sure that all those who were treated unfairly are now able to access the justice they deserve.

In the letter, Burgon condemns the Government’s shameful decision to unlawfully restrict access to justice for its own citizens, and calls for answers on how much public money was wasted defending their unjust policy, as well as a Government commissioned independent review of the effects on access to justice of the fees in other Courts and Tribunals.

Full text of the letter

Dear Secretary of State,

I’m writing to you following the Supreme Court’s Judgment yesterday that the Employment Tribunal Fees introduced by the Conservative / Liberal Democrat Coalition in 2013 are unlawful and impede access to justice.

This means the Ministry of Justice has been operating unlawfully for four years. Given this, it is now vital that you take urgent steps to address the injustice, unfairness and damage caused by your unlawful policy.

Your junior Minister Dominic Raab MP had no other option than to concede that the Government will have to “take immediate steps to stop charging fees in employment tribunals and put in place those who have paid”.

Please could you inform me:

• How much money from the public purse your Government has spent defending its unlawful and unjust policy?

• When the Government will be issuing a full and unequivocal apology to working people and their families for deliberately and unlawfully blocking their access to justice?

• When the Government will be issuing a full and unequivocal apology to people and families who had to undertake disclosure of their personal financial circumstances in an intrusive and even humiliating level of detail as part of the Government’s failed ‘Fee Remission’ Scheme for Employment Tribunals?

• By what date the Government will have fully reimbursed all those who were unlawfully required to pay Employment Tribunal Issue Fees and Employment Tribunal Hearing Fees?

• Whether your Government will be setting up a scheme, system or arrangements to ensure that all those who were unlawfully treated by their employers but didn’t issue an Employment Tribunal case because of the applicable Issue Fee, or didn’t proceed to the Employment Tribunal Hearing because of the applicable Hearing Fee, are restored to the position in which they would have been had it not been for your Government’s unlawful policy?

• Given the Supreme Court’s Judgment states that “In order for the fees to be lawful, they have to be set at a level that everyone can afford, taking into account the availability of full or partial remission”, will your Government now commission an independent review of the effects on access to justice of the fees in other Courts and Tribunals? Given your Government’s record of denial in relation to your unlawful Employment Tribunal Fees, it is clear that your Government cannot be trusted to carry out this review itself.

Congratulations are due to Unison for righting this wrong at the Supreme Court. It is just a shame that the Government did not listen to the trade unions, the legal community, the Labour Party or myself. If the Government had done so, it would not have found itself in the shameful position it now does – found to have unlawfully restricted access to justice for its own citizens.

Given the level of public interest in this matter, I have made this letter public. I believe it would also be in the public interest for your reply to be made public.

Yours sincerely,

Richard Burgon MP

Shadow Secretary of State for Justice & Shadow Lord Chancellor

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todaybharatnews · 4 years

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via Today Bharat On August 28, Peddulu was reunited with his family in Jagtial district of Telangana. As the airplane took off the tarmac at Dubai international airport and the seat-belt sign went off, 35-year-old Jangili Peddulu heaved a sigh of relief. He was ecstatic, thankful to his fate, even as a montage of troubling images from the last five years flashed before his eyes. At last, he was going to meet his family in a few hours. Five days earlier, on August 21, he was stopped by immigration officials at the same airport and prevented from flying out of the country, for he had only an emergency certificate or temporary passport and not the UAE administration’s exit permit to leave. Without wasting time, as soon as the airplane took off, he requested his co-passenger at the window seat for a few aerial photographs and video of “the impossible city”, a city where an individual like him, as he believed, could have become someone through sheer hard work. He is not sure if he could ever return even if he wished to. On August 28, Peddulu was reunited with his family in Jagtial district of Telangana. Now in the comforts of his residence, by the side of his wife, aging father, and schoolgoing children, Peddulu advises friends and acquaintances to never do what he had done. “I want to ask everyone to travel to the Gulf only after securing valid employment and travel documents, and never trust an agent,” Thanks to an ongoing amnesty scheme that was rolled out by the UAE administration in the wake of rising coronavirus cases, allowing all foreign nationals with VISA expired before March 1 to leave the country without a penalty or prosecution. The short-term amnesty that began on May 18 and was to end on August 18 has now been further extended till November 17. “Since May, I have been trying to come back home. Ever since the coronavirus pandemic struck Dubai, thousands of people like me had been out of work. It was a complete shutdown,” says Peddulu. He says during this period he had to borrow Rs 25,000 from home and another Rs 60,000 from a friend to clear personal dues before returning home. In Bur Dubai, Jytha Narayana, a social worker who also hails from Jagtial district of Telangana, has been running from pillar to post to help irregular migrants like Peddulu safely return home. Irregular migrants, in human rights parlance, refer to those who have been overstaying in a country. Speaking to indianexpress.com over the telephone, he says he is working currently with at least 40 migrants who had “accidentally” crossed over to Dubai from Muscat and are waiting to return home by making use of the amnesty. Most people do not have a single document to prove even their nationality, he says. “When we go to the Indian Consulate in Dubai, we should at least have documents to prove their Indian nationality. We need to get a clearance certificate from the police station concerned stating there are no active criminal cases against the applicant. In Peddulu’s case, it took three full months before he could get an emergency outpass,” says Narayana. A majority of such migrants wishing to return home are from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, he says. Swadesh Parkipandla, a resident of Jagtial and the president of Pravasi Mithra Labour Union, said in the case of such irregular migrants, a certificate is required from the district collector of the applicant’s native district in India to prove his/her nationality. In a similar case recently, the wife of another man stranded in Dubai after having crossed over from Oman four years ago appealed to the Jagtial district administration to coordinate with the Centre and the Indian Consulate in Dubai to facilitate his safe return. On August 8, along with the volunteers of the Union, Mulkala Jyothi pleaded that her husband Sathyam be brought back home. Sathyam has been working in Dubai as an irregular migrant worker and wished to return home in wake of the pandemic. According to Parkipandla, there are hundreds of irregular migrants, like Sathyam, wishing to return home. Hyderabad-Mumbai-Muscat and then Dubai Peddulu’s trysts with the Gulf started in 2010 when he first travelled to Saudi Arabia in search of a job but had to return a month. As a tractor driver in Jagtial, he was earning around Rs 6000 a month. But dreams of a better standard of living for his family once again prompted him to travel to Dubai in 2011. This time, he stayed in Bur Dubai along with several others from Telangana, did painting, welding, gardening, and everything that came his way. As a houseboy he was earning a monthly income of around Rs 60,000, six times higher than what he used to earn back home, and managed to send home nearly half of that. Later, according to him, it was when he wanted to visit his family back home that he realised that his VISA had long expired. By then, after running away from his original sponsor he had been overstaying in the country for 18 months. He was sent to jail for three days and then deported with a hefty penalty. For him, return to the village was merely physical as his mind stayed back in Dubai. The jobs back at home were no match to Dubai, in terms of the remuneration. At the same time, having been deported there was no way he could go back. Even after returning, Peddulu was in touch with people in Dubai. As time passed, his desperation was felt by some who offered to help. In 2015, he managed a visit-visa stamp for Muscat on his passport. The Oman capital was hardly the destination. “I was in touch with friends in Dubai who put me in touch with a local agent in Jagtial who, in turn, connected me to a few men from Kerala in Muscat,” he said. “It was a total package of travel from Jagtial to Dubai. I paid around Rs 1.10 lakh without enquiring about the entire details.” When he reached Muscat, the Keralites took his original passport and gave him another passport with a Muslim identity. Along with 10 others, Peddulu says he was put up in a room for the next 15 days. As it was the month of Ramzan, they mostly stayed indoors. In groups of two or three, they were shifted to Dubai in vegetable vans. “We took the highway. At the border, when the armed guards checked the vehicle and spoke to the driver in Arabic we knew anything could have happened.” It was a relief once the vehicle reached Dubai. He had already lived in Dubai for three years. He worked as a “houseboy” in several houses, worked odd-jobs making a decent living for his family back home till the pandemic struck the city. Risking life for better livelihood According to Mandha Bheem Reddy, a senior migrant rights activist and the president of Emigrants Welfare Forum, while many are cheated by organised criminals, many migrant workers have died at the Oman-UAE border when the military on either side opened fire at them. In May 2012, Durgam Bheemaiah of Velagatoor in Jagtial district was allegedly shot dead by Oman’s border security forces while he was crossing the border from Muscat to Dubai. He had gone to the Gulf in search of livelihood and ran away from his sponsor in Dubai to Oman. “He was an irregular migrant in Oman, and he was unable to pay the heavy penalty. So he chose the desert way to come back to India via Dubai,” says Bheem Reddy, adding that for over eight years the family has been awaiting an ex gratia amount from the government, but in vain. “Whether these migrants are taking this path knowingly or unknowingly, it is certain that the motive is to earn a better living for their families,” says Bheem Reddy pointing out that nearly 90 per cent of those who opt this route are senior migrants who have already lived and worked in Dubai for several years. In many cases, workers run away from their sponsors in search of better remuneration, become overstayers in that country, and face a “life ban” for violating local laws while returning to their home country. “The government will take their biometrics and deport them permanently. It is usually these immigration deportees who crossover from Oman to Dubai to rejoin their once gainful employment or even work as part-time as houseboys, car washers, etc which are quite lucrative.” Forgery, Impersonation and illegal use of passport On his return to Mumbai, Peddulu was briefly detained and questioned by the immigration officials at Mumbai International Airport based on a lookout circular issued against him. Days after he had traveled to Muscat in 2015, the Dabolim Airport Police Station in Goa arrested a 31-year-old man named Syed Baseer Ahmed, a native of Tamil Nadu, on charges of forgery, impersonation and utilising the genuine passport issued to Peddulu, by replacing the photograph. According to a summons notice from the Goa police dated September 14, 2015, Peddulu is a witness in the case. According to another notice, dated 26 July, 2016, the Regional Passport Officer-Hyderabad, had sought a written explanation from Peddulu regarding his passport found being used by another person. Failure to explain could result in action against him under the Passport Act, 1967. “At the airport, he was served a notice under Section 41 CrPC directing him to cooperate in the investigation and released on a personal bond. He is suspected of having sold his passport. In this case, it was another Indian who returned or else it could have been anyone. That is a threat to national security,” said Bheem Reddy. Migrants rights activists have been voicing out against organised human trafficking of workers who end up in a foreign country as ‘irregular migrants’ without any access to health or justice. They urged the government to thoroughly investigate such cases so as to prevent it.

#IFTTT #Today Bharat

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khalilhumam · 4 years

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Harrowing tales from African domestic workers in Lebanon

New Post has been published on http://khalilhumam.com/harrowing-tales-from-african-domestic-workers-in-lebanon/

Harrowing tales from African domestic workers in Lebanon

Migrant workers are deprived of basic human rights

Portrait of domestic worker Hellina Desta. Seven years ago, Hellina migrated from Ethiopia to work in Beirut, Lebanon, and has been working for her current employer since 2015. Photo taken in Beirut, Lebanon, August 18, 2015. Photo by UN Women/Joe Saade via Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Nine Nigerian women are currently sleeping on the streets of Beirut, Lebanon, after they were laid off as domestic workers during the height of the coronavirus pandemic. The women had approached the Nigerian Embassy for help but were turned down, according to a Middle East Eye report on June 23. Nigeria’s ambassador to Lebanon, Goni Modu, reportedly told the women to “go back to their masters” while they await evacuation. Lebanon is currently undergoing a stringent financial crisis exacerbated by the pandemic which has led to increased job loss. However, these nine domestic workers don’t hold normal jobs. African domestic workers in the Gulf and Arab countries are essentially domestic slaves — and the labour laws in these countries perpetuate the exploitation and abuse.

Domestic slavery in the Gulf and Arab countries

In April, Temitope Olamide Ariowolo, 31, a Nigerian woman, was advertised for sale at $1,000 United States dollars on Facebook by Wael Jerro, a Lebanese man. Jerro posted Ariowolo’s international passport on the Facebook group, “Buy and Sell in Lebanon,” according to screenshots obtained by Middle East Eye before the post was deleted.

A man has been arrested in Lebanon for allegedly putting up a Nigerian maid for sale. In a Facebook advert he had said the 30-year-old domestic worker could be bought for $1,000. Read more https://t.co/ZOpBkzFIgi #BBCAfricaLive pic.twitter.com/tjtlfQzLVp — BBC News Africa (@BBCAfrica) April 23, 2020

Jerro has since been arrested.

Breaking news on Trafficked Nigerian girl for sale on Facebook by a Lebanese. The Lebanese Govt just announced the arrest of Mr. WAEL JERRO for onward prosecution against criminal sales of a human, a young Nigerian girl. 1/2 https://t.co/BBkIscyGHr — Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (@nidcom_gov) April 23, 2020

But Ariowolo refused to return to Nigeria even after the intervention of the Nigerian Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM) offered to evacuate her. Abike Dabiri, head of NIDCOM, stated that 69 abused domestic workers were evacuated back to Nigeria.

50 trafficked Nigerian women have been rescued from Lebanon & returned home.They've all been placed in quarantine as a precaution against coronavirus. Last month,a Nigerian woman working as a maid in Lebanon was rescued after being put up for sale on Facebook for $1,000. pic.twitter.com/nspCTiLKqg — Josey Mahachie (@MahachieJosey) May 26, 2020

Early this month, the Lebanese Embassy in Nigeria suspended domestic work visas to “address rights, abuses and violations” of Nigerian household staff in Lebanon. But this abuse of household workers is not exclusive to Lebanon, — it is rampant throughout the Gulf region.

Dear @GeoffreyOnyeama @naptipnigeria @abikedabiri kindly help Nigerian ladies who are treated as slaves in the name of maids in #lebanon and #oman to come back home. Several of them are depressed, they need your help to come back home. Thank you. — adekola damilola (@adekoladammy) May 19, 2020

In August 2018, two Nigerian migrant domestic staff were killed in Riyadh by their Saudi Arabian hosts. Young girls are usually recruited as housekeepers by registered agencies in Nigeria. Nigeria’s Daily Trust newspapers revealed that contract stipulates that within the first 24-months, the servants “must not ask for a salary increment, stop work or runaway, or refuse to work or finish the contract, even for one day.”

The Kafala system and migrant labour

The Kafala sponsorship system allows a migrant to work in Gulf and Arab countries by tying their immigration status to their employer. The conditions are slave-like because the migrant worker typically gives up most of their rights in exchange for a contract, allowing for abuse with impunity. Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Jordan, and Lebanon, all actively participate in this system that provides temporary, cheap labour during economic prosperity and equally discarded during less affluent periods, according to the International Labour Organization:

The migrant worker cannot enter the country, transfer employment nor leave the country for any reason without first obtaining explicit written permission from the kafeel [employer]. The worker must be sponsored by a kafeel in order to enter the destination country and remains tied to this kafeel throughout their stay. The kafeel must report to the immigration authorities if the migrant worker leaves their employment and must ensure the worker leaves the country after the contract ends, including paying for the flight home. Often the kafeel exerts further control over the migrant worker by confiscating their passport and travel documents, despite legislation in some destination countries that declares this practice illegal.

This system, which requires the absolute dependence of the worker on their employer, is an obvious example of modern-day slavery. It promotes the abuse of migrant workers. For instance, this Tanzanian woman was forced to work “like a robot” without rest or days-off in Oman for three years. Her employer constantly reminded her: “I bought you for 1,560 rials ($4,052 USD) from Dubai. Give it back to me and then you can go,” whenever she asked for food or improved working conditions. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfKWr65siHY] Consequently, migrant workers have two grim options: Put up with the exploitative conditions or escape. But those who escape are not entitled to compensation. In fact, they “can be fined, indefinitely detained and deported,” asserts Migrant Rights, an advocacy organization. It does not stop there — migrants abandoned by their sponsors can “be stranded for years” since they cannot afford the cost of a return flight ticket to their respective countries.” There is no doubt that the sponsorship kafala labour laws perpetuate the exploitation of African domestic workers. However, African states are also often complicit. Ethiopian journalist Zecharias Zelalem revealed that in 2007, the Ethiopian government hired a US-based public relations firm that lobbied US Congress to “quash a bill condemning Ethiopia’s human rights record.” To pay the PR firm, they misappropriated over $600,000 USD from its consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The embezzled funds had actually been raised by Ethiopians in Diaspora to rescue “Ethiopian domestic workers languishing in Lebanon,” Zelalem learned. The case was discussed on Twitter:

After a spate of suicides by Ethiopian domestic workers in Lebanon,Ethiopians there raised $640,000 to support their community. Then it disappeared. None knew where it went, until now Via @mailandguardian pic.twitter.com/qVsSntJDvh — mwanaume.com (@MarigaThoithi) June 1, 2020

In many African nations including Nigeria, policy confusion, weak regulatory laws and enforcement — compounded by victims’ desperation to migrate to greener pastures abroad — has fueled this human trafficking disguised as domestic work.

Migrant domestic workers march for improved working conditions and labor laws in Beirut, Lebanon, November 19, 2015, via Migrant Domestic Workers on Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0.

The Kafala system directly contravenes ILO's International Labour Standards that promote “decent and productive work, in conditions of freedom, equity, security and dignity.” Sadly, since the adoption of ILO's Decent Work for Domestic Workers Convention C187 in 2011, only 29 countries have ratified it. On the other hand, Gulf and Arab countries like Oman, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Lebanon — and their African counterparts like Ethiopia, Nigeria, Tanzania — are yet to ratify and domesticate this law. The redress of a bitter history of exclusion and injustice to migrant domestic workers may seem far-fetched. But Myrtle Witbooi, president of the International Domestic Workers Federation (IDWF) is optimistic: “One day, we will all be free,” she said.

Written by Nwachukwu Egbunike · comments (0) Donate · Share this: twitter facebook reddit

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thechasefiles · 5 years

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The Chase Files Daily Newscap 5/14/2019

Good MORNING #realdreamchasers! Here is The Chase Files Daily News Cap for Tuesday 14th May 2019. Remember you can read full articles for FREE via Barbados Today (BT) or Barbados Government Information Services (BGIS) OR by purchasing by purchasing a Daily Nation Newspaper (DN).

PS SENT ON LEAVE – Seibert Frederick, a long-standing civil servant and permanent secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, has been sent on leave effective yesterday. He was apparently sent after nine months in the senior position. Frederick has been replaced by Terry Bascombe, a former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Small Business, Entrepreneurship and Commerce, who was supposed to take up the position of Special Envoy to the Republic of Suriname last January. Yesterday, a memo written on the ministry’s letterhead and signed by Frederick, which he sent to staff at the ministry, was widely being circulated. (DN)

PRINCIPAL SUSPENDED – Valdez Francis, the principal at Grantley Adams Memorial, who was at the centre of a student protest at the school last year, has been suspended. Minister of Education Santia Bradshaw confirmed recently that Francis was no longer at the Blackman’s, St Joseph school. “Mr Francis has been suspended and the ministry is carrying out an investigation following the findings of an inspection report. As I am sure you would appreciate, I wouldn’t want to say anything more at this stage which may prejudice those investigations,” she stated. Sources told THE NATION that on one of the occasions when several ministry officials were at the school, a fight broke out resulting in the search and confiscation of several weapons. (DN)

CLASSES AFFECTED BY CONSTRUCTION - Ongoing construction of the Maria Holder Nursery School in Government Hill, St Michael has resulted in a disruption of classes at the nearby Springer Memorial Secondary School. A source close to the developments told Barbados TODAY the construction has resulted in a lot of dust in the area. The project which started on April 22, is scheduled to be completed on July 13, 2020. Parents of the Charles F. Broome Memorial Primary School were notified in an April 16 letter from Principal Dr Monica Walton that the construction area would be properly fenced to “ensure the safety of students and school personnel”. However, with Springer Memorial Secondary School located downwind from the development classes have been interrupted. President of the Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union Mary-Anne Redman told Barbados TODAY Acting Principal of the school Mitchelle Maxwell held a meeting with the staff to determine ways of mitigating the ill effects of the construction. “The school day will be shortened to allow for heavy construction work to start after that time. School ends at 1.p.m. The Principal and union have also agreed that classrooms and staff rooms are wiped down before the start of school every day. These measures were put in place to ensure that there is minimal discomfort and health threats to staff and students alike,” Redman said. A circular signed by Maxwell said upon receiving permission from the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training the school would be closing at 1 p.m. from Monday, May 13 to Friday May 24, 2019. The circular also noted students were required to attend school only on days identified during weeks five and six. First-year-students were expected to report for school today May 13, and again on Monday, May 20 next week. Second-year students are expected at school again on Tuesday, May 21. Third year-students are required to attend school on Thursday, May 16 and Wednesday, May 22 only while fourth year-students will report to the Government Hill, St Michael institution for classes on Friday May 17 this week as well as Thursday, May 23 and Friday, May 24. (BT)

SUPPORT FOR MAGISTRATE – Former educator John Goddard is giving Chief Magistrate Christopher Birch a thumbs up for the way he handled a schoolboy who came before him for beating a teacher. In fact, Goddard is sending a warning to authorities that the violence in schools may cause young people to turn their heads from the teaching profession. Last week, when the fourteen-year-old student appeared before the court for beating the teacher over a cell phone battery, Chief Magistrate Birch told him he must have been on drugs, and remanded him to the Government Industrial School for 28 days. Birch also ordered that the young man receive a drug test. While speaking at the Democratic Labour Party (DLP), lunchtime lecture, at the George Street Auditorium, Belleville, St Michael, last Friday, Goddard, applauded the Chief Magistrate’s approach. “I applaud Magistrate Birch for the reprimand which he gave to that boy,” Goddard said. Goddard said he was concerned that a disruptive subculture was impacting negatively on schools, making the job of teachers a nightmare. He said that some children have absolutely no respect for teachers. “And after a recent statement in the House of Assembly, children now believe that teachers have no authority. I warned about that. I don’t know if ya’ll read the article I wrote, but I warned about that. But what is happening now, is that principals are being challenged, teachers are experiencing old hell in the schools, because the children let them know, you can’t touch me.“You can’t even say anything to them. That teacher that we are talking about, did not touch the child, except for taking the cellular phone [battery] to make sure that it is not going to cause any disruption in the class, but the boy went for a piece of wood with two nails to beat the teacher. Were it not for those two male teachers who intervened, God knows what would happen with that teacher,” Goddard said. Addressing the topic: Advancing the Education Agenda, the former educator noted that teachers were not paid well in the first place, and then they are being exposed to “the nonsense going on in schools”, may cause young men and women not to want to take up the teaching profession. “If I were young now, I don’t know that I would go into teaching,” he said. Goddard said a political party serious about development in Barbados, must come up with a clear and comprehensive strategy for advancing education on the island. (BT)

WORRYING TREND – Acts of violence “on par with boys” have replaced wandering as the principal offence for wayward girls here. Registrar of the Supreme Court Barbara Cooke-Alleyne, said girls were now “on par” with boys as it relates to charges for assault and assault occasioning actual bodily harm. She made the revelations at the opening of the 11+ Programme In The Winners’ Circleat the New Dimension Ministries this morning. “In 2017, the popular charge for a girl was wandering, [followed by] wounding, serious bodily harm, assault, theft, indecent language and drugs. For the boys, it was assault, bodily harm and wounding. “[But], in 2018 there was an amazing change for the girls. We realized that wandering is no longer a top charge for girls in Barbados. It is assault occasioning actual bodily harm. The girls are now on par with the boys.” She explained that many of the girls who came to court saw domestic violence in their homes as parents fought and quarrelled with each other. She added that these girls in turn then acted out what they saw at school or in their other environments. But the Registrar added it was recognized that some of the problems also stemmed from children having Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), mental disorders and some who were “truly depressed”. “It is more the girls than the boys who are depressed, and the reports also show that girls have a higher likelihood of being abused in the household as opposed to the boys. So, this shift you are seeing is a great concern,” Cooke-Alleyne pointed out. She told the students of Hindsbury Primary, St. Matthews Primary and the Rock Christian School, that the “In The Winners’ Circle” programme was timely as it was designed to teach young people how to deal with conflict. She added that the one lesson she wanted the students to take away was how to deal with conflict resolution. “You have options, you have choices… and we want to change how our young ladies are behaving in society,” she said, noting the programme was designed to prepare those who sat the Common Entrance Examination for secondary school. The programme, now in its 11th year, will focus on topics such as Bullying, Drug Use; Your Body and You; the Law and You; and the Consequences of Actions. For the first time, the programme will be conducted nationally, targeting over 3, 500 students who took this year’s 11+ examination over a two-week period from May 13 to 28, at 13 centres across the island. The initiative, which is sponsored by the Maria Holder Trust and Guardian Insurance, is also intended to target parents through a workshop to assist them with the transition process. (BT)

LABOUR REFORM – The membership-based organisation tasked with representing and assisting private sector employers with their people management strategy in Barbados is calling for an urgent overhaul of labour legislation in order to help boost productivity. In addition, officials of the Barbados Employers’ Confederation (BEC) have complained that concepts on aging and pensioners’ involvement in economic activity should be revisited. Addressing a media conference at the BEC’s Braemer Court, St Michael office today, president of the association Marguerite Estwick said she believed it was time for a “modern labour code” to be developed for Barbados. “It will bring order, it will identify some areas where there are significant gaps . . . and modernize how we treat with labour legislation in Barbados,” said Estwick “We urge the current Minister of labour to bring good order to the industrial relations environment and to provide the legislative requirement to guide the process for all stakeholders,” said Estwick. There are about two-dozen pieces of legislation governing labour relations in Barbados. She said while the industrial relations environment remained relatively stable in 2018, the BEC remained concerned that the demands made by trade unions were not in keeping with the economic reality facing the country. “The other area of critical concern about the current body of labour legislation is the need to update the trade union legislation to make provisions for the glaring gap that relates to decertification,” she said, adding that requests have been made since 2008 for that issue to be addressed. Decertification relates to the process of an employee terminating a union’s right to represent them. Presenting her report for the financial year ending April 30, 2019, Estwick said the year saw a heavy focus on economic recovery, with a record of more than a dozen meetings being held with the social partners. “There is a clear and most urgent mandate that the government reforms its human capital management and strategic workforce management, its approach to talent acquisition and talent retention, its strategy for continuous learning and for the creation of an agile public sector operation,” said Estwick. She added that if the country were to remove the cyclical economic challenges linked to inadequate productivity, Government’s human resources strategy “must engender a modern and robust human resource infrastructure that will allow for the attraction and retention of a cadre of highly motivated talent, the harnessing of resources and infrastructure to manage performance and other workplace practices”. As such, the trained human resource executive said “It is clear that there is an urgent need to revise old legislation, update costly and colonial vestiges in our civil service, implement new people management policies and reward systems, and introduce new arrangements for workdays and the hours of work.” She said there was also an urgent need to revise a list and treatment of public holidays and to revise archaic sections of the national insurance legislation that foster “non-productive” practices. In fact, Estwick said the time had come for a national dialogue to take place on legislation that may unintentionally discriminate against retired persons. “Legislation should discourage ageism,” said Estwick. She explained that sections of the National Insurance and Social Security Act that prohibits a government pensioner earning an income should be updated in order to reflect “modern concepts” that encourage national participation and independence for older citizens. She said the BEC regrets the somewhat slow progress from the Labour Department in relation to repeated requests to review issues associated with the Holidays with Pay Act. She said the BEC had one recent meeting with the Labour Department in that regard, and she was hoping that the pace with which those consultations would be carried out would increase. Estwick warned that officials should not allow their efforts toward reform to wane as soon as there was any slight improvement or turnaround in fortunes. (BT)

TRANSPORT BOARD EMPLOYEES USING SEVERANCE TO JOIN TAP – Government’s Transportation Augmentation Programme (TAP) is finally beginning to gain some traction. And at least three more vehicles will soon be added to its fleet, following a decision by two former Transport Board workers to use their severance to purchase minibuses for the programme. A third employee will join them when his severance is finalised at the end of May. Chairman of the Transport Authority Ian Estwick this afternoon disclosed that as of last Friday 28 public service vehicles (PSVs) had signed up to TAP, while close to another 50 applications were being processed. “As of Friday May 10 we were at 28 active and we had 42 pending. Those 42 that are pending are at various stages of the process and we had another three today, so I think it’s moving along nicely,” Estwick said during a press briefing at the authority’s Constitution River Terminal. At that briefing, Adrian Gibbs, Fabian Thorne and Ryan Daniel who have spent a combined 59 years at the state-owned Transport Board were lauded by Minister of Transport, Works and Maintenance Dr William Duguid for their decision to enter TAP. The 52-year-old Gibbs and 49-year-old Daniel both accepted voluntary separation packages in the last phase of layoffs at the Transport Board in March, while Thorne, 44, has accepted a package in the upcoming wave of retrenchments set to take place this month. “Essentially what they are doing is that all three are joining onto the TAP and the benefit is that the severance that they are accessing by virtue of having worked some 20 years at the Transport Board, they’re leveraging that severance to be able to purchase a vehicle and put that vehicle into TAP,” Dr Duguid said. “So this is the perfect model of empowering our people who were drivers at the Transport Board for years and encouraging them to become entrepreneurs, to use and leverage not only the opportunity from the severance but also their experience and knowledge from working in the Transport Board to now come and offer their services. I want to use these three men as a model…” Duguid said the three men would be given the opportunity to purchase duty-free vehicles. Both Thorne and Daniel described their decision as “a dream come true”. The three men said they would be encouraging other workers at the Transport Board to follow in their footsteps. Gibbs, who worked as a driver for 20 years, told members of the media he had confidence in the programme. “As a young man I still have to work. If I took the severance and don’t work it would go along and I would have nothing, so the reality is that you have to be focused as to what you do with the money. “I have confidence in the TAP programme,” Gibbs said. With the severance payment expected this week, Daniel said he was looking to purchase a vehicle as soon as the funds were received. He admitted he had been working towards this goal. “I had been working towards this for a good little while and I was only too happy to hear that the minister was ready to meet with us and I wasted no time in getting here,” Daniel said. Thorne will be leaving his post as acting supervisor at monthend for what he described as a viable business venture. “I think this is an excellent opportunity for me personally and for anyone to take their severance package and leave the Transport Board to start their own business. “It’s an excellent business opportunity and I will encourage my comrades back at work to take the opportunity right now to use the severance and come onboard with the TAP programme,” Thorne said. (BT)

LAND’S END – The compulsory acquisition of land on Bay Street for the construction of a new and improved Hyatt Centric Hotel has hit another snag. Barbados TODAY understands there is disagreement between government and at least one landowner over the value of the real estate and the necessary price for acquisition to occur. Attorney General, Dale Marshall disclosed that at the center of the disagreement is the land owned by businesswoman, Asha Ms Ram Mirchandani on the spot which currently houses the Liquidation Center. “The owners have told the Government of Barbados that they have no difficulty acquiring the property, but they want a certain amount of money and the valuations we have don’t support that. So it is a process that we’re going through, but at this point I don’t know if there’s any sense elevating it beyond what it is,” said Marshall. “Every time the government seeks to acquire property, it exercises its right of eminent domain and an owner would have his right to a view as to whether it is worth X or Y and as far as I am concerned that is the only issue between the Government of Barbados and the owners of the property.” While Ms Ram refused to comment on the disagreement, she directed Barbados TODAY to her son, Rabi Mirchandani, a director of the family business. He indicated that after contracting a “reputable” real estate company to provide a valuation of the property and providing a copy to the government, the company was yet to receive a response. During a March 13 sitting of Parliament, Prime Minister Mia Mottley revealed that Government was against the previous plan of having the Hyatt built on two spots in Bridgetown. She said it would now be constructed on three lots after Government’s compulsory acquisition of land, which includes the nearby Mirchandani-owned property. At the time, she expressed hope that “we can reach an amicable agreement on the quantum of price”. In his response however, Mirchandani said: “The Government of Barbados expressed an interest to purchase our land on Bay Street on which the Liquidation Center operates. We were informed the purpose of purchase is to facilitate the Hyatt project, which we recently became aware, is to increase from 189 rooms and 19 residences to 350 rooms.” “Conversations led to negotiations where each party was to provide a current market valuation of the land using the land acquisition rules,” said Mirchandani in a statement. The acquisition process still requires parliamentary approval, after which “it shall be lawful for the Governor General…to declare the land to have been acquired…” according to section 5 of the Land Acquisition Act, Cap. 228. By that time however, the Mirchandani family is hoping to have the matter settled on good terms. “We have been operating the business, the Liquidation Center since 1993 and quite a number of employees and customers who have supported us over 25 years all depend on us as we do on them. The cost for relocation of our business was calculated by a reputable real estate company and while we recognize the keen interest of the government to see the Hyatt hotel become a reality, we too would like the opportunity to continue our family business even if it is at an alternate location,” said Rabi. The project, which was first announced in October 2014 by then Minister of Tourism, Richard Sealy under a Democratic Labour Party (DLP) administration has been fraught with controversy. Ms Ram at the time placed her full support behind the project, indicating in February 2017 that she intended to take full advantage of the development. The following month, social activist David Comissiong filed an injunction for a judicial review of the permissions granted by then Prime Minister Freundel Stuart to Hyatt developer Mark Maloney for construction of the hotel. This was based on a perceived failure by Maloney to carry out an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) at the construction site. At the time, he also questioned the impact the proposed 15-storey hotel would have on the area, which has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. Following a change of government, Comissiong, now Barbados’ Ambassador to CARICOM expressed his willingness to withdraw the legal challenge if Government agreed to his key demands. (BT)

CHINA STRIKES BACK – Sending Wall Street into a slide, China announced higher tariffs Monday on $60 billion worth of American goods in retaliation for President Donald Trump’s latest penalties on Chinese products. Duties of 5% to 25% will take effect on June 1 on about 5,200 American products, including batteries, spinach and coffee, China’s Finance Ministry said. With investors worried about the potential economic damage on all sides from the escalating trade war, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 617 points, or 2.4%, and the technology-heavy Nasdaq plunged 270 points, or 3.4%, its biggest drop of the year. Earlier, stocks fell in Europe and Asia. “We appear to be in a slow-motion train wreck, with both sides sticking to their positions,” said William Reinsch, a trade analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a former U.S. trade official. “As is often the case, however, the losers will not be the negotiators or presidents, but the people.” Beijing’s move came after the U.S. raised duties Friday on $200 billion of Chinese imports to 25%, up from 10%. In doing so, American officials accused China of backtracking on commitments it made in earlier negotiations. The same day, trade talks between the two countries broke up without an agreement. On Twitter, Trump warned Xi that China “will be hurt very badly” if it doesn’t agree to a trade deal. Trump tweeted that Beijing “had a great deal, almost completed, & you backed out!” The rising trade hostilities could damage the economies of both countries. The tariff increases already in place have disrupted trade in such American products as soybeans and medical equipment and sent shockwaves through other Asian economies that supply Chinese factories. Still, the two countries have given themselves something of an escape hatch: The higher Chinese tariffs don’t kick in for 2? weeks. The U.S. increases apply to Chinese goods shipped since Friday, and those shipments will take about three weeks to arrive at U.S. seaports and become subject to the higher charges. Also, both countries have indicated more talks are likely. Top White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said Sunday that China has invited U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to Beijing. But nothing has been scheduled. And Trump said Monday that he expects to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping in late June at the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan. The president has repeatedly insisted that increased tariffs on Chinese goods don’t hurt American consumers. But Kudlow, head of the president’s National Economic Council, acknowledged over the weekend that U.S. consumers and businesses will bear some of the costs. “Both sides will pay,” he told Fox News. In the U.S., prices of soybeans, targeted by Chinese tariffs last year, fell Monday to a 10-year low on fears of a protracted trade war. In a statement, American Soybean Association President Davie Stevens, a soybean farmer from Clinton, Kentucky, expressed frustration that “the U.S. has been at the table with China 11 times now and still has not closed the deal. What that means for soybean growers is that we’re losing. Losing a valuable market, losing stable pricing, losing an opportunity to support our families and our communities.” Trump told reporters Monday that a new program to relieve U.S. farmers’ pain is “being devised right now” and predicted that they will be “very happy.” The administration last year handed farmers aid worth $11 billion to offset losses from trade conflicts. Trump seemed to suggest that the aid will make up for or partially cover the $15 billion that he said represented “the biggest purchase that China has ever made with our farmers.” In fact, U.S. farm exports to China approached $26 billion in both 2012 and 2013 and came in at $19.5 billion in 2017 before his trade war began taking a toll on agricultural sales to China. The president’s allies in Congress scrambled to limit the damage to farm country. Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa said it is time for U.S. allies to “get in the game” to push China to the negotiating table. “China needs to get with it,” he said. “You can’t move these goalposts like they’re moving them and expect to be respected.” The highest tariffs announced by China will apply to industrial chemicals, electronic equipment, precision machinery and hundreds of food products. Beijing is running out of U.S. imports to penalize because of the lopsided trade balance between the world’s two largest economies. Chinese regulators have instead targeted American companies in China by slowing down the clearing of shipments through customs and the processing of business licenses. Oxford Economics calculated that the higher tariffs will reduce the U.S. economy by 0.3% in 2020, a loss of $490 per American household. Similarly, forecasters have warned that the U.S. tariff increases could set back a Chinese recovery that had appeared to be gaining traction. Growth in the world’s second-largest economy during the January-through-March period held steady at 6.4% compared with a year earlier, supported by higher government spending and bank lending. The tensions “raise fresh doubts about this recovery path,” Morgan Stanley economists said. The latest U.S. duties could knock 0.5 percentage points off annual Chinese economic growth, and that could widen to 1 percentage point if both sides extend penalties to all of each other’s exports, economists say. That would pull annual growth below 6%, raising the risk of politically dangerous job losses. China’s state media tried to reassure businesses and consumers that the ruling Communist Party has the means to respond. “There is nothing to be afraid of,” said the party newspaper People’s Daily. “The U.S.-instigated trade war against China is just a hurdle in China’s development process. It is no big deal.” Trump has threatened to extend tariffs to the remaining $300 billion or so in Chinese tariffs that haven’t been targeted yet, but told reporters Monday: “I have not made that decision yet.”The president started raising tariffs last July over complaints China steals or pressures foreign companies to hand over technology and unfairly subsidizes Chinese businesses that are striving to become global leaders in robotics and other technology. A stumbling block has been U.S. insistence on an enforcement mechanism with penalties to ensure Beijing carries out its commitments. (BT)

COMMISSIONER: CRIME PLAN WORKING – Even as Barbados recorded its 23rd and 24th murders in just six days and less than six months into the year, Commissioner of Police Tyrone Griffith is maintaining confidence in the plan to arrest the worrying spike in homicides and especially gun deaths. Griffith, in an interview with Barbados TODAY stressed that had it not been for the efforts of the police, the situation could have worsened. He explained that police have been successful in gathering intelligence which thwarted several “heinous acts” and the recovery of illegal firearms. “Things are working because things could be worse.… We rely a lot on intelligence and we have had quite good intelligence and as I said at the Passing Out Parade, there are some four [potential] murders that we have foiled due to good intelligence. “So, I think our plans are working and we have been recovering firearms and the hotspots are not as hot as they used to be.” Government has come in for severe criticism for its handling of crime. Last week, the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) called for the firing of Attorney General Dale Marshall and Minister of Home Affairs Edmund Hinkson. The DLP made the call in a press release, which claimed that none of the initiatives implemented by the ruling Barbados Labour Party (BLP) had worked. The DLP charged in the release: “There are efforts being made to curb this situation, we are unhappy to say that those efforts are not bearing fruit. “The DLP is once again calling on the Prime Minister Mia Mottley to mandate her Attorney General and Minister of Home Affairs to come up with workable solutions to stem the killings that are now too frequent in this country or remove them from their posts. Barbados deserves nothing less.” While making no mention of the release, Griffith poured cold water on this criticism. He pointed out that many of these shootings were executions and that the odds were therefore heavily stacked against law enforcement in preventing them. “Given what we are seeing, for the most part many of these gun related crimes are clearly executions. There is no easy way to manage executions because if individuals want to kill, it is fairly easy to do so…. Clearly if an individual goes to a remote area to shoot someone, it is difficult to police that,” he stressed. Last Friday, 29-year-old Katani Jamani Emmanuel Callender, alias Kay Kay or “Snoop”, of Sunny Side Court, Deacons Farm, St Michael, was shot and killed at Ruby Tenantry, St Philip. Callender, staying with a friend in Ruby Tenantry, St. Philip, was sitting in a chair just outside the residence when loud and sudden explosions were heard. His lifeless body was discovered by residents of the household. The previous weekend, police responded to the shooting of 46-year-old Eton Likeyn of Beckles Road, St Michael. Police say Likeyn and Andrew Michael Vanderpool of Apt 5E, Country Towers, St Michael, were having a conversation while seated in a motor vehicle. The duo were approached and surprised by a man who had his face hidden with a scarf. The armed man ordered both men out of the vehicle and proceeded to rob them of cash and valuables. Likeyn was shot and later died. (BT)

ARTHUR’S SPECIAL CASE – Richard Delisle Arthur is on trial in the Supreme Court in what Principal Crown Counsel Alliston Seale has described “a special case”. Arthur – the brother of former Prime Minister Owen Arthur – today pleaded not guilty to having 102 rounds of ammunition in his possession on January 31, 2012 without a valid licence to do so. “This is a special case. This accused is the licence holder of firearms. It is not the simple run of the mill case,” the Principle Crown Counsel told the five-man, four-woman member jury in the No. 2 Supreme Court as he opened the case against Arthur, said to be in his 50s, and from Maynards, St Peter. “Police are alleging that they had occasion to visit the residence of the accused and execute a search warrant…. They found certain things… and as a result of investigations carried out, charged the accused with possession of 102 rounds of ammunition,” Seale told the jury presided by Justice Randall Worrell. Moments later, Seale called four of seven police witnesses to the stand. Among them was firearms expert Sergeant David Leslie who revealed that the 102 rounds of ammunition handed to him on February 14, 2012 for testing were assorted. The cartridges comprised of .308 Winchester calibre; 7.62 calibre; 5.56mm calibre; .32 auto calibre; .22 magnum calibre; and .22 long riffle calibre ammunition, he said. Sergeant Leslie added: “All the [ammunition] . . . are apparently live . . . all are ammunition as defined under the Firearms Act of Barbados.” Queen’s Counsel Andrew Pilgrim, who is Arthur’s lead attorney, along with Kyle Walkes questioned Sergeant Leslie on whether he knew his client as a marksman. The firearms expert declared: “Yes, I am familiar with Richard Arthur, I know him in association with shooting.” Also giving evidence today was Station Sergeant Lawrence Collymore who was attached to the Firearms Licensing Department at Station Hill in 2012. He told the jury that he was the keeper of records for issued firearms at the time. He revealed that he made a check of those records after having a conversation with Officer Dwayne Marshall on February 13, 2012. Sergeant Collymore said: “I . . . found that Richard Arthur was the holder of three armed licences. A 9 mm STI pistol; a .40 STI pistol and .38 pistol – this licence allowed him to carry 50 rounds of [that] ammunition. Both STIs were issued for sport shooting.” Collymore went on to explain that once a firearm licence was granted for personal protection, the Commissioner of Police assigns a specific quantity of ammunition to go with that licence. According to him, if the firearm is issued for sport shooting no ammunition is assigned to those licences. Through questioning by the Principal Crown Counsel the officer went on to reveal that there were four members shooting clubs in Barbados with one of them now defunct. Ammunition used at the clubs he said are purchased and dispensed of at that location and unused ammunition must be returned to the executive member or appointee of the club. That member he explained is “supposed” to store the used ammunition at the requisite storage facility. He added: “Based on my investigations in 2012 he [Arthur] was not an executive member of any club in Barbados. He was an executive member prior to that [but] sometime between 2009 and 2010 his status as an executive member had ended.” But he said that an executive member “certainly” could not keep their ammunition at home. Pilgrim cross-examined Collymore and put forward three of the “purported” licences granted to his client. He questioned whether those licenses were documents proffered by the Royal Barbados Police Force, to which Collymore answered “yes”. The officer was also asked whether the three documents showed that Arthur had the right to have 50 cartridges for each licenced firearm. Collymore answered: “This is what the licences are saying sir”. But Pilgrim went on: “But none of them says you can hold 50 cartridges of .22, .308, .306 . . . none of them said anything like that?” The officer responded: “No sir”. After several more questions by the defence attorney, the case was adjourned until 9 a.m. tomorrow when more of the Crown’s witnesses are to give evidence. (BT)

WEED IN THE FRIDGE COSTS COOL CASH – Possession of a traffickable amount of marijuana has cost a 30-year-old salesman $1,500 over the next two months. The fine was imposed on Quamie Kareem Cox, of Arsensal Road, Jackson, St Michael today after he pleaded guilty to charges of possession, possession with intent to supply and possession with intent to traffic the illicit substance. Sergeant Edwin Pinder told Magistrate Kristie Cuffy-Sargeant that two jars, carrying 69.2 grammes of cannabis, were recovered from a fridge in his backyard when police executed a search warrant at this house on May 12. When asked to account for the substance, Cox said: “This is mine, officer”. If Cox fails to pay the sum imposed on the trafficking charge he will spend four months in prison. Cox must return to the District ‘A’ Magistrates’ Court on July 16 to show proof of payment. He was reprimanded and discharged on the other two offences. (BT)

COMMUNITY SERVICE FOR CANNABIS – A District ‘A’ Magistrate today sentenced an Eden Lodge man to 160 hours of community service on a drug charge. When Michael Eugene Kareem Spooner, 26, of Quarry Road saw police patrolling in the community on May 11, he ran off clutching his pocket. He was quickly apprehended and searched, where 21 small freezer bags were found containing cannabis. “I got that to smoke,” Spooner told police at the time he was detained. Sergeant Edwin Pinder told Magistrate Kristie Cuffy-Sargeant the illegal drug weighed 6.22 grammes. Spooner, who has no previous criminal record, has been ordered to return on August 9 to update the magistrate on his service. (BT)

MICE ALL OVAL – The Mecca of cricket has become a mansion for mice. Kensington Oval, the architectural jewel in the crown of cricket venues in the Caribbean, was forced to close its doors twice last week after droppings were discovered, and staff of the Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) and Kensington Oval Management Inc. (KOMI) given the option of leaving their desks. Efforts are now under way to have a second wave of industrial cleaning done at the Fontabelle, St Michael facility to rid especially the administrative offices of any clutter, or even discarded food utensils that may have attracted vermin there in the first place. Kensington Oval is managed by KOMI and houses its offices, as well as the BCA’s. Chief executive officer of KOMI, Ben Toppin, confirmed to THE NATION that news of droppings being found had been communicated to KOMI, and immediate action taken at the end of last week. (DN)

WEST INDIES GO DOWN TO BANGLADESH AGAIN - Half centuries by Shai Hope and captain Jason Holder were not enough and West Indies lost to Bangladesh in Dublin, Ireland, today. Hope scored 87 and Holder 62, but West Indies struggled to reach 247 for nine and did not bat out the 50 overs in the fifth match of the Tri-Nation series. Mustafizur Rahman and Mashrafe Mortaza combined for seven wickets. In reply, Bangladesh eased to 248 for five, winning by five wickets with 16 balls remaining. Mushfiqur Rahim scored 63, Soumya Sarkar 54 and Mohammad Mithun chipped in with 43. Ashley Nurse took three for 53. The two teams will play again on Friday in the final match. (DN)

POORAN SIGNS WITH AMAZON WARRIORS – Nicholas Pooran has been signed by the Guyana Amazon Warriors as their Marquee Player for the 2019 Hero Caribbean Premier League. The Trinidadian wicket-keeper batsman played for the Barbados Tridents last year. Pooran has played 11 T20 Internationals for the West Indies and has become a fixture in T20 tournaments around the world. He is also a member of the West Indies squad for the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup. This will be the third CPL team that Pooran has represented, having started his career with the Trinbago Knight Riders before moving to the Tridents. The rest of the Amazon Warriors squad will be decided at the Hero CPL Player Draft which takes place on May 22. Omar Khan, Team Operations Manager, for the Amazon Warriors, said: “Nicholas is amongst the very best T20 batting talents in the world and we wanted to bring him into our team as we push to go one better than last year where we finished as runners-up. He is explosive and exciting, and we are very pleased to be able to have such an impressive young talent representing the Guyana Amazon Warriors this year.” The 2019 CPL will take place from September 4 to October 12. (DN)

TIGHT GAMES IN U-21 NETBALL - The second round of matches in the inaugural Under-21 Netball Tournament generated several close finishes and lots of excitement at the Netball Stadium on Sunday. With the impasse between the Barbados Netball Association and the umpires apparently resolved, the officials cut an impressive figure in their green and white outfits while the players provided some thrilling moments for the vociferously supportive crowd in the stands. Many of those spectators and netball officials received gifts compliments of the BNA honouring Mother’s Day. Ironically, Island Ice Queens added the most heat as they remained out front in Zone 2 by grounding Tropical Luxury Tours Lightning 42-35 to move to 15 points. (DN)

LONE GOAL PUTS WALES IN - Weymouth Wales’ hopes of winning a domestic double remain alive as the reigning Premier League champions sent knockout holders Paradise crashing out of the Barbados Football Association’s (BFA) Champions Cup at the quarter-final stage. The experienced Walton Burrowes was the hero on Sunday night at the Wildey Turf, scoring the lone goal in the 28th minute to give Wales a 1-0 victory and a spot in the semi-final. It came against the run of play. Under pressure from a wave of Paradise attacks, full-back Ricardio Morris’ right-footed clearance fell into the path of Burrowes, who was heavily marked by central defender Barry Skeete. The former national captain opted to head back towards goalkeeper Jason Boxill, but Burrowes showed great awareness and anticipation to intercept Skeete’s mistimed back-pass and lobbed the ball over the head of the advancing Boxill, who was miles off the goal line. (DN)

NURSE TO RECEIVE OFFICIAL FUNERAL – Legendary Barbados and West Indies cricketer, Seymour Nurse, will be accorded an Official Funeral on Friday, May 17, at Kensington Oval. Members of the public are invited to pay their respects at the service, which will begin at 9:30 a.m. The body will repose for viewing at Empire Club, Pavilion Road, St Michael, on Wednesday, May 15, from 4 to 6 p.m. and at Cricket Legends of Barbados, Fontabelle, St Michael, on Thursday, May 16, from 4 to 6 p.m. The public is invited to sign the condolence books which will be opened at the viewings. Nurse played 29 Tests for the West Indies between 1960 and 1969. The middle-order batsman made his debut against England in 1960 and in 1966, during the West Indies tour of England. In that series, he scored 501 runs in five Tests, including four fifties and a hundred. Following this performance, he was named Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1967. In addition to cricket, Nurse was a coach with the National Sports Council, a member of the Barbados Cricket Association’s Board of Management, a national selector and a manager of the Barbados senior and youth teams. Nurse passed away on Monday, May 6, at the age of 85, after a long illness. (BGIS)

HOLLYWOOD STAR DORIS DAY, SINGER OF QUE SERA, SERA, DIES AT 97 – Actress Doris Day, who became one of the greatest box-office attractions of her time as the cheery, freckle-faced personification of wholesomeness, died on Monday at the age of 97, her foundation said on Monday. Day, who co-starred with 1950s and ’60s superstars such as Rock Hudson and Cary Grant, died at her Carmel, California home after a bout with pneumonia, the Doris Day Animal Foundation said on its website. Her shiny girl-next-door image was built on a series of innocent romantic comedies, including Pillow Talk, for which Day received an Oscar nomination, That Touch of Mink and The Thrill of It All. Day also had hit records, most notably Que Sera, Sera from the movie The Man Who Knew Too Much. It became her theme song, even though she had initially been reluctant to record it. Day’s life was not always as sunny as her movie roles. She married four times, was divorced three times and widowed once, suffered a nervous breakdown and had severe financial trouble after one husband squandered her money. “My public image is unshakably that of America’s wholesome virgin, the girl next door, carefree and brimming with happiness,” she said in a memoir, “an image, I can assure you, more make-believe than any film part I ever played. But I am Miss Chastity Belt and that’s all there is to it.” “She’s the girl every guy should marry,” a critic wrote in the Saturday Review. “Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Kim Novak? They’d all be trouble. Doris Day would be true blue, understanding, direct, honest, and even a little sexy.” She was born Doris von Kappelhoff on April 3, 1922, in Cincinnati and headed to California at age 14 to be a dancer. She abandoned that dream after her right leg was broken in an auto accident. She concentrated on singing and at 16 had a job with Les Brown, one of the top orchestra leaders of the day, and recorded her first hit, Sentimental Journey, with him. She changed her surname at the suggestion of a band leader who heard her sing Day by Day. At 17, Day married Al Jorden, a trombone player who she later claimed beat her. Her only child, son Terry, was born in 1942, and the couple divorced the following year. Day’s movie debut, Romance on the High Seas in 1948, was a hit, at least in part because of Day and the Oscar-nominated song she sang in it, It’s Magic. A series of musicals followed with Day often playing a singer trying to break into the entertainment world: My Dream Is Yours in 1949, It’s a Great Feeling in 1949 and Tea for Two in 1950. In 1953, she landed the title role of Calamity Jane, and success continued in 1955 as she teamed with Frank Sinatra for the musical Young at Heart and with James Cagney for the drama Love Me or Leave Me. She expanded her range again in Alfred Hitchcock’s remake of his own The Man Who Knew Too Much, which co-starred Jimmy Stewart. Day returned to light comedy in 1957 with The Pajama Game and two years later first joined forces with Hudson for Pillow Talk, her most popular movie and the one that earned her an Oscar nomination. She and Hudson made some of the most popular – and profitable – movies of the early 1960s, including Lover Come Back, Move Over Darling and Send Me No Flowers. In 1951 Day married agent Martin Melcher and after his 1968 death, she found he had left her nearly penniless. She had a nervous breakdown in 1974 and then won $22 million in damages from Melcher’s attorney and other associates who had mismanaged her money. New success came, however, with The Doris Day Show on television, which ran for four seasons. Day did not learn until after Melcher’s death that he had committed her to do the show and she was initially reluctant to do it. In 1976, Day married restaurant owner Barry Comden but they also divorced. After retiring from performing, Day worked mainly with the Doris Day Animal Foundation, helping abused animals. Her home in Carmel, California, was usually full of dogs and cats, mostly adopted strays. She stayed away from entertainment circles for more than 20 years after accepting a lifetime achievement honour from Golden Globe organisers in 1989 but released a CD in 2011. Proceeds from the recording went to her animal foundation. (DN)

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