Back in the USUK

Friday 21st August

Someone, can’t remember who, wrote a book with the idea that the UK had become a state of America, called USUK.  Hahaha.  But it feels so true after returning from our quiet corner of South West France. Everything here seems so commercial.  It is all about money.  Even the only programme I got to watch on TV last night, a feeble documentary by Anne Robinson about how we spend our money.  It seems we are rapidly becoming absorbed by the Capitalist monster…

One of the slight frustrations of Eymet is that on a Monday two of the three Boulangeries are closed.  Firstly the lack of any collaboration, as all three are open on six days – it just happens that on a Monday two are closed.  Secondly, the one that is open runs out of croissants before eight every Monday, and out of bread itself shortly afterwards.  But like some blinkered horse they do not appear to see a business opportunity staring at them.  Why not make more croissants and bread on a Monday?  And this is more or less the French way.  Whether it is stubbornness or stupidity, or just a different way of looking at life, I am not sure.  Most of the shops close for the obligatory two-hour lunch and at 11.45, even though they only opened at 10, they are stopping you from coming into the store, in case you attempt to buy something at one second past twelve.

Well, of course, we chose to live here.  And part of that is the un-commercial attitude to life.  Making money is not the main thing; enjoying yourself seems to be.  They spend a long time buying, cooking and eating food, and drink wine with everything. In USUK we have no time for cooking or eating even and buy ready meals from Waitrose or cheap takeaways, bolting our food down so that we can get back on the computer and read our e-mails. Getting on and watching spiralling house prices are our main concerns.  So, welcome to USUK.  But I cannot wait to get back to the home of true culture.  Vive La France.

They Used to Die Young

Thursday 20th August

I have just finished reading all of Anthony Trollope’s novels, around forty or so of them.  And I am struck, amongst other things by just how many people died young.  Many infants never reached school age at all, many poor women died in childbirth or from complications soon after.  There were not a few cases of Consumption, the ‘Cancer’ of the Victorian Age, for which there was no cure, just a chance of prolonging life a few short years more.  And some died of drink, or soldiers in battle, or just of some undiagnosed debilitating disease.

Those that reached sixty without encountering any of the above might expect to live another ten years or so, but many died young.  The amazing thing is the amount they managed to accomplish in those sometimes short years.  Trollope himself died in his sixties but managed to write a huge number of novels and volumes of short stories and travelogues too.  Along with this he worked for most of those years as first a junior and then a senior member of the Post Office, never seeming to let his work interfere with his writing, or vice versa.  He also married and had several children, bought and sold houses and tried his hand at farming too.

People tended to leave school early, and the poor were barely educated at all.  Marriage was common in your teens and children too, many of them; families of ten children were not uncommon.  Men were elected to Parliament in their twenties and became ministers at thirty.  Of course the knowledge that life was short (or usually shorter than ours) meant that young age was no barrier to progress in many careers.

Nowadays with the sense that old age and retirement will come upon us later and later there is no such urgency.  Many are still pursuing their education well into their twenties, women are postponing having children until their forties or even later, and the young are still at home longer and longer.  Many may have to wait until their parents die before owning their own homes at all.  We can all expect (or hope) to live into our eighties and by then it could well be nineties, centurions may well become common.  But is a longer life necessarily a better one? Well, I sincerely hope so….

So What Shall We Talk About Today, Children

Wednesday 19th August

Do you ever wonder to yourselves, “How on Earth does he think of something different to write about every day” or possibly more likely “What rubbish has he come up with today?”

Well, I do.  Wonder, that is, what I will possibly write about; what can be of any interest to anyone at all?  I do have my old faith-full’s – Music and Politics, or the book I am reading, or some facet of the news that strikes me as of particular note, or of course events here in Eymet.  But sometimes the mind goes completely blank.

I used to write, back when I was working of course, of life being like a treadmill, and we little hamsters could never quite run fast enough to escape the wheel, the faster we ran the faster the wheel spun and the faster we were forced to run….

And of course I have discovered, but think I probably always suspected, that life itself is a treadmill.  Sometimes quite a pleasant one, but no matter how one tries to escape one slips back onto (into) the treadmill. Things come round again with amazing regularity.  I am already thinking (at the back of my mind) about Christmas; the football season has started again and I cannot quite kick the habit of eagerly watching the results – not that my watching or not watching will affect the scores in any way – but somehow I feel if I don’t know the results my life will be missing some vital piece of information, when of course in a couple more weeks I will have forgotten these pointless results.

The café has become our new (though not really unpleasant) treadmill.  In theory we can open when we like, or not at all; but some strange compulsion, sense of duty or just routine drives us on to open every day.  It also afford me a couple of hours on my own, to write this and some other stuff and to listen to some music (Felt Mountain by Goldfrapp – which I may write about later).

Anyway, tonight is the Marche Nocturne again, another four or five hours of madness, ridiculous mountains of moules et frites and litres de vin will be consumed no doubt, some even by me.  It’s a tough life children, I am only trying to prepare you for it.

Colourless Tsukuru Tazaki and his years of Pilgrimage – by Haruki Marukami

Tuesday 18th August

I have read almost all of the wonderful books written by Haruki, and have enjoyed them all too; not always the same thing.  I started with Norwegian Wood, probably his most accessible and popular novel right through to the one before this 1Q84, which I thought was a bit over long.  I suppose he belongs to that recent category of surreal or magic fiction, there is often an element of the supernatural, or time shifting, or sheer impossibility in his writing but presented as entirely possible.  He also investigates what it is to be human, the conflict between good and evil and the contradictions of modern life.  He also shows us how the Japanese, who to us in the West might appear quite different from us, are just the same as we are, with the same qualities and problems.

This book is a bit quieter, nothing much really happens.  Tzukuru had four very good high-school friends and one day when he was twenty he was inexplicably excommunicated from this tight-knit group.  The book explores the nature of friendship and growing up and how we deal with loneliness and pain.  Saying that it is also quite hopeful.  Above all else it is beautifully written and just carries you gently along.  I will miss it now that I have read it.

White Wine and Oyster Festival

Monday 17th August

This is the real highlight of the year, the Medeaval day, the Gourmande Evenings and even the Vide Greniers were just a prelude to the ultimate madness that is the White Wine and Oyster Festival.  Your really haven’t seen anything like it.  And nor had we, but now we won’t miss it.  It is as the name suggests supposed to be a celebration of white wine and oysters but has grown into something much bigger.  There was also another Vide Grenier on the same day (Saturday) at the Pont Roman, but the main event is held in the square, the Place Gambetta itself.  Most of the food is being cooked and served right in the middle around the central fountain and there are tables all around the square and under the arches too, with either benches or little metal stools to sit on.  There is a whole team of oyster schuckers and a constant queue for the slippery beasts, a taste I have never quite acquired.  There are also of course Moules et frites, and Langoustines, and all manner of cold cooked seafood.  There is grilled duck and risotto, roast chicken and my favourite, sardines, salmon and big prawns (gambas) cooked on a huge rusty old barbeque.  There are melon baskets, there are crepes, there are glaces and of course there is lots of wine, red, rose and of course the white we are supposed to be celebrating.

The day starts about eleven when the first barbecues are lit and the first sack of moules are being cooked.  We were really busy in the Café, as early revelers had coffee and cakes before the real food was ready and the smell of barbecue smoke and fish being cooked was wafting over us all.  I succumbed early and had my sardines and frites.  This carries on all day, with maybe a short break between five and seven when the real eating begins.  As evening comes on the French descend in numbers and suddenly you are fighting for a place at a table.  Everyone is eating and drinking and greeting old friends and then at ten the music starts.  Well, I say music guardedly.  There is a huge stage filled with massive speakers and lights and the EuroDisco belts out.  Now, I am not a great fan of dance music, but after a few glasses of wine you find yourself dancing and clapping and singing some sort of words (though most of the songs seem to consist of chanting Hey Hey Hey or some other sophisticated lyric) along with the DJ who constantly throws out commands in French.  The French seem to understand and change their dance or response and we hapless Brits try our best to follow.  It is unmitigated madness with women dancing on the tables and everyone going crazy.  We gave up just after twelve but it continued until 2.00 a.m.

And next morning there wasn’t a scrap of litter, the square had been cleared and hosed down and you would never have known there had ever been a Fete d’huitres et vin blanc.

Just Another Friday Music Night

Sunday 16th August

Well we were tired for a start.  It had been a busy Thursday and Friday despite, or maybe because of the rain.  We weren’t even sure if we were going to the Friday Night Music in the pub Gambetta, and after all, how many times do you want to see Geoff Barket – good as he is.  In the end we rolled up about quarter past nine,  To our surprise Geoff was singing inside the pub rather than outside under the arches, the usual summer location.  Maybe it had been the earlier rain or it was just that bit chilly.  Anyway the pub was full, no seats at all.  We sat outside for a bit but couldn’t really hear the music.  Than a couple of friends called us in and made room for us at their table.

Geoff finished his first set with the long version of ‘American Pie’ and Rob (Elvis) and I mimed to all the words and creased up with laughter.  The second set was Geoff and Elvis and really rocked.  They were joined by Kenny on harmonica and vocals and did a fifteen minute jam which started with ‘High healed Sneakers’ and somehow mutated into the Who’s ‘Magic Bus’ and included several Beatles and Stones numbers.  Brilliant.  Then Rupert joined them and sung ‘Is she really going out with him’ and ‘Come Up And See Me’.  We were all dancing the night away.

The music finally finished at twelve-thirty,  Nothing special about it, just another Friday night in Pub Gambetta.

The Trouble with Housing

Saturday 15th August

The trouble with housing is that it isn’t about housing people, putting a roof over their heads, anymore; but about making money.  Like so much in the modern world it is all about money.  I grew up in a council house, and there was no stigma in that at all.  It was a perfectly decent semi-detached house with a front and a back garden and had been built in the flurry of decent housing provision after the war.  I am sure that Mum and Dad were very pleased to be offered such a nice house so soon after getting married.  They would have to wait a hell of a lot longer now.

The rot started with Thatcher and her wheeze of selling off council houses.  In order to make the idea work sitting tenants were offered huge discounts, but the key ingredient was that none of the money could be ploughed back into new council houses; it could only be used to reduce the rates.  So, at-a-stroke, council housing provision almost came to a standstill.  It was still relatively easy to buy your own house if you had a deposit and a steady job and the number of owner occupiers steadily increased until about 2003 when the ever-increasing price of houses started to put the possibility of owning your own house further and further out of ordinary people’s reach.  We now have a situation where in London and the South East it is almost impossible to buy a house without being helped by your parents.  Hundreds of thousands of young couples are living in rented flats with rents going up every couple of years – they must despair.  The number of buy-to-let mortgages keeps increasing as wealthy people decide to buy another property to let out, in effect the tenant pays your mortgage and you still retain the capital.  It’s a no-brainer – except for the poor tenant who will never own their own house or have a controlled reasonable rent; making money out of other people’s misery in effect.

And all for the love of the market, that cruel beast that makes the rich rich and the poor poorer.  At the last election all parties promised to increase the number of new houses being built, but in reality that won’t happen.  As long as housing is seen as a financial investment rather than a necessity for a decent life nothing will change.  In fact it is getting worse.

2066 – Janek has to move on

Friday 14th August

Diary Entry – 20660425

“I am getting stronger every day now.  I realise how fortunate I was to have been found by Dan and Emily; I could so easily have been found by ordinary people, who would have turned me in to the Polis.  But actually no-one could be more ordinary than Dan and Emily.  Let me tell you a bit about them, because I doubt there are many people like them left, unaffected simple country folk, they remind me of those 2D photos I was telling you about from the last century, they have the same inner smiles.

Dan must be nearly eighty I suppose, but he is far fitter than I have ever been (even with three gym visits a week).   He has a ruddy complexion and a stubbly face, I’m not even sure if he shaves his body let alone his face.  Emily is a bit younger but still a good fifteen years older than me.  She is rather overweight; she obviously hasn’t heard of slimming drugs, or maybe she just doesn’t care.  I have never met a woman yet who doesn’t care about her looks, but Emily seems the exception.  They have neither of them married and as far as I can tell they don’t even own a syn-sex module, so what they do for sex I have no idea.  Maybe some people just get by without it, or do that old-fashioned wanking stuff.  I have had to do without sex now for a few weeks and to tell the truth I miss it, even syn, which I used to complain about so much.  I wouldn’t mind a session now actually; so maybe that’s a sign that I am getting better.

But lonely as their existence is, they seem relatively happy.  I wonder if they regret never having married or the lack of children.  Maybe they just never met anyone, or did Dan do all he could to keep his sister single and by his side.  I wonder what will happen to the farm when they die.  But idyllic in some ways as their life is, they are still really just existing, aren’t they? Apart from the satisfaction of growing their own organic food they have no real future; there isn’t any prospect of change in their future.  But maybe that is the key to their happiness.   Everyone in our society is so hooked on the idea of progressing to the next level that we have forgotten what real achievement is; we have forgotten what life is supposed to be about.  No matter how clever the hypercoms are, surely life cannot be boiled down to a digital formula, an economic system that caters for all but satisfies nobody.

I would like to stay on the farm a bit longer, but I know I will have to move on.  At least I may be better prepared this time.  Emily keeps giving me these wistful sad looks, and really I cannot reciprocate, even to be kind.  She is the sweetest woman, but I cannot get involved.  Dan keeps giving me suspicious glances and asking if I am well yet.  So, it is time to move on, and we all know it.

Dan has looked out a decent pair of shoes for me, and Emily has found an Atlas of Southern England so I might know where I am.  It is obviously a few decades out of date, but it is the first real paper artefact I’ve seen in years.  She has also given me some cheese and a few tubs of beanz and a shoulder bag to carry them in.  My old handbag is almost worn out now, though it has kept the laptop safe all this time.

Dan even shook my hand and wished me good luck, but Emily was all weepy and couldn’t say goodbye properly.  I am leaving as soon as it gets dark tonight.  Dan’s idea; travel at night, avoid the roads in daylight, even driverless lorries may have cams in them, sleep in the woods away from the roads during the day.  He has even begrudgingly given me an old wind-up torch; I haven’t seen one of these in decades.   But where am I going?  Hastings.  It’s a town on the coast, Emily says that a lot of poor people live there, or so she has heard.  I need to find somewhere I can just blend in, where no-one asks any questions, and critically where I can exist without cred.  I am nervous, of course; I am shit-scared actually.  But I started this thing so I have to see where my journey takes me.  If it all ends badly, if I get caught, clagged even – at least I have tried, in my own way, to be free (is that the words of an old song from the last century– I seem to remember it from somewhere).”

Litter

Thursday 13th August

Why does litter annoy us so much?  Is it the total disregard for the environment, or the throw-away society we have drifted into?  Whatever, it certainly annoys me.  London is full of litter, to the point that you don’t even notice it anymore.  At least the fag packets seem to have diminished somewhat of late but it is the McDonalds boxes and Coke containers that seem to accumulate in corners that really annoy me.

Here in Eymet there is a big market on Thursday and a Night Market on Tuesday and a Gourmande evening again on Thursday, to say nothing of the special festival days, and yet after every event all the litter is cleared away.  At every night market there are clearly labeled “Poubelles” for food, glass and other waste – and people use them.  This morning walking the dogs there was a lorry and three workers collecting litter from the car-park, picking up discarded bottles and paper plates and even cigarette ends, leaving the place quite spotless.  There are two rubbish collections a week, where in England some council’s have reduced these to once a fortnight.  With councils hard pushed for cash and facing even more cuts you can expect even more litter in the U.K.  However the French manage their local finances the place is pretty litter-free.  And of course as we all know if there is no litter on the streets very few people drop any, whereas if the streets are filthy people simply chuck more stuff on the ground.

“Why Don’t We Do It In The Road”

Wednesday 12th August

This was a track on The Beatles Double White Album.  It is pretty rocking and was actually written by McCartney, though from the sentiment one would have suspected it to be by John Lennon.  The Double White album, as it has become known though only The Beatles was embossed on the cover came after Sergeant Pepper, and though the former was lauded at the time as the best album ever the White Album has weathered better and sounds far more modern than Pepper.  I actually prefer the mini-album Magical Mystery Tour to Pepper.  Maybe with the death of Brian Epstein they wanted to get back to basics a bit more, though the Double White does have its fair share of excess.  And maybe Paul, always far more conscious of his image and his legacy wanted to show us that he was indeed a rock’n’roller.  The lyrics are very basic “No-one’s really watching us, Why Don’t we do it in the road”, repeated in a more and more hysterical screaming voice.  But like Helter Skelter on the same record they showed a different harder edge to McCartney.

Here in Eymet the pavements are pretty ropey, full of cracks and dips and wobbly bits and broken concrete, so most of us Eymetois tend to walk in the roads, until a car comes along and forces us off.  This is not applicable however to one of our dogs, Polly, who incidentally likes the middle of the road as her favourite toilet spot and no amount of cars will dislodge her when she has started.  I often look at her and sing “Why don’t we do it in the road.”  Hahaha…