Remember, Remember...

the fifth of November.

Ah, Guy Fawkes Day. Bonfire night. The now 401-year celebration of the foiled plot to blow up parliament. I can only imagine what London must have been like.

In bright Manchester, I didn't know where the celebrations would be. I had been informed by Julie that there would be fireworks in Hulme, but the trip might take too long :( Considering the amount of explosions I have heard outside my house for the past couple nights (comparable to the noise and commotion during the end of Ramadan), we wouldn't have to go far to see something.

And indeed I was right. We decided to sojourn out to Platt Fields Park, just beyond the Curry Mile (a monstrously large park, with a lake and island); I figured something would be going on there. As we started down the Mile, we stopped to observe the ashes falling from the sky. We wondered how our eyes would survive the hazy fog the enveloped the entire city. The fast moving clouds may indeed have been the fallout from too many rockets.

We were saddened to find nothing at Platt Fields. That is, nothing immediately. Instead, we were pleasantly surprised to have a moderate view of fireworks far and away. Balz complained about there not being any "large" fireworks, but this was strictly due to distance.

I can definitively say this was different than the 4th [of July]. Although I wasn't as close to the fireworks, they were no less grand. Indeed, it is quite different to stand alone in a park, with 3 friends, turning every which way to catch the lights and explosions coming from all directions. It was like every neighborhood harbored their own collection of rockets, a cataclysmic battle-of-the-bands. Occasional sparklers would arise, and mischievous kids with their own tricks would unleash an explosion or two.

After the ordeal, which was short objectively but long by no stretch of the imagination, we headed to the Whitworth, a pub near my home, where we enjoyed lager, cider, and poor folk music (not music of poor folk, but poorly performed). On the way back to my house, I got to hear and see more fireworks being shot off across the street, in Whitworth Park. This was fine, although the one that flew sideways indicated it was amateurs setting them off.

In my bed, I was carried away to Slumberville by the glorious fireworks, explosions, and general hub-bub of English tomfoolery.

//End of Post//