tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-85458575885299254822024-03-14T07:54:35.421+00:00Pepys MotetA British composer's ambitious quest to premier a requiem in the highly atmospheric Abney Park cemetery by lantern light.Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.comBlogger3111125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-44603752272893424372020-08-12T23:04:00.007+01:002020-08-13T09:07:23.999+01:00A picnic on the Heath<p><span style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: Helvetica;"><i><u>8th August 2020: A Picnic on the Heath</u></i></span></p><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">August 8th is my birthday. In ordinary years, I take a bunch of my favourite people punting in Cambridge, or head to the standing stones at Avebury to unleash my inner pagan, but, over the years, I have spent several birthdays on Hampstead Heath. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">The first Heath birthday was in 1996 when I was at drama school. I had recently discovered the place and was keen to show it off to those who hadn’t yet been drawn in by its magical ways. I still have the pictures I took of Edward Thornhill and Sam Jane standing in tall grass, somewhere near Kenwood, recreating a corset-tingling scene from A Room With A View! The pictures were taken in black and white but have a curious green tinge. In the 1990s, long before the digital age made photography accessible for all, I took pictures on XP2 film. The joy about XP2 was that, although the film was technically black and white, it could also be developed in the same colour-processing machines which back then could spit a whole set of pictures out in an hour. The drawback, which was also a positive, was that the photographs ended up with colourful hues to them. It was impossible to predict what colour your pictures would turn out. Sometimes they would be almost black and white. Other times they’d have a subtle sepia tint, or a rose-coloured wash. They could be slightly green, a little blue, or, on less happy occasions, garish orange! It was an exciting lottery which gave each set of prints a unique mood. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">I loved the pictures because they made me feel like I was living in Edwardian times, and, certainly, when I look back at my albums, you’d be forgiven for thinking the optimistic, youthful faces peering out at you, would shortly be off to fight in the trenches! </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">Anyway, I wanted everything to be as simple as possible for my birthday this year. Many of my friends are still wary about travelling or being in confined spaces, so a picnic on Heath was a no-brainer. It actually never occurred to me that the weather would be anything other than sunny this year. Despite the fact that it’s never actually rained on my birthday, I regularly get myself in a proper pickle trying to think of alternatives for inclement weather. This year, it was just going to have to be what it needed to be. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">The highlight for me was the fact that my dearest friend, Fiona was flying down from Glasgow to join me. I have missed her intensely during lockdown and this has been the longest period since we met where we’ve not seen each other in the flesh. The first thing I did when she stepped into our house was hand her the Christmas present which had sat on our fireplace for eight months! </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">We arrived on the Heath just after noon and chose a spot half way between the summit of Parliament Hill and the Men's Ponds. When we arrived, the sky was pretty thick with white cloud but after about half an hour, the clouds vanished, the sun burned through, and it suddenly got really hot: panic-inducingly hot. So we made a dash for the shade of the nearest tree, where we pretty much stayed for the next ten hours, barring, of course, the occasional visit to an ice cream van on the edge of the Heath at Millfield Lane. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">The police were patrolling. Since lockdown, police have been a regular fixture on the Heath, which feels a little strange. They are, of course, the ultimate fun-sponges! We kept seeing panda cars creeping along the wider pathways. They mostly seemed to be handing out fines to cyclists, which felt like a bit of a waste of resources.</div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">There are three natural lakes used for swimming on the Heath. A Men's pond, a Women’s pond and a pond on the other side of the heath in which both men and women can swim. Since the ponds reopened in July, you have to book to swim in them and they’re usually sold out days in advance, which leaves many people bitterly disappointed, particularly on a scorchingly hot day. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">Between the Men’s and the “Ladies’” pond, there’s a more shallow boating lake. It’s recently been considerably re-shaped, extended and landscaped to avoid a repeat of the 1975 catastrophe which followed a freak storm when a phenomenal amount of rain fell on the Heath in a very short period of time. All of the ponds burst their banks and caused such terrible floods in the neighbouring districts that, in one case, a man actually drowned in his basement.</div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">Anyway, I’ve never seen anyone so much as paddle in the boating lake - giant signs warn against it - but on Saturday, scores of people were actually swimming there. There were kids in there wearing arm bands and all sorts. It was like a modern day version of a Seurat painting! </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">I think it was probably the angry-looking fishermen on the edge of the lake who dobbed the swimmers into the police. They’ve probably paid big money for the licenses which allow them to fish in those ponds and wouldn’t necessarily want scores of sun-stroked idiots frightening the fish away! </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">In total, I think 17 of us sat down to picnic (if you include the babies inside the tummies of Abbie and Little Michelle.) Neither yet know the gender of their children but if old wives tales are to be believed, Michelle’s bump, which sits high, neat, large and proud, would almost certainly be a boy. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj7VsvNSPB6LaDlNspVeS1CICV81ae0RWSQzlbVMGd5cG1FxWgUHwEy4e1zwzPIA_ydoxDEKHeAlnbjH-bIhw6s1S7CLnFWphLwrNiQiCvtFTK_sHr7Zi50QMCSLKnEPsEv8zyLxtuodw/s2048/IMG_0229.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj7VsvNSPB6LaDlNspVeS1CICV81ae0RWSQzlbVMGd5cG1FxWgUHwEy4e1zwzPIA_ydoxDEKHeAlnbjH-bIhw6s1S7CLnFWphLwrNiQiCvtFTK_sHr7Zi50QMCSLKnEPsEv8zyLxtuodw/w400-h267/IMG_0229.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Most of the picnickers </td></tr></tbody></table><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">In the golden hour before dusk, the shadows lengthened and the entire heath started basking in a glorious peach-coloured light, which melted into an arc of pink and purple cloud, whilst the red and white lights of Central London came out to dance on the southern horizon. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">We sat, eating pizza, still under our tree, as the evening winds drew in and the light died. The last to leave (apart from Nathan, and Fiona, who stayed at ours) were Ted, his wonderful partner Gersende and their three year-old daughter, Emma who is the spitting image of both of her parents, and one of the most charming kids I’ve met in a long time. Abbie’s son, Wilfred (himself something of a charmer) was obviously also somewhat taken by Emma. They stared at each other for long periods of time like star-crossed lovers in a period drama. And now we’re back to A Room With A View! <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg74RSyFmWau0sV8MqZ9cJm4h5rVpAjkZUftvokUNBHqENS9gZa2j5IMqLRwX794IQRQWwjCXdZEGG24UqbPlINqVlBQMQJ7MiYgOmq0pCCXxxdLBvaN-mgpy3AeNT_k-cuD3yAcZojM7s/s2048/IMG_0321.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg74RSyFmWau0sV8MqZ9cJm4h5rVpAjkZUftvokUNBHqENS9gZa2j5IMqLRwX794IQRQWwjCXdZEGG24UqbPlINqVlBQMQJ7MiYgOmq0pCCXxxdLBvaN-mgpy3AeNT_k-cuD3yAcZojM7s/w400-h267/IMG_0321.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fiona, Edward, Nathan and me</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">It felt fitting to end the night with Fiona and Ted. Two of my oldest friends, and probably the two people (aside from my brother and parents) who have attended more birthday picnics than anyone. All three of us were at the Northampton Music School together. I’ve written recently about our myriad adventures as a busking string trio in the Midlands. </div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">I checked my emails as we left the Heath to find one from my astral twin, Alison, another music school alumnus. We were born on the same day in the same year and always drop each other a Happy Birthday missive. She’s currently training to be a priest.</div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;">I left the Heath feeling a wonderful sense of happiness that people are returning to the joys that nature can bring. The place was filled with families. And children playing and laughing loudly in a way that they just wouldn’t whilst playing computer games and such. This is the biggest gift, I feel, that lockdown has given us.</div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOXgdCar5n4PA4JGa4GH5Dd1seNf46sEHNPGPYRmxBxZan_euY4UiDNqIXErIStlz561R3nRxXR2lXFnJEcSSn57tDE47vtsAGt_UL7c_3_UEOZSXPog3IgrGvY3pB9i1-TxlDwys0m4w/s2048/IMG_0339.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1365" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOXgdCar5n4PA4JGa4GH5Dd1seNf46sEHNPGPYRmxBxZan_euY4UiDNqIXErIStlz561R3nRxXR2lXFnJEcSSn57tDE47vtsAGt_UL7c_3_UEOZSXPog3IgrGvY3pB9i1-TxlDwys0m4w/w267-h400/IMG_0339.JPG" width="267" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">That pink arc<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: helvetica;"><br /></div>Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-34506306083013950982020-08-07T21:45:00.005+01:002020-08-07T21:51:14.808+01:00The Golden Road<i><u>August 6th, 2020</u></i><br /><br />I’m in Wales. One of the reasons I’ve not blogged for the last few days is that I’ve been blissed out, living life on a moment-by-moment basis, whilst salty sea breezes buffer my skin and etch lines into my forehead! I look like Captain Birdseye! <br /><br />I’m staying in a cottage in Pembrokeshire, with a group of university friends. We come away most years and have stayed in the same beautiful seaside cottage near Dinas Head on three occasions now. I think we first went away together as a group twelve years ago. On that occasion, we went to the New Forest. My abiding memory of that particular holiday was our camp site being invaded by a set of tiny New Forest ponies, who rampaged through our little patch like a bunch of football hooligans. One of them ended up in young Isabel’s tent, steadfastly refusing to move. I have seldom laughed as much as I did that afternoon. <br /><br />Anyway, yesterday, after embarking on some sort of Krypton Factor-style challenge involving the transportation of fourteen people and four cars to various key points along the length of a long, non-circular public footpath, we set off for The Golden Road, which stretches across the Preseli Hills, about six miles inland from where we’re staying. <br /><br />The plan was to take our packed lunches and go for a very long, gloriously rugged walk. There seems to be some sort of heatwave going on this week in London which has not reached Pembrokeshire, but, the pay-off has been the most astounding, elemental weather. And nowhere was this more the case than up in the Preseli Hills. On several occasions, we actually found ourselves within the clouds. Great mists would roll in and then, almost immediately, glorious windows opened up in the clouds, allowing us to peer down at a patchwork of fields and ancient woodland and then out to the elephant grey sea. The sun shining through the clouds had turned little sections of the yellow cornfields below us into shimmering pools of gold. It was magical. <div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6TbBURuIn2_9e62hQmOWCqVMknN7R6PgKuOwY3r8EMfaoOMZ2Cg3EsvIwiVwDVfNoVWMkN5kwqc2ScQVd5taw9UUhd-IoboZ8910YwVEma_U_MoHYGy3P57BuDg20aVSHRY4_ywpc7Sc/s2048/IMG_0133.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6TbBURuIn2_9e62hQmOWCqVMknN7R6PgKuOwY3r8EMfaoOMZ2Cg3EsvIwiVwDVfNoVWMkN5kwqc2ScQVd5taw9UUhd-IoboZ8910YwVEma_U_MoHYGy3P57BuDg20aVSHRY4_ywpc7Sc/w400-h266/IMG_0133.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Those patches of gold<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div><div><br />The Preseli Hills are, of course, the very hills from where the giant rocks of Stone Henge were quarried. It’s impossible to comprehend how they managed to transport such enormous blocks of stone over such large distances and, indeed, why it was that they chose to use rocks from this part of the world. <br /><br />The area does feel mystical, somehow. Most of the hills’ peaks are crowned with Iron Age burial mounds. Huge piles of stones mark the spots where important, yet long-forgotten people have been laid to rest. The views from these tors are exquisite. You can see for miles and miles. At one point we realised that the misty mountains poking up in the distance, far across the sea, were almost certainly in Snowdonia - probably 100 miles away! The winds, as you might expect, were somewhat bracing up there. <div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpNk4MoShzVnGHwvdMzev0C7OqcT4wdO57ThgzuHJ6cWjXuhJ7g9dA_IFlwj_bgVY4Mmr_zS-UyXiqjf_bndKfmrBrEBQ8kjrfzgbecQNKQ_mh81tUCZ7FMqhKvMlYEvA50n9aopgcXKY/s2048/IMG_0127.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpNk4MoShzVnGHwvdMzev0C7OqcT4wdO57ThgzuHJ6cWjXuhJ7g9dA_IFlwj_bgVY4Mmr_zS-UyXiqjf_bndKfmrBrEBQ8kjrfzgbecQNKQ_mh81tUCZ7FMqhKvMlYEvA50n9aopgcXKY/w400-h268/IMG_0127.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">All fourteen of us at The Place of the Eagles (Foel Eryr)<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br />We came across very few people on our walk. It ought to have been a fairly easy walk, but the paths in some places were almost unnavigable, vanishing regularly into marshland. Even the hardiest walkers were turning around and returning to their cars! The soil on the hills is really peaty and in some places curiously bouncy. I wondered if I was experiencing an earthquake when one patch of turf suddenly started to bounce like a trampoline! <br /><br />The drawback was that the trainers I was wearing, veterans of my 120-mile walk along the River Nene four years ago, were entirely un-waterproof. Within minutes of starting our trek, my socks were a soggy, sodden mess. <br /><br />About half way through the walk, whilst sitting on a tor, I took my shoes and socks off to get some air on my feet. It was whilst ringing out my socks that I noticed my feet had gone weirdly pale and wrinkly. Jeannie described them as looking “parched” which was curiously appropriate whilst being simultaneously the complete opposite to what they actually were! <br /><br />To avoid trench foot, I made the decision to do the rest of the walk barefoot. It turned out to be a rather wonderful experience. I’m entirely flat-footed, so actually a long walk can leave me in quite a lot of pain after shoving my trotters into shoes which are nothing like as wide as Hobbit feet like mine need shoes to be! <br /><br />The sensation of walking across the moors barefoot was fabulous. The grass was soft, springy and fabulously damp. Periodically, I’d feel a foot squelching into a pool of water or peaty mud. The only time I needed to put my trainers back on was to negotiate a section of the path where thorny gorse had grown across the ground. But for the rest of the time I was as happy as Larry. No accidents. No cuts or grazes. Just happy feet! </div><div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCrsdczU8LzJmwrdFYOmdxer-VbXIxL-VwrEXxkuulCkZciogO2DiTtTI9zr2F7AnAReZ9i0VN4Jh6kKi9O9WR7QB6a_XE39VHULSE8xxs8aw9mBbbIMvHgjstwlrQ0AEysCOqTaj_GMY/s2048/IMG_0118.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCrsdczU8LzJmwrdFYOmdxer-VbXIxL-VwrEXxkuulCkZciogO2DiTtTI9zr2F7AnAReZ9i0VN4Jh6kKi9O9WR7QB6a_XE39VHULSE8xxs8aw9mBbbIMvHgjstwlrQ0AEysCOqTaj_GMY/w400-h268/IMG_0118.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nathan and Jago in the mist</td></tr></tbody></table><div><br />At one point, we came upon a large family of Ultra Orthodox Jewish people making their way up the mountain side, which is a somewhat curious sight outside London or Manchester. They were playing rather loud music as they walked - half-klezmer, half-pop music. I walked a little further, but when I looked around to see where they’d got to, they’d disappeared to the extent that I wondered if I’d actually imagined them. </div><div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4czR0HtHpCyc01gbT2oAImHkxqigTtpVzWXU0YvNpkZAH9majfwJYOqxUTHt6OoB84-a5P4_NgJKPrxI1T1WSqlh-qsHCSNQ9B4U7QQ8qTjqhMUFEVQbl4f6pW_nYMD1siIJGd2JynEU/s2048/IMG_0131.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4czR0HtHpCyc01gbT2oAImHkxqigTtpVzWXU0YvNpkZAH9majfwJYOqxUTHt6OoB84-a5P4_NgJKPrxI1T1WSqlh-qsHCSNQ9B4U7QQ8qTjqhMUFEVQbl4f6pW_nYMD1siIJGd2JynEU/w400-h268/IMG_0131.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Iain, Wils, Lola and Tomas</td></tr></tbody></table><div><br />Oh yes... and when we got back home to the cottage, we were rewarded with a beautiful sunset!</div></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxijUK7KNIqRfmyP8_lj4FWf78v5ojgNkMNtOt9Y5050eVCStmVOcR-mls_nEzX-Sj4M0-RINykqDTSea-6dV_o0KqGI1DYmAUKFgPI37re54C8KHpiC0cLRu-v2nSTZKi8wkhl5KYm2o/s2048/IMG_6568.jpg" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxijUK7KNIqRfmyP8_lj4FWf78v5ojgNkMNtOt9Y5050eVCStmVOcR-mls_nEzX-Sj4M0-RINykqDTSea-6dV_o0KqGI1DYmAUKFgPI37re54C8KHpiC0cLRu-v2nSTZKi8wkhl5KYm2o/w400-h300/IMG_6568.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The view from our sitting room window (not even joking!)<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div>Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-16344757949400484382020-08-01T23:08:00.000+01:002020-08-01T23:08:25.729+01:00Spaldwick<i><u>May 30th: Spaldwick</u></i> <div>
<br />On 30th May, Nathan and I drove up to Huntingdon to visit our good friends Lisa and Mark and their kids Poppy and Rosie. Nathan is Poppy’s godfather and was told when he accepted the position that he would be responsible for her glamour and her grammar!<br /><br />Lisa’s middle child, George, didn’t make it through childbirth, so I have taken on the responsibility of looking after his memory on Earth. The London Requiem is dedicated to him. <br /><br />They live in a charming village called Spaldwick, which is near to where the A1 meets the A14, not far at all, in fact, from Brampton, where Samuel Pepys grew up. The powers that be have been working on the junction of those two massive roads for some time now. The exit from the A1 onto the A14 feels a little messy and unnecessarily windy, but my parents tell me it’s entirely revolutionised the A14 which was a total disaster in those parts.<br /><br />It was an incredibly hot day but Lisa’s garden is cool and shady. Rose had her paddling pool set out in the garden and was leaping in and out of it with boundless energy. It was one of those days when, as children, we’d be allowed to get the hosepipe out. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwSGYXFnrOHgOHTY47SQpaNEybvgzG8JiuwtPqg-9sA4LmnQWyN5oFNy4nxzivoILrwQk1-eqjYYOOkVvq0wsUGhMoqJh4RHIGp98SUfSM71iEIfaTz2PKndADnhnDBK47AjbpxQDGi5Q/s1600/IMG_9715.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwSGYXFnrOHgOHTY47SQpaNEybvgzG8JiuwtPqg-9sA4LmnQWyN5oFNy4nxzivoILrwQk1-eqjYYOOkVvq0wsUGhMoqJh4RHIGp98SUfSM71iEIfaTz2PKndADnhnDBK47AjbpxQDGi5Q/s400/IMG_9715.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rose's paddling pool</td></tr>
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Every time I’m in Lisa and Mark’s garden, I’m reminded of one of my most mortifying experiences. It was the day that Andy Murray first won Wimbledon and they were having a massive garden party. It was another incredibly hot day and the party erupted into a huge water fight. There were water bombs and pistols, hoses, and frankly, anything which could be filled with water was being used as a weapon or a missile. </div>
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<br />Mark and I were stalking each other like Ninjas, pouncing with increasingly ludicrous quantities of water. A marvellous opportunity presented itself. I caught Mark just outside the kitchen door taking a breather, so filled the entire washing up bowl with freezing cold water, sneaked up behind him, and tipped the lot over his head. I laughed demonically. <br /><br />Imagine my surprise when Mark turned around, a look of deep shock on his face, and I realised it wasn’t Mark at all! It was a complete stranger who wasn’t taking part in the water fight. I felt just terrible! <br /><br />Anyway, on May 30th, Lisa and Mark proudly took us to see their new allotment. Apparently the Spaldwick allotments have been a long time coming but curiously it was during lockdown that the Parish Council finally made it happen. I think there are maybe 20 separate patches, all rather pristine-looking with big water tanks regularly spaced along a central path. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The allotment</td></tr>
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There was something deeply moving about the place. I couldn’t put my finger on it. Maybe it was seeing all the villagers enthusiastically erecting and painting sheds, carefully digging their patches and sharing the knowledge they were learning. None of them were jaded old timers. No one was pretending to be king of the allotment or policing the behaviour of anyone else. They were just coming together as a community and doing something really worthwhile. It was genuinely heartwarming. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Proud Mark</td></tr>
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I think the weather helped by bringing a sort of nostalgic quality to the place. The sun beating down. Clouds of dust spewing into the air. Rosie ran off into the hedgerow where the local children had built the mother of all dens. It was so reminiscent or the late 1970s somehow: Those long, hot summers of drought, ABBA albums, teddy bear’s picnics, flared jeans, Atara’s Band, blackberry picking and Silver Jubilees. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lisa in her shady garden</td></tr>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-6693029308900647552020-07-31T14:27:00.001+01:002020-07-31T14:27:35.020+01:00Uffington White Horse in lockdown<u><i>May 26th: The Uffington White Horse </i></u><br /><br />This year, I was determined to make the most of the beautiful weather. Late May and early June were particularly lovely. My favourite time of the day is undoubtedly dusk. Twilight. The gloaming. The period when it gets dimpsey. The fact that there are so many words for it tells you that that the magical transition from day to night has intrigued and delighted people for generations. As the days get longer, and we approach Midsummer, dusk becomes all the more special. For me, there is nothing more beautiful than sitting on a hillside watching the sun coming down. The shadows lengthen. The wind picks up. The air becomes thick with electrons. Smells become more intense. The birds become deafening, and then, slowly, stop, replaced by the sparse hoots and shrieks of the night. Banks of lavender and pink clouds fade into a blue light and everything is suddenly mysterious. Your eyes start to play tricks. You see shapes moving out of the corner of your eye. You talk in whispers. Anything louder seems crass. <br /><br />One day, I long to see the green flash. I have seen phosphorescence, the Northern Lights and a total eclipse of the sun. Each one was as magical and extraordinary as I’d hoped it would be. Phosphorescence, which I witnessed at midnight in Nerja in Spain whilst skinny dipping with Sam Becker and Philippa, was perhaps the most extraordinary, largely because it was so unexpected. We were lying on the beach, at the water’s edge, enjoying the sensation of the warm sea water lapping over us. We suddenly noticed a bank of green shimmering light on the waves, perhaps twenty meters out to sea. I’m not sure why we weren’t frightened. It seemed natural, somehow, and we were intrigued. We stayed put, allowing the gentle waves to wash over us as the light got closer and closer. And then it engulfed us. We all stood. I can’t tell you why. Maybe there was a moment of doubt or fear in us all. But I remember watching these glistening diamonds flowing down the contours of Sam and Philippa’s body as the water fell from them, and feeling the luckiest man in the world. And as soon as the phenomenon appeared, it had disappeared again. <br /><br />Anyway, there has always been more than a whiff of the pagan about me. I don’t think any composer could make music without a belief in magic of sorts. I have always been intrigued by witchcraft, ghost stories and prehistoric communities and have a deep reverence for the power of nature. One of my favourite spots in the world is the Uffington White Horse in Oxfordshire. I have visited the place on countless occasions and introduced it to many friends. I have blogged very regularly about trips there, so I won’t describe it in great detail this time. <br /><br />It’s undoubtedly the most iconic of the various white horses which are cut into chalk hillsides across England. White horses are ingrained in British folk law and they have intrigued us for countless years. I can guarantee that there’s a picture of a white horse somewhere in your house. If you look carefully on the front of a tub of Anchor Butter, for example, you’ll see a depiction of the Westbury White Horse in Wiltshire. Some of the carvings are Victorian, like the one at Sutton Bank in Yorkshire. Others, like the one at Westbury potentially date from the 9th Century. Uffington is special. It’s the oldest white horse in Britain, and possibly more than 3000 years old: a fact which I find utterly staggering. Its full beauty can only be seen from the air - which has generated many conspiracy theories about UFOs - but it is also far more figurative than many of its brothers and sisters and this adds to its mystery. Its quirky shape has been recreated on all manner of logos and tattoos. <br /><br />Michael had never been there, so I decided to take him one night after work. I knew it was a long journey - perhaps a two-hour drive from London - so didn’t tell him where we were heading. We simply packed a picnic and headed west on the M4. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Michael with the White Horse behind him</td></tr>
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I have never visited the white horse in bad weather, and always enjoyed the place most at sunset. The horse is on a hillside which faces the setting sun, and it starts to glow in majestic shades of red and orange in the golden hour before dusk. The yellow grasses which grow on the hillside in the summer also seem to turn orange, and I have countless pictures of friends in the area in front of hillsides which almost seem to be on fire. It truly is the most awe-inspiring location. And all the time, sometimes almost deafening, the incessant chirps of skylarks, who actually sing as they fly. Their sound is utterly unique - almost like the sound of a modem dialling into the internet in the late 1990s!<br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">That orange light...</td></tr>
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Michael was suitably impressed. There is no such thing as a bad view in that area. Uffington marks the end of the Chilterns, so if you face the west and you can see the entire Wiltshire Plain stretching out for miles towards Bristol and the horizon. Head up to the Iron-age hill fort and look east for views of rolling hillsides. In the Golden Hour, I can guarantee shadows longer than you’ve ever seen in your life. It was a truly magical evening. <div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Those impossibly long shadows</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The gloaming</td></tr>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-25540974375556390442020-07-30T20:13:00.002+01:002020-07-30T20:13:38.001+01:00A walk with Philippa <i><u>May 25th: A walk with Philippa </u></i><br /><br />One of the drawbacks of lockdown was not being able to see my two closest female friends, Philippa and Fiona. I’ve known Fiona since we were about 15. We played in the Northamptonshire Youth Orchestra together and used to busk as part of a string trio with our mate Edward Thornhill in shopping centres across the Midlands. On one occasion, just after I’d finished my A-levels, my parents went on holiday to France. I was so convinced that I’d tanked my exams, that I refused to go with them, telling them that I needed to be in Northamptonshire instead, in order to go through the process of clearing. As it happened, I did rather well, and got into my first choice university, but by then the holiday had been booked and I was destined to stay at home alone. However, even at the age of 18, I was scared to be on my own at night in our house in Higham Ferrers, which was considered to be haunted by pretty much every person who stepped inside it, so Edward came to stay with me for the week. By then we were both driving, so we spent a fairly magical time travelling out to crop circles in the middle of the night, ghost-hunting in the eerie Brixworth church and listening to ELO, ABBA and Steeleye Span on the car stereo. Typical teenaged pursuits. On the Saturday night, my mother sneakily called from France, expecting to hear the sounds of a full-on drunken house party. What she heard instead was the sound of the kettle boiling, me with a mouthful of one of her home-baked chocolate chip cookies and Fiona and Edward playing Eine Kleine Nachtmusik in the background! We’d phoned Fiona up at about 10pm to say, “we’re coming to Northampton to pick you up… bring your violin.” We played chamber music through the night. I was a dream teen!<br /><br />Fiona now lives in Glasgow. We speak most days on the phone, but I haven’t been able to see her, and this saddens me enormously. Philippa, on the other hand, lives in London. I met her when I was 19. She’s actually the same age as me, but was a year behind me at York University on account of having taken a year out to back-pack across India, learn to walk like a model and become impossibly glamorous. I think, to this hick-from-the-sticks, all the people I met at university who’d grown up in London seemed that little bit more sophisticated and confident but Philippa was something else. As my Mum once put it, “you notice her the moment she walks into a room.”<div>
<br />Philippa has two children, however, and my assumption about most families in lockdown was that they were all hunkering down, dealing with the misery of trying to educate children, whilst, in many cases (including Philippa’s), simultaneously working full-time from home, without being able to rely on child-minders, parents, or, for those long first weeks, the ability to go to the local park to let the kids run around like lunatics. Philippa also has a husband, two dogs and a cat. They all live in a tiny terraced house off Columbia Road and I genuinely don’t know how they’ve managed to stay alive!<br /><br />Anyway, we decided to go for a lovely walk one evening in late May. I drove out East, and we went on a winding route which took us across the slightly grotty Ion Road Gardens, past Hackney City Farm, through Haggerston Park (which is full of plum trees - a post war initiative designed to get Eastenders eating proper food) and along the canal tow-path all the way to Victoria Park. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Philippa on the tow path</td></tr>
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Hackney and Shoreditch have a very different vibe to Finchley and Highgate. Many of the people who live there are considerably too cool for school. It’s a Mecca for bearded hipsters with coiffed hair, cut to look just a little bit shabby, who drink home-brewed beer and eat in terribly expensive über-trendy restaurants in old warehouses. City workers by day, the suits come off, they reveal their tattoos and they pretend to be artists by night, playing with guitars and frisbees in parks, and discussing philosophy in barges which have been turned into bookshops. <br /><br />(I should point out that none of this describes Philippa who is a highly successful screen-writer!!)<br /><br />The great irony, of course, is that you have to be very wealthy to live in Hackney these days. It’s a shit hole, with dreadfully arcane parking regulations, gangs, shootings, and terrible pollution, but because it’s also got cereal bars, macrobiotic cafes, spoken word artists and an impossibly cool, shabby-chic vibe, it’s more expensive to live in than the genteel, tranquil, leafy, but apparently boring Highgate! Based on the people we met on our walk, I’d say a great many Hackney residents are really noisy, quite into drinking and quite bad at observing social distancing measures. I can’t tell you how many people bumped into us as we walked along the tow path - and how many of them didn’t seem that bothered!<br /><br />I must book in a session with a psychotherapist to get to the bottom of this bizarre and irrational dislike I have for Hackney. Of course, it’s got a lot of positives. The area around Philippa’s house is absolutely beautiful. It’s row upon row of charming terraced houses, all perfectly kept, and a brilliant backdrop for period dramas. They film there ALL the time. The streets are filled with kids playing out. It feels really safe - like a proper community - and her neighbours are wonderful people. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Philippa and her husband Dylan outside their lovely house</td></tr>
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One of the other things I love about Hackney is the graffiti. That sounds like a strangely sarcastic comment, but the walls by the canal are filled with it, the colours are quite brilliant and I love how it all reflects on the smooth surface of the water. The graffiti is often quite witty, political and artistic in those parts as well. It doesn’t feel as mindless or destructive as it can feel in other places. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some of that graffiti</td></tr>
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Anyway, location aside, it was a real tonic to see Philippa. It always is. She makes me howl with laughter, puts up with my whinging and always deals with my curious outbursts with great kindness. I do say some very odd things to her. I’m not quite sure why this is. We went walking with her dogs, who are the fastest things in the world once you let them off their leads. They are particularly fond of squirrels. You see these little black dots tearing into flower beds without any sense of the damage they may be doing to themselves, or the the herbaceous borders! I also wonder what the dog would do if she actually caught a squirrel. They’re adoringly good-natured creatures, but maybe they’d chew them to see if they squeak. Eek! </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3p-pdf8jVFtA0dqTn_tx6hbgBLB0aEfCvhA-Y_Jb0xIwB-694oA7AqOVlAmflAZcPFJkKVhtLGZyKgRzbbaj1ot3buFjeE2SEnIESTLxsyeTkbHBK_xKBUX2-N7H0FFS3TNKXBMd13FE/s1600/IMG_9781.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3p-pdf8jVFtA0dqTn_tx6hbgBLB0aEfCvhA-Y_Jb0xIwB-694oA7AqOVlAmflAZcPFJkKVhtLGZyKgRzbbaj1ot3buFjeE2SEnIESTLxsyeTkbHBK_xKBUX2-N7H0FFS3TNKXBMd13FE/s400/IMG_9781.JPG" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">With the lovely dogs in Victoria Park</td></tr>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-45890182138456783182020-07-29T22:28:00.001+01:002020-07-29T22:28:05.912+01:00Tide Mills and Meriel <i><u>19th May 2020: Tide Mills</u></i><br /><br />On May 19th, 2020, Nathan and I drove down to East Sussex to visit Meriel. One of my lockdown priorities was visiting friends who were living on their own. Of course, self-isolating with family brings a whole set of bizarre challenges, but lockdown was toughest, in my view, on those who had to deal with it alone. I have friends who didn’t speak in person to a living soul for eight weeks or more and I cannot bear the thought of anyone being lonely. <div>
<br />I’m rather pleased to report that Meriel seems to have found herself a partner during the latter stages of lockdown, but certainly, back in May, she was living alone, and feeling a little blue. <br /><br />It was a great pleasure to drive anywhere during lockdown. You could literally sail from destination to destination without encountering any slow-moving traffic. Even traffic lights very rarely seemed to get in the way of a decent drive. We’d initially discussed the idea of trying to meet Meriel half way between Lewes, where she lives, and London, but the idea of spending a glorious sunny day by the sea was too alluring to ignore. And we'd be there in a flash...<br /><br />May 19th was a Tuesday, so we were never going to turn into a speck of bathing suit in a provocative Daily Mail aerial photograph of a mass of bodies on Bournemouth beach! Besides, our planned destination was Tide Mills which is very firmly <i>off</i> the beaten track! It doesn’t have shops, or ice cream vans, and the shingle on the beach is razor sharp, so, even on the hottest summer days, outside of global pandemics, it’s always bizarrely empty. <br /><br />It’s a really atmospheric spot. Tide Mills is a derelict village which was condemned in 1936 and abandoned in 1939 when the last few residents were forcefully evicted. It was used for street-fighting training in the Second World War - largely by Canadian troops - so it feels eerie. These days, the old village is nothing but a twisting, wind-carved network of light grey stone walls and brick built arches covered in sea grasses and twisting brambles. It’s the perfect stage for adventurous or imaginative children and on a misty Autumnal day, I’m pretty sure the ghosts of past villagers can be seen going about their business. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBbD4lNzAtlF0djYmc3F4l4IWbmFsVb7F7OEskNH_ashyphenhyphenWibtIkeYtXn95_uyU4xGZgX6rA-Cnz8ktx7FN2wvbkeMttwmwlE0yX1JJrmdgQVwlZ7BT3LC5uY9WmBnS8tdlNAsb6M6jzJ0/s1600/IMG_9559.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBbD4lNzAtlF0djYmc3F4l4IWbmFsVb7F7OEskNH_ashyphenhyphenWibtIkeYtXn95_uyU4xGZgX6rA-Cnz8ktx7FN2wvbkeMttwmwlE0yX1JJrmdgQVwlZ7BT3LC5uY9WmBnS8tdlNAsb6M6jzJ0/s400/IMG_9559.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The long, steep shingle beach</td></tr>
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On a hot sunny day the place seems to gleam. The long shingle beach plunges down to a silvery-grey sea. The reflection of the sun dances on the white waves. But that shingle is lethal! The beach is so steep, that attempting to climb up from the level of the sea is nigh-on impossible without cutting your feet to shreds. Anyone visiting the place should take a pair of sturdy sandals, or sensible water proof shoes. There is, as we know, never an excuse for Crocks, but, if you happen to have a pair, Tide Mills is the place to wear them, before burning them, naturally. <br /><br />We walked along the old tramline from Tide Mills into the neighbouring town of Seaford. It’s one of those desert-like landscapes you get when areas of shingle start to become home to strange plants which almost resemble cacti. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBPP5m7fSyAk2h8PiDMM02alaxJdmFHoFP8RZvBV0Fxu0eSoo61Q71EuZh7qwHhJr_TyrONS8pVINM4UhZF65glgbaxG7bk55thB-Tiq-yeW9FrEc0YMxpWNbP-oPG51qAmQjd5c30Z34/s1600/IMG_9579.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBPP5m7fSyAk2h8PiDMM02alaxJdmFHoFP8RZvBV0Fxu0eSoo61Q71EuZh7qwHhJr_TyrONS8pVINM4UhZF65glgbaxG7bk55thB-Tiq-yeW9FrEc0YMxpWNbP-oPG51qAmQjd5c30Z34/s400/IMG_9579.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The old tram line to Seaford</td></tr>
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The joy about Meriel is how freely she laughs. Her head tilts backwards and she lets out a chuckle and then a roar of infectious joy. Life has not been kind to her over the last few years and the laughter was sometimes buttoned by a frown. But she’s found resilience and inner strength and I’m pleased to say the laughter is back. Perhaps she now sees in herself the person we all love incredibly dearly. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJztZ1UJiHEXZTIHhuTesmUaqDxO9BPCan5fg5zq-_0ip1BhoWgJCRdbFuo6-W0HrYYZCCcL-FbNXDmE6XR0IZc_hK7w3FfJ5yQP6gqWJxLgYvEF_5429fhEKddHvLXiyvxCTwWZqdo-s/s1600/IMG_9567.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJztZ1UJiHEXZTIHhuTesmUaqDxO9BPCan5fg5zq-_0ip1BhoWgJCRdbFuo6-W0HrYYZCCcL-FbNXDmE6XR0IZc_hK7w3FfJ5yQP6gqWJxLgYvEF_5429fhEKddHvLXiyvxCTwWZqdo-s/s400/IMG_9567.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The infectious laugh</td></tr>
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On the way home, we called in on Hilary and her son Jago who also live in Lewes. We sat on a rug about five meters away from them in their garden. Obviously, it’s quite difficult to explain social distancing to a hugely excited little boy - Nathan in particular is one of his favourite people in the world - but we managed to complete the visit without being licked, and I think this has to be a celebrated! I took quite a number of pictures of our little group, sitting happily in the early evening sunshine. Unfortunately, Jago has not yet left behind his desire to stick his tongue out in every single photograph. I’m not entirely surprised - his father refused to be photographed at his own wedding! Hilary, furthermore, is almost impossible to photograph with her eyes open. It’s a really strange thing. She’s not one of those people who blinks noticeably, but when the camera comes out she turns into Blink McBlinky. <br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eyes closed, tongue out!</td></tr>
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Some people have a curious self-sabotage button which gets pressed the moment a camera comes out of its bag. This causes some to blink, and others, (Hilary NOT included in this category by the way) to start talking incessantly. You know the sort? They launch into a monologue, “no, no, put it away, I always look terrible in photographs… well hurry up, then… gawd, who do you like you are, David Bailey? Come on… I’ve got a cake in the oven.” And, of course, instead of focussing on looking wistfully into the camera, their mouths take on terrible gurning dissatisfied shapes. If you’re the person who thinks they look awful in photographs, you’re obviously either not learning to love yourself in a mirror, or you’re tensing up when pictures are taken because you think you’re going to look horrible. </div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-26117917679238967022020-07-28T21:03:00.003+01:002020-07-28T21:03:19.639+01:00Thaxted... finally <i><u>18th May 2020, Thaxted</u></i><br /><br />It took quite some time before my mother and father felt confident to have us pay them a visit. They are both in their mid-70s, so it’s been very important for them to shield themselves, and for the rest of us to make sure we do whatever is needed to help them in this respect. We finally drove to Thaxted just after Boris decided to relax lockdown rules for the first time in that famously confusing Sunday afternoon speech. The country, of course, immediately went into meltdown. I always felt the message behind his new rules was simply to be a little more relaxed whilst remaining vigilant and sensible, but everyone decided it was best all round to take to social media instead, screaming the most ludicrous questions, and smugly posing the inconceivable scenarios: “So, if I’m not allowed to see both parents at the same time, what if I’m walking with one, and the other one comes out of a shop. Will we be arrested?” And, of course, if you ask, the answer will always be no. So I don’t ask. But I’m probably a natural rule breaker…<br /><br />May 18th was a beautiful hot day, which was nothing new for lockdown. So that we could stay within the rules, a great plan had been hatched which involved meeting my Mum by the side of the house, and walking with her - a ludicrously large distance apart - whilst carrying a picnic into the beautiful fields behind their house. Rumours were circulating in Thaxted that there was a bluebell wood somewhere in the area so we thought we might have a look for that. In true rural folk style, however, the only directions my parents had been given was to turn right at the badger set! “No, not THAT badger set,” said my Mum as we walked past the largest earthworks I’d ever seen created by a mammal which is not a rodent, but actually a member of the weasel family. It’s always good to get a fact in. <br /><br />My father would independently make his way to the designated picnic spot - and we could see his familiar swaggering gait walking five hundred metres behind us. <br /><br />I felt very emotional seeing my Mum. We hadn’t seen each other since early February and I’d been incredibly worried about her, at one stage wondering if we’d ever see each other again. Such terrible stories were floating around about people dying on their own, and their loved being unable to even attend their funerals. I’d watched Llio’s beloved Dad’s funeral on Zoom and been so distressed at the sight of her bravely sitting on her own - two meters away from one of only eight people who were allowed to be there with her.<br /><br />My Mum’s smile can light up a room, and seeing that flash of white hair and the turquoise and lilac colours she almost always wears, was a real tonic which almost made me cry. <br /><br />We chose a rather lovely spot for our picnic at the corner of two fields, and sat, about five metres apart in two clumps, unable to share food despite our having brought most of Sainsbury’s with us. We were, however, so grateful for the experience of being there. My mother wore a sun hat. <div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cow parsley?</td></tr>
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Looking at a photograph of the occasion, I see a bank of what I hope is cow parsley behind us. There is a lot of giant hogweed around at the moment, and it looks very like cow parsley. It’s known as “Britain’s most dangerous plant.” Look it up. When the sap of this terrible weed comes into contact with a person, it rects to bright sunlight and badly burns and blisters the skin. No joke. This isn’t some strange conspiracy theory. This year’s hot weather has meant that giant hogweed is now growing everywhere. They are trying to kill as much of it as they can. Huge patches of it along the Dollis Valley Green Walk are now brown and dead, with signs up warning people to be careful. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Those beautiful fields</td></tr>
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After finishing the picnic, we went back to sit in the parents’ garden. My mum had decided that we could use the downstairs loo, so had left a pair of gloves and some hand sanitiser outside, but in the end I decided to wee behind a tree!<br /><br />Since lockdown started, my parents have been playing online Scrabble with their friends Sally and Stuart. I chatted to my Mum on the phone yesterday and she estimates that they have now played well over 100 games. My mother has a physical Scrabble board which she carries around with her, so that she can play around with the letters old-school style, before committing them to the game. When Sally and Stuart place a word on the online board, she dutifully adds it to the physical board. Seeing her with her iPad AND a Scrabble board was one of those delightfully eccentric sights which makes you proud to be from the stock you’re from! </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Online" Scrabble</td></tr>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-84184425275543849432020-07-27T22:19:00.001+01:002020-07-27T22:19:31.955+01:00A walk into The Shire <i><u>A walk into The Shire: 22nd May 2020</u></i><br /><br />On the evening of the 22nd of May, we went for a very long walk with my cousin’s step son, Harry. It feels a bit technical and impersonal to call him my cousin’s step son, and because he refers to me as his uncle, I should probably call him my nephew. When you’re one of three gay siblings, you take what you can in terms of younger relatives! <br /><br />Harry lives in East Finchley, probably less than a fifteen minute walk from our house, and, ever since his wonderful mother died last year, we’ve tried to see him as regularly as we can. He’ll always be an important part of our clan. <br /><br />It was his idea to go for a walk. One of the joys of walking with people during lockdown was that you could cover some serious distances because the very act of walking was the sole thing which was allowing people to legally be together. In the very early days, just sitting on a bench for a breather was viewed with great suspicion. I once watched a tired dog-walker being moved on by an over-zealous policeman. I remember having a furtive sandwich on one occasion, sitting on a wall in a secluded street in Hampstead with a friend, looking around us like we were doing an illicit drug deal! But the bottom line was that if you wanted to be with someone whilst staying within the rules, you just had to keep on walking...<br /><br />Harry’s visit, therefore, was the perfect opportunity to head down to the Dollis Valley Green Walk, to see what kind of adventure it could offer us. <br /><br />As I’ve written recently, this North-London, ten-mile footpath follows Dollis Brook from Hampstead Heath deep into the Green Belt. The Green Belt, by the way, is a 7-10 mile wide area of green space which entirely surrounds London. No one is allowed to build on it, so it stops the city from sprawling whilst giving city dwellers a “girdle” of open space in which to breath clean air. <br /><br />Nathan and I had hitherto only walked a couple of miles along the stream, and we were keen to see where else it would lead us.<br /><br />Dollis Brook really is the most wonderful little stream. Parts of it seem to be winterbourne, or, at least only active after a decent amount of rainfall. It has, of course, been a particularly dry year, so perhaps it’s of slight concern that the brook is empty in several places. I always panic about the fish. I wonder if they have a sense that a river is drying up and manage to swim to safety down stream. Perhaps they simply end up floundering and panicking in ever-shrinking pools; a ready-made meal for a passing kingfisher. <br /><br />The brook is entirely lined by tall trees, all of which change colour with the seasons from lime green to orange and brown. Sun glints on the surface of the water like diamonds, and shines through the branches of the trees to create intricate and beautiful lace-like patterns on the pathways. The birdsong is intense. Magpies, crows and parakeets squawk, caw and croak tunelessly (and yes, there are many parakeets in North London), whilst robins, thrushes and blackbirds show off their virtuoso vocal prowess. On one magical occasion, I heard a cuckoo. It was so clear and cuckoo-like that I thought it had to be fake! In May, the whole pathway is lined with wild garlic. Delicate white flowers tumble down the banks of the stream whilst the air hums with the scent of Italian cooking! Next year I shall make pesto. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wild garlic near Dollis Brook</td></tr>
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The brook snakes up through suburban housing estates, allotments, golf and cricket clubs before splitting into two separate streams. The right-hand fork, which is officially Dollis Brook, heads up to Totteridge and Whetstone, flanked by the designated Green Walk. The left-hand fork is known as Folly Brook. The path is a little wilder and less well-trodden, so it was this fork which we decided to explore with Harry. <br /><br />The further north you walk, the more the suburbs peter out. Playing fields and bramble-bedecked wooden fences and walls give way to scrubland and then heathland, and then, through the dark trees which surround the brook, you see open fields with horses and cows. Most non-city dwellers reading this blog will be doing so with quite a healthy dollop of “so what”, but when a Londoner like me realises that he can walk from his house into the actual countryside, he gets a little excited. It reminds me of my childhood. I grew up in a fairly rural environment, always aware of the changing seasons. Things were difficult when weather became inclement. When the mists rolled in from the fens, or the snows fell, or the Nene flooded, or winds took trees or electricity cables down, we knew about it. We couldn’t get to certain places. We’d have power cuts. In the city, by and large, things just carry on as normal.<br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfAJFxM1skr-qWcK_2JDyKi_JMMMl1CFSiqsXQEf898ZfifvI57GCNShC8SHZkjaU97xgvUzrQTznGyfAw0m5mZjp94wJtxpfGgw5Qsj_j2YojHDkABM4JUfkC63XhyphenhyphenI5jBtaFdW-pRRQ/s1600/IMG_9595.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfAJFxM1skr-qWcK_2JDyKi_JMMMl1CFSiqsXQEf898ZfifvI57GCNShC8SHZkjaU97xgvUzrQTznGyfAw0m5mZjp94wJtxpfGgw5Qsj_j2YojHDkABM4JUfkC63XhyphenhyphenI5jBtaFdW-pRRQ/s400/IMG_9595.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The open fields of the Green Belt</td></tr>
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<br />The greatest thing about Folly Brook is that it suddenly enters a sort of woodland, which resembles Middle Earth. The path takes you through entirely enclosed walkways of shrubs, and gnarled, twisted hawthorn branches which feel like secret passageways. Fallen trees have become stiles and bridges. Ferns grow tall. Everything is green, verdant, Jurassic almost, and utterly magical. Rhododendron trees with pink, purple, blue and white flowers thrive in the marshy ground. And climbing up a steep ridge, you suddenly find yourself standing by the beautiful Darland’s Lake. A lone heron perches on a log waiting for fish to pass. Leaves rustle in the trees. The mayhem of London is another world away. There’s no traffic noise. You could be in the middle of nowhere. In any period of time. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2phUdndaG7PztSeT01PR1APMRyVL8L1vNLfkGdzPivUwVjzsZvALTxrrRv-hVMMNgNmrQH9LUzyEXMlHWE5ld43fgGLVUxHz2sJlkIyXVG_wrYjbMCigRHK2AYGOtcmuk88X-7VMXjys/s1600/IMG_9602.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2phUdndaG7PztSeT01PR1APMRyVL8L1vNLfkGdzPivUwVjzsZvALTxrrRv-hVMMNgNmrQH9LUzyEXMlHWE5ld43fgGLVUxHz2sJlkIyXVG_wrYjbMCigRHK2AYGOtcmuk88X-7VMXjys/s400/IMG_9602.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Darland's Lake</td></tr>
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Turn right at the lake and you’re in an area of open heathland scattered with gorse, buddleja and butterfly-laden wildflowers. A steep, wind-swept hill takes you up towards Totteridge Village. If you stand on the hill and look behind you, you can see nothing but green, rolling countryside. The odd Merchant Ivory-style, grand manor house pokes its head above the trees, and, back in the direction of the city, a few distant cranes are all that could ever remind you that you’re not in the middle of the Chilterns in the 1930s. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI4XlNkaz_qIrNJx-_Kzcebsg_5W6ri3h6ZkWOIhkJumj3WHseWypYkKb1BBPmQ85M9k3KcLCu2p_rc4QInoKdfHZ5CSs6npOPncI7XIm9izRpL9ahpXpCBqex1TIzcBae86Tv6qzuiMg/s1600/IMG_9612.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI4XlNkaz_qIrNJx-_Kzcebsg_5W6ri3h6ZkWOIhkJumj3WHseWypYkKb1BBPmQ85M9k3KcLCu2p_rc4QInoKdfHZ5CSs6npOPncI7XIm9izRpL9ahpXpCBqex1TIzcBae86Tv6qzuiMg/s400/IMG_9612.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Harry in the heathland looking back towards the city</td></tr>
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Waiting at the top of the hill is the famous Orange Tree pub, which was not open back in May, but will be now. When a global pandemic isn’t raging, it’s the perfect place to sit and eat a hearty plate of grub in a pub garden. We went there with Nathan’s Mum and Ron about a year ago. The only issue was the wasps, which we trapped in bottles of lemonade. <div>
<br />Our journey back to Finchley found us following Dollis Brook itself, after walking along the road to Totteridge and Whetstone. It’s a less magical, but still very pleasant walk which takes you through a water meadow, which is rather romantically called Whetstone Stray. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHqy-jE-vcjgiXRgNLtsfaN0Y98DqgaE8g515bhB-vD1tyGPFFkE5jIYKG1YlZYqbw0GoQ36Huc0vIB7Ks4ExOiElD6jjFL9Dz2__Q_3XSbwVU_VZba_O8-o5mEhWZwW5daLJW85cg1lM/s1600/IMG_9614.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHqy-jE-vcjgiXRgNLtsfaN0Y98DqgaE8g515bhB-vD1tyGPFFkE5jIYKG1YlZYqbw0GoQ36Huc0vIB7Ks4ExOiElD6jjFL9Dz2__Q_3XSbwVU_VZba_O8-o5mEhWZwW5daLJW85cg1lM/s400/IMG_9614.JPG" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Whetstone Stray</td></tr>
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Over the following months, we have walked variants of that particular trip on countless occasions. Brother Edward came up to Finchley on the 16th June, on the 30th of June, Nathan's birthday, we had a very pleasant walk with his sister, Sam, his nephew Lewis and their dog Ginny, and on 11th of July, Nathan and I turned left at Darland’s Lake, and found ourselves walking out of the Tolkien novel and entering the world of Lewis Carroll. Steep paths lead up and down the hillsides in this part of the greenbelt, many of which are lined by incredibly tall hedges, just as I imagine the garden in Wonderland. <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFaYFNaDNOup28N0_zeFs5NvprQyZBRV3tRt6uHp-aLW-4hTx4GNkh53BWlfmvUz_mHdBTTKXg1FMp_BMxC0unsGeJQemeZ3vXyEJ6VDw5cFWEAiH57yGMIieb6N3H0TdGsyv5bzKE3DE/s1600/IMG_9811.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFaYFNaDNOup28N0_zeFs5NvprQyZBRV3tRt6uHp-aLW-4hTx4GNkh53BWlfmvUz_mHdBTTKXg1FMp_BMxC0unsGeJQemeZ3vXyEJ6VDw5cFWEAiH57yGMIieb6N3H0TdGsyv5bzKE3DE/s400/IMG_9811.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brother Edward by a rapidly-drying Darland's Lake</td></tr>
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So, in a very peculiar way, we have to thank Covid-19, because, I think, it has encouraged many of us to explore our local areas in almost forensic detail. For the first time ever, I have thought, “I wonder where that path leads?” and instead of walking on, I’ve merrily headed down the path to take a look. As a result, I have found great beauty, little hidden pastures, absolute peace and tranquillity - and, a week ago, 2kg of blackberries! </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDoaxIF7LnSGMaejRcPbD73j0-Fah-iUqRqAzIb3FsF6MZQR3sZia-gcxM5yRptaLF2xKwskmA1GlmoSCiQQf6RpoAQrJBomQoyn79N6SkNOXr-agDVUUEFmwH8ceYs96YvdoQ-SlHNww/s1600/IMG_9967.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDoaxIF7LnSGMaejRcPbD73j0-Fah-iUqRqAzIb3FsF6MZQR3sZia-gcxM5yRptaLF2xKwskmA1GlmoSCiQQf6RpoAQrJBomQoyn79N6SkNOXr-agDVUUEFmwH8ceYs96YvdoQ-SlHNww/s400/IMG_9967.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ginny and her family by Darland's Lake</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0WTxawjXG6QiHticy-3-1uAX42n2ELceYcRMXuASP2xg2ay902CMDVU-YOJ04cBXS9xJ5bQl9yfxQjLMnmEemjaBU2rghJnLi5pp7KS7RKOHL5HyBaugwB4o8aXYdvFHiQmfrEBPNNZw/s1600/IMG_9958.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0WTxawjXG6QiHticy-3-1uAX42n2ELceYcRMXuASP2xg2ay902CMDVU-YOJ04cBXS9xJ5bQl9yfxQjLMnmEemjaBU2rghJnLi5pp7KS7RKOHL5HyBaugwB4o8aXYdvFHiQmfrEBPNNZw/s400/IMG_9958.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nathan, Lewis, Sam and Ginny in Middle Earth</td></tr>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-88779899071094535242020-07-26T18:03:00.000+01:002020-07-26T18:03:05.594+01:00Zoom Seder<br /><i><u>April 8th 2020: A Zoom Seder</u></i><br />
<br />The period of Passover/Easter this year was the first time many of us became aware of the true horrors of lockdown. These two simultaneous festivals, are a time when friends and families gather together and much-loved annual traditions take place: Easter Egg hunts at your Grannie’s house, spring-welcoming ceremonies in ancient stone circles, parades, carnivals, rare visits to church or synagogue, the creation of palm crosses, and, of course, for Jewish people, the almost bewildering set of rituals associated with the Seder meal. It was this period which made us realise what we were truly missing and what might not be with us again for some time. Sure, we’d all experienced the queues, the boredom, the lack of loo paper, aspirin, yeast, baked beans, the worry about our jobs and the general panic and fear about catching the blessed illness, but it was the lack of human contact which made most of us feel so hopelessly sad. And not being able to spend time with friends and family during this holiday brought it all home. <br /><br />For the last three years, I have celebrated Seder at my wonderful friend Felicity’s house. I don’t think Felicity would mind my saying that, despite being a highly successful QC and a massive supporter of the arts, cooking for friends and family is probably the most important thing in her life. She hosts Friday night dinners for scores of people every week, but it’s the two Passover meals - which celebrate the story of Moses - which are probably the most important meals of them all. Like most Jewish families, Felicity’s crew have developed a series of joyous, charming, unique and theatrical responses to the countless rituals associated with the occasion, and these serve to make a Seder meal at her house an unmissable event.<br /><br />Being unable to invite people to her house this year was a horrifying thought, so, she decided to organise a Seder Zoom. And when I say organise, I mean she meticulously planned every aspect. The day before the meal, she delivered two Seder boxes with all the food, curios, plates, napkins, matzah, table cloths, candles, books of prayers, songs and stories, table decorations and instructions we’d need for the following night. It truly was a one-stop Seder-shop. The instructions were incredibly detailed, from when to lay the table to when to get the food on to avoid any conflict with religious rules. Felicity always decorates her tables with scores of miniature frogs to represent, probably the most palatable of the ten plagues. You don’t want a table crawling with blood, lice or boils, do you? (Although a thunderstorm of hail and fire might be fun to recreate!) I was very touched and excited, therefore, to discover a lot of little frogs in our Seder box. She'd also given us both a little gift. Knowing I'm a collector of cufflinks - and one of the world's largest ABBA fans - she'd found me a beautiful pair with the word Abba (which means father) written in Hebrew on them. <div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ4YDxLs-92kjawhzGaCmgdnyZqppTQaNhsDlfHkRE3_MKXVQ2Qj2M7yae9paL7mtTxE4uB1SeyBcwbOs7vsZU8bQqAwILV1RyjAwxqTOLLuwTkAjIPBD6QfNJd24ng0BpLqib7hKLFVg/s1600/IMG_5336.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF44_5gdJY81ASf_6BmIYXdk-a112hCsxgUq1Inybeo7x-LiZEO4yKI3__P6Nn4ld2_p20rwvGe-pP0lbgy8gFJb7fhSASmFxyzVKOb4_SHADH1x_NPYBHdgHrbKtjBOYFgAyoxfXiLNw/s1600/IMG_5338.JPG" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF44_5gdJY81ASf_6BmIYXdk-a112hCsxgUq1Inybeo7x-LiZEO4yKI3__P6Nn4ld2_p20rwvGe-pP0lbgy8gFJb7fhSASmFxyzVKOb4_SHADH1x_NPYBHdgHrbKtjBOYFgAyoxfXiLNw/s320/IMG_5338.JPG" width="240" /></a>We set up a make-shift table out of a pair of ottomans in the sitting room. Once decorated, it really did look a picture, and, of course, the house was simultaneously filling with the rich, glorious smells of the food we’d been sent. <br /><br />I think there must have been ten or so households on the Zoom call. It was the early days of Zoom, when no-one quite understood the concept of the mute button. For a while all we could hear was a terrible, echoing, nightmare wave of sound - and, at a crucial moment everyone suddenly started to sound like daleks. The sound of mastication got quite overwhelming at one point when one of the guests decided to eat his soup very close to his computer’s mic. But none of that mattered, because we were all together. We all had the same food. The same books. And Felicity had worked out which sections of text we were all going to read out to one another. It was heartening, warming, and, at times, highly moving; a very bright light within a very dark time. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEP3qGo1IXevAeqgqKRHD2ZylZbQLUcHwmcfEfuqFAn5m2DjMKLom1XMFkmdj0DrMmo53ATQiJf9Ss_lt3ohtKXpsh9wzYRBykc_gq4H2ns-dsQveaOGkus1IZRF2dz8Nqpmm5jFt9tHU/s1600/IMG_5337.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEP3qGo1IXevAeqgqKRHD2ZylZbQLUcHwmcfEfuqFAn5m2DjMKLom1XMFkmdj0DrMmo53ATQiJf9Ss_lt3ohtKXpsh9wzYRBykc_gq4H2ns-dsQveaOGkus1IZRF2dz8Nqpmm5jFt9tHU/s400/IMG_5337.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-15938810029685905282020-07-25T23:16:00.002+01:002020-07-25T23:16:16.925+01:00Psalm 23<i><u>April 13th 2020: A new recording</u></i><br />
<br />The fog of my own COVID illness finally started to clear in early April. I knew it was dissipating because I finally found myself wanting to write music again.<br /><br /><div>
At the same time, people from my synagogue were dying. On one occasion I attended a joint Zoom shiva for two men who had died on the same day. My heart broke to see Ethel, the husband of one of them, sitting there, entirely on her own, in the flat where her husband had passed away, still suffering from the illness which had killed him. I felt utterly helpless. We all did. We couldn't be there in person. It was just horrifying.. </div>
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Ethel and her husband Judah were both huge fans of our synagogue choir and I instinctively knew that I needed to write something which had a chance of bringing just a modicum of hope or comfort to the scores of people who were suffering. </div>
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I wrote to our rabbi and asked him which of the psalms he felt had a message which might best speak to people who were frightened or grieving and he immediately suggested Psalm 23, <i>The Lord Is My Shepherd</i>. After reading the words I knew not just that I wanted to set it to music, but furthermore that I needed to step up to the plate and sing it myself. I am usually rather happy hiding in the background when it comes to performing. I like being part of a choir primarily because, whilst I love making music, I’ve always suffered crippling embarrassment and nerves when asked to perform anything solo. I have the typical voice of a director in my head at all times which says, "what DO you look and sound like?!"<br /><br />The piece wrote itself in minutes. I have seldom had such an immediate musical response to words. Obviously, setting Hebrew text brings its own set of challenges. I had to run everything past Michael to make sure I was stressing all the correct syllables. Scantion is something I’m fanatical about. Nathan, who is even more fanatical about it than me, taught me well!<br /><br />I asked Julian Simmons if he would produce the track for me. We decided that I could send him midi files of all the different instrumental parts and trust him to make sensible choices in terms of the pads and samples he used. We've been working together since 2002, so I knew that everything could be done remotely in this manner. We wouldn’t need to sit in a studio together, even though that's the way we'd always worked before.<br /><br />I asked Fiona to add some violin, and she recorded herself playing in her front room in her house in a village just outside Glasgow. I loved that we were making music like this. It somehow felt like we were beating the virus. My body had beaten the virus and now creativity was beating it as well.<br /></div>
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The track the three of us created felt epic and emotional and all that remained was for me to record the vocals. I do not have a good enough microphone at my house, so, after much discussion, we decided it would be okay for me to go to Julian’s house in Crouch End to record it. As long as we were never in the same room and could be linked-up via headphones, it felt like we weren’t being foolish, or breaking too many lockdown rules. </div>
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<br />So, in the middle of Passover, on Easter Monday, in fact, I drove through the entirely empty streets of North London from Finchley to Crouch End. The weather was incredible. Spring really did suddenly rush in this year. I pulled up outside Julian’s house, texted to say I was there, and the front door was opened for me. My instructions were to head up the stairs, and go into a room where a mic had been set up with a music stand and a pair of headphones which I put on. I took a kippa out of my pocket, placed it on my head, and then heard Julian’s deeply familiar and hugely friendly voice in my ear. It really was a wonderful moment. Julian's wife, Carla, is a vicar, so we were actually recording the piece in a rectory! I don't know why this felt quite so right. It was Passover, but it was also Easter and Psalm 23, of course, has as much resonance with Christians as it does with Jewish people, so, I reckon I was in exactly the right place. </div>
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<br />“Shall we do this?” Julian said. And for the next hour, I sang my heart out. I thought about Ethel and Judah most of all. I remember looking out through the window into Julian and Carla's garden, seeing the sun and the lime green buds bursting on the trees, and, for the first time in I don’t know how long, feeling a sense of optimism. I sang well. The notes sailed out with great ease. And, before I knew it, everything was in the can.<br /><br />I stood on the street by my car, and Julian and Carla brought their son, Yuvi to the front door for me to meet for the first time. We chatted for five minutes, standing maybe ten meters apart, I blew kisses, got back in my car and drove home, feeling very happy, and incredibly hungry. <br /><br />The photograph below shows the transliterated Hebrew words to the psalm, with all my marks indicating where the stresses needed to fall, alongside literal English translations of the words. I really did my homework! </div>
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And if you'd like to hear the piece again (or for the first time), <a href="https://youtu.be/fQlNJMPyLh8">please click here</a></div>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-39634574014589948222020-07-24T12:20:00.000+01:002020-07-24T12:21:26.506+01:00Central London Lockdown<i><u>Photograph(s) Two: Central London. May 2nd and 4th 2020. </u></i><br />
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In the very early stages of lockdown, Central London seemed like a no-go zone. I remember seeing a set of photographs taken by newsreader, Sophie Rayworth, which showed all the familiar tourist hotspots almost eerily empty. <br />
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On two occasions, quite close together, I found myself walking into Central London, once with my friend Michael and once with Nathan, on both occasions to experience something I felt I would never have a chance to witness again. And some of the things we saw on those two walks have embedded themselves in my mind, probably forever. They were both deeply moving and hugely magical. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTcszKq9aUBW3uQ0GaxI-HAfPzYLp_lhm1aMnrB6wfj0RGK9CgXQ7RspjBkyRkVBjZQ1nlz0UENoAFIWn6oN9v45ssnl2lARY1YBhFXXekYZ0PMXIUwej5Jl8F7tpDY_YZxlslDuT8t2A/s1600/IMG_9349.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTcszKq9aUBW3uQ0GaxI-HAfPzYLp_lhm1aMnrB6wfj0RGK9CgXQ7RspjBkyRkVBjZQ1nlz0UENoAFIWn6oN9v45ssnl2lARY1YBhFXXekYZ0PMXIUwej5Jl8F7tpDY_YZxlslDuT8t2A/s400/IMG_9349.JPG" width="400" /></a>The most astonishing aspect was the complete silence. The nearer to the centre of London we walked, the more empty it became. Take away the tourists, the workers, the theatre goers, the revellers and the people who have second homes in the country, and you’re not left with a great many people. Food shops up in Finchley were open and positively thriving, but everything in the West End was closed, and a great many shops and cafes were entirely boarded over. Some of the larger shops like Liberty and Selfridges had security guards standing outside, and very often these were the only people we saw. <br />
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Standing on the South Bank and being able to hear nothing but the wind rustling the masts of boats on the Thames was hugely eerie. Hearing St Paul’s Cathedral’s bells chiming the hour whilst crossing an entirely deserted Hungerford Bridge some 2 kilometres away was nothing short of miraculous. Walking around Covent Garden and hearing our footsteps echoing in the roof of the covered market was beyond spooky. Whilst with Michael, I walked for about four blocks, all the time hearing the sound of an alarm in the misty night air. It was the sort of sound which would have been blotted out by traffic noise within a second of hearing it in a normal London. <br />
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Piccadilly Circus was particularly weird. The huge LED billboards had been replaced by a giant, blue screen which merely read “NHS”. There were no cars. Almost no people. The occasional bus or cyclist drifted past, silhouetted perfectly against the dark light. You could hear the spokes of the bicycle wheels clicking as they passed. <br />
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On one of my visits, I chatted to a homeless man whilst standing on the steps underneath Eros. These steps are usually packed with tourists screaming at each other in a hundred different languages over the yells of traffic, but we were almost whispering to each other. “Where did you study?” asked the incredibly well-spoken, middle-aged homeless man, half way through our chat, “York” I said… “ah, I’m an Oxford man, myself…”<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVNP93hbXCAcaS1hfVHEa35kXGXMWAA6zUB4kSBbG5ANEuXe62h6R1wsAoBuAuQhtSolRn6rlX9KCAQLHOUfOVLd2teJggZ8ohmtRpiuAwMslXH4TfV1iZLbrD3dJcmE_ZUsMxKfn21iQ/s1600/IMG_4723.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVNP93hbXCAcaS1hfVHEa35kXGXMWAA6zUB4kSBbG5ANEuXe62h6R1wsAoBuAuQhtSolRn6rlX9KCAQLHOUfOVLd2teJggZ8ohmtRpiuAwMslXH4TfV1iZLbrD3dJcmE_ZUsMxKfn21iQ/s400/IMG_4723.jpg" width="400" /></a>Nathan became rather tearful whilst walking down an empty Shaftesbury Avenue underneath the glowing marquees of the closed theatres. This is his world - his community - and seeing the ghosts of shows was too much for him. For me, standing in the middle of that particularly road took me back to an Autumnal Sunday morning in 2006 when we were shooting the apocalyptic movie, 28 Weeks Later. I worked both as a casting director and as the acting coach on the film, and we did a lot of filming on empty streets. I wrote about it in my blog on March 30th this year. We shot a sequence in the very spot where I was standing on Shaftesbury Avenue - and, to be fair, everything was as crazily empty back then… except for the massive film crew. And, even at 6am on that Sunday morning, we had to do pedestrian and traffic lock-offs for three minutes at a time. We’d finish the shot and then a stream of bemused people and angry-looking drivers would file past. This wasn’t the case back in early May this year…<br />
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The other notable aspect of my trips into Central London was the darkness. This was partially created by many of the main landmarks, including the London Eye, the National Theatre and the fountains in Trafalgar Square being lit up in the dark blues and purples of the NHS colours, but it was further enhanced by large areas of the city not being lit up at all. Large swathes of buildings on the Thames were in complete darkness and most of the bridges were unlit. And possibly, as a result of less pollution (both light and from traffic fumes), the skies were much darker. I have never seen stars in the skies above central London before. I’m used to a sort of milky, orange, halogen glow, with clouds reflecting light back into the city. Not so on May 4th. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTcszKq9aUBW3uQ0GaxI-HAfPzYLp_lhm1aMnrB6wfj0RGK9CgXQ7RspjBkyRkVBjZQ1nlz0UENoAFIWn6oN9v45ssnl2lARY1YBhFXXekYZ0PMXIUwej5Jl8F7tpDY_YZxlslDuT8t2A/s1600/IMG_9349.JPG" imageanchor="1"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOJN1RN_4jzhBUFP0GRDdj-Etdi6EPzvkEUWSI86_o9wwGgcpkHKnVqGQMKABAYPQKYqRMISOqqvXzJiD15_A8Wa0PNaQIEZdU_jP1la5bQduQH7CqTqYZ8SMdioc7anqs_vw7UY30z7Q/s1600/IMG_4693.jpeg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOJN1RN_4jzhBUFP0GRDdj-Etdi6EPzvkEUWSI86_o9wwGgcpkHKnVqGQMKABAYPQKYqRMISOqqvXzJiD15_A8Wa0PNaQIEZdU_jP1la5bQduQH7CqTqYZ8SMdioc7anqs_vw7UY30z7Q/s400/IMG_4693.jpeg" width="400" /></a>Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-77668839111937322732020-07-23T23:33:00.002+01:002020-07-23T23:36:01.074+01:00A return to blogging - with a different mind-setI can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat down this year, written all, or most of a blog-post and then decided not to publish. Most of the time I’ve been too frightened of the consequences of having an opinion in a divided world where, unless you are happy to put your name to the exact wording of a script which has been written by a bunch of shrieking virtue-signallers, you’re considered to be a right-wing fascist, and dispatched accordingly. I am trying as hard as I can to avoid anything which is triggering: anything which brings back the hell of what happened to Nathan exactly a year ago. <br /><br />We entered lockdown talking about a brave new world. Caroline Flack’s suicide had made us think more than ever about the concept of kindness, and when people started dying in their thousands, we finally started to act on these thoughts. The helplessness and terror that every single one of us felt meant that, for a brief, almost magical period, we forgot about our differences and started to pull together. We checked in on friends and family. We put notes through the doors of complete strangers. We celebrated love. We accepted hardship and learned to put up with lack of food and interminable queuing. <br /><br />And yet, within weeks, we were divided again. A new script emerged that we were forced to use. You couldn’t talk about going for a walk unless you added the words “socially-distanced”, key workers had to be described as “brave” and so it went on. If you broke the new laws, or used the wrong script, then the cracks started to open again. People became incensed: “what? You don’t wear a mask?” “How dare those dreadful Londoners living in flats without gardens go to their local park?” “How dare these people go to a beach on a sunny day?” “What?! You’re not applauding the NHS at 8pm on a Thursday? You are so uncaring…” <br /><br />And, of course, the moment Dominic Cummings messed up, the seething anger and bitterness which had built up in us all whilst being cooped up in tiny houses, flooded over the country like an oil slick. You’d think he’d ridden through County Durham with a machine gun and a machete, our anger was so intense. “He must be sacked!” “No, sacking is too good for him” "Covid is his fault" “Burn the witch…” And, as lockdown finally eases, we are back in our echo chambers, literally tearing each other apart, demanding that certain public figures are cancelled for expressing independent ideas or flying too close to the inappropriate wind. We demand that art is censored. Our silence is violence. Our words are violence. We support Black Lives Matter and then the official UK Twitter account for the group starts to tweet antisemitic conspiracy theories but if you criticise them, you're racist and sent into a corner to "do the work." In short, we can’t win. No one wants to debate because no one can be bothered to listen to two sides of an argument. We only read the comments or newspapers which re-enforce our own views whilst living in a culture of absolute fear. Nuanced conversations have been forced behind closed doors, into conspiratorial whispers, whilst those who scream the loudest use sweeping, deeply unacceptable terms like “fascist" “Nazi” and “genocide” to re-enforce their hatred of the people who refuse to bang their drum. Is whipping people into submission a way of making the world a better place? Do we genuinely believe that we can change someone’s mind by attacking them? <br /><br />Until very recently I thought I could fight it. Moreover, I felt it was my DUTY to fight it, having seen, first hand, the hell that happens when you don’t. I now realise I can’t. A good friend of mine finally got through to me in one of those text messages which you just want to frame for future reference; “let the terrible twos rage. I’m not engaging. People just want to bicker. I prefer to transcend, knowing my own truth.” <br /><br />And suddenly it was like a weight was being lifted from me. I no longer needed to be the man who rants about politics, about Brexit, about social justice warriorism and virtue signalling. By ranting about the dangers of all of this, I am no better than those who have stolen my right to call myself left wing from me. I need to focus on my own truth… or perhaps try to find my own truth. There’s a long old road ahead of me, I will fall off the wagon countless times, I’m sure, but I need to do this for my own mental health. <br /><br />Twitter is no longer on my phone. I no longer watch the news. I am actively attempting to surround myself with beauty, music, kindness and joy, so that, instead of throwing negativity and bitterness into the ether, I’m creating art which moves people and gives them the space to be transported from the anger of the world. <br /><br />And that, my friends, is the last I will write on the issue…<br /><br />But the blog is back, so what am I going to write about? <br /><br />I’ll confess. Lockdown for me was a rather special time. I was lucky. Sure, I lost a tonne of work but I had Nathan. Though three people died at my shul, I didn’t lose anyone hugely close to me. And, more than anything else, because I had the sodding illness, early on, I was able to be a little more adventurous. Once the terrible fog of COVID had cleared and my creativity returned, I was able to go out and experience the joyful silence of London. I could go for long walks in the seemingly never-ending sunshine. We could explore the joys of the green belt, which turned out to be just half an hour’s walk from our house. We were able to watch the days getting longer and longer and feel that extraordinary sense of optimism growing on a daily basis. For the first time in years, I watched the seasons turning. <br /><br /><div>
…And I photographed everything fanatically because I knew I was living in a remarkable time which I would probably never see again. And so, for the next however long, this blog will be a testimony to that remarkable time. I will publish one photograph a day from the lockdown period and write a little bit about how I was feeling when I took it. <br /><br />I very much hope you will join me on a journey into a unique time, and enjoy experiencing it through my eyes. <br /></div>
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<b><u><i>Photograph One. Chalk messages. April 2nd, 2020</i></u></b><br /><br />Whilst still recovering from COVID, Nathan and I started to take advantage of our permitted daily walk. To begin with, it was simply a way of regaining strength - we would walk up the tiniest incline and find ourselves breathless - but the feeling of fresh air was very healing after two weeks trapped inside. The outside world, however, was very frightening. Lockdown happened a week into our illness, so emerging into the new world was like walking into a dystopian novel. Everything was deathly silent. Cars no longer roared down the once busy Ballard’s Lane. A masked young lad on one occasion rode past me on a bicycle yelling vaguely homophobic comments before screaming “covid” and coughing in my direction. The shops were empty. Passing someone in the street involved stepping out into the middle of the road whilst holding our breath to give them as wide a berth as possible. We crossed over the road for old people. We could hear bird song. The rustling of trees. The barking of foxes. My neighbour attempting to play "Tequila" on a guitar. Over and over again. And we discovered the joys of the Dollis Valley Green Walk, which follows a brook that runs all the way from Hampstead Heath, through Finchley, into the greenbelt. <br /><br />But despite the beauty of Dollis Brook, those early days were highly depressing. It was still winter. Gales in February had brought down all manner of trees. Paths were muddy and everything seemed spiky and wintry. <br /><br />Our strength grew and the walks became longer, and, to our great joy, we discovered that people were chalking messages of hope onto the pavements by the side of the stream. The messages touched both of us. The sentiments were simple but optimistic:<br /></div>
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“Focus on the right things. </div>
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Stay strong. <br />Make a difference. <br />Stay connected. <br />Be kind. <br />Look after each other. <br />Stay hopeful.”<br /><br />I look back to those times and realise we were both broken men. The symptoms seemed endless. The illness affected our minds. We couldn’t focus on anything. We felt depressed. We were scared. We’d lost our sense of smell and taste. But to those two, frightened, hobbling, breathless men, those messages meant the world. And I send my heartfelt thanks to whoever wrote them. <div style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-90064518565549817652020-04-17T13:03:00.004+01:002020-04-17T13:03:57.818+01:00The SJWs are back<div style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-kerning: none;">I read a rather troubling piece on the BBC website today which suggested that TV presenter Ben Fogle had got into a bit of trouble for suggesting that we could all open our windows at 9am on the Queen’s 94th birthday this coming Tuesday to sing happy birthday to her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Cue the entrance of the Social Justice Warriors, whose pissy scripts have changed very little since the Coronavirus crisis began:</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">"Next Tuesday will have been many people's birthdays. Some of them may be dead due to Coronavirus” </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">"The Queen is a very wealthy woman who could be donating £millions to NHS and opening up one of her palaces for use as a hospital.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">"Let's save the clapping/singing for the frontline heroes shall we?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And then the obligatory pompous dig: “Really misread the room with this one Ben."</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Patently Ben Fogle is not a bad man for suggesting that the country unite to sing to the Queen. She is beloved to many and frankly, I rather like all initiatives which enable people to come together in these lonely and difficult times. Plainly Ben Fogle wasn’t suggesting that anyone should be forced to do something they didn’t want to do. He was just mooting an idea, which, it turns out, had come from his 8-year old daughter. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The idea that ANY of the Queen’s Palaces would be appropriate for use as a hospital is laughable. This is not the First World War. You can just see the decision makers can’t you; “right, we’ve been offered EXCEL in the heart of London where the virus is rife with its huge, concrete-floored rooms where thousands can be treated… but, wait, the Queen has offered the dusty ballroom and drawing rooms at Sandringham in Norfolk. She says she’s got a special deal with the Big Yellow Storage Company and can get the Whistler paintings whisked away in an appropriately socially-distanced way. We reckon we have space for at least 17 beds...” </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Accusing someone of not being behind NHS Workers has the same ring to it as the empty cries of racism which blighted the internet last year. Only the most horrible people would try to argue that the NHS isn’t vital and wonderful, but it seems it’s incredibly easy for a twisted mind to warp someone else’s words to make it look like they’re arguing just that! It’s a form of thought-control. It’s gas-lighting. It’s mean-spirited, pathetic virtue-signalling. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">There is space in the world for those who want to sing Happy Birthday to the Queen as WELL as those of us who want to applaud the NHS. Doing one absolutely does not preclude doing the other. Neither is regulatory. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">We’re all doing our bit - or trying to at least. We all get it wrong from time to time, or snap under the pressure. There isn’t a hierarchy of pain during this crisis. There’s only love. And I’m still not sure this message is quite getting through. If you can't be kind, use your spare time learning a foreign language or a musical instrument. It's better for your soul. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-3561861359314220652020-04-02T12:29:00.002+01:002020-04-02T12:29:39.391+01:00Turn down the suspicion <div style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-kerning: none;">I watched the deputy chief medical officer making an announcement on the television a few days ago. She seems to think that we might be in this lock-down scenario for another six months, which is information I’m sure the majority of us took with an inward gasp of air. It really got me thinking: Obviously people are dying at the moment - in almost staggering numbers - and for the time being, health professionals probably need to be taking the lead in guiding us through the early stages of this pandemic. But, at a certain point, if the economy collapses because no one is allowed to go back to work, we could face a far deeper crisis. We are justifiably protecting the vulnerable in society at the moment, but, as lockdown measures continue, a whole new set of people will find themselves in deep water, and the government can’t keep bailing us out - particularly if there’s no hope of our economy being kick-started. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Of course, there’s a lot of talk of kindness at the moment and, almost every time I look at social media, I find myself moved by the genuinely altruistic gestures of others. But I’m also seeing a lot of self-serving posturing and general virtue-signalling, which I think we could all do without - particularly from celebrities who seem to take great delight in posting their marvellous messages of hope from beautiful houses which look out onto enormous gardens. And, furthermore, in the process of demonstrating that “we’re all in this together”, others are taking to the Internet and being quite horrible to those they feel are not towing the virtuous party line. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">After what we went through last summer, it was no surprise to me that a knitter decided to use the “clap for our carers” initiative as an opportunity to “call out” Nathan, whose weekly online knit-a-long happens to start at 8pm on a Thursday, the very time that those of us who felt moved to do so were opening our windows and applauding our over-stretched health service. This knitter’s tone felt horribly smug and self-righteous, as she admonished Nathan for “making money” whilst the rest of us thanked our brave NHS workers. And to that knitter I say the following:</span></div>
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<li style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-kerning: none;">Nathan’s online knit-a-longs are for people around the world and not just Brits</span></li>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">We really need to stop focussing on what other people are doing and start focussing on what we ourselves are doing during this crisis. Quietly turn the negativity into positivity.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Let me make this statement: We are all different. We are all dealing with this awful situation in the best way we can. Some of us are coping better than others. Some of us are better placed to cope than others. Most government advice, in my experience, seems to assume that the majority of us are part of a nuclear family. But many people I know, of all ages, are living on their own and this lockdown is causing anxiety and waves of terrible loneliness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The other thing I have observed in the few days I’ve been out of the house for walks since my Covid-19 quarantine effectively came to an end is how people, certainly in London, are really icy with those they pass in the street when they’re out on their constitutionals. I understand that we’re all terrified - but we’re not going to pass coronavirus onto anyone by smiling whilst we’re doing that hysterical do-se-do around them, whilst, simultaneously (if you’re me) holding our breath. It really isn’t very kind to look at everyone you pass like they’re plague victims. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Nathan and I went down to Hampstead Garden Suburb for our walk yesterday. It’s now 18 days since we got the virus, so, by every calculation we’re now fully recovered. I celebrated by getting a vegetarian pastie at Daniel’s, a kosher bakery in Temple Fortune. There were only three people in the shop and two women were queueing behind us. As we turned to leave, one of these women scuttled to the other end of the shop. The woman behind her, somewhat confused, asked if she was still in the queue to which the scuttling woman replied “yes, I just wanted to get away from THOSE people.” She pointed at us like we’d just shat on the floor. As we left, Nathan addressed her, “it’s very difficult not to be offended by that remark…” I’m sure, had she found out that we’d actually <i>had</i> the virus, she would have considered her dreadfully unkind statement to have been justified. As it happened, it just upset me. Coronavirus, it turns out, isn’t a great deal of fun. I have had a pretty awful pair of weeks and I was actually really excited that I had sufficient energy to go for a walk and enough appetite to want to eat a pastie. I get that we’re all terrified, I really do, and perhaps it’s easier for me to say this, as someone who’s recovered relatively unscathed, but we really need to turn down the suspicion by a notch and start to treat those we’re forced to interact with with a little more respect. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-41561458176386048352020-03-30T16:12:00.000+01:002020-03-30T16:12:26.932+01:00Wedding anniversary <div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-kerning: none;">Last night, at about midnight, I had a sudden flash of “what the fuck?” I realised that we are actually living through what, for so many years, has been the sort of thing which only happens in movies. Thirteen years ago, I worked as the acting coach on a film called 28 Weeks Later. The film was set in a post-apocalyptic London, 28 weeks after a weird virus had turned most of the population into rage-fuelled, blood-thirsty zombies. Actually, we weren’t allowed to call them zombies because they weren’t actually dead - they were known instead as the “infected.” We did a lot of filming in iconic London locations in the early hours of the morning. At the time it felt like quite a treat to be on Shaftesbury Avenue with all the theatre marquees turned off and no cars or pedestrians in sight. It gave us the opportunity to go down into abandoned tube stations, and strange tunnels and snickleways. One Sunday morning we did some filming in Finsbury Park. This particular sequence focussed on an upturned car on Stroud Green Road, positioned outside a bashed-up pizza restaurant. I think there were some corpses. To be honest, there were always corpses - it was a horror movies after all! I remember watching a night bus passing the scene, and a group of somewhat terrified clubbers, bleached-out from a night of partying, staring down at the scene, trying to compute what they were witnessing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And last night, I suddenly realised that I was living through the very thing which had seemed so far-fetched back in 2007!</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I watched aerial footage of some of London’s key tourist destinations, all eerily empty. There was a shot of the pedestrian bridge over the Thames which runs from St Paul’s to the Tate Modern. We filmed sequences for 28 Weeks Later there as well - one early morning in October. The sunrise we witnessed on that day remains the most spectacular sunrise I’ve ever witnessed. The sky was initially filled with streaks of mauve and lavender and then, as the sun appeared, everything turned orange and yellow. Every window lit up - almost as though the whole city were on fire. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I have another rather special memory attached to that bridge. Back in 1999, when it opened, Sam Becker and I were working at the New Ambassadors Theatre. The bridge had some sort of design flaw which none of its architects had predicted. If people walked on it, on masse, their footsteps would somehow align, and the whole bridge started to bounce - really quite dramatically. Sam and I, keen for new experiences, decided to walk from the theatre down to the bridge to experience the phenomenon for ourselves. I guess it was almost midnight when we finally got there, but the place was heaving with people having a fabulous time walking across the bridge. And it was the most bizarre, stomach-churning experience. Like a fairground ride. It was almost as though the floor were somehow rippling underneath our feet. It was how I imagine an earthquake must feel. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Of course, the following day, the bridge was closed for an extended period whilst they figured out how to remedy the situation, so I am always very grateful that Sam and I had thought to be so spontaneous. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I think I feel a little better every day. I’m not coughing anything like as much as I was, but my sense of smell still hasn’t returned. I thought I could smell the soap I was using in the bath this morning, but that might have been a memory of the good old days! I am having surreal dreams, which my father tells me is a symptom of a virus. I dreamed a few days ago that I’d learned how to play the flute. For me, this is about as random as anything I could ever have imagined. Hell would freeze over before I EVER took an interest in the devil’s pipe. Flutes are the coriander of the musical world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It was our sixth wedding anniversary yesterday, and, in line with our once-yearly tradition, we strolled up to Alexandra Palace. Readers will remember that we got married - in song, and on the telly - in a disused Victorian theatre deep within the “Ally Pally” complex. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Our yearly visit to the Palace gives us an opportunity to see whether spring has come early or late in any given year. In 2014 it came particularly early. We’d had weeks of wonderful, unbroken sunshine in the run-up to the wedding and this is very much captured in the filming we did for the show’s opening sequence. Meriel appears in shot at one point like Julie Andrews twirling in a sunny alpine meadow!</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Nathan’s sister stayed with us the night before the big day, and we got a taxi up to the venue first thing. There are a number of photographs of me holding a bouquet of dusky pink roses which had been sent to us by the singer Katie Melua - a particularly wonderful surprise and it was the first thing we were handed as we arrived. I remember my brother arriving very early, and then Hilary, and the five of us walking, with our photographer Gaby, to a blossom tree where we spent a wonderful few minutes enjoying the sensation of the pink and white petals falling down on us like confetti. The view from Ally Pally over London is spectacular and I remember it looking very misty in the early morning sunshine. I also remember noticing that the rainbow flag was flying from a flagpole outside the complex and feeling incredibly moved, welcomed and accepted. It was amazing to think how far the gay rights movement had come in my lifetime. That frightened little child who didn’t dare to tell his Mum that he’d been spat at in the street because people had decided he was gay was now the poster boy for true equality. And that felt magical. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Of course, a lot of people at the time were telling us that gay marriage was going to lead to the end of society as we know it. Back then, the Christians were convinced there would be a giant flood. God was really going to let us have it to show quite how much he hated the concept of same-sex marriage. In the end God sent weeks of sunshine - and ironically chose to break the glorious sunny spell, some three weeks after we’d got married… on Easter Sunday! I’m sure there were one or two very disappointed and confused Christians that year. I often wonder how these religious sects must feel; you know, the ones who sit on the edge of a cliff waiting for the rapture to come. At what stage must they think, “oh dear, we’ve given all of our worldly possessions to the people who told us the end of the world is nigh, and now we’ve got to re-enter society with our tails between our legs.”? I think, if I weren’t brain-washed, I might feel a bit of anger. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The blossom wasn’t quite as advanced on the trees this year as it was back in 2014. It has been very sunny of late in London, but yesterday morning, maybe just as a little subtle warning from nature not to spend the weekend passing the virus around willy-nilly, it actually hailed. Proper hail. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Ally Pally was, of course, next to empty. The weather didn’t help, but they’ve also closed the car parks to stop people from congregating there. They’ve also blocked most of it off, so you can’t go up to the building itself. We walked up to the boating lake. They have these wonderful pedalos shaped like flamingos and swans, but all are moored to the island in the middle of the lake. One wonders how long it will take for nature to start taking over. How long will it be until the boats are covered in mill-dew and algae? How long until weeds start to push up through the tarmac? One day, we may well know whether those set dressers on 28 Weeks Later got it right. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">If reading this blog has given you a sense that you might like to see our wedding again - or for the first time - we have a link which you can follow for a private viewing. Let me know if you enjoy... Happy times. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">www.nathantaylor.co.uk/ourgaywedding.m4v</span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-52589718995580633982020-03-27T22:30:00.002+00:002020-03-27T22:30:34.524+00:00The infected <div style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-kerning: none;">It feels like forever since I last wrote a blog. I’ve had very little to write about. Since the business with Nathan last summer, I’ve not much liked the world. It’s felt vengeful. Brutal. Angry. Divided. I’ve felt irrelevant. Ignored. Old. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And, of course, in the last few weeks, the world has descended into… well, what is this? How can any of us effectively describe the situation we’re presently in? Is this the “black out” that the shamans warned us about? Is this the beginning of the end? Or is this the moment when we take a collective step backwards in an attempt to learn what we’ve been doing wrong, so we can finally begin the process of healing? </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It’s certainly a surreal time. A frightening time. More than anything else, I suspect, it’s a time when we realise how fragile ALL human beings are.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">My union, the Musicians’ Union, awarded me a grant of £200 to help me to pay this month’s rent. For the first time in my life, I received financial assistance without having to fill in a painstakingly long form. I wasn’t asked which word best describes my gender or ethnicity. I wasn’t asked to apologise for being who I am. The union simply asked if I needed help. The answer was yes and a day later the money was transferred into my account. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">My own story is, of course, echoed by creative freelancers around the world. Three weeks ago, I lost nearly all of my work. Every day, over the course of about a week, the emails came in to tell me that my diary had been denuded. I fell into an absolute panic, waking up in the night in pools of sweat wondering what was going to happen to me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">But then I realised it was happening to other people. More and more of us. Other musician friends were losing their work. The theatres were closing - and the bars and cafes. Then the schools, the shops… And there we all were; an army of workers, scratching our heads, shell-shocked, challenged in ways we could never have predicted. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And then Nathan and I got sick. We spent nine days in complete isolation, living with this infamous virus which had travelled all the way from a market in a region of China I’d never heard of. We initially told very few people and simply hunkered down. The stigma felt great - and we didn’t want people to panic. The problem with Coronavirus is that it consumes all of your thoughts. The news seemed to suggest that it was the second stage of the illness - the coughing - which was carrying people to their graves. And so you sit, waiting for the cough to come, going to bed at night with a heavy chest wondering if you’ll even wake up in the morning. And the other thing about the virus is that it makes your head feel very strange. A sort of fug descends which, on one hand, fills your brain with bizarre existential thoughts, and, on the other, makes it almost impossible to focus on anything. And worse than that is the fact that the symptoms come and go. One day you’re full of beans. The next you’re exhausted again. And after a while, this can start to make a person oscillate between depression and anger. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And the sodding thing throws insane symptoms your way. All of those adverts which say that the only two things to watch out for are a fever and a dry cough are just nonsense. I, for example, have had no sense of smell or taste for four days. Nathan’s eyes ached and he had weird deafness. I had oddly painful feet, terrible upper back pains… But the number one symptom is fatigue. A deep, dark, fuck-this type of fatigue. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The other thing you find yourself regularly doing is shouting at the telly to tell them that their numbers are wrong. They have to be. If no one but the very ill and the very famous are getting tested for COVID-19, how on earth does a<i>nyone</i> know how many of us have it? Our Prime Minister has it. Our future king has it. This thing is everywhere. I have it. Nathan has it. Becky has it. Jo has it. Thierry has it. My brother probably has it. Are any of us included in the official figures? Of course not! And then the next question is whether there are legions of people who are getting it, but experiencing no symptoms. And we won’t know any answers at all until we start aggressively testing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">What does seem to be the case is that the virus has sunk its teeth into my synagogue. The festival of Purim, I suspect, came at the wrong time. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I’m horrified to say that people are dying. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I was devastated by the news of the passing of one particular old gentleman of whom I was particularly fond. I actually dedicated an arrangement to him and his wife in the concert we did last month. He got ill on Friday and died on Monday. His wife, now ill, has been forced to self-isolate. There’s no one there to hug her or do any of the things which bring hope and respite to the grieving. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And then, of course, other members of the community are feeling frightened and desperately lonely. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The irony, of course, is that we endured gale after gale in the first half of the year, but since we’ve all been in lockdown, the sun has shone every single day! Spring has come. Blossom is heavy on all the trees. I woke up two days ago thinking how much I wanted to see my parents. On a day like that, at any other time, I’d have jumped into my car and gone to see them. But we can’t. Mothering Sunday came and went with very few people getting to see their parents. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">There is, however, something strangely comforting about all of us being in the same boat. It reminds us of our commonality in an era where we were being forced to see only difference. And I believe this is the key to the healing of society. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">At 8pm yesterday night, something very beautiful happened. The entire nation stopped to applaud our beloved National Health Service. I wasn’t entirely convinced that Londoners would want to get involved in an initiative like this. Though it’s painfully true that, here in the capital, we’re ahead of the curve in terms of numbers of infections, Londoners can be a little prickly and arch. We aren’t renowned for our sense of community spirit. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Anyway, at a few minutes to 8, I opened my window and looked out into the street. I could see a group of three people standing on the pavement opposite who seemed to be looking at their watches. Of course, the eerie thing was the lack of traffic on the roads. If people had started clapping on Ballards Lane at 8pm on an evening before self-isolation started, we almost certainly wouldn’t have heard anything but the roar of engines. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">But suddenly I could see windows opening in flats above the shops opposite - and, at the stroke of 8, the applause started. It echoed down the empty streets. Soon it became cheering and then whistling. It lasted about a minute. It would almost die-out for a few moments and then take off again. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The idea that people were doing this the length and breadth of the country was deeply moving. My mother said that her entire street in Thaxted had taken part. Hilary and Meriel applauded in Lewes. We were united in our pride in and love for the NHS. Many of us will desperately need its services over the next few months. Some of the people who stood and applauded last night will find themselves on NHS ventilators, feeling absolute gratitude that our health system is still available - free - for everyone. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">We none of us know where any of this is heading. The only thing we know for certain is that things will get harder before they improve. I can’t help but think that this is an opportunity for us all, however. This event could go down in history as the movement when we rediscovered the true meaning of kindness. The moment when we collectively reappraised the meaning of happiness. The time when we stopped shouting and started listening. When we discovered that there’s a difference between what we want and what we need. When we stopped demanding our rights and instead focussed on our responsibilities. Who knows, this may even be the moment when we finally redistribute wealth. Owning a house might become a basic human right and not another way of making obscene amounts of money. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Please stay well. And if you’re lonely - reach out. Tell someone. They may not be able to come running to you in the flesh, but the one thing about this crisis is that we’ve all got a lot of time on our hands to listen. </span></div>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-69607875629117298082020-02-17T23:23:00.003+00:002020-02-17T23:23:56.515+00:00Kindness <div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby paid a very moving tribute to Caroline Flack on Dancing On Ice last night. For those reading this blog from far-flung places, Caroline Flack is a British TV presenter who, on Friday, took her own life at the age of 40. The finger of blame is pointing very firmly at social media and the media in general. She was hounded mercilessly after apparently assaulting her partner who subsequently asked for the charges to be dropped. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Holly Willougby quoted a tweet from Caroline with a particularly beautiful message, “in a world where you can be anything: be kind.” </span></div>
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<span class="s2">And so, today, social media is filled with people writing about kindness. Ironically, the trap that many seem to be falling into is the belief that they still have carte blanche to be as unkind as they like - as long as they’re being unkind about those they deem to be unkind. I have read so many tweets angrily demanding everyone stop following Piers Morgan, Katie Hopkins and Nigel Farage because of their hate-filled words. Frankly why anyone would follow any of these people in the first place is beyond me, but they are also the most obvious examples of figures who court controversy by spouting prejudice-filled bile. They’re the sorts of names us liberals can fire into the echo chamber and be met with a sure-fire round of applause. Criticising them makes us feel good about ourselves because we’re signalling to the world that we’re virtuous. But the likes of Nigel Farage don’t give a shit what us liberals think about him. We’re not his target audience! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The great irony is that I saw people tweeting messages today about kindness today whom I’ve witnessed aggressively piling onto people who don’t share their very narrow and specific views, and people who have publicly shamed others who’s only crime was questioning the liberal status quo.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">And here’s the thing which really upsets me: </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Most of the people reading this blog will know that, in July this year, my husband lost his livelihood and very nearly lost his life as a result of asking people to be kind to each other. The only differences between what he said and the beautiful words of Caroline Flack were that he was asking for people to respect one another whilst discussing the thorny issue of diversity. Within minutes his words had been twisted and the obliterating tidal wave of hatred rolled over us.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">And let me tell you something: It’s not the figures like Piers Morgan whose opinions cut the deepest when the shit hits the fan, it’s your friends who suddenly distance themselves from you. It’s the people you worked with in the industry who, out of fear for their own careers, disown you on social media without so much as phoning you up to find out the truth. And believe me, that is where a lack of kindness really shows itself in its horrific true colours. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">And that is when you realise who your true friends are. And believe me, I will eternally be grateful to every single friend, family member, colleague, ex-lover and person in the knitting world who kept us alive in the dark times. You know who you are. I wish I could thank you all by name, but they’d only go after you. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Before what happened to Nathan, I was as guilty as anyone else of allowing my venom to be sharpened as a result of reading nothing but headlines. Particularly when it came to matters relating to the LGBT community, I could be incredibly self-righteous, deeply sarcastic, dismissive and horribly mean. When Seyi Omooba was offered the role of Celie in The Colour Purple, and homophobic tweets that she’d previously sent were made public, I became utterly addicted to outrage. I would often get myself so worked up by the anger I felt, that I’d sit up late at night, picking online fights with anyone in the industry who attempted to support her. I still remember that churning sensation, which grew and grew and often meant I couldn’t sleep at night. Friends and colleagues who told me what a lovely girl Seyi was were plainly the supporters of homophobia. I was incensed. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">But now I realise, that at the centre of this maelstrom was a young actress. A talented person with hopes and dreams and a joy for life who will now be changed forever and, as maybe a direct result of her treatment, probably far more entrenched in her views. She was taken to the cleaners and she’ll probably struggle to work again in the industry. Is that really what we wanted when we threatened to boycott the theatre if she performed there? Can anyone truly say they’re glad that this happened to Seyi? </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I saw first hand what Nathan went through and is still going through. The waves of terrible pain. The howls of anguish. The bewilderment. The loneliness. The sense of betrayal. And all this combining with the glee which some people seemed to show when I announced he’d been taken into hospital. We were accused of white fragility. Male fragility. Of weaponising our situation. Of lying about being in hospital and being told to provide filmic proof of where we were if we expected to be believed. The messages rolled in, one every five seconds, as we sat waiting to be assessed, a gash on the back of Nathan’s hand where he’d clenched his fist so tightly to combat the pain, the skin had simply split open. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">And those same people are still going after Nathan because he hasn’t apparently been punished enough. And they’re still chasing Maria Tusken, a year after she was torn limb from limb in very similar circumstances. A week ago, she posted a picture of herself on Instagram dressed in vintage 1940s clothing. The picture was simply captioned, “a 1940s day”. Someone then circled the phrase “1940s” and wrote “oh my God, unfollow this Nazi.” And I, for one, take particular exception to the misappropriation of the word Nazi. I believe it to be deeply insensitive and hugely antisemitic. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">It’s worth pointing out that people online are now calling calling their behaviour “radical kindness.” <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>But, in my view, if kindness needs to be qualified with an adjective, it can’t be called kindness. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I stand with Caroline Flack. Nothing in the world is more important than kindness. Genuine kindness. Not kindness to a degree. Not kindness until someone says something we don’t want to hear. Not restricted empathy. Genuine understanding that every single one of us is struggling through life and if we understand and listen to each other’s fears, even if we think they come from the wrong place, we can consider ourselves kind. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">And I, for one, know that I still have a long, long way to go in that regard. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-88522356598307652672020-02-04T19:58:00.003+00:002020-02-04T19:58:53.530+00:00Icelandic wool<div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">We are presently on a bus heading away from Reykjavik towards the airport. The weather has turned. I think it’s raining. It might be snowing. We’re passing through the most bizarre lunar landscape of black, jagged rocks, almost entirely covered in snow, but a mist has come down, and we can’t see for more than about thirty metres. I now know exactly what everyone meant when they told us we’d lucked out with the weather! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Yesterday found us exploring Reykjavik more thoroughly. We took ourselves to a frozen lake in the middle of the downtown area and dared to walk across it on the ice. I say “dared” but a group of girls were playing a game of football on it, so plainly there wasn’t any great risk of falling through! I have no idea how deep the water was as I blithely skidded across, but it’s certainly not an experience I can expect to repeat in the near future. I am just about old enough to remember cold winters when we were able to walk across rivers and things in the UK. I think they even used to flood a field in Kennilworth for ice skating... but I’m sure global warming has put paid to that. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">There’s an area on the side of the Reykjavik lake into which they pump warmer water, meaning the ducks, geese and swans have something to float about on. We stood by the side of the lake to watch them, and were astonished by the appearance of three young swans who rushed up to us and started honking, plainly hoping for a bit of food. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Nathan is a sucker for any animal he can anthropomorphise, so immediately demanded we head to the nearest shop to find them something to eat! Twenty minutes later, we were back at the lake with a bag of raisins, having read that they make a lovely treat for ducks. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Of course we all know what happens when we eat too much fruit, so I have images of the entire population of water fowl suffering terrible diarrhoea today. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We met a couple of Nathan’s friends for lunch: an actor and a politician. Everyone in Iceland knows each other. Asking an Icelander if they know one of their fellow country people is not at all like Americans asking English people if they know the Queen. In fact there’s an app here which tells you how closely you are related to a fellow Icelander which is often used by people going on first dates. The theory is that you don’t normally need to go back further than four generations to find a link! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We met outside the parliament building, which is the least securely protected parliament I’ve ever seen. The square in front of parliament is where Icelandic people go to register their disgruntlement. The first time people went there en masse was in the early twentieth century, oddly to register their disapproval at the idea of an under-sea phone cable being created. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Most recently, in 2009, thousands gathered to demonstrate against the government’s response to the country’s economy collapse. I’m not sure why Icelanders took to the square to bang pots and pans together but the event is known as the Kitchenware Revolution.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">From the parliament building we went to Harpa, an astonishingly beautiful concert hall by Reykjavik Harbour, which was designed, I think, by the same bloke who made the brilliant Weather Project at the Tate Modern. That was the one with the giant rising halogen sun, which remains one of my favourite-ever pieces of art. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The building is something else, based around tessellating hexagons and cubes of glass and steel which hang off the ceilings and cling to the walls like a blue, white and mirror-ball beehive. The views from the concert hall as as impressive as the architecture itself, across the lavender blue sea to snow-bedecked mountains on the other side of the bay. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We did some souvenir shopping. I always like to buy a bauble for the Chanukah Tree whenever I’m somewhere special! The Icelanders have a particularly strange - and spectacularly pagan - Christmas tradition, which involve thirteen different, hugely mischievous Santas called the Yule Lads visiting Icelandic homes in the thirteen days before Christmas. They are the sons of a giantess called Grylla and they have somewhat bizarre names which describe their specific, anti-social tendencies. There’s Door Slammer, Sausage Swiper, Window Sniffer, Spoon Licker... Despite their puerile tricks, they leave little gifts, unless the child they’re visiting has been naughty, when they leave a potato. It must be great fun to live in Iceland during this period! Why stop with one, benevolent Santa when you can have thirteen evil ones?!</span></div>
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<span class="s2">It started snowing at about 4pm. It was the first time we’d seen snow falling since our arrival, so it felt very magical as we walked along Laugevegur. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Nathan’s knitting friend Rósa picked us up from our hotel in the late afternoon to take us on a tour of some of the many yarn shops in the Reykjavik area. It was an incredibly brave thing for Nathan to do as he has no idea whether he’s welcome in the shops or not. The most painful aspect of his horrifying experience was seeing friends of his - good fiends whom he’d holidayed with, shared experiences with - publicly distancing themselves from him after being told by some of the Social Justice Warriors that if they didn’t denounce him, they’d be next for the treatment. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The deepest cut of all was the designer, Stephen West. I went on holiday to Italy with him, and thought we’d got on very well, so when he made his public statement telling the world what a horrible person Nathan was, I desperately wrote to him to explain exactly what had happened and that what he’d been told was nothing more than rumour and lies. I was literally at the end of my tether and I reached out to him for his help. He ignored my email. He didn’t even offer an explanation as to why he’d done what he did. I was utterly devastated.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">To make matters worse, the person who badgered him to denounce Nathan, (a terrible podcaster with a face like a gurning, melted candle) was subsequently sent to court on charges of fraud. What a veritable beacon of morality she turned out to be. Well done Stephen: you sold your soul to the devil. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Seeing books by him in the shops we visited was a hard pill to swallow and the experience made me feel highly uncomfortable, but everyone we met was utterly charming, particularly Rósa, who is one of the most beautiful and generous souls I’ve ever met. She asked me why I didn’t knit. Would you want to be part of a community which would eat its own?</span></div>
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<span class="s2">Reykjavik is part of a continuous collection of different towns and cities which come together to form a mega-conurbation (at least by Icelandic standards!!) We visited one of them: Hafnafjörth, which looked very lovely. Rósa tells us it’s architecturally similar to Bergen... </span></div>
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<span class="s2">After a fabulous evening meal, Rósa took us back to Reykjavik, tipping us off about a little sculpture park in the vicinity of the main church. I noticed, as we drove past, that the gate was still open, and the place was floodlit even at 10pm, so, after being dropped off, we took ourselves back there for a look around. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">It’s so very “Iceland” to have a sculpture park which you can walk around at night. There was no one there to read us the health and safety riot act. No signs to tell us to beware of pick-pockets. No impending sense of danger, or group of lads smoking weed under a doorway. It was free to enter. We just got to wander around by floodlight, all on our own, our long shadows dancing on the glistening snow. It was a deeply memorable experience. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">But then again, that’s Iceland. Around every corner, something magical is waiting for you. You just need to open your eyes to it. I can’t begin to describe what a wonderful time we have had here and how welcoming and beautiful we found the people. I return to London feeling inspired and excited. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-83529473549110237542020-02-03T15:52:00.001+00:002020-02-03T15:52:46.698+00:00Reykjavik <div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">Waking up naturally in the dark is a very surreal and confusing experience. You literally have no idea what time it is and whether you’ve woken up in the middle of the night, or if you should be thinking about starting your day. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The air up in the mountains in Iceland is as pure and soft as any I’ve ever experienced. Before we left the summer house for the last time, I stood outside taking huge gulps of pure oxygen, wondering how awful it must be for an Icelander to arrive in London, and then, how many years I’ve knocked off my own life expectancy by living in the metropolis since the age of 20. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I learned this morning that the centre of Iceland, an unimaginably huge area of land which they call the Highlands, is entirely inhospitable and uninhabitable. There’s apparently a single road, which dissects the island and links the north and the south, which is closed for close to eight months of the year. I’ve been looking at pictures of the Highlands. They are profoundly beautiful in an utterly otherworldly way. It’s so bizarre to think that so few people will ever get to appreciate the area in the flesh. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The Northern Lights we experienced last night were more glorious and magical than any we’ve seen on the trip so far. They are almost certainly our last before returning to London, as we’re in Reykjavík from now on, where there’s a great deal of light pollution - and the forecast is for overcast skies. But three straight nights of the phenomenon is about as good as it gets. Last night’s were brighter and more vivid than any we’ve experienced before. They were bright green with splashes of yellow and the sky turned into a giant lava lamp at one point. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Watching the northern lights from a hot tub is one of life’s most decadent and wonderful experiences. Ice crystals actually form in your hair whilst the rest of your body slowly cooks!! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">On our way to Reykjavík this afternoon, we crossed over a river which had entirely frozen over. Thoranna and her daughter Ysold were both astonished and said they’d never seen the river like that before. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The sun’s been incredibly watery today and was hidden behind milky, pastel clouds, which gave us far more of a sense of how depressing it must get in this country when there are long periods without the glorious, bright sunshine we’ve been experiencing for the last three days.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">We are staying downtown in Reykjavik. It’s certainly unlike any other European capital city I’ve visited. It’s small, slow-paced and architecturally unique. A lot of the older buildings have roofs and walls made from corrugated iron. Many of the houses are painted in bright, vibrant primary colours. I’m sure they very much brighten up the winter months for the locals. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We walked up to the main church, a striking building which looks like a giant Art Deco fan. We ventured inside for a few minutes, but I can never stay too long in a church without beginning to feel incredibly uncomfortable - even in Iceland, where the majority of people are atheist, and where Christians tend to be more tolerant than anywhere else in the world. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The organ inside the church is stunning. It has over a thousand pipes and some of them stick out at very bizarre angles, almost like a heavenly band of bugles. For some reason I imagined those particular pipes providing sounds on the brassier end of the spectrum! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The tarmac on the road leading up to the church has been painted with a giant pride rainbow. I’m not sure I can imagine that ever happening in the approach to St Paul’s Cathedral but it’s hugely indicative of the Iceland’s general embracing of “other.” It feels appropriate at this point to point out that Iceland doesn’t have an army. Many feel that this implies a general tendency towards pacifism whilst others argue the Icelanders are way too laid back to take up arms. Yet more suggest that they have a healthy disregard for authority. My kind of people, then! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">In the late afternoon, we visited the Penis Museum in Reykjavik, which is a sight to behold! It’s filled with jars with cocks in formaldehyde belonging to an assortment of animals from whales and elephants down to hamsters and mice. And yes, there are human penises there. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The art and sculpture inspired by phalluses was fascinating, the picture of a dolphin pleasuring itself was hysterical, the ancient examples of condoms were bizarre and I very much wanted to have a toot on an ocarina shaped like a dick, but the willies in jars made me feel increasingly queasy. <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>I suppose it’s something to do with penises being life-givers and seeing them cut off and in jars felt utterly wrong. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">This evening we took ourselves to a drag show at Iceland’s premiere “queer” bar, Kiki, which was a huge amount of fun, despite the place being half empty and the drinks being twice the price of the UK. (Ironically, it was happy hour!) Based on the numbers in the bar, I’d wager that Iceland is either so tolerant towards LGBT people that no one needs a gay bar or that Sunday night is not party night here. There were certainly no Icelanders in the bar apart from its staff. Our drag queen was called Faye Knús. Get it? Fake News? Apparently “knús” means hug in Icelandic, so it’s a clever little name. She was very witty, very crude and a great lip-syncher.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The audience was invited to get up on the stage to lip-sync numbers, so I put Nathan’s name in the hat to mime to “And I’m Telling You” in a suitably over-the-top and comic manner. It went down a storm. Sadly no one else followed suit... I think they were intimidated. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-76009646217341669192020-02-01T21:44:00.000+00:002020-02-01T21:44:06.684+00:00Tomatoes, torrents and trolls <div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">We woke up in Thoranna’s family’s summer house and realised we were surrounded by mountains, snow and the clearest, most crisp air. It’s always rather intriguing to arrive somewhere when it’s dark, only to discover what it actually looks like in the morning. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The Icelanders have definitely worked out how not to be slaves to the horrors of the natural world. <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Broadly speaking, this is achieved by working with and harnessing nature instead of trying to defeat it. What they don’t know about driving in the snow, for example, probably isn’t worth knowing. In fact, I learned today that the first team to drive across the South Pole did so in a vehicle designed by an Icelander. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The snow is far dryer and more powdery here than the sloppy stuff we get in the UK, but all the roads are quite comprehensively covered in the stuff and the cars just keep on driving. I’m told it’s largely to do with decent tyres. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We drove along the “Golden Circle” today which is Iceland’s preeminent tourist circuit. It takes in some breathtakingly spectacular locations, so I thought it was going to be utterly thronged with tourists, but it was really rather quiet. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The Golden Circle takes you through the mountains and, what I think the Icelanders might consider to be woods. The trees here don’t grow very tall, so when they’re clustered together they can look a little pathetic. Before the Vikings moved to Iceland, the place was apparently highly forested, but, after they’d chopped everything down, it apparently proved fairly difficult to bring them back. There’s a joke over here which goes, “what do you do if you get lost in a forest in Iceland?” “Stand up!”</span></div>
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<span class="s2">Our first major stop was at the Gullfoss waterfall. I have no idea why this beast of a waterfall isn’t every bit as famous as Niagra or The Yosemite Falls. It’s on a scale so epic, I’m not sure I can quite do it justice by trying to describe it! The falls are incredibly wide - surely far wider than Niagra. Water thunders down in two stages and disappears deep, deep down into a ravine. The sheer volume of the water kicks up so much spray that you can’t see the river underneath. You literally can’t see where the falls end. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The water which pours down the hillside is a somewhat mystical greeny-yellow colour: a little like oxidised copper mixed with chalk, but what is most thrilling about the waterfall at this time of year is that a lot of it has frozen solid. Huge towers of icicles cling to the sides of the ravine. It’s almost impossible to comprehend that such fast-flowing water would ever be able to freeze over, but the temperatures were astonishingly cold. I could feel my ears burning to the point that I felt if I’d bashed them too hard they would have shattered into a thousand pieces. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">From Gullfoss, we went to an area of great tectonic activity where a real life geyser called Strokkur spurts columns of boiling water thirty meters into the air. There used to be two geysers right next to each other, the first of which was considerably more impressive. That geyser was actually called Geysir and was the geyser which all other geysers were named after. Sadly, an earthquake in the 1970s brought Geysir’s work to a close and he’s remained a dormant, hot, sulphurous pool ever since. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">When you walk around the area, you encounter scores of circular pools surrounded by rocks shimmering with multicoloured minerals, none of which it would be wise to touch because they’re full of boiling water. People cook eggs there! They bubble restlessly like curious cauldrons and it’s of little surprise that Icelanders are so obsessed with trolls, witches, ghosts and folklore. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We tore ourselves away from the geyser for the next adventure in our Icelandic saga, and saw scores of horses galloping along the side of the road. They’re smaller than ordinary horses but what apparently separates them from all other horses is a fifth gait called “skeith” which is somewhere between a cantor and a gallop, but an unbelievably smooth variant: so smooth, in fact, that the jockey doesn’t bob up and down as he or she rides. No other horse in the world possesses that particular ability. Or so I’m told. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We had our lunch in the most peculiar setting, namely a geothermally-heated greenhouse where they grow tomatoes all year round. There are tables set up within the tomato vines and all the food served is based on tomatoes. Bumble bees live in the greenhouses all year round. The waitress told us that they’re a little quiet in the winter months but they were certainly still buzzing around. It was all absolutely fabulous. And the food was delicious. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The last part of our glorious day saw us driving through the mountains as the sun melted into a peach-coloured light, which made the snow-covered mountains glow magically. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">As we made our way through the stunning countryside - tall skies, 360 degree panoramic views - we listened to ABBA. That’s about as good as it gets, in my world, particularly when everyone sings along in harmony. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The sun set as we climbed a hillside overlooking a wide, wide river, silhouetted against the tangerine sky as the evening winds began to strengthen. To make matters perfect, we’re predicted more Northern Lights tonight. How lucky do I feel? </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-5852345316668619202020-02-01T02:19:00.001+00:002020-02-01T02:19:26.445+00:00Steam, sulphur and silica <div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">We woke up in the dark this morning. It was a surreal experience, made all the more surreal when we discovered that sunrise happens in these parts at 10.30am! I saw for the first time, as we breakfasted in the dark, with the wind howling outside, that this sort of thing could get a bit too much after a while!</span></div>
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<span class="s2">We left the house in the dark, and Karl drove us to the “Bridge Between Continents.” What I didn’t realise is that the North American and the Eurasian tectonic plates rub against each other directly underneath Iceland. It’s why the place is so volatile. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Thoranna and Karl come from towns no more than twenty kilometres away from each other, but they joke that Karl is European whilst his wife is American. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We stood underneath the bridge as the first rays of dawn started to creep across the sky. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Dawn was a pink, mauve and lavender affair in the fresh wintery air. We’ve been told many times how lucky we’ve been with the weather and today, the sun shone constantly... </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We went from the bridge to a lighthouse a kilometre further along the coast and marvelled at the shimmering winter wonderland which was being revealed by the rising sun. The ground was covered with a thick hoar frost and the lighthouse started glowing a sort of peach colour. Long icicles hung from the edges of the cliffs. I realised that I haven’t seen an icicle since my childhood (when I used to see them all the time.)</span></div>
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<span class="s2">From the lighthouse, we walked down the hill to an area where huge clouds of steam </span>were bursting out of black rocks. The air stank of sulphur and the steam was a brown-yellow colour in front of the sun. The zone had been set up so that people could safely walk around without getting burned by the roasting hot gushes of steam shooting out of the ground. </div>
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<span class="s2">A series of wooden walkways led us through the plumes of steam and smoke, and, rather thrillingly, the sun was in exactly the right spot in the sky to create the ghostly phenomenon of Brocken Spectres. This meant that our shadows were actually being cast onto the wall of steam in front of us, and because the sun was low in the sky and directly behind us, our shadows started to appear in completely circular rainbows. It was surreal and deeply magical and we spent at least half an hour getting absolutely drenched by salty, sulphur-filled water whilst filming the phenomenon! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">From there we headed to Grindavik, the little town where Karl grew up. We had lunch in a fabulous little cafe within a complex where most of the town’s shops were situated. It’s very much a local space for local people. The shopping centre was no bigger than an average-sized supermarket, but there were a number of rooms within, housing individual establishments including a hair dressers and a women’s clothing shop. The walls of the corridors between the rooms were filled with photographs of different amateur sporting groups from the town over the last forty or so years. Karl found a picture of his sister in an all-female football team in the 1980s. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Almost everyone who lives in Grindavik works in the fishing industry and we drove down to the harbour to have a look at the hustle and bustle. I’ve yet to see a whale. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">From Grindavik, we headed to the famous Blue Lagoon, an astoundingly beautiful geothermal spa complex and pool, which is probably the biggest tourist attraction in <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Iceland. It bills itself as one of the 25 Wonders of the World. I’m not sure what the other 24 are, or indeed which list of Wonders of the World goes up to 25. I thought there were ten but then again, I thought one of them was the hanging gardens of Babylon which I don’t think is an actual thing...</span></div>
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<span class="s2">Whatever the case, the place is stunningly beautiful. The water, which is filled with silica (a sort of white, mineral-rich mud) is a very light blue colour and it reaches temperatures of 100 degrees, which makes it utterly glorious on a cold, winter’s day. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The lagoon is in a snow-filled dell, and the water is really buoyant, so you sort of bob about in the steamy, misty, toothpaste-coloured water. We felt like those wonderful red-faced Japanese snow monkeys who flock to the Jigokundani hot springs to keep warm in the winter. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, google them, and then imagine Nathan and me! We were so blissed out that we missed two minor earthquakes which happened whilst we were there! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The area around the Blue Lagoon is the place where the most ferocious tectonic activity is currently taking place. The locals don’t seem to be hugely concerned. I chatted to a lady in a petrol station this afternoon who said she’d been experiencing tremors all afternoon. 94, according to the news, in the last 24 hours. This evening there were two more significant tremors. Icelanders are being very pragmatic. We’re told the epicentre of the earthquakes is in a “convenient” place where any lava flow would probably avoid a key power station and a major road. That’s alright then! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">This is evening we drove to Thoranna and Karl’s summer house in the southern mountains of Iceland, which is the warmest part of the country, and an area where trees grow. (A relatively rare sight in Iceland.)</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The journey took us along the beautiful southern coastal road. As the sun started to set, the sky went the palest blue colour, which was reflected onto the snowy mountains.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The summer house is made of wood, and it’s absolutely wonderful. It reminded me of a far grander version of the hut little Heidi lived in with her Grandfather on the Swiss Alps! There’s even a little loft bedroom... but sadly no hole in the roof to look at the stars! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The Northern Lights returned - fuzzier and more covered in cloud than last night - and Thoranna gave us baked cheese and apricot jam before we all jumped into their hot tub. We went to bed just as a huge green arc started to stretch across the sky. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We were desperately troubled by news from back home that the UK has now pulled out of the EU. I can think of no place I’d rather be on this hideous night than looking at the Northern Lights in one of our neighbouring European countries, but I can’t stop my mind from telling me that I entered Iceland as a proud EU citizen and will exit it as a piece of shit ready to be thrown into the fan which Boris Johnson has gleefully erected on the White Cliffs of Dover. What will become of us, I wonder? </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-17272223488081707312020-01-31T11:15:00.002+00:002020-01-31T11:15:45.678+00:00Where are we?<div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">We arrived at Gatwick airport yesterday morning with that specific gnawing hunger you get when you get up too early in the morning! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Our flight’s check-in was, rather bizarrely, in an area of the airport almost exclusively reserved for flights to China. And, of course, China, as a result of the Coronavirus, is a place where people are presently a little wary of travelling. The check-in zone was a somewhat eerie sight, almost empty but for a few people wearing face masks. I was a little perturbed that the area felt so hot. The woman behind our desk was fanning herself keenly. It strikes me the one thing you don’t want from an area where a virus might be trying to transmit and mutate is a hot, moist environment. Maybe I’m being paranoid? </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Funnily enough, on the way to the airport, I’d watched a series of terribly moving images featuring hundreds of people in the Wuhan district frantically shouting messages of support and encouragement to each other from their tower block windows. Each apartment, of course, is a prison cell. They shout “add oil” to each other, which I assume is a way of saying “have courage.” It must be absolutely terrifying to be quarantined in your own flat, helplessly peering from your window into a potentially disintegrating world. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I bought a camera case from Dixons, reluctantly acknowledging that mine has fallen apart. It’s been a hugely expensive month. The man behind the counter seemed rather shocked when I declined his demand to provide him with a boarding pass which I’m pretty convinced is just a cynical attempt to collect more data about me. I recently discovered that handing over one’s boarding pass in these situations is not actually a legal requirement, so, because I’m a contrary bugger, I’ve stopped doing so! I would rather tell the world via this blog what I purchase in airports! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The ludicrous internet Social Justice Warriors have moved on to their next targets in the crafting world. It is no surprise to me, sadly, that both targets are men. One of them has been torn apart for designing a pattern called Spice Market. I assume his crime is cultural appropriation or insensitivity to those who work in spice markets.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The other “education” work they’re selflessly carrying out is a peach of an own goal on their part - and absolute proof (if any were needed) that they are not just fuelled by rancid misandry, but that few of them actually bother to find out basic facts before their addiction to outrage forces them to wade in and comment on a rumour based on a half-fact based on a prejudice-fuelled lie. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The brief headline is that a guy called James wrote a book filled with knitting patterns and recipes for cake. The book came out last year and was successful. A couple of weeks ago, James and his husband (a doctor) were interviewed on a Channel 4 show called How To Lose Weight Well, and asked if knitting could actually help you lose weight. Their response was that any weight loss would be negligible but that, if you lived a sedentary life for whatever reason, doing something with your hands would almost certainly be better than doing nothing at all. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Before the show was even screened, the SJWs moved in and James was accused of fat-shaming. Before long, a rumour started to circulate that his cake recipe book was actually a diet book which told women how to live their lives. Just like in Nathan’s case, if it hadn’t generated such a damaging tidal wave of vitriolic hatred, their uninformed response would have been funny. And actually, now that I understand the motivation and tragic modus operandi of the SJWs, my sense of humour about them has partially</span></div>
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<span class="s2">returned. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Obviously it was mere seconds before James’ gender was brought into proceedings. Words like “mansplaining” “misogynist” and “bully” were bandied around gleefully. There were even threats of violence towards him. But don’t take my word for it before becoming incensed on James’ part: get out there and read the actual facts. Do what no self-respecting SJW would do!! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Of course, there’s a great deal of pain lurking behind my flippant remarks. The experience we lived through over the summer nearly cost both of us our lives and it’s certainly the reason why I don’t write this blog very often. The sense of helplessness I felt as Nathan was torn limb from limb was utterly crushing and still, six months on, I feel my stomach clenching. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">For what it’s worth, the radio 4 documentary about Nathan’s experience is being broadcast on Sunday, so you can hear all about it in his own words. It was recorded whilst we were in the thick of the hell, so heaven knows how we’ll come across. But here’s the link. </span></div>
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<span class="s2"><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000d70h">https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000d70h</a></span></div>
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<span class="s2">But that’s enough about that! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Where did the flight from Heathrow actually take us?</span></div>
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<span class="s2">Iceland. ICELAND!! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Seen from the air, Iceland is a white tundra. Hills and mountains dusted with icing sugar rise from deep blue lakes. Huge plumes of white steam burst out of the ground. It’s deeply other-worldly and like nowhere I’ve ever visited. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We were picked up from the airport by Karl, the husband of Thoranna, with whom we are staying. The sun was low in the sky as we touched down. It turned everything a glorious shade of orange. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Karl told us that there’s a huge amount of tectonic activity on Iceland at the moment, including, to my surprise, earthquakes. I don’t know why this information surprised me so much. Iceland, after all, is known as the land of fire and ice. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Karl drove us back to the house he shares with Thoranna and their two wonderful children, Ysold and Isak. Thoranna and Nathan were in a production of the Rocky Horror Show some twenty years ago and she’s been trying to get him to come to Iceland ever since. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">They live in what the Brits might call a Scandinavian-style house. From what I can gather, most people over here do. Big, open, communal bungalow spaces seem to be the fashion, with light pouring in from all angles. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Obviously we came to Iceland because we’re desperate to see the Northern lights. They’ve been on my bucket list for as long as I can remember, and, after seeing Monument Valley, a ghost town and a total eclipse in America in 2018 and then meeting Björn from ABBA, I’ve got the bug for ticking off more! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We we sitting around the kitchen table when Ysold ran in to say that the lights were in the sky, so we ran out into the street to see a feint green arc stretching across the night sky. It wasn’t dancing or morphing into different shapes and it was competing with the street lamps and the general glow of Reykjavík in the distance, but it was there. I saw the Northern Lights. Yay! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">We had supper with Thoranna’s wonderful mother and father. The mum is a highly talented knitter and she and Nathan were able to have long, nerdy chats on the subject.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">We have a Northern Lights app on Nathan’s phone which suddenly started glowing red, suggesting there was a 30% chance of seeing the lights where we were - if there were clear skies. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">A quick look out of the window assured us that there were, indeed, clear skies, so Thoranna bundled us into her car and drove us to a peninsular on the very west of Iceland where she (rightly) said there’d be no light pollution. And suddenly the Northern Lights were there in the sky. Another ribbon of green, but this time wider and far clearer. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">A small gathering of people had their cameras fixed on the sky, and long exposures were generating very lovely results. I just wasn’t set up to take anything decent on my own camera. I didn’t have a tripod, my hands were freezing and I couldn’t see any of the buttons or controls because it was so dark! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Thoranna then decided it might be good to drive to an even darker location: a golf club she knew in the middle of nowhere... and that’s when the light show kicked off in force. To put what we saw into context, the Northern Lights do not appear to order, they weren’t really predicted to appear at all last night and yet, Thoranna (an Icelander) said it was one of the best displays she’d ever seen. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">The sky was filled with milky ripples and flashes. A glowing staircase suddenly appeared, with scalloped edges, and then fiery ribbons of mint green started dripping down from the heavens, dancing, bobbing, rolling. Sometimes the lights were mere smudges. Sometimes they were sharply-defined spears shooting upwards, directly above our heads. And then, almost as soon as the glorious display had started, it faded, firstly into a gossamer haze and then into the blackness. We felt truly blessed. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">It’s funny: I knew we were going to see them and I knew we were going to see them in a spectacular way. Perhaps I threw this desire out into the universe. Perhaps it’s just because I believe in magic. But magic, we saw. </span></div>
Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-57280638505931652822019-11-15T21:59:00.001+00:002019-11-15T21:59:32.832+00:00My Scottish Odyssey: Part Two <div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; color: #454545; font-size: 17px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span class="s1">I woke up to find Edinburgh bathed in wintry sunshine. It was bitterly cold. There had probably been a frost whilst I was having a rather lovely lie-in in the very pleasant, not-too-pricey room I’d booked myself. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Somewhat irritated by having to pull a suitcase about, I made my away along Rose Street, before crossing North Bridge and hauling myself up to the Castle, memories constantly rushing into my head from scores of Festivals in the 1990s. That feeling of invincible optimism returned. The sense of innocent hedonism. The Edinburgh Festival is a bubble of exhausting fun - at least, that is, if your show is selling out. If not, it can be a fairly humiliating experience...</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Handing out fliers on the Royal Mile brings out the very worst in everyone. Passers by are forced to become the rudest people in the world simply to get from A to B. Introverts become almost catatonic. Public school boys become obnoxiously confident. Wannabe thesps turn into mini-Brian-Blesseds. I remember one year organising some sort of horrific, wanky exercise involving a company of actors, in chevron formation, standing on a street corner, moving and breathing as a single organism. No one wanted to be there. As instructed, they started moving like fronds of seaweed swaying in the tide, but then mortification took over and they started shuffling at ever-greater speeds down the cobbled hill... straight into a pub! </span></div>
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<span class="s1">I remembered the year when everyone came down with the most shocking flu and Philippa and I clung to one another in a single bed, shaking violently. There’s a picture of me wearing an enormous jumper in the height of summer because I felt so cold. I’ve only had a flu three or four times in my life and that one was a stinker! </span></div>
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<span class="s1">The sun set as my train pulled out of Edinburgh and skated across the beautiful hills and moorland towards Glasgow. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">As I walked through Glasgow Station, I could hear someone playing a pub piano version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah on the honkytonk piano in the ticket hall. It seemed most strange to me that all the street lights in the city were on at just gone 4pm. In this neck of the woods you get beautifully long summer’s evenings but those winter nights must be super-punishing. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Speaking of punishing, the hills which lead up from the station in Glasgow are almost as impressive as those in San Francisco. I was rather relieved to only have to walk up one of them.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I was staying at the Ibis Hotel, which is all a bit too cool-for-school for an old man like me. Instead of a check-in desk, they have a person who hangs about in the bar with an iPad. I walked in and immediately assumed I was in the wrong place...</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The room was fine, but I’ve started to get very angry with hotels which don’t have baths in them. Invariably, when I arrive in a hotel after a long day of slugging things about, I want a nice, long, hot bath. And, actually, even when I do manage to bag myself a room with a bath, it’s often either tiny, or the soap dispenser is half way up the wall. Life, it seems, favours those who shower. Mini-rant over... </span></div>
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<span class="s1">We ate at Glasgow’s CCA, which has a vegetarian restaurant attached to it. I had been joined by Adele, who is UK Jewish Film’s first point of contact up there, her husband Michael, and Tanya, who is one of my oldest university friends. She’s one of the group I go camping with, and, because she’s based in Glasgow, I don’t get a chance to see nearly enough of her. I adore Tanya and her entire family and have made a mental note to spend far more time with them. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">The screening in Glasgow wasn’t perhaps as well-attended as I was hoping. It was a late screening and the first time this autumn that temperatures in the city had dipped below freezing. I was given a proper telling off afterwards by one of the audience members who plainly feels that London Jewish people don’t think enough about Jewish people in the rest of the country. “We don’t all come from NW3” he said, “no,” I replied, “I’m from Northampton!” Of course, his argument has a degree of validity and it’s very much in the same sphere as the North-South divide issues which (Islington-based) Jeremy Corbyn smugly brought to the country’s attention after the recent spate of flooding. Of course, the thing which irritates me most about all of the discussions on the subject is that there’s this incredibly misguided assumption that everyone in the country is either Northern or Southern. If you really want to feel ignored, try coming from the Midlands. Or worse, East Anglia!</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I had a troubled night’s sleep, and wondered if I’d been having nightmares because I woke up feeling quite anxious and sad. It’s a mood I didn’t managed to shake for the rest of the day. A long train journey home, crammed against a radiator didn’t help matters, neither did my bizarre ticket home which told me that my train left from “Glasgow Central/ Queen Street.” My outsider’s assumption from that piece of information was that Glasgow Central Station is also known as Queen Street. Wrong. They’re two separate stations, which are at least as far apart as Euston and Kings Cross. My map took me to Queen Street Station where a mock-astonished staff member scoffed before telling me that NO trains from his station went to London. I actually said excuse me to him three times before he deigned to give me his attention. Yay. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">So there I was, with fifteen minutes until my train, dementedly running through Glasgow to the main train station...</span></div>
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<span class="s1">When I finally arrived there, I discovered the station had two levels, so asked a member of staff where trains to London went from. “Upstairs” - came the reply. “And whereabouts is that?” I asked. “Upstairs.” Ask a silly question - mock the silly Englishman who’s plainly in a panic! </span></div>
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<span class="s1">I have two bugbears about Virgin Trains. The first is that, when the crew come down the aisle with the food trolley, whenever anyone asks for a cup of tea, they’re trained to say “would you like anything to go with your tea? Crisps? Cake? Chocolate?” It’s hardly encouraging healthy living... </span></div>
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<span class="s1">And then, when you enter the loo, the most awful thing happens. A chirpy little voice pops up saying “hello, I’m the toilet. Well, actually, I’m Fiona from Glasgow and I won a competition to be the voice of the toilet.” She then lists all the things which can’t be flushed down the loo on the train. It’s deeply distracting. In fact, I know blokes with relatively shy kidneys, who wouldn’t be able to pee for a week after hearing that! </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Euston station was hell. Welcome to London! They’ve moved the entrance to the tube and now funnel people into tiny little, deeply-angry lines. It took five minutes to get down the first escalator into the ticket hall, where we were greeted by two gurning women flanking someone dressed in a Pudsey Bear suit collecting for Children In Need. I wonder how many of the frustrated commuters wanted to rip that soddin’ bear’s other eye out! </span></div>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-29881755912542124122019-11-14T18:22:00.000+00:002019-11-14T18:22:31.634+00:00My Scottish Odyssey: Part One<div class="p1" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; color: #454545; font-size: 22px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 3px;">
<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">I’m presently on a Virgin Train winging my way through the Midlands on the way back to London after three days away. The older I get, the more gruelling travelling becomes, and I’m absolutely shattered. </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">My trip started in Newcastle. I felt a great rush of excitement as I pulled into the city. It really is like an old friend, someone you’re always really happy to see, even if you haven’t bumped into them</span><span style="font-weight: bold;"> for a while. Every street corner seems to have a memory attached to it. I made two films in the city and have spent long periods of time there as a result. Funnily enough, I’ve always been there during times in my life when everything’s been on an even keel, so all the memories are full of joy.</span><span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-weight: bold;">The team up at BBC Newcastle are always so friendly: they knew their patch, they know their listeners and they’re always incredibly keen to roll up their sleeves to make great content for the North East and Cumbria. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Stepping off the train, I instantly became aware of how crisp and cold the air felt. It was a massive relief after being crammed into a boiling hot train compartment which smelt of electric fires and dust. It was so hot that I could sense people panicking. Every face I looked at was bright red and slightly sweaty. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">As I walked through the ticket barriers, I remembered my first trip to the city and being filmed arriving there by the local BBC. They wanted to record my first impressions of the city but were quick to tell me that, under no circumstances, was I to pronounce the city like a Southerner, ie “Newcarstle.” I was told to sound a short “a” and to stress the castle part of the word. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">This was back in, I think, December 2010, which coincided</span><span style="font-size: 17px;"> with the coldest snap of weather I, certainly, have ever experienced in the UK. Temperatures dropped to minus 18 in the city and there was snow and ice everywhere. I seem to remember stumbling about in a suit, a duffle coat, wellies and a flat cap, and being astounded that Newcastle folk didn’t bother with any outer layers. Many of the lassies were out in high heels, skating on the icy hills of the city centre like Bambi. I remember asking one lad why he wasn’t in a coat. “Cus me friends would have taken the piss out of us” he said, adding, “I did think about wearing one...” </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Despite the Arctic temperatures, the sun was shining most days, so everything took on a very magical quality. Alastair from the BBC and I went on a bizarre odyssey which involved getting off at every single station on the Tyne and Wear Metro network. The idea was to see what the environs of each stop had to offer in terms of filming locations, but, somewhere on the branch to South Hylton, we became so bitterly cold that our trips to the stations merely involved getting off the train and sliding along the platform into the next carriage before it left again. I remember getting off the train at one stop to explore a multi-storey car park in the hope that its open roof had decent views over the tracks. When we got up there, the whole top storey was covered in a foot and a half of utterly virgin snow. What had been an expanse of Tarmacadam was now a giant field in the sky. We danced through it like little kids, taking great delight in the footprints we were leaving whilst our blue shadows stretched for miles in the late winter sunshine.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">I was in Newcastle this time to do an interview with my old mates at the BBC about the UK Jewish Film Festival which comes to Newcastle at the end of the month. My job at the moment is running the festival’s tour - and it’s a fairly comprehensive undertaking. We’re visiting 21 towns and cities across the UK, from Inverness to Exeter, Bangor to Norwich, with the dual-pronged mission of getting films about Jewish people into locations where there are very small, often isolated, Jewish communities whilst simultaneously<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>hoping that non-Jewish audiences will also come to watch. A good film is a good film, after all, and, in an era of growing anti-semitism, it also feels important to debunk myths and stereotypes associated with Judaism by demonstrating what a diverse bunch Jewish people are. That’s the theory, at least. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Last week, this wonderful job took me back home to Northampton, where I learned that my Watford Gap film is now ten years old. Where do the years ago? On that front, I’ve noticed a whole flurry of BBC broadcasts in recent months, none of which I’ve had anything to do with, which bear uncanny similarities to projects I’ve run in the past. First there was “A Symphony of Buskers” (I made “The Busker Symphony” for Channel 4 in 2006) and then “The M1 Symphony” which sounds fairly similar to A1: The Road Musical if you ask me! Ah well: all art flies up into the ether and falls back down in little flashes of someone else’s inspiration. Ewan McColl made “Song of the Road”, a radio ballad about the building of the M1 twenty years before I was even born! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">From Northampton, I went to Manchester, where the UK Jewish Film Festival is a very big deal. They screen twelve films up there each year, and everything is run with great precision and passion. I was there to oversee their opening night: a screening of the French language film, My Polish Honeymoon, which I have been championing ever since I saw it about four months ago. It tells the story of a young <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Parisian couple who go to Poland in search of their Jewish roots. It’s a film about belonging, really, and how difficult it can be when you don’t know where you come from. It’s witty, charming and quite sad in places. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">One of the film’s lead actors, the charming Arthur Igual, was in Manchester to do a Q and A after the film, and I was tasked with looking after him.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">It had been a beautiful day in Northampton, but the further north I drove, the worse the weather became. It turns out that the Met Office had issued a yellow warning for the Peak District and Manchester, and I have seldom driven in such dangerous circumstances. In fact, the last time I drove in similarly shitty conditions, I was also in Manchester! On that occasion, there’d been a mega-snow storm, with snow so dense that vehicles were driving at less than five miles per hour. I remember my car suddenly going into a skid and spinning in a somewhat slow, full circle towards the side of the road. My first thoughts were, “that will do.” I got out of the car, looked around for a sign to tell me what the parking regs were (all were covered in a thick layer of snow) and promptly abandoned ship, my body shaking with adrenaline! But I digress... </span></div>
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<span class="s2">After being interviewed on Radio Newcastle on Tuesday morning, I had a lovely cup of tea with my old friend, Helen, who produced both Tyne and Wear Metro: The Musical and the first 100 Faces film. It’s always such a huge joy to see her, and she was looking particularly well. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I travelled further North after lunch, following the East Coast Mainline up through Northumbria, over the glorious bridge at Berwick Upon Tweed and into Scotland. It’s surely one of the finest sections of railway in the country, clinging, as it does, to the coast for mile upon mile. There was a feint rainbow over the water at one point, then the rain started falling and the sea seemed to turn angry and grey. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I kept catching glimpses of the A1 Road, which often runs parallel to the railway. The road becomes single carriageway in those parts, really for the first time since the Archway Road in London, which was, of course, my stomping ground until we moved to Finchley in the summer. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">There’s not a single stretch of the A1 which I don’t know, and I kept spotting places where we’d filmed whilst making my road musical film. The clover field on the outskirts of Berwick where I’d had a massive bout of hay fever, Eyemouth where we filmed a fishermen’s choir and where I was when Fiona called me to say she was getting married, the curiously bleak power station at Totness which we filmed from the window of an articulated lorry, the white-topped “Bass Rock”, which looms mysteriously out of the sea at North Berwick, and then, suddenly, the iconic Arthur’s Seat informs you that you’re nearing Edinburgh. And what a sight for sore eyes that must have been for ancient, weary travellers. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">Edinburgh was its usual buzzing self. Winter had definitely arrived up there and my stroll along Princes Street to the hotel was a bracing affair. It truly is the most spectacularly beautiful city. It may even be THE most spectacularly beautiful city in the world. Its castle seems to be made from the very granite rock that it sits upon, almost as though it were born out of the hillside. Pushed up from the bowels of the earth.</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The Scottish premiere of My Polish Honeymoon took place at the Edinburgh Picturehouse, whose staff have been profoundly delightful at every stage. It’s a magical cinema, right in the heart of the city, just a stone’s throw from the castle and Princes Street. I was very relieved to learn that the screening had sold out, because it means all the work we’ve been doing in Edinburgh to let people know about the film has paid off. </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I focussed my marketing attention on French speakers, the Polish community and, obviously, Jewish people in the city, so it was quite fun trying to guess who was who as people took their seats! </span></div>
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<span class="s2">I had invited Laurence Païs to the screening as a special guest. She is Consule Générale et Directrice de l’Institut Français d’Ecosse. Having failed GCSE French, that became quite a mouthful to say in my little speech of introduction. I could feel my face flushing ever-redder as I got closer to the words!</span></div>
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<span class="s2">The film was very well received and I was lucky enough to talk to a number of people afterwards, one of whom was a Jewish survivor who’d been smuggled out of Belgium as a baby by her heroic English mother when the Nazis invaded. I was so confused when she started talking to me because she didn’t look a day over 60! Her story made me realise quite how much fundamental kindness us Brits have lost in recent years. In both World Wars, when no one really had a bean to their name, we accepted huge numbers of refugees: Jews. Belgians. Poles. And here we are in the 21st Century clinging to our wealth like avaricious lard buckets. </span></div>
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Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8545857588529925482.post-63637199939485546002019-10-28T20:03:00.001+00:002019-10-28T20:03:47.658+00:00Italy I am currently heading into work. I’m trying a new route which involves a bus and a tube instead of three tube trains. When you get above or below central London, it’s very hard to travel in a west-east direction, which means it takes me an hour and twenty minute to make a journey which would take thirty minutes to drive. And, of course, because I’m working conventional office hours, I’m travelling on packed tubes during the rush hour which invariably make me want to cry!<br />
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Just before the mayhem of High Holy Days in the synagogue, I managed to get a long weekend in Italy with Michael. Again, I wrote several blogs about it, but didn’t post them for the reasons listed in my previous entry. That said, we had a brilliant time, and because I’ve already written the majority of content, I’m going to reclaim a bit of joy and take you all back to the end of September..<br />
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We stayed in a villa in the hills above the town of Pescia, which is not a million miles from the ancient city of Lucca. Artists and creatives tend to bang on about the glorious light in Tuscany and the more I visit the place, the more I realise it has a unique and very beautiful light. I’m not sure I yet have the words to quantify this statement. Certainly, at the beginning and ends of the day, colours seem super-saturated and clear. But at other times, everything takes on a sort of soft-focussed, somewhat impressionistic straw-coloured haze. Or maybe I’m romanticising. <br />
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The villa we stayed in is surrounded by dark cedar trees and spearmint-green olive groves. From the balcony, you can see for miles, all the way to the lilac misty peaks of the mountains which rise from the sea plains between Pisa and Lucca. <br />
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In the middle-distance, ancient villages with their skyscraper-esque churches, cling perilously to the hillsides. Sound travels in curious ways in that particular location. The noise of a woman whistling for her cat, maybe half a mile away, feels like it’s happening right next to you. At one point, I heard the drumming and cheers of a festival in Pescia, carried on the breeze, direct to my ears. And of course, every morning and evening, the romantic clangle of church bells is delivered fresh to your ears. <br />
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It is, of course, astonishing how quickly us Brits can get to a place as beautiful and serene as Tuscany. Pisa airport is so un-busy, that you’re off the plane and through passport control in a heartbeat. We were swimming in the pool at our villa by the middle of the afternoon and eating in the most glorious little restaurant in a valley beyond Pescia by 8pm. <br />
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There is, of course, nothing better than properly-cooked, rustic Italian food. Weeks after our trip to Da Sandrino in Sorana, my mouth still waters when I think about what we ate there: spaghetti with tomato sauce, spaghetti with garlic and chilli, fried potatoes, a bowl of the glorious local delicacy, Fagioli Di Sorana (white beans), and fried mushrooms in a batter so light, and crisp, I have no idea how they were made.<br />
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The restaurant is in a tiny, wood-smoke-scented village, next to a river which gushes through a deep ravine. Does it get any better than that, I wonder?<br />
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We went for a trek on our second day; up the side of the rather steep hill from the villa where we’re staying, to a hillside town called Monte a Pescia. The air up there is incredibly pure, and filled with the scent of wild flowers, mint and wonderful Italian herbs. It’s the sort of air which is so rich with oxygen that a single gulp makes you feel alive. The views drifting down towards Pescia are glorious: farmhouses, with terracotta roofs, scattered across dark, tree-lined, hills. The odd wisp of smoke. <br />
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From Monte a Pescia, we followed an ancient stone-paved footpath back down into Pescia itself. This was the ancient road which linked the main town to its baby sister in the hills and it’s steeped in terrific atmosphere. You get the most astonishing sense of how hard life must have been for people in those Tuscan hills before the invention of the car. I imagined old women walking alongside donkey carts up the vertiginous slopes every market day. <br />
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We met a horrible cat with bright yellow eyes whom I made the mistake of stopping to stroke. It turns out it was utterly deranged and it went at me with its nasty claws, drawing so much blood that I had to go and see a pharmacist! Cats are freaks. They see my leonine energy and go on the attack or skittishly run in the opposite direction. Slags. <br />
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We swam in the villa’s pool that afternoon, which was a real treat. It’s a salt water pool, which I think is better for the environment, and, on a day where scores of young people across the world were marching against climate change, it was nice to know that some people were doing their bit. (Says the man who’d just jumped on a plane for a three day holiday in Tuscany!) I guess I’m just making the most of my beloved Mainland Europe whilst I’m allowed to feel a part of it. <br />
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In the late afternoon, we drove to Lucca, a Medieval, entirely-walled, circular city where cars are not allowed. We went to a little shop there where they sell lovely-looking formal men’s clothes at very reasonable prices and I bought a couple of suits and some ties, which I was excited to wear until I realised that the more expensive of the two had a small amount of wool in it, which makes it pretty much unwearable, particularly when it’s hot. <br />
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I’ve never been able to wear wool, much to the chagrin of my knitting-guru husband! I see knitters holding gloriously colourful yarns up to their cheeks and revelling in their softness, and simply imagine how sweaty and itchy they would make me feel. <br />
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We had a quick sit down in a cafe in the market square where, for reasons best known to themselves, they were playing an instrumental version of My Heart Will Go On. On a loop. Round and round. To make matters even more surreal, the tune was being played on a recorder - incredibly badly. It had plainly been recorded as a joke and the giggling waiter obviously found it very amusing, which it was - the FIRST time he played it! <br />
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It reminded me of being a student and my mate Ellie and me playing California Dreaming 18 times in a row on the juke box in Vanbrugh Bar to see if anyone would notice. They didn’t seem to. How we laughed!<br />
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We drove up to the top of a mountain for an evening meal in a remote trattoria. Heaven knows how a place like that survives. It was a Friday night and there were only four people eating there. I can’t think how the owner even covers the costs of his chef. We ordered a starter and then two plates of pasta, which, for the Italians, is a confusing choice. Pasta is only really a dish which you eat between a starter and a meaty main. We’d ordered a side of roast potatoes, because, well you can never eat too many carbs. We assumed it would come with the rest of the meal, but it actually arrived after our pasta plates had been cleared away as a sort of triumphant “and now here’s your roast potato main course. Ta-da!” It was really very strange. Nice potatoes though. <br />
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Annoyingly, I managed to lose my wallet at some point that night. It probably slipped out of my pocket as I got out of the car. I lost about €80 and taught myself once and for all that I’m just not a wallet person. I lose wallets at an almost frightening rate of knots whilst some people manage to keep theirs for a lifetime. I learned at my Uncle John’s funeral on Thursday that he’d kept the first love letter he wrote to his wife in his wallet for the best part of 60 years. A hugely romantic story, but I was slightly more impressed that he’d kept the same wallet all that time! <br />
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We left for Florence, rather early on the Saturday, after a glorious breakfast in the garden of the villa. They do the most wonderful spread of cheeses, home-made jams and marmalades, breads, pastries and hard-boiled eggs. To eat in the sunshine, with a light, Tuscan morning breeze ruffling your hair is definitely one of the things you need to do before you die! It’s right up there with seeing an eclipse or meeting a member of ABBA! (Or maybe not...) <br />
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We were in Florence early enough to attend a Shabbat service at the Great Synagogue there, which is a stunning, domed, ancient building. It’s got an almost impossible acoustic, however, certainly when it comes to understanding spoken words, and because it’s a Sephardi service, not a great deal of it felt familiar. What seems very clear is that the building and the service screamed out for a choir. Acoustics, where the sounds spin in circles into the ether, are always rather lovely for nice, slow, contrapuntal choral pieces by composers like Rossi. <br />
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We met my old, dear friend, Tammy for lunch. It’s become a tradition to meet her there every time I’m in Tuscany and it’s always wonderful to see her. We laugh almost constantly. <br />
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We went for a stroll through the old town, which, probably because it was a Saturday in the late summer, was utterly rammed with tourists. Isn’t it funny how you never quite see yourself as a tourist?! The Ponte Vecchio was nothing but a sea of faces bobbing up and down. After a while, the experience of walking about in a place so crowded starts to feel claustrophobic and exhausting. The inherent beauty of Florence is considerably diminished by its popularity. Beauty draws crowds. Crowds destroy beauty.<br />
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My Mum tells the tale of weeping when she saw Florence for the first time in the 1950s. I feel it’s important she never returns to the city, as it will almost certainly not be the place in her memory with which she fell in love:<br />
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We knew Sunday was going to be a day of bad weather and the likelihood was that we’d need to hunker down, read some books, eat food and snooze. As it turned out, the weather wasn’t quite as bad as promised, so we took ourselves on a drive to Bagni Di Lucca, a sleepy spa town, deep in the mountains. It’s a rather charming spot which has an air of faded grandeur. At some point in the early twentieth century, it was obviously THE place to visit. These days, it feels very down-at-heel - a forgotten time capsule which is charming precisely because so many of its shops and cafes are exactly as they were in the 1950s and 60s, right down to the signs which hang above the doors. The whole experience regularly transported me to those old 1960s slide projections we used to look at in German lessons, featuring Hans, Lieselotte and Lumpi the dog in the Bavarian town of Cadolzburg. <br />
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A beautifully clear river charges its way through the middle of the town and the whole place smells of damp vegetation. <br />
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On our last day in Tuscany, the mists rolled in, and turned the hilltop villages around Pescia into film sets. <br />
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The valley out towards Serana is as verdant and tropical as I’ve always imagined Hawaii. It is so unlike the scorched, sunflower-filled world one might expect to find in Tuscany. Tall ferns line the sides of the roads. The river batters the rocks with force. Many of the buildings in those parts are paper factories both ruined and fully operational. I assume that decent paper is somehow made from lots of trees and very fast flowing water. <br />
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We drove up to Vellano, marvelling at the fact that we couldn’t see more than five meters in front of us. We knew there were vertiginous drops into dark tree-filled valleys in all directions, but everything was protectively wrapped in a soft, white, hugely eerie blanket, as though nature were trying to lull us into a false sense of security to encourage us to leap into the unknown.<br />
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Under the mist, all sounds are amplified and held in. The trickle of water in a town fountain becomes almost deafening. The sound of rock music screeching in a local teenager’s bedroom might as well have been on headphones, just for a moment of course, before the fog blanks the sound out again. Distant thunder rolled, cracked and echoed. And there we were, walking in the whiteness, unaware of what was going to suddenly appear in front of us. It was magical, surreal and a little bit unnerving. You<br />
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By the time we’d driven onto the plains around Pisa towards the airport, the mists had lifted and Tuscany was bathed in sunshine once again. It was as though we’d just awoken from a dream...Benjamin Tillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17131693431596716861noreply@blogger.com0