 Auschwitz, Poland |
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2007 Tuesday 25th September 2007 I'm lucky to walk through Senate House every day on the way into work. As well as being the administrative centre of the University of London, it also houses the University library, so I have many happy memories of 'revising' (read nodding off, head on desk, waking two hours later to find chunks of blueberry muffin stuck to cheek). The Art Deco design was the work of Charles Holden, who was appointed as architect in February 1931. The construction, which was by Holland, Hannen & Cubitts began in 1932, and King George V laid the ceremonial foundation stone on 26 June 1933. The building was completed five years later in 1937. The structure is often considered to be London's first skyscraper. The original plans, however, detailed a building three times its original size, extending from the British Museum to the Octagon of University College London. A lack of funding and the onset of the Second World War deterred the original plans. During the 1930s Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists, intended to house Parliament in the building in the event of his taking power. Hitler is also rumoured to have intended it as his headquarters in London after the invasion of Britain - I personally think that is utter bollocks, manufactured by bored UL students to impress freshers. Believe me, I was one. At the outbreak of the Second World War, Senate House became home to the Ministry of Information offices, and the library transported out of London, to avoid being destroyed by the Luftwaffe. The building has provided a backdrop for many films and TV programmes over the years including Batman Begins, The Day of the Triffids, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Foyle's War, Richard III, Silent Witness and Jeeves and Wooster. Monday 24th September 2007
A seagull in Scotland has developed the habit of stealing crisps from a neighborhood shop. The seagull waits until the shopkeeper isn't looking, and then walks into the store and grabs a snack-size bag of cheese Doritos. Once outside, the bag gets ripped open and shared with other birds. The seagull's shoplifting started early this month when he first swooped into the store in Aberdeen, Scotland, and helped himself to a bag of crisps. Since then, he's become a regular. He always takes the same flavour of cheese Doritos. Customers have begun paying for the seagull's stolen bags because they think it's so funny. Sunday 23rd September 2007 Designed by architects David Marks, Julia Barfield, Malcolm Cook, Mark Sparrowhawk, Steven Chilton, Loren Butt and Nic Bailey, The London Eye stands 135 metres (443 ft) high on the western end of Jubilee Gardens, on the South Bank of the River Thames.
The wheel carries 32 sealed and air-conditioned passenger capsules attached to its external circumference. Each capsule holds approximately 25 people. It rotates at 26 cm (10 in) per second (about 0.9 km/h (0.5mph) so that one revolution takes about 30 minutes.
The wheel was constructed in sections which were floated up the Thames on barges and assembled lying flat on pontoons. Once the wheel was complete it was raised into an upright position by cranes, being lifted at 2 degrees an hour until it reached 65 degrees. It was left in that position for a week while engineers prepared for the second phase of the lift. The total weight of steel in the Eye is 1,700 tonnes. Saturday 22nd September 2007 Friday 21st September 2007
Part of the London Design Festival, the Super Design Market can be seen in the ballroom of the Royal Festival Hall from Friday until Sunday 23 September. The Super Design Market is a curated selling market, with products from Britain’s best up and coming and established designers. Over 30 products have been selected by a panel of respected design curators. Products are limited edition and batch produced work selling for between £5 and £100. Designers selected include: Michael Marriott, Simon Maidment, Martino Gamper, Frauke Stegman, David Weatherhead, Tim Parsons, Jordi Canudas, Alexandre Bettler, Gitta Gschwendtner, Gore&Jones, Nadine Jarvis, Richard Shed, Sam Johnson, Ulrika Jarl, Front Yard, Andre Klauser, Michael Anastassiades, Carl Clerkin, Sato Hisao and Tithi Kutchamuch.
My favourites were Reflect-Please bags made from worker's waistcoasts, wall-mouted miniature cow heads for your hanging storage needs and slip cast ceramic custard cream boxes. Thursday 20th September 2007 On the back of the news story of Cambridgeshire Police chief constable Julie Spence's need of more staff and resources to cope with the pressures caused by a sudden influx of migrant workers, cultural differences have come to light as being the cause of many of the crimes.
This has caused one migrant community to produce a 'guide' to cultural nuances that newcomers should be aware of. It apparently includes advice such as 'In the UK, you should not carry around knives of weapons of any kind', 'if you have drunk alcohol, in this country, it is wrong to drive a motor vehicle', and 'in the UK, before you touch or grope a stranger, you must ask permission'. I've unearthed some more, very solid advice for our new foreign friends: Vocabulary If you are fond of someone, you should tell him he is a "great tosser" - he will be touched. The English are a notoriously tactile, demonstrative people, and if you want to fit in you should hold hands with your acquaintances and tossers when you walk down the street. Habits
Universities Observing these customs will signal to the librarians that you are "in the know"- one of the inner circle, as it were, for the rules are unwritten and not posted anywhere in the library. Likewise, it is customary to kiss the librarian on both cheeks when he/she brings a manuscript you’ve requested, a practice dating back to the reign of Henry VI. One of the most delightful ways to spend an afternoon in Oxford or Cambridge is gliding gently down the river in one of their flat-bottomed boats, which you propel using a long pole. This is known as "cottaging." Many of the boats (called "yer-i-nals") are owned by the colleges, but there are some places that rent them to the public by the hour. Just tell a professor or policeman that you are interested in doing some cottaging and would like to know where the public yerinals are. The poles must be treated with vegetable oil to protect them from the water, so it’s a good idea to buy a bottle of Flora and have it on you when you ask directions to the yerinals. That way people will know you are an experienced cottager. Food
Few foreigners are aware that there are several grades of meat in the UK. The best cuts of meat, like the best bottles of gin, bear Her Majesty’s seal, called the British Stamp of Excellence (BSE). When you go to a fine restaurant, tell your waiter you want BSE beef and won’t settle for anything less. If he balks at your request, custom dictates that you jerk your head imperiously back and forth while rolling your eyes to show him who is boss. Once the waiter realises you are a person of discriminating taste, he may offer to let you peruse the restaurant’s list of exquisite British wines. If he does not, you should order one anyway. The best wine grapes grow on the steep, chalky hillsides of Yorkshire and East Anglia - try an Ely ‘84 or Ripon ‘88 for a rare treat indeed. When the bill for your meal comes it will show a suggested amount. Pay whatever you think is fair, unless you plan to dine there again, in which case you should simply walk out; the restaurant host will understand that he should run a tab for you. Transportation
It is rarely necessary to take a taxi, though, since bus drivers are required to make detours at patrons’ requests. Just board any bus, pay your fare of thruppence (the heavy gold-colored coins are "pence"), and state your destination clearly to the driver, eg: "Please take me to the British Library." A driver will frequently try to have a bit of harmless fun by pretending he doesn’t go to your requested destination. Ignore him, as he is only teasing you (little does he know you’re not so ignorant!). For those on a shoestring budget, the London Tube may be the most economical way to get about, especially if you are a woman. Chivalry is alive and well in Britain, and ladies still travel for free on the Tube. Simply take some tokens from the baskets at the base of the escalators or on the platforms; you will find one near any of the state-sponsored Tube musicians. Once on the platform, though, beware! Approaching trains sometimes disturb the large Gappe bats that roost in the tunnels. The Gappes were smuggled into London in the early 19th century by French saboteurs and have proved impossible to exterminate. The announcement "Mind the Gappe!" is a signal that you should grab your hair and look towards the ceiling. Very few people have ever been killed by Gappes, though, and they are considered only a minor drawback to an otherwise excellent means of transportation. One final note: for preferential treatment when you arrive at Heathrow airport, announce that you are a member of Shin Fane (an international Jewish peace organisation-the "shin" stands for "shalom"). As savvy travellers know, this little white lie will assure you priority treatment as you make your way through customs. Sunday 16th September 2007
St Pancras Old Church is reputed to be the oldest church in Britain - maybe even the oldest of all Christian churches. Once situated on the banks of the River Fleet and overlooking a Roman encampment, the site is thought to have been used for Christian worship well before the arrival of St Augustine at the end of the sixth century. Sections of Norman masonry and Roman bricks and tiles give some indication as to the history of the Church. However, rebuilding and restoration have obscured any clear view of the past.
The novelist Thomas Hardy studied architecture in London from 1862-67 under Arthur Blomfield, a Covent Garden-based architect. During this period, the Midland Railway line was being built over part of the original St Pancras' churchyard. Blomfield was commissioned by the Bishop of London to supervise the proper exhumation of human remains and dismantling of tombs. He passed this task on to his protégé Thomas Hardy in 1865.
Hardy would have spent many hours in the churchyard during the construction of the railway, overseeing the careful removal of the bodies and tombs. The headstones around this Ash tree were placed here around this time - the tree roots have since grown around the stones. The churchyard ground is so crowded with dead that hundreds of bodies are buried to a depth of twenty-four feet in the older part of the grounds. During excavations to extend the church in 1848, masses of coffins were found packed one on top of the other in endless rows, with scarcely any intervening ground. Problems were encountered as recently as 2004, when more bodies had to be exhumed to make way for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.
A few years before Hardy's time here, Charles Dickens referred to Old St Pancras' Churchyard in his Tale of Two Cities, as the churchyard in which Roger Cly was buried and where Jerry Cruncher was known to 'fish' (a 19th Century term for body snatching and tomb robbery). In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the literary associations of St. Pancras’ churchyard were enhanced: William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin were both buried there, and Percy Bysshe Shelley first met his second wife, Mary Godwin [later Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein], at her mother’s grave in this churchyard.
During the Civil War the church was used as barracks and stable for Cromwell's troops. Before the troops arrived, the Church's treasures were buried for their protection, and then lost, and only found during restoration work in the early 19th Century. One item discovered was a sixth Century altar stone said to have belonged to St Augustine. St Pancras Gardens has itself only recently been restored by the Heritage Lottery Fund. A number of noteworthy people are buried there, including John Soane, JC Bach and John Flaxman.
The tower is depicted in William Hogarth's well-known engraving "Gin Lane" (set in the squalor of the 'Rookery' of St Giles). Meanwhile, Charles Dickens used St George's as the setting for "The Bloomsbury Christening" in Sketches by Boz.
Currently in the midst of a 2.5 year restoration programme funded by the Paul Mellon Estate, World Monuments Fund in Britain and the Heritage Lottery Fund, it will reopen in Spring 2006. London Open House weekend provides the public with the first opportunity to see the restored interior and the church's original east-facing configuration last seen in 1781.
All this holiness had to be topped off with a flying visit to the British Museum.
Saturday 15th September 2007 1. Children are not allowed to bring their own
lunch unless they have been told to by a vision. from Armando Iannucci. Wednesday 12th September 2007 Tuesday 11th September 2007  SellaBand offers a new model for free legal distribution of new music as well as allowing music fans, for the first time, to develop a direct relationship with their favourite upcoming music artists. It’s not a record company, but a facilitator, bringing artists and fans together, and presenting a new economic model. For musicians, SellaBand is free to join. SellaBand was formed by Johan Vosmeijer, a former executive of Sony Music Entertainment and Pim Betist, founder and creator of the SellaBand concept. Says Pim: "As a music lover I was sick of hearing the same music forced upon me time and time again. I wanted to create a concept where the fans can decide for themselves what they were going to hear". Self-recording, unsigned artists upload their own profile page on SellaBand, featuring 3 (or less) demo songs, some pictures and a biography. Artists can use their page to promote themselves, encouraging their friends and fans to direct others to the site, and listen to their free music files. Music-lovers, referred to as "Believers", can purchase ‘parts’ in $10 increments, in the bands/artists they believe in. SellaBand also provides a sophisticated search engine to enable potential Believers to find and identify new artists. Believers have the opportunity to help promote their favorite bands, while at the same time participating in potential future revenues of the artist they believe in. Once 5,000 Parts have been sold, the real action starts for the artist and their fans. With $50,000 in their account, the door closes and it will be no longer possible to purchase parts, or to take money out. However, before their band of choice has reached the target, music fans can switch their investment to another band, decide to invest more money, or withdraw their investment altogether. The $50,000 resulting from parts sold, will be used to record a CD (a collection of 6 songs on average) in a top recording studio, with an experienced A&R/production team to support the band in their effort to do the best job of their first album. Precisely 5,000 copies of the CD will be printed. This so called "limited edition" will be sent to the homes of the Believers who have bought a Part in the band. Says Chris Kimsey, famous record producer and one of the Experts on SellaBand.com: "Music for the people, chosen by the people, supported by the people not some marketing plan to sell us music that we do not want. SellaBand puts value back into the sound of music". Next, the songs on the CD will be available as free downloads on SellaBand's Gallery. This is an all-access area where music fans can find and download music for free. All advertising revenues will be shared equally between Artists (33.3%), Believers (33.3%) and SellaBand (33.3%). Revenues per band are based on their market share on the SellaBand Gallery. Also, a "standard" version of the album will be released. Bands can sell it on their own websites and at shows. SellaBand will offer the product through online retailers and other similar sites. Net profits of the CD will be shared equally between Artists and Believers. In the meantime, bands are free to do what they want - sign a record deal, start their own label, or come back to SellaBand for the next experience. Johan Vosmeijer: "While SellaBand's commitment to record the best possible music will always be 100%, we want the legal commitments for musicians to be as light-weight as possible. Basically, we see SellaBand as a sort of trampoline for bands to use. Ultimately it is up to the artist to see how high they can jump, but we won't hold them back in any way or form." Sunday 1st September
2007 To celebrate the end of summer, Edward threw one of his famous parties.
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