Pri's blog

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/15/world/australia/china-students-censorship.html?_r=0 This article about the clash between the nationalism of students from mainstream China, and professors in universities in Australia, reminded me of a conversation I had with a British colleague with whom I travelled recently.  In the places we visited he often talked  and asked questions about the Chinese presence in the country, drawing also from his travels to other parts of Asia and Africa. His comments were quite critical about the way that  Chinese investment and behaviour overseas  was having  a negative impact on local economies and cultures. And there was a lot of agreement. I couldn’t help thinking  that  consternation about this growing Chinese presence, must be exactly how a different generation of peoples of Africa and Asia would have felt at the height of European colonisation!  The Brits, the Dutch, the French, the Portugese, the...

Ships in Honiara Harbour, October 2017  prifernandophotos from the Lonely Planet Guide to the Solomon Islands So today is Remembrance  Day.  A good time to remember the Solomon Islands, a site of a fierce battle in 1942 between the Americans and the Japanese, resulting in the  sinking of 67 battleships and transports, and the loss of 7,000 American and 30,000 Japanese lives.  Lonely Planet does not tell us how many islanders died during these battles, even though it says that the township of Tulagi was gutted.  #islandlivesmatter