A Harringay Housewife

Autumn on my street

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Fri, 17 Oct 2014 14:48:00 +0000

Coats are taken out of the wardrobe, mornings are chilly and you'd be foolish not to carry an umbrella.

Autumn has most certainly arrived.

Even a short walk down my street is full of colour.

That crazy bottle brush bush!

And the beauty of decay.

Can you see the arrival of autumn on your street.

Just looking

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Fri, 03 Jan 2014 00:13:00 +0000

On Looking: About Everything

There is to See

by Alexandra Horowitz

I like to think that I'm an observant walker. That I notice the unusual, the out of place and the weirdness of everyday life. That I take pleasure in spotting small flashes of extraordinary beauty in my neighbourhood.

However, reading Alexandra Horowitz's book has made me wonder how I would see my streets if I was a geologist, an ornithologist, a toddler.

This book goes some way to telling me.

A 'boring' street is a riot of colour, shape and interestingness to a small boy or girl with little language; it is a dog social network every bit as exciting to a canine pal as Twitter. To someone who know all about beetles, bugs and butterflies, it's a living habitat, literally buzzing. A birder will spot the sounds and traces of our feathered friends. To a geologist it is a map of thousands of years of Earth history - yes, even tarmac.

There were chapters of the book I was less interested in, such as the medical one although there were lessons to be learned about observing people as individuals and not simply obstructions, or the walk with the artist where I didn't feel particularly convinced by what she'd learned (except to never pass up the opportunity to poke your head around an open door) but others, such as observing how people *behave* on the street, I found utterly absorbing.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book and will probably re-read certain chapters. It has certainly inspired me to make a New Year's resolution to take time to stand and stare and to see familiar routes as constantly refreshing and renewing themselves across days, weeks, years.

Or to take a quote from a writer, John Burroughs, mentioned in the book, "To find new things, take the path you took yesterday."

A trip to the top of the Hornsey Church Tower

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 03 Jul 2013 22:05:00 +0000

On Saturday 10th June, the girl and I took a walk up the Hornsey Church Tower. We were not disappointed. Some great views from the top and some very interesting snippets of history uncovered in the tomb trail we did afterwards.

The Tower is all that is left of the medieval church of St Mary when Hornsey was a small rural village in Middlesex. The lower part of the tower dates from around 1500 and there is a particularly fine Tudor fireplace in the basement entrance. Ascending the stairs to the Ringing Chamber, you notice the tell-tale red brick of the Tudor period. On the walls of the Ringing Chamber, boards commemorate notable peals by the bell ringers. The bells were removed in 1968 and melted down to make a new peal for St George in the East, Stepney.

As you climb, the red brick gives way to yellow stock brick used for making the Tower higher in 1833, when architect George Smith created the top of the tower in a Gothic Revival style, passing the timber bell frame in the belfrey tower

and getting a little giddy on the stone steps.

Finally you arrive on the roof, repaired in 1995 and take in the magnificent views of green and pleasant Haringey and beyond.

Towards the city

Wood Green and the Hornsey Gas Tower

Ally Pally (naturally)

and as far as the eye can see.

Back at the bottom, we popped into the chapel where the War memorial, rescued from the demolished Victorian Church, is hung.

and picked up a tomb trail which highlights 11 graves of particular local significance

or which are especially poignant.

We found the tomb of poet Samuel Rogers, famous in his day, but largely only remembered now because of his association with more famous poets.
Mine be a cot beside the hill,
A bee-hive's hum shall sooth my ear;
A willowy brook, that turns a mill,
With many a fall shall linger near.

and a link with slavery days at the tomb of Jacob Walker.

"In America The Faithful Slave,
In England The Faithful Servant"

Refreshing ourselves with teas and home made cakes, we rested in the pleasant gardens before making our way home.

Many thanks to the Friends of Hornsey Church Tower for a super open day. The next open day will be in September for the London Open House Festival. I heartily recommend you find time to visit this lovely spot on our doorstep.

Click on any photo to view on Flickr. Some photos have further info

Sadness and Rejoicing in a Tottenham Churchyard: A walk around All Hallows

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 09:05:00 +0000

In 1851, London finally banned burials in churchyards as parish burial grounds in cities became squalid and unsanitary, due the rapid growth of the population. Burying the dead became the responsibility of out-of-town municipal burial grounds and a burial in the parish churchyard needed special permission. It was the age of the great Victorian necropolis, the sleepy parish churchyard became a symbol of a bygone age.

A 341 bus ride to Lordship Lane and a short walk across Bruce Castle Park brings you to one of the most charming corners of Tottenham and, indeed, Haringey. Nestled between the park and the enormous Tottenham cemetery is the parish church of All Hallows, which has been the site of a church since the 12th century when King David of Scotland bestowed a church upon Tottenham and its people in 1124. Parts of the current church date from the 14th century, with Tudor and Victorian additions and a little bit of 18th century at the top of the tower.

This little sculpture of King David was added in the 1930s, his wife Maud decorates the other side of the door.

Three ages of building: Tudor, 14th century and Victorian.

Surrounding the church is the parish graveyard, a pre Victorian churchyard falling into rack and ruin a little, but nevertheless full of small pleasures for the lover of funerary history. We were led on a walk by Deborah Hedgecock, curator at Bruce Castle Museum on a cold Monday, hoping the rain would hold off (it did). Despite the chill, our party of twenty or so had a lovely time poking around the tombs and gravestones of old Tottenham.

There is much to discover there, but I will concentrate on three discoveries which were of particular interest to me. The first was the tomb of Margaret Lydia, daughter of the Ettrick Shepherd which the Scottish and/or literary types amongst you will recognise as James Hogg. How one of his four daughters ended up in Tottenham is not clear but since it is clearly marked who her father was, Margaret was obviously well known as his child. Sadly, she died young, aged 22 and her elegant tomb can be found on the North side by the church wall.

The second grave was a reminder of the terrible infant mortality suffered before our age of vaccination, scientific advance and universal health care. A grave maintained by Andrew and Elizabeth Johnson contained the bodies of their 10 year old child, and two babies aged 18 and 20 months. This grave is surrounded by similar ones, as whole families are laid to rest often before their grieving parents.

You are also reminded that mothers often followed their infants to the grave following childbirth when you stumble upon this grave of a young mother Ann Deacon (click the link to see a portrait of her by Constable), part of the Quaker family headed by William Hobson of Markfield House, builder of the Martello towers in Napoleonic times. Ann died at 24 at the same time as her infant son.

Many of the graves are too worn away now to read but my third discovery was a small grave on the ‘angel’ side of the churchyard, the South, with a single word Xaipe on it. My classics teacher, OAE, came to my rescue with the translation “rejoice, be happy!” which is a greeting in both Classical and Modern Greek. OAE notes that the 'X' is pronounced 'Chi' as in loch. A simple and elegant epitaph, wouldn’t you agree?

This is a lovely place, with great ancient yew trees, alive with birdsong and full of wild flowers. Stepping back widdershins around All Hallows church from the North, you half wonder whether you’ll find the 21st century back on the south side, or perhaps there will be a few sheep grazing, wandered in from the open fields, and a couple of watchmen keeping an eye open for bodysnatchers.

A short pause to pay your respects at the exquisite and touching Celtic Cross war memorial raised for a son lost at the battle of the Somme and a last look at the Priory, now a vicarage, but once a 16th century farmhouse before heading home (via the wonderful Marmalade cafe in Lordship Lane for a cake and coffee if you have time).

The graveyard needs friends. If you are interested and able to help out in any way with documenting the graveyard then I’m sure Bruce Castle Museum would love to hear from you. I also met Dave Morris on the walk who is resurrecting (pardon the pun) the Friends of Tottenham Cemetery. Look out for further details of that in the near future.

If you’re not too squeamish, Catharine Arnold’s book Necropolis: London and its Dead is a must read.
Click any photo to view larger. More photos on Flickr

Haringey Remembers: Holocaust Memorial Day #hmd

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 21:49:00 +0000

Haringey Remembers: Holocaust Memorial
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Via Flickr:
In the Garden of Remembrance in Bruce Castle Park

'Imagine, Remember, Reflect, React'
Designed by Claudia Holder, Artscope
Sculptor Paul Margetts
January 27th 2008

Haringey Holocaust Memorial Day
National Holocaust Memorial Day website

A Winter walk before sunset at Railway Fields

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 18:00:00 +0000

It's never a bad time to visit Railway Fields but just before sunset on a cold November day is absolutely magical.

I had the place to myself but the bushes and trees were alive with birds and the odd squirrel. Robins, blackbirds, a thrush and a magpie were the birds that I could identify as they flitted frantically. At this time of year, the search for food is a serious business.

There is a special English sort of magic to the light and the landscape at this time of year, like wandering into the pages of a Susan Cooper novel, and that magic can be found just off Green Lanes on our side of the bridge, a walk back in time.

Here the frost crackled underfoot and the leaves were just right for kicking through.

Here and there weird structures hinted at secret inhabitants.

The colours of winter: black and brown, white and green

And then the sun sank behind the trees and houses of Lothair Road Sth

Learning about Working Men's Clubs At Stroud Green and Harringay Library

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 18:39:00 +0000

Learning about Working Men's Clubs
Originally uploaded by MrsEds
Via Flickr:
A talk by Ruth Cherrington, a social historian of Working Men's Clubs, at Stroud Green and Harringay Library. Part of a series of talks by local people on a variety of topics, organised by the Friends of Stroud Green and Harringay Library.

This month's talk at Stroud Green and Harringay library on Working Men's Clubs was another excellent one.

Ruth Cherrington, who at the moment is singlehandedly documenting the history of Working Men's Clubs across Britain on her site Club Historians and through her book, Not Just Beer and Bingo, treated a full house to a fascinating walk from the beginning of the club movement through its heyday in the 60s and 70s to the present day where many clubs are struggling to survive and some are being forced to close.

Some of the audience at Stroud Green and Harringay Library

Ruth focused her talk on some of the many local clubs in this part of London, including Wood Green Social Club and the Langham Working Men's Club on Green Lanes. The Langham began life in a rented shop in Turnpike Lane in 1908, while Wood Green Social Club was forced to be 'dry' because they had a teetotal patron to help them set up in the building, a situation that lasted until 1949! Many local clubs were established by local transport workers, such as the Railwaymen in Finsbury Park.

Ruth admitted that the decline of the clubs is a cause for concern and down to many factors, including the changing nature of leisure but was optimistic that some of the clubs can and will adapt, pointing to the success of Bethnal Green as an example of how clubs can change and thrive again.

Ruth Cherrington

Not Just Beer and Bingo

Much, much more about this can be found at Ruth's website Club Historians where you'll also find links to buy her book, Not Just Beer and Bingo A Social History of Working Men's Clubs. Ruth has also written on History Workshop Online about this topic.

Many thanks to Ruth from the Friends of Stroud Green and Harringay Library for donating her time on a Saturday afternoon to deliver us a brilliant talk.

Not just Beer and Bingo! A talk on the Social History of Working Men’s Clubs

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Sat, 06 Oct 2012 11:21:00 +0000

Friends of Stroud Green and Harringay Library are very excited to announce this talk by historian Ruth Cherrington, author of a number of publications on Working Mens Clubs documenting the history and development of the Working Men’s Club and Institute Union.

The free talk takes place at Stroud Green and Harringay Library, Quernmore Road N4 on October 13th at 3pm. All welcome.

This is fascinating piece of 'history from below' and we're very much looking forward to welcoming Ruth.

To find out more about Ruth's work see clubhistorians.co.uk
Ruth has also written about her work on History Workshop Online: Who Cares About Working Mens Clubs

Ruth's book Not just Beer and Bingo! will also be available on the day.

Ruth Cherrington

Bin disaster area

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 14:18:00 +0000

Bin disaster area
Originally uploaded by MrsEds
Via Flickr:
An apocalyptic scene of bin chaos. Some very intense council engagement needed here.

I reported this one by using Fix My Street rather than the council site simply because I wanted to attach a photo to emphasize the sheer scale of the mess. The Haringey Council site is pretty efficient but the inability to attach photos is a source of frustration.

The reply to the FMS request from LBH included a slightly naggy paragraph about using the councils own site rather than FMS. Fair enough but build an app/site that enables pictures and the ability to add feedback and I will always use it on my smartphone.

Haringey's forays into using LoveCleanStreets seem to have been low key. Not sure if they continue to support it but it at least has an app for smart phones and the ability to add pictures. Personally I didn't like it as I thought it was slower than both the council's own site and FMS.

Reporting should be a process that takes seconds and then people will be more likely to do it.

UPDATE: Thank you for your e-mail received on 28th June 2012 regarding the fly-tip. Your request has been logged under Job Ref No. ****** and a crew will be deployed within the next 24 hours to clear the fly-tip. I can also confirm that the next scheduled refuse collection for Langham Close N15 will be carried out on tomorrow Friday 29th June 2012 and every week thereafter.

Let's hope that the *crew* contains an officer to engage with the residents about use of the bins - surely an enclosed space like this could have large container style bins behind a fence (with a lockable gate?) to discourage fly tippers and casual litterers.

Guerilla Gardening at Frobisher Road, Harringay

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 15 May 2012 18:04:00 +0000

Guerilla Gardening at Frobisher Road, Harringay
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Love this idea for creating a little container garden in the street with a tyre and a handy bollard.

Before the National Health Service...

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Mon, 14 May 2012 18:23:00 +0000

Free Exhibition: Here Comes Good Health! at The Wellcome Collection

Once upon a time in this land, there existed no National Health Service. Just one lifetime away, children died of diphtheria, a terrifying disease that strangles the life out of its victims, measles, and scarlet fever. They suffered with tuberculosis, rickets, anaemia, malnutrition and postural defects. Families were crowded into small terraces, a 1930 report describing 8 room houses being occupied by six families of 15 adults and 19 children.

The 'hero' of this Bermondsey story at the Wellcome Collection is MP for Bermondsey, Dr Alfred Salter, who lost his own daughter aged 8 to scarlet fever, and his wife Ada, the first female Mayor in London. They had a clear mission to work for better public health, including producing 'health propaganda' that aimed to promote messages about cleanliness, nutrition, child welfare and immunisation as well as improving health services for the poor of Bermondsey. Doctors like Salter, who did not ask people to pay for his services if they couldn't, paved the way for a National Health Service, understanding as they did the effects that 100 years of industrialisation and then a catastrophic war were having on the nation's poorest.

The lightbox exhibition at the Wellcome Collection is a reminder of what public health reform meant. To listen to politicians today, you would think that it was about the idle populace trying to get something for nothing out of a state that has better things to do than concern itself with public health and welfare. The narratives of today dismiss this kind of history as sentimental. How could we go back to such conditions in this modern shiny world? Well, judging from recent housing reportage, all too easily, and with such slum like conditions, must come the return of the kind of problems with health that the politicians and reformers of the 1920s and 30s would have hoped to never see again.

Look how far we've come, let's not let anyone take that us back to that past.

Alfred Salter on Wikipedia
Here Comes Good Health! at The Wellcome Collection : watch the films online
Charley your very good health : 1948 government cartoon explaining the Health Act that established the National Health Service

An interesting encounter in the Harringay Passage

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Thu, 10 May 2012 16:41:00 +0000

Some of you are probably aware of my (frankly unhealthy) interest in litter, dumping and rubbish disposal. I am particularly interested in *why* people dump or litter or refuse to sort their rubbish, the ethnography of dumping, as it were.

Part of this fascinating (honestly) topic is the phenomena of scavenging. In Haringey, you will see people sorting through bins, breaking open dumped bags of rubbish or stealing bags of rubbish left out for charity to forage. On the whole, I don't really object to someone taking something I've thrown away if they can make use of it, although I draw the line at the whole charity bag stealing thing.

Today, I got my chance to find out a little more about what and why people scavenge when I came across a man rifling through some dumped bags of junk in the Passage. After giving him my usual speech about not leaving a mess and tidying up, I asked him what he was looking for and why. He quite happily answered that he was looking for things to sell. "You wouldn't believe what people throw away", he said, "Gold, mobile phones..." There was clearly nothing of such worth in this pile of bin bags but he pocketed some CDs, some jewellery and other bits and bobs. I asked him where he was going to sell this stuff. "Car boot sale," he said cheerfully. He revealed he was Italian and when I asked him if he did this kind of foraging often, he grinned and said "No, only when I need to."

After taking everything he wanted, under my beady eye, he tied up all the bags, and then I helped him put them all in a wheelie bin (which I knew was not a problem as the house is currently empty. I even wheeled the bin to the gate to make sure it would get emptied in the morning).

The encounter left me thinking yet again how we can find a way of allowing the kind of people who aren't likely to be glued to Freecycle or who might not have the means to get them any other way to take what they need from what others have rejected. I've not really come up with a solution yet but I've added a little more information to my 'field notes' in my ongoing investigation into rubbish.

Lessons from Weimar or what to do with those dead utility boxes instead of filling them with litter

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 10:35:00 +0000

I just want one of these:

Guerilla Bench: "Beziehungskiste" from rugwind on Vimeo.

Got to be better than this:

Who, what, why? Explained here

With thanks to Tony Bovaird on Twitter who shared the link

The Chewing Gum Artist of Muswell Hill

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 10:32:00 +0000

While perusing this fascinating article (read it, it's good) on the costly problem of chewing gum litter on Edible Geography, my eye lit upon the mention of Muswell Hill and the artist Ben Wilson's solution to those hideous little patches.

Ben's tiny pavement works of art are beautiful and celebrate his locality and its people.

A recent New York Times profile of him noted,

his pictures have become a chronicle of the neighborhood, a representation of its residents’ whimsies, sorrows and passions. Among the pictures dotted outside the post office, for example, are an R.I.P. painting for a postman and a picture of a tiger in honor of a postal worker who is from Sri Lanka.
To mark the closing of a Woolworth’s store a couple of years ago, Mr. Wilson crowded every employee’s name onto a piece of gum, along with a good-luck message from the managers. He painted another in which the employees thanked their customers. The two pictures are still there, even though the store is gone.

Read the NYT profile here
Ben has a Flickr group dedicated to his work.

Photo by Mathew DC on Flickr

I love this wonderful idea as much as I love the pothole gardener!

Harringay Passage-Street Audit 14th April 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 19:56:00 +0000

Harringay Passage-Street Audit 14th April 2012, a set on Flickr.

Local residents with Living Streets identify how Harringay's pedestrian superhighway could be improved and the experience made more walking friendly.

My photos look at signage, junctions, street furniture, DIY security and unhelpful home improvements.

Comments and suggestions can be found beneath the photographs on Flickr.

A full report from Living Streets will be produced in the near future.

Spring for the Warhammers

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 19:25:00 +0000

We are being treated to a real show now the weather is warming up.

Some pretty faces deserve a closer look:

Forget me not Harringay

Wall to wall wallflowers

Do drop by and visit. You may even find me out there wielding watering cans. Say hello!

Originally posted on Harringayonline.com on March 31st

Easter free

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 21:01:00 +0000

Free Museum: British Museum

A bit obvious maybe but finding myself in the neighbourhood with my five year old and with two hours to spare, we thought we'd pop in. We were directed to the families info station where we were supplied with a programme of events which included making shields, playing African board games and medieval storytelling. We were also given the choice of two trails and we chose the one around the African galleries. As if we weren't enchanted enough by the volunteer who shared bangles, cloth and donkey bridles with us, the African galleries were a delight. The trail led us from river goddesses to ironwork from Benin via gorgeous textiles to modern sculpture made from old machine parts and giant pots. For a five year old who loves colour, shape and animals, this was a wonderful experience. We felt in need of a story, so we sprawled in front of the medieval story teller and enjoyed old tales of foolish boys some of whom get to marry the princess and some who get eaten by wolves. T'was ever thus.

The British Museum is fast becoming my destination of choice with or without five year olds. Many other London museums seem a little crazy at holiday time but the British Museum seemed to be able to absorb us all, young and old.

Free book: The Outer Circle: Rambles in Remote London by Thomas Burke

A little literary time travel is always fun, especially if it takes you back in time to your own neighbourhoods. It allows us to see the area we live in as it was, giving us a sense of local history, it gives a little frisson of excitement as long dead train stations or music halls jump out of the page like a glimpse of dinosaurs in Jurassic Park and and also enables to understand that though the faces and buildings may change, how places are perceived and judged seem to change very little over the generations.Thomas Burke takes us around the 'outer circle', the suburbs that ringed London in 1921: Hackney, Harringay, Crouch End, Lewisham, Eltham and so on. The fun in this is that the North London 'burbs that he wanders around are my stamping ground today and it is most amusing to note that very little changes.
Some examples:

While Highgate's motto reads: "It looks so bad", the motto of Tottenham is "Who cares?...There is a heartiness about [Tottenham] that comes refreshingly to the visitor from Highgate, where heartiness is forbidden"
"The beauties of Wood Green are not to be taken in a random eyeful. Rather a loving search must be made for them"
"Wood Green is the original Jack Jones: Bowes Park is Jack Jones 'come into a little bit o' splosh' "
"Harringay, I learn from the local guide, " is and has been for many years a suburb with a distinct individuality of its own"

Burke is an amusing writer, gone and forgotten now I suspect, but with a good ear for dialogue and a careful eye for detail. He takes delight in the more working class areas of London, while finding little of fun and gaiety to be had in the stuffier parts, such as Highgate:

Hideous stillness broods over all. Providence has given these people pleasant bread, and they accept it with a scowl, as though it were a stone. That mean, middle-class quality of " reserve " has led its people to applaud, as something in itself admirable, a sulky demeanour towards the outer world...There has been much talk lately of a Middle-Class Defence Union. Believe me, these people need no Union for their defence. They are quite capable of looking after themselves

Attention must also be paid to when this book was written, which was one of the things that drew it to me. Comic writing can reveal as much about the society it makes fun of as any serious history book. It opens at the Armistice. London is celebrating the end of a pitiless and destructive war. It is full of service men and the young celebrating. Burke mentions the "collapse of the servant market" which happened as young women released from the drudgery of domestic service by war work looked for jobs in offices, shops and factories rather waiting on the middle classes in suburban villas. Servants or lack of them fill the conversation of the anxious Highgate middle classes in much the same way schools are the topic of choice at their dinner tables now. Burke thinks the lack of servants is a liberation for the middle classes.

At last the hard-up professional man has a socially legitimate excuse for not burdening his home with the Unwelcome Stranger

In another scene which tells you a great deal about the attitude to government post WW1, Burke leaves one of his wandering pals selling Lloyd George dolls

He planked down his little case, and opened it, and produced a small dummy figure of Mr. Lloyd George, carried out, as the dressmakers say, in American leather. He seized this figure by the middle, and pinched it, when it shot out an impudent tongue of red rubber, upon which was printed : " A land fit for heroes."
He had given it but two pinches, when the land- lord bought one, and carried it across the bar. When I left Studdy, he had a clamouring group of ex- Service men about him, holding out their fourpences for a copy of their particular Cenotaph.

This book is available as a free ebook (some scanning errors and one page repeated but nothing to spoil your enjoyment) from the Internet Archive: http://archive.org/details/outercirclerambl00burk

Recommended for all dwellers of the 'burbs from Tottenham to Tooting and all stations East. Photo Grand Parade, Harringay early 20th Century from Harringayonline.com

Free website: Little Bird Deals

Bit of a cheat this but it is free to join. Group discount sites are getting a bit of a bad name but this family orientated site enabled me to purchase half price ticket to see Echoa at Sadler's Wells, probably something I wouldn't have known about without their offer. Recommended for people with families in London or who come into London a lot. p.s. I have nothing to do with the site, just think that its a useful service.

Littlebird.co.uk

Free for three: Invasion and Refuge

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 19:25:00 +0000

Have managed to skip February in this blog but that's probably down to the fact that my OU course began and I've been totally immersed in early 20th century history.

Today I found a way to combine a free activity with my studies by attending a free lunchtime talk at the Wiener Library.

Free talk: 'Testimonies/Témoignages' - Documenting the Stories of Refugee Children Rescued into Switzerland During World War II

Samantha Lakin has been researching the histories of refugee Jewish children who escaped into Switzerland. In her talk, Samantha gave us a brief glimpse into the lives of two of the survivors who managed to join the all too small group of children who were permitted to cross into Switzerland, aided by French adults who risked their lives to help them pass.

Lone children under 16 and families with children under 5 were, in theory, given refuge in Switzerland, but in practice these lone children had to rely on luck and sympathetic border guards to grant them safe passage to the orphanages and welcome camps that were set up by organisations like the Salvation Army, the Red Cross and Jewish groups to look after the children. Young children were expected to walk for several days, often badly shod and ill clothed through the mountains before crossing barbed wire and a no man's land patrolled by armed guard to get to safety. Older children were sometimes given babies to carry. Even if they made it, there was no guarantee they would be permitted to stay.

We were also reminded that these kids were the lucky ones. So many children and their families were rounded up from 1942 and deported to the death camps. The survivors themselves made clear in their testimonies that they were not badly treated and were grateful for their escape.

Painful to contemplate that these atrocities were committed in living memory. Even more painful to be reminded by a short poetry reading from an Iraqi refugee academic that war continues to make children refugees and victims.

Earlier in the week I paid a visit to the new Furtherfield exhibition in Finsbury Park.

Free exhibition: Being Social

Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, blogs, Flickr...so many ways to share all our waking moments, the highs and lows, the funny and the tragic. Chances are, you are all using some form of social media, even if only membership of Harringay Online.

Does this new technology change us? More and more, people, especially the young, are sharing intimate details and feelings online, where they can be accessed easily by strangers. Being Social, the new exhibition at Furtherfield’s gallery in Finsbury Park explores our relationship with social technology and asks questions about our willingness to share so much of ourselves.

All the exhibits are fascinating; these are the ones that particularly provoked a reaction from me:

‘Kay’s Blog’ by Liz Sterry is a reproduction of Kay’s bedroom based entirely on reading Kay’s blog. Liz lives in England, Kay is a teenager living in Canada. Thinking about photos and thoughts shared via social media, it makes you wonder how easy it might be for someone to do the same with your own domestic world.

A tweet wall is a stream of consciousness. Tweets collected around Finsbury Park on a certain day expressing many emotions (and quite a lot of thoughts about football) have been captured by Jon and Ali. Reading them altogether is like suddenly being granted telepathy and able to hear everyone’s thoughts at the same time. Twitter is sometimes referred to disparagingly as the ‘hive mind’, but this exhibit suggests the opposite, a raging sea of disjointed thoughts and feelings.

We’ve all heard of people who create multiple identities online, maybe some of you reading this have more that one online ID. Karen has turned that idea on its head by allowing multiple personalities to create her. Invited people are permitted to interact with others on the internet as Karen. Karen doesn’t hide behind by anonymous ids, she is hidden because you can no longer be sure that the person you are interacting with is Karen.

Finally, what if you want out? What if you decide that you want to disappear from social media altogether. It’s not as easy as you’d imagine, but the people at modd_r have built a machine to commit web2.0 suicide to definitively delete all social media profiles. If you go will you miss it? Will you be missed?

I was intrigued and challenged by this exhibition. As an enthusiastic user of social media and a great believer in its use for collective action and inclusion, it provoked me to thinking about how we help a generation who has barely known a world without social media to understand its power and pitfalls and build a relationship with the new technologies that allows them to use it safely and effect the change they want with it, without being ruled by it...and even giving them a way out of it if they have had enough.

Being Social is open until 28th April Thurs-Sat 12-3 in the Furtherfield Gallery, Mckenzie Pavilion, Finsbury Park.
Free workshops every Saturday 10-1 (booking advisable, info@furtherfield.org)
Furtherfield

Free book: The Invasion of 1910 by William Le Queux

A piece of alarmist popular fiction from 1906 that imagines the German invasion of England, notable as having started its life as a serial in the Daily Mail (the Mail promoting fear of foreign invasion, how unusual!) who went as far as dressing up their newspaper sellers as Prussian soldiers and posting fake headlines about Germans marching on the Home Counties.

An extract from it was printed in my primary sources book for my course, but I had to admit to being tickled by it as it imagines that the surprise invasion would be via Suffolk (Lowestoft) my county of birth. The list of towns and villages taken by the invading forces read like a list of my days out as a kid, so although it isn't exactly high art, I couldn't help turning the pages.

Although it turned out to be fantasy, the book also gives a little shiver of recognition that it could have been my great-grandparents fleeing for their lives from their little rural backwater in East Anglia away from an invading force, a situation that unlike most of Europe, we in England are fortunate enough to have avoided for hundreds of years. We should always be grateful for that.

Available from Project Guthenburg or as an audiobook from LibriVox (American reader)

The Cloud Factory

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 22:38:00 +0000

Heard this tonight by accident, sung by June Tabor.

These are the words...or, I should say, this is the poem.

The Cloud Factory
(Bill Caddick)

My father worked in the Cloud Factory,
He'd come home wreathed in dreams each day
My Mother took his cloudy clothes
To brush the threads of dreams away.
She'd scold and say "you and your dreams,
They're just for kids and fools like you."
But Father he'd just wink his eye and smile and say "Are you sure that's true?"

Chorus
My Father taught me how to sing. He sang that dreams were everything,
Can't be bought and can't be sold, More than silver,more than gold.

My Mother thought him fanciful,
She used to chide him all the while,
But me, I thought him wonderful,
Do anything to see him smile.
I used to hear him singing low,
The words are with me to this day:
"You have to hold on to your dreams or else they simply slip away".

The last time I saw him ill and dying,
The only time I saw him cry.
Too late for dreams to come true now,
As he watched his last clouds rolling by.
Back home she opened windows wide,
And let the clouds out strand by strand
Til all but one had blown away and I caught and kept it in my hand.

My Mother doesn't do much lately
With no more clouds to clear away.
since they closed the factory down
No dreams seem to drift this way.
I found her sitting alone and still,
at first I thought her fast asleep.
But Father's coat lay in her lap and around her feet the dreams lay deep.

Chorus
She said "He taught me how to sing......

Sometimes I pass the disused factory
And gaze into the empty sky,
and if I let the fancy lead me
A dream or two comes drifting by.
Oh I'll teach my children how to sing,
To sing that dreams are everything,
Can't be bought and can't be sold,
More than silver, More than gold.

Spring is waking up and putting her face on

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 17:13:00 +0000

Hints of Spring are everywhere.

This tiny iris is blooming in our commmunity planter

and this clump of pretty little snowdrops were sighted in a Wightman Road front garden.

Three free to see

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 14:50:00 +0000

January is going by in a bit of a blur as routines kick back in and I find myself back on various sidelines holding the kids' coats or helping out at the Citizen's Advice Bureau office but I have managed to find three free things to see this month that I loved.

Free photography

Don McCullin at Tate Britain

This display of Don McCullin's landscapes, portraits, and photos of Berlin in 1961 stays with you for a long time. As a history student, the pictures of the building of the Berlin Wall and the armies facing off against each other across the barricades are utterly compelling. This felt like the start of World War 3 and the tension is apparent in the faces of the army personnel. Meanwhile people pose for photos and stand and watch the action in their Sunday best. I wonder what Karl Marx and Freidrich Engels would have made of a whole square being named after them.

Don McCullin's industrial landscapes are also important. These landscapes of Yorkshire, Liverpool and Co Durham remind viewers of the enormous human cost to the Industrial Revolution. People are dwarfed, landscapes are grimy and grassfree, children go about their play in front of great piles of scrap metal or belching factories, boys play foorball on waste ground littered with rubbish, mothers push prams down roads that appear to lead into wasteland. This is the other side of heritage, the true face of the industrial landscapes so soon to be transformed into places of no industry or even cleaned up museums to a disappearing past.

I was also taken with Don McCullin's portraits of homeless people in the East End. He tells us that he wants to us to look into their eyes and really see them and his photos certainly force us to do that but the picture that stays with me is the one of a group of men standing, all asleep on their feet as though they've been switched off by an invisible hand.

Tateshorts: Don McCullin (video)

Free exhibition

Boxed at The South Bank

Planning your funeral might seem a bit like a morbid pastime ( I have decided on some of the music for mine though) but this exhibition of special coffins from coffin makers in Ghana and Nottingham makes it somehow less Victorian and a bit more,well, fun.

Plain wooden boxes are so 19th century. These days, you can get 'planted' in eggs, replica cars, (small) Viking longships, or my favourite a giant corkscrew.

The coffins from Ghana include a cocoa pod, important for the local economy and a small Mercedes, a symbol of success and wealth.

Go have a browse. You'll probably find yourself musing on what kind of box would best symbolise your life. Could they make a coffin out of a giant bar of chocolate?

Free sculpture

Virginia Dare at St Brides

A beautiful little sculpture that is tucked away at the back of St Brides Church in Fleet Street. Made by Clare Waterhouse (1999) to replace an original (stolen) marble representation, Viginia Dare was the first English immigrant child born in the Americas of parents who were married in St Brides in 1585.

She was born on Roanoke Island on August 19, 1587: "Elenora, daughter to the governour and wife to Ananias Dare, one of the assistants, was delivered of a daughter in Roanoke". The child was healthy and "was christened there the Sunday following, and because this childe was the first Christian borne in Virginia, she was named Virginia"

Frost

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 09:56:00 +0000

The blooms in our community planters are suffering from the hard frost.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Harringay

Library books: feeding their addictions

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 16:14:00 +0000

Library books: feeding their addictions
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Via Flickr:
At the age my kids are, they don't read books, they ingest them. Not literally of course, but they nibble away at books, returning again and again to the pages they like. They don't want just one book on Dr Who, they want them all. They're not always sure what they like, so library books enable them to develop their tastes and experiment with new flavours. They get to sit among books, take them off shelves, flick through them, read snippets all under the approving gaze of a librarian.

For as good as book shops are for kids, at the end of the day the booksellers must sell stock and so it's hard not to hover and make noises about 'not spoiling the book' etc. The good librarian, on the other hand, understands that a child's love for books has to be left to grow unmolested by fussing grown-ups.

Every single literature addiction I have began in a library from the moment I met and fell in love with Sherlock Holmes in a tiny (now under threat) library in Ipswich. My parents did not deny me books, they loved them too but they couldn't have kept up with my voracious appetite any more than I can keep up with my kids' today.

Closing libraries is closing minds, denying opportunity for the dreaming child to find soul mates in books, keeping the child in their place being fed what they grown-ups think they should be reading. You can't measure a return on investment on a library, how can you measure developing imagination, knowledge and empathy in our children and ourselves in a piechart?

I am most fortunate that Haringey have given a commitment to our libraries. I'm not having to chain myself to railings or weeping outside watched over by police as they empty the stock and board up the windows as is happening across the country, but each one of those closures is another bitter blow and a terrible legacy for this government that must have their Victorian forefathers spinning in their graves.

Wild Winter's Day in Harringay

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:25:00 +0000

Rainy and windy but still quite exhilarating. Winter's dark and wild beauty reveals itself.

Staying in and keeping it free

noreply@blogger.com (Liz) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 11:22:00 +0000

December played havoc with my plans to get out and about. The first two weeks seemed to be mainly about shopping for presents, the last two weeks about looking after the kids, playing with new presents and enjoying lounging about the house. Still plenty of free stuff to enjoy if you don't get out and about though, thanks to libraries and the internet. Here's three free things that I enjoyed.

Library book: Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann

Great big German family saga that charts the decline of a bourgeouis family in pre-unification Germany. While not usually a fan of family sagas, this one is a cut above. Highly readable, interesting characters and big themes: sacrifice, death, decadence, conflict between business and art. The central character that binds the book together is Tony who suffers bad marriages and disappointment in her attempts to be socially acceptable but remains a sympathetic character who endures long after the males of her family are driven into the grave by work and poor health.

Free Film: Secret Agent by Alfred Hitchcock

An early movie by Hitchcock starring John Gielgud who you forget was quite the handsome young movie star with cheekbones that could cut butter (as the expression apparently goes), Madeleine Carroll as the chirpy English girl whose enthusiasm for espionage is soon tested and who delivers the fast moving dialogue with aplomb, Robert Young as the baddie German spy with a nice line in patter and the great Peter Lorre overacting like mad as the murderous General. The wit, the dramatic angles for the action and above average characterisation mark this out as a Hitchcock and well worth 86 minutes of anyone's time.

Free ebook: After London by Richard Jeffries

I downloaded this onto my new toy, an e-reader. Described by the Observer as a strong candidate for the most beautiful of all Victorian novels, the fact of Jeffries being a nature writer shines through both in his scientific description of post apocalyptic England and the descriptions of the hero's voyages which teem with detail about the birds and landscapes he passes through. The strongest parts of the book are the descriptions of environmental collapse in the first part and Felix's trip through the nightmare landscapes of an extinct London which are truly gripping.

I was less enthralled with the descriptions of future feudal societies, although there is some interest in Jeffries proto-socialist philosophising about the corruption of the nobility, the inability of the lower classes to overthrow a society that they recognise to be rotten and which enslaves the vast majority of them and the eulogising of a society of workers (the Shepherds) where men and women's work is of equal value, sharing and hospitality are the norm and war is for defence rather than glory or gain as in the other societies Felix encounters, which, perhaps, were the parts that were said to give William Morris such inspiration for his News from Nowhere in which "absurd hopes curled around... [his]... heart as... [he]...read it."