Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
Shots this week show people in a paused moment. The world never stops spinning and if you don’t take the odd time out you feel you won’t stop spinning either. If I could have any superpower it would be to be able to freeze time – it would be bliss. You could mooch about doing whatever you needed to without having to deal with people doing the same thing at the same time, which is what happens in a big crowded city like London. We are all trying to get our shit done and we’re all basically in each other’s way.
This would be like “flexi-freeze time” (patent pending). I’m not sure how this could exactly work if we all had that power mind…could be slightly problematic logistically. I guess I was really just selfishly thinking of myself. Just thought it would just be so great not to have to actually do anything or have anything demanded of you for even just a little bit. The world in stasis. Its a beautiful thought. The tricky bit would be wanting to unfreeze it… maybe its this heat, it makes you so lethargic you don’t want to do anything . To be honest, even just talking about freezing is cooling me down a bit…
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
All the shots this week were taken at the Portobello Summer festival which was on weekend before last and was a free fest and the first time it had ever been thrown. It was an amazing vibe all day, helped undoubtedly by the relentlessly good weather. It was like carnival but just for the locals and everyone trotted out from the area to hang out and have a day of listening to great music and basking in the sun. Grooverider and fabio really kicked it off on the square and there were two more stages on Portobello Green and also in Acklam Village featuring acts such as Audio Bullys and Jazzie B and an inspirational Akala. I never found out who the guy was in this shot but he looked and sounded brilliant. They even turned Portobello rd into an outdoor cinema and filled it with deckchairs and wireless headphones. As I mentioned last week this area is starting to get its positivity and energy back a year after Grenfell which this event was actually dedicated to. The tragedy plunged the neighbourhood into misery and despair and there is still a massive fight underway to get justice for the survivors but like suffering personal grief and loss, at some point you have to go forwards and reinvest in life. You have to participate again and remind yourself that we are all just lucky to be here no matter what is going on . You exist, you’re winning. End of.
The Daily Mail yesterday described the attendees of the Anti-trump March on Friday in London as a ‘rag tag band of left wingers’. This was predictably fake news. For a start I don’t actually think you can actually use the term ‘rag tag band’ to correctly describe 100,000 people. Everyone there would agree that there was not just one type of person present. It wasn’t just left wingers, it was representatives of every single different group you can possibly think of from all over the entire world. And if there is one thing you could draw from the event is that it isn’t just one demographic that hates Trump. Its all of them. And not little niche factions of society. Entire continents and genders have been maligned by his rhetoric and his policies. He has literally managed to piss off everyone and they were all there to inform of this fact. Here are a few of the ‘rag tag band’ nominees in no particular order…
Latin Americans
Believers in Human Rights
The Palestinian Movement
The whole Muslim world
All Parents
The entire female gender
Dog lovers (woof)
Workers of the world.
The LGBTQ+ community
The much persecuted Gingers of this world
He even managed to alienate some of his own kind
…and basically most of Britain who clearly don’t like him.
And every group and protester expressed their dislike of the man in different ways. Some went straight up insult.
Is it a coincidence that Trump basically rhymes with ‘Cunt’? Hmm, I’m not so sure…
Some went for the jugular..
And some went for the surreal approach…
Umm?
Okay..and sorry, how is that going to help?
Am a massive fan of Jarvis but don’t quite see the connection between him and Trump. Anyone?
I don’t get this but sure someone will..
Or this one for that matter…although the person next to me thought it was hysterical so there you go…
Stansted gag..clearly
And my personal favourite…
“Yesterday Trump flew over my allotment and look what happened to my courgettes!” Exactly!
The march was very good natured. A wonderfully positive spirit despite the crowd having joined together in hatred of one man. I have been on a lot of marches before but never against a single individual. It is astounding how much animosity he has generated. Someone had even brought a Trump shaped punch bag that you could take swings at. And many did…
Even Trump himself had a go..clearly hating himself as much as everyone else did
The irony is that this gi-normous crowd had joined together in hatred of a man who stands for hate.
As the quote goes: “There is always a lot of hate at anti-hate rallies” and this was no exception. You need to be able to see the oxymoron present…(Not the moron, he was golfing in Scotland – drum roll put-leeeease!) …even if you hate the haters you are still a hater. Trump has become the ultimate bogeyman, the focal point for all the anger for everything that is wrong with the world. Is he responsible for all of it? No, of course not but he has managed to be so divisive and destructive he has galvanised his opposition. So in some ways, if you ascribe to the butterfly effect, he is so bad that he has actually got people off their arse and sprung them out of their apathy and into action. He has succeeded in bringing energy to movements and ideals that have become complacent so you could actually argue he has become an (inadvertent) positive force in the world.
But this was a mostly positive I do have to commend a lot of the banner makers for maximum effort, humour and inventiveness…
Incredible likeness wouldn’t you say…
Tell it how it is
For some they made it about themselves. Give yourself a pat on the back…
well done. we really appreciate your sacrifice…sure Donald would to.
well done also. Really proud of you.
And good to have the Scandinavians on board…obvs.
This one perplexed me as it seems like she is actually for it, which I’m not sure was the intention…
And just in case anyone was in any doubt what she was referring to, here is the flip side…
Some were very confusing/confused
Umm, he is a lot of things but I’m pretty sure he is a man
I’m pretty sure you get Brexit but there you go…
I can only think the one on the right sounded better in their heads but they might want to look at their faecal obsession..
And I don’t know why but this one just really made me laugh.
And there was only one banner that actually annoyed me and it was The Guardian’s attempt to get in on the action…
Could you say anything less wishy washy if you tried? Why even bother? Love what someone scrawled on it. Think they must be referring to the removal of the process that created the copyrighters who came up with that bullshit slogan.
And so the marchers marched. And songs were sung. And protest was made. Did it help? Who knows? It did succeed in making him feel unwelcome and it made him skip London as a destination on his visit so guess that’s job done. Will our government take note and listen to the voice of these people? We are, as a country, poised between America and Europe and he is trying to force us to decide. Is he really the way we want to go? A man who clearly cares about nothing other than himself, his donors and his own administration? We surely needed to be guided not by trade repercussions but by our moral compass. We need to use it, above all else, to navigate through the next stage in this country’s history and to follow the path that leads to a society for all, regardless.
There are two ways the human race has survived and evolved. Competition and conflict which Mr Trump clearly ascribes to. Or alternatively cooperation. The greatest achievements of our species has come from cooperation, our greatest divisions from competition and our greatest tragedies from conflict. Which sounds like the best way to go in your opinion? Do you want to get on the Love Train or the Hate train? All aboard?
And, finally I will leave you with a cute picture of a dog to keep this piece on the fight against facism light and fluffy. Snookums (name changed to protect her identity) here clearly felt very strongly against Trump’s visit. Although I do think that is slightly disrespectful to pigs and I will be mounting a campaign to ensure this canine does not spread hate and division in the animal world… #pigsagainstdogswhothinkpigsareliketrump
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
As the old saying goes, give a person a fish and they will eat for a day, give that person a fancy pineapple filled with smoothie juice and a mini umbrella and they will shoot the shit out of it for their social media.
Are we at the stage when sharing what we consume is more important than actually consuming it? Are edible items being chosen not for their taste but for their aesthetic appeal? Is getting ‘likes’ now more valuable than eating? Will people’s food buying decisions now be dictated by how good it appears on camera?
The answer from me to all of the above questions is “I don’t know, maybe but I’m starting to think so….”
More slices of summer this week. When the weather is this good it is difficult to think about anything else. And that’s a good thing. Forget the dismal political doom n gloom. Forget about major sporting tournaments. Forget about the crapola that is your life. Just bask in the sun and all your troubles will go away. People seem happy. Relaxed. Without a care in the world. The shots from the last few weeks have all been mostly from west london, around Portobello Rd and on Golborne Rd and wanted to show the good summer vibes here at the moment as it feels like the area is starting to get its mojo back. And I am pleased about that…
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
Every shot this week was taken on Portobello Road as it is celebrating its 150 anniversary this year. Not that’s a huge departure from my usual fair, a lot of my shots are taken on this street. In the last decade or so it is the road I have walked along the most, almost every day. But if you are going to walk down any street every day of your life it might as well be Portobello. There is always something going on, someone great to look at, some little nugget of life playing itself out amongst the members of this community. Truth is there is nowhere near as many characters as there used to be. There are now way more tourists and definitely more poshos but it is still a endlessly fascinating street and I always manage to stumble upon something to captivate my attention in every daily journey.
I could go on about how it has changed and how more vibrant it used to be and the loss of small independent businesses and how gentrification had killed its soul but wishing for how it was to return is now, I realise, just a dead end thought process. It achieves nothing. Those people, those places, they ain’t coming back because they are from the past. Present day Portobello is yes, a different affair to what it was and I miss a lot of the people that used to be in this neighbourhood but it still has stacks of charm and character. Now that there are lots more tourists and photo shoots (see above) it has actually made my life a lot easier as I just look like one of them when I am wandering around taking photographs. These days I rarely get noticed as a result which means I can get better shots. I am actually thinking about going ‘full tourist’ as find its the ultimate camouflage for a street photographer. I’m gonna get a “My girlfriend went to London and all I got was this lousy t-shirt’ t-shirt, a union jack baseball cap and walk around looking vaguely lost and I am basically invisible.
