Set in one of [tag]Rio De Janeiro[/tag]‘s 600 ghettos, Vigario Geral, [tag]Favela Rising[/tag] charts the story of [tag]Anderson Sa[/tag], [tag]Jose Junior[/tag] and [tag]AfroReggae[/tag] on a journey from outlaws to social revolutionaries. In their debut feature, directors Jeff Zimbalist and Matt Mochary allow us to see inside the notorious ghettos of one of the world’s most fascinating cities.

After a few months, I have decided to change the theme of the site here at Stirlyn.co.uk. Once again I ventured to Brian Gardner’s site as I saw he’s brought out a new Vertigo Electrified theme that really REALLY caught my eye. I love Brian’s designs, their clean and precise and aesthetically pleasing, as well as being easy to modify and customise to your own look. (Brian includes fonts and blank images so that you can change things like headers and logo’s etc.) I really loved the previous Eye Candy theme, but I needed more space on the page for…

I was a big brother fan up until series 2 I think, then I completely lost interest but when Celebrity Big Brother aired for the first time, I was glued. Who can forget the slow collapse of Vanessa Feltz right before our eyes. It was glorious to watch the facades melt away from the normally PR concious and slickly presentable icons of entertainment (albeit past their A-List sell by date). For me the Reality show overload is really too much. With BB, IACGMOH, CLI, ANTM arggghh and all the rest, I have decided to limit the ones I get drawn…

Of course, what you can do, is employ the services of a member of the audience as a temporary replacement. Jazz is after all a highly improvisational form of art. That’s exactly what happened on Saturday when I visited an intimate Jazz club in Soho, Jazz After Dark, where the food was good and the music was even better. Apart from that is, the impromptu stand in.

Last Saturday saw 19 of us venture down to Effingham in Surrey, to the Delta Force Paintballing center, to celebrate with nephew Andre, his birthday. He has reached the ripe old age of 13, so what better way to mark the ascension, than with a foray into violence real-time, none of that virtual nonsense, that’s for little kids. Along with 12 of his mates, the seven adults prepared for what we anticipated would be an exciting and enthralling experience. I don’t think any of us knew we were in for some quality pain.

Today I attended the end of term concert staged by Project Music Workshops (PMW) and the Poplar Partnership at Cabot Hall, Canary Wharf. PMW work with children and adults creating Gospel Choirs and performing in various parts of London and the surrounding counties. When you attend the concerts, hear and see the enthusiam of the kids and their tutors, it is something that helps you to understand that unlike what we hear and see on the news, all kids are not in trouble. Some really have a great outlook on life and are willing to try new things and get…