UK folk; how did you remember the 5th of November?
deLYS
388 Posts
Those in the UK please to summarize what is going down? Is it like the 4th of July there? Did they just blaze up a big ass bonfire? How come the US don't celebrate by just burning shit in a big pile on Independence Day too? That's how I like to get down hittin' it in the woods.Is the party for Roman Catholic terrorists, or Protestant rule kicking ass? Is this as misleading as Boxing Day which has nothing to do with actually kicking ass, just delivering mail? That discovery was dissapointing, like the tooth fairy. No Holyfield, just postage. Does the movie adaptation of this story suck? 
Is it like Devil's Night over here in Camden? Is blood bein' spilled? Is booze being drank? Is girls inhibitions waning? Is there school? Is there stupid programming in relation to this day on network television? Like a bonfire version of the Yule log? Do they make corny shirts and plastic earings and dumbass pins for people to wear to the office around this day? I have no desire to scour wikipedia or the web as I want to osmose all things learned through cartoons and heresay.and while I'm at it do you celebrate halloween? Because now that I think about it Id love to trick or treat over there as characters from Monty Python or something yelling in half baked cockney ringing everyones doorbell for haypenny candy. -------real ignorant towards your ways except the butter on the bread and some county college grade history so please accept this as a lighthearted act of diplomacy, I been all around europe but never seen the westside and am 
Is it like Devil's Night over here in Camden? Is blood bein' spilled? Is booze being drank? Is girls inhibitions waning? Is there school? Is there stupid programming in relation to this day on network television? Like a bonfire version of the Yule log? Do they make corny shirts and plastic earings and dumbass pins for people to wear to the office around this day? I have no desire to scour wikipedia or the web as I want to osmose all things learned through cartoons and heresay.and while I'm at it do you celebrate halloween? Because now that I think about it Id love to trick or treat over there as characters from Monty Python or something yelling in half baked cockney ringing everyones doorbell for haypenny candy. -------real ignorant towards your ways except the butter on the bread and some county college grade history so please accept this as a lighthearted act of diplomacy, I been all around europe but never seen the westside and am
Comments
We have a saying (yep!), "remember remember the fifth of november". So that's how we remember it. I was taught that in school.
V for Vendetta is a classic and I won't go near the movie.
Last night, there were tons of fireworks visible from my window. I listened to a nice record and watched them. Very enjoyable.
At the weekend I got drunk and blew up some fireworks as well.
It's not really a big deal like your 4th of july stuff. Just an excuse to blow some stuff up and get drunk.
Cheers!
If it was still about taking sides and not about getting drunk while setting off fireworks then it would undoubtedly be a Protestant celebration as, to this day, we still burn effigies of Guy Fawkes on the bonfires.
Truth be told though it really is all about just burning things, getting drunk and setting off rockets. It certainly doesn't have any emotional historical connection like, say, Independence day or Thanksgiving.
and
I've only experienced 4th July once and it didn't really seem all that similar. Aside from fireworks, there's no massively commercial element to Bonfire Night. There are associated foods but no cards or decorations or huge Frickin' lights all over houses and that kind of shit. Bonfire night is more jacket potatoes, roast chestnuts, hotdogs and the like.
"No Holyfield, just postage."
hehehe - nah, it's not as misleading as boxing day though I always know that holiday for 2 things: football matches (everyone is off work so it's one of the few chances I get in the year to check out some live football) and old films. films like canonball run or escape to victory... but fuck boxing day, we're talking about Bonfire Night, right?
"Is it like Devil's Night over here in Camden?"
see that would require me to google shit about that in order to compare...
"Do they make corny shirts and plastic earings and dumbass pins for people to wear to the office around this day?"
No, not at all. There really isn't anything on sale other than fireworks, as far as I can think.
Hallowe'en has been taken over in a very American way with people not necessarily wearing costumes to scare the living shit out of people but rather just for the sake of wearing costumes. Trick or treat is bullshit. People either open the door and give a treat or pretend they're not in and don't bother. NO TRICK AT ALL. wtf is that? In my day people would stock pile eggs for months before, ensuring anyone who didn't give up the goods took some yolk related nastiness to the exterior of their domicile...
and all the "penny for the guy" shit started in september this year, it seemed like... fuck's that all about?
Trick or treating is relatively new here. When me and my mates first tried to do it 20 years ago we got dogs set on us and the police called and folk did not appreciate our brand of junior racketeering. Today confectionary-based extortion is at the heart of our society. Progress cannot be halted.
My girlfriend says that the shit goes off in Belfast big-time. Bonfires across the city, usually stacked higher than the houses - made up of caked layers of wooden pallets and car tyres. They burn holes in the street tarmac, and by the time the council has gotten round to re-surfacing them, 11 months have passed and a fresh stack is being prepared. Girlfriend says the Prods see it as a day to be fiercely pro-loyalist, while the Catholics see it as a day to hide.
............................................................................
On a less serious note, the fireworks in Oxford have been going off for at least a week, and a few halloween parties involved fireworks as much as fancy dress. I spent the whole weekend 'celebrating'; DJed Friday and Saturday night; watched the Shining on DVD as a late Halloween treat Sunday; and cruised into work w/ hangover Monday.
^^^ hmmmmm....not a good look? ^^^
In Texas we call this Brunch.
You live in Oxford? I'm here too, where do you DJ? The place is so small that i bet i know you or someone who knows you...
I like the book and thought the movie was dumb as hell too, but only from reading it was I familiar with the holiday, I wondered what kind of cultural characteristic it was for someone from the region to read about Moore's future world, It mysteriously glorified Fawkes' actions and for me being unaware of it I assumed where he was coming from and devised for myself that it was a celebration cause the place was....saved, obviously haha. I just remember the movie sucking hard, but I wondered if it somehow simplified the plot to empathize that perspective of the holiday. I should have remembered who wrote it though, those Frickin' convuluted Matrix dudes and there was no salvation.
It's not really a big deal like your 4th of july stuff. Just an excuse to blow some stuff up and get drunk.
Truth be told though it really is all about just burning things, getting drunk and setting off rockets. It certainly doesn't have any emotional historical connection like, say, Independence day or Thanksgiving.
I like that they just admit that shit and know whats really fun, not like a decorating competition or a contest for how much goofy festive shit you could wear!
Hallowe'en has been taken over in a very American way with people not necessarily wearing costumes to scare the living shit out of people but rather just for the sake of wearing costumes. Trick or treat is bullshit. People either open the door and give a treat or pretend they're not in and don't bother. NO TRICK AT ALL. wtf is that? In my day people would stock pile eggs for months before, ensuring anyone who didn't give up the goods took some yolk related nastiness to the exterior of their domicile...
It was like that here too, last week I overheard these old people talking about that too, they were saying how it used to be every year their shit got so fucked up on mischief night and now it doesn't happen so much. Even as a little ass kid 6-9 I must have got jumped and robbed and cracked a egg over the head nearly every mischief night if I got caught out playing, I remember getting accustomed to wearing all black and having to hide out and shit when dudes would be egging and trashing the school. Then it would be like an initation when you stop trick or treating; one year someone was bound to try to fuck with you and take your shit and you and your friends would just one day step up and beat the shit out of them, then the next year all your friends would be robbing everyone and they'd be the assholes and the end of October was more just a slight headache.
Bonfire Night celebrates the very best of British. Something about burning Catholics too, but I forget.
Trick or treating is relatively new here. When me and my mates first tried to do it 20 years ago we got dogs set on us and the police called and folk did not appreciate our brand of junior racketeering.
Damn, that is both scary as hell, is this nz?
t first came over here with the ET film. Really.
as for guy fawkes, i think theres two things going on: one is celebrating the foiling of the gunpowder plot and the execution of guy fawkes, the other is explosions which make up for the fact it was foiled i.e. which are a substitute for blowing up the houses of parliament. there are places in which it is rampantly anti-catholic (lewes - you should go, its one of the most raw things i've ever seen).
No shit! ET? now thats a cultural phenomenon, that's in NZ? Is it there where they are celebrating burning Catholics?
My girlfriend says that the shit goes off in Belfast big-time. Bonfires across the city, usually stacked higher than the houses - made up of caked layers of wooden pallets and car tyres. They burn holes in the street tarmac, and by the time the council has gotten round to re-surfacing them, 11 months have passed and a fresh stack is being prepared. Girlfriend says the Prods see it as a day to be fiercely pro-loyalist, while the Catholics see it as a day to hide.
Its starting to sound right here like all these images they put on the news over in US to freak out the population, footage of violent burning effigies and bloodthirsty looking dudes in the Middle East, except with a Guy Ritchie twist...Think I should mark the 5th in Belfast on the mental calendar as like a baaad acid trip for all my future endeavors. Do a lot of people in those areas end up beating the shit out of eachother around this time of year when the tensions seem to rise? Are the more Anti Catholic celebrations typically exclusive to areas where theres only Prods? Damn Catholics having to hide, I never realized that night was like that and I can ride with Alan Moore and V on this shit wholeheartedly. I guess in certain regions the Catholics always seemed to b e hiding and thats why they could never be trusted, lol
alan moore on religion
they have a lot of clips of interviews with him, you kind of feel bad for him with what they've done to his stories on film, I watched one clip of him talking about how he refused to get paid for what they did to V for Vendetta and left it up to the artist just to hook him up because he wanted to see him paid, I heard Watchmens being made too so uh oh
You either set of fireworks in your own back yard and then went to the local bommie where the local wives would have made bonfire toffee or flapjacks or whatever (and then hang around getting sooty faces and making every item of clothing reek of smoke for weeks whilst cooking spuds in tin foil in the glowing embers) or go to a local park where they have big organised firework displays and even bigger bommies, but you are not allowed too close, which removes the excitement and risk or fatal injury.
This Friday we are also going around to some Indian friends who are celebrating Diwali with more fireworks - it coincides nicely for everyone that this happens just after the 5th. And believe their food is nectar!!!
this isn't "datestrut"
Fuck you funny guy!
Thats the Lewes bonfire night parade that Francis talks about; I'm surprised that it was so strongly Protestant in the 80s, but I suppose it makes sense; first time I went a few years back it was, as a catholic (lapsed), weird to suddenly see 'No Popery' signs, and effigies of the pope, amid the fire and flames. But, as mentioned, its very tongue in cheek these days, more a clebration of tradition, as indeed is bonfire night itself, the religious aspect is non-existent.
Lewes is a great night out, great they still allow it, the whole town is on fire for the night, its weird to be so close to so much fire. Wandering around afterwards, in the debris, and the roads littered with burning torches, fireworks still going off, is like the aftermath of a very friendly riot.
I first went to the Lewes one in 1987 and it was a mad night - big brawls, Class War thugs, Orangemen, fireworks flying around, flaming effigies and torches and definitely not a family night out. Some years are less full on than others and now they've toned it down a bit. Lewes is a strange place on any day of the year, though. What Glastonbury is to hippies, Lewes is to occultists.