A new week for GOTB...and a new climate apparently
Hello! My name is Marigold and I am the Project Coordinator for the \"Grandchildren of the Blitz\". The project is working with young people, adult volunteers and elders. Together, we are looking back on the stories of the blitz and bringing them back to life. Here\'s a bit of background....
Grandchildren of the Blitz will happen over a number of months and will bring with it a number of different stages. First of all, we are running a weekly session for 9-12 year olds. In these sessions we are focussing on different aspects of the blitz and learning about them through creative work and games. We are also running training sessions with the Imperial War Museum and the Oral History society and training our young people - and adult volunteers - in interviewing techniques.
I am also visiting Residential homes and Day Centres meeting elders who lived in the local area during the Blitz years. We are having conversations about how they see their relationship with children in the area and how/if they think this area has changed since the Second World War.
We are asking Elders in they would like to engage with the project in a number of ways: celebrating the project with us by coming to our Launch event, joining us on our Blitz Walk in June led by Local Historian Neil Bright and also if they would be interested in talking to young people about their memories and experiences.
We will then be working with our team of adult volunteers to transcribe these interviews and in the autumn, we will be running weekly sessions in which we will work with children, adults, elders and a writer to explore how to dramatise some of the ideas, characters, stories and themes that were revealed in the interviews.
In Spring 2011, we will be performing this script with an intergenerational cast. We still don\'t know where we will do it - it may be in a theatre or it may be outside at a site that has an important role in the history of the Blitz - we are waiting to see what the Elders and the stories reveal and what space would suit these stories best.
I will be tracking this process every step of the way - so do come along with me...and if you reading this and want to get involved - just give me a call on 020 7237 4434 or at marigold@londonbubble.org.uk. In the meantime, keep calm (and cool!) and carry on....
Flags, fiestas and far more...
The journey continues. The first stop of the day (yesterday) was St. Joseph\'s Primary School. I have been going around a few different primary schools doing taster sessions with the young people from Years 5 and 6. In the sessions, I have been working to provide an overall \"taste\" of the project - including exploring elements of the Blitz through images, working with interview techniques and delving a little bit into performance - with the aim of encouraging young people to come to the bubble and get involved with the project. These taster sessions have enabled me to gain an understanding of how much the children already know about the Blitz (alot!) and how interested they are in the subject (very!).
The session at Joseph\'s School was no exception. The whole experience - from the friendliness and enthusiasm of the staff through to the responsiveness of the children - was pretty great. We did some really good work and when I asked how many of the children might be interested in participating in the project - a good few of them put their hands up. It would be great if some of them did come along to our Thursday evening sessions.
I had a merry little cycle down Lower Road and back to Bubble HQ and did a few hours at my desk before heading over to Frank Whyman House - a block of sheltered flats just down the road. I had a very funny experience a few weeks earlier when I was trying to get through to them by phone (or at least trying to get through to their management company) only to realise they were about two minutes away. Bonus.
So, there I found myself in a very peaceful world of well kept rooms and corridors, replete with floral decoration and respite from the outside world. I had arranged to talk to some Elders living in the flats about the project and we gathered in the common room for that very purpose. It was lovely to be there. In some of the residential homes and day centres that I have visited, I have felt like a bit of an intruder, I have been asked to talked to Elders when they have been eating their lunch or having their own social time and I have been a bit mindful of interrupting that. Yesterday however, everyone had gathered there - wanting to talk and wanting to hear about the project. Why, there was even Union Jack Flags that had been used to decorate the room in a quasi-VE day manner. Brilliant.
Through the general hubbub, Mrs. Gwyne rang a little bell - the friend of teachers and group leaders everywhere- and away we went. I started by introducing myself and talking a little bit about the Bubble - what we do and where we do it, I then introduced the project and asked if it would be okay to raise a few questions with them and have a chat - \"Oh yeah - we can definitely chat\". Fair play - they could. And I was very glad of it.
I started by asking them what they thought their relationships with young people in their area was like. Some responded very positively, saying that they always found the young people in their area to be very polite and considerate. I enjoyed hearing this as this is very much my personal experience of working with children in this area - both in schools and at Bubble. Others said that they had no respect - because they were given so much and had no idea of its worth, others said that children these days were growing up too quickly. One gentleman said that - back then- if a child misbehaved in a shop or in a public place - they would feel like them would be able to have a word with them or give them a clip around the ear and send them back home. These days, he said, people who so afraid of getting in trouble - either with the police or with gangs - that they don't feel they can respond in this way. I found myself in an interesting position - how do we maintain a sense of community and shared care, whilst respecting the rights of the individual?
We then began to talk about whether the area had changed since the Second World War and the overwhelming opinion was that it had changed enormously. Many of the elders talked about the disintegration of community due to the huge amount of private housing. Many said that again - back then - neighbors helped one another in all sorts of ways. It was generally felt that this had hugely subsided during the last fourty years and that the ties and links that support community life had been severed. Amidst a lively outburst of conversation, I begin to hand out photos of the local area including the ruins of Keetons Road School, a VE day Party in Camberwell, a evacuee tea party in Worthing. Annie - who was sitting to the left of me and told me that she went to Keetons Road school -she wanted to look at the photo, but was unable to see. We talked a lot about what happened and she told me a very poignant story. One day, she was on her way back from somewhere, when she looked up and saw a German Bomber emblazoned with a huge swastika flying very low nearby. No air-raid siren had been sounded and she frantically knocked on the nearest door, they quickly took her in and all took refuge in their Morrison Shelter. In such clear and simple stories, holding incredibly powerful images and told through the eyes and mouths of those that have lived through it, history very firmly sweeps into the present. For me, the swastika is a horrific yet somehow distanced symbol of human torture - for Annie it was her daily reality. She also told me that much later on, she came across the same woman who had offered her shelter..
We talked some more and then I invited everyone to come to our Launch Night - for which there was a very excited response and also if anyone would consider sharing their experiences with the young people - a good few were up for it, so that was great. I said my goodbyes - popped back over to the office to do a couple of things, then went down to the Ellen Brown Centre on Grange Road for a partnership meeting for the Bermondsey and Rotherhithe Carnival. At the carnival, we will be handing out the names of those local civilians who were killed during the Blitz; their names, their age and their address, along with a token of remembrance . We will ask people if they would like to add this token to our remembrance map; which will be a map of the local area. Handing out the names will be participants/volunteers involved with the project and members of the Bubble Staff team we hope that these people will be dressed in 1940s attire. If you want to help us do this that would be great, just get in touch. The majorith of the Carnival is celebrating the Blitz Spirit, rightly so, it is a carniva, but we wanted to step beyond the bunting and remember not only our countrys ability to live through the Blitz, but also remember those that lost their lives. If you remember Stacy Solomon from the X-factor - from Dagenham, laughed a lot - then she will be headlining! Come along..
A very productive day and some amazing stories. Over and out.
World Wars and World Cups (and bowls)
And the project rolls on. More stories, more insights, more developments. In the spirit of the World Cup, let'Ss KICK OFF with some memorable moments.
I visited Age Concern last week and was introduced to a very mixed bunch of elderly gentlemen. I sat down and started chatting to them and when I mentioned the project and what I had come to talk about - they all began talking over each other and out of this very excited talk, they collectively volunteered up one particular chap who was sitting very quietly in the corner. They told me to stand up and carried my chair over for me and placed it next to him. I sat down, we introduced ourselves and started to talk.I asked him about how he felt this area had changed and he said that it had changed beyond recognition. He had many things to say about how the area and the people that have moved in, all fuelled by a singular conviction that he had been completely neglected by the country that he given the best years of his life to serve.
He had worked as part of the fire brigade and was in his early twenties during the time of the Blitz. He and his family had been completely bombed out. The force of one of the blasts had knocked the air completely out of his baby's lungs. She had been killed instantly. When he talked, he did so without a trace of emotion. It was like an iron curtain had been slammed down between that time and now, completely dividing up the two periods of his life. Or like it had all happened to another person.
I asked him if it was painful to talk about it. Not at all - was his response - it was all gone now, he said. It was almost like those Blitz years - in all their pain and torment - had been his real life and everything since had been something else, laced with shadow. He said that he sometimes wished he wasn't even here. To give your life to war and to your country and then to feel like it has been in vain, must be a enormous weight in the living of daily life. But, he said - he enjoyed coming here, seeing his friends and feeling a part of the community of the centre. That and his daughter and his grandchildren, made his life worth living. Again - the importance of the relationships between the generations, of passing down stories and the faith in new beginnings and new life - comes into play. He was charming. And I felt privileged to brush up against a life that is so different to mine and that has been through events that I cannot begin to comprehend. Very moving.
In a very rich contrast, I met a very chatty and lively lady down the road from us in Surrey Docks. She had been around nine during the Blitz and was evacuated down to Devon. She spoke very enthusiastically about the experience about getting on the bus and being given a PACK LUNCH! In these days of scarcity and rationing, a full pack launch was a very rare treat and to get one at all was a source of some celebration; in Betty's case - V2s and German Bombers were entirely eclipsed by the neat sandwich triangles nestling in her lap. And when the bus couldn't leave that day and they had to come along the next day and get ANOTHER pack lunch, well there was a victory on a much smaller scale, on the fronts of hunger and deprivation at least, the war had been won.
These two people - one an adult, one a child - lived through very different wars. The first - a war of total turmoil, chaos and destruction. The second - a war of new experiences, small delights and exploration amidst complete devastation. Its fascinating to see these memories of war running against each other and to begin to think how this might contribute to the production that happens at the end of this project.
Alongside visits to Elders homes and in addition to the weekly sessions that we are continuing to run with the 9-12's every Thursday, we have begun to embark on our Oral History training. Rib Davies - an accredited trainer from the British Library is running three sessions overall. The focus of these sessions is to explore the origins of Oral History, is role in recording the history of our communities and to equip our young participants and adult volunteers with interview techniques. The first session was fascinating and it was brilliant to see the adult volunteers working alongside our young participants, who were furiously taking notes! At the end of the day, they tested their new found skills through interviewing me about the 1990s. Very strange. And slighting exposing.
Once you start to think about memory and the importance of the things that you have lived through - how they have contributed to your understanding of the world and your voice within it, everything does take on a new sort of meaning. After the day's training that I attended, I went back to visit my hometown and as I was having my morning cereal from the bowl that I had as a child, I felt very moved by this bowl! A child's memory does seem to very much focus on the minutia of things - as with Betty's sandwiches - and to be brought back to the bowl and the illustrated detail of this boy fishing on a mushroom, was a lovely little anchor in the widened scope of adult life. A reminder to not forget about the little things and moments that steadily - or not so steadily - build our lives.
Now, I shan't prattle on much longer. But before I sign off, if by any chance you are reading this before Saturday 12th June - DO COME ALONG to the Bermondsey and Rotherhithe Carnival tomorrow. We will have a presence there with our mobile mapping installation. We have sourced the names of all the civilians that were killed during the Blitz in the Bermondsey/Rotherhithe area. We will be displaying the full list. Next to each name, there will be a pin - with the name attached to it and passers by will be encouraged to choose someone, perhaps of their own age and gender or perhaps someone who lived in their street/area, then asked to remove the pin from their name and place it on our remembrance map of the local area. They will also be wristbands availaible with that person's name on it so they can carry their memory into the day with them. We have been busy here at Bubble HQ - with the much appreciated help of our volunteers, cutting up the 746 names of those civilians that were killed. It is an epic task, punctuated by glancing into the lives of those killed; a ten week year old, a 92 year old, a list of ten surnames in a row: an entire family wiped out in one blast. Do come along if you can.
Thanks for reading. Over and out.
Bubble Blitz
11/07/10: Hello Marigold & co. I'm hoping to join the Thursday group to work with you guys. The project is quite absorbing. I suppose you've gathered a lot of material already, from the elderly folk, about the Blitz and its impact. We might want to do a period piece. Or a modern-day thing with lots of references to that bygone age. Quite excited about the whole thing!
Adults
15/07/10: Wonder how many adults from that time are still around? Not many, I would assume. Adults of the Blitz can supply more detailed information.
Interviews
Hi Muhammed - so sorry about the delay in getting back to you. Fantastic that you are going to be joining us for the Thursday group. Yes, we are already in the midst of interviews - they are going well and we are gathering some really interesting material. Amazing how much people can remember - there are some very detailed memories that people hold from being as young as five. Incredible really. Great that you are reading the blogs and keeping an eye on the progress of this...Best, Marigold
5,4,3,2,1 - LIFT OFF!
So, we are officially launched. Grandchildren of the Blitz has left its pad and as we speak is soaring through the sky. In June, we held a bit of a launch shindig here at Bubble HQ which included a slideshow on the impact of the Blitz on this area by local historian Neil Bright and a quiz called by none other than the Pearly King of Camberwell and Bermondsey - Pearly King Jim! It was a lovely evening, made even lovelier by the abundance of homemade cakes - baked with care by bubble staff and our team of volunteers. It was very touching to see everyone in the project coming together - the young people, volunteers, the elders and family and friends. It started to feel like it was really happening and that the different generations of this community were at the heart of it.
Since then, our Thursday evening research sessions with the young people have continued - we have been diving back into the 1940s world of play - playing street games down the road and thinking about how it feels different to modern play and how children now spend their free time, learning and practicing interview techniques and preparing for their interviews, which are now well underway. We have done four interviews so far, and one in the pipeline for next week. As the stories flock in, some common experiences rise to the surface - namely, the contrasting world that these then children occupied. A world not only of bombing and scarcity, but of rubble and play, sweet shops bombed out and open to looting, the relative luxury of evacuation to the countryside and many more tales of many more experiences.
We are also in the process of developing our website for the project, which will be a way of us sharing every part of the project as we go along. We will have extracts from the interview, background historical information on the Blitz, forum pages, photo galleries with images of archived objects and of people/events of the, interactive maps of the area showing damage done by bombing and much more. The website will be a resource for research, a place to share experiences of the project and a means of keeping track of what is going in.
Some of our volunteers are doing research into this period of history and sharing it back with us which is hugely appreciated. And as ever, comments or feedback or reflections on any of this are warmly welcomed!
GOTB
Here are some thoughts -just thinking around the project.
The phrase \' during the war\' means so much to particular British generations - the Second World War- but to many others now living in London \'the war\' can mean a variety of wars- Cyprus,the Gulf War, Bosnia,Serbia, Kosova, Rwanda etc.Different contexts, different specifics,different enemy but civilians involved in conflict and survival. The Blitz changed Bermondsey, political and economic developments changed Bermondsey, immigration changed Bermondsey. Some of that immigration caused by war. The MP for Bermondsey during WW2 was a pacifist.
Important in this project to be true to the experiences but not to be nostalgic or zenophobic.
History of Peek Freans at the wonderful under-funded Pump Museum - a big employer which had strong links with the community. Their own history says that they employed Polish immigrants on the night shift only. Why? After the WW2 they employed the \'Windrush generation\' in departments \'which would be ready to accept them\'. I came across a reference in a memoir to the fact that they didn\'t employ married women or trade unionists during WW2.
Childhood memories can be be very powerful, fragmented, sometimes overlaid by things later learnt. Getting this on stage will be very interesting!
GOTB
When are the first sessions taking place for GOTB?
Start
I'm thinking session 1: Thurs 16th September (6.30 - 8.30 pm.) You thinking of joining?