Tragic Friday 13th

I spent Friday afternoon in the CBS office completing preparations for the BCRP board to short-list candidates for interview for the Business Crime Reduction Manager post due to happen in the coming week. I'm glad that all I have to do is make sure everyone has the necessary documents, and gets on with the task in hand. CBS funds the post, but as directors we play no part in the appointment. I am told there's an interesting array of applicants, but I have resisted temptation to look through them all, and discuss them. We're happy to let others on the Board take full responsibility for delivering a new team member to work with us.

Clare suggested we go to a concert in St John's Canton in the evening. North Walian bi-lingual singer-songwriter Huw M was performing with his folk band to launch 'Utica' his latest CD album of his own songs, on a Welsh record label called i Ker Ching. Another younger bi-lingual singer songwriter performed his songs solo, to start the evening, his guitar technique and musical confidence was impressive, and paved the way nicely for the main act of the concert. Huw band consists of a young woman with a clear singing voice who played accordeon, a woman 'cellist who also sang, and the Marshall sisters, whom I believe are the daughters of  the Pastor of one of Cardiff's Afro-Caribbean churches.

I could tell within the first fifteen seconds that this was going to be quite a song fest. The playing and harmony were crisp and tight. Songs in English or Welsh were beautiful and engagingly simple. The relaxed warmth exuded by the group's leader gave an intimacy to the performance. It was sheer pleasure, and Clare bought one of the CDs to take home and play.

The Wales - Holland football match was being played at the stadium nearby, and foreworks were let off during the performance. The streets were busy as we left. It was only after we woke up late this morning that we learned of the massacres in Paris at the time we were at the concert. People doing the same things we'd been doing, concert going, attending a football mach, eating out, gunned down.

Much of the rest of the day was spent checking the news, wondering how three teams of men, eight people in all could organise themselves without detection by the security forces, and wreak deadly havoc. Owain arrived in time for supper, much disturbed and distressed by events. He'd already learned that a music acquaintance had been with his wife at the Bataclan concert massacre, and escaped being murdered by laying down and pretending to be dead. These are dark days for Europe. For anyone involved in the business of security and public safety, this is a sobering wake up call.