Migrants. To many in the UK, the word conjures up visions of unwashed, tattered scraps from the table of humanity, their worldly possessions in a small cloth bag and a scroungy look in their vacant eyes, sucking up taxpayers' blood and sweat. That a migrant (especially a non-white one) can be polished and educated, rich and successful, compatible with and even interested in local culture, seems to be a bizarre notion for the majority of Brits.
Three themes dominate the papers, day in and day out: (radical) Muslims as cultural misfits, hordes of East Europeans flooding in via EU enlargement (the job-stealing 'Polish Plumber' is the new boogeyman), and asylum seekers sponging state benefits. Sure, each of these categories has some merit, and this island nation is historically xenophobic by nature.
But in all this hysteria, the political parties in charge enact misguided kneejerk populist measures, and the one migrant group who actually does nothing but benefit the economy gets the stick.
Work Permit (WP) and Highly Skilled Migrant Program (HSMP) visa holders [I'm one of the latter] are, I would hazard, some of the best and brightest young people working in the UK, across nationalities. The WP is an employer-sponsored 5-year work visa (sort of like the US H1-B) while HSMP is a points based system that rewards youth, higher education and work experience, and above-average earning power. You needed 65 points to be eligible for the scheme, which would give you a one-year employer-independent work visa, extendable for a further three years. Both WPs and HSMPs could, after completing four years in the UK, apply for ILR (Indefinite Leave to Remain) - the equivalent of permanent residency. After a minimum of one year on the ILR, an application for British citizenship could be made.
All this WAS the case. This year, the Home Office introduced two major changes. The first was pushing up the timeframe for ILR (and therefore eventual citizenship) from 4 years to 5. The second, more fundamental change, was a sudden and complete revision of the HSMP system last week, with some points categories scrapped, new ones introduced and more gradient points allocations. All fine and dandy (objectively speaking it's definitely an improvement on the older system) - but it will apply not only to fresh applications but also to extensions for those already here.
Now it doesn't directly affect me for now, cos I already got my extension till 2010 a couple of months ago. But thousands of others have been caught in the lurch. After investing much or all of their life savings to come here, sometimes with familes, find work and set up a new life in the UK - the application form even asks you to pledge that you will 'make the UK your main home' - they go to renew the initial one-year visa and presto chango, they suddenly don't meet the new criteria. What now for them? Shut shop and fuck off? Is this the reassurance that the government of your newly adopted country gives you - at any point they can change rules and tell you to piss off?
I feel especially sorry for those who got caught in between the two rule changes - say, someone who would have qualified for ILR in a few weeks' time suddenly has to wait another year, and deciding to knuckle down and wait it out, then gets slammed with another rule change, which is effectively a deportation order for those who can't make the new bar.
There is already talk of legal action on immigration boards, but I don't know what will come of it, because at the end of the day, all said and done, this is Britain and the British are free to do what they like to foreigners in their country. Indeed, even when known radicals like Abu Hamza are given state benefits of £30k a year and preach hatred at the mosques every week, even when 50,000-plus asylum seekers and their dependents are given that precious piece of paper every year, the government is free to throw as many obstacles and hurdles as they can at their most skilled, hard-working, law-abiding group of residents. Freedom and democracy, yeah!

Ten years ago, in a year when Boyzone and the Spice Girls haunted self-respecting teens everywhere, I woke up from a larval adolescent stage and did many memorable things. And while sex, drugs and grunge had (and have) their own niches, the seminal event was learning to ride a motorcycle. Since, for the price of a few scars, a couple of cracked bones and two acrylic front teeth, I've gotten to ride some awesome machines, tour dozens of absolutely incredible places and even managed to earn a living off it - twice.
So considering this is the longest (ten months) I've been without a motorcycle in the past decade, I am going absolutely nuts. I tell myself the next few months are too cold to ride around in anyways, but it's all a filthy lie.. for reasons x and y, I'll be able to afford a bike only by March, which just happens to coincide with the onset of spring.
Besides, I live less than a kilometre from my workplace, a distance insufficient to even get an engine warmed up, and even I must admit it would be daft to pay £150 instalments for a bike and put in 25 miles a month.
Man, it's like being single after a string of fiery relationships.. and having a prosthetic hand.

For a change, work took me eastward-ho to Asia last week, to Taiwan. The jetlag still has me reeling - I spent 50 hours in planes and airports, and barely 70 hours actually in Taipei - but fuelled by duty-free Absolut, i'll blog instead of passing out on a couch and drooling.

Split into two posts cos I have no clue how to upload loads of images into one.

Look at this view out of my hotel window. Okay so I was staying in some farflung suburb called Chung Ho City, but doesn't this look like Bombay? Only less smoggy, and cleaner, and not noisy.. right, not so much like Bombay then.

In central Taipei however there's no contest. It's one of the cleanest cities I've seen yet, with wide roads and all the buildings looking pretty new. The latter is also a bit of a downside however, because I love wandering through tatty old city sections; culture and flavour and all that. Maybe I didn't visit the right parts but there was a smidgen of sterility to it. (But yes, at the end of the day, I'd rather live on Marine Drive than Mohd Ali Road, if you know what I mean..)

And this here is Taipei 101, at 1,666 feet above ground, presently the world's tallest inhabited building. It's absolutely colossal - you have to tilt your head painfully to see it fully. Unfortunately a combination of bad planning and being uninformed meant I couldn't make the time to go up to the observatory.. there was a 30-minute queue for tickets and I had 45 minutes to spare before I had to head off for the freakishly-far-away airport and leave. Bah. (contd..)

One evening I went to a small local store and spent ten minutes trying to figure out what on god's earth was stocked on the food shelves. Giving up, I settled for the (also puzzling) booze shelf. Randomly picking up these two bottles, I sat back to enjoy Taiwan's finest (sum cost: equivalent of £1.50). But oof, it was beyond awful. I'd rather drink cough syrup with a splash of vinegar. Oh wait, that's what I did.

Food glorious food. The country has a great reputation for street food, from grilled squid and filled dumplings to spicy eggs and the invitingly-named stinky tofu, and this street stall seemed as good a place as any to sample it. You choose your morsels, place them in a plastic basket and hand them to the chap who grills and fries them up. Please note the pile of chicken's feet in one of the tubs at the bottom of the picture. Er... hello, room service please!

In the malls however, you have massive food courts, with huge displays of appetising-looking plastic food fronting each shop. Madame Tussaud, eat yer heart out. The only other place I've seen this was Japan (where I promptly made an ass of myself by asking for the dish in the display), so I figure this is a wise Eastern idea called 'look and choose your meal by pointing at the sample instead of babbling at me in a language I don't understand you stupid tourist!'

But in the malls, you also find bizarre establishments like this: a Pepsi shop. Yeah, an entire shop containing a Pepsi fountain and a few sad-looking bits of Pepsi merchandise. Beckham and co hung about on the far wall presumably to persuade impressionable Taiwanese kids (and mind you, in 3 days I don't think I saw even one obese native, adult or child) to quaff the sugary swill. Wtf?

But all is forgiven when you go to a nightclub like Carnegie's, a rocking and very popular dance-pub (so to speak) packed with expats, youngsters and (it was a Halloween theme night) various assorted freaks. Some tracks were a bit cheesy but I was sufficiently lubed with Jim Beams and everyone around was really friendly and enjoying themselves, which is what seals the deal really. Plus there were short-skirted girls dancing away on the bar counter, which is never a bad thing.

On that pleasant note, je suis off to get some shuteye. If I never see you again, Taiwan, good morning, good evening, and good night.