JOTTINGS IDLE AND OTHERWISE

BY MRJ

NEWS, views or just plain gup about sex fills the pages of news papers—even those which like to be considered as serious. While much of it just panders to the appeal of the prurient in human beings, some of it is, or can be, quite educative.

WHAT BIRDS AND BEES DO: For this week yours truly wishes to provide you a brief sampling—mainly to get rid of the whole pile of cuttings on the subject that your jotter has culled from varied publications in course of his daily browsing!

To begin, London school kids, tired of Pokemon cards or collecting pictures of football stars, have apparently alarmed city authorities by swapping prostitutes’ pornographic calling cards instead.

What are such calling cards? As per a Reuters item, "the sexy illustrated cards that offer services like Swedish ‘massages’ or a night with a buxom transvestite, are illegally plastered in public phoneboxes across the capital and are becoming hot commodities on the city’s school playgrounds. Oh, really?

Then, there was a capsule item from Shanghai that reported that a train in southern China hit a pair of young lovers who failed to hear its approach as they kissed ‘passionately’ on the tracks. So what happened? The impact left the woman, a 25-year-old migrant worker in Zhaoqing city, in a coma. But her companion walked away virtually uninjured. What a cad.

Once again from swinging London—comes this report. British medical researchers can unmask you if you pretend to love or be in love. The true-love certificate will not be issued by heart specialists since research has dethroned the heart in the kingdom of love.

It is the mind that matters. True love can be certified through a brain scan and it can then be "analysed". Thus, love may turn out to be nothing more than activity of the brain which is supposed to be only a computer.

Scientists are now able to see what love does to the mind. How boring and non-romantic! How very different from ol’ Billy Shakespear who long ago said: "Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind." Ah, well.

Switching over now to Naples—often confused abroad with Nepal—comes this bit. Crowds are reportedly pouring into Naples’ Archaeological Museum to see the collection of erotic art, many of the 300 artifacts unearthed from the Roman city of Pompeii that was buried when Mount Vesuvius erupted in A.D. 79.

The objects in what some call the Pompeii Peep Show—frescoes, vases, statues, engraved cups and dozens of phalluses—have been seen in public only for brief periods since they were unearthed when the ancient city was rediscovered in the 1700s.

PEEP SHOW: For your kind information, the exhibition’s curators have included documents showing that the Bourbon kings who ruled Naples at the time were embarrassed by the objects—not from a sense of modesty but out of fear that foreigners making the Grand Tour of Europe would conclude that the people of Naples were libertines.

When Guiseppe Garibaldi’s troops reached Naples in 1860 in their drive to unify Italy, one of the first things they did was to open up the collection ‘as a liberating symbol." That, however, did not last long: ‘first pressure from the Vatican, then the onset of fascism, then World War II kept the collection out of sight to all but ‘recommended visitors’."

Now that it’s year 2000, I suppose Neapolitans came to the conclusion that it was about time to restore their ancient glory. You’ll not be surprised, no one is complaining.

Again, from London—this time a piece on the "battle" for the soul of its red-light district. The crux of the item relates to a battle royale between "Soho’s renowned prostitutes, who want to continue earning a living in the relative comfort of their discreet flats, and the local council, which wants to gentrify the area."

While letting premises for prostitution is illegal, the law is unclear over woman who use their own accommodation. The Soho Society claims it has not received a single complaint about the women, and local traders say that they are a long-accepted part of the Soho’s character, others maintain "no bad women, just bad laws". What say you?

Then, there’s a brief news item indicating that Sheffield, famed for its stainless steel cutlery, is planning to legalise prostitution in massage parlours, escort agencies and saunas.

If the City Council actually goes ahead, one is informed, Sheffield will be the first city in Britain to bring back brothels. Of curse, as per plans, the premises used by the prostitutes would be regularly inspected by Council health inspectors and police.

From the city of Al Capone -- to wit, Chicago -- comes the report that "armed with two-way radios, envelops filled with 10 and 20 dollar bills and a prayer, a small group of men prepares to hit the dimly lit streets in search of prostitutes and drug dealers.

Now hear this: They are not cops, nor are they looking to break the law. They are an earnest group of Catholics who want to spread the word of God. And they are willing to pay those who they encounter for the time to do it. Well, it takes all kinds to make this world, wouldn’t you say?

Now a tailpiece: according to a US government report raising the tax on a six-pack of beer by 20 per cent could reduce gonorrhoea by up to 9 per cent. Of course, brewers are not buying that story.