Thoughts on This and That

Not just me, with my blog yesterday, but Bradford (Park Avenue) chief executive Bob Blackburn, and the Telegraph and Argus for publishing the Nicky Law to Avenue story.

As I said previously, I felt Law was out of his depth when managing Bradford City, it seems contract’s are a subject he struggles with too, he won’t now be joining Avenue - he had assured them he didn’t have a contract at Alfreton Town, but it turns out he did - he wasn’t aware that a “piece of paper” he signed was actually a 3 year contract.

Oh dear!

Another empty office block on the outskirts of the city centre (providing it actually gets built that is).

Oh joy.

If you are elected to serve your city as a councillor, surely your first responsibility is to serve those people who have elected you? Not so if you are Bradford’s Labour party group leader Ian Greenwood - who is refusing to take the position offered to him as council leader, or let other Labour councillors to take jobs running the council, as he will not work with some of his fellow elected councillors because they are members of other parties.

The article linked to explains that the Conservative and Liberal Democrat groups had proposed an all party executive to tackle the many issues facing the city, surely being able to have an input in these things is the reason someone stands to serve as a councillor? If someone isn’t willing to do that - and instead wants to serve petty party politics then I doubt their suitability to be part of the council at all.

Well it’s the local council elections today and, for the first time in my life, I have no intention of using my vote.

I guess this makes me a hypocrite, after all I have gently criticised people I know for not using their vote in the past, but I don’t feel guilty about it at all, whatever the outcome in my ward.

All the main parties have had their chance to do something in Bradford in the last few years, and they are all as bad as each other, the city gets worse and worse with no progress being made. None of them deserve my vote, as these are local council elections the wider political issues on which many people base their votes do not play any part for me, not that anyone is worth voting for on a national level either. Oh for the “none of the above” option.

I really hate the fact that party politics has to play a part in the resolving of local issues, if only a likeminded bunch of individuals with the best interests of the city at heart could stand and win control of the council I’m sure we’d see some progress, unfortunately I know that cannot, and will not, ever happen.

I’ll probably still sit up half the night and follow the results though, despite me not using my democratic right today I am very politically aware - I wasn’t called “Prime Minister” by my former work colleagues for no reason.

I just had a walk up to the supermarket to pick up a few things, as I walked back down through Bradford City Centre I was approached by a woman who, very politely, asked me where the “High Street” was. Anyone who knows Bradford City Centre will appreciate what a tough question that was to answer!

After a few “err’s” I asked her what she was after specifically, she rattled off a few shops that Bradford doesn’t have (but just about everywhere else in the world does), and in the end the best I could suggest to her was the Kirkgate Centre (good for about 10 minutes) and Darley Street (good for another five). How depressing, if only she’d wanted some pound shops, or a (quite possibly stolen) mobile phone she’d have been spoilt for choice.

Still, our local paper has today announced that Debenhams have signed up to anchor our proposed new shopping development, which would be great apart from the fact we were told they were going to be the main tenants about 10 years ago when the scheme was first mooted and, despite half the city centre having subsequently been demolished, no work on building the thing has started and the article still cannot give a start date. I won’t hold my breath.

On the positive side, I’m out of here, albeit temporarily, in two weeks time - it can’t come soon enough.

After two awful curry experiences in Bradford over the weekend I was beginning to lose faith in the place, happily that may have been restored by the Punjab Grill and Sweet Centre, to which I paid my first visit last night. It certainly won’t be the last.

It may be a quid or so more than the city centre restaurants, but it’s well worth it. Each of our party of five were more than happy with their food - my starter of a chapple kebab (think shami kebab but with nicer lamb and a hell of a lot more chillis and spices) was superb, and my main course of Karahi Chicken was also very good, and certainly the best I’ve had in Bradford for a while.

The abundance of spices, in the kebab especially, did cause a few ramifications this morning - but certainly nothing that would put me off visiting the place again!

Wow, my third entry in a day - I do have too much time on my hands.

Anyway, there’s nothing worse than a bad curry and, in Bradford, it’ s something you shouldn’t have to put up with. Unfortunately the one I’ve just had in the International was well below acceptable standards.

The quality in there seems to vary, probably dependent on the chef, but whatever the reason there was no need for me to be served up a powdery, salty Lamb Rogan Josh. My dining companions aired similar complaints about their own dishes, so it’s not just a matter of bad luck.

As a bit of a self-criticism, I’ve always been a bit reluctant to try new places when it comes to curry, but I’m scheduled to pay my first visit to the Punjab Sweet Centre this coming Tuesday - hopefully the experience will be more pleasant than this evenings!

There aren’t too many pubs worth visiting in Bradford nowadays and, after last night, it appears another one has gone down the pan.

When I’m at a pub I like to be able to have a drink, chat with the people I am there with and, if music is being played, I like it to be at a reasonable non-intrusive volume. That is the sort of atmosphere that has been enjoyed at The Head over the last few years, now it seems to have gone down the route of playing booming “dance” music as loud as possible on a Friday and Saturday night.

I wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that at 9:15 last night, there were six people in the place, it always used to be pretty busy. I certainly won’t be back anyway.

During my little ponder around Europe last year the exchanging of email addresses became a common ritual, even though in 99% of cases both people knew for a fact that they’d never be used. The throwaway line “if you’re ever nearby Bradford you should let me know” was used just as much so, it was very much to my suprise when that 1% chance came about and a German girl I met in Madrid, Christa, sent me an email saying she’d be travelling from Manchester to York, an suggesting a visit to Bradford on the way!!

Now Bradford, like any other cities, has it’s problems - in terms of it’s perception to outsiders and the impression it gives the fact that the city centre is a dump is probably it’s biggest. Attempts are being made to re-generate the place but, with Leeds 9 miles away having firmly grasped renewal and regeneration a long time ago, it’s likely that we’re always going to lag behind and not punch the weight a city with a district population of half a million should.

Anyway, thats another matter, and after getting over my suprise and sorting out the details, the matter at hand was trying to give a visitor as positive impression as possible in just a few hours on a midweek evening, time constraints meant that trips to the best parts of the district like Saltaire, Haworth and the countryside were out. So I was left with suggesting a visit to the National Museum of Film Photography and Television and, of course, a curry!

As I had to work I left Christa with instructions on getting from the train station to the museum without seeing anything too bad and arranged to meet up with her when I got back to Bradford from work. It seems my plan worked well and she loved the museum (she is a media student after all) so after I picked her up it was on for the food.

One good thing about Bradford is the selection of relatively cheap places to get a decent curry, for those not knowing, Bradford has a large immigrant Asian population (mostly from the Kashmir area of Pakistan and Bangladesh) who were first needed by, and attracted to, the city to work in the mills of what was once the wool capital of the world. A welcome side effect of this influx was a number of places that opened to serve them the food they wanted to eat, and their subsequent transformation into a place anyone can go to get a decent feed.

In spite of that I do feel the standard of curry in the city centre has gone downhill in recent times, and I try to avoid most of the city centre places late on at weekends as they seem to exist simply to serve drunks any old dish, but one place that is usually reliable enough is Omars and I decided that would be a safe option for a Monday tea-time. After explaining (or trying to explain) the menu Christa opted for a vegetable korma (sh’ed never had a curry before) which I was embarassed to order but, much like the museum, she seemed to enjoy - as we left the restaurant and headed back for the train station I was feeling quite satisfied about the impression I’d managed to give of Bradford and felt suitably confident enough to show off our impressive City Hall and Centenary Square which, for once, was thankfully scally free and even had a German style beer garden as a temporary attraction, which was a fitting touch in the circumstances.

After a swift pint of Paulaner I was able to send Christa on the more obvious tourist attractions of York happy that I’d managed to give a decent impression of my hometown to an outsider and empowered with further thoughts about what women really mean when they say yes, no or maybe and why they think the three have interchangeable meanings, I also got to thinking that maybe I should be a little more positive about the city I’m from.

I almost choked on my Greggs Chicken Bake when I was walking through Bradford the other night and read the newspaper billboard suggesting that our very own Lister Park was the best in Britain, so as soon as I got home I thought I had to check this story out. When I looked, to my great suprise, I found that it actually is, according to the judges of “Britain’s Best Park” Competition anyway.

My bemusement stemmed from the fact that the last time I visited the place it was a bit of a dump wrecked by litter and vandalism, though when I thought about it I realised that was probably about six years ago and, as the article states, there has been a lot of investment in the place.

So, to see if the place deserved such an accolade, the only option was for me to pay the park a visit so that’s what I did today. I had been meaning to go up to Cartwright Hall (Bradford’s civic art gallery) for the David Hockney exhibition and, as thats set in the park, it gave me the chance to kill two birds with one stone.

Anyway up I went and I was impressed with what I saw, apart from the boating lake having a bit too much litter in, the place is very nice even though I think “Best in Britain” is possibly stretching it a bit. As well as the boating lake and cage there’s a nice botanical garden, lots of leafy green space to take a picnic, some nice colourful floral displays, Cartwright Hall itself and some purpose built areas for sports and there were plenty of people making use of the place, though I didn’t bump into a drug dealer, which I thought was a feature of any visit to a British Park nowadays.

I’m a big fan of parks, and after visiting plenty on my trip round Europe last summer I don’t hold out much hope for the place in the European competition, but it’s nice to know there’s somewhere like that close at hand, especially if the weather keeps holding up well for the next couple of months, though it will never hold the place in my heart that “El Retiro” in Madrid does.

Maybe there are a few other places in Bradford I should re-acquaint myself with over the next few weeks.