One of the pleasures of arriving at a port-city is the first impression, the immediate surfaces, the familiar-strangeness. The roll of the train into the station; cinematic movement, office blocks, bridges, viaducts the electrical infrastructure of the inter-city and suburban railways, glimpses of an earlier time, when capital took different forms, red brick buildings withContinue reading “Notes on Hamburg and its Housing”
Category Archives: Shipping
Engels in Eastbourne (Radio Ga Ga Reprise)
Eastbourne has a lovely sea front and some glorious sea. It’s easy to understand why Engels liked to spend his holidays here. When he died Eleanor Marx helped row a boat out into the channel to scatter his ashes upon the water. The town has some good architecture, varied and of a range of stylesContinue reading “Engels in Eastbourne (Radio Ga Ga Reprise)”
Shore Line Strolling
Complete silence seems the wrong environment for meditation and contemplation. I would for ever be listening for any possible noise. All that silence would drive me to distraction. Sitting on a piece of rock armour on the beach works much better. The slosh of the waves messing about on the shore line is part ofContinue reading “Shore Line Strolling”
A Map of Dover, 20 March 2022
The Spirit of Britain in Dover Western Docks (next to Admiralty Pier). The sacked workers have all left. Essentially blackmailed by their employer, DP World. ‘If you don’t do as we say, you won’t even get your redundancy money’. There are people on the three ferries as at least two have been firing up theirContinue reading “A Map of Dover, 20 March 2022”
Global Supply Chains
We should take liberties with Raymond Williams book Keywords. It was never meant to be definitive, a list of all possibilities. It was a methodology. How to take a word and look at the social relations which help to form and define it and how meaning changes over time. According to The Shorter Oxford EnglishContinue reading “Global Supply Chains”
Sea level
Quite a lot going on for a short walk. The container ship Cap San Nicolas sailing from Antwerp to Algeciras. ITV news carried a story yesterday about how Amazon destroys thousands of items each week. Many of them never used. “Stuff that’s not even single use but not being used at all, straight off theContinue reading “Sea level”
Spring light, and Varne lightvessel
The light was fantastic; like lucid dreaming. It was so clear the Varne LV (light vessel) could be seen. Samskip Endeavor – container ship – Rotterdam Waalhaven – Dublin. ….and the Varne LV (lightvessel). Varne LV warns shipping of the Varne bank – which is right in the middle of the busiest shipping lanes inContinue reading “Spring light, and Varne lightvessel”
Eco Future (?)
The crude oil carrier, Eco Future which has a 299999 t DWT capacity. It is sailing to Mongstad, Norway from Dongjiakou, China. The port of Dongjiakou is one of the 10th largest ports of the world. The website of the port authority flies the flag of the Chinese Communist Party. The hills of France coveredContinue reading “Eco Future (?)”
Commonwealth of Independent States
The container ship Banak on route to Norfolk, United States from Rotterdam Maasvlakte. Banak departed on Saturday 26 December 2020 and is expected to arrive on 6 January 2021. It sails under a flag of convenience based in the Marshall Islands. This collection of coral atolls in the Pacific Ocean is an associate state ofContinue reading “Commonwealth of Independent States”
Fading light, into sunset
The light was fading and ships started to become blurred shapes on the horizon. There was plenty of light high in the sky, and in the west, where the sun was setting with a lot of colour and intense light. I could not get the settings correct on the camera for ship photographs and theyContinue reading “Fading light, into sunset”
Commodity Fetishism 