Twitter. It's a pretty dividing concept. You've got one group, the Tweeters themselves, who see it as a way to speak to the world. Whether it's to network, promote, or just to get something off your chest - you can guarantee that somebody, somewhere will be listening. Then there are those who see it as nothing more than egotism. Bragging in 140 characters or less. But last night, Twitter stepped up. All over the country, people were doing their best to report riot news in their area. As the night went on, and more of London was burned to the ground, I, for one, couldn't leave my Twitter unattended. It seemed that it was the quickest way to find out exactly what was happening, with real people reporting fresh bouts of violence before any news organisation even got wind of them. And now the same social networks that have been blamed for this pointless violence are becoming the very platform for it's clean up. In the wake of all this destruction, there are some embers of hope. Maybe there is more good than bad in the country.
Here is just a snippet of what Britain had to say last night:
@BrianMcHarg: fill the water cannons with pink dye, spray the rioters en masse each night, round up the pink folk the following day. simples. #londonriots
@Mattedmondson: My best mate, Tom, is a police man. He's barely slept for days and is out there now fighting this. It's all so unnecessary. #londonriots
@fleetstreetfox: Dear police and fire people on the streets tonight: from the rest of us, thank you. #Londonriots
@cripesonfriday: Can they stop calling it unrest, sleeping on a sofabed in a draft with a lumpy pillow is unrest.
@clarkville: The fire brigade are, as always, true fucking heroes!
@DavidAllenGreen: I think we should have another royal wedding. That will do the trick. Harry and Pippa, your country needs you...
@swanidotcom: The Youth of the Middle East rise up for basic freedom. The Youth of London rise up 4 HD ready 42" Plasma TV #Londonriots
@SamAtRedmag: poor local shopkeepers who've worked their whole lives & are now watching it go up in smoke. No-one will help them rebuild #londonriots
@GarethAveyard:How embarrassing to be human.
@keirshiels:Moral of the week: Must heed warnings of The Kaiser Chiefs.
@sueperkins: Dear Dave, fancy putting that Peroni and focaccia down and getting THE FUCK back to the country you apparently run?
@MrsLRCooper: How come Cameron cut short a work trip to Africa to deal with Murdoch but won't cut short his holiday to deal with this crisis. #perspective
@Divine_Miss_Em: This is simply awesome PR for the Olympics..
@GasolineShorts: My friend is currently cowering in her flat above shops in Hackney with her three month old baby. Anyone who thinks this is fun is a twat.
@gracedent: that's not sticking it to the police. it's just fucking over the person who's sold you milk every day for years.
@paulkingsnorth: When you blame looting and burning on 'poverty' you insult everyone poor who has an ethical backbone and knows how to use it. #londonriots
@itisTwin:London..... We're better than this man....
@caitlinmoran:I notice no-one has made a joke in my timeline in the last two hours. I have never seen this before.
Tuesday, 9 August 2011
Monday, 8 August 2011
My gap three weeks: diary of a first time traveller.
This summer, instead of frittering away my life watching back to back episodes of Jersey Shore, I decided I would actually do something a bit worthwhile and interrailing, which is pretty much travelling around Europe by train. So, me and two friends loaded our size-of-a-small-room backpacks with paraphernalia for just about any eventuality, including a waterproof poncho (hello,boys) and boarded a plane to Amsterdam.
And from Amsterdam we went to Den Haag.
And from Den Haag to Paris.
To Barcelona.
To Nimes (which was an accident, more of that later).
To Venice.
To Lljubljana.
To Bovec.
To Krakow.
To Prague.
And while it was an absolutely amazing experience, as three novice travellers we made a LOT of mistakes. Pretty much every mistake you can make, actually, from booking hostels on the wrong day to accidentally hanging around waiting for a night bus in a well-known red light district. So, for those of you off on your own adventures, first of all, lucky you. And second of all, here are some of the things I learned on my Gap Three Weeks. Take heed.
1. Learn about exchange rates. In Krakow, we didn't understand that 25zl equal 1 Euro. So you can understand our embarrassment when we got 40zl out of a cashpoint then galavanted about town expecting to live like kings.
2. READ THE SMALL PRINT ON YOUR TICKET. In a manouvere I don't think I will ever understand, I ripped off part of my ticket before going because I thought it was a questionaaire (yes, really. And no, I don't know why). Turns out that without part, the same part that was lying on my bedside table some 230 miles away my quote: 'ticket becomes invalid' end quote. Trust me, that is not a fun fact to be dealing with when you're nursing an Amsterdam sized hangover.
3. Pretending to be asleep on trains doesn't get you out of paying. They'll just shake you right awake.
4. Invest in a sleeping bag. Some of the hostels are pretty grim, and the only thing you want to catch when you're away is the travel bug.
5. Be prepared to sleep in some pretty strange places. Some of my personal highlights included pitching a tent on a train platform (seriously, very good idea) and a rather unforgettable night in Nimes. We'd spent a day trying to get from Barcelona to Marseille, but ended up stranded in Nimes when trains stopped running. Our initial plan? Just stay out all night and get the first train home. That was soon scuppered when we realised that tumbleweed wouldn't look out of place blowing around Nimes town centre. So, we set of trying to find a bed for the night. Several 'no vacancies' and '150 euros a night' later, we found ourselves in a cat-themed hotel. And after some VERY jammy convincing, ended up with an, shall we say, ususual set up. A woman staying in the hotel was on her own, but had booked a room for four people. No word of a lie, we ended up sharing her a room with her. Her in one bed, two of us in another, three in a double and one on the floor (we'd picked up three other backpackers on our way). She didn't speak a word of English. We don't speak French. She woke up every hour on the hour to have a cigarette. We were a bit drunk off beer and exhaustion. One of the more awkward nights of my life...
6. Read a map. In Barcelona station, we saw a sign about international trains saying: "Zurich, Venica, Talgo." So, we marched up to the ticket office, and asked for three reservations to Talgo. Instead of reservations, we got a blank stare. So I continued: "I think its in Switzerland." The ticket lady burst out laughing. It was out turn to look blank. Once she'd calmed down she told us that Talgo is actually not a Swiss holiday destination, but a type of train. To put it into perspective, that would be like an English person asking to go to Arriva. Not my finest hour.
7. Go to places you would never usually visit. In fact, go to Slovenia. It may not sound it, but it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been. See for yourself.
8. If you're planning on going to Barcelona, go there last. Seriously, that place is harder to get out of than Alcatraz.
9. The train journeys can be really long. Use your time wisely. Like us? We decided to write a rap about our travels to the tune of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme tune. Things are much funnier on 24 hours with no sleep.
10. Sounds cheesy, but above all just relax and enjoy yourself. Things might not always go to plan but you can guarantee you'll end up in some pretty amazing places.
And from Amsterdam we went to Den Haag.
And from Den Haag to Paris.
To Barcelona.
To Nimes (which was an accident, more of that later).
To Venice.
To Lljubljana.
To Bovec.
To Krakow.
To Prague.
And while it was an absolutely amazing experience, as three novice travellers we made a LOT of mistakes. Pretty much every mistake you can make, actually, from booking hostels on the wrong day to accidentally hanging around waiting for a night bus in a well-known red light district. So, for those of you off on your own adventures, first of all, lucky you. And second of all, here are some of the things I learned on my Gap Three Weeks. Take heed.
1. Learn about exchange rates. In Krakow, we didn't understand that 25zl equal 1 Euro. So you can understand our embarrassment when we got 40zl out of a cashpoint then galavanted about town expecting to live like kings.
2. READ THE SMALL PRINT ON YOUR TICKET. In a manouvere I don't think I will ever understand, I ripped off part of my ticket before going because I thought it was a questionaaire (yes, really. And no, I don't know why). Turns out that without part, the same part that was lying on my bedside table some 230 miles away my quote: 'ticket becomes invalid' end quote. Trust me, that is not a fun fact to be dealing with when you're nursing an Amsterdam sized hangover.
3. Pretending to be asleep on trains doesn't get you out of paying. They'll just shake you right awake.
4. Invest in a sleeping bag. Some of the hostels are pretty grim, and the only thing you want to catch when you're away is the travel bug.
5. Be prepared to sleep in some pretty strange places. Some of my personal highlights included pitching a tent on a train platform (seriously, very good idea) and a rather unforgettable night in Nimes. We'd spent a day trying to get from Barcelona to Marseille, but ended up stranded in Nimes when trains stopped running. Our initial plan? Just stay out all night and get the first train home. That was soon scuppered when we realised that tumbleweed wouldn't look out of place blowing around Nimes town centre. So, we set of trying to find a bed for the night. Several 'no vacancies' and '150 euros a night' later, we found ourselves in a cat-themed hotel. And after some VERY jammy convincing, ended up with an, shall we say, ususual set up. A woman staying in the hotel was on her own, but had booked a room for four people. No word of a lie, we ended up sharing her a room with her. Her in one bed, two of us in another, three in a double and one on the floor (we'd picked up three other backpackers on our way). She didn't speak a word of English. We don't speak French. She woke up every hour on the hour to have a cigarette. We were a bit drunk off beer and exhaustion. One of the more awkward nights of my life...
6. Read a map. In Barcelona station, we saw a sign about international trains saying: "Zurich, Venica, Talgo." So, we marched up to the ticket office, and asked for three reservations to Talgo. Instead of reservations, we got a blank stare. So I continued: "I think its in Switzerland." The ticket lady burst out laughing. It was out turn to look blank. Once she'd calmed down she told us that Talgo is actually not a Swiss holiday destination, but a type of train. To put it into perspective, that would be like an English person asking to go to Arriva. Not my finest hour.
7. Go to places you would never usually visit. In fact, go to Slovenia. It may not sound it, but it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been. See for yourself.
8. If you're planning on going to Barcelona, go there last. Seriously, that place is harder to get out of than Alcatraz.
9. The train journeys can be really long. Use your time wisely. Like us? We decided to write a rap about our travels to the tune of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme tune. Things are much funnier on 24 hours with no sleep.
10. Sounds cheesy, but above all just relax and enjoy yourself. Things might not always go to plan but you can guarantee you'll end up in some pretty amazing places.
Not so much panic on the streets of London, more total fucking madness.
"Lock your doors, stay in your homes and please don't try to go outside."
The sentence would slot nicely into the dialogue of some low budget zombie movie. But to hear it coming out of my TV? Into my lounge? On the real life news? I never thought it would happen. Unless you've been hibernating, you will have seen the positively apocolyptic coverage of the London riots. As the dust settles and the innocent people scramble to salvage the remaining shreds of the normal lives they were leading this time last week, there are going to be a lot of questions that need answering. Like, who did this? And why? Where did all the anger come from? What were they trying to prove? I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't buy that there was some political undertone to this twenty-first century version of the lunatics taking over the asylum. I get it, I really do. People are angry. The country is in a state, and someone needs to step up and take the blame. But this? Completely unconnected. This is just mindless. These kids, they're not looting Debenhams to teach the government a lesson. They're doing it because they can. They don't know why their angry any more than we do. It's this pack mentality - 'if enough of us do it, we won't get caught.' So what,what exactly have you done? Destroyed your own captial city? Burned down your own houses? Smashed the shops that you buy your food from? Wake up, London. This isn't 'sticking it to the police', this is shitting on your own doorstep personified. If you've got something to say, fine. But what's so wrong with saying it peacefully? It doesn't make you weak, it makes you smart. After all, who wants to help out the boy in a balaclava weilding a baseball bat, or the girl throwing fireworks at cars? I can't help but think of what a waste this is. If only we could unite to do something positive.
Oh, and David? Make sure you stop off at the duty free on the way home. You're gonna need a drink when you see the state of the country you apparently run.
The sentence would slot nicely into the dialogue of some low budget zombie movie. But to hear it coming out of my TV? Into my lounge? On the real life news? I never thought it would happen. Unless you've been hibernating, you will have seen the positively apocolyptic coverage of the London riots. As the dust settles and the innocent people scramble to salvage the remaining shreds of the normal lives they were leading this time last week, there are going to be a lot of questions that need answering. Like, who did this? And why? Where did all the anger come from? What were they trying to prove? I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't buy that there was some political undertone to this twenty-first century version of the lunatics taking over the asylum. I get it, I really do. People are angry. The country is in a state, and someone needs to step up and take the blame. But this? Completely unconnected. This is just mindless. These kids, they're not looting Debenhams to teach the government a lesson. They're doing it because they can. They don't know why their angry any more than we do. It's this pack mentality - 'if enough of us do it, we won't get caught.' So what,what exactly have you done? Destroyed your own captial city? Burned down your own houses? Smashed the shops that you buy your food from? Wake up, London. This isn't 'sticking it to the police', this is shitting on your own doorstep personified. If you've got something to say, fine. But what's so wrong with saying it peacefully? It doesn't make you weak, it makes you smart. After all, who wants to help out the boy in a balaclava weilding a baseball bat, or the girl throwing fireworks at cars? I can't help but think of what a waste this is. If only we could unite to do something positive.
Oh, and David? Make sure you stop off at the duty free on the way home. You're gonna need a drink when you see the state of the country you apparently run.
Tuesday, 4 January 2011
Jumping on the bandwagon
Like most of the world, I entered 2011 drunk, surrounded by my lovely friends and still burdened with the hint of a food baby conceived at Christmas Dinner. And, like most of the world, I spent the first day of the shiny new year under a duvet, cursing Jaeger and vowing the be a better person. So, just so i've made an official record of them, here are my new years resolutions...
1. Seriously stop biting my nails.
2. Learn to do the splits. I really need a better party trick than rapping to 'Baby Got Back'.
3. Find out what happens to Harry Potter in the end. I think I might be the only person that doesn't know.
4. Be tidier - hair and bedroom included.
5. Write important dates in my diary, not on the back of Nandos receipts.
6. Save enough money to go to Thailand with one of my best friends in June.
7. Work up the courage to go bungee jumping.
8. Be good at ice skating.
9. Be good at uni.
10. KEEP. MY. RESOLUTIONS.
1. Seriously stop biting my nails.
2. Learn to do the splits. I really need a better party trick than rapping to 'Baby Got Back'.
3. Find out what happens to Harry Potter in the end. I think I might be the only person that doesn't know.
4. Be tidier - hair and bedroom included.
5. Write important dates in my diary, not on the back of Nandos receipts.
6. Save enough money to go to Thailand with one of my best friends in June.
7. Work up the courage to go bungee jumping.
8. Be good at ice skating.
9. Be good at uni.
10. KEEP. MY. RESOLUTIONS.
Monday, 27 December 2010
“First we make our habits, then our habits make us.”
I'll be straight with you, I watch the trashiest TV. Anything to do with car chases, deformities and velour-clad women trying to work out just who their baby daddy is - pretty much the spam of the entertainment world. So, I was having a flick through the other night, hoping for a bit of World's Toughest Prisons, or maybe Sharks Do The Scariest Things, when a BBC3 programme called Freak Like Me caught my eye. A few minutes in, I was hooked. It's all about people's weird, yet strangely endearing, little habits they have that come so naturally to them but seem completely unnatural to the outside world. There was a guy obsessed with eating out of bins. A women who only ate stale food. A student who collected dead bees. At first, I watched along with that morbid fascination you get when you're exposed to a situation you have no personal experience with. I thought to myself "I don't have any habits like this". A few days later, though, I realised that isn't strictly true. I have quite a few weird little rituals actually. It's just that they've become so engraved in my life that I don't even notice I'm doing them, don't even regard them as quirks. For example, I always, always have the volume of my TV on an even number. Don't ask me why, it's just something I've always done. Always stack my biscuits in 4's when I'm having them with a cuppa. No idea what I think is going to happen if 5th biscuit comes along and rocks the boat. Talking to my sister about it, she has her own little collection of habits that, at first, she didn't even regard as unusual because she was so used to them. I think it's exactly that little web of unique quirks, traits and rituals that make humans so interesting. We shouldn't be shy about them, we should be embracing them. We should be getting our freak on. The only thing we should be embarrassed about is the terrible pun I just made. Sorry, don't hate me.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00w59n8/Freak_Like_Me_Episode_5/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00w59n8/Freak_Like_Me_Episode_5/
Wednesday, 24 November 2010
Cuts are nuts? So is kicking the shit out of a window.
Pretty iconic image, isn't it?
People assume that, as a student, I would be marching behind these people, waving my placard just as passionately as everyone else. And don't get me wrong, I completely agree with the cause. Like thousands of others, I'm feeling pretty conned by Nick Clegg and his pledge to keep student fees down. To be honest, that was the precise reason I voted for him, and the most profound among the myriad other reasons I didn't vote Conservative. And I don't for a second believe that this was something out of Clegg's control. He knew exactly what he was getting into when he agreed to a coalition with the Tory's. After all, he'd been so avidly campaigning against their manifestos for months.
But what I want to make very clear is that I don't want people to think that this balaclava-donning, window-smashing army are speaking on behalf of me. By all means, go, stand up and make your voices heard. But whatever happened to a peaceful protest? The government aren't going to want to put that behaviour through University. They'll take one look at the carnage caused and think more along the lines of high security than higher education. The magnitude of the destruction will completely outweigh the reason why people gathered in their thousands in the first place. The media coverage will solely focus on the violence and unrest, and a few months down the line people will have completely forgotten why we were so angry.
So yeah, well done. Any chance we had to fight rising tuition fees shattered when those boots hit that window.
Saturday, 6 November 2010
I haven't blogged since the eurovision song contest.
But I am still alive, still well and still not getting the whole 'Twilight' thing.
I'll admit that most of June was frittered away watching re-runs of Come Dine With Me, but I've actually had a pretty busy few months.
1. I went on holiday to Ayia Napa where I learnt that sambuca is really not my friend.
2. I also learned that just because it happened on The Hangover, my dentist friend isn't willing to extract her own tooth in exchange for a pretty questionable chicken burger. Cop out.
3. I jumped off the top of a two storey boat into the sea. Even though I'm scared of heights. And the sea. All to catch a can of stella. Lad.
4. I learnt that my friend thought a kestrel was somebody who plays the guitar. I don't even know how she gets these ideas into her head, because I'm pretty sure nobody will ever have told her this.
5. I found out that McDonalds now do weddings. FINALLY. "Chicken burger, McFlurry and some holy matrimony, please."
6. I applied to be on the Million Pound Drop with my housemate. We've already mentally spent our winnings.
7. I got a job at a summer camp, which was really fun. But I've always thought that facepainting is pretty straightforward. Yeah? Oh, no. I almost reduced a child to tears because of my incredibly sub-par attempt at painting her face like a monster.
8. I made a pledge to myself that I would do more exercise, went for ONE run, got 10 minutes down the road before hobbling home with a massive stitch. Pretty much the next Usain Bolt.
9. I fulfilled one of my lifelong dreams and managed to do the worm. Well, I almost broke my face but the worm definitely happened.
10. I broke the world record for the biggest game of musical bumps at Bestival 2010. Well, not me personally. That would be a very small game.
11. Me and my housemates filled our lounge with 99 red balloons and danced in them like that scene on Scrubs. You know, for a treat.
12. I found out that the dubstep remix of the Pokemon theme tune is a real thing.
13. I relived my childhood at London Science Museum. Seriously, why don't I live there?
14. I found out that my brothers quite the local crim. Getting a taxi home with him from town, our taxi driver starts going on about a house party he had when he was younger where some random boys threw the entire contents of his freezer in the garden and stole his shoes. My brother goes very quiet, before miming to me "Oh my God, that was me." Very awkward taxi ride.
15. I discovered eating a kilo of gummy bears is no big deal.
I'll admit that most of June was frittered away watching re-runs of Come Dine With Me, but I've actually had a pretty busy few months.
1. I went on holiday to Ayia Napa where I learnt that sambuca is really not my friend.
2. I also learned that just because it happened on The Hangover, my dentist friend isn't willing to extract her own tooth in exchange for a pretty questionable chicken burger. Cop out.
3. I jumped off the top of a two storey boat into the sea. Even though I'm scared of heights. And the sea. All to catch a can of stella. Lad.
4. I learnt that my friend thought a kestrel was somebody who plays the guitar. I don't even know how she gets these ideas into her head, because I'm pretty sure nobody will ever have told her this.
5. I found out that McDonalds now do weddings. FINALLY. "Chicken burger, McFlurry and some holy matrimony, please."
6. I applied to be on the Million Pound Drop with my housemate. We've already mentally spent our winnings.
7. I got a job at a summer camp, which was really fun. But I've always thought that facepainting is pretty straightforward. Yeah? Oh, no. I almost reduced a child to tears because of my incredibly sub-par attempt at painting her face like a monster.
8. I made a pledge to myself that I would do more exercise, went for ONE run, got 10 minutes down the road before hobbling home with a massive stitch. Pretty much the next Usain Bolt.
9. I fulfilled one of my lifelong dreams and managed to do the worm. Well, I almost broke my face but the worm definitely happened.
10. I broke the world record for the biggest game of musical bumps at Bestival 2010. Well, not me personally. That would be a very small game.
11. Me and my housemates filled our lounge with 99 red balloons and danced in them like that scene on Scrubs. You know, for a treat.
12. I found out that the dubstep remix of the Pokemon theme tune is a real thing.
13. I relived my childhood at London Science Museum. Seriously, why don't I live there?
14. I found out that my brothers quite the local crim. Getting a taxi home with him from town, our taxi driver starts going on about a house party he had when he was younger where some random boys threw the entire contents of his freezer in the garden and stole his shoes. My brother goes very quiet, before miming to me "Oh my God, that was me." Very awkward taxi ride.
15. I discovered eating a kilo of gummy bears is no big deal.
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