Who remembers these Communist ‘failures’?

A quirky museum needed a bit more room for its array of historic cars, trucks and motorcycles. So it tried selling off part of its Slovak and Czech collection.

Makes sense… we can all do with some more space can’t we. So, what do we do? We have a garage sale.

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And the Lane Motor Museum in Nashville is one BIG garage.

But is this really how to advertise your wares?

The museum said this about one of its Communist era vehicles: “This is not a vehicle for the casual driver. Performance is sluggish at best. As the driver sits right next to the engine, the heat and noise are appalling. Turning the steering wheel alone is a real workout.”

Well, to be honest they were talking about a 1950s Tatra T-805 and they were only asking just over 4,000 euros for it.

The old 800 series consisted of ‘special purpose’ vehicles made for the military and building firms. And let’s face it nobody really cared about builders OR soldiers in mid-Europe in the 50s.

So, silly truckers then?

I say no!

More like Honest Joe, that thing as rare as a Kia Picanto that never breaks down – an honest car dealer!

I’d buy a Communist truck off them…

The Nashville-based Lane Motor Museum, opened in 2002, specialising in European vehicles. But recentlyit wanted to get rid of the Tatra 805, Aero 30, Tatra 613, and Tatra 75.

The collection included Aero, Škoda, Tatra, Praga, Jawa and Velorex. Of them, four car models are now up for sale: Tatra 805, Aero 30, Tatra 613, and Tatra 75.

Also for sale was a Tatra model, 613. The company intended them for government officials in communist countries. This ‘limo’ is for sale for €10,000. More than 11,000 of the vehicles were produced from 1973 into the Nineties.

An Aero 30, was for sale for $10,000 too. This car was produced between 1928 and 1947. The company initially produced planes.

Jeff Lane has

been an automotive enthusiast since an childhood. He began restoring his first car -a 1955 MG TF—when he was in his teens.

His venue is one of the few museums in the US to specialise in European cars and is based at Sunbeam Bakery at 702 Murfreesboro Pike. The former bakery has a high ceiling, natural light, and hand-crafted brick and maple wood flooring. The architectural style complements the age of the cars represented.

#slovakia #czech #motormuseum #lanemotormuseum #tatra #1955MGTF #Aero #Škoda #Tatra #Praga #Velorex #Nashville

Years ago I was asked to write something about Slovakia’s dream machine … a prototype flying car.

I loved it, but I worried I was being a bit of an Icarus about it all, blinded by the light, waxing lyrical. I certainly didn’t want to support a car crash in the sky!  

Then it completed a 35-minute 80K flight between airports in Nitra and Bratislava.

It was suddenly a story about a brave new world and set to fly up the news agendas.

And, a few weeks ago, the aircar received the Certificate of Airworthiness from the Slovak Transport Authority after completing 70 hours of rigorous flight testing.

Brilliant!

Then rumours and mixed facts began to confuse the issue… some said the company couldn’t get finance etc.

Now AeroMobil management, has come back saying the flying vehicle project remains achievable.

So, let’s have an affectionate look at the hybrid car-aircraft and what has been achieved over the decade and a half of its existence:

The vehicle has a BMW petrol engine which you can fill up at the pumps.

Its creator, Prof Stefan Klein, said it could fly about 1,000km (600 miles), at a height of 8,200ft (2,500m), and has completed 40 hours in the air so far.

And it only takes two minutes and 15 seconds to transform it from car into a plane!

Its wings fold down along the sides of the car.

Prof Klein said the vehicle reached a cruising speed of 170km/h and carry two people. At the moment it requires a runway though.

Flying cars are finally the way forward – or the way up in reality.

In 2019, consultant company Morgan Stanley predicted the sector could be worth $1.5trillion (£1tn) by 2040.

However, AirCar, Klein Vision, says the prototype has cost “less than 2m euros” (£1.7m).

Dr Stephen Wright, senior research fellow in avionics and aircraft, at the University of the West of England, described the AirCar as “the lovechild of a Bugatti Veyron and a Cesna 172”.

And he did not think the vehicle would be particularly loud or uneconomical in terms of fuel costs, compared with other aircraft.

And he revealed how 40 people from eight countries, including the UK, had worked hard on it, making it another international project emanating from the Little Big Country. 

But Aeromobil are not alone and at least 20 companies are on working flying machines.

Uber for instance is working to create an aerial taxi service in Dallas, Fort Worth, Los Angeles, and Dubai. Uber wants a plane-helicopter hybrid with fixed wings and tilt prop-rotors. The vehicles will take passengers from rooftop to rooftop.

Terrafugia Inc. in the US, also has a prototype flying and it has completed its first flight,

And Dr Paul Moller, of Davis, California, has spent 40 years developing a flying car that can be mass produced. He built his first one in 1967 in his garage.

#slovakia #flyingcar #klein #bratislava #nitra #flyingcarflies #icarus

I’ve protested about Artificial Intelligence ever since our barmy army of boffins came up with this real no-brainer threat to our civilisation.

And, as Dylan almost said…

Come gather ’round people wherever you moan
And admit that the robots around you have grown
And accept it that soon you’ll be turned to a clone
 – If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start clickin’ or you’ll sink like a drone
For the times, they are a-changin’

Dylan is one of history’s greatest songwriters, so, for some reason, recently it was decided to see if Artificial Intelligence could do it any better.

Yep, science decided to see if we needed Dylan to write incisive, powerful, emotional and thought-provoking lyrics anymore – or could we get a robot to do it for far less?

And this is what the new trundling troubadour of poetry, the artificial intelligence chatbot, ChatGPT, came up with:

ECHOES OF CHANGE

In a world spinning out of control
Where the powers that be have taken their toll
It’s time to rise, let our voices be heard
For justice and truth, let our spirits converge

(Chorus)
Echoes of change, they’re calling out loud
In every street, in every crowd
Together we stand, united we fight
For a better tomorrow, we shine our light

And then unbelievably the folk-less, tone-less, note-less, brain-less buffoon of our modern world came up with this sanctimonious, syrupy, sucking-up stupidity …

Let these words echo through the night
A beacon of hope, a guiding light
Bob Dylan’s spirit, forever we’ll keep
In this anthem for change, the flame runs deep

Surely, they would better read

Let these words echo through the sh*te

A beacon of hope or a guiding blight?
Bob Dylan’s spirit, forever we’ll keep
In this anthem for change, written by a robotic creep  

I was cruising round the net when I came across this video of Dylan playing a REAL one-man show!

Well, actually, Bob had members of his band with him – but, yep, there was only one man in the audience.

I know many of us will know this performance well but it is always worth a revisit for Dylan’s warmth and humour – and his eccentricity.

And this wasn’t one of the occasions when Bob’s topsy turvy career was in the doldrums, nope he had already lit the blue touch paper to his resurgence and his Never Ending Tour shows included songs like Down Along the Cove, Tell Me That It Isn’t True, Samson and Delilah and You Win Again.

This was a world exclusive tickets for Swedish television personality Fredrik Wikingsson – a personal show by legend His Royal Bobness.

And one Sunday afternoon Bob did it,he performed at Philadelphia’s Academy of Music for Wikingsson who was working on a film series about how solitary individuals experience events designed for large crowds.

Wikingsson, a self-described huge fan of Dylan, had persisted for a long time to arrange the concert. He told Rolling Stone magazine that he was so nervous before the show that he could not eat.

“I was smiling so much it was like I was on ecstasy,” Wikingsson said. “My jaw hurt for hours afterwards because I couldn’t stop smiling.”

Ol’ Bob does four performances on the vid, sadly they are cut short but worth a look all the same. He is at his growly best!

#bobdylan #hisroyalbobness #singleman #howdoesitfeel? #onyourown #philidelphia #2014

Covering the news is an important job … it’s not an ego trip for wannabes who work down the chip shop

BBC political editor Andrew Marr said recently: ‘Terrible things are said online because they are anonymous. People say things online that they wouldn’t dream of saying in person.”

I agree with him, blogging is generally the rantings of people angry at everything from the corner shop to the giant commercial conglomerate they believe has slighted them in some way.  And they believe they’ve found a way of fighting back. But they haven’t.

A reader wrote to me asking why I describe myself as a journalist while condemning the great pretenders who, on the one hand, haughtily despise people like me, yet claim to be journalists themselves…

The reader’s name is Chuck.

Well, Chuck, the closest most pretend journalists have got to the Fourth Estate is memories of eating fish and chips out of newspapers on a rainy street corner!

Seriously though, there is mainstream journalism and peripheral journalism, specialist stuff.

I’m proud to say I have been a mainstream journalist working for UK national newspapers, international magazines and major broadcasters for decades …

I cover news and I’m trained to do so.

I understand the law generally and particularly in the way it impinges on what I can and cannot say or do, I understand my responsibilities to my audience, my publisher and my profession … I am read and listened to every week and I try to tell the truth about what’s going on and I know what to watch out for, the red-herrings, the manipulation of those with an axe to grind and how easy it is to get things wrong.

I am an investigative – and sometimes undercover – reporter and understand exactly what I can do and what I can’t. I know the laws regarding door-stepping and stake-outs. I know exactly when investigative journalism oversteps the mark and becomes harassment. I am an award-winning headline writer, award-winning newspaper designer, daily newspaper night editor, group editor, sub-editor, copy-taster, news editor.

I’ve been a war correspondent, a travel writer, a food critic and a music critic and I’ve covered some of the biggest stories in the world.

I could go on Chuck, but the above should tell you why I’m a real McCoy journalist and why I get angry at people who think they can do what I do  … those who flounce around wine bars and drop-in centres calling themselves journalists and spreading maliciousness and poor judgement.

The press gets enough bad press as it is and is the whipping boy for everybody from the chattering classes to the great pretenders …

Basically, my argument is ‘don’t call yourself a journalist if you’re not one’ – call yourself a writer or a blogger or a scribe – or perhaps a specialist.

Journalism isn’t about anonymous inarticulate, vindictive attacks on people and companies, it isn’t about venomous smears and trying to do as much damage as possible by libelling and defaming somebody who’s hurt you.  Journalism isn’t about getting even, it’s about trying to tell the truth, it’s about exposing wrongs, putting things right. Journalism is the historic fountain of truth.

 Of course, I’m not stupid enough to thing that all us professional hacks are knights in shining armour, but we are trained crusaders and let me say again, most citizen journalism has nothing to do with journalism at all.

#journalism #journalists #bloggers #citizenjournalism

Hospitals will be ‘under immense strain’ as nurses go on strike, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation has said. So, let’s look at the figures behind the unhealthiest strike of all… what do you think?

The Health Foundation think-tank has said the average basic pay for nurses fell by 5 per cent in reality since 2011.

RCN general secretary Pat Cullen has said: “This is a once in a generation chance to improve pay and combat the staff shortages that put patients at risk.’.

“Patients pay a heavy price. We are doing this for them too.”

So, nurse are putting patients at risk – on Ms Cullen’s admittance – a. for the patient’s own good, b. on a bank holiday, c. when the country’s back is against the wall, d. when waiting lists are growing f. patients are left in corridors.

Now, let’s have a look at what people earn …NHS pay is operated in a banding system introduced in 2004.

A newly-qualified nurse starts in Band 5 and will earn £27,055 a year, slightly more in London. Most nurses operate in Bands 5 and 6, while Band 7 and above tend to be management positions.

The RCN has estimated that an average NHS nurse’s pay is around £34,000.

Here is the current banding scale:

• Band 5 – £27,055 to £32,934
• Band 6 – £33,706 to £40,588
• Band 7 – £41,659 to £47,672

The average income in the UK in 2022 was £27,600 per year or £1,950 per month.

So, let’s look at what people earn, according to JOBTED:

Dental Receptionist – Average Salary

The average salary for a Dental Receptionist is £8.50 net per hour (£20,000 gross per year), which is £9,600 (-32%) lower than the UK’s national average salary.
A Dental Receptionist can expect an average starting pay of £6.80 per hour. The highest pay rates can exceed £13 per hour.

 Nanny – Average Salary

The average salary for a Nanny is £8.80 net per hour (£19,200 gross per year), which is £10,400 (-35%) lower than the UK’s national average salary.
A Nanny can expect an average starting pay of £7.65. The highest pay rates can exceed £15.

Dietitian – Average Salary

The average salary for a Dietitian is £32,300 gross per year (£2,120 net per month), which is £2,700 (+9%) higher than the UK’s national average salary.
A Dietitian can expect an average starting salary of £23,000. The highest salaries can exceed £60,000

Fashion Designer – Average Salary

The average salary for a Fashion Designer is £29,310 gross per year (£1,960 net per month), which is £290 (-1%) lower than the UK’s national average salary.
A Fashion Designer can expect an average starting salary of £21,650. The highest salaries can exceed £70,000.

Journalist – Average Salary

The average salary for a Journalist is £32,160 gross per year (£2,120 net per month), which is £2,560 (+9%) higher than the UK’s national average salary.
A Journalist can expect an average starting salary of £17,630. The highest salaries can exceed £50,000.

According to the NimbleFins website, on average UK households spend £671 per week (£2,907 a month) to cover living expenses including a roof, food, clothes and transport.

Things ain’t easy in this mean and septic isle of course – but do we need to hold the health of our fellow man to ransom when, on average, we are getting by? Why don’t nurse, doctors, lawyers, train drivers etc negotiate better deals for the future when the UK is better able to pay …?

Don’t forget that the country is also under attack from that other fundamental of society, educationalists.

The fact that children endured devastating Covid-related chaos and disruption to education, all sounds a bit uncaring doesn’t it. Any educator should be trying to connect with their students.

Almost all of us have faced pay cuts in real terms, simply because of the cost of living, inflation etc etc … but is this really the time for unions to be bringing ordinary people on the street to loggerheads?

Shouldn’t we all pull together to get back on our feet, for the sake of our sanity, health and bank balance?

#nhs #bankholiday #strike #patients #hospitals

I can count my best friends on one hand… although I need to count one name TWICE to reach five!

Yep, four friends on my wagon – and I must admit one of them is my wife!

In reality, three friends then. That’s it!

Well, in fact we can digitally remove another of them.

So, in fact that leaves two… two fingers.

Yes me, Andrea and my best mate No 3 were like equal rights musketeers. We travelled, travailed, and tripped, bought and sold antiques – old stuff anyway – marauded round the country and planned to travel the world…

Then Jeff died. He wasn’t even old. But he was funny, irascible, awkward, looked like a Hell’s Angel and had almost a dozen children.

When he went, a lot of love and laughter went out of so many peoples’ lives.

I was working for a pan-European radio station staked by a barmy Teutonic billionaire and run by an elephant seal of a fat man, rather pongy too, a chain-smoking moron who claimed he had been trained as a lady’s hairdresser and jockey.

Once he was the ‘fifth digit’ in my handful of friends until I saw through his see-through tattered negligee of lies.

He is still here.

But Jeff is gone.

I miss Jeff…

Here is the first of two radio shows I made in his beautiful memory … funny stories about him and the music he loved to listen to as we drove over the hills and far away in search of old stuff, adventure and escape.

#broadcaster #radio #friends #enemies

The Preservation Society tells the story of the book they tried to ban … it has remained in the wilderness for more than six years

Journalist, editor and broadcaster Leigh G Banks was commissioned by a leading publishing house to write a small book on Staffordshire’s Six Towns … then, at the last minute it all fell apart.

Now the book – described as  offensive, objectionable and  inappropriate by the publishing house – is about to hit the streets.

Out of the Darkness, takes a road-trip round Staffordshire revealing how it changed from  the ancient grime and smog-ridden home of the world famous pottery industry to become a burgeoning centre for commerce and the arts.

It’s a personal journey round the Six Towns for Leigh G Banks which began in the early 1960s when as a child he visited Trentham Gardens with his grandmother, Ada. Later,  he became a fan of Burslem’s Northern Soul fame and in the book he talks vividly about his experiences  at the notorious 1970s Hollywood rock festival near Leek.

In the 1990s he upped sticks from Manchester and moved  to Staffordshire but it wasn’t until beginning to research Out of the Darkness in 2011 he discovered that many of his ancestors hailed from Slindon, near Eccleshall.

Leigh said: “It was clear my grandmother was drawn to the Six Towns although she never told me about  our family connections. But every chance we’d get we’d jump on a bus or a train from Manchester and visit for the day.

“I suppose because I came from a dirty old city like Manchester I was never offended by the grime of   Stoke but what I was fascinated by even as a child were the buildings and the architecture. I found it all majestic.

“I would wander the streets for hours just looking up, looking up  … that’s part of the ethos of the book, look up in the Six Towns, much of the history is above your head in the friezes and inscriptions on the buildings.”

Leigh got a call from the international publisher  commissioning him to write a book on the towns.

“I didn’t approach them with the idea, they came to me,” Leigh said: “I liked the thought of taking a look at the towns, their history and how they’d changed against a backdrop of my childhood.”

But a year into the publishing process things started to go wrong. “Out of the Darkness was being advertised on Amazon and on all the major book sites, we’d been given a launch day and had arranged a venue and a couple of lucrative deals with major stores and then, out of the blue, the rug was pulled from under us. It was a real shock.”

Correspondence from the managing director of the publishing house, said ‘our advisers share our view that much of the content of your book may be considered offensive, objectionable or inappropriate by some readers and consequently may harm our reputation and potentially damage our relationship with both our readers and our trade customers’.

`They were objecting to phrases and paragraphs in the book including:

• Pubs reeked on every corner.
• Stoke was becoming a slum while the Victorian super-rich lived in imposing elevated red brick mansions. They were closer to God up there.
• Let’s begin at Trentham’s highly technical new round-about with it’s dozen or so drunken lampposts and its already grimy black and white road sign pointing to all the roads that lead to the heart of this story.

Leigh said: “The objection to the description of the Trentham round-about was the funniest though! Who in their right mind would be offended by the description of  drunken lampposts – what if we’d said they were bent!

“We couldn’t believe it … I’ve made my living as a writer for more than 30 years   and know exactly what I am doing. Why they adopted that attitude to the book I will never really understand.”

He said: “A lot of people were interested and a number of book shops had put in orders – and a major supermarket had wanted to stock it, so we thought we’d better let people know what had gone on.”

A stunning new – heart-felt – piece from Society writer Eric Lastick …

BOB DYLAN’S PAINTED ROAMS & GATHERED COURSE AT HIGHWAY  61

DREAMLIKE SCENES & VISIONS—-TOO THE PAINTED ROAMS OF THE SIXTY ONES…

Digs highway signs…zags and corner stores of old. Exit a heart of a painter—too the road top moods…sullen moon’s riches in which few can really see. Less to own, yet it’s keys rise with the stars on what is left to gather these roams of the highway 61’s…painted the starts, struggles of life—and of love. Broken dreams determine the rolls of step on stones. Motorcycle take me home. Lessons learned to each new crisis. Girl on a picnic, yet this year alone. Office space for lease off a roll down cliff…a business goes the same. And still, no one buying. Nobody care to know. Revenues of broken dreams. Unfixed is the mix and makeup of “Sweet Jane”

A car fixed, frozen on the rail road tie. Endless long distances ahead…as the 61’s abandoned—and almost closed. Wise helper, the old lady crow from the past. This motorcycle highway of where the 61 used to live and prosper, now just of old dreams. Wishes start at every freight car bustle…conductor override and send all the wishes of old. Again, we are on our own. Feel it, the rollings of railing to the heaviest of stones. Jump-in Jack Elliot just bought the new clock…sold his stopwatch…smart watch, left too the curb. The wise guy, the bum…and their outlaw ways got them to where they land; right here at the demolition…ended of ave. Toad on the road disclosedsed of all highway 61’s’. ”Just a museum piece for all fair weather creatures once upon a time.” A motorcycle rider of the road. The joy. The peel, the wonder. Time now to pack for autumn.”Road closed”. Next tour is a milestone run…and big one! Memories and wide stretched, for only ‘mind’s eyed sees. The rest Dylan tells in song.

(BACK IN TIMES OF THE HIGHWAY)

POUR ME ANOTHER LITTLE TASTES OF HEAVEN…killing track-rubber on this road ride…lasting in the inspirited…whale ‘n and taking down the natural’s of the 61’. Smooths with sail-cats mementos…bye and bye. Albert, the iceman, pull over his flatbed heavy. Frozen doors…mile a minute skid. How proper their distances. Coffee little’s…a cafe stay. Mr. Collins have it, a rip roaring guitar in 3 chord blues…ice machines…scenes from the 61’s of hand picking strum line. Mike Bloomfield hammers like ghost goblins royal spirit rolls! Richard Emanuel loves the keys and harmonies. Road miles and corner tap room charms. ”Wish i had a mountain in hand lyrics from those days” say the artist. Those people…their travels. Memories bundle in one. Now a test, as too—– he who ride the highway’s smooths of heaven’s door. Highway 61.

PIT STOP AND FAITH PLACE TO TRAVEL. see you at the hole in the wall.

Bull ride lead me home. Nightingale on holiday. Open bar. Tequila jumbo…slow Gin fizz. Artifacts on wall…all front and centered. Clear cut caviar, never how it seems! Onion dip, free fall sandwiches, with art deco tables. Rap them up and take home. Sway left to center right, good night—-too a drunken stupefied fall! bow to the Captain’s nest…obided troubadours…young and old—-wrestling a poet’s dream; and maybe someday get there. Iron clad notions of the best bottled bread. Wish I’d been back England’s ways away when Sandy Denny opened with million dollar bash! Signs and times, a hundred mimes over. Lend me a call, my favorite dish. Catch and release every starfish who plays bass lines with King fish on call. I gotta say that this layout, maps and blends of a real hoot! Another lime in that Tex Mex blend, old boy…and have another Irish twists and mists—too play off the ambiance like a Irish spring day ”.I’ll be back at 7.” Hold that drink with the other , quite seven. Big tips and generous folks of my kind.

FURTHER ON THE HIGHWAY 61

(DYLAN AND VAN GOGH) TO THE TOUCHES OF EVERY BRUSHSTROKES…

Images weigh of  route 61. Rev and Gogh the landscape, these tumbles…and vested colors of their lore. A take to the highway of best known open minds, Sometimes UN-charters—too often dazzle, yet much to close to the shades of home. But still, the rhymes on perfect verse and time. Heart vessels …& all of the pains of it’s local beats—right to the rhythms to amaze. Banded riches…fears of an old bump—yet never let the eyes of an artist ever really fail. Trial change endeavors be their calls…their answers to it all; stretching…burgeoning where no one knows. Insides and sounds of the mystics. Mercurial end dose cures, if only for a few moments. Brush me… and hit me up with grayness. In greens, a dose of cure without envy. I will wish you both a scene of freedom…as ”the Egg-man” delivered with seamless UN-cracked—right into the ice box, which only the mind’s eye sees. Justifies.

(THAT EVIL HIGHWAY)

IN ALL THE IRONS OF GOD AND WHAT IS KNOWN OF OUR EVIL…a combination of mind and spirit of a two sided wind drive, finding center course, with nothing so obvious as night clawed vultures…terrors and screams past the broken street lamps. Never ending corridors backed up by magic. Halloween samples of angel and devil…there and suddenly gone—right off the front lawn! Cat of creature, the night is long. HEAVEN scent through mischief …and of light insinuating themes; as the church bells ring the love of the hour. New born fawn…opening eyes of truth. Turntables and black limousines. Carousels of the East river drives—right out of the foggy midnight turn. Folly free me past this conundrum…handcuffed and loaded on a large mushroom stay. A bed-knob irony approach of what could and couldn’t . Then a light of your smoke…and hammer wind out the lights. Free ghost take restless…and no supports…as no one sees, yet hears them. Open sesame stable. One needs a warm comfortable chair to ponder in. The black, the white of things to come. A hideaway cot and liquor cabinet…junket places of  deuce roll. Then come the horses…and all owners on quest. An answer of loaded details. Both good and bad.

THE DEMOLITION FINAL RUN AT HIGHWAY 61 (Like a rolling stone)

Rugged are the roads, the hard places of broken bits…cornered gravely off the highway of ragged dwellers. Soup can, dust weather bowl over an open fire. Cigarette holders hides in the sands—-drift and sink away their own smiles. Many highway run. Born to travel. Wares of it’s comes and goes. People and thinking, the fork in the road. What one must take on ”the heavy”. Die there of the unseen smooths ventured. YES, LIFE’S hard roads. Road runner avoids and of all the wily dynamite of a self brought empty soul-search. Crimson moon blend towards a long gone ride. Motorbike drive. Hiccups your blues, as too where ya’ going in this new age angry climate…and this hard road life. Spend bread the gamble without the look about the miles of road. Now middle age creeps like built on food and iron bar weighed crates. Mind, body and spirit.Have too hold…but can you? The road may be long in it’s search for sustainable life.Some peace. The air and airs may tame down through the grass long…the ears bigger. Gravity an ancient long. Earth’s besides itself; although truth and knowledge starts from within. The hard road you have now a resting point. Coasted dreams too reality. Find it at home.

Nowadays Mosa Kiswane can be regularly found sitting on top of the world.

But a decade ago he had lost almost everything, was drinking in despair and loneliness…

Mosa was standing at the bottom of a mountain of problems and anxieties caused by parental alienation.

Today though he is an inspiration to all victims of this family ‘crime’ committed by exes who have become the real deadbeats of the heart.

Mosa, aged 51, said: “I’d reached rock bottom seven years ago. But I climbed back and got to the summit of Kilimanjaro.

“In 2016 I was feeling so low and suffering from depression. I’d been hit by many personal tragedies, it had been a hell of journey. But then I started to believe in myself and I got up again, faced my demons and took control of my life.”

And recently Mosa climbed the Aconcagua Mountain in Argentina.

He describes it  in his own words:

“The climb started in the 10th of January and it was to last until the 25th, the news from other climber was that no one was able to summit since  the 2nd of January due to heavy snow and bad weather.

“Nevertheless I didn’t let that bother me and believed that I would be able to summit somehow.

“As we started to go up and reach higher camps, it became harder and harder with each step to breath, more stories of other team’s failure in the summit push, as we reached high camp 2 or camp Canada as it’s called.

“My friend and expedition leader Mostafa Salameh who introduced me to all this climbing had to be evacuated in the middle of the night due to him suffering a heart attack,

“!I wasn’t aware of the evacuation as I was in my tent and asleep, which was lucky as I would have never left his side and would have gone down with him, he is an old friend of mine and we go a long way.

“Without my best friend and mentor, I decided I will do everything to summit for him as well, 

“On the 23rd of January we pushed for the summit. 

“We woke up at 3am and started the push around 5am, it was one of the hardest things I ever done in my life, we lost 4 members of the team on  the way due to frost bite and other health complications and they had to be taking down to save them, despite all this I kept on pushing and climbing until I reached the summit at 14:30, I was ecstatic and so emotional.

“I managed to raise the banners for NAAP and Diabetes UK.

“Only me and two  others from the team made it.”

Mosa’s extraordinary determination to fight back is something we see all the time – the courage of people battered emotionally by ex-partners and the madness of family courts, the courage of people who climb massive obstacles to get their children back in their lives.

And help others along the way.

Andrew John Teague, founder of D.A.D.s and NAAP, said: “This sends a message to all parents and children who experienced parental alienation, don’t ever give up on yourself or your children.

“I have experienced the horrors of family courts and having strangers telling you if you can see your children or not based on a system that is not fit for purpose.”

Mosa said: “My story is not dissimilar to many other parents who experience parental alienation, it nearly broke me at the beginning and I didn’t know how to handle it, but I refused to bow down and fought the battle with all I got, I learned many lessons along the way and this has shaped the person I am today. This climb was for you all.”

Mosa live in London where he has built a new life as a personal trainer, nutritionist VIP concierge at London Heathrow ensuring people have a smooth ‘journey’ through the airport.

He said: “I used to work for British Airways as a cabin service manager and did that for 16 years. I went round the world.

“Then in late 2015 I separated from my wife. This was a when my problems began … we were together for 15 years and had two boys who were 10 and seven year old. We decided that the marriage wasn’t working and we had to separate.

“Later, I lost contact with my children, not by choice. I wasn’t prepared for it. I started drinking  a lot and the stress caused me to have a mini-stroke.

“I was hospitalised and was unable to work for three months, I managed to find a shabby studio to rent but was unable to see my children which impacted me and nearly drove me to suicide on many occasions.

“I wasn’t able to function properly but I somehow managed to get back to work and had to take voluntary redundancy from BA as I needed the money so I could rent a proper place where I can have my children come and stay over.

“I did that and at the same time started my legal battle to be able to see my children, I self-represented and it was tough, Cafcass offered me supervised visit by my ex at the beginning which I took but it nearly broke me again.

“I was overweight, drinking too much and suicidal.

“But I woke up one day and decided that I need to stop drinking and get healthy. It was tough but I did it and I enrolled into college and gained a personal training diploma. At the same time, I got a part time job at the airport and since then I led a healthy life style and managed to get more contact with my boys.”

Mosa’s climbs include the Aconcagua Mountain in Argentina, Mount Elbrus in Russia which is the highest in Europe, Mount Aconcagua in Argentina, he offered me a place on his team as someone had to cancel at short notice and their place was already paid for, I only had one week to prepare myself but I took this once in a lifetime opportunity and said yes. 

Aconcagua is the highest summit in the world outside the Himalayas at 6961m and is the second highest on the seven summits list after Everest.

Pictures by Leonardo Antonio Avezzno

#parentalalienation #alcohol #drinking #familycourt #children #family #cafcass #suicide