Secret Garden Party 2011

I realise its been a long time since I posted anything so I guess I'll dive straight back in with my Secret Garden Party adventure.

Arriving on the Thursday, after a little panic about what you could take in alcohol-wise and desperately hiding bottles of spirits in tents, we got in a set up camp. After struggling to find somewhere nice to camp we settled next to the family camping area which turned out to be nice a quiet.

After we settle me and Clare decided to go for a little pre-wonder whilst we waited for two more friends. SGP is held around a beautiful boating lake with a small river that runs off it and parallel to one side.

Whilst looking at some interesting art that hung from a willow next to the lake a rowing boat crashed up near the edge. The tangled boaters tried to free themselves whilst shouting at pass-byers to get in! Falling into the festival spirit I scooped Clare up and waded out to the boat. We were welcomed with cheers, hugs and lots of port (the wine, not the nautical term).


Once we docked up (with 6 more people in the boat that they had set off with), we carried on our wonder. There were so many things to look at and do, I can't believe how the festival has grown in 5 years (since my last trip).

Here are some highlights to shorten this post:

"Things":

• Lost Horizon's - A separate camp area with a Sauna in a yurt, plunge pool, showers, live music, nakedness and the best chai at the festival
• Stair Party tower - A spiral stair case made from single bed frames with mattresses all the way up
• Soft cushion room - a room completely filled with tons of soft things
• Folk in a box - a tiny room with one flickering light, one solo artist, one audience member and one song (I was played an amazing acoustic cover of Tom Waits's Martha)
• An old Ferris wheel and Helter skelter - It felt like being "at an adults playground"
  
• Lots of commissioned art all over the site
• Laughter workshop - I have never felt that naturally high from just laughing, very rewarding and very fun.
  
• Benji the dog - Our next tent neighbours funny little poodle dog
• The Dragon fly - They had built an island in the middle of the lake with a disco on it. The only way you could get there was by boat and on the Saturday they set fire to the whole thing with a huge firework display and balloons with LED's in them that lit up the night sky
  

Music:

• The Correspondents, now with 100% more flying on a rope
• Blondie, accidentally bumping into our ship mates from before
• Martha Tilston, wonderful and heart warming
• Nathan Ball, beautiful acoustic set in Lost Horizons
  
• The Destroyers, dance till we almost died, hay and sweat

And now for some pictures (taken by Clare)

Our Impromptu ride

Impromptu Friends

Shadow box

Stair Party!

Cushion room

Ferris wheel at night

More photo's here http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v39/popadom3/SGP%2011/

Capitalist Man Day

So I did something quite unlike my normal ideals/activities, I spent an evening/morning feeling very much like a male capitalist (possibly with an American twang?). By this I mean I was invited over by two friends of mine (James and Hector) to watch the Sunday night Superbowl.

Now normaly I might have made my excuses, but a combination in not seeing these two friends and a bit of curiosity about the game led me to accept the invitation. The closest I had come to the game in the past was (admittedly technically close) being a radio engineer when the NFL took over Wembley for one game. In this instance I couldn't really see the whole pitch from the sidelines and didn't actually understand any of the rules, it was also very cold and stressful and I would have preferred to be in a lot of other places at the time.

Anyway, I arrived early evening and after a quick game on the xBox it was time for the pre-match babble. For any sport I have watch I generally find this part of the coverage to be unessiary and long, however it was a useful time for Hector too try and teach me the rules whilst James cooked us all a meal.

To me the game was likened to Chess and this in someways I would agree. I would personally go for the war analogy, but either way, it shows that one of the important aspects is stratagem and foresight. A lot of play seems to involve well thought out pattens of some unit... players clearing a path for other players or some players causing a distraction or diversion whilst another bit of play is carried out somewhere else on the pitch. I think I could go as far as explaing the general rules of play but, then again, there is wikipedia's for these things.


Still, at about halfway through the 2nd quarter I realised, with a beer in one hand, two friends, a good meal in belly and an actual lose understanding of whats going on, I had started to get really into the game. I started cheering at good catches and making those little impressed sounds when a particular strategy actually worked well.

It was ashame in the end that the team Hector and James were supporting lost, even though it was an exciting game. I could see though, that this game is very much TV orientated as a specator sport. I should imagine being in the stadium with out all the slow-mo replays, cheep cold beer, toilet two rooms away and central heating, that the game could seem a little tedious/boring considering most games last around the 3-4 hour mark.

After the game we proceeded to get thoroughly baked and play video games till 9:30 am (which has completely thrown me of any sort of regular sleep patten again). Still all in all I had a really fun evening with two friends of mine and actually felt like I learnt a little about a sport.

The Obstruction Society

6 Friends meet
An idea based on "The 5 Obstructions"
3rd meeting
3 Glasses of red wine
4 Works of art handed round
1 Hour
1 green pen
"Twice in France"
1 Dictator
1 flip of a coin
18 obstructions


I'll explain this later... Promise

Facebook

I'm not normally one to repost other peoples material on a blog, but I really want people to see this:

Stuck

My flat mate pointed out that I have started adding "As it were" to most sentences. Its quite annoying trying to not say it now, but it reminded me of the days where everyone used to add "like" at the start of sentences.

Has anyone else had any funny words that they found or have been pointed out to say a lot?

I wonder why a group or a word can get so ingrained in ones head?


In other news I feel a little stuck and lost. I have had a week of no work (though there should be some more by the coming wednesday) and I haven't really found the energy to meet up with people or do much with my spare time except sleep. I really don't want to get back into my terrible habit of sleeping most of the day and waking up in the evening.

I'm a little stuck with my creative side as well, which isn't helping. I haven't really taken a picture in awhile, I can't think of anything to paint, and I feel a little stuck on my Ukulele (I can play a few songs OK, but not well, and some of the more complicated ones are starting to frustrate me).

I had a very vivid and pleasent dream last night. I dreamt I met someone who I had an increadibley deep conversation with. But she ran and I became quite worried somthing awful had happened to her as when I last saw her she looked a little off the rails and a bit opressed by people (It was more of a feeling than something I saw, you know how dreams can be). I set out to find this person and got my closest friends involved. We looked all over a section of countryside that was pretty similar to where my parents live except it had a giant underground/metal works at the top of a hill. For awhile we though she was dead, but I found a message on couchsurfing asking for some advice on some things I had also previously struggled with. In the end we did find her and we all had a long talk, I held her hand and petted it whilst my friends told stories of hardship and recompense. Then I woke up and things just weren't as pleasant...

Traveling times

So I've decided to try and make some plans for some much needed travelling. I've had the travelling itch for quite a few years and something always seems to get in the way. Well I think its about time I stopped making excuses and actually vaguely planned something so I'll do it.

I plan to travel out to Japan on 1st July. I'll have about a week in Tokyo to explore on my own before Tasha (A close friend who is currently working out there) finishes. Then we plan to hitch-hike down to Kobe and (depending on when we get there) catch a ferry across the sea to Tianjin. From there we can work our way to Beijing which is where we'll begin the epic journey that is the Trans-Siberian railway.

I'd like to think I could stop of somewhere on the way to Japan (Maybe India?), but it really depends on how much money I have saved and if I manage to get a decent price for selling my VW Camper (which I'll be really sad to see go, but I feel like I don't have the time to give it decent attention).

So for the moment I have to bide my time save some money. Which isn't going exceedingly well as I realised there are a few things (for one) I need for my camera if it is to travel with me (e.g. a Monopod, Camera armor, and a decent second lens). Still I have a bit saved already, I just have to be a bit stingy money wise for a bit...

Protests

Last night me and my two flat mates ended up in a very heated discussion on politics (pretty much out of the blue as well). One of the interesting things that was brought up was protesting, due to the recent jailing of a (stupid I may add) protester.

One flat mate thought that protesting should be controlled as it partial is in England. He reasoned this, that recently the Nazi party wanted to do a rally in Germany. Obviously the government and pretty much everyone else wasn't very happy about this and they were banned from doing so. In the end they took the city to court and they were allowed too.
This is a interesting reason, BUT in my opinion I agree that they should have the right. Freedom is all or nothing, you can't pick and choose who gets to exercise their freedoms, otherwise its not a freedom.

Example B:
Whilst this is pretty amusing I also find it a fairly valid back up for the freedom to protest. So you don't like what some protests are protesting about? Well protest against them then... Obviously this could get out of hand in a silly manner, but the point is that just because someone holds a placard or is protesting doesn't mean you/anyone agrees with them. You still have to stand up for what you believe in though.

Speaking of which, here are a few of my pictures from the recent Education Cuts marches in London

Oh yes! I forgotted to say...

I have also joined the tumblr revolution=. So I'll be using that for posting my photo's that don't really have much to do with anything I would write etc.

http://trees-are-weird.tumblr.com/


In other news, I really need some decent sleep. Only slept about a total of 5/6 hours in the past 2 days... Which has had some odd... effects. (Such as 'doing a Rezi' "I really like this song, though I've heard it too often... oh wait... there's no music on...").

I think I might post one of my incredibly terrible short stories on here, just to fill the gap.