Jake's View | Goodbye consulates, and please just keep on going
In this world of phones, faxes, e-mail, SMS, satellites and post offices the role of the foreign consul appears a massive waste of taxpayers' money
Consulates forced to move out of Central
Back many centuries ago national governments (or what passed for them) had a problem when they wanted to talk to each other - no phone, no fax, no Web, no e-mail, no SMS, no satellites, no cable, no post office, no nothing.
Even if all they wanted to do was say "Hello", they had to get it on a piece of paper and give it to a special messenger who would then make an arduous and often hazardous journey of up to several weeks.
Someone then came up with a great idea.
Let's have a permanent representative in Otherland, he said, and let's have Otherland send us one of theirs too. That way we won't have to send messages back and forth all the time.