It's that time of year...

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Anyone for Battenberg?

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It was the reminder of yet another iconic food item not available – at least to my knowledge – to those of us living in the Balkans. A friend messaged me on Facebook to say he thought it was time the resurrect ‘The Battenberg Effect’. Now that’ll mean nothing to some of you, while other readers will be thinking of pink and yellow fluffy sponge squares glued together with jam and wrapped in marzipan! The Gutenberg Effect – or thegutenbergeffect – is a blog I started a couple of years ago. It was a ‘tech blog’ of sorts. Drawing from my experience in communications and creative development, as a writer, project manager and mentor, I wanted to add my two pennies to the understanding of trends in technology and the social impact of these changes. I hadn’t posted on the site since before our move to Bosnia and Herzegovina...until today. His message made me realise I still have something to say on the subjects I used to riff around, but from the new perspective of our new environment. For ex
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Do you recognise this?

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Over the last couple of weeks Rowan and I have spent hours wandering the streets of Mostar trying to get our bearings. We've visited the four malls, sat in cafes and restaurants, run the gauntlet of pedestrian crossings and traversed the Neretva more times than we can remember. In one long walk through the tall apartment blocks that inhabit some much of the west side we chanced upon a strange, unfamiliar site. The picture does not show a rubber ball in some crazed state of decay. Rather it is a fruit. We know that much from watching two pigeons pulling one apart. We poked one or two ourselves. The pavement was littered with them, with more still clinging to the overhanging tree. Perhaps we're being particularly ignorant but this doesn't look like any fruit we've seen before. And therein lies today's lesson: fruit is still fruit, whether we recognise it or not. I look forward to discovering exactly what I photographed and to seeing what the 'fruit' of our lab
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Encouraging creativity

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Most days when I write I write and Rowan discovers what’s be posted the next time she’s online. Today, there was some discussion beforehand. We were in Klub and she was showing me some artwork produced by young people on Saturday. Four square canvasses were sat on the side. This one caught my eye. The young people who come to Klub come from a range of backgrounds. Some are in education and will end up in university. Others are involved in more vocational training. Some have had no education. We’re been providing opportunities for all of them to engage in a range of creative projects. It was not easy at first. From what we can work out, the sort of creative activities that would not be uncommon in UK youth work are very definitely foreign concepts here. Over the last few months it’s been encouraging to see more of them decide they want to take part. Which brings us to this art. It is mainly the work of a nineteen year old, who was helped out by a thirteen year old – the thirteen year ol
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