June 1 2012: British Pub Quiz at the Queens Head in São Paulo

***VEJA ABAIXO PARA VERSAO EM PORTUGUÊS***

The “pub quiz” is a tradition of British pubs. Over 22,000 different pub quiz events take place every week in the UK making it a common way to enjoy a pint – and possibly win a prize.
http://j.mp/pub-quiz… Mark and Tim are both British, both are married to Brazilian girls (the best, right?) and both live in São Paulo – and love a pub quiz! So they would like to invite you to come along to test your knowledge of the UK, win some great prizes and have some British style fun at the Queens Head pub in Pinheiros.The quiz takes place on the eve of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II (60 years as Queen), a few months after the 200th birthday of Charles Dickens, and just a month before the London Olympic Games – there is a lot for the UK to celebrate in 2012!The quiz will include six rounds, each one focused on a specialist area, with ten questions in each round. You enter the quiz as a team (maximum 6) and stay in the same team all evening – you can win prizes for coming first in a round as well as winning the grand prize for the best total team score of all rounds together.

The tradition of British pub quizzes is that your team name is amusing, so think carefully about what you want to call your team – there might be a special prize for the best name on the night!

Each team can play one round during the evening as their “joker” round – meaning your points for this round will be doubled. You must announce in advance of the questions that this will be your joker round, so pick the round you expect to do best on!

The rounds will focus on these topics:
. Movies
. Books
. Music
. Sport
. God Save the Queen (Royal Family)
. UK in Brazil

The quiz will start at 20:00 with the first three rounds, then there will be a break for 20-30 mins followed by the next three rounds – it should be complete by 22:00. You can enter even if you miss a round, but it will affect your chances of winning the grand prize.

During each round there may also be a question using London ‘cockney” slang with a link to the round topic:
http://j.mp/cockneyslang

Points to remember:

1. No cheating. This is fun, remember? Any team using Google on their phone or calling a friend to get answers will be disqualified and asked to go to the boteco over the road. There is no need to cheat and you won’t go to Heaven if you do.

2. The questions will be inclusive and reflect the British culture that many Brazilians will be familiar with – so you don’t need to be a professor of British history to come and enjoy this quiz!

3. The questions will be asked by Mark and Tim in both English and Portuguese – you can answer in either language. So even if your English is not fluent, you can still enjoy the quiz.

We look forward to seeing you. Please indicate on this event that you plan to come, please pass on the invitation to your friends, and if you already know who will be in your team then please post your team details on the wall here! See you at the Queen’s Head!

Please sign up soon – there are only 75 seats available so we need to know the numbers of people and teams planning to come – thanks! The quiz will end at 2200 and live music will start at 2230 until late : )

Click here for the Facebook event page so you can sign up…

Mark Hillary, CEO, IT Decisions
http://www.itdecs.com/

Tim Lucas, CEO, The Listening Agency
http://www.thelisteningagency.com/

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O “pub quiz” é uma tradição dos pubs britânicos. Há mais de 22.000 eventos desse tipo todas as semanas no Reino Unido – é uma boa desculpa para se desfrutar uma cerveja – e, possivelmente, ganhar um prêmio. (http://j.mp/pub-quiz)

Mark e Tim são ambos britânicos, casados com mulheres brasileiras e vivem em São Paulo – e adoram um pub quiz! Agora os dois estão convidando vocês para testar o seu conhecimento da cultura popular da Inglaterra e do Brasil, concorrer a prêmios bem bacanas e se divertir à moda britânica no pub Queen’s Head em Pinheiros.

O quiz acontecerá às vésperas do aniversario da Rainha Elizabeth II de 60 anos no poder, poucos meses após o 200º aniversário de Charles Dickens, e apenas um mês antes do Jogos Olímpicos em Londres – há tantas coisas para o Reino Unido comemorar em 2012!

O quiz incluirá seis rodadas, cada uma focada em uma área especializada, com dez questões cada. Você pode participar como uma equipe (máximo 6 pessoas) ou simplesmente aparecer no pub e a gente acha um time para você. Haverão prêmios para a equipe que ganhar cada rodada e um prêmio maior para a equipe com a melhor pontuação de todas as rodadas.

A tradição do pub quiz britânico inclui escolher um nome engraçado para sua equipe, então comece a bolar um nome legal para a sua equipe – você e seus amigos podem ganhar um prêmio especial para o melhor nome da noite!

Cada equipe pode jogar uma rodada durante a noite como a sua rodada ‘especial’ (o “joker” ) – ou seja, os seus pontos para essa rodada vale o dobro. Você deve anunciar antecipadamente qual será a sua rodada escolhida.

As rodadas serão sobre os seguintes temas:

. Filmes
. Livros
. Música
. Esporte
. God Save the Queen (Família Real)
. Reino Unido no Brasil

O quiz começará às 20:00h com as três primeiras rodadas. Em seguida, haverá uma pausa de 20-30 minutos, seguida das três últimas rodadas – precisamos terminar às 22:00h.

Lembrando que você pode entrar depois do inicio do quiz, mas isso vai afetar suas chances de ganhar o grande prêmio.

Durante cada rodada pode haver também uma pergunta usando “gírias” inglesas vinculadas ao tópico da rodada: http://j.mp/cockneyslang

Pontos para lembrar:

1. Jogue Limpo! Isso é só diversão, lembra? Qualquer equipe que for flagrada usando o Google ou o celular para obter respostas será desclassificada.

2. Não precisa ser um expert sobre a cultura britânica. As perguntas
refletem a cultura britânica que muitos brasileiros conhecem – você
não precisa ser um professor de história da Inglaterra para entrar e
se divertir neste quiz!

3. As perguntas serão feitas por Mark e Tim em Inglês e Português -
você pode responder em qualquer idioma. Assim, mesmo se o seu Inglês não for fluente, você ainda pode participar do quiz.

Queremos ver vocês lá! Por favor, nos diga se você gostaria de
participar e, por favor, repasse o convite para os seus amigos. Se
você já sabe quem vai fazer parte de sua equipe, por favor poste os
detalhes aqui. See you in the Queen’s Head.

Reserve seu lugar! Há apenas 75 lugares disponíveis e precisamos também saber quantas pessoas/times estão planejando vir. O quiz terminará às 22.00 e a música ao vivo começará às 22.30 até tarde : )

Clique aqui para a página do Facebook

Mark Hillary, CEO, IT Decisions
http://www.itdecs.com/

Tim Lucas, CEO, The Listening Agency
http://www.thelisteningagency.com/

I was not born in Belfast, but that’s what my Brazil ID card says…

I just collected my Brazilian permanent ID card. It’s taken many visits to the policia federal in Lapa to get this far. Though my permanent resident status was approved back in September 2011, it has taken about six months for them to produce a plastic card – and I had to go in person to fetch it.

The card says that I am British – quite correct. But it says that I was born in Northern Ireland – wrong. I was born in Surrey, England.

The police said that they cannot choose the UK, Great Britain, or England as a place of birth on their computer system, so they chose Northern Ireland as it is “pretty close”… I explained that it was wrong, but they said that my nationality is correct and I won’t have any problem using the card even if my place of birth is not correct.

Imagine that. The police and immigration officials can’t even put my correct country of birth on my ID card because of a computer system SNAFU.

Still, I don’t mind being from the Emerald Isle. It could have been worse, France is closer to Surrey than Northern Ireland!

Henry VIII has a lot to answer for

The English Reformation in the 16th Century was the series of events that led to the creation of the Church of England – when the English broke away from the power of the Roman Catholic church.

For most of my life, I never really considered the significance of this, other than the knowledge that if I had ever met and wanted to get married to an English princess I could never be a King thanks to my own Catholic background.

But now I have moved to Brazil, and as Lent begins this week, I can see a huge glaring difference.

In England, the tradition is to make pancakes on Shrove Tuesday – a way of seeking absolution for the crap we eat all year, get rid of it all, and eat more humble food for the following 40 days up to Easter.

In Brazil, the entire country goes wild and nobody does any work for a week… because it’s the CARNIVAL season!

Henry VIII has a lot to answer for…

In-ger-land

I was filling out the form I need to complete to register as an overseas voter and there is a section where I need a witness to my signature. But it can’t just be any old witness. It has to be another British person who does not live in Britain and is not related to me.

São Paulo is a city of 20 million people, but I don’t know a single British person here yet…

Perhaps if I take the form up to the Bristol Tavern pub down the road from where I live, there might just be an ex-pat who can help?

Farewell Blighty

In my last blog post I listed a few places I will be over my last couple of weeks in the UK before I leave to go and live in Brazil.

I have arranged a couple of farewell events, one for my local Ealing tweetup crowd, and the other for anyone else who wants to see me in central London. Take a look here for details:

Rupert St, Dec 22

Ealing, Dec 23

See you there!

For FIFA’s sake…

I quite enjoyed the BBC Panorama documentary last night detailing corruption and fraud within football’s international governing body, FIFA. FIFA behaved consistently as if they do not need to respond to any of the fraud allegations, but we are talking about hundreds of millions of dollars that should have been used for the development of the game, all ending up in the back pocket of FIFA board members. The BBC presented a number of new facts that proved illicit payments to at least three FIFA board members.

However, the argument in the UK media is that the BBC is unpatriotic to expose these people just a few days before the vote for which nation will host the 2018 World Cup. We are relying on these same people to vote for the England bid just as the BBC accuses them of fraud.

But the BBC is not the voice of the State. I would love to see England get the World Cup in 2018, but if the BBC affects the impression of England and a bunch of FIFA crooks don’t vote for our country because they don’t like to see their dirty laundry aired in public then doesn’t it demonstrate some much greater British values, not least about the freedom of the press?

Would anyone really want to see a situation where the BBC had evidence detailing how many bribes these FIFA officials have taken, but they kept quiet to ensure those same people voted for England?

Whether we win or lose this bid to host the 2018 World Cup, it’s time for the English FA to join forces with other national football associations and to demand that FIFA is entirely reformed… it should be an open, transparent, not-for-profit association developing football across the world, not a shady cabal of villains all earning millions by having their votes bought.

I’m glad I don’t work at Murphy Oil

Take a look at this debate from Linked In. The first person is talking about their investment in Wales, which I have asked them to elaborate on and compare to other parts of the UK.

Clearly this has upset Philip Hughes of Murphy Oil, who is of course based in Wales, and seems to think it’s xenophobic to contrast why a company invests in Wales as opposed to Northern Ireland.

But not only does Mr Hughes choose to try shutting down the debate by implying I am racist, he then starts suggesting that he is a “real” business person and I couldn’t possibly have a view.

That’s because I’ve written a book. That makes me an ‘academic’ and therefore not able to comment on what the real business people do in their offices.

If this is how debate takes place in Murphy Oil, I’m glad I don’t work there!

—

Tom Lawrence • Paul – You are demonstrating perfectly my problem that the big outsourcing names have done a lot of damage. Was your experience an off shoring model? 

I would say its almost (if not 100%) impossible to deliver the large ROI that exist in most companies through effective procurement via an off shoring model. Impossible for the simple reason that its all about business engagement, trust building, etc. 

Procurement doesn’t actually buy anything – its an influencer. An internal consultant. So to make people change their behaviours (which is where the real value is – multiples of what is achievable through negotiating with a supplier to get a better price) you have to be on the ground, in front of the stakeholder working with them day to day. Off shoring simply won’t work. Its too impersonal. Too process led. You need good commercial communicators intercating face-to-face with the stakeholders. 

The transactional work we do (e.g. help desk, supplier onboarding, market research, etc.) we run out of a shared services centre in South Wales – same time zone, same culture, same mother tongue (and they have mainland European languages in abundance there too). It means even this team can be ‘imtimate’ with our client stakeholders. We tried to run it out of Hydrabad, but because they were unable to form relationships with our client stakeholders, it failed. So we moved it to Wales.

philip hughes • Well done Tom – good decision …. although I wont get hung up on the expression “mother tongue”… diolch yn fawr!!!

Mark Kobayashi-Hillary • Why Wales over other parts of the UK though?

Tom Lawrence • Why Wales? Lots of skills there, fed by Cardiff Uni – including languages. Lots of call centres, so plenty of relevant work experience. 2.5 hrs on train to London. And the govt grants are very attaractive. 

Altogether it was more attractive, and better value, than the alternatives, e.g. Poland.

Mark Kobayashi-Hillary • I mean compared to Newcastle, or Belfast, not Poland though…

philip hughes • Your persistence on this matter is annoying Mark – Tom made a choice based on best value delivery with quality driven well trained very capable available workforce. Competition is always fierce for regional development – this time south wales next time newcastle or belfast or wherever you happen to live – move on and talk about outsourcing as a business benefit or not and stay away from the xenophobia OK!!

Mark Kobayashi-Hillary • Philip, I’ve got no idea at all what you are talking about. I’d asked in the debate about the merits of investing in various regions of the UK, including Wales, but Tom actually compared the investment to Poland as the alternative – I merely asked again about the relative merits of various regions within the UK. 

That’s xenophobic and annoying? I’m certainly glad I don’t work with you. I think my record of writing books about investment in Brazil, Russia, India, China, Poland, as well as working with several UK trade bodies to promote FDI, including the Welsh Assembly, speaks for itself on the accusation of xenophobia.

philip hughes • Being an academic is fine and if Mark has written books also fine. I just wonder if anyone has read them? An examination of Regional development funding, with the last vestiges of objective 1 may assist in understanding Tom’s excellent decision to come to Wales. 

Anyway back to debate at the sharp end of business – is outsourcing pure cost reduction – no in my opinion as I dont understand “pure” cost reduction. A matter of definition. 
I think outsourcing is a great tool for providing improved VALUE to businesses, which has a cost component, but there is also the intellectual improvement to business processes released by utilising the vendors skill and experience gained elsewhere, which is almost impossible to cost in the traditional sense.

Mark Kobayashi-Hillary • Philip, I’m at the “sharp end” of business working with some of the world’s leading firms on a daily basis, though clearly you consider it rather academic to also write about that experience.

When I’m 64…

I saw this BBC report on French protests about the retirement age being raised to 62. Of course, the typical French disdain for England is annoying – the same old stereotypes being dredged up by French protestors.

But the real point applies to France and England – and most of Western Europe equally – who is going to be paying the state pension by the time I ‘retire’? I personally think that the concept of the third age, rather than a retirement, will have become normal by the time I am 65.

By third age, I mean it will be normal to enter into a new career, to use your life experience working with a charity, or working on the local council… doing something useful that is still work and probably still pays something – though far less than you would have earned during your main career. But by that time most of us won’t have a need to support kids or a mortgage anymore, so income requirements should be more modest anyway.

What I don’t expect is that I can hit the age of 65 and suddenly put my feet up and retire from work, to live out the next 20 years on the golf course.

In Britain, it’s the present taxpayers who pay the state pension through their tax. The older people claiming pensions will suggest that they have paid into their NI pot and now they are just claiming it back, but there is no bank account they are paying into, it’s the young workers paying their pension. The stakeholder pension was the first step towards trying to shift people to a sense of personal responsibility for their old age, but I’m not sure I have met anyone who actually has a stakeholder pension.

Perhaps it sounds too harsh and ‘Anglo-Saxon’ to suggest that personal responsibility needs to make a return – rather than a blind reliance on the state, but European demographics are not favourable. There will be far more old people as I age and fewer young workers paying income tax. Immigration would be the only real solution and yet that’s not something most politicians are welcoming either…

If you are ‘retiring’ 20 or 30 years from now then don’t look to the state to pay for your every need. Or if you think that’s an unreasonable assumption to make, then get out on the street and throw a few bricks – like the French.

The Pope in Britain

I’m a Catholic because I’m half-Irish-half-English and, as my dad isn’t much of a believer, I ended up getting baptised – not that I actually go to church. My attendance record is pretty much based on weddings and funerals.

But, when I was asked if I would be interested in working with the government Cabinet Office to follow Pope Benedict around the UK during his visit, providing live commentary via Twitter and blogs, I jumped at the chance. Though I’m not a follower, the teachings of his church have permeated their way into my consciousness just because I was always surrounded by Catholics when I was growing up – and who wouldn’t want to be embedded with a head of state providing a live Twitter feed of what really happens ‘backstage’?

But it was the former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who invited the Pope to the UK. And Brown is no longer in office. And the current Prime Minister is either less interested in the Pope visiting, or more attuned to the scandal that will be caused by his visit. Most probably the latter as the child sex scandal furore only seems to be getting worse and the present Pope was previously in charge of handling complaints against the Vatican, and should therefore be acutely aware of the issues – and be handling them rather better.

So the regular media will continue to cover the visit, but all additional nice-to-have coverage (like a live blogger backstage) were all canned.

It’s a shame as I was looking forward to trying to offer some insights. The views of the church often rub directly against my own liberal opinions – I was working in Malta last week and I was surprised to hear that divorce is illegal there because the church won’t allow it. The Catholic church has some way to go to reach the standards considered acceptable in a modern-day society where free expression and respect for Human Rights are considered essential.

But the church has an immense history and tradition and is followed by hundreds of millions of people. I was looking forward to exploring these questions of how faith collides with modernity, but now I won’t get the chance anyway. Another thing I can blame on David Cameron.

What a shame.

World Cup: It’s a bit of fun

The Football Association in England don’t really prioritise the national team. The Premier League has the money and the clout and any spare time the players have is focused on their club. The 2010 World Cup squad was a team of players who only play in England – none of the English players in the present national side play outside England.

That can be viewed as a testament to the power of the Premier League, but it also serves to emphasise the relative unimportance of the national side. So when are we going to treat the major football competitions as just a bit of fun, rather than going in with the assumption we have a real chance of winning?

England were third favourite to win at the start of the competition. But that’s not a realistic reflection of the team, it’s how much money was bet on the various teams… the betting on England ends up creating a perception that they are a front-runner, yet they consistently underperform.

It’s time to treat the major tournaments as a carnival where progress is a bonus, rather than analysing every last second of games England usually lose.