Hello friends – native and foreign.  That’s right, OurWorldMyEye is an open blog, a friendly blog and an accepting blog - we do not close our borders to anyone and consider any reader to be a citizen both of our world and my eye.

UNDER THE UMBRELLA OF BRITISHNESS (2008)

UNDER THE UMBRELLA OF BRITISHNESS

Today I have something a bit different for you – it is both exciting and depressing.  Informative and laughable. 

As you may or may not be aware, after the massive fuss that was made about immigration a while back (remember that?  An apparently huge political and election time issue that has not been mentioned since?  The media creating another shit storm to sell papers do we think?) the government in their infinite wisdom instigated a new, more complex and bureaucratic system of rules about who could or could not come into the country.

Part of these measures was the introduction of the… Life in the UK Test, that is now required for settlement (indefinite leave to remain) in the UK or British citizenship.

I learned of this test a while back when a student I was working with – who had lived here all his life, but had an Italian passport, was being made to take the test before he would be granted British Citizenship.  A young man who was in every way British and part of British society – being tested on life in the UK to see if he was worthy of being granted indefinite leave to remain.  He told me some of the questions that were asked in the test and they were a joke.  And how demeaning for someone who has lived here all their life, to have to take a test to see if they are British.  I wonder how many people in the country would pass this test if we were all made to take it tomorrow?  If the general populous of Britain were to fail it without revising, then what would that imply about the test?  Perhaps that the questions, in fact, did not relate to being a British Citizen or life in the UK at all.

At the time, I scribbled a note to myself to look into this more, but, having many notes and many scribbles I forgot.  That is until I couldn’t sleep the other night and I randomly started thinking about this again.

So, I have been doing a bit of research into the Life in the UK Test as I think it is quite an interesting topic.  I also thought I would take the online practice test to see how I faired.

I SHOULD TECHNICALLY BE KICKED OUT OF THE COUNTRY

The results my friends – I should technically be kicked out of the country!  That’s right, I failed – getting a quite poor 15 out of 24 correct answers.

I AM A FAILED CITIZEN

Now given it is a Friday and it seems appropriate we have a little test and a bit of fun – my challenge to you is to also take the practice test and then post your results in a comment added to this post.  I would be very curious to see what other people score and you would be assisting me in my research for perhaps a greater project that I have in mind.

Interested?  Of course you are.  Simply click on the link to go to www.ukcitizenshiptest.co.uk take the test and then let me know how you do!

As always, thanks for listening.  Now go and see if you are British enough to be an authentic UK citizen! (and don’t forget to post your results as a comment on here)

Chinese Fags (2009)

Chinese Fags – an interesting language difference.  Google indexing – a perplexing language difference.

I find these cigarettes interesting – mainly because they have amazing writing on the packet, which I have no comprehension of.

Also because they are different from the packets I am used to seeing.  Somehow, even though they are very similar, they are more exciting because of their minor differences!

So perhaps anything that is in a different language is more interesting to behold than that which is in your own language.

This is probably true for many things.  It is not true for computers.  I hate computer language – it is foreign that is for sure, but more interesting it is not.

This is my first post in a long while.  As you may recall, I have had computer and camera related issues which put a bit of a stop to posting for some time.  The digital camera is still out of action, but the computer working fine again now.

I was all set to begin a new regime of regular posts when I had the genius idea of changing my web hosting company.

In my ignorant fashion, I assumed this would be an easy thing to do.  Get a new host, move everything over, bobs your uncle.

In reality – the foreign language that is computer code and the Internet pissed all over that premise.  Moving the site was a bitch and whilst that has now been achieved – it has destroyed my Google rank!  Why I am not sure, but Google will no longer recognise my humble blog and so I am again stuck head first, trying to decipher a language invented for those more technologically gifted…and perhaps more dedicated than myself!

The saga will never end!

Update your RSS…

By the way – since the domain for this blog has slightly changed (behind the scenes only…not from a readers perspective…you may want to update your RSS feed, if you have one pointing at the site.
(cti9q4m26n)