Postcard from Norfolk - Caravans

Caravans, it would appear, have come a long way since the holidays of my childhood, when, if I recollect correctly, they were essentially overheated (perfect British holiday weather exists in fading Polaroid’s and childhood memories) Tupperware boxes filled with happy holidaymakers and a miasma of feet and drying beach-towels.

We are holidaying in Norfolk, and we are in a caravan.  This is not a social experiment.  This is real.  It’s also an attempt to ‘try something different”.  Why we have to ‘try something different’, I have no idea, as ‘sticking with the familiar’ is my favourite strategy when on holiday in Norfolk; rise late, walk on beach, lunch, shop at local shops for evening meal, visit the pub, cook dinner, teevee, bed, repeat.

But different it is, and the caravan is certainly that.  A lot of thought has gone into the modern caravan.  For a start, room in the bedrooms has been sacrificed to create more room in the communal areas, including a large kitchen and living area.  Obviously the designers consider that a family going on holiday together will actually want to spend time with each other, which is a charming ideal (it is good to know that there is still a place in the world for wild optimism), or be able to watch the telly in comfort, which is pragmatism.  The seating area is a large el shaped ‘bonkette’, traditionally used by teens for pouty slouches in very much the same boneless way that lemurs drape themselves over tree branches.  As well as a kitchen you can actually cook in, there is a dining table that you can sit at without having to fold away either another piece of furniture, or a teen.  All of this occupies the same space at the front of the caravan, the shared family living space.

The site itself is a mixture of residential and rentals.  You can tell the residential caravans because they are surrounded by tiny gardens enclosed with low fences.  Residential caravans also come with extensions, usually those lock up plastic tool sheds you see that look like a cross between one of those things that go on top of cars for extra luggage, and a portaloo.  Judging by the contents of the open ones, these can house bicycles (sensible) or washing machines (very sensible).

The site itself is a mixture of residential and rentals.  You can tell the residential caravans because they are surrounded by tiny gardens enclosed with low fences.  Residential caravans also come with extensions, usually those lock up plastic tool sheds you see that look like a cross between one of those things that go on top of cars for extra luggage, and a portaloo.  Judging by the contents of the open ones, these can house bicycles (sensible) or washing machines (very sensible).

The site itself is a mixture of residential and rentals.  You can tell the residential caravans because they are surrounded by tiny gardens enclosed with low fences.  Residential caravans also come with extensions, usually those lock up plastic tool sheds you see that look like a cross between one of those things that go on top of cars for extra luggage, and a portaloo.  Judging by the contents of the open ones, these can house bicycles (sensible) or washing machines (very sensible).

In terms of pecking order, residents look down on renters, renters look down on motor-homes and everyone looks down on campers.  Scum.

The caravan has two loos.

That’s right.

Two toilets.  Fuck the iPod, two toilets in a caravan is real design genius.  Two toilets in a caravan is probably the single greatest contribution to family, if not world, peace since the invention of alcohol.

I remember the facilities of my youth.  Even in the long hot summer, where the crispy crinkly grass’s colour had faded like that of an old Polaroid picture first to dull green then to brown, the toilet block had a fringe of lush green grass around it, kept fresh by the eternally damp concrete that was in turn moistened by the Timotei-scented showerings of endless adolescents and the occasional Imperial Leather lathered middle class refugee.

This then, is luxury caravanning.  Luxury because of the space, luxury because there’s a little rack to hang your towels up to dry on the outside of the caravan, luxury because the telly is colour and large (although not as interesting as watching the goings-on of your fellow caravanners through the enormous picture window) and luxury because, most importantly of all, you don’t have to lead a torchlight parade to shared facilities last thing at night, in flip flops.

Merry Christmas

This should have been all brussel sprouts.  Instead, it's mostly trout.

With the flooding hitting so many people and so many travel plans, it’s clear to see that for many, the pre-Christmas periood is about getting home to see your family, because wherever you live , your home is where your family is.

This migration home was evident on the motorway at the weekend.

One of the best train journeys I ever had was on a Christmas Eve, the carriage looked like a scene from a seasonal Hallmark made for tee vee schmaltsfest, with the luggage rack silver and gold and green and red with wrapped presents poking out of plastic bags, and the travellers either glad to be going home, or glad to be going home for Christmas.  Possibly the general atmosphere of goodwill towards all men was assisted by the noble English tradition of opening the booze at twelve sharp on Christmas Eve, especially if intending to use public transport, but so what?

On the motorway, instead of the usual lone traveller in their car, one could peek into mobile bubbles of Christmas, making their way to relatives.  Back seats were crammed with kids and boots were crammed with presents.  The journey gave rise to an impromptu game of awarding the best presented back sill of a car.  If you are going to totally obscure your rear view, you may as well do so with some jolly packages.

And while a strong contender for most Christmassy car was the one where the lady in the passenger seat had a large, beautifully wrapped box on her lap, the winner without a doubt was the large car with the parents in the front, the kids in the back and the presents and a dog in the large rear boot space.  The dog was well out of sight and reach of any humans and was just beginning to realise this, as it started to carefully shred the wrapping on the box nearest to it.

Loaded cars are part of Chjristmas.  I have friends who make a journey between various family members, clocking up many miles and many hours of radio listening.  They call packing the boot ‘loading up the sleigh’.

With the floods and the rain and the weather stopping trains in the south and ferries in the north, it’s taking some people a lot of effort to get to their loved ones. But weather your present is beautifully wrapped, or in the dog, or just their presence, it’s worth it.

Here's to all the travelers - may they arrive safely to a warm welcome.

Merry Christmas!

Comment on: 'The UK census, it's just a big box of ticks'

Comment on: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/mar/19/lucy-mangan-uk-census-politics

As anyone who, after a simple misunderstanding, has had their binoculars confiscated by a magistrate can attest, the English are peculiar about their privacy. At the start of the century it was predicted that the largest single issue facing the on-line community was going to be privacy. And that prediction was right, but in exactly the opposite way that the bearded social scientist crossed with Mystic Meg making it intended. Instead of us all jealously guarding our privacy, there seems to be a rush by certain people to push the details of their private lives at anyone that will pay attention or, to give it its technical name, Facebook.

The Government could save a fortune by getting Facebook to undertake the census rather than Lockheed Martin (a company more recognised for delivering ballistic missiles than forms that allow you to consider yourself quite the wit by listing your religion as 'Jedi'). Not only would this allow everyone to list their personal details, but to make the exercise self financing this information could then be sold on to marketing companies the next time Facebook updated its privacy settings and all the users ticked the 'I accept these terms and conditions - even the one about using my photographs as 'before' images in adverts for weight loss pills, face creams or self help books on fashion and grooming' box, without reading them first.

Not only that but social networking gets into a lot more detail than: 'How many VHS box sets of 'Buffy the vampire slayer' do you still have knocking around?' or whatever else they are asking in the census this time round, and in real time too. If the Government wants to know how many people are: 'in a relationship, but increasingly irritated at my partner's habit of sucking Quavers until they dissolve while watching telly, and building up to Do Something about it', right now, then social networking can deliver.

Of course, while people are quite happy to share their snapshots, opinions, thoughts and details of their relationship status with the world, they are rightly reticent to share any personal details, at all, with the Government. This is for two reasons. The first is the fear that the data will somehow fall into the hands of an twisted megalomanic and be used for evil. This is an entirely reasonable fear if you substitute the treasury for the undersea volcano base that said twisted megalomaniac resides in. The second reason is that the government will collate the name and address of everyone in Britain in a handy DVD form that can be left on a train, where it will be found by somebody who works in marketing and, as a result, you will spend the rest if your life receiving direct mail about yoghurt.

The biggest problem with the census in it's current form though is that it has no feature that allows you to include a photograph, or even a simple line drawing, of yourself. This ironically neatly illustrates the gulf of understanding that exists between the snoopers and the public. The government values a census because it provides data on who lives where and so on. The public values a census because it not only gives middle class people who are researching their family tree hours of fun and an excuse to use the internet for reasons other than download money-off coupons for biscuits but, vitally, is key to producing that moment in every episode of 'who do you think you are' where a well spoken but slightly irritating thespian discovers that they are directly descended not from Latvian nobility as they always believed, but a instead from somebody who was common as muck and who spent a spell banged up in Strangeways for Lurking Near Duckponds.

Such a moment is always accompanied by a grainy snapshot of some cross eyed rickets riddled bloke in a battered hat and disgrace boots and that's what the census lacks, a chance for us to record now for posterity the images that might pop up centuries hence to mortify our ancestors. And if you can sport a huge stove hat and whiskers while doing so, then so much the better.

Family Monopoly

A few years ago, the people who make Monopoly came up with the genius idea of local editions. You could go round your home town buying up the cathedral, the local footie stadium and so on. It was also, of course, tremendous fun to see if your street was of a high, or low, value – congratulations, you live in a shit part of town and now everybody knows it.

You can even have a truly bespoke edition:

http://www.mymonopoly.com/home.php

Surely this is a fantastic idea for a couple of reasons. The first is that you can have a really, really local version. Live in a tiny village? The sort that only famous folk singers and homicidal maniacs ever come from? Well, why not have a village edition, with local landmarks like the war memorial, church and bus shelter. In fact since they closed down the post office, that’s it for local landmarks, so you have to get creative, ‘that spot where Darren shagged our Sally’, ‘Where Jon was sick after he drank all that scrumpy’ and so on.

But why are we restrained by geography? Monopoly comes out at family gatherings when the usual arguments have been exhausted and everyone needs some fresh material to bicker about. So how about some properties that have a special place in family history, ‘where Cousin Sadie had her first wedding’, ‘where cousin Sadie had her second wedding’, and have the second location cheaper than the first? Or the classic: ‘The house Tom’s bitch wife got in the divorce’?

Or moments or occasions, like your twelfth birthday party could be a low value square because you peed yourself with excitement in front of everyone when you opened your present and it was a Back to the Future toy car, oh the humiliation! Other low value squares: the time your cousin tried to touch you, the time you held a funeral for your pet dog (that wasn’t actually dead, you were just going through a morbid phase). High value squares could be ‘My first drink’, ‘passing my driving test’ or the ever popular ‘out and proud’ (adjacent to ‘dad makes full recovery from heart attack’).

(Best version to unwrap on Christmas morning: family secrets edition. But is ‘Tina’s little problem’ a high or low value square?)

Of course, the real benefit would be to use people, not places. Fed up with having to put up for years with Granma’s sadistic game of arranging family photographs in order of current preference? Then imagine her delight at finding that the least expensive property on the board is ‘Grannie’s Hovel’.

I predict a fist fight before the top hat makes it once round the board.

Family Holidays 1 – Caravans

If the smiles in the snapshots are any indication then our family holidays, at least when I was a plump baby or chubby toddler, were pretty jolly affairs. In various different mediums; black & white, Polaroid and faded technicolour, the family pose happily against various backdrops; sandy beach, pebbly beach, forest or mountain. All in exotic foreign locations; Spain, Italy, Switzerland, the Isle of Man, Largs.

Then, at some point in the 1970s, possibly not unconnected to my growing ganglyness and hence my growing unsuitability for stuffing into overhead lockers to save the price of a seat, we started to take holidays in England.

I suspect that my parents were actually trying to toughen us up. Worried that all that sunshine, sand, fun and the relaxed attitude of foreigners to the serving of wine with dinner to the under tens, Mum and Dad decided that the ideal holiday destination for us was the 1950s.

Time travel technology not being available they decided on the next best thing – caravan holidays.

Today, anyone misguided enough to collect a handful of Sun tokens to put towards their £1 weekend break in a caravan park will probably have the image of a modern static caravan with microwave, sky telly, carpets and a mains toilet.

Well forget that. We’re talking 1970s here. The static caravan was basically a big beige tupperwear box. Kitchen utilities were limited to a stove with two settings: ‘keep cool’ and ‘incinerate’. Excitement was whatever back issues of Commando comic you had remembered to bring along and what porn you could forage around the site and the flooring was one of two colours – dung flecked with fly-shit black, or green faded to dung flecked with fly-shit black. The telly was black and white and there were large notices forbidding the use of chip pans.

I occasionally wonder if dad had some contact at the Met office though, because the holidays we took were blessed with the kind of weather normally associated with places called ‘The Devils Anvil’ in Spanish. Great for the beach and sales of camomile lotion, which I was ritually slathered in every night as my sunburned skin popped blisters like bubble-wrap, it turned the interior of the caravan into something resembling that sweat-box Alec Guinness stumbled out of in ‘Bridge on the River Kwai’.


What effect such heat would have had on an interior toilet Christ alone knows. Luckily, that was one worry we did not have, because in the 1970s an inside toilet was an optional extra in a caravan just as it was a luxury in a 1950s house. Instead we had the ‘toilet block’, a truly ghastly structure of rotting concrete that, even when the weather was turning the countryside as brown as the caravans themselves, remained damp.

While most of my specific holiday memories are blurred and, appropriately, faded as an photograph left in the sun, three caravanning occasions do stand out.

Devon, 1975. Sun, sea, sand, buckets and spades. I spend the days investigating rock pools and the nights caked in camomile lotion, gently radiating the same amount of heat as a three bar electric fire. I can’t recall if it was a rare dull day or a family excursion for the hell of it, but we went to Torquay cinema to see…Jaws.

Now I’m not sure if this actually counts as abuse, but taking a kid not yet out of short trousers to see that film while on a seaside holiday had a pretty profound effect. The benefit of not being out of shorts was that it was a lot quicker to soak them with your own piss in fear at the thought of ever going near the surf again. After a day of scanning even the rock pools for fins, my parents showed a masterly understanding of psychology and bought me a rubber shark of my very own. Some might say it was the ability to show control of the totem of the thing I feared that got me swimming again, I say it was so I could re-enact the scene where Robert Shaw gets eaten with my new shark and old Action man.

The Lake District 1979. My older brother tolerates my staying up with him to watch, on the B&W telly the B&W movie ‘Night of the Demon’. This is still just about my favourite horror film, mainly because you don’t actually see much of the demon, it’s all suspense and suggestion. My younger self though, was terrified, especially at the thought of something lurking…between the caravan and the toilet block. That’s right, no loo in the caravan.

I was too scared to own up to needing to visit the toilet block. Even when promised use of a torch. Frankly, you could have put a fucking tommy gun in my and not got me out there. God knows it wasn’t anything as mundane as peados and wierdos I was worried about (the kids back then on the caravan park were gargoyles, all scabs and snot – you’d have to be a sicko indeed to go after one), it was a sixty foot fucking fire demon. But my bladder kept me awake, giving me more time to get wound up, until I hit on a cunning solution.

What I learned was this – peeing into a plastic basin in the dead of night in a tiny bedroom in a silent caravan sounds like a fucking roll on a snare drum at the Last Night of the Proms. It almost drowned the noise of my brother laughing in the next room.

Great Yarmouth, 1982. An enormous caravan site, so big it had rough neigbourhoods. The attractions of the beach, the site pool and the many delights of the town were as nothing compared to my chief delight – haunting the arcade and thumbing my pocket money ten pence at a time into the Star Wars arcade game – the one with the wire graphics where you actually got to sit in the cabinet and pretend you were in an X Wing.

Years later I played Star Wars Rogue Leader on the gamecube. The graphics are astonishing, the sound fantastic but…where’s the cabinet, the smell of sea and sweaty kids high on chips, rock and candyfloss and where oh where is the slot for the ten pences that, in comparison with the coin today, were like manhole covers?