°…
Less than a month ago, the view from that same skylight was of snowdusted rooftops.
Now, sunlight, warmth, surprisingly tropical downpours reminiscent of Sydney. The tree is happier, and might offer some shade. Yet, with that foliage arcing up over the bed, it does begin to look more like a tiger’s den than the monastic (scholarly) cell I projected onto the space when I first moved in. Though grateful it never acquired the Dickensian character of “foul’d and frosty dens, where vice is closely packed and lacks the room to turn” - or, just a little room-lacking, a bit of vice. Still, the jungle-green tones seem ubiquitous: changed the desktop to this last Thursday; then gorgeous book and magazine arrive in the post on Monday, both with fecund green covers; while London’s grey-black-brown (which I actually quite like) is overwhelmed by lucent greenery.
Spring accounts for the green, obviously. Something I have to remind myself of, having come from a place where the proverbial, often-English ‘green and pleasant’ has been steadily replaced by drought-brown, even in the south eastern corner of the continent. But, tropical, humid?
Only now beginning to discover the enormous parks and canals in London (when I’m not overpopulating the British Library - what would Karl and Charles, neither of which were academics, say about being conscripted to such hyperbolic uppercrustiness? Something along the lines of the Londonist, or more sardonic still? I’m seriously tempted to rewrite “A Modest Proposal” and nail it to the doors of the BritLib - and the friendly security guards might just let me.)
So, London, twenty degrees and shimmering - I never imagined this would feel hot before. After experiencing two winters in a row, I’m a little starved for sun. The pond at Hampstead Heath beckons, but maybe not yet. Sitting out in the sun most every chance to wash the English pastiness off my skin, with some success. Admittedly, these moments were around squat evictions and various radical gatherings, but at parks and along canals they were. (I would not, however, really be inclined to go to RockAgainstRacism (aka Ken For Mayor campaign) again, but we did get to hear just a little of Poly Styrene do ‘Oh Bondage Up Yours’ (an old youtube clip). Which is to remind myself that too much greenery, or that of the pastoral rather than jungle kind, never produced good music - or, for that matter, art, writing …) I’ve not yet done the pilgramage to Highgate, but I do like that it’s overgrown rather than well-tended, as the only other cemetery I’ve seen (Stoke Newington) was.
And, ah, Mayday in the debauched, dangerous classes style - not really eurotrash, but still funny.
That said, I’ve obviously been nostalging about Melbourne quite a bit of late, coming from an almost constant orientation toward translations of the often-untranslatable. And, so, more than tempted to indulge a renowned Melbourne snobbery. But suffice to point to this compact remark illustrative of that Melbournian haughtiness - viz Sydney, of course - and note that Melbourne’s biggest problem is that it’s in Australia.
Soundtrack, courtesy of motel de modeka and B:
Little Dragon - test (or get a whole lot while it lasts)
Clout - Sunshine Baby
Frank de Wulf - Drum in a Grip (Wax Doctor Mix)
I’ll be sure to pass that one on to my sublimely bitter co-Sydneysider - “Melbourne’s biggest problem is that it’s in Australia.
And I’m greatly enjoying your current meditations (scholarly) on place.
ana [April 30, 2008 @ 5:12 am]
I was amused in part because, being here, I’ve had to hone and repeat a similarly compact ‘explanation’ for AU (Europeans are peculiarly ignorant of colonisation - though maybe this is not so peculiar, psychically speaking - and provincial):
Melbourne - manufacturing and multiculti; Sydney - finance capital and segregation; Brisbane - plantation economy and slavery; Perth - mining capital and apartheid … all arrayed around persistent frontier and border wars, with a heavy dose of penal-colony conformism.
And now, having imagined I was done nostalging, the inbox is overflowing with stuff about the Melbourne taxidrivers’ wildcat blockade. Yes, Melbourne’s biggest problem is that it’s in AU, just as London’s biggest problem is that there are English people, still. But not that many, in some rather large parts.
s0metim3s [April 30, 2008 @ 11:10 am]