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Dembele has had a free ride this season
at 11:54 5 Apr 2025

There is an interesting passage about laziness in Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism (2008) by Korean economist Ha-Joon Chang. Chang says:

"Countries are poor not because their people are lazy, their people are 'lazy' because they are poor."

"After her tour of Asia in 1911-1912, Beatrice Webb, the famous leader of British Fabian socialism, described the Japanese as having 'objectionable notions of leisure and a quite intolerable personal independence'. She said that, in Japan, 'there is evidently no desire to teach people to think'. She was even more scathing about my ancestors. She described the Koreans as '12 millions of dirty, degraded, sullen, lazy and religionless savages who slouch about in dirty white garments of the most inept kind and who live in filthy mudhuts'. No wonder she thought that 'if anyone can raise the Koreans out of their present state of barbarism I think the Japanese will', despite her rather low opinion of the Japanese. This was not just a western prejudice against eastern peoples. The British used to say similar things about the Germans. Before their economic take-off in the mid-19th century, the Germans were typically described by the British as 'a dull and heavy people'. 'Indolence' was a word that was frequently associated with the Germanic nature. Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, wrote in exasperation after a particularly frustrating altercation with her German coach-driver: 'the Germans never hurry'.

In other words, culture changes with economic development. That is why the Japanese and the German cultures of today are so different from those of their ancestors. Culture is the result, as well as the cause, of economic development. It would be far more accurate to say that countries become 'hardworking' and 'disciplined' (and acquire other 'good' cultural traits) because of economic development, rather than the other way around.

Indeed, Japanese workers used to be a pretty militant bunch until fairly recently. Between 1955 and 1964, Japan lost more days per worker in strikes than Britain or France, countries which were not exactly famous for co-operative industrial relations at the time. Co-operation and loyalty came about only because Japanese workers were given institutions such as lifetime employment and company welfare schemes. Ideological campaigns (and government bashing of militant communist trade unions) did play a role, but they would not have been enough on their own."
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Stoke City v Queens Park Rangers- match thread hi
at 15:23 29 Mar 2025

Andersen seems completely out of it.
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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 14:11 26 Mar 2025

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Film 2025
at 17:33 19 Mar 2025

I found it typical underwhelming Netflix fare. I was surprised to discover that at $320 million it's one of the most expensive movies ever made.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films
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Choons - The French Connection
at 14:13 18 Mar 2025

"I was for a very long time passionately in love with her" (David Bowie)

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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 13:56 18 Mar 2025



https://lyricstranslate.com/en/limmensita-immensity.html-3
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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 15:08 12 Mar 2025

Se telefonando on the previous page is an Ennio Morricone composition.
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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 13:02 12 Mar 2025

Another one of those grand 60s numbers, Gino Paoli's Il cielo in una stanza/The Sky in a Room

Half a pop song, half an orchestral work. Mina Mazzini's slower version was used in Scorsese's Goodfellas.



Lyrics in English and Italian:
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/il-cielo-una-stanza-sky-room.html#songtranslation
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The Boro Match thread.
at 19:55 11 Mar 2025

Kieran Morgan blasted it.
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The 58 years ago this week WBA v QPR match thread
at 16:04 8 Mar 2025

Just seen the highlights replayed at half-time and neither the penalty nor the sending off looks that clear-cut (maybe things will be clearer when there are better highlights available).

It's possible the oppo player ran across Colback. Whatever happened it wasn't one of those crazy lunges from Colback.

Furlong didn't seem to have raised his arm that high.
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Choons - The French Connection
at 11:59 8 Mar 2025



The English version by QPR's very own Sarah Cracknell
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Choons - The French Connection
at 14:31 7 Mar 2025



Chorus:
Chaos is everywhere
All my ideals: words now meaningless
I search for a soul who can help me.
I am part of a disenchanted generation,
Disenchanted
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/desenchantee-disenchanted.html-1#songtranslation
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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 13:57 7 Mar 2025



Rimini is an Italian holiday resort. This blog has a translation and an explanation of the song:
https://deandretranslated.blogspot.com/2014/08/rimini_8.html
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Friday Choons - The Italian Job
at 21:42 6 Mar 2025

Another one from magnificent Mina Mazzini, composed by Ennio Morricone for the Italian TV series Aria condizionata:

Live


With English subtitles
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Choons - The French Connection
at 15:11 28 Feb 2025

Two institutions of French pop, Jean-Jacques Goldman and Francis Cabrel, sing Goldman's Comme Toi, a hit in France in the early 80s, during my grape-picking days.

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Choons - The French Connection
at 10:12 28 Feb 2025

I always thought this one was appropriate when QPR are on one of those long winless runs:

Il faut savoir (You've got to know)

You've got to know...when the good times have gone and the worst is to come.
You've got to know...how to keep your dignity, whatever the cost.
You've got to know...when you are powerless in the face of destiny, how to hide your tears.
You've got to know...but me, I didn't know how.

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The power of the Won
at 13:26 27 Feb 2025

Club shop seems to heavily advertising the Yang Min-hyeok shirts (this screen keeps popping up)
[Post edited 27 Feb 13:28]
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The power of the Won
at 12:33 20 Feb 2025

Years ago I did evening classes at the Korean Cultural Centre (near Trafalgar Square). I have to admit I didn't get very far in terms of speaking Korean.

However, it's actually not that hard to learn to read Korean as there are only 24 characters in the Korean alphabet. Each syllable (e.g. Yang 양) is composed of individual characters from the Korean alphabet (e.g. ya ㅑ):

syllable - characters - sound in English alphabet

양 = ㅇ + ㅑ + ㅇ = [silent] + ya + ng

민 = ㅁ + ㅣ + ㄴ = m + i + n

혁 = ㅎ + ㅕ + ㄱ = h + yeo + k
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Friday Choons - Cover Versions
at 13:10 14 Feb 2025

Hong Min's Song of the Wanderer (cover of Wichita Lineman)
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QPR v Fat Frank's Lady Godìva first eleven match thread
at 21:39 11 Feb 2025

Choker.
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