Weekend in London, March 2022

Last weekend was wonderful :) I spent it in London with my friend, on a weekend away we were originally meant to go on two years ago. On Friday evening I enjoyed a catch-up over pizza with my oldest friend - we've known each other since we were 5, and will both be turning 30 in the next few days! And then I spent Saturday and Sunday with another friend on this little trip, enjoying the sunny spring equinox weekend in a couple of the city's large green parks, and some great food, before a breathtaking concert on Sunday afternoon.

First - the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew!

Neither of us had been to Kew Gardens before so we were very excited! London traffic meant we arrived an hour later than planned but thankfully there were still parking spaces (just), and we got inside the gates quickly. And yaaay we're in a lovely green park full of grass and trees and flowers! Of course the trees are still mostly bare, but there were daffodils, and glorious pink magnolia, and marvellous cherry trees just bursting with beautiful blossom. It'd be a wonderful place to have on your doorstep as a local, somewhere to go and while away a few hours or a whole day, with a book and a picnic in good weather.

One of the first things we came to was The Hive, an interactive art installation that represented a beehive. From the outside it looked like an enormous roll of wire mesh, but from it emanated a low vibrating hum and orchestral music. Inside, a thousand LED lights flickered in time with the music and humming, which were created to mirror the fluctuating intensity of vibrations produced by bees communicating with each other, as recorded in one of Kew's own beehives. It was a bright sunny day so the lights weren't particularly obvious, but standing in the middle of the installation and being surrounded by that loud vibrating hum was quite impressive. It was a cool example of environmental interpretation, which we've been covering at college this year, something interactive and immersive that engages different senses. The Hive itself it was surrounded by a wildflower meadow (which obviously doesn't look like a wildflower meadow at the moment, but will be a visual and olfactory feast in a few months time) and little boards giving information on bees and the importance of wildflowers.

Wonderful big old trees. Victorian glasshouses full of exotic plants. (Both of us smiled as we entered the tropical section of the Princess of Wales Conservatory - the heat, humidity, plants, and smell of it all reminded my friend of home in India and me of visiting my aunt in tropical Queensland.) Carpets of daffodils and little purpley-blue flowers that weren't bluebells. A pagoda built in the 1760s. A treetop walkway with views over the park and all the way to the City. A lake. Woodland walks and open parkland. Ring-necked parakeets. Cherry blossom! Oh and a tasty lunch - I had a quiche made with mushrooms, spring onion, and nettle. (I must go forage some nettles and make something.)

I had a mooch around the gift shop, hoping to find a hand lens - small little things that anyone can use to look at plants and insects in greater detail (or rocks, or jewellery, or archaeological artefacts, etc.). But to my astonishment they didn't have any!? I thought that Kew Gardens, which must want to encourage people to have an interest in plants and studying botany, would sell the simple accessible tool that is the hand lens. They didn't even have magnifying glasses. Tut tut.

By 4pm we were pretty tired from all the walking around, so just sat on a bench for a while looking at the trees and daffodils in the sinking sunlight, and we left around 5pm. It was a really lovely day, and we only saw half the park. Definitely a place to go back to, especially at a slightly later time of year when the trees are in leaf and there's more growing.

Cherry blossom and the Palm House at Kew

For dinner, we went decidedly out of our way to Southall, to an authentic Punjabi restaurant called Raunka Punjab Diyan. There was an Indian sweets shop next door so we went in there first and my friend bought a selection. The restaurant was busy, and loud, and I was the only non-Indian person in there; my friend asked if I was happy to stay or if I wanted to go to the quieter Turkish place next door. Had I been on my own I probably wouldn't have been quite comfortable, but an Indian restaurant full of Indian people is a sign that it's good! As a food lover, going to a local, family-run restaurant where they serve authentic and delicious dishes, which you don't get in typical Indian (or any other) restaurants that cater to British/tourist tastes, is one of the best experiences.

My friend recommended several dishes, and ordered for us (the staff interacted with her as she speaks the language). To start we shared paneer shashlik - marinated paneer cheese chargrilled with green peppers, onion, and tomatoes. Then we shared two mains and sides: sarson da saag with makki di roti (cornbread roti), and daal makhani with garlic naan. All was delicious! Sarson de saag is a mixture of mustard leaves, spinach, and other greens, cooked down with spices then pureed and traditionally served with a makki di roti. Daal makhani - black lentils and kidney beans slow-cooked with tomatoes, butter, and spices - is one of my favourites anyway... but oh my goodness this one was incredible! In contrast to the chili heat of the saag, and other daal makhani's I've had, the daal was mild and had a lovely sweetness to it, and it just tasted wonderful. Yummmm :)

The sweets aka desserts sounded amazing, so of course we got some. I ordered ras malai, a chilled dish of a soft cheese dumpling in saffron milk, and my friend had dudh jalebi, coils of syrupy deep-fried batter served in a bowl of hot saffron milk. Both were utterly delicious! Mine was lovely and light and refreshing, the milk ever so subtly fragrant. We also ordered some aloo tikki chaat - potato patties with chickpeas in a spicy sauce, chutneys, and yoghurt - from the 'snack' part of the menu to take away with us in case I got hungry later in the evening... which of course I did not after the filling meal. We left it in the cold car overnight, and ended up having it for lunch the next day. And, for a change, I was enjoying myself so much that after the starter I forgot to take photos of the food! Haha.

It's sad we can't really get anything like that closer to home. In Southampton, my friend says Sanjha in Shirley is good, more authentic than most Indian restaurants, and there's an Indian sweets shop in St Mary's, but neither are as good as ones in London. I wondered if I would be able to try and make ras malai at home but my friend said Indian sweets all take a lot of time and effort to prepare. But I might still try and make something similar, perhaps with ricotta. And the sarson da saag has given me an idea of what to do with those big bags of spinach that I usually end up wasting half of because I can't use it all in time - I'll try cooking it down with onion, garlic, ginger, and spices, blend it to a coarse puree, and serve with a flatbread. Decent healthy snack or lunch :) 

Holm oak in Greenwich Park

We stayed in a Holiday Inn Express in Limehouse. Parking was £20 so the man at reception suggested parking in a nearby residential street instead - but after driving around my friend couldn't find such a place, at least that felt safe, so pay £20 we did. In the morning, breakfast was included so I enjoyed some scrambled eggs, baked beans, and a Cumberland sausage, plus a yoghurt and a croissant, though I was feeling quite dehydrated from not drinking enough the day before (there weren't any water refill stations at Kew that we could see), so was disappointed to find no bowls of fresh juicy fruit, or even canned fruit salad, to rehydrate with, though I had a few glasses of water of course.

Our plan for the morning was to go to Greenwich Park. Wandering down the avenue of trees towards the Royal Observatory I was very happy to see a magnificent holm oak - an evergreen species from the Mediterranean - its limbs spreading out in a wide circle around it, a real parkland oak. (Parkland trees grow outward as well as up because they are surrounded by open space, whereas the growth of trees in woodland is more upright. This can give you a clue as to the history of a place, e.g. if you see a parkland tree in a wood, or an upward-reaching tree in an open park.) 

The Royal Observatory, which has the Prime Meridian marker, was closed, but we could see the line through the gates and I noticed it went down a wall and onto another footpath - so we got to see and stand on it anyway :) One foot in the eastern hemisphere, one foot in the western hemisphere. We continued down the hill and went to see Cutty Sark - the world's last surviving tea clipper and one of the fastest ships of its time, built for the China tea trade and launched in 1870 - which was impressive to look at from the outside. I do admire the sailors, who had to clamber up the rigging in the middle of the deep dark ocean as the ship rolled about in the waves. Ambling back through the streets I was tempted by food several times - at the stalls in Greenwich Market (a cute little covered market), at a gelato shop, and at a bakery that filled the street with the scent of baking cinnamon buns. Alas the latter had only just come out the oven and weren't ready for sale yet, and the staff couldn't tell us how long it would be, so we didn't wait, and made our way back to the park. 

The reason for going to London in the first place was to see the matinee of 'Planet Earth II Live in Concert' at The O2 on Sunday afternoon. I had been given tickets as a birthday or Christmas gift in 2019, and the show was originally booked for March 2020, then for obvious reasons rescheduled twice. So it was great to finally go! I should have done some research beforehand and pre-booked parking, as we ended up paying an absurd £36 to park for the afternoon. We ate the aloo tikki chaat for lunch, which was of course very tasty, and had some of the Indian sweets my friend had bought, which were really nice. After the ridiculous stressful faff that was collecting the tickets and getting in, we could just sit back, relax, and enjoy the concert.

Planet Earth II, the TV series, was of course stunning. I think it was the first Attenborough series that I watched in full, so it's stayed with me and remains my favourite, though of course they're all amazing. I especially love the soundtrack - composed by Hans Zimmer, Jacob Shea, and Jasha Klebe - and the main theme is one of my favourite pieces of orchestral music, probably in part because of its association with the spectacular cinematography of the series; it always sends a shiver down my spine and brings a smile to my face. The concert was basically screenings of some of the more well-known clips from the series, on the big screen, without Attenborough's narration but with the soundtrack being played by a live orchestra. It was spine-tingling, breathtaking, and we both sat there in awe, absolutely loving it. Science presenter Liz Bonnin hosted, coming on stage in between clips and talking about them (and of course the importance of protecting the natural world), with the series' Executive Producer, Mike Gunton, who could tell us about how they made it, which was cool. While Sir David Attenborough is brilliant, the actual production teams are the ones who envision and create these spectacular documentaries. Each clip is a mammoth task and the teams do astonishing work.

After that fantastic concert, we went to find the gelato place within the O2 - I had been wanting some ever since passing the shop in Greenwich. It was of course going to be stupidly expensive, but oh well. I chose a scoop of hazelnut, and my friend got white chocolate-pistachio; we each tried a small spoonful of the other's and her's was amazing, I should have chosen that instead haha. Afterwards we got an early dinner in the Design Quarter's street food hub just outside the O2; I got an Indian naan wrap with minced lamb and salad, but sadly it was very spicy so I regretted my choice a bit. But once back at the car I thoroughly enjoyed finishing off the two Indian sweets I'd had half of at lunchtime. My favourite was a bright orange cardamon-flavoured syrup-drenched ball called a ladoo. 

And that was it, homeward we went. This weekend in London, enjoying so many great things with my friend, was just so lovely, really special, and was a great way to have an early birthday celebration :) I know this has been a long post, but it's more for my memories than for an entertaining read, haha. But thanks for reading if you have.

Winchester Young People's Climate Assembly

Back in November I spent a Saturday participating in the Winchester District Young People's Climate Assembly, organised by a number of local groups and held in the University of Winchester's Business School. Excitingly, it was the city's first Citizens' Assembly, a group of people brought together to learn about, discuss, and make recommendations on an issue or set of issues. The aim was to explore what young people in the District, aged between 16 and 30, want to see in a zero-carbon future and think should be done to get there faster but fairly. 

Power. Intersectionality. Action. We were charged to remember these three things over the course of the day. That is - that we have power collectively; that climate justice cannot happen without social justice; and that it is vitally important to actually take action.

(If you don't know what intersectionality is, it basically means that various factors such as race, gender, sexuality, age, disability, poverty, etc, overlap. They exist on their own but compound to form unique life experiences and challenges, and determine who has power and privilege in our society and who does not. Anyone wanting to tackle a social justice issue must consider and try to understand the multiple ways in which a person or group may be impacted, and make sure they are included in discussions and listened to. For example, people on low incomes and people of colour are more likely to be exposed to pollution, less able to afford organic and sustainable products, and less likely to be invited to join the conversation (or to have the time, money, or energy to attend) and have their say in creating change. So, climate justice is totally interwoven with social justice, it cannot happen without it.)

After the introductions, the day kicked off with talks by expert speakers on energy, transport, homes, food, and lifestyles. After that, we had about an hour to discuss on our tables what we thought were the main challenges around those topics. After lunch (which was a delicious vegan buffet held in the new sustainable West Downs Centre next door), a local Councillor talked about the roles of Councils and how they can be influenced, and then we each chose one of the five topics to focus on for the afternoon and moved to new tables, where in groups we discussed actions that could be taken to help reach a zero-carbon future faster. The day then rounded up with everyone voting on the suggested actions, and the organisers and guest Councillors giving responses.

I warn you - this is not a concise review of the event, it is long post of my notes taken over the day. Obviously there was a lot of information to take in, all of it fascinating, so I couldn't note down every point. I wish I had a copy of the slides used by the speakers, but that's probably a good thing for this post, as it would be even longer if I had that extra info, haha.

Expert talks

Transport and liveable places (by Sustrans South)

• Older towns and villages that existed before WW2 are/were more livable - they were small, walkable, and all or most amenities residents would need could be found within the centre. That is not the case now, and developers don't often consider this when creating village-sized swathes of new housing. 
• Electric vehicles will still produce around 14 tonnes of CO2 over their lifetime, 10 of which is just to make it. Nor can they be made fast enough to fulfill the demand for new cars by 2030 when the no-new-fossil-fuel-cars law comes into effect. We have to reduce our use of private cars.
• Lots of our infrastructure doesn't work for us.
• Demographics are changing - e.g. young people are driving less and having fewer children - but infrastructure isn't changing to reflect that.
• We need to rethink public spaces. Make places equitable and liveable first. "Healthy Streets". Create neighbourhoods, designed around people not cars. (The speaker said about how she lives on a busy road, an unpleasant and unsafe place to stop and have a chat with neighbours - as a result, they don't know each other, there's no sense of neighbourhood and community and no interest in making the area nicer.)

Sustainable homes / Building design (by Guy Derwent Architects)

• We need intelligent design with passive sustainability. This takes into account the effect of natural resources like sunlight, wind, and vegetation on the site when designing the building's lighting, heating, and ventilation systems etc, and takes advantage of them. E.g. face the main living area south to get the most light, even if that means the houses on a street aren't in a straight line, and place a sun shade over windows at an angle that will shade the interior during summer and let light in during winter. Or orient houses so that gardens get the most light, better for growing food. Again, designing places for people first rather than what is going to be most profitable.
• The average lifespan of a building in England is just 50 years.

Food (by Winchester Food Partnership)

• Eat less but better meat - locally reared, grass fed, high welfare, etc.
• We need less protein than we think - the average woman needs 50g a day.
• Plant-based diets are not necessarily more sustainable or environmentally-friendly. As with everything, it depends where and how a product was made, what resources were needed, how the farmland was created and is used, how the people working there are treated and paid, the supply chain, how much the product is processed, how and how far it is transported to the consumer, etc.
• We need more community composting.
• Do we focus on encouraging dietary changes or reducing food waste?

Lifestyle changes (by the founder of Earthian Zero-Waste Shop)

• Plastic can only be recycled 2-3 times.
• Less than 9% of plastic ever produced has been recycled.
• We need closed-loop supply chains, for example where suppliers take back empty containers and refill them. (Circular economy.)
• There is only 1 landfill site left in Hampshire (at the moment), a lot of waste goes to energy recovery plants (waste is burnt to produce electricity).
• Best to worst: Refuse (say no), Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot (bin).
• Maybe start by making one change per month to make it more manageable.

The talk on energy was given by a rep from Wessex Green Hub, but I didn't take any notes on that for some reason. She mentioned Doughnut Economics, though, which is a cool framework for sustainable development. And the idea of local energy production, such as lots of miniature power plants each generating and providing energy to a street or two or three.

Challenges

Sustainable and affordable housing

• Acquiring long-term thinking and strategies instead of focusing on short-term profit
• Evaluating current building use more
• Making sustainable development more economically viable for developers
• Getting developers to engage with and consider the needs and wants of the public (e.g. what amenities would be useful in a new development, gardens/allotments on the roofs of blocks of flats or offices, communal spaces to foster community, etc.)
• Getting the government to address things from the top down, e.g. put into law building regulations such as double insulation, triple glazing, solar panels, heat recovery, rainwater harvesting, green roofs etc for every new building
• Developers are set in their ways. Target councils, housing associations, local organisations to make decisions, change their policies and standards for what developments they approve, put pressure on from the grassroots level.

Food

 - How to support those on lower incomes to buy better

 - How to eradicate the discourse that continues consumption (not just food)

 - How to make people more open to diet change

Lifestyle changes

 - How to scale up sustainable products to supermarkets

 - How to support employers and local businesses to be sustainable and support sustainable working

 - How to celebrate small changes rather than dismiss as "not good enough"

Energy

 - How to reduce energy consumption

 - How to decentralise energy production and make it more local and zero-carbon

 - How to better share energy use

Transport

 - How to improve public transport - cost, reach, accessibility - cheap and fast

 - How to incentivise main demographic users of private cars to use public/clean transport

Council duties, responsibilities, and how to influence them

District/borough councils (in this case Winchester City Council) are responsible for council housing, planning for businesses and homes (use of land/buildings, appearance, landscaping, environmental impact, etc.), the Local Plan, housing benefit, housing the homeless, household waste collection, car parks, leisure spaces like parks, and air quality. County Councils are responsible for roads, highways, and pavements, cycleways, waste disposal, planning for minerals and waste, flooding, and buses.

Regarding energy, Councils can do what they like on their own land - so for example there is a lot of potential for County Councils to generate energy on the roofs of schools and care homes. With transport, councils can have policies but no decision-making powers because most public transport is now privately-owned. With buildings, again councils have their own buildings, and can set standards for the design and construction of buildings to ensure health and safety. With food, WCC has the Environmental Health Department which monitor restaurants, noise, air quality, etc, and HCC buy food for schools and has some farms.

So how to influence the councils?

• Official ways - Write to councillors. Attend Full Council meetings, and make a deputation (10 minute talk) on any topic to the County Council, or ask a question to the District Council (however you must be registered to vote in that area). Attend a Committee meeting and make a deputation on an agenda item. Petitions. Run for election.
• Unofficial ways - Campaigning (best as a team - recruit, build case including surveys). Get lots of people to write to councillors. Write to papers. Media/social media.

Proposed actions

Transport / liveable places: Ban cars in the city centre, but maintain a single bus lane and access for hired mobility scooters and timed deliveries. Subsidise buses for everyone (including free bus travel for under-16s and Universal Credit recipients), paid for by increasing residents' parking permits and workplace parking levies based on vehicle emissions. Improved and continuous street lighting for safety, solar-powered and with motion-sensors. Increase extent of bus routes outside of city centre, especially out to rural communities. Cycle highways linked to network of cycle lanes.

Energy: Infrastructure upgrades for social housing that includes district heating, electricity for charging EVs, internet - cheaper if done all in one go. Open up roofs of public buildings for community renewable energy projects. Change Planning to ease installation of renewables. All council parking to include wide availability of EV charging. Visible and celebrated generation of renewable energy and supporting information at all schools and hospitals.

Housing: Student housing needs to be warm, dry, and affordable - create tenant unions, regulate landlords, have rent caps. [Frankly that should apply to all housing not just student.] National regulation on new builds to create sustainable homes - Councils need to lobby central government. Affordable retrofitting with well-administered grants and accessible financing. Increase council housing stock and make them pleasant homes. Counter NIMBYism - more brownfield site development, avoid wealth-influenced decisions.

Food: Community campaign to educate and change behaviours on food waste. Household food waste collections by Council (e.g. Eastleigh Borough Council do this). Council incentives to encourage more sustainable food businesses with more accessible opening hours. Local organisations and councils to encourage more sustainable diets by offering sustainable choices and education (e.g. by serving those foods). Council to develop a Local Plan for local food (e.g. including more community gardens/allotments and spaces for growing food).

Lifestyles: Free access to green spaces by public transport during school holidays. Audit empty spaces in towns to give room for sustainable businesses and homes. Councillors actively engaging with young people more. Funding youth climate activities and pathways into environmental jobs. Smarter planning to allow people to live their lives locally. Divest pension funds from fossil fuels.

After the participants voted on the actions - we were given 10 sticky dots to place on our favourites - the organisers and guest Councillors reviewed them and made a response. It was mostly very positive and encouraging, but a local Councillor also gave reasons why some of the actions would be really difficult to do - which was good and useful, and largely appreciated, he didn't do it in a dismissive way.

...

Obviously, there will be reasons why all of those proposed actions would be difficult or have a negative impact on a group of people. But they're a starting point for discussion, compromise, and taking action. Whether or not recommendations made by Citizens' Assemblies are followed is up to politicians, but CAs are increasingly being used and listened to. We in the UK are technically a 'democratic' country - and we do indeed have freedoms and rights that many countries across the world do not - but in reality there is hardly any public participation in the way our country is run, we have very little say and almost no way to hold the people in power to account. Citizens' Assemblies are an important part of a more democratic future. Along with more action.

If you've read this far, thank you! I know it's a long post. I really enjoyed this event, and I hope they organise future ones, and bigger ones with more than 25 participants and voices from a range of backgrounds. The organisers will be presenting the list of actions to both local councils soon, and letting us know their response. It was so energising to be around like-minded people who really care about these issues too. Especially people younger than me, many still teenagers, passionate and no-nonsense - the sort of people who, when somebody says "Well, no it's not fair but that's just the way it is" respond with "So make it fair!". When the local Councillor made his response at the end, two girls on one of the tables spoke up and said that actions like the ones proposed need to be taken, no ifs, no buts. They need to happen; adults - councils, businesses, governments, normal people - need to start making them happen, standing up to powerful individuals and corporations. There have been four decades and more to take the actions needed and it hasn't been done, and now we are the ones being left to clear up the accumulated mess. We're simply telling you what needs to be in place for us to start doing that. We've had enough of the myth of unlimited growth, and profit over people and planet, and exploitation, and rampant consumerism and short-term thinking and ecological destruction and all of it. We want a better world. 

There is widespread apathy, and a big reason for that is simply the scale of the problem. It is enormous, too big for most of us to see as we go about our daily lives with the more immediate stressors that occupy our thoughts. It is enormously complex, like a vast web, and solutions to one issue will create conflict elsewhere. It's terrifying, and our minds shut the issues out so we don't get overwhelmed by them. Western society wants to be able to tackle climate change while still retaining the lifestyles and level of comfort that we have, but that's just not possible. We have to change, dramatically. The society and systems humanity have created are mind-blowingly complex. But that doesn't mean they can't be changed. We have to band together, step up, and find a way forward.

Thanks for reading!

Cornwall, October 2019, day 5

Saturday 26th - Boscastle and the All Hallows Gathering

My friend had suggested this particular week for me to go down to visit her because at the end of it was a pagan-y, witchy event held nearby, and we're both into that sort of thing. It was the sixth annual All Hallow's Dark Gathering in Boscastle, home of the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic. I didn't really know what to expect, as the event's website didn't have much detail about the schedule, but was intrigued and looking forward to it. I didn't notice the archive of blog posts about all the previous events - those would have given me a much better idea, haha.

The morning was a lazy one - I stayed in bed and read my book while my friend and her parents watched the Rugby World Cup Semi-Final in the lounge; I did end up slightly regretting that, as it turned out to be a rather impressive and historic match, but oh well. In the afternoon we all drove up to Boscastle, just a few miles away, and met up with my friend's aunt and her family who were on holiday as well.

There had been storytelling sessions in the museum earlier in the day, but we arrived too late for that. The Morris dancing started at 3pm outside the museum so we walked down there to watch it amongst a good crowd of witches, pagans, folky folks and curious members of the general public. It was windy and cold! But thankfully, surprisingly - magically - the rain which had been falling all day stopped just 40 minutes beforehand and held off for the rest of the event. There were three Morris groups: Wreckers Border Morris, based locally in North Cornwall, Beltane Border Morris, based in Dartmoor, and raven-masked duo Huginn & Muninn, from London. The latter, named after Norse god Odin's two raven companions and inspired by Scandinavian myths and legends, were unique, funny, and a little bizarre, at one point replacing their raven masks with enormous black opaque balloons. There was an MC who explained the context before each dance, but the wind and the rushing river were too loud for me to hear him from where I stood. It was good to see some teenage members among the dancers, too.

Morris dancers outside the Museum of Witchcraft & Magic

I enjoyed all the dancing, but my favourite Morris side was definitely Beltane, I loved them immediately. Inspired by the myths, legends and wilds of Dartmoor, they're darker and have more intensity than most Morris I've seen (which isn't loads, I grant you); there are no bells or handkerchiefs or white outfits, it's sticks and drums and roaring voices and black tattered clothes and blackened faces, their fiery energy delving into something ancient, deep, and mysterious. I'd join them in a heartbeat if I could.

Some Morris sides, like Beltane, practice "blacking", blackening their faces, which causes controversy because many people assume it has something to do with race. It doesn't. In addition to being an ages-old disguise which brings a sense of anonymity, mystery, the supernatural, and the dark side, it's actually a way of remembering the oppression of working classes. In the past, poor land labourers used to perform dances or mummers plays to raise money for food or other necessities, and would blacken their faces so they wouldn't be recognised and punished or victimised for begging. More horrifically, following the activities of a couple of large, organised groups of poachers who blackened their faces to try and avoid identification, in 1723 the British government passed the "Black Act", introducing the death penalty for 50 criminal acts (bringing the total number of capital offences up to around 200, the highest number for any country, ever). From then on, people could be executed just for blacking their face or wearing a mask, among countless other small things like fishing in a private pond or damaging a hedge, and the legal rights of defendants were almost non-existent. While we in the UK thankfully no longer have the death penalty, dire poverty still exists, as do laws largely protecting the interests of comfortable property owners, and the poor are often victimised and powerless. So Morris dancers painting their faces black is a way of remembering, bearing witness, and standing in solidarity.

I felt bad for Cwmni Gwerin Pontypwl, the little group of traditional Welsh dancers who performed when the Morris dancing took a break at 4, as most of the audience dispersed. I'm sorry to say it just wasn't interesting enough to hold my attention in the chilly wind and I went with my friend and her family up the street to get something to eat, to tide us over till dinner. The chip shop had a little marker plaque on to indicate how high the 2004 floodwaters had reached; it was above everyone's heads. The Morris dancing resumed for a while before finishing around 5pm, and we went up to sit in the pub and warm up. Before the lantern procession at 6pm, we crossed the little river and walked down the length of the narrow harbour, past the two 16th-century harbour walls, to the inlet, and stood there for a while looking out at the glimpse of sunset on the horizon between the cliffs. A seal popped its head up a few times.

Boscastle's harbour inlet

Boscastle harbour

The procession would make its way down from the main car park at the top of the village to the museum, so we waited by the museum, where at 6pm there appeared Penkevyll the Lands End 'Oss and her Teazers. The 'Oss was a sort of hobby horse, a decorated and caped horse's skull carried on a stick or pole by someone hidden beneath the black, yellow-ribbonned cape, and the Teazers led her in a dance (https://youtu.be/hTt2h8vdA2s). I loved the drums, tribal and trance-like. Another 'Oss wandered around through the crowd dressed in a bright blue cape decorated with seashells and led by a Rider walking in front holding a rein. It was interesting. The dance and drumming continued as a sort of summons until the procession arrived, bringing Penkevyll's "bone sisters" the Mari Lwyds, from Wales, to join her. One was cloaked in white with red ribbons, but the other was the creepiest of the three - standing like seven feet tall, cloaked in black, the skull painted black and decorated with white swirls and dots, little red lights in the eye sockets, a fake pigeon also with red eyes perching on top of the skull, and dark blue fairy lights wrapped around the top of it like some sort of crown.

Penkevyll the 'Oss and her Teazers

The Pwnco Ceremony followed. Penkevyll and her Teazers went into the museum, and the Mari Lwyds stopped at the door to beseech entry. I was too far away to hear or see the goings-on, but the Welsh dancers accompanying the Mari Lwyds spoke traditional ritual verses in Welsh, which were responded to in Cornish. Eventually they were successful and joined Penkevyll in the museum to bless it for the coming year.

Outside in the twilight, lit only by a few flaming torches around the circle, next up was storytelling duo Stone Soup. They were good, energetic, but unfortunately the wind meant that I couldn't hear most of it so couldn't follow the story. It was something about a soldier who meets a stranger who convinces him to work for him for seven years, looking after his cooking pots but not being allowed to look inside them. All I can really remember is the repeated refrains of "Chop, chop, chop! Feed, feed, feed! Bubble, bubble, bubble! Sweep, sweep, sweep!"

The overcast sky meant that it was almost full dark by this point. When the story finished and the event's MC started to say something about a dark apparition sometimes seen in deepest Dorset, "an eerie, unholy rhythm involving drums, fiddle, and voice commenced" (quote from the event's blog - it's a cool description and I couldn't have put it any more interestingly). Glowing red smoke started billowing on the hillside above the performance area, from which rose up a huge head, human-featured but horned and otherworldly. The Darkest Ooser slowly made its way down the hill to the gathered crowd, led by a thick chain in the hand of a creepy attendant who was shrouded in black and carrying a skull-topped staff. After moving around the edge of the audience, its huge red eyes staring, the Ooser stepped back to watch the rest of the proceedings.

A beautiful prayer-like song was sung. Due to the strong wind and the un-amplified voice, I couldn't really hear it, but I've since discovered it was The Traveller's Prayer written by folk musician John Renbourne (https://youtu.be/BRxK6tl4-1M). Then one of the Beltane men stepped forward. Holding a staff at arms length, pointed towards the crowd, he moved slowly in a clockwise circle, piercing the night with an eerie, slow, two-note whistle - whistling being a largely forgotten way of calling the spirits. When he completed the circle, he stood facing the crowd and, in a strong voice which carried to those of us stood at the back, began to speak:

"Spirits of this place - spirits of land, of sky, spirits of sea, of cliff face and tree - spirits of this place, be our witness. Hear our hearts. Hear their quiet murmurs. On this day, at this time of the year, we stand on a cliff edge, on a precipice, looking into the dark..."

We were reminded that it is not just our ancestors who ask us to remember; so too do "the wise women, the witches, the cunning men, the keepers of the old ways" and the wild old gods of the land. We are called to acknowledge and remember not only our human ancestors but also our fellow creatures, "our wild cousins, our cousins who fly, our cousins who crawl, who are dying in their droves... those species who have breathed their last breath... and those who will not make it through this winter...". We were invited to make a simple ceremony of remembrance - whispering the name of a lost loved one, followed by the words "Ancestor, I honour you."

The speaker finished his moving address with a final few rousing cries of "Ancestors, we honour you!" and threw back his head in a ululation. The spell of silence was broken for a moment as many joined in with a cry or cheer, and then another spell was woven as the drumming and chanting began: "In my blood, in my bones, I hear your voice, I hear your call. Ancestors dance with me, ancestors chant with me, I hear your voice, I hear your call..."

That drumming and singing, pulsating and hypnotic, could have carried on for a long time, but after maybe five minutes someone managed to bring it to a close and the MC announced Beltane back into the circle for their Fire Dance. Each year they have a special guest stand in the middle of the circle during the dance; this time it was two young men who run an occult shop in New Orleans and had travelled all the way over here just for the Dark Gathering! Very cool. As was the dance.

Beltane rounded up the evening with a final dance called "Haccombe to Death" - in which they actually held aloft flaming torches, which was awesome - and then lined up to sing "Leave Her, Johnny", a sea shanty sung by crews prior to leaving a ship at the end of a voyage.

And that was it. Everyone dispersed, going indoors to get warm and eat. Somehow it felt so much later than 7pm. But the event had been wonderful, enjoyable, moving, meaningful, authentic and real, and I loved it!

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At 9pm, after a very welcome dinner of beef stew, we walked back down one last time to the Museum of Witchcraft & Magic. While there were signs of life spilling out from the pubs and hotels in the main area of the village, the dark and deserted harbour-front was a little disconcerting, the only noise being the rushing waters of the river. But the museum was open till 10pm especially for the Gathering. It was really interesting, albeit - due to the age of the building, the late hour and darkness outside, the low lighting inside, and some of the exhibits/information - a little creepy. I haven't been in there before, so I'm glad I had a chance.

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Weeeeell, I wasn't expecting to write so much about this, haha. Also, in case you were wondering, my memory is not this good. I've only been able to recall and write so much about the evening from reading the event organiser's blog post and looking at the photos and videos on there. If you'd like to see what some of it was like, someone put together a great video of the second half: https://youtu.be/4h7m-Ded1_g. It's long, but here are the start times for specific clips in the video if you want to look at any in particular:

• Procession: starts at the beginning
• Penkevyll, her Teazers, and the Mari Lwyds: starts at 05:00
• Pwnco Ceremony: starts at 06:20
• Stone Soup storytelling: starts at 08:15
• The Darkest Ooser: starts at 12:35 (skip to 14:55 to get a good close-up)
• Traveller's Prayer: starts at 15:40
• Calling the ancestors: starts at 17:15
• Ancestors chant: starts at 24:40
• Fire Dance: starts at 28:50
• Haccombe: starts at 33:20
• Leave Her Johnny: starts at 35:55

Alternatively, scroll through the two blog posts on the event website to see some good photos:
https://allhallowsgathering.com/2019/11/10/dark-gathering-2019-part-one/
https://allhallowsgathering.com/2019/11/18/dark-gathering-2019-part-two/

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The Dark Gathering was a brilliant way to end my trip down to Kernow. On the Sunday morning I was on a train again, homeward bound.