24/2003 - Have you seen Jack in the Green?
2nd June 2004
Hi Y’All,
We recently celebrated VeeJay’s first birthday. She went in for the vehicle bit of her service (diesel cake and an oil-change for birthday tea?!), and then the living quarters section had its check-up the following week. The Fiat garage that did the vehicle service and the dealer who sorted out the other bit are both over on the other side of the county to where we are parked at Basecamp Fulking. So, to save a longer journey on those two mornings, we took ourselves off the nights before each appointment and had the bizarre experience of parking up and sleeping on our former neighbours’ drive i.e. next door to where we used to live. Odd. Jeni twitched the nets upstairs in Les and Carole’s house and peered out to see if our buyers had done anything untoward to the lovely garden, but apart from the addition of several monstrously cherubic statues round the tasteful water feature, it all seemed to be as before. It was a rather surreal situation though - not least because as quite a few of you know, Jeni’s Mum and Dad lived for 20 years in that house before we did, so it was weird to go into the road and not go to number six!
There were threats by several other former near-neighbours to throw bread on the Lorry’s roof to encourage early morning seagull visits and thus discourage us travellers. However, we counter-threatened snatch-squads to kidnap their wheelie-bins so they decided they were prepared to put up with us for a couple of nights after all.
It was good to see Les and Carole again, now that we don’t have to eye each other with suspicion, wondering what the next practical joke is going to be (full garden gnome marriages outside their patio doors in retaliation for a dozen yellow plastic ducks on strings in the tree outside the front of our house - you know the sort of things suburban living, coupled with just a tad of eccentricity, encourages). When we were parked on their drive for those two nights, Les and Carole did allow us to cross the threshold of their house and, following a home-delivery Chinese meal, we felt obliged to continue the Former Neighbours Board Game Challenge. Before we could whip out the Boggle or Rummikub, Les and Carole slapped their box of Trionimos on the table, throwing down, if not the gauntlet, then certainly the Marigolds, and goading us into a new board game experience. Very good it was too (even though, as usual with these two fiends, we didn’t win).
As its name suggests, it’s a bit like dominos but has triangular tiles with numbers instead of dots, so you have to match up both numbers on one side. Then because of the three sided shape, you get all kinds of bonuses for completing a wedge or making a bridge - all very technical but - ‘good game, good game!’. We have since found a very neat little travel version which now graces the games cupboard in The Lorry, nestling alongside our new ‘SuperBoggle’ which had to be purchased after one member of Team Fruitbat, who shall remain nameless, eh Dave?, shut the last one in the cupboard hinges, with disastrous consequences. SuperBoggle not only has an integral timer with all kinds of flashing lights to warn of minutes ticking away, but also gives the option of playing with a grid of 25 letters rather than the standard 16 - wow! Actually it’s harder rather than easier, as you might expect.
So, where were we? Apart, that is, from on our former neighbours’ driveway.
Oh yes, celebrating the arrival of May. When we were down in Spain we were impressed with Spanish society’s ability to carouse at any opportunity and in particular to maintain the traditional festivals, usually ones with a quirky blend of religious and pagan origins. Whilst there’s no way that the UK can get anywhere near their exuberance for public frolicking, or indeed compete numerically with the multiplicity of fiestas, there are of course goodly numbers of traditional celebrations to be found over on this side of the Channel, especially when the sun comes out and it’s safe to emerge from under layers of woollies and waterproofs. It also helps, as we found out last year, to have a drum to bash and a couple of 5 metre high Giants to accompany.
So it was off to Hastings on the first May Bank Holiday weekend to dress up in silly costumes (any excuse!) and make a lot of noise at the Jack in the Green festival. We decided to take the van over and park up on a campsite just at the top of the hill above the Old Town and fishing quarter for a couple of nights so we would be near for everything that was going on. (‘Near’ being more of a relative term when we realised how far up this substantial hill it was laden with drums ... ). After being ensconced in the tranquillity and privacy of Basecamp Fulking, it was odd to be back in the liveliness of a commercial campsite, especially on a sunny Bank Holiday weekend. We did find ourselves muttering, old-farts style, about the shortcomings of the site compared to Those Campings We Have Known across the channel. Oh dear. And we promised we wouldn’t do that too much.
Our lovely friend Micky from Kent whizzed over to have coffee with us one morning and forced us to eat quantities of pain au chocolate, despite our protestations. We were, though, reassured when she told us they were the SlimFast variety. As she had to get to Ashford before mid-afternoon she couldn’t join in any of the goings-on, but kindly took us down to the seafront before she left to save us toiling down the hill. Fond goodbyes were said and off she went; we then wandered in search of a legendery ‘drum-off’ which was due to start shortly.
A couple of minutes later Jeni’s mobile rings. It’s Micky - she’s on her way back as Jeni has left something in the car (her brain?). Jeni speeds back to the appointed place to collect same as Micky gamely returns in the car. Further fond farewells. Jeni heads back to where Dave had said he’d wait. No Dave. Looks round. Still no Dave. Trots up and down a bit. Definitely no companion Fruitbat. Then a tapping on the window of a motorhome parked up in the nearby car park. The door opens and Dave is standing there, beckoning. ‘Come on, we’ve been invited in for tea!’
How does he do it? In the perhaps four, or maximum five, minutes it had taken Jeni to rush on her errandette, Dave had met some fellow Camping Car-istes and got invited in! Anyroadup, it turned out he’d been asking them how they’d persuaded the parking attendant to let them stop there in the coach park all day (we were wondering where on earth we’d put The Lorry the next day when we left the site, had the heavy drums with us and would need to be in close proximity to such essentials as cups of coffee, baby-wipes [for the removal of face paint] and the loo!). What’s more, it transpires these hospitable folk are from the Isle of Wight (Dave’s origins too as some of you know) and are even offering us somewhere to park when we go over to the Isle of Wight the following week to visit the overseas branch of the family! If we hadn’t managed to get such a good all-in-one ferry ‘n’ campsite deal, staying close to No. 2 Daughter and No. 1 & 2 Grand-daughters, we’d have taken them up on it, probably. Such is the generosity of the Camping Car Community, eh?
Our main focus for the weekend’s activities was the big Jack in the Green parade on the Monday, for which we were part of a group from Eastbourne drumming our way round the streets in front of ‘our’ Giants. So there we were again, part of the continuing tradition of Gianting in European folk history – yes really! Andreda (the moon goddess) and Herne (the hunter) are the two splendid figures we accompanied, though we had rivals of the Hastings’ Section 5 drummers’ 4 metre high skeletons, an almost 6 metre Giant of the Ravens group from London and a brace of slightly more diminutive giantettes (though still at least 3 metres tall) from other parts, including a couple from France. The whole procession, including at least a dozen Morris sides dancing their way round, was headed by Jack in the Green himself (an immense leafy mound with a face - he is of course a traditional May Day figure, some people think an expanded garland dating from the 17th century, others think he’s much older and more significant. In any case, he’s definitely the symbol of summer). He was escorted by his consort, Black Sal, and an entourage of wild drummers, the Bogies, naughty fairies, assorted wood sprites and the chimney sweeps who symbolise the cleaning of chimneys after the fires of winter have been put out. Quite a parade. And all a great excuse for dressing up, painting faces and making an awful lot of noise. Oh yes, it’s playtime again!
Anyone who didn’t start out with a green face certainly ended up with one, thanks to the daubing efforts of Jack’s friends, the Bogies, and that included many of the watching crowds as well as those of us taking part in the procession. Dave’s cossie for these ‘green man’ type occasions is something along the lines of entire-contents-of-garden-centre meets offspring of tree-nymph and incredible hulk. It involves a rather hideous rubber mask perched on top of his head, a horizontal shock of wiry grey-green hair, quantities of green grease paint and an awful lot of foliage. In the best traditions of sequins, each of these leaves is lovingly sewn on by hand (Dave’s). Just as well they are artificial or we could have a significant insect infestation emergency.
It was quite a long procession, and Jeni has to confess to nipping back to The Lorry and swapping her drum for a nice light rattle after only a third of the way round. Sneaky, eh?, but she didn’t fancy the idea of the very steep hill at the end, up to the castle, carrying and thwacking her not insignificantly sized drum. The parade started in bright, warm sunshine but over the three or so hours it wound round the town (and had a half hour stop for refreshments somewhere in the middle), a heavy sea mist started rolling in. By the time we all made it up to the castle grounds and drummed in the whole straggling procession, the clouds were thick, the wind was blowing (pity the poor folk inside the Giants battling to stay upright) and it was perishing! So much for welcoming in the summer in traditional fashion!
We felt a bit wimpish given that some of the Morris folk had danced and waved their hankies exuberantly all the way to the castle, and still arrived prancing. Regrettably, though, we were so exhausted and chilled that we didn’t stay to watch to denouement of Jack being slain (to release the spirit of summer) - it was back down to The Lorry, en masse, to put the kettle on and thaw out. Just in time before the rain started too. (Oh yes, we had turned up at 7.30 a.m. before the coaches and secured ourselves a slot, with the agreement of the parking attendant, in the main coach park where our new acquaintances not only parked the day before, but stayed overnight as well!)
All very jolly and highly recommended if you’re in the Hastings area this time next year (it’s one of the bigger Jack in the Green celebrations around, apparently). Also commended to you is the Beltane Bash in London at Conway Hall over the Bank Holiday weekend at the other end of May, which continues in the same spirit. We also had fun at that last weekend, parading the Giants round the streets of Bloomsbury and drumming round the edge of the fountains in one of the squares as children, naughty fairies and another Jack in the Green danced in the water. An unexpected bonus for the tourists on the open-top buses, who came in close proximity to the top halves of quite a number of the Giants in that procession. And the sun shone throughout! Ah, the peasants at play!
Dave didn’t spend the whole of May greened up (though it must be said, we were glad of the BOGOF offer on baby wipes at Tesco to deal with the aftermath of these verdant events). We managed a trip over to the Isle of Wight to see family and friends there without either of us donning a leaf or smearing ourselves with face paint. We did the rounds of family and were happily able to spend lots of time with Helen and our two senior Gorgeous Grand-daughters, Sorrell (now 7) and Mia (17 months).
We went with Helen and Mia to collect Sorrell from school when we arrived. She dashed out, rushed excitedly up to Jeni, gave her a big hug and kiss and, looking round, asked ‘Where’s Grandad?’. Dave was standing behind her, so gave her pony tail a tug. She spun round, glared at this strange hairy-faced geezer, and turned back to Jeni, asking impatiently ‘Where is Grandad?’. When Jeni pointed at the pony-tail puller, Sos looked, rocked back on her heels to take a longer view, squinted, peered and still couldn’t see Grandad behind the newly enbearded chin. It took Dave a full minute of pulling his usual silly faces and assuring her that it was really Grandad, before she launched herself into an enthusiastic bear-hug. Even then, when she’d come down to land from her helicopter-spin in Dave’s arms, she tugged at the whiskeriness and asked if the beard was real!
Sorrell, who’s also known as Squirrel, absolutely loves coming to stay with us in The Lorry. She has the berth that’s made up from the two little bench seats of the ‘dinette’ - we all call it the ‘Secret Squirrel’ bed. Naturally she completely wore us out over the weekend she stayed with us - football, badminton, drawing, reading, swimming. Oh yes, she and Jeni love their swims together, and true to form, once Sos had found out there was a pool we could use in the next-door holiday park, there was no stopping her. In there every day. Jeni ended up like one of her wrinkliest Agen prunes after a couple of hours escaping the sharks, rescuing Sos from the water-dragons which chased her down the slide, tickling the toe-anemones under water, measuring how much further Sos could swim than last time and doing synchronised chlorine-flavoured ballet-cum-disco dancing. She did get a bit of a swim as well! Sos nearly had to carry Granny-Jeni back down the lane to the little caravan site!
And what happens when Mia is old enough to come and stay as well?! (Dave prompts a reminder that No. 3 Gorgeous Grand-daughter, Hannah, is also just 11 months behind Mia in age ... !) How about a self-contained trailer?!
So, following that lovely episode, we had a vital mission: to deliver a very important consignment of Spanish contraband back across the water. But we think we’ll spare you the details on that one until the next time.
Until then, be happy, be silly whenever possible and above all, eat more fruit!
Hugs,
Dave and Jeni
xx