Does anyone grow up? Ever?

Not if you're in politics, you don't. D and I were discussing politics and history in bed... we tend to do this a lot these days. It's awesome, because it combines two of my favourite things - naked and learning.

We realised that the world is essentially like school. Cliques, and gangs, and kids that get picked on, and so on. To make my typing easier, all the countries are going to be somewhat male-gendered. Here's what we thought...

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First of all, there's USA, with his cousin Canada. USA is the jock on the playground, except he's got a really rich dad as well, so you don't mess with him. That, and he has a bizarre thing that he thinks God endorses his right to be the coolest kid on the playground. Canada's cool, and a little annoyed that everyone thinks that, since he's USA's cousin, they must be similar. He's just happy, being nice to everyone.

They like to hang out with UK, France, and other places like that. They sometimes have little friendship groups - like Eurozone, and NATO - within the huge group they like to call the Cool West Gang. They like to eat USA's cake and hang out, and basically rule the playground, since they all have quite rich parents. But, not quite as rich as USA.

There are some kids that nobody wants to play with. Take Zimbabwe. He's the kid with really bad lice and generally poor hygiene, and his parents are too self-absorbed and mental to pay attention and fix it. Because of his problems, none of the kids from the Cool West are allowed to play with him, which is a shame. Zimbabwe gets lonely.

There are some kids like Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan, who don't like USA's influence on the playground. So, they'll flick marbles at USA and generally annoy him. Sometimes, USA will beat up one of them, to show that you shouldn't mess with him, except it just makes them even more annoyed.

Saudi Arabia is the kid who's kinda friends outside of school with UK, and has ridiculously rich parents. Nobody really wants to fight the kid with that much money.

Japan's the kid who tends to sit by himself, playing the very latest portable games console and drawing pictures of killer robots and partially clothed girls getting attacked by tentacles. He went a little berserk attacking various countries a while ago, but USA firmly put him in his place by shattering his two prized marbles. So, he's quiet now, and invites everyone in school to his massive parties where he gives out free Gameboys and pens. [Well, everyone except China.]

There's a bit of the playground near the playing field that used to be Palestine's. He was happy enough with it - it had some fairly shiny stones and a nice shady patch under a tree. Then, the Cool West saw that Israel was getting bullied a lot, with no real place to fit in. They offered him Palestine's corner by the field cos it kinda looked empty, and Israel's dad used to play there as a boy, apparantly. Ever since, they've been fighting over that tiny patch of land.

There's the twin brothers, India and Pakistan. Their parents broke up very badly and now they're brought up so differently that they can't get on at all. They fight nearly all the time, except when they're playing cricket, which is quite surprising, but nice. Their little sister, Bangladesh, is pretty cool, but she doesn't go to their school.

Some other kids that are around, but don't really get involved in squabbles too much are Australia, the friendly zany kid who is secretly amazing at sport, and his cousin New Zealand, who's also friendly, and his dad has a sheep farm. There's the quiet kids who make up a little Pacific group, and they hang out with Australia and New Zealand sometimes.

Even though USA would like to think he's the biggest kid on the tarmac, there is one kid that he's afraid of, although he wouldn't say that to his friends. China, the new kid, transferred a while ago from another school. He's tall, and extremely well-fed. His father worked very hard for a long time, and did some pretty awful things, but then he became pretty rich, and some other parents who secretly worked with him got really rich too. Suddenly, China's become a real threat. He doesn't care that the Cool West won't play with Zimbabwe, and places like that - he trades his cake there for things they have and he needs, like marbles and shiny stones.

Russia's a bit of a headcase. He used to be have his own little gang, governed by the fear of being alone and easily picked on, but after a while, the kids realised that they wanted to get with the Cool Kids gang, and eat Liberal Cake with the Eurozone. With a pretty unstable homelife, he comes to school and picks on the kids that haven't quite got round to getting in with the Cool West, but have definitely abandoned him. A while ago, Russia promised pencils to the kids like Ukraine who can't get their own, and every so often, to exert his power, simply decides not to give out pencils anymore, which means that taking tests and writing notes becomes very difficult. Eventually, Russia is poked enough by the Cool West gang to reluctantly start giving them out again. Everyone's a little worried that one day, he'll just come in and go beserk on everyone, but since he's so messed up, it's not too much of a threat.

Every now and again, there's some playground gossip that USA or UK has been hanging around South America's corner of the playground, in search of illicit toys from home and Red Bull. It's common knowledge that kids like Columbia are doing quite well of their business, although it's never talked about.

The best thing about being one of the original Cool West gang members is that you never get caught AND punished. There was a time in the playground when there was the first total playground war. Everyone was fighting everyone. Germany threw a few mud clods with hidden rocks in it, and UK ripped Germany's uniform and beat him up really bad. When the dust had settled, and Germany and his friends finally gave up, the Cool West gang of the time deemed his mud clod actions to be more heinous than uniform ripping, even though both of them are pretty awful [in playground terms].

And, minus most religion-y bits, this is the world. Once you get religion involved, it becomes much more complicated. That always seems to be the case with religion.

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My thoughts on the Middle East lack-of-peace? Not enough cake. Not in the slightest. I would be more than happy to fund the cake, of course, and provide wheat/dairy-free versions for those who require them. Icing is optional, but cake never is.