So much to tell but so want sleep!

So yeah, got up at a reasonable time this morning, walked to Bournville, got into town, onto train. Nothing especially interesting to tell about this part of the day, 'cept guess who was sitting just across the aisle from us on the train? Only David Lawrence!!!!!

Um. Got there in plenty of time, and went on funky tram up to the university. They'd said that they would provide sandwiches and drinks so we had naïvely hadn't brought any lunch, only a banana and a biscuit each. The sandwiches were awfully dainty (read teensy, with hardly any filling) and it's a wonder we didn't faint from hunger before the afternoon was out!

The actual university programme went fine though. We were having the introductory lecture when who should wander in and sit down but Steven Jones and mum - this is the actual proof that mathematicians don't communicate with one another! We saw some accommodation (nothing remarkable in either direction really, buildings are a bit ugly but in nice surroundings), had a tour of the Union and Sports Centre, and went in a really cool but quite scary lift in the Arts building! It's just a series of metal boxes on a pulley system, so no doors or anything, and you've just gotta step on and off the moving platform! We also heard quite a bit about the various pub crawls that go on throughout the week!

On the maths side, we got told loads about studying in Canada/ America in the third yr (wowowow!), and the interview turned out to be all right. At the start, we'd been given schedule sheets with rooms and interviewers. They'd obviously had some problems finding enough staff to interview, so being the last on the alphabetical list, guess who had a blank.. So I got this nice lecturer guy, who'd evidently not been expecting any students at all, but he did seem to know what he was doing and everything - he just had a couple of phone calls from his wife, asking which button to press on the new car!!! I got asked a few mini maths problems, most of which I was fine on, and when we came out, he said that I'd obviously been very well taught. How do you take that? That could be a compliment, or it could mean that I had no ability and it was all down to my teachers scraping me through! But it's true that I have been very well taught!

Then to finish off we had a random guy, already retired but taken back to give his 'party piece' I assume, very funny. Think 'Sound of Music' combined with Pythagoras' Theorem!

And we met Ben as planned.. and came home to find cold fog.. and fell asleep at the keyboarddddddddddd.

Sitting here listening to the Walton CD that Mr G lent me (and that somehow mysteriously duplicated itself overnight), and I've realised that people who don't listen to classical music are missing out on the amazingness of Walton's Façade Suite for Orchestra!!!

I actually don't understand how people can listen to it and not just fall in love..

I will even part with the disk for a (short amount of) time if more people can hear the wonderfulness! Even if it's the only piece of classical music you try, go for it, it is incredible! Make your ears happy!

So it finally happened. Riots broke out in Paris' poor, immigrant communities. Deaths, god knows how much damage - and people claim to be surprised. WAKE UP CALL: THIS HAS BEEN COMING FOR ABOUT THIRTY YEARS!

If there was one reason why I'm glad that I did French AS, one thing that made the struggle worth it, it's that I now know why these riots are happening, and I am very glad that I don't live in France. It isn't just about name-calling in the street, though no doubt that goes on. It isn't that nobody's racist in this country, 'cos they are, but I don't think that it's just that I live in Birmingham. There's nothing on the scale of the French. It isn't even that individual French people are all nasty bigots. French society as a whole is just blatently and unashamedly racist.

The vast vast majority of France's immigrant society lives in inner city 'ghettos' (I'm using that word carefully), or the 'cités', as they're called. Apartment blocks, small and badly constructed, provide the accommodation. There are no facilities - a lot of homes don't have basic stuff like fridges, forget youth clubs or cinemas or anything like that. Black, Arab, Muslim, Spanish - basically anybody other than white-of-French-origin - 'outsiders' are all treated the same, especially if they are obviously not European in origin, and are basically excluded from all walks of society. Even if you have a first-class BAC and a good degree, and were born in the country, the chances are that nobody will employ you, because you are l'étranger (the foreigner), and you live in a cité. You do not receive equal treatment in the eyes of the law, however unofficially. If by some miracle you have managed to get a job, you will discriminated against until you want to leave. This has been going on for decades - and without a job, you cannot afford to move.

And it's obvious why the situation hasn't improved. In a word, secularism, and the underlying principles. If instead of celebrating people's differences, you try and make everyone conform to the French ideal, isn't it obvious that some sections of society will end up marginalised and discontented. Why do they think the BNP has had such frightening success rates?

I could go on for yonks (I already have done.. even longer, then!), but I do feel quite passionately about this. For more info, however, try the BBC website, it seems to have some quite good stuff:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/4405822.stm

I'm not one for violence, but it does make you wonder whether these riots were the best thing that could have happened, not least because it has brought the issue into the spotlight of the world's media. People have been drawing parallels with the riots in Lozells a week ago, and I may be looking at our country through rose-tinted glasses, but there's less excuse here. If they think they've got problems with racism, they should visit France.