Social – Page 4 – Fooyah

August 28 2023

Just (Hann)Over There

As part of the journey to M’era Luna 2023 I had a little less than a day in Hannover, or Hanover as apparently we British spell it. Smith and I flew to Hannover, stayed the night in a hotel room and then travelled to M’era Luna in Hildesheim.

There’s a website that gives information about curios in different places. You let it know where you are going and then the return data are interesting things. The first one we wanted to see was the church with the pentagram built into the walls. In the above picture you can see the pentagram [traditional sign of the devil] and also the Star Of David around the clock. I’m not sure why either are there, but also, I don’t really care. It was pretty nice to see.

Next on the list was the musical manhole cover or drain cover I guess they should be called. Trying to explain manhole cover to a German native was interesting. Their language didn’t have the male-ness of it in their word so English gets called out, quite rightly, for being misogynist.

The new town hall in Hannover was spectacular and very pretty. The whole centre of the city was a delight, even with the mentally unstable people we saw. I found the basement level shopping mall quite a surprise but understandable. It’s hard talking to Germans about their cities when they talk about “it was bombed and we built it back the way it was before”. I’m not sure of the correct response to that. I know when in Washington DC I was almost proud the Brits had burnt the White House to the ground, but these war actions felt different.

Wandering around Hannover it was strange to see emblems of the British royal family. But then I remembered that the current royal family are literally descended from the Hanoverians who ruled Britain in the past. Once I remembered this I felt a kind of kinship with the city and I’m not even a royalist. I’m definitely a not-royalist. But there we go.

I’m trying to upload the musical drain cover to YouTube but am struggling slightly, I think that the music might be missing for some reason, but that’s the main reason for uploading. I will try again in a moment.

June 23 2023

The Studio Experience

The Legend and I went for a tour around the Harry Potter studios near Watford in the recent past and I thought I would add my impressions of the place here.

It was a hot day when we travelled and I was very glad that there was some form of cooling system in the buildings. Our tour started at a particular time with some small talks and a grand entrance to the Hogwarts dining room hall. I was impressed and the production and direction was impressive. They did shove us out of the hall quite quickly but I had seen enough of it by then. None of the staff were rude, they were all remarkably upbeat and chipper.

Being able to see the movie sets used in the real films was really quite amazing. I really liked the Great Hall. Some of the smaller sets were really interesting and to see the level of detail that the prop makers had achieved was amazing. Every book had proper writing all the way through and all flasks were labelled etc. Absolutely amazing.

There were plenty of animatronic beasts lurking around and the detail and complexity that went into all the beasts was second to none. I was reminded of how much effort and planning goes into making a movie like this. After the script based on a book you then have all the art work that helps make the creations come true. After the development art work there’s more development and making the animals, sets and costumes. Then there’s the main act of filming it all.

It was a curious site to see the sets built up and looking remarkably real inside but then noticing that the outside is just scaffolding with wood work. Such a simple background to a complex interior. Of the large sets on display the interior of Gringots Bank, I think, was the one that I was most impressed with. A magnificent sight of marble (fake), gold (fake) and dragons (fake). Diagon Alley was recreated along with Kings Cross Station Platform 9 3/4. The whole tour is a very impressive sight. To see these places in reality was like those dreams when you are just waking up, seemingly real and unreal at the same time.

June 6 2023

Anyone But Them

I recently visited my ancestral home village and read through the local magazine. My parents still live in the house I grew up in and so they are known in the village and are part of the fabric I guess. Somehow this area still has a Lord Of The Manor. I honestly have no idea what this means but the locals seem to have some sort of natural deference to this person, local societies have them as their patron, and it irritates me an awful lot. Imagine some twat being given deference just because they were born into a title or even bought it. This annoys me so much about this island we live on where the ideals of meritocracy are constantly overshadowed by the rights of those entitled (literally).

I read the local magazine during the visit and I have to say I want to write to them. There was a lovely little article responding to some criticism that had been placed at the door of the local GP surgery. I didn’t see the original argument but I imagine someone was annoyed at the “service” they had received. The Practice Manager had a short response piece along with a local asking that we all be nice and understand the pressures that the NHS are under. This is all positive community stuff. The local practice needed defending and so the locals defended the practice.

My message for the residents of that village is somewhat different. I’ve looked up who represents them as a local councillor and, as you would expect, I suppose, they are pale, male and stale. A classic tory. He even has the full name of the tory party next to him, which I don’t think I’ve seen that often. The conservative and unionist party. Next I looked up the local election results for the most recent polling date. I could only find the 2019 results, for some reason the 2023 results are not on the local website. This person gained 77% of the votes cast. But the votes cast only account for a turn out of 32%.

The slightly bigger picture in that area is that the Member of Parliament is Kemi Badenoch. A tory of the worst kind and utterly useless. Their election results was 37,629 votes. A majority of 24,966. That whole area is full of tories who, by definition, are selfish. This saddens me. People who complain about the struggling local services and yet they are resoundingly a tory area. What do you expect from these government services following twelve years of austerity – a political choice? Rather than moan to the local magazine how about you actually do something and vote for a different party? Vote for change. Vote for anyone but them.

The recent local elections where I live were just as depressing. I live in a small, mostly working class, village. There are some large properties but I had hoped that overwhelmingly the village would be left leaning. I was so wrong. The results were that all three tory councillors got re-elected. The village faces threats from lack of public transport, the doctors moving and nine hundred new houses being built to more than double the size of this place. And yet most people still vote tory because they are too scared to vote for anything else. Have you looked at the labour party? They are just tory-lite but would be so much better for nearly everything. They wouldn’t be the best party to lead this country but they would certainly be better than the current bunch of shits.

June 3 2023June 8 2023

Cobbles, Company, and Cocktails

I recently had a lovely weekend with friends of over thirty years in the Belgium city of Leuven. It was a celebration of getting old for one of us and we got together for probably the first time in twelve years. We live in different ends of the country and in different countries now so getting together is just a little bit harder than meeting up at the Star Of India or King Willy IV. It’s odd but when comparing technology from now to then and the ease of keeping in touch I feel it’s amazing we ever did anything. Imagine having to phone call people and organise things “live”.

So, trains, cars and cars on trains meant that we had a weekend in Leuven. It’s a very pretty town and had a lovely atmosphere, probably aided by the fact it’s a university town. On the Saturday we just met up, found our lodgings and drank and ate. On the Sunday we ate, drank, ate and drank and somewhere in the middle of that there was a visit to a little brewery on the edge of town. It definitely was not Stella Artois which has it’s home at Leuven.

Leuven has a large pedestrian area, although there were many bicycles on the loose! The roads were nicely wide and there were statues here and there. Effectively within the main ring-road the place is safe, quiet and impressive.

At night the town is gorgeous. It’s well lit and oozes sophistication – apart from that one little street which has a McDonalds – the rest of it is lovely.

This past week I also spend some time in the UK equivalent town of history and cobbles. I went to Canterbury. The streets are thinner but just as full of tourists as Leuven. There were many eateries but not so many bars which is a shame I guess. Canterbury is a university town and also the home of christianity in the UK – not that that fact is a draw on me going there. I’ve been in the cathedral and so am not that fussed about getting inside there again.

You can see from the picture above that Canterbury does pretty well in the “cobbled streets and old buildings look” category. Maybe Leuven is a bit better as they rebuilt the whole town after the first world war and made it look like it did before!

May 21 2023

Third Or Fourth Time

So, I’ve had Covid, again. I felt utter rubbish a week ago and after a couple of days, before going back to work I decided to use one of my few covid tests. It turned out to be positive, which was a bit of a surprise. There followed five days of isolation. I got better slowly and have reached the point when I hope my viral load is low enough not to infect other people. I would say that I felt like poo for around six days. I slept a lot. Had a headache. Ached. I think I feel fine now, but am worried about some longer lasting effects. I want to have a run but I am actually quite bothered that my lungs aren’t up for it.

To pass the time I’ve been playing computer games and working through some television series. I’ve played Gran Turismo, Minecraft, Fortnite, and Minecraft Dungeons. I’ve also been flying around the world in X-Plane flight simulator. It’s an on-going project and I am flying up the eastern seaboard of the USA. I’ve just landed in Nantucket. Next is probably Boston or maybe Nova Scotia.

The television shows I’ve watched have been The Last Of Us. Which I enjoyed about fifty percent of. I’m not sure it’s as great as I had heard. I think the world gets caught up on memes a lot now. For instance I’ve not watched Tiger King or Squid Games. I’d rather wait and watch this stuff in my own time, I don’t like getting carried away with the hype. I have historically found that hyped shows and films turn out to be not good. I’ve also watched the first season of Altered Carbon, which was good looking although I needed pins and yarn to keep up with whatever the fuck was happening. Oddly in that series the best character is not the lead but a hotel.

I’ve been reading too. I spend around an hour on each activity and then circle around the things I’m doing. Adding stuff on this site is also a good distraction from time. I read Beneath the World, a Sea, by Chris Beckett and I can honestly say it was one of the most disturbing books I’ve read for a while. I will liken it to Heart Of Darkness although I am pretty sure someone else will have made that comparison before me. I really enjoyed the book and will be buying more by the same author. I’m just about to start a book about a scientific look at psychology and what pseudoscience there may be used around the world.

While doing boring house stuff I’ve been listening to podcasts and one of the main ones I’ve been enjoying is The Curious Cases Of Rutherford and Fry. It’s a short podcast covering science stuff and answering listener questions each episode. It’s a delight and the relationship between the presenters and producer is excellent. I was aware of both presenters before the podcast having read books by Rutherford and watched some TV by Fry. In a recent episode Hannah Fry asked people to download an app to their phone to help scientists model a pandemic outbreak. This freaked me the fuck out and I looked at the date of transmission and it was either December 2017 or January 2018. What the actual fuck?!

I know science has spent a lot of time looking at pandemics and how they spread. But this seemed prescient. Although, ask a thousand questions and eventually one will seem important. To think of what we’ve been through since the end of 2017 and the struggles the world has faced. How many people died because of Covid and the people who couldn’t see each other. It’s been horrific. There is a television programme associated with the science study and it’s called Contagion, because of course it is, and was broadcast or streamed on BBC4. It’s not available at the moment on iPlayer but I am definitely going to watch it. To see what happens.

May 8 2023

Conflicted

I recently found out that I will be getting a medal for the coronation that took place two days ago as I write this. I already have a jubilee medal and the requirements were very similar – basically have been involved for more than five years. These medals spark some very uncomfortable feelings in me. I am a republican and so wearing these seems to signal my appreciation of the monarchy and all they stand for. I haven’t really done anything to deserve the medal. No one died, no one fought, I haven’t contributed to the country any more than in my little corner of the globe. I don’t feel I deserve a medal when compared to members of the armed forces who have most definitely earnt them.

There are other very strong feelings and thoughts about the history of this country and the medals we give out. For instance, if you are “recognised” you might receive an OBE. This is something along the lines of Order of the British Empire. The British Empire. Still, in 2023. Britain banging on about the Empire. The Empire – the forced colonialisation of most of the world. The death and slavery caused by the Empire is something to be atoned for. The Empire was a racist march over lands used by others to steal and enrich this country. The current wealth of the country owes itself to the racism and wankership of our ancestors. Britain pillaged the world for it’s own gain and now it likes to stand on its crumbling step calling out others for being a little naughty.

The coronation puts on show all of the things that annoy me. A hereditary system of governance, plenty of religion, racists [mainly the current government but also most institutions], stupid symbolism, overt displays of stolen wealth, pomp and ceremony as if that makes a difference. What a load of shit.

So I am conflicted. The cognitive dissonance I employ is strong. Fortunately I only need to wear the medals two or three times a year. I will. But not as an endorsement, as a symbol of the recognition of my time spent messing around in the CCF.

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