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International Scene
By Raymond Canon
THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 18, 1998. PAGE 5.
Just desserts
Light the candles and pour the red wine
into your glass. Before you begin to eat,
raise your glass in honour of yourself.
The company is the best you'll ever have.
So goes the advice of a gent by the name of
Daniel Halpern, writing on the joys of
solitary dining.
Mister Halpern was writing from a
decidedly salubrious vantage point: one that
gave him the choice of dining alone or in
company. Lots of folks don't have the option:
Spinsters. Bachelors. Widowers. Lighthouse
keepers.
And prisoners on Death Row.
What an experience that must be, eh?
Your Last Supper. The warden comes to your
cell and asks you through the bars if you
have any special requests in terms of what
you would like to put in your mouth on the
occasion of your final chow down.
What about it, reader? Imagine the worst.
Imagine that you have been tried, convicted
and sentenced to execution for crimes that
thankfully only you and your conscience
know to date.
What would you order for your last meal
on earth?
Steak? A bit heavy, I fear.
Caviar? Rather rich for what might well
Where is Kazakhstan?
I wonder if there were any others beside
myself who were curious why Kazakhstan
had a hockey team at the Olympics. It is not
as if they had been a real contender all these
years, yet they were there although several of
the European teams were not. I felt it was
worth looking into and reporting on my
findings.
I knew a bit about the place already, but
after my research, I realized the operative
word was "a bit." The country is located in
central Asia to the north of more familiar
places such as Iran, Pakistan, India and
China but it was part of the Soviet Union and
chose to become independent rather than stay
with the new Russia.
About one-third of the population is
Russian in origin and it is out of this segment
that the hockey team you saw at the
Olympics, or read about, was formed.
There are seven other countries in the area
that also opted to separate from Russia, but
Kazakhstan is by far the largest. Its capital
used to be Almaty, in the southern part of the
country, but in order to discourage the
Russians from taking over any of the more
isolated northern part of the area, the Kazakh
government deliberately moved the capital
far north to the wind-swept city of Akmola.
Frankly I don't envy any diplomat, from
Canada or anywhere else, who gets posted
there for any length of time. It's what we
used to call in the business a hardship post.
Kazakhstan is like Canada in that it has a
climb those steps.
King Crab? Pork and Beans? Pâté de Foie
Gras?
The most common request prison caterers
hear is for cheeseburgers, believe it or not.
Over the past 15 years, the state of Texas has
put to death 144 men by rope, electron and
lethal injection. The majority of the
condemned men order cheeseburgers for
their final nosh, usually with a side of french
fries.
Mind you, 24 of them declined any sort of
meal at all.
As for the rest of the prisoners' orders, well
you name it — chances are it's been requested
at one time or another.
James Smith, executed for murder in 1990,
solemnly requested a last meal of common,
garden-variety dirt. Alas for Mister Smith,
dirt wasn't on the prison menu, so he reluc-
tantly settled for his second choice: yogurt.
Many condemned prisoners order
elaborate, three-, four- and five-course meals
only to have their appetite desert them when
the food finally arrives.
But some cons carry it off right to the end.
Gordon Fawcett Hamby was captured after
robbing a Los Angeles bank in 1920, in
which he shot two clerks.
Sentenced to die in the electric chair,
Hamby ostentatiously decked himself out in
a black suit and a white shirt, then called the
large land mass but few people. It also, like
Canada, is filled with oil and all sorts of
other minerals. It also has great agricultural
potential.
However, as you might guess, it is oil that
makes people sit up and take notice for the
western part of the country borders on the
Caspian Sea and oil is there in bountiful
quantities. Some Kazakhs speak of their oil
reserves is being second only to those of
Saudia Arabia.
It is hard to tell which estimate is closest to
the truth for the simple reason that many of
the areas in and around the Caspian Sea have
yet to be thoroughly explored. This is where
Kazakhstan needs western know-how for
they simply do not have the capacity to do
the necessary exploring. Even Canadian
drilling firms have become involved but
they, along with the others, will tell you that
it is difficult making a deal with the local
authorities and it is not likely to get easier.
Part of the problem is the rampant
corruption which prevails and nobody is
quite sure just in whose pockets the money
flows.
Then there is the question of getting the oil
out to the refineries and to western markets.
The most logical way is by pipeline and,
although some of these do exist, they are
only fragmentary and could eventually go in
all directions of the compass. One has even
been proposed through Afghanistan and
Pakistan but, given the perennial unrest in the
former country, nobody has any idea when
such a pipeline would be built.
One of the more logical routes would be by
pipeline to the Black Sea and then by tanker
through the Bosporus in Turkey. Here again
lobster salad. "I need not worry about
indigestion," he noted.
The famed spy Mata Hari went out in
similar style, ordering a specially tailored
suit and elegant new gloves for her
appointment with the firing squad.
There's no record of what Mata Hari ate at
her last meal, but I bet it wasn't fattening.
And Gary Gilmour, the man executed in
Utah State Prison back in 1977?
After a lot of brave talk, Gilmour declined
to dress for the occasion. His final meal
request was similarly un-flashy. Gilmour
meekly ordered a hamburger with the works,
two fried eggs over easy, a side of home
fries — plus two mini bottles of bourbon to
wash it all down.
Gilmour was lucky. Most prison
regulations prohibit any alcoholic beverages
with the last meal.
Which reminds me: if you're thinking of
committing any offence for which you might
receive the death penalty, do yourself a
favour and don't do the dirty deed in Texas.
Or California. Especially if you're a smoker.
Both Texan and Californian law absolutely
and unequivocally prohibit that famous final
cigarette for prisoners who are about to be
strung up, fried or flat-lined with lethal
chemicals.
No smoking allowed.
Could be bad for their health, don't you
there is a problem for the Turks claim the
narrow strait on which Istanbul is located
cannot handle any more traffic than it already
is.
The current president of Kazakhastan,
Nursultan Nazarbaev, has a fairly good idea
where he wants the country's economy to go;
it is the politics that is a bit more
questionable.
Mr. Nazarbaev makes sure that only his
own loyal followers are in any position of
power and he tries to play them off against
each other so that none of them will be able
to challenge him. Some criticism is tolerated
but, should it go beyond that in any way, the
heavy-handedness of the government makes
itself felt.
But because of the long border between
Kazakhstan and Russia, Mr. Nazarbaev tries
to stay on good terms with Boris Yeltsin.
Although the Kazakh leader has already
agreed to build a pipeline to China which
sits on his eastern border, he may well end up
permitting the main one to be built north to
Russia to join up with the latter's system.
Of such decisions are good politics
frequently made.
Needless to say, there is not a great
following of the country's hockey team but at
least it showed the flag at the Olympics and
that may be the most that Mr. Nazarbaev can
hope for at the present time. Meanwhile there
is all that oil!
Men do less than they ought unless they
do all that they can. — Thomas Carlyle
The
Short
of it
4 Nk
y onnie Gropp
Tears, a balm for the soul
I attended a funeral this past week and
among other things it got me thinking about
the power of tears. What draws them out
can be intolerably painful, but there is little
doubt that they can be the balm to, if not
heal, then eventually soothe even the
greatest anguish.
The words, "If I could just have a good
cry, I'd feel so much better," have been said
many times, on many occasions through the
years.
Obviously, there are situations when tears
are expected, when to not have them fall
makes us suspect what type of heart beats
inside a dry-eyed mass of flesh and blood.
The loss of a loved one, pain of the body or
soul, are things we expect will precipitate
some tears. And therapists attest that
weeping will help assauge grief and hurt
through time.
So, if crying is part of the grieving
process, can it also be restorative for minor
mental maladies? I believe so and believe
me I should know.
Though I can't cry on demand, as one
woman I know was frequently capable of
doing, my kids would probably tell you that
I am a weeper of the first order. The other
evening my comment that a certain movie
had me sobbing "like a blithering idiot",
elicited a sardonic response from my son
about that being a big surprise.
So I'm a bit of a drip. My eyes well at
movies, books, songs and, abashedly I note,
even some commercials. I have even been
known to watch a movie time and again so
that I can have a good cry. Because, the
thing is, interestingly enough, that while I
agree with all the talk about a good cry being
therapeutic, I am finding it more difficult as
an adult to summon tears when I'm feeling a
little down or just plain sorry for myself.
With so much real misery in the world
perhaps I feel a little guilty about wallowing
in self-pity. Thus I hide under a celluloid
cover.
Growing up does inhibit selfishness. Yet,
unfortunately, grown ups also seem to have
to bear increasing weight on their shoulders
with staunch dignity.
Certainly, the longer I live the more joys
I've known, but conversely, I have also had
to swallow many anxieties. When I cannot
take one more dollop of trouble added to a
plate heaped with puny problems, it would
be such sweet relief, as a guileless child
would do, to let it all go and blubber like a
baby.
But I am not a guileless child, I am an
adult — a generation that is also, some may
forget, all too human. Like children, adults
too feel pain, feel afraid and feel alone. They
occasionally feel challenged and threatened
or get depressed and tired.
Yet, they also must be strong. Part of
maturity is recognizing the need to be
strong, to be in control of at least a portion
of your life. And so we adapt and learn to
cope. Usually times are good, but when they
aren't the clichés form our physiognomy —
we put on a brave face, lift that chin and
keep a stiff upper lip.
So who can blame us if every once in
awhile we pop Sleepless in Seattle into the
VCR, grab a kleenex, wipe away that steely
facade and permit ourselves a little well-
deserved release.
Arthur Black