Ciaran Isn't Writing

How Eurovision Whitewashes Genocide A special thanks to Francis Francis for proofreading. Oh rascal children of Gaza, You who constantly disturbed me with your screams under my window, You who filled every morning with rush and chaos, You who broke my vase and stole the lonely flower on my balcony, Come back – And scream as you want, And break all the vases, Steal all the flowers, Come back, Just come back… Oh Rascal Children of Gaza, Khaled Juma, 2014 Introduction In 1948, Zionist militias expelled 750,000 Palestinian Arabs from 78% of Palestine. Hundreds of towns and villages were depopulated: their residents forced to flee and the buildings either destroyed or filled with Zionist settlers. Thousands of people were killed. Arabs remaining in Israel were subject to martial law, and still face racist discrimination in Israel. Those that were displaced in the conflict have never been allowed tov return. This was the start of ...

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all had a joyous month and are looking to the new year with excitement.  I’m not, but I hope everyone else is.  Leap years are always good luck. I mean, wasn’t 2020 great? And 2016, what a year! Look, our New Year’s Eve sucked. I’d come up to Birmingham to visit Francis, and the selfish bastard caught norovirus, so we spent the day in separate rooms, on our phones, reading, and napping. He’d stopped shitting his guts out by midnight, so I let him come up to the attic room to watch the fireworks. We could see all of Birmingham from there, and it was lit up beautifully, or as beautifully as Birmingham can be managed.  The magic wore off when we went downstairs to check on his cat, to make sure she wasn’t too scared of all the fireworks, and we found she’d killed a robin and left it on the rug. She was sat next to it too, looking… proud? Happy? Well, it certainly wasn’t “ashamed”. So we sp...

What happened? Nothing too exciting this month. A few relatives had birthdays. Went to my uncle’s surprise 60th birthday party, which is a risky game at his age. But he loved it and had a good time, and I got to eat delicious Jamaican food and see a bunch of my cousins. I hadn't seen them in years, so it was great to catch up.  I actually spent some time with my brother for his birthday. We’re not as close as I’d like, but it was nice to hang out. His girlfriend and baby were there too, and Nephew decided to claim the present I got my brother. It was a hot water bottle shaped like a triceratops, very soft and apparently very huggable. Nephew also tried some chocolate cake, which he loved. He can sort of say and sign "more", which he does at the same time. And, man, did he want more cake. My brother and his girlfriend were breaking off smaller pieces of cake for him, eventually just sprinkling crumbs onto his highchair in the hopes that picking up such tiny pieces ...

 What’s been happening How fantastic, my second blog and very little has happened this month. To me, at least.  Most of my time has been thinking about and preparing for Halloween. Honestly, it’s so nice to have a kid around to share the excitement with. My nephew loves the decorations, especially the pumpkins and lanterns, and he has a little costume and bag all ready for trick-or-treating. He wears the bag on the crook of his elbow like a handbag and it makes him look so cunty. I had a lot of trouble with my costume, namely that I had no idea what I wanted to be. Everyone else was dressing as a vampire, and I didn’t want to copy them. I have a cockroach costume I often default to, and assumed this would be what I wore. Then, on the morning of Halloween, inspiration hit. I was going to be a witch, using mostly clothes from my wardrobe. After a mad scramble to buy a hat, I got out my graduation gown, my nan’s shawl, and a belt. I glued a veil to my hat for extra ef...