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At the going down of the sun...
Nov. 8th, 2009 04:17 pmIt is, indeed, sundown, and I am sitting here with a cup of tea, having just returned from an overnight outing. It was a friend's 40th birthday party last night, and so we were away to Shropshire, staying in a B&B in Market Drayton. This morning we left the B&B and went for a stroll round the town centre, just in time to hear the approach of the pipes and drums leading the Remembrance Day parade.
It was a pointed reminder that the deaths go on. The parade was led by the band of the Royal Irish Regiment, and there was a group of young soldiers in dress uniform all with identical shiny new medals, which must have been their campaign medals from their recent tour in Afghanistan. Soldiers with the accent of my home town.
And after we had seen the parade go by, and had paused at the cenotaph for 11 o'clock, we went on our way. Which led through Nantwich, and a spur-of-the-moment decision to visit the Hack Green Secret Bunker. Now it's a museum, but not so long ago it was part of the UK's last ditch defence system, part of the control system for the country after a nuclear war. This afternoon I stood within touching distance of the stuff of my generation's teenage nightmares, a pair of decommissioned but quite real nuclear missiles. They are remarkably tiny objects for something that could destroy an entire city. The place as a whole is a disturbing way to spend a couple of hours on any day, let alone Remembrance Sunday, not least because the video room has the banned BBC film "The War Game" on continuous loop. They are *not* kidding with the sign on the door warning that it's not suitable for small children. More information about Hack Green at the BBC's H2G2 site.
At the going down of the sun, let us remember, and be grateful that we are still here to remember.
It was a pointed reminder that the deaths go on. The parade was led by the band of the Royal Irish Regiment, and there was a group of young soldiers in dress uniform all with identical shiny new medals, which must have been their campaign medals from their recent tour in Afghanistan. Soldiers with the accent of my home town.
And after we had seen the parade go by, and had paused at the cenotaph for 11 o'clock, we went on our way. Which led through Nantwich, and a spur-of-the-moment decision to visit the Hack Green Secret Bunker. Now it's a museum, but not so long ago it was part of the UK's last ditch defence system, part of the control system for the country after a nuclear war. This afternoon I stood within touching distance of the stuff of my generation's teenage nightmares, a pair of decommissioned but quite real nuclear missiles. They are remarkably tiny objects for something that could destroy an entire city. The place as a whole is a disturbing way to spend a couple of hours on any day, let alone Remembrance Sunday, not least because the video room has the banned BBC film "The War Game" on continuous loop. They are *not* kidding with the sign on the door warning that it's not suitable for small children. More information about Hack Green at the BBC's H2G2 site.
At the going down of the sun, let us remember, and be grateful that we are still here to remember.