Safe in world of Noggin the Nog

Is it safe? If you’re as old as me, you’ll recognise that as a quotable quote from the 1977 film Marathon Man starring Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier, where our greatest theatrical knight attempts to interfere with the dentition of the best-known graduate of the Method Acting school without benefit of anaesthetic.

Any road up, with that in mind, the answer to this loaded question from many decades ago is, if it’s Iceland, yes it is. Rather along the lines of another, rather less distinguished foray into cinematic entertainment, entitled if it’s Tuesday, It Must Be Belgium.

If it’s Iceland, dear reader, it is indeed safe because that small-yet-feisty Nordic nation has been named, for the umpteenth year running, the safest place on Earth. Swiftly followed by New Zealand, Austria, Portugal and Denmark.

From which I can only deduce that those worthy and earnest contributors to this decision have never considered the dodginess of having a baby while being a woman in political office, electing an extreme right-wing leader or getting rid of “ghetto” immigrant neighbourhoods.

And in the case of Portugal, never experiencing Portuguese drivers who make their better publicised Italian and French counterparts – and Mad Max – look like the archetypal possessors of the flat hat, the string-backed driving gloves and the kind of in-car seat covers that would make a chintzy Agatha Christie set come over as the last word in must-have contemporary chic.

It’s a long list of over 30 “safe” nations, judged on such factors as low crime rate, instance of political terror and (presumably, lack of) internal conflict; needless to say, the good old US of A doesn’t make it in there as it is compiled by an organisation boasting the snappy title of the Global Peace Index which strikes me as no doubt yet another of those interfering international bodies like the UN, Nato, etc, up with which Donald Trump will not let America put.

Interesting that he is unwilling to let trained Americans with guns go anywhere in the world where they might actually be able to help out but that he’s delighted for wealthy and entitled amateurs to go to places where, from an expensive place of safety, they can shoot, kill and butcher beautiful and endangered animals.

But I digress… Ireland makes it in there at a respectable No 10 (at least until the hard border goes up, ) but England is nowhere to be found. Hardly a surprise given the current level of gun and knife crime in the deep south.

Wales and Scotland, of course, are not nations so we don’t count. I think I’m relatively safe to say that, especially as the Scottish Office is apparently to be moved lock, stock and barrel from Westminster back north of the border so that they can show us the error of our deluded devolved ways. You don’t have to be a raving Nat to see that as a bit of an indication that something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Except Denmark (No 5 on the Safe List) seems to be doing rather well, thank you, all things considered, what with all that happiness (No 1 on the Happiness List), hygge, high levels of civic engagement and being able to work off all its angst and misery by inventing Scandinavian noir and wearing snuggly sweaters.

But never mind, all is not lost. At least we here in the land of Scots can amuse ourselves by naming a new town after Bonnie Prince Charlie. Blindwells, near Prestonpans, is being touted as a residential area taking the name of Charlestoun to mark the fact that BPC’s Jacobites actually managed to win a battle there.

Before going on to the debacle of Culloden and thence to become the inventors of Scottish kitsch and yet another example of this nation’s vexed relationship with the concept of glorious defeat. Those who have made this suggestion for the East Lothian site have obviously never read the lyrics of that great Michael Marra song, Mincin’ wi’ Chairlie.

Glorious defeat we have to live with. It’s in the DNA. But vainglorious defeat? That, in the words (almost) of Scandi noir, is a bridge too far…

Peter Firmin

And speaking of things Nordic which we were, indirectly, I noted with sadness this week the death of artist and TV animator Peter Firmin, creator of the immortal Noggin the Nog.

And Nogbad the Bad. Was ever a villain better named? I think not.

Then there was the original of Basil Brush, Ivor the Engine, Pogles’ Wood and the wonderful Clangers.

I wonder what he and his colleagues were on when they invented these tiny, pink, knitted aardvarks who lived on pudding and the makings of the Soup Dragon while consorting with the Iron Chicken. Such innocence. Such fun. They should name a town after Peter Firmin. Or perhaps a whole nation. Somehow you just know it would be safe.

Reykjavik, capital city of Iceland. The safest place on Earth, apparently.