The weekend rolls around again and, weary from another week of administering harsh probings on behalf of the Inquisition, I found myself taking a trip to Finsbury Park.Finsbury Park is a suburb named after the park in its midst and, depending on one's view of these things, either a haven and beacon of hope to people fleeing fashion tyranny and colonial oppression, or a seething, heaving mass of the Great Unwashed. It features prominently in various scenes from that great documentary Children of Men which was on at the talkies a few years ago, and indeed from the moment one emerges from the underground, one feels one has walked straight into the filming of that epic. The woman giving instructions in the tunnel, the dirty and grimy nature of the tunnel, the derelict building whose ruined front[1] greets one as one emerges from the railway tunnel, and the thronging masses of people from all over the world - these are boiler plate scenes from the factual episodes depicted in that documentary. Though of course there are many more children in Finsbury Park than in the documentary - not sure what the filmmaker's problem with children was, perhaps he had a bad time at school, but for some reason they were noticeably absent from the doco.
I should not of course dwell on these disgruntled artistes and their unpleasant opinions of our Noble Commonwealth. This disturbed vision of the United Kingdom of England and The Brummy Isles does not have any thing to say about the UK's civilising influence on the rest of the world. As we have seen when our genteel football lovers promenade through European towns displaying their gracious English manners; when English dramatic productions (and especially our musicals) are lauded from New York to Beijing; and when English food is served in every restaurant around the globe; the benefits of English culture are understood and loved throughout the world. And nowhere is the global community's desire to rush to England to partake of it more clear than in places like Finsbury Park. For it is here that the world's huddled masses have come to find respite from their troubles under the great and comforting mercy of our benevolent Queen. For Finsbury Park has actually been turned into a huge refugee camp, where those fleeing persecution and terror come to nurse their hurts and start again. It is nothing like the camp depicted in that bitter documentary of course - one can enter and leave (by train!), and there is a thriving community composed of every race and creed on the Earth, all gathered in the one place to make their fortune.
Being new to London, I decided to wander through this great camp to experience its full rich texture, rather than circumventing it along one of the main shopping streets. Some of the refugees I saw being sheltered by our beneficient state included:
- Refugees from fashion tyranny: As the reader is no doubt aware, since we graciously agreed to relinquish our (enlightened and enlightening) grip on the African colonies, some of them have slid into ruin and terror. Fortunately for these nations, the enlightening touch of British civilisation, though brief, has stopped them from being capable of committing any great cruelties to their own kind, and the tryanny of their new masters expresses itself through the capricious oppression of all forms of interesting fashion. These cruel leaders require their working classes to dress entirely in black or grey, with all forms of colour outlawed. Naturally people flee such unjust treatment, and the first place they flee to is England, so famous around the world for its fine fashions and devotion to the tasteful use of colour. So it is that as one wanders through the western side of Finsbury park one can find the newly-liberated, browsing a shopping arcade lined with shops selling multi-coloured dresses and gowns, having their nails encrusted with multi-coloured jewels, and having multi-coloured hair extensions attached to already bedazzling coiffures. Anyone who questions our enlightened refugee policies should surely only need to see the joy on the faces of these simple folk as they mix red and fuschia ballgowns with yellow nails and electric blue shoes, to know that a good deed is done every day in the Capital.
- Refugees from the sun: there are places in the world, particularly the middle-East, I am told, where the use of any form of sun screen or sun protection is banned. By the time they reach puberty, young women of these countries are so damaged by the sun that they begin to show signs of premature ageing, and by their twenties they are horribly disfigured. Sadly, these countries were never English possessions (some of them were conquered by Europeans!) and so have never learnt the sterling English practice of politely looking the other way; and so naturally these young ladies must cover up completely to avoid the discrimination which attends facial disfigurement in these countries. Some of the more enterprising of these young ladies, no longer able to work due to their disfigurement, and unable to leave home without the protection of a male bodyguard, flee oppression and come to London. Sadly, they have so long been covered from the world, and are so soaked in the anti-sun-screen propaganda of their home countries, that they cannot quickly adapt to our British sun-loving ways. Fortunately the British government has held the line against calls to ban these young ladies' strange clothing, and one can see them occasionally on Finsbury Park streets, not yet settled into English ways, and so scuttling furtively from doorway to doorway, swathed in black from head to foot, cleaving wherever possible to the shadows. Poor dears! But I'm sure in time they will be brandishing their sunburnt cleavages with the best of the British lower classes; and if they can never adapt, surely their daughters will grow up with the freedom to be as brazen as our own English lasses!
- Refugees from childbearing: it is worth noting that there are some (like our dear own Oscar Wilde, about whom I believe none of the rumours) who do not wish to engage in the great British practice of beating one's own young, and so to avoid the discrimination which attends such a lifestyle decision in most parts of modern England, they flee to Finsbury Park, where one can do and be anything one wants. I have it on good authority that there are many from parts of Europe - particularly Eastern Europe, where beating one's own young is almost as much a national pastime as it is here in the UK - who flee to the UK to better construct a child-free life. Naturally these folk like to make friends with others like them, and in time, rejected by much of society, they form very tight and close bonds with friends of the same sex as themselves. Perhaps there is some kind of consolatory aspect to the friendship one forms with another childless person of the same sex as oneself? In any case, it is endearing to see the sweet and enduring friendships these childless folk form. One can see them walking about the streets of Finsbury Park deep in conversation, holding hands for all the world like they were very close siblings. How ennobling to have such a close and platonic friendship with an adult of the same sex, and to be unconcerned by the public opprobrium which is sometimes visited upon the childless! I envy them their platonic closeness, and devotion to a lifestyle choice.
- Antipodean Big Brother escapees: As one is perhaps aware, a rite of passage for our bizarrely grotesque Australian cousins is to star in that most grotesque of stage shows, Big Brother. Those who fail to star in this show often recreate it in large, impromptu gatherings in public parks and Public Houses throughout the towns and cities of the Nation on Friday and Saturday nights. But wherever there is art there is snootiness and discrimination, and some Australians are excluded from these rites because they are considered to be too uncouth to take part. One can only imagine, what a person must be like to be considered too uncouth by an Australian! Fortunately the UK extends her welcoming embrace to all who flee any form of discrimination, and our Australian cousins who are rejected from even the rudest of Antipodean society are welcomed with open arms here. So it is that they are able to form their own groups here, where they can recreate the Big Brother stage show they love free of discrimination. I hear that their antics in so doing are quite offensive, and fortunately they have been corralled in their own camp around Shepherds Bush. In time I am sure I shall visit and see one of these shows. I hope I survive the affair to report upon it in these notes.
- American Christian escapees: a large and noisy bunch of Americans lives just Northwest of me, freshly escaped from the tyrannical grip of their fundamentalist churches (or at least, that is my conclusion judging from their behaviour). They have secluded themselves in a suburb which recreates American life in its entirety, though their protestations about the presence of public transport, pavements ("sidewalks" - I ask you!) and gun control laws have fortunately so far fallen on deaf ears. One can only hope they remain as powerless here as they must surely be in America.
- Jungle fliers: my own genteel suburb has its own African (or perhaps Australian) escapees! Yes, dear reader, even Willesden Green must play its part in offering safe haven to the world's dispossessed. I do not often welcome the hoi polloi in my own neighbourhood, but in this case I do not mind so much, even though they may take up residence in Willesden Gardens itself... for they are parrots! That's right, dear reader, there are parrots in Willesden Green, spotted a week ago flying from tree to tree. Noisy blighters, but much more harmless than most of the other noisy blighters in my suburb. I just hope they don't befoul my gargoyles.
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[1] I think actually this building was ruined during the final confrontation linked to above - not sure where the sea is though, I get deuced confused by all the roads and byways in London but I could have sworn there was no body of water near me when I emerged from the station, and I couldn't find so much as a tunnel to the Thames. But forsooth, I didn't look very hard. Children of Men is a factual account, so it must be there somewhere.
[2] this commune is described rather dourly by Miss Gardam in Crusoe's Daughter, and it is this Wollstonecraft-like quality to the arrangement which inspires the title of this post . For while laying out (as it were) my debauching testimonials for the edification of the other commune members, I spied a squirrel outside the window. Upon further discussion I learnt that yes, in fact, this commune's grounds are graced with their very own squirrel! Lucky me!
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