International Justice - Travelling To Court

In the UK a trial is cancelled. One party was told the wrong dates so the case was dismissed.
What happens in a case where the woman doesn't turn up because she is missing or dead and the accused is let free to attack again? In a recent case, I think in the USA, the courts used a video of the missing presumed dead woman's accusation because although she was not around it was 'in the public interest'. In many cases the woman or girl or child - or man - is scared or can't to through with a trial. In Singapore they have video links. If the person needed is in another country this saves the cost of flying them in.
What happens on days when the planes and trains and buses aren't running or bad weather? You would not cancel the trail - justice stopped by bad weather and typos.
You could even have a phone-in. Can't the judge or court phone the missing person and ask, 'where are you?, put the phone on speaker, then later have the person turn up in court when traffic allows.

WORLD TRAVEL MARKET, BEST BUDGET HOTELS & IBIS

Budget Hotels - IBIS EXPRESS and more
The Charms of the East London Edexcel Location

The World Travel Market moves with the times and years ago it was at Kensington Olympia but it is now held at Edexcel on the Docklands Light Railway. It looks new and exciting.

East London is great if you are travelling into the City Airport, although not for me. East London was probably cheaper at first for the organisers, it's bringing heart-warming life to an area which needed redeveloping and big signs show Arab countries investment but the location still seems worryingly inconvenient to travel agents and the travel writing press like me travelling from West or North West London in the Heathrow direction.

The show used to have major events for the press all week but now the big day is the opening day starting with breakfast at 9 am. How do you avoid the stress and risk of a late arrival after travelling 2 hours with waits and delays at three or more train interchanges?

My policy as a travel writer, tourist and Anxious Angela is always to arrive the night before - as I do on site at my Writers' Holiday in Caerleon, Wales. Airports often have a hotel attached. Every conference centre should have an attached hotel, or two or three, like shopping malls in South Africa.

For WTM I want a budget hotel nearby 'my' WTM.

So what are the overnight options? The hotels increase their prices if they are alongside a conference centre during a conference and are also fully booked. I was quoted more than £200 a night. (without breakfast and wifi which is £10 a day and you have to organise it yourself with the whole hassle of passwords and not getting a connection for half an hour of the one hour you want to use it. I was considering Sunday to THURSDAY.  For that money I could have paid for a taxi home to cart my clobber.

IBIS and Budget hotels

So I looked into the value for money IBIS hotels. I logged onto the WTM site and the IBIS hotel next to the conference centre had a room. I left my computer for a minute to discuss my budget 'one night or three?' But by the time I got back the room had gone!
The rooms were available and not available, like traffic lights. That's because you, the customer can book and cancel if you change your mind or change your plans. Until 2 pm on the day of arrival.

The advertised rate of a modest £49 on the website had shot up to £99 for a hotel some distance away. I booked three nights.

Then I phoned to check the hotel's nearness to the station. Nowhere near walking distance to the conference centre. You need a cab. I hate relying on cabs.

When my father phoned to say my mother was dying in hospital in 2005 it was raining and I tried to book a cab. I called six companies. Eventually I booked a cab. But it arrived 20 minutes later than it promised, firstly because of bad weather - and secondly it had diverted to fill up with petrol.
By the time I reached hospital mother was unconscious, my woebegone father gasping, 'Why are you so late?'

Now I'd rather have the second option of walking to the station. My London base is near the station. I chose to live near a station. When mother died I had to cancel a press trip to Nottingham. Now I read that they are planning a huge Robin Hood attraction opening 2015. But that's far in the future. What's in my mind? Don't rely on a cab.

Planning is all. One reason why people are late is that they are over-optimistic about travel times. Canny interviewees check journeys. Drive to your job interview destination the night before. Some people drive to check the venue of Harrovians Speakers Club of which I am president. I know Edexcel but not the Ibis hotel.

We drive to my chosen Ibis hotel the week before. I imagined East Barking would be a run-down high street dodging drunks and down and outs. No way. It is on a motorway, with a pavement beside the noise and pollution, in a cluster of three or four budget hotels, two branches of the IBIS and the one I pull into is the IBIS Express.

A very helpful front desk man tells me the cab is only £5 and you don't need to tip. I am almost tempted to switch to this place. However, no way can I walk from here.

He is able to find me a hotel nearer Excel conference centre, the City Airport. We drive there.

Quiet location of industrial estates and high rise offices and modern apartments. Not exactly a bustling shopping centre with cafes and pubs and shop windows  displaying quirky goods. But next door to a Costa which stocks my favourite almond bake slice. Long walk to the DLR but easy to find your way under the DLR to the the station. One interchange on the DLR. I book one night.

The smiling receptionist warns that people stay a night and want to stay on but the hotel is booked. I ask here to cancel my other booking but she can't. No way am I booking a second hotel in the same group when I am committed to more than £300 for another and her hotel can't sort it out.

I email the cancellation but get no reply. I shall phone them.

Then I'm off to 'my' new IBIS. What shall I pack? Not too much. No room for a nightdress. They won't have a bathrobe at a budget hotel. Costa next door supplies breakfast if I'm up before the press breakfast or can't wait until I get to the press centre.

What about breakfast in the room. A tin of prunes? Must be self opening. Try Morrisons. Oh, forget that. Since my IBIS Express hotel visit I now have the IBIS booklet showing all their hotels. Happy reading.

If you've any suggestions, please contact me
annalondon8@gmail.com

http://www.wtmlondon.com/ (Home page of World Travel Market 2012 at Edexcel lists all the events)

What You Must See at The World Travel Market - Armchair Visits

The Delights Of World Travel Market - Nott(ingham) Harry Potter, Jews' News
Drum beats echo as you wander past pictures of the world's highest hotels, romantic restaurants, and amazing waxwork museums' hologram faces. You photograph robots offering you leaflets, on your way towards double decker tourist buses temporarily turned into bars. Flag-waving countries with floor to ceiling videos have music-blaring stands divided areas into desks for tourist boards which display newly opened and renewed tourist attractions on the world's continents at The World Travel Market.

November may be a dull month worldwide but in London it's all happening. As usual I expect six foot girls in corsets from Las Vegas, maple syrup pancakes from Canada, Belgian beer and chocolates from factory shops, French wines from the Champagne region, saucers of dates and nuts from Arab countries, leaflets from Israel, Palestine, all smiling PR people.

Upstairs in the press office you get catalogues too big to carry all day, plus heavy goodie bags containing free CDs on tourist attractions if you are prepared to listen to 2 hours of statistics confused by government reps who speak no English but are translated by well-spoken saints into muttering microphones and Confusion he says. The important aim for travel writers is to network and collect address cards from tourist boards. Better still, if you are lucky, meaning eagle-eyed and beaver persistent, a busy editor who wants articles about your last trip.

Just when you are ready to collapse from dehydration and exhaustion at six o'clock the show's exits close. You are trapped like children following Germany's Piped Piper as Caribbean bands can be heard echoing across the halls. Limitless cocktails stop you stumbling up the four flights of stairs at the nearby DLR.

Did you buy a copy of a newspaper with a free big umbrella and lug the heavy newspaper around all day whilst tripping people up with the umbrella (two and four years ago) - or did you postpone buying until the evening and find they had run out of umbrellas or didn't have them this year (three and five years ago).

Olympia
The exhibition was originally held at oval Kensington Olympia, where a plaque recorded how sedate Queen Victoria in her tiara watched whooping Red Indians riding horses with Wild Bill Cody. I'm now researching budget  hotels. If you have any suggestions, please tell me.

I used to think that it was hard to reach Olympia in time and often persuaded an expensive Kensington or new hotel hungry for business and publicity to give me a four-poster bedroom for the night.

In my happy heyday I was a honeymoon specialist always in the honeymoon suite writing for Brides, Northern Echo or any newspaper whose staff I bumped into at events at WTM. Editors please call me.

Jewish Travel Guide, Anne Frank and Amy Winehouse
Now I'm blogging and self-publishing guidebooks. My latest is a Jewish Travel Guide A-Z. I started with Amsterdam's Anne Frank and compiled it for my own reference when speaking on radio. At a previous World Travel Market I discovered that Poland's most visited site is Auschwitz (featured on Polish and UK school trips). I've visited Schindler's Museum in Krakow, Poland's beautiful medieval former capital.

But my list of must visit one day tell me more still includes Nigeria's Queen of Sheba burial site which I heard about at a previous World Travel Market. I've also researched every country in the world from biblical times to WWII. Biblical sites, for example include Yemen's Queen of Sheba attractions.Thoughout the year I watch the news. Amy Winehouse's dress was bought by a fashion museum in South America. 

Wish List Of Writers', Songwriters' and Singers' Homes
On previous visits to the show I learned about Elvis's Jewish connections, lots more sites to see in the USA singers, and country singers; and an Australian country singers' museum.

As for researching tourist sites connected with my fellow authors, I haven't yet seen R L Stevenson's last home and monument in the Pacific, nor Harry Potter which is near me and a real possibility for a visit. If you have visited these places or have any other suggestions please contact me
angelalansbury@hotmail.com

Here's your link to what's on at The World Travel Market 2012 at Edexcel
http://www.wtmlondon.com/

Delete everything from (new) mobiles sent back to the shop?

Every traveller relies on a phone, for phone numbers and as one of the latest ad says, so the satellite navigation can tell you where you are. What could go wrong? Your new, upgraded phone.
A woman is worried because she took a faulty phone back to the shop and the new owner can see all her photos and new emails and bank details and passwords being updated.
Others says she should have deleted everything and re-installed icloud with a new password.
But you don't delete everything from your new phone after spending two days loading up all your phone numbers. You take it into the shop saying 'there is a problem' hoping they can fix it. After half an hour they give up and call the manager.
He gives you a new phone and promises to wipe the old one - or says he'll get it fixed and give it back - he then turns to three people waiting impatiently behind you.
By then you are late and trying to check the new phone is working and rush off.
When you phone the shop next week they tell you to keep the new phone. They can't find where the old one has gone but think it went back to the manufacturer and got binned.

Reforming UK Primary School Teaching - Adding Dates+History

The new list must include English spelling+ grammar. If not please add it.
Geography: continents, read maps and Satnav, find countries in the news, ancestors, classmates' origins.
Practical maths: how vacuum cleaners work, use a dishwasher, Run water in waste disposal to prevent solid food blocking drains.
Keep accounts: pocket money in, money spent.
Keep time, file homework papers, tidy room.
Possible careers + skills+exam passes for jobs. I needed Latin A level to study English at London Univ / science A level for psychology.
Music - read music and compose a simple song. Sing in tune:  start with happy birthday to you.
Politeness worldwide: Say Please+thank you. Use a hanky to wipe noses. Wash hands before+ after meals. Don't put fingers on food when passing cake slices. No fingers inside cups.Take off shoes or wear overshoes in homes where you sit or pray on the floor or babies crawl.
Languages: (Don't tell me it's confusing to learn other languages. It helps me spell and understand English knowing Latin. I wish I had learned Greek, German, and Spanish. Beggar children in third world countries can ask for money in ten languages. People with multiple borders such as Czech republic speak up to 8 languages. The Scandinavians who speak languages nobody beyond their border can speak, means they have to be near-fluent in at least one other language, English.) Russian+Greek alphabet. 100 words, 3 grammatical sentences in the present, past and future, a request and a command. 1 song, in 12 languages.

Cheap colour change tests for HIV are being developed

This is good for poorer countries which need tests but cannot afford them.
What brief news reports have not space to mention and discuss is that if this were available on the internet or from a doctor the public could test themselves without having the record on their medical records or sent to an insurance company or employer.
The NHS is likely to object because people might get suicidal if not told in person by somebody who can help deal with the reaction - or demand a re-test if the level of false positives is high. But another advantage would be people could ask potential dates or mates to take a test in public before getting involved physically and emotionally which would cut down infection rates. As we have cures or treatments to prevent, alleviate, if not eliminate, many diseases and ones which take over when your immune system is low, that must be good for the long-term health of the majority of patients as well as their partner or potential partner. It might even save the NHS the cost and time of testing people.
Currently some US states require medical tests before marriage to protect the unborn child. Also have what used to be called VD was a grounds for annulment of a marriage. So this save a lot of aggro when many people are infected and don't even realise it.
France requires every motorist to carry a breathaliser. One day every traveller will be required to carry a set of condoms and health check kits and use them before a relationship starts.
Anything which saves money and saves lives and relationships has to be good.

How do you speak on a subject when you are not an expert?

1 I wrote a book on etiquette and when I spoke on radio on etiquette I was asked why Americans eat with a fork in their left hand. I didn't know - but an American rang in with her answer. I learned that if you can't answer a question, you ask the audience. If none of them know, it doesn't matter that you don't and you can say you'll find out and let them know later. If somebody does know, you can thank them profusely.
2 You look the subject up in Wikipedia. In advance. You find the world expert on the subject who has written a book. You pick a pithy a quotation on the subject. You ask who in the audience has read the book and what they thought of it.
3 If you are asked suddenly (the speaker didn't turn up) try to get a break at half time during which you check wikipedia on your laptop or mobile phone for more ideas.
4 You ask the audience for their biggest problems and then ask who has solved that problem. You'll soon find you have a relevant or amusing or helpful comment on their methods or attitudes.
5 Turn it into a workshop. Start by flattering the audience for being such a group of experts. Ask the list of their top ten challengers and get a VIP to write these on a board. Break them up into groups of 2 or maximum ten and give them 20 minutes and then get them to give feedback. (While they are doing this, you can research the subject on the internet.)

Making Drinking Alcohol Safer

Today's news stories are about UK police shutting down premises associated with assaults and rapes. 18 year old student drinks vodka bottle in 15 minutes and falls to his death down a flight of stairs.
Don't alcohol bottle labels in many countries warn you to limit the amount you drink, like pills? If not, they should.
I've read several incidents of people dying on stag nights, usually the groom or best man. Now it's colleges. We should bring in laws like the Scandinavians. Drink must be served only with food. Anybody who spikes a drink, serves anybody else too much alcohol, or encourages them to drink dangerous amounts should be held responsible.