When I first arrived in the early 1970s, I wrote a couple of letters back to India - to my school friend Dolly. The letters never were posted. Dolly died while I was still at school with her, and her death changed me profoundly - but that is another story. I was writing to her as if she was still alive, because these were the things I would have said to her, and almost only to her. Her parents were sufficiently disengaged from her to ignore her mail, even if it was from England, so these would be private letters.

I told her about the way Britian was 'clean' - the roads were cleaner than I had ever seen them in any part of India. But I added that the 'dirt' was not under our feet, but in the way they regard the female of the species - as purely sensual objects, and announce it daily in their family newspaper.

Page 3 - then and now

On page 3 of the Sun Newspaper at the time there was a woman with bare breasts presented every day. On page 2 was the home news, made by men - on the next page was a woman with bare breasts, (declaring her position in relation to the man?) It nauseated me. My aunt who had invited us to stay bought it every day. This was apparently 'normal' in this country. Why? I started thinking about who does this, and what that says about this society.

In 2012 I was one of the people who signed a petition called 'No more page 3' being one of over 240,000 signatures online. It gained support from over 140 MPs, 30+ universities, and many trade unions, charities and advocacy groups. It took three years to achieve. Lucy Holmes, who instigated this petition, stuck at it, and got it done. Social media had much to do with this campaign.

So if I were to write to my friend now, I would have to say that this has now changed - since 2015 the Sun newspaper does not print a topless nude on it's Page 3. But not quite disappeared, since the Sunday Sport still has a topless nude, says Google. I take their word for it.

The expression 'Page 3' has taken on a life of its own, in the mean time. In India 'Page 3 culture' is a watered down version of the voyeuristic tendency in the reading public - apparently this is the name given to the country's partying, high society or upper class metropolitan culture. These people may be found in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore largely, and are all a feature of a culture promulgated by the page three norms established by tabloid newspapers.

Who goes to the Albert Hall? Then and now.

Has that changed?

The first time I had heard about the Albert Hall was when we first arrived in very early 1970s, and I had walked past it, walking from South Kensington towards Hyde Park, past the Albert memorial.

A picture of this memorial was in a textbook we had at School, and I wanted to see it. I wrote to Dolly saying that there was a huge concert hall behind it - but my parents are not keen to take me to it, because there is nothing in their programme which resembles my parents' idea of music. Nor mine, of course, but instead of turning away, I was on an anthropological quest. What do they call music, here, then - other than the contents of Top of the Pops? What is their idea of classical music?

I found out when I got to an English boarding school. Here I encountered Sir Andrew Davies whose movements on the conductors' podium I watched, mesmerised - the music swelled in unpredictable swoons and sweeps, sometimes rapidly and sometimes inexplicably slowly. I let it sweep over me - watching Davies's little finger move a tiny bit, to bring in a new instrument, or a particular group of singers.

Yesterday, I got a review of the year from the same venue. Yes, what it shows has changed dramatically - because society and the music scene in particular have changed.

Here is a link to that missive. In it you will find this Indian comedian's performance, which would never have been there in 1976

You will also find a range of other acts, including one for those with learning difficulties. Its worth following that link. It is a wonderful glimpse at what the UK is like just now. Podcasts, ballet, and poetry from immigrants from the Caribbean - Ask yourself - is this the country that Mark Tully et al think about when they write country comparators?

Middle East war - what is different now?

In the early 1970s, when we came to England, the flight flew us across the mountains of the northern Middle East - Israel and Egypt were then at War. My parents had already spoken of the Suez Crisis. I didn't understand any of it and wrote to Dolly about how beautiful the scenery was on the way here.

Today, after the October 7th Hamas incursion into Israel, the details of which are barbaric to say the least, what would I write to her?

I would have to tell her that in all my adult life, I have had a bellyful of what happens when people develop and nurture hatred. Hitler's hatred of Jews was what led to his policy of gassing them en masse. Alongside the tragedy this resulted in a huge sense of outrage, German guilt and the world's censure.

I lived very close to a concentration camp in Northern Germany - people came to our house to stay over, and visit Belsen. I could hardly avoid it - the house we lived in used to be inhabited by a German doctor who 'treated' the inmates of the concentration camp. We found papers to that effect - it was referred to as the Labour Camp. My father was a civilian doctor, employed by the occupying British Army on the Rhine. A very different kind of doctor, I should add.

After the discovery of this large scale crime, (Belsen was liberated by British soldiers) Israel was born - the Jews wanted a place of their own - this I thought was entirely understandable. They however removed the population of Palestinians from Jerusalem and its surrounding areas, and occupied their 'promised land' - not so good. They have fought ever since, to defend their actions.

England, which was a welcoming place to Jews escaping the holocaust before and during the War has largely been sympathetic to the Palestinians. Therein lies another history.

But what about London? How could I describe to Dolly what the scenes were like in the aftermath of the Hamas attack in London on 7th October? I had a first inkling of the mood in London as I was walking past one of the middle eastern embassies in London's Mayfair. On the road lay a banner declaring 'Britain has Blood on her Hands'.

I shivered.

It is not often that I feel afraid when I am in Central London, which has been my home since the late 1970s, when I got to university. I think of London as one of the safest places to visit and live.

The repurcussions have been worldwide. Most notable have been in the US - which supports Israel, where students have been protesting in every way possible, with the support of their University administrators, who were taken to task by US Senators who could not tolerate their antics any longer.

In the USA, big company CEOs asked University administrators to give them the names of those who had signed a pro-Hamas letter, so they would never be offered jobs in their company - this one was to Harvard University.

We have never seen anything like it. What would I say to Dolly?

I would say that the truth and perception if truth are becoming dangerously distant from one another in the current Middle East conflict. There is so much accumulated hatred and wish for revenge that there seems hardly the slightest chance of a path towards peace.

The US is being sucked into the war whether or not it wishes and the rhetoric is doing nothing but muddying the truth.

“Our missiles, drones, and special forces are ready to direct qualitative strikes at the American enemy in its bases and disrupt its interests if it intervenes in this battle,” Ahmad “Abu Hussein” al-Hamidawi, head of the Kataib Hezbollah militia, said in a statement.

“These evil people must leave the country. Otherwise, they will taste the fire of hell in this world before the afterlife,” the statement said.

It is hard to see how this can lead to peace.

Sometimes, despite changing societies and values, in a turf war, nothing changes.