As regular visitors know I'm currently rereading Dickens' magnificent Tale of Two Cities and have just reached the start of the French riots (about half way through). The similarity between the mind set of those involved and those commenting today is astonishing. Some passages could refer to this week's events. Fascinating.

speaking of Dickens...when Britain had sensible jails.

I went to a talk tonight to learn more about this strange place I've chosen to live in.

It was about The Rocks..a suburb of lovely old buildings beneath the Harbour Bridge. First buildings began in 1790..built by convicts.

I always thought the convicts came out in chains and lived in horrible conditions.

Instead the British government chose Governors who had enlightened beliefs...once they arrived the convicts basically worked in normal jobs and built houses to live in and then the next load of convicts would board with them. Instead of being ostracised when they had finished their sentence many became the pillars of society (maybe even 'sex offenders' as well..although the colony was rampant with male bordellos )

And so within a 100 years they had a burgeoning colony in which free settlers wanted to emigrate to.

Such a positive idea...and then politicians came along and said 'lets get tough on crime"