Absolutely Anything Else

fluffy2560 wrote:

Unless it's a chain store here, it's almost impossible to get what you want here as regards your rights.   Mom and Pop ain't gonna play ball on that one and they won't be polite about it either.

My experience is the opposite. I have always had fair play by famly run businesses, the big stores do not give a damn. I am not saying you are wrong, just we must have different expreiences. Mom and Pop want your business tomorrow and the next day too, the employees of the big store just don't care, so what. I must admit an exception at MediaMarkt we took back what we thought was a faulty appliance, we wrrapped  it up etc and walked it (we do not have or need a car) and the guy at returns could not be more helpful, turned out we had somehow oh it was a hi fi speaker system, somehow not set it up right, and it went back to the factory, they tested it, caeme back to Media Markt with tesed etc and the guy on returns and collects could not have been more helpful, but I think that is very rare and I wrote to MediaMarkt to say what good service he gave - it is a kinda rule of mine that if you complain (and believe me I do) then you should also compliment, the guy on customer service probably does not get many compliments

This is why negative reviews or star ratings on e.g. tripadvisor just to pluck a name out of the air are entirely unreliable. Very few people who had a nice time will bother to say so, but very many people who had a less than nice time will bitch about it, the standard deviation curve and the star rating are not very much in alignment there.

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I do now is check the items in the shops physically

Then why not buy them in the shop while you are there?

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Unless it's a chain store here, it's almost impossible to get what you want here as regards your rights.   Mom and Pop ain't gonna play ball on that one and they won't be polite about it either.

My ex[perience is the opposite. I have always had fair play by famly run businesses, the big stores do not give a damn. I am not saying you are wrong, just we must have differet expreiences.

My experience is the same as fluffy2560.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I do now is check the items in the shops physically

Then why not buy them in the shop while you are there?

For myself, two main reasons:

1) Price -- usually cheaper from an online store
2) By EU law, you can return anything, no questions asked, within a few days with all online purchases. Thus there is no "will this store take it back or not" issue.

I think it comes down to a matter of preference all in all, i prefer to deal with people i know. I do not mind paying a little extra for that. And perhaps,  I just hate great big shopping malls they are just awful horrible places so I avoid them whenever I can.  I am not (or at leat I don't hink I am( claustrophobiic but well.... gh... just awful awful places with no daylight and nowhere to sit down nless you want to pay at the Food Court, just awful. ugh. other people seem to like them, to me they are just awful.

SimonTrew wrote:

this Hungarian habit of not demanding your consumer rights is ridiculous and someone has to take a stand and it seems that it is me.

I took a major stand once. Ended up in court. All EU consumer law was on our side. We lost. AND the judge criticized us for even claiming we had these consumer rights. We appealed. Also lost. But as least the appeal court said the judge was wrong to criticize us. We could have appealed further (to the EU level), but we had by then spend several thousands of Euro in legal fees, so gave up.

Which is why, I suspect, no one takes a stand here --- you just loose a lot of money trying to get your rights because even the courts don't acknowledge you have even basic EU consumer rights, even when the laws are suppose to be standardized in Hungary. Ergo -- even the courts default to history and local culture and ignore the international law.

Oh, yes, the EU consumer protection site for Hungary is total junk. What a shock.

SimonTrew wrote:

got a bottle of Hungarian champagne on the way home from her work, unfortunately it was, wel,l corked

Wineries or retailers are not required to replace a corked bottle.

"Western" wineries or retailers will, for reasons of good customer relations and PR.

In Hungary, they don't care about good customer relations or service, or PR in most any business. Because the market is incestuous here. They have the market tied up and could care less if you are angry and refuse to buy another bottle from them -- there are more fish in the sea.

SimonTrew wrote:

....

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I do now is check the items in the shops physically

Then why not buy them in the shop while you are there?

Because in my previous example, as you should have read, the price difference is about 10K HUF. 

So I can inspect for physical suitability at the shop, then search online for the same item elsewhere at a discount.

Moreover, the EU Distance Selling rules will apply mail order but they don't apply if bought in the shop directly.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

....

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I do now is check the items in the shops physically

Then why not buy them in the shop while you are there?

Because in my previous example, as you should have read, the price difference is about 10K HUF. 

So I can inspect for physical suitability at the shop, then search online for the same item elsewhere at a discount.

Moreover, the EU Distance Selling rules will apply mail order but they don't apply if bought in the shop directly.

And those would be derived from the UK Distance Selling Regulations which are made by the Minister of Whatever It is Called These Days under the Consumer Rights Act 2015. So we are back where we started, or perhaps not, that the UK has had the strongest consumer rights for generations with the Sale of Goods Act, Weights and Measures Acts, Unfair Trading Acs (now subsumed as the Unfair Tradings Regulations 2008).

What I am more concerned about is when the merry-go-round is a bit fast, is that unlawful under the Funfair Regulations? Stop the world, I want to get off.

SimonTrew wrote:

I think it comes down to a matter of preference all in all, I prefer to deal with people I know. I do not mind paying a little extra for that. And perhaps,  I just hate great big shopping malls they are just awful horrible places so I avoid them whenever I can.  I am not (or at leat I don't hink I am( claustrophobiic but well.... gh... just awful awful places with no daylight and nowhere to sit down nless you want to pay at the Food Court, just awful. ugh. other people seem to like them, to me they are just awful.

I don't think it matters at all with consumer and consumable goods. It's the same goods, different place.   Why spend 25% (it's not a "little") more at one place for exactly the same goods which you know has a limited lifespan just because you are on vague nodding terms with the guy behind the counter? 

My experience here is that the guy behind the counter will be just as nice to the next person who comes along here and loyalty counts for much less these days than it used to in the HU environment. 

Avoiding the malls is easier with online shopping too.  Best time to go is a school day, mid-week, around the middle of the day but not lunch time.

SimonTrew wrote:

....
And those would be derived from the UK Distance Selling Regulations which are made by the Minister of Whatever It is Called These Days under the Consumer Rights Act 2015. So we are back where we started, or perhaps not, that the UK has had the strongest consumer rights for generations with the Sale of Goods Act, Weights and Measures Acts, Unfair Trading Acs (now subsumed as the Unfair Tradings Regulations 2008).

What I am more concerned about is when the merry-go-round is a bit fast, is that unlawful under the Funfair Regulations? Stop the world, I want to get off.

Doesn't matter what happened in the UK, the EU has now taken over that aspect and now it's universal across the EU.  The fact that it seriously diluted the UK acts was lost on those in Brussels/Strasbourg.  It seems to have improved the situation here (but looks more and more like lip service). So did better things in more serious countries unlike the HUBR (HU Banana Republic) but it also messed things up elsewhere for others.

The merry-go-round will stop 31 March 2019 when the wheels fall off.  Slightly off topic but great story. I was listening to a radio show this morning and there was a report on the the EU extradition system. As far as it goes with the UK, it will collapse since the UK will remove itself from the ECHR.  Irish guy said his extradition hearing to the UK, that it would be illegal since the ECHR would have no jurisdiction over the UK post-Brexit and any sentence he would be subject to would end after Brexit and therefore his rights could violated.  Brilliant legal arguments.  Maybe the UK will get back some decent consumer protection.  If HUBR gets subjected to sanctions, then maybe we'll see a HU-exit.

fluffy2560 wrote:

My experience here is that the guy behind the counter will be just as nice to the next person who comes along here and loyalty counts for much less these days than it used to in the HU environment.

If loyalty counted for anything you would not need to have loyalty cards. I just refuse to have any credit or loyalty cards, it is just another form of debt. I do not have any debt, I owe nobody nothing. I am not rich by any standards, but I just refuse to have debt, It makes my life a bit harder, and yes I suppose I technically owe the gas company for taking their gas before they bill me for it, but even then I am on payment plans where actually the gasman and electricity company owes ME money, I am ahead of their meters. I just refuse to have debt.

A loyalty card says essentially if you shop with us or fly with us or bank with us, we will give you a discount... so why do they not give everyone that discount? You get your discount for a pound of flesh, preferably beef silverside or free drinks in business class. Your loyalty is an intangible debt, goodwill as the financial accountants have it,

Take for example the Fluffyettes. You have sunk loads of money into them and what is the reward? Changing nappies, student loans, driving lessons, etc etc they are patently on the red side of the Fluffster book, when are you going to recoup that outgoing> The fluffyettes patently are leeches within the Fluffster household, sucking money out of the housekeeping, what do you get back for it? Piles of washing and shut up Fluffy I am watching the telly.... children are definitely an economic harm and anyone who produces them should be tried for, I dunno, Overpopulation of the Planet Act 2020 or something... those like me and the missus who don;t have any are definitely an economic good as we support the Fluffyette's education without requiring any for the Trewsettes that don't exist, can live in smaller homes thus saving valuable land resources, use as a family uinit much less energy than a family of Fluffsters, can get anywhere together on a tandem bicicyle, etc etc. Children are an absolute drain on the economy and should be abolished. That is my modest proposal.

It makes my life hard but once I was in a lot of debt and got myself out, and I am never going to do it again, I am and always have been very responsible with money, but others will get you into it  debt if you let hem. and I let my three ex-partners. amd if the missus tries it then that makes four ex-partners. Neither a lender nor a borrower be, as Shakespeare has it in I imagine Merchant of Venice. I don't buy on the never-never, I can wait, i pay with money that I have and if I don't have it, I go without. I know in today's society the idea you pay as you go along is a bit absurd but then I am rather old fashioned I guess.

SimonTrew wrote:

.....suppose I technically owe the gas company for taking their gas before they bill me for it, but even then I am on payment plans where actually the gasman and electricity company owes ME money, I am ahead of their meters. I just refuse to have debt.

A loyalty card says essentially if you shop with us or fly with us or bank with us, we will give you a discount... so why do they not give everyone that discount? You get your discount for a pound of flesh, preferably beef silverside or free drinks in business class. Your loyalty is an intangible debt, goodwill as the financial accountants have it,

Take for example the Fluffyettes. You have sunk loads of money into them and what is the reward? Changing nappies, student loans, driving lessons, etc etc they are patently on the red side of the Fluffster book, when are you going to recoup that outgoing> The fluffyettes patently are leeches within the Fluffster household, sucking money out of the housekeeping, what do you get back for it? Piles of washing and shut up Fluffy I am watching the telly.... children are definitely an economic harm .....Children are an absolute drain on the economy and should be abolished. That is my modest proposal....

You try and pay your gas or electricity in advance!  We get these pre-paid yellow cheques in advance and in a moment of financial madness we tried to pay two at once, one obviously a quarter ahead.  Caused all sorts of ructions including, oddly (in my mind), sending the money back via the postman. We've had the same stuff with others.  No utilities here can cope with paying ahead.  My water bills are miniscule. I'd rather just pay like 1 year head.  Doesn't work!

Loyalty cards are indeed nonsense so I always try and take the discounts immediately if I can.  I'm quite happy to collect the points if someone else is paying.  I've got loads of air miles but not on the right airlines currently so no way to cash them in.  I might have to gift them to a relative before they run out.

Re: the Fluffyettes, yes, they cost money.  But OK, I'll play this provacative game for a moment.   

I could think of it as just a somewhat risky investment - have a kid, invest in it, grows up, scores big time, then there's payback.  Some people really do think about that. 

Here's a great example in Jeff Bezos's parents.   They put money in to Amazon and now  Bezos Parents are worth $11 billion

Lower down the scale, maybe there's someone who might actually give a damn before one is hidden away in some corner of a foreign field.

I've always thought that even if people are involuntarily childless through no fault of their own can still do wonders for society by adoption or fostering.   There's more to parenting than all the negative stuff.  It's up to individuals of course to decide what to do - their decision.  Some people don't want them - including some of my relatives.  But different strokes.

Kids can be absolutely good fun at any age. No. 1 Fluffyette was here 2 minutes ago policing my forum usage joshing me about finishing a bit of work! We had a bit of a laugh over that and while discussing incidentally Dora the Explorer costumes for dogs.   

What's not to like about it?

fluffy2560 wrote:

You try and pay your gas or electricity in advance!

I do pay my gas, leccy and water in advance, as they are all on pre-payment plans. The previous owners were, it seems, rather profligate so the estimates were WAY higher than our actual usage, but that has been paid. On current standing, the electricity company owes me over 100.000Ft by its own admission but will not pay it back. Pretty similar situation with the gas, for about 50.000Ft, and water, for about I think 30.000, that all the utilities according to THEIR OWN READINGS that I am in credit with them, i.e. that they owe ME money,

Of course I had my tongue in my cheek about children, but why should the missus and I, who have actively chosen never to have children, pay for other people's? There are far too many children, the world population has expanded enormously. It is very selfish to have children, yet society rewards parenthood in 101 different ways. We have chosen, that when we are right and settled and can be sure to bring up a child properly, then we will apply for adoption, in a few year's time, I feel no great need to pass on my own genes,

So don't get me wrong, I love children, I am an "uncle" I mean a friend not a real uncle of many of my friends' children, but that doesn't mean I have to have any and just consume more of the world's limited resources, it is in the end a very selfish act, caused by a selfish gene that wants to self-replicate. Children are even more delightful when you can hand them back to their parents when you are fed up with them

What we need is the word "unbranding". I think we have "rebranding", but the comedian Jim Moir, who was Vic Reeves, has kinda unbranded (maybe disbranded, dis- having privative force as the OED puts it) He is a very clever chap and a great comic actor, but never goes under Vic Reeves any more, and I imagine would say "that was just a character I played". yet it is not, whem you had Vic Reeves Big Night Out or Vic Reeves blah blah you cannot totally disassociate yourself from your stage persona, it does not work like that. People remember, Jim, or perhaps it is just me. Pseudonyms or pen-names etc abound, no problem, but YOU ARE THE SAME PERSON, and stop pretending you are not, it is not as if the work you did as Vic Reeves was in anyway shameful. I do not get it, really,

Always best to use your real name, I think.

Never mind. Equity, the UK actor's union, which is not only the last trade union but the last closed shop, which the closed shop (i.e. that you cannot work unless you are a member of the union) was abolished in 1981ish by thatcher, but Equity is still a closed shop. So much for equality. The faculty of arty-farty subjects send me a bunch of losers who can tell me nothing about van gogh, but i cannot put on my hit, "Somewhere my love lies sleeping (with a male chorus)" without being a member of Equity,

And they have the downright temerity to call themselves Equity! Inequity. Right, next, the Performing Rights Society... I presume you all actually pay for your music and video downloads?

I got my slip for voting in the local elections in September. Because I can be bothered to go and vote and register and vote.

So, please, if you have a vote, use it. I don't care how you vote, that is your choice, but if you have a vote, use it. Spoil your paper vote or whatever, but go and vote. If you don't then you can just shut up, if you can't be bothered to get of your arse to get to a polling station, then you can shut up.

I am allowed to disagree with you because I always vote. And do not tell me that your vote doesn't count, it is not 19th Century hungary when it was your Count that voted. Your vote does count, that is how we change govenments. The vox populi, the voice of the people may be all right on telly, but what matters is what you say at the ballot box. If you say nothing, you have no right to say anything.

So please everyone, if you have a vote, please use it. I think I shall vote with my feet, as Lenin said..

if you want honest news you have to pay for it. And that is as it should be. Newspapers are either funded by you, as a subscriber, or funded by advertisers, or usually a combination of both. Proper investigative journalism is expensive, which is why I subscribe to Private Eye, and have done for thirty years. Good news journalism costs money. The freedom of the Press is a very important thing that people seem to forget, it is OK in the US when you have First Amendment rights to say anything except shouting "fire" in a theatre (which is a bit Ironic when someone fired at Abraham Lincoln in a theater but never mind), if you want your freedom you must fight for it, vote for it, campaign for it. Write to  your MP or senator, whatever, it does count, because most people don't. I have spent many evenings in draughty parish council or district council or county council meetings to be allowed as "a member of the public" to say what I want to say (often limited to two minutes, that is how much "members of the public" are allowed)

That is one of the expressions I  hate, "members of the public". They are presumably "everyone else except my clique". I thought I was a member of the public. I thoughteverybody was. What a ridiculous way of saying "anyone else but me  and my gang".  hoi polloi in Greek, "the masses, the people". Stil the same 3000 years later.

You cannot hope to bribe or twist, Thank God! The British journalist
But seeing what the man will do, Unbribed, there's no occasion to. --- Humbert Wolfe

In the end it is we, the public, who do sway opinion, make opinion, we hoi polloi. Voting websites and surveys etc are not a reflection of our opinions, because they are funded by someone and there is then a conflict of interest. The only genuine lack of conflict of interest, assuming the vote is not rigged, is to get and vote. Don't tear signs down for the people you don't like, we live in some semblance of democracy. (demos, the people, but that is later Greek).

You or i have free choice every day, we can choose where to spend our money or not spend it or whether to save it or whether to give it to charity. We have that enormous choice. Please don't lose it. Go and vote. I am not asking you to vote for anyone,  but vote with your feet, i.e. the opposite of what Lenin said, get off your arse and go to the polling station and vote. it is important.

Here endeth the lesson.

SimonTrew wrote:

....Of course I had my tongue in my cheek about children, but why should the missus and I, who have actively chosen never to have children, pay for other people's? There are far too many children, the world population has expanded enormously. It is very selfish to have children, yet society rewards parenthood in 101 different ways. We have chosen, that when we are right and settled and can be sure to bring up a child properly, then we will apply for adoption, in a few year's time, I feel no great need to pass on my own genes,

So don't get me wrong, I love children, I am an "uncle" I mean a friend not a real uncle of many of my friends' children, but that doesn't mean I have to have any and just consume more of the world's limited resources, it is in the end a very selfish act, caused by a selfish gene that wants to self-replicate. Children are even more delightful when you can hand them back to their parents when you are fed up with them

Ah well, let's explore that and be offensive at the same time.

I would counter my kids will probably have a higher asset value, even utility than a kid in a ghetto sweatshop in a 3rd world country.  That'a horrible thing to say really about people, but I suppose (apologetically) it has to be true.  All by dint of an accident of birth and the opportunities therein.   

But as one of my colleagues supposed, poverty is actually learnt behaviour, e.g.  Child plans to be a rag collector because Dad was a rag collector. Alternately where NGOs have been or there is government reach - child always wants to be a teacher or a doctor as that's what they know.  They can unlearn poverty and improve their asset value and utility.

Sure, the genes are selfish but so what?  Voluntarily childless oriented genes will - if such a thing is genetic and not free will -  will just die out.  So such behaviour is inevitably self-limiting.  But if we're going the full Dawkins, in our species case, it's not that controlling. We're (mostly) sentient, free thinking individuals, so selfish genes are not influencing your voluntary childlessness. 

But like I said before, kids today might be the saviours of tomorrow.  Somewhere, a kid will be born who will come up with the cure for cancer, faster than light travel, a radical design of an egg beater or just be a very talented road sweeper.  We need all sorts for the world of tomorrow and some of those kids will surely benefit you directly or indirectly. It's investment in the future so no-one should truly begrudge it. Who will treat your hemorrhoids, make your false teeth or clean your drains?

What's your plan then? Eugenics? And who gets to choose? 

Not been listening to Alex Jones on Infowars have you? 

I've got deja-vu on this subject.

SimonTrew wrote:

....

Here endeth the lesson.

A guy I know who writes long detailed progress reports was complaining that people always send him comments via e-mails with just the abbreviation TLDR in them. I don't know if he's found out what it means yet.

SimonTrew wrote:

if you want honest news you have to pay for it.... .

Or The Econimist. It does not come for free, but has a balance of opinions, The Economist has a tradition of not using bylines, like Private Eye, ut I don't imagine it would be hard to find out who wrote the colum or piece if it mattered. The point is You have to pay for it. You pay it though advertising, the BBC licence fee, the cost of the paper, however. But if you want a free press, you have to pay for it. Orwell has an essay, "A farthing newspaper", saying to summarise seems reasonable but then whose news are you getting? Tomorrow there wil be free newspapers, then whose news are you getting? And that is as true today as it was 80  years ago. (A farthing is a quarter of an old penny, so 1/480 of a pound sterling, i.e. next door to nothing.)

"The Lords Spiritual have nothing to say, The Lords Temporal say nothing, and the House of Commons has nothing to say and says it. We are ruled by journalism".

But we get what we deserve. As ian hislop said, on Have I Got News For You, the editor of Private Eye for many a year, "If you don't like the Daily Mail, don't ban it. Just don't buy it". The freedom of the press, that is ,freedom of expression, is a very important thing. Yet nobody cares any more, demonstrations end up in everyone being in prison under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 1990 which was supposed to expire two years after but has been perenially extended, our rights to protest civilly and without violence are being continually curtailed,your smartphones collect all kinds of personal information of where you are and who  you called, so you have no privacy, and you don't care about it. You should care about it.

OK, we dropped the religion, but politics is important. Not what Orban Viktor says or Theresa May or whoever. What is important is what you say. Go and vote.

Blimey I have been walking around Budapest lately while everyone with money has disappeared to Balaton that my shoes are in tatters, I have spent hours and hours, days and days walking around Budapest while everyone is away at Balaton.

But time wounds all heels.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

....it is in the end a very selfish act, caused by a selfish gene that wants to self-replicate. Children are even more delightful when you can hand them back to their parents when you are fed up with them

Ah well, let's explore that and be offensive at the same time.

I don't see anything offensive in what you have written.

fluffy2560 wrote:

I would counter my kids will probably have a higher asset value, even utility than a kid in a ghetto sweatshop in a 3rd world country.  That'a horrible thing to say really about people, but I suppose (apologetically) it has to be true.  All by dint of an accident of birth and the opportunities therein.

Indeed.

fluffy2560 wrote:

But as one of my colleagues supposed, poverty is actually learnt behaviour, e.g.  Child plans to be a rag collector because Dad was a rag collector.

I do not see how that follows. I know it is a sitcom, you may or may not have had it in mind, but if you take Steptoe and Son (A famous british sitcom), the son did not plan to be a rag collector and desperately was trying to escape, all the time being tied to his father. Their business partnership was not called "Steptoe and Dad". It is the parents who choose or limit what their children do, or give them opportunities, but the tail does not wag the dog.

And I agree that it is the environment around you. I grew up in a New Town essentially run by defence companies, so your choices were, British Aerospace, GEC-Marconi as was, Ferranti, so no surprise I worked at a defence firm. Of course there were independent businesses but since their money came from the employees of those defence firms, if not from the firms themselves as subcontracting, all those businesses were essentially tied even if they thought they were independent.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Alternately where NGOs have been or there is government reach - child always wants to be a teacher or a doctor as that's what they know.  They can unlearn poverty and improve their asset value and utility.

Unforunately poor countries (what we are now supposed to call "the developing world", another euphemism) tend to have poor governments, and the government takes the money and uses it on something other than education or what the NGO (non-governmental organisation, by which you mean foreign aid) gives it to them for.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Sure, the genes are selfish but so what?  Voluntarily childless oriented genes will - if such a thing is genetic and not free will -  will just die out.  So such behaviour is inevitably self-limiting.  But if we're going the full Dawkins, in our species case, it's not that controlling. We're (mostly) sentient, free thinking individuals, so selfish genes are not influencing your voluntary childlessness.

Well at least we seem to be having a more civil argument than Dawkins often seems to me on the telly But why should not adoption etc be the way to go. Of course we would need to keep some sex-mad self-obsessed nutters to keep reproducing children for us, and we'd have to keep them sweet while they slave away for us, but we could stick them all in Hollywood and they would not even notice the difference.

fluffy2560 wrote:

But like I said before, kids today might be the saviours of tomorrow.  Somewhere, a kid will be born who will come up with the cure for cancer, faster than light travel, a radical design of an egg beater or just be a very talented road sweeper.  We need all sorts for the world of tomorrow and some of those kids will surely benefit you directly or indirectly.

How will they benefit me? Cui bono? They might benefit their generation, or maybe their children's generation, but how will they benefit me? By the time they get the education, I will be dead.

fluffy2560 wrote:

It's investment in the future so no-one should truly begrudge it. Who will treat your hemorrhoids, make your false teeth or clean your drains?

I have a good friend who is a proctologist i.e. an arse doctor, another good friend who is a dentist, and I clean their drains. These are people of the same generation as me.

fluffy2560 wrote:

What's your plan then? Eugenics? And who gets to choose?

Yes, that is very Brave New World, Aldous Huxley. That is really the problem ,even with adoption, who adopts ugly babies or the wrong colour babies or wilful teenagers with minor crime records?

Since adoption has to go through an agency, the agency "chooses" the parents as much as the children, no you smoke so  you can't adopt, no you are the wrong colour or you are lesbian so you can't adopt, you do not have a separate bedroom, whatever, so even with adoption it tends to go to the societal norm, not the potential parents but the agency will tend to stick together like with like, unless you are Madonna Ciccone of course.

Even my childhood friend from Cairo, Kim, who was Korean  by birth and was adopted by Dutch parents, he had been terribly burned somehow and his parents were missionaries and somehow rescued him and got skin grafts etc, but even then, he went to a British school in Cairo, grew up in Western ways, was a good Christian, etc etc.... Looking back, I am not even sure he was Korean, Vietnamese would seem more likely for his/my age, caught with a bit of napalm maybe, but he was told he was Korean. He didn't speak Korean, "only" Dutch and English. But he didn't speak Vietnamese either, so he must have been adopted very young. He knew he was adopted, I don't understand why people would hide that from their child, if they truly loved them. But that is another story.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Not been listening to Alex Jones on Infowars have you? 

I've got deja-vu on this subject.

I have no idea what you are talking about there. I have no idea what Infowars is, or who that Alex Jones is.

SimonTrew wrote:

.....
I don't see anything offensive in what you have written.
....
Indeed.

..... but the tail does not wag the dog.

And I agree that it is the environment around you. .... so no surprise I worked at a defence firm. Of course there were independent businesses but since their money came from the employees of those defence firms, if not from the firms themselves as subcontracting, all those businesses were essentially tied even if they thought they were independent.

It is offensive in a way because I've lightened and distanced day to day human suffering by throwing in and reducing that to economics.

But re: Stevenage, well, exactly, you are a product of your environment and that's got to be learned behaviour.  Might even throw in  that's nuture not nature.  My Dad was quite keen for me to get an apprenticeship but I had other plans and academically oriented goals.  So he wanted me to learn his experiences and enforce his learned behaviour.  He had no ambitions further than his own horizons. Not that he wasn't overall a "good egg".  But I can also see myself doing it to my kids in some way but at least I am aware of it.

SimonTrew wrote:

.....Unforunately poor countries (what we are now supposed to call "the developing world", another euphemism) tend to have poor governments, and the government takes the money and uses it on something other than education or what the NGO (non-governmental organisation, by which you mean foreign aid) gives it to them for.

NGOs are not foreign aid.  They are usually charitable. Foreign aid is always inter-government aid.  I grant you that some NGOs dispense government aid as agencies but they are not synonymous with foreign aid as there are other ways for funds to reach inside the country. It's always with permission of the government.    But this is an old story. Developing countries are usually hopelessly corrupt and that's why there's little trickle down. 

SimonTrew wrote:

....
reproducing children for us, and we'd have to keep them sweet while they slave away for us, but we could stick them all in Hollywood and they would not even notice the difference.

If you want to get into that and I'm not even that sure what you meant, I would cite Angelina Jolie or even Michael Jackson as strange examples of the genre.  What they did is effectively outsource their reproduction and parenting. That's really quite weird to me as physically I don't think there was anything to stop them reproducing in traditional ways. 

SimonTrew wrote:

....How will they benefit me? Cui bono? They might benefit their generation, or maybe their children's generation, but how will they benefit me? By the time they get the education, I will be dead.

Nah, you cannot possibly believe that. It's trolling. 

Kid aged 15 now could be the specialist treating you in hospital in 25 years unless you are planning to pop off anytime soon.

SimonTrew wrote:

I have a good friend who is a proctologist i.e. an arse doctor, another good friend who is a dentist, and I clean their drains. These are people of the same generation as me.

Ok, so they were kids once just as you were. The drain cleaners of today are servicing the pipe obstructing medics of the past.  By the time you are 80 with dodgy knees and cataracts, presumably you will be hiring a younger person who has a digital internet Facebook AI connected plunger? N'est pas?

SimonTrew wrote:

...Even my childhood friend from Cairo, Kim, ........ Looking back, I am not even sure he was Korean, Vietnamese would seem more likely for his/my age, caught with a bit of napalm maybe, but he was told he was Korean. He didn't speak Korean, "only" Dutch and English. But he didn't speak Vietnamese either, so he must have been adopted very young. He knew he was adopted, I don't understand why people would hide that from their child, if they truly loved them. But that is another story.

Are you sure he wasn't Indonesian? Netherlands has many people of Indonesian origin and their language has many borrowed words from Dutch.

SimonTrew wrote:

......
I have no idea what you are talking about there. I have no idea what Infowars is, or who that Alex Jones is.

Well, you need to Google it to keep up with the news. 

It's a hot issue currently and it's tied up with Trump, Bannon and now Boris.

Alex Jones is often referred to as mad and has had his madness curtailed by "social media".

Look for it!

Am I just extremely weird or only slightly weird? When I get an appliance or whatnot, I stick the receipt on the back of the appliance so that I know where the receipt is etc. My missus has this bizarre habit of sticking them in a box or filing cabinet never to be found again, but the receipt for the wishdasher is on the back of the wishdasher, etc etc so you know where it is. Am I the only one who does this, that the receipt goes with the appliance? I know of one other person that does this, but I had to teach her when she was moving house. She emailed after her move, "Works a treat"

fluffy2560 wrote:

Are you sure he wasn't Indonesian? Netherlands has many people of Indonesian origin and their language has many borrowed words from Dutch.

Could well have been, Indonesia being the old "Dutch East Indies". He was told he was Korean. Perhaps when he was older they told him where he really came from, I certainly don't know. Perhaps he even came from Korea, but thinking of the history and so on,  Maybe he is even online somewhere, but I don't use facebook etc. He is obviously the same age as me or thereabouts, and I was born in 72...

I'm splitting this very enjoyable discussion up into pieces to make it I hope easier for others to follow.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

....How will they benefit me? Cui bono? They might benefit their generation, or maybe their children's generation, but how will they benefit me? By the time they get the education, I will be dead.

Nah, you cannot possibly believe that. It's trolling. 

Kid aged 15 now could be the specialist treating you in hospital in 25 years unless you are planning to pop off anytime soon.

I have a realistic view of my life expectancy, That as well is inherited, and none of my family has lived over 80. I am 46, I smoke tobacco, and I am not going to give up smoking to skew the odds in my favour, because I enjoy smoking.  On average, smokers die seven  years younger than non-smokers. There is, in insurance/actuarial bookkeeping, something called the "smoker premium" exactly for that reason but they are not allowed by law now to say "if you smoke, you will die younger so we won't have to pay your monthly retirement for so long". It is the same with a pension, what ideally they would like you to do is die about six minutes after getting home from your 55th or 70th birthday party (whenever it is set) and then die nice and quickly, you are their best customer. My mum who died a couple of years ago was getting her husband's my father's Smiths Industries pension he had worked there in the fifties, and it was like ten pounds a month or something that she got and surely, I imagine, they would have said dear Doreen, don't you want a cash to cancel it so that we don't have to keep up all the paperwork, but she just liked getting the ten pounds a month, no that is for my haircut or whatever it was, Smith's Industries or whoever administered that pension she must have drove them nuts.

A "smoker premium" is actually a discount but they are not allowed to say so any more because that's discrimination. Like women and men have to pay the same for life assurance because of sex equality laws, even though that stares in the face that on aggregate women live longer than men. What a nonsense. The actuary's  books knows or rather predicts with lots of information, what the true odds are, so in that case you get men subsidising women, which is hardly equality, is it? But this is déja vu when we had the good discussion about is gambling the same as insurance or the stock market...

The chances of me being alive at the age of 81 are rather slim, the odds are rather against that. That is a realistic , cold-hearted view, and if you want a realistic view of your life expectancy you can easily find out even before you take the life assurance, plus what with dealing with electrics, constantly up ladders, etc etc the chance of my coming a cropper are probably more than to "sit on your arse for forty years and hang your hat on a pension", as Louis MacNeice has it. It is not trolling, it is not pessimistic but realistic. I am not very important in the big scheme of things so I don't see how that matters.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Are you sure he wasn't Indonesian? Netherlands has many people of Indonesian origin and their language has many borrowed words from Dutch.

Could well have been, Indonesia being the old "Dutch East Indies". He was told he was Korean. Perhaps when he was older they told him where he really came from, I certainly don't know. Perhaps he even came from Korea, but thinking of the history and so on,  Maybe he is even online somewhere, but I don't use facebook etc. He is obviously the same age as me or thereabouts, and I was born in 72...

I'm splitting this very enjoyable discussion up into pieces to make it I hope easier for others to follow.

You could just get someone else to search for him on FB.   Kim is however a massively common name in Korea of course so you'd have your work cut out if he was Korean. But Mrs Fluffy says it's fantastically easy to find people on there. 

I know from living in NL that many people there are married with Indonesian people - my former work colleague there had a Indonesian origin spouse but you'd never know they weren't Dutch. 

I don't use FB either - obviously my social media dopamine hit comes from here.

Waffling on for a second, great things imported to NL from Indonesia include Rijsttafel and Sambal- very nice and spicey. Shame NL restaurants are so pricey and close early (always by 22h - ludicrous).

SimonTrew wrote:

.....
I have a realistic view of my life expectancy, That as well is inherited, and none of my family has lived over 80. I am 46, I smoke tobacco, and I am not going to give up smoking to skew the odds in my favour, because I enjoy smoking.  ......

The chances of me being alive at the age of 81 are rather slim, the odds are rather against that. .....

Speaking as a convert and former smoker (clean 20+ years), what you could do is simply give up.  There's no time like the present.   Just stop. Right now.  Easy to say I know.

I stopped because I realised it made me feel crappy and under par.  It's very possible and it's not that difficult to stop.  You just need to be mentally prepared, determined and avoid the triggers.  But I admit, even now, I am still tempted even if its only for a second.  Once an addict, always an addict.  Mrs Fluffy stopped when she got a bun in the oven - made her feel sick and she just didn't fancy it anymore.  Body knows what it needs.

The one I am finding more difficult to do is reduce my alcohol intake to close to zero.  I do like a couple of glasses of wine but I don't think my throat likes it.  I try to lay off but wine is so cheap here, and it's pushed everywhere socially, it's hard to avoid.  Hardly ever drink beer unless I am outside on the beach at Balaton. Rarely drink spirits - I have a bottle of Albanian whiskey in my  cupboard that I bought at least 10 years ago and I've still not finished it.

I suppose the best thing to do is to only drink when there's food.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Could well have been, Indonesia being the old "Dutch East Indies". He was told he was Korean. Perhaps when he was older they told him where he really came from, I certainly don't know. Perhaps he even came from Korea, but thinking of the history and so on,  Maybe he is even online somewhere, but I don't use facebook etc. He is obviously the same age as me or thereabouts, and I was born in 72...

I'm splitting this very enjoyable discussion up into pieces to make it I hope easier for others to follow.

You could just get someone else to search for him on FB.   Kim is however a massively common name in Korea of course

He has, or had, a Dutch surname, a very famous but uncommon one, so that will narrow it down a lot.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

.....
I have a realistic view of my life expectancy, That as well is inherited, and none of my family has lived over 80. I am 46, I smoke tobacco, and I am not going to give up smoking to skew the odds in my favour, because I enjoy smoking.  ......

The chances of me being alive at the age of 81 are rather slim, the odds are rather against that. .....

Speaking as a convert and former smoker (clean 20+ years), what you could do is simply give up.  There's no time like the present.   Just stop. Right now.  Easy to say I know..

You missed the point, i enjoy smoking and until they make it illegal, I will continue to smoke. It is a filthy, disgusting, expensive habit. It is also very enjoyable. I think every, I dunno, one in ten cigarette packets should have instead of the health warnings which nobody reads anyway, "smoking is lovely". Just to even up the propaganda a bit. I will not smoke around children, not so much for the smoke which is a tiny risk if you bother to do any proper research (and I have) but because I do n ot want them in any way to think it is cool just because I am your cool Uncle. I do not recommend it to anyone. But, it is enjoyable, that is what mind-altering chemicals do, legal or not. Chocolate is enjoyable for some people and gives you a brain rush, but  you don't get health warnings on chocolate bars. My own personal view is that every vehicle with an internal combustion engine should have a 20% warning stripe in black and white all around its perimeter saying "Warning: This car emits more diesel or petrol fumes into the environment than your cigarette, it pollutes the sides of buildings and also it is extremely dangerous to anyone who is walking or cycling", something like that. It just happens that, having run out of gay people, people of a different colour or race or religion, smokers are now the easiest people to attack, to be hypocritical about, they are an easy target. Which is actually handy because the Nemzeti Dóhanybolt, the cigarette shop, aways has a great big red white and green target outside it, you would think they were doing it on purpose

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Could well have been, Indonesia being the old "Dutch East Indies". He was told he was Korean. Perhaps when he was older they told him where he really came from, I certainly don't know. Perhaps he even came from Korea, but thinking of the history and so on,  Maybe he is even online somewhere, but I don't use facebook etc. He is obviously the same age as me or thereabouts, and I was born in 72...

I'm splitting this very enjoyable discussion up into pieces to make it I hope easier for others to follow.

You could just get someone else to search for him on FB.   Kim is however a massively common name in Korea of course

He has, or had, a Dutch surname, a very famous but uncommon one, so that will narrow it down a lot.

If you said Dijkstra previously, that's not that unusual.

fluffy2560 wrote:

If you said Dijkstra previously, that's not that unusual.

I didn't, but you guessed correctly. And to put it on record, his adoptive father was not the famous Edsger Dijkstra, any more than I am a military historian of the same name.

Not particularly unusual, but not Fazekas (Smith) or Schmidt etc either...

fluffy2560 wrote:

Shame NL restaurants are so pricey and close early (always by 22h - ludicrous).

As if Hungarian restaurants open late? I suppose in the tourist areas they might, but I don't know any where I live. If anything, they seem to keep hours at the least convenient times possible.

There is one, near where I used to get the bus on the intersection of busy bus routes that opens from 12-2pm and 4-7pm. Okay, so the lunch shift people from work, that would be understandable but that it is not a particularly industrial etc area so you are not going to get the lunchtime trade. And the people who commute are not going to get home until let's say 5.30pm have a change, moan about the day for a while, go out to the restaurant which is now.. zarva (closed)?! I wonder how they ever stay in business.

There is another by a very busy intersection, that only opens three days a week between 12pm and 2pm, not even evenings. That is not even trying. The missus and I have often fancied going to it, if we happen to have exactly two hours to spare in the middle of the day....

Fortunately I know of a little scottish restaurant near me, called McDonald's. Even they only open 24 hours for "drive-thru", so if you are on foot you have to pretend you are a car and ask at the "drive-thru". It is absolutely astonishing, if you work a night shift as I sometimes pretend to, that you have no chance until the baker's open at 5am. No good for me when I clock off at 3am.

I went to the tobacconists about 11pm last night and of course the 0-24 "non-stop" tobaconnist, they were shut just for a few minutes, stocktaking or something I imagine. But it is not "non-stop" then is it I did suggest they amend it to "occasionally closed" but for some reason they did not understand my logic.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

If you said Dijkstra previously, that's not that unusual.

I didn't, but you guessed correctly. And to put it on record, his adoptive father was not the famous Edsger Dijkstra, any more than I am a military historian of the same name.

Not particularly unusual, but not Fazekas (Smith) or Schmidt etc either...

I am sure he's not the famous one but it's really not uncommon as a name.

Remember Carol Vorderman off the telly.  She's Dutch. I met her brother once in Holland - Anton.  Not much to say really about him - he was a property developer I think. 

The most common name here is Laszlo Szabo - Leslie Taylor.

SimonTrew wrote:

As if Hungarian restaurants open late? I suppose in the tourist areas they might

I live in a tourist area, and I know of none open late*. A few bars and clubs, yes. But what is exactly "late" is relative I guess.

And the buses stop running about 7:30. And with a zero percent alcohol limit, there is only a taxi. And there are not that many here. And they are expensive. So you get to walk home, which is not easy for me since I live a few km from the nearest town.

*But of course, I don't know them all.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Shame NL restaurants are so pricey and close early (always by 22h - ludicrous).

As if Hungarian restaurants open late? I suppose in the tourist areas they might, but I don't know any where I live. If anything, they seem to keep hours at the least convenient times possible.
....

There's a 24h Hungarian restaurant on the Buda side of the Castle tunnel.    Never tried it but I've driven past it multiple times.   It's called Kicsi Csango.

There are also some pizza and kebab shops near Pest side Petofi Bridge. Might be called King Pizza or something.  I pass it sometimes at odd hours when I'm going/returning from the airport.

But even in Balaton in the season, by 23h everything is closed down.   By 1st September most things will be closed down during the week, possibly open weekends but in any case, they won't re-open full time until maybe mid-May.

klsallee wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

As if Hungarian restaurants open late? I suppose in the tourist areas they might

I live in a tourist area, and I know of none open late*. A few bars and clubs, yes. But what is exactly "late" is relative I guess.

And the buses stop running about 7:30. And with a zero percent alcohol limit, there is only a taxi. And there are not that many here. And they are expensive. So you get to walk home, which is not easy for me since I live a few km from the nearest town.

*But of course, I don't know them all.

Well yeah, in Budapest I think the public transport is excellent, the local buses the BKK I have loads to choose from but pretty much all of them run from about 4.30am to about midnight, and I think that is not at all unusual for Budapest. Out of Budapest, it gets a lot worse.

I suppose the tourists have their evening meal etc and the hotels will serve later depending on their custom, and I am not opposed to tourism, bringing money into the Hungarian economy all to the good, I wish Hungary promoted itself more. I once did an experiment in England, I went to every travel agent in Cambridge and asked for a brochure on Hungary. Nothing. Somewhere at the back of their "Anywhere else" kind of brochure is a small ad for Budapest City Breaks but that is it. Absolutely nothing else. There is no equivalent of the English Tourist Board or whatever most countries have, Canada Tourism or California (i am aware that is not a country), whatever, to promote your own country as a destination it is ridiculous. In England I have never known anyone except a Hungarian who has ever even heard of Lake Balaton, for example. It's the largest lake in Europe, isn't it? Depending on whether you count the Black Sea as a lake, or in Europe, and a couple of Russian lakes but again one can always change the definiton to suit oneself, the fact is it is not promoted at all

It is relative, as you say. Hungarians tend to rise very early and eat very early by my standards, I would not if I were working day shift expect to be in before about 8.30am and leave about 6pm, have dinner at home at 8pm or something, but that is I think very late by Hungarian standards. But then I might have a skewed idea of this because my Hungarian sister-in-law  and her partner both work night shifts, but even they will tend to have their dinner before they go to work, around 5pm when they don't start work until 10pm so  it is not as if they are in a hurry, and of course then have breakfast when they get home around 6am.

In Budapest they have had a price increase on the taxis from 450ft to 470ft per 1km  think, but really considering inflation that is not a great hike. I have no great need for a taxi, but the missus always uses Főtaxi and they are the best, they are always on time or early to arrive when she has an early morning flight, clean, smart, polite. I do not see why you would use anyone else. I suppose that is a personal recommendation and I am not sure if I am allowed to say that here, but they are the best.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Remember Carol Vorderman off the telly.  She's Dutch. I met her brother once in Holland - Anton.  Not much to say really about him - he was a property developer I think. 

The most common name here is Laszlo Szabo - Leslie Taylor.

Surely Szábo László if you want to get it right

I bet the Fluffyettes must have a right struggle which name order to use. Even for my missus, a Hungarian married to an Englishman, it can be a right struggle sometimes to get cards etc with the right name order, she has about nine choices what with the "ne" wife suffix etc. which she doesn't use but if she is not careful they will add it on and then the name on your card differs from the name you actually use, etc.

SimonTrew wrote:

.......In England I have never known anyone except a Hungarian who has ever even heard of Lake Balaton, for example. It's the largest lake in Europe, isn't it? Depending on whether you count the Black Sea as a lake, or in Europe, and a couple of Russian lakes but again one can always change the definiton to suit oneself, the fact is it is not promoted at all
.....

I dunno, some people have heard of it.   Many other people in Europe know of it but they call it Plattensee.  Ok, not English, but an older Dutch guy I knew a while back told me that as a kid he travelled by road to Balaton each year for their family holidays.  And of course  the East and West Germans could meet their relatives there on "neutral ground". 

I had relatives in Littlehampton, UK and there was the surprisingly named Balaton Restaurant (see it on streetview here, but alas now renamed). 

Black Sea isn't a lake as it's got flow through the Bosphorous straits to the Med.  Now Caspian or Aral, then we're talking lake (or more technically precisely, oil based dumping group and radioactive salt pan).    Then there's the Neusiedler See next to Austria which is only about 1m deep.

There are lots of tourist websites though....

http://visit-hungary.com/contact-081107 … f-the-hntohttps://hellohungary.com/enhttp://tourinform.hu/englishhttps://www.budapestinfo.hu

Hungarian National Tourist Office was set up on 1 st March 1994 to carry out public interest tourism marketing tasks for the Ministry of Economic Affairs,

www.cecta.org/nto/hungarian_nto.htm

fluffy2560 wrote:

Remember Carol Vorderman off the telly.  She's Dutch...

No, she is a good Cambridge chapess, who now is on a daytime advert for something or other, I think Sun Life Assurance, if it is not that it will be Wiltshire Farm Foods or one of the others that get advertised to retired people during the day,

John Betjeman, the English Poet Laureate, was Dutch or rather his grandparents were, they changed their name from  Betjemann as it sounded a bit too German when the British had some kind of argy-bargy with the Germans. His father invented the Betjemann Tantalus. Accept no imitations.

SimonTrew wrote:

.....Surely Szábo László if you want to get it right

I bet the Fluffyettes must have a right struggle which name order to use. Even for my missus, a Hungarian married to an Englishman, it can be a right struggle sometimes to get cards etc with the right name order, she has about nine choices what with the "ne" wife suffix etc. which she doesn't use but if she is not careful they will add it on and then the name on your card differs from the name you actually use, etc.

I was just being lazy.  If I was doing it properly I'd have done it the right way around but there's an assumption here.  Mr Szabo might not actually have been Hungarian.

The rules explained to me by locals are that foreigners do not have their name order changed. 

Kids don't have any problem with the name order.  If they know the nationality of the person they adapt on auto-pilot to that person - e.g. speak English to non-Hungarians, Hungarian to Hungarians.  They just do it automatically now.  It's all a bit obvious to them and there's never really any discussion about it.