Day trip to Jorvik, and Quilt Museum

I've taken a few days off work for a long weekend and on Friday I went to York on a day coach trip. It's a long way, made longer when you have to pick up travellers from 3 towns before you even start, and then have a "comfort break" half way there and back in Derbyshire. But the coach wasn't full and I had the whole back seat to myself so I could spread out.

I did the same trip a couple of years ago with my daughter, but we didn't get to see inside the Minster as there was a wedding in progress, or go into the Jorvik Centre, so those were my plans for Friday. We arrived in York just after midday, and I headed directly to Jorvik. I had been looking forward to looking at the exhibition, and just managed to get in ahead of a party of school kids.

To say I was disappointed would be understating. I should mention here that I did my degree in Heritage and Landscape, and while I'm by no means an interpretation/exhibition expert, I do take a more professional view of things like this than your average tourist probably would. So with my critical eye, I have to say that a £10.50 entry fee - even if you can use it multiple times in a year - is a rip off. Given the huge amount of archaeology in York, there is very little on display in the Jorvik centre. The first room has a glass floor which covers a reconstructed "dig" or excavation of a typical Danelaw-era building. Not a real one, just a representation of one. There is a video screen on one wall, and a few interpretation panels set into the walls, along with a shoe which I think was a real one, but as it had no label I couldn't be sure. The lighting is very low, I assume so as to not have reflections on the glass, but it means you can't actually see very much of the shoe in its display case set into the wall.

Then you take a mechanical ride "through ancient Jorvik" in a moving gondola seat. The noise of the mechanics driving the seats around was too loud and distracted from the commentary coming from the head rests. The display was, well, embarrassing to be honest. Mannequins moving jerkily with their glazed expressions, some pretending to talk (to which the lady from the head rest responded - without explaining that the language would have been a mix of local dialect and imported Danish/Scandinavian). The smell I suppose was meant to evoke the varied smells of close-dwelling inhabitants of York in those times, but it just smelled like glue. I was rather glad to get off the ride, helped by a young lady who certainly looked of Scandinavian descent, and spoke with a slight Yorkshire accent, unlike some of the other staff in their too-clean clothes. There was even an American girl working there, and while I'm all for anyone getting a job here if they want one, having an American with a strong American accent in first-person interpretation set in a city in England before American had even been discovered, was just wrong!

The second room had more exhibition cases set into the walls, an interactive touch-screen "game" with Danelaw characters that you could take shopping and learn about the foods (except it didn't work very well, and wouldn't show me anything in the section on honey and bees), some skeletons in cases, and possibly the best part of the whole exhibition: a life size digital skeleton standing up with highlights of the medical wear and tear on the bones and possible causes, that then was dressed and had a facial reconstruction overlaid. She looked more real than the staff. But again, most of the exhibit cases were poorly lit and for items such as bone combs and jewellery, you really should be able to see all of the detail clearly.

It took me around 45 minutes to do the whole thing, and that was stretching it to read all of the interpretation and spend a few quid in the gift shop. Very disappointing and they seem to have taken the "pitch it at a 7-year-old" way too seriously as I didn't learn anything new from any of it. By contrast, you can go to the centre of Gloucester and look down on glass covered Roman remnants of the city in situ (not a reconstruction) for free, and as far as exhibits go, I prefer the Cirencester museum with lots of natural light and well thought-out displays of the roman and other jewellery and other artefacts.

From there I decided to pop into Duttons Buttons, a real treasure trove for the haberdasher! I bought some  gently sparkling cream with grey marble buttons for a cardigan I am currently spinning yarn for. Could have spent a lot more in there than I did.

Next on my list was a visit to the Quilt Museum. It took a while to find it, as the signage pointed down the wrong road! Eventually I managed to track it down, and what a gem of a place it is! A little more than half the entrance price of Jorvik, but well worth every penny. Sadly, the museum will be closing at the end of this summer as they can't afford the rent on the Guildhall that they currently inhabit. This is such a shame, and means the 800 historic quilts that they currently own will not be shown to the public until or unless another suitable building can be found - surely with 2 Universities in York, some space could be made available to the Quilter's Guild?

Over the summer, the museum has an exhibition of 15 historic quilts paired with 15 new quilts designed and made by the designer Kaffe Fassett under the title "Ancestral Gifts". Kaffe is well known as a knitware designer, and known for his colour work especially. The quilts he has made for this exhibition are a gorgeous riot of rich colours, predominantly reds, oranges and pinks, but a couple of pastel quilts are there too. And the building itself is prefect for displaying them, with its very high beamed ceilings and simple white walls. I'm really glad that I decided to visit while it is still open, and I'd encourage anyone else with a love of textiles to go if you are in York between now and September.

 

 My final destination was meant to be York Minster, but for the second time they seem determined to keep pagans like me out of the place! Last time we were in York there was a wedding at the Minster; this time they were ordaining a new lady Bishop and the Minster was closed to the public all day. I had wondered why there were so many black-clad vicars wandering around the streets while I was trying to find the Quilt Museum, and it got me thinking what is the collective noun for clergy? A "cassock" perhaps? I decided to sit in the gardens to the side of the Minster for a while and read my book in the sunshine, and I could hear the choir inside singing which was nice.

At 4pm I went to find some sustenance for my long journey home, and settled on some fudge and a hog roast in a bun with all the trimmings. I felt a little bit of olde worlde was called for after the Vikings had let me down!

   

Long time ago

In Lidl this morning, doing my usual Saturday wander around the sliced sausages and raspberries, I was humming First Aid Kit's song "Long Time Ago" to myself. It's the tune that BBC 4 have been using to promote their new Danish drama "1864", so I'm sure you'd know it if you heard it. A little old lady was stood next to me at the bacon section and she commented what a pretty tune it was. I just said thank you, and then she said she had eaten some of the bacon last week and it was lovely. She was digging around for a later use-by date so I helped her find one.

This of course led to a little more conversation. Turns out her husband died a few weeks ago. She was also buying herself some flowers, because, she said, her parents always said to enjoy them while you can see them. She and her husband had been married almost 60 years. Then I got a brief summary of how they had grown up together in Bristol and how he had waited until she was 17 before asking her out. She was engaged at 21, married at 23 when he came out of the navy.

She told me that a man she has known a few years asked her to marry him last week, and that he wanted to take her to Europe for 3 months. She said "I'm nearly 84, I can't go to Europe!" I said she could go wherever she wanted to, to which she put her head on one side and said "yes, but not with him!"

I can't hope for 60 years of marriage, but I do at least hope that the years we have together are as happy as that lady's were with her husband.

Immigration, without the hysteria

Did you watch the Opposition Debate on the BBC last Thursday? For my American and other non-Brit readers, the UK will be voting in a new government on May 7th, and the whole of our media has gone election crazy.

Though 4 of the 5 leaders tried to stick to the topics as they were presented, it wasn't long before Nigel Farage of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) was blaming immigration for all of the UK's current woes. It was good to see the other leaders rally together, and present an almost united front to oppose UKIP's far right theology, but all too many people get hysterical on the topic of immigration and I think it needs some careful unpicking to get to the roots.

The news coverage of the boatloads of migrants from north Africa crossing the Mediterranean Sea and landing in Italy, and the migrants waiting at Calais in France for a chance to jump under a lorry's axle or inside its load to get onto either a ferry or through the Chunnel surely shows the desperation and the lengths that these people are prepared to go to for a better life. Some British newspapers have given too many column inches to some extreme right-wing views this week. I can't claim to have the same readership, but I can put forward a different view.

UKIP, by Farage's own admission, would drastically reduce the UK's overseas aid budget. They see it as handing over money to people in other countries with no real benefit to the UK. They are misguided.

The purpose of the overseas aid budget is to reduce immigration. If we can help these developing and struggling countries tackle some of their social issues, by giving them aid in a variety of forms, their populations are less likely to want to leave. Our pounds sterling go much further when spent in African countries to help educate children, provide safe drinking water and sanitation, or assist with housing and health programmes, than it does when spent on people who actually make it across our borders and then ask for help.

UKIP want the UK to leave the EU, so that we don't have to accept European migrants. European migration works for all European member countries, not just those in the east. You may not want to go and live in Poland or Slovakia or Bulgaria, but your children might especially if they decide to study higher education in a European country. Many young Brits already go to France, Germany and the BeNeLux to study at university level: if you have to pay a fee here at home, then why not pay a similar amount in a different country and have some extra experience to add to your CV at the end of your studies as well?

And what about when you retire, and the British summers just don't give you the amount of sun that you would like. Moving to Spain, the south of France or Portugal has long been the option of British retirees, who take their state pensions with them. If we leave the Euro Zone, you wont be able to take your state pension with you, and your medical care wont be covered either. Does it still sound like a good idea?

"They come here and take our jobs" How many times have we heard that over the last 100 years? It's not a new complaint, and you can go back further than 100 years and still see it in historical records, if perhaps not using those exact words. It's also not just uttered by Brits; in countries all around the world, an influx of "others" usually creates a backlash with a similar sentiment. It's convenient, but it's normally not true.

Migrants want to work, it's the driving force behind the risks they take to get to their chosen destination. They want to work, earn some money and then send a portion of it back to their families in their home country. Some want to work and save so that when they return home, they will be able to buy a home, perhaps with a bit of land, to support themselves and their families. Typically, Poles tend to stay in the UK for just 2 or 3 years before returning home. They are fiercely patriotic for their own country, and have no intention of staying in the UK indefinitely.

So what are these jobs that the migrants are taking from under the noses of our young men (who generally are the ones complaining the loudest)? I accept that immigrants can be found in all employment sectors, but immigrants usually fill gaps in our employment market that Brits can't or wont fill themselves. Bus drivers, dentists, cleaners, daffodil pickers. Don't blame the immigrant for obtaining the job; ask why the employer didn't give the job to a Brit - could it be the attitude that some work is beneath us, or the level of English is better in a Polish student than in a native speaking English man or woman?

Housing, schools and our health system are undoubtedly struggling at the moment. It is easy to blame that on immigration, as if a single factor could account for all the ills in our society. We know we have been building the wrong kinds of housing in the wrong areas for decades, yet we have done very little about it. Selling off council housing stock and then wilfully preventing those councils from re-investing in building more housing with the proceeds is one of the main reasons why there is so little social housing today. That's not the fault of immigrants, that's the fault of a middle aged white woman.

Schools, particularly primary schools, have fewer places because the planners didn't take into account social mobility across Europe, and because there are not enough teachers. Why would anyone want to be a teacher in a British school today when they will spend most of their time on paperwork and coaching children to jump through hoop after hoop of tests, for very little pay or recognition? Neither of those things are the fault of immigrants.

Our health service would simply grind to a halt if we were to sack all of the immigrants working in it. From GPs and surgeons to cleaners and ancillary staff and every post in between, immigrants working alongside nationals do an amazing job with the resources available to them.

So what can we do? We are an island, with finite space to fill with housing. Austerity has taken a significant chunk out of the social welfare system, and many people are still finding things tough despite being told that we've turned a corner and prospects are improving. The first thing we should do is stop the hysteria. We need to talk about immigration calmly and sensibly, without demonising the immigrants and making them scapegoats for our own political failings and short-sightedness over the past decades.

As someone who loves to travel and would quite like to live and work in another country one day, I would be a hypocrite if I said we should close our borders. More than that, I'd be stupid and unrealistic. Make something hard to get hold of and you immediately increase the demand. Our streets are not paved with gold, and we need to do more overseas to ensure people know that.

We could:

• Allow people to come here, but not give them financial support in the form of social housing or benefits. Make it clear that if you have nowhere to stay and no money to live on when you arrive, you'll be sent home straight away. This might not be a popular move, but it seems the most sensible to me, and is one that plenty of other countries work with.
• If an immigrant commits a crime, send them home straight away at the start of their sentence, rather than insisting they serve all their time at our expense and then trying to find them to send them home once they have been released.
• Possibly introduce a new tax rate for immigrants, so they pay slightly more for the first 5 years of their stay. Also introduce a slightly higher business tax rate for those companies who employ a higher percentage of foreign nationals. Only slightly higher for both though.
• Do more overseas to improve the locations from which the greater numbers of migrants are arriving. Some are fleeing poverty and war, and we can do something about both of those. We need to implement education programmes that do not paint the UK as a financial utopia, but give a realistic view of how hard it can be to live here with very little money. 
• Work within Europe to create a fairer dispersal of immigrants. It is not fair to expect Italy to accommodate everyone who happens to land on their shores, but equally we can't take everyone who wants to come here.
• Encourage more people to return home, or migrate onwards. We already know many people intend to return home after a few years, so we could make this an easier option for them, assisting with travel costs rather than assisting with living costs while they are here. 
• Encourage more Brits to expand their horizons and work, study and live overseas. It's not something often talked about in immigration debates, but it could be a real benefit to the UK to have citizens who are outward thinking and have a better understanding of our place in the world. We have always been a nation of travellers and explorers, and we could use the European migration possibilities to our advantage instead of only ever criticising them.  

But just stop with the name-calling and rhetoric that is not dissimilar from the Nazi ravings of last century. We are better than that.

It's an eclipse Jim....

...but not as we know it!

A partial eclipse over most of the UK today, and thankfully I live in one of the few bits with very little cloud :)

I wish I'd cleaned my windows...

30 Q&As for last year and this

I know I said no looking back, but I saw this meme on a few other blogs over the past week so decided to join in.

1.  What did you do in 2014 that you'd never done before?
   Published my first knitting pattern, and got some orthopaedic inserts for my shoes.
   
   2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
   I don't normally make new year resolutions, but I did want to get better at spinning and I've achieved that. 
   
   3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
   Two of my friends had babies this year, both little boys.
   
   4. Did anyone close to you die?
   Not particularly close to me, but one of my husband's relatives died in November.
   
   5. What countries did you visit?
   Wales, America and Denmark. I think people forget that Wales is a different country to England sometimes.
   
   6. What would you like to have in 2015 that you lacked in 2014?
   A pair of Viking combs.
   
   7. What dates from 2014 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
   Definitely our time in Denmark in September. Four nights and 3 whole days exploring Copenhagen and Roskilde with my daughter was exciting and chilled at the same time. 
   
   8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
   Apart from not quitting my day job in a blaze of glory (or just a blaze); publishing and selling my knitting patterns.
   
   9. What was your biggest failure?
   I haven't failed at anything specifically this year, but I haven't finished everything I had hoped to. 
   
   10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
   Quite the contrary, my blood pressure is now well under control, my feet are responding well to the inserts (though my back is still protesting) and I've lost a few pounds in weight. Mentally I've had a few wobbly days, but nothing that got out of hand.
   
   11. What was the best thing you bought?
   A washing machine for my daughter and her chap, for their new house.
   
   12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
   Stephen Sutton. Without doubt a very special young man who devoted his final months of life to raising funds to assist other teenagers with cancer. If you would like to donate, you still can here Stephen's Just Giving Page
   
     13. Where did most of your money go?
   Flights. Which makes it sound like I jet set around the globe regularly, but I don't. The cost of a return flight from London to Houston is now around £800, which is more than twice what it was the first time I flew there in 2006. It is also more than I spent in total for 4 nights in a hotel, flight and spends in Denmark.
   
   14. What songs will always remind you of 2014?
   Nickelback – Edge of a Revolution
   Ed Sherring – Sing
   Royal Blood – Little Monster
   
   15. What do you wish you'd done more of?
   Dancing.
   
   16. What do you wish you'd done less of?
   Banging my head against metaphorical brick walls.
   
   17. How did you spend Christmas?
   I don't celebrate Christmas. We celebrate the winter solstice instead, doing much the same thing as everyone else does a few days later. On Christmas day this year I cleaned my front room carpet and did loads of laundry.
   
   18. Did you fall in love in 2014?
   Yes, with a bakery in Copenhagen.
   
   19. What was your favourite TV program?
   I really don't watch a lot of telly, I tend to have it on in the background just to help me keep track of time. I did enjoy the BBC's Musketeers, Crimes of Passion (the Swedish murder mystery series on BBC4) and my guilty pleasure, Strictly Come Dancing.
   
   20. What was the best book you read?
   Jo Nesbo “Phantom” - I adore his writing and can't wait to read the next in the series “Police”
   
   21. What was your greatest musical discovery?
   Royal Blood – gutted that their tour sold out before I could get a ticket.
   
   22. What did you want and get?
   Dresses! 
   
   23. What did you want and not get?
   Less stress at work, less micromanagement, less deception.
   
   24. What was your favourite film of this year?
   I didn't see many films this year, certainly fewer than in 2013, but I really enjoyed Dallas Buyers Club, Out of the Furnace, and the 3^rd Hobbit.
   
   25. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
   Apparently I was 44. Not the exact day of my birthday, but we did go to Southampton to see Killswitch Engage and Trivium.
   
   26. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
   Not having to explain and accept the inconsistencies and bloody-mindedness of TDCJ. There is no sensible reason why TDCJ inmates are not permitted to make pre-paid overseas calls. But maybe we'll get video visits instead before he comes home.
   
   27. What kept you sane?
   Knitting, my daughter, loud music, the robin on my window feeder, frozen yoghurt.
   
   28. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
   Christian Bale. Nuff said.
   
   29. Who did you miss?
   My parents. My husband. My dearest friend.
   
   30. What does 2015 hold for you?
   A new job (secondment), more European-style eating, and possibly (hopefully) a trip to Norway.

It's in the blood

Back from our Danish adventure (with a little bit of Sweden thrown in as well), and have some images to share with you all!

Our 4 nights in Copenhagen were great, so much to see in such a relatively small place. I could definitely adopt the culture of not hurrying anywhere and always time for coffee and cake.

Since I've been back, I've started to move some of my Etsy shop stock over to Folksy. For those who are not familiar with Folksy, it's a British-based marketplace similar to Etsy, but I like the feel of it better for my yarns and hares. If you are interested, check it out Hare's Moon Yarns on Folksy

Eurovision: you put your best act in, you best act out, in out, in out....

I am unashamed to say, I adore the Eurovision Song Contest. From way back when I was a kid and used to listen in bed to it on my radio, to my adult years watching it on TV, I have only missed a handful of shows over the past 40*cough* years.

Now that Eurovision 2013 has come and gone (number 58 for all you aficionados, so only 2 more years to the Really Big Party Eurovision - can you imagine it!) the inevitable introspective naval gazing has begun in the British media. Oh why do we do so badly, they opine. Last week everyone seemed relatively confident that good old Bonnie Tyler would "do well" and some were even sticking their necks out that she might .... well, come in the top 3 at least.

But no. Bonnie managed what is now being described as a "credible" 19th place with 23 points. I think the media just don't want to rub salt in the wound. The top 3 acts all got over 200 points, and Bonnie came in behind the Armenian entry which was written by Black Sabbath's Tony Iomi. That in itself should tell you something about why the UK hasn't won since we borrowed an American called Katrina back in 1997.

While I wasn't a huge fan of Denmark's winning entry, I can see why it won. The staging took you straight to Les Miserables - one of the biggest films out in the past year, and a smash hit musical, not to mention a classic novel written by Frenchman, Victor Hugo. Add a young blonde girl with a passable voice and a catchy repetitive chorus and Bob's your mother's brother.

Azerbaijan's second place was courtesy of an attractive young chap singing a well-written song (in English, as were many of the higher-placed songs, so the UK can hardly complain that no one understood our lyrics), with interesting staging of a "shadow" man in a glass box and a girl in a red dress. Third place Ukraine I personally thought had a weak song, but they did employ a gimmick of having the female singer carried in by a 7 and a half foot tall guy dressed as an ogre. I have no idea what that had to do with the song, but it seemed to do the trick!

My personal favourite this year, Malta's entry, did really well, and the Norwegian song has been growing on me all week - so much so that I've added it to my Spotify playlist today. My daughter loved the Greek entry, a ska number called "Alcohol Is Free" by a group of guys wearing black kilts, who also finished inside the top 10. That's the beauty of Eurovision.

So, why didn't the UK win? Simple, we don't take it seriously enough. We insist on wheeling out either spoof acts created solely for Eurovision, or has-beens (even nice ones like Bonnie and Blue), with songs that may well be popular with Radio 2 listeners, but do not hit the button with the rest of Europe. The UK really does have some of the most tallented musicians in the world, the best song-writers and the biggest-selling artists winning awards all around the globe and racking up platinum after platinum record sales. But if we want to win Eurovision, we have to stop looking down out noses at it and just sending a token entry to the slaughter.

Look at Hungary's and Malta's entries this year: 2 simple, low key, songs with young male singers who you'd be happy to see any night of the week down at your local pub Open Mike night. Swap either for Ed Sheeran, and we'd have been in the top 10 too. If we need a female singer to belt out a power ballad, look no further than Adele or even Florence West from Florence and the Machine. Hell, swap the Danish girl for Diana Vickers from X Factor and we'd have probably done better than we did last night. Let any of them write their own song, and it could be United Kingdom 12 points all the way.

The political voting was reduced last night, mainly due to some of the usual culprits not getting through the semi-finals. Austria didn't even give Germany 12 points and I can't remember the last time that happened. It's really not because the rest of Europe don't like us: they just don't like what we send to Eurovision. And frankly, neither do we.

The only way for the UK to do better next year is for someone to take a good look at what is popular around Europe in their respective Top 40 charts in around September this year. Then ask a Brit who happens to be doing similar stuff rather well to give it a go. Release the song at the end of March right across Europe so that everyone has already heard it by the time May arrives. Sit back and cross fingers.

If we really do want to do well, that is.