The Drummers of Afon Sistema

I had not intended to go to town today, but I received an email from the library saying a book was in, so I popped down. (The book was Michael Rosen's Many Different Kinds of Love; the well loved poet/children's author was a survivor of the first wave of CoVid, but had to be put into an induced coma for 40 days while he was being ventilated).

This trip downtown out to be a good decision. Unbeknown to me, Stroud Jazz festival had started. Families and small groups of friends were picnicking everywhere: in the churchyard, on the steps of buildings; all enjoying the sunshine and music that was about to start.

In King Street I heard the deep boom of a drum, and my heart responded. I followed the sound to outside the Sub Rooms, where a samba band, Afton Sistema, was playing, accompanied by dancers in colourful dresses with wide hooped skirts. I watched them for a while then rushed to the market to tell Clean Steve about them. I minded his stall so he could take his little Fujipix down to snap them. He will have a better picture then mine, I'm sure!

I went to grab an iced coffee while the band regrouped, and the cafe I met a former WEA attender. She is well known for her disapproval of most things, and her 'Sodom and Gomorrah' remarks about innocent pursuits, but I was still taken aback when she said, in response to my enthusing about the band, 'I've no time for that sort of Jungle Music'.
Although I can be pretty sure she's not a Catholic, she reminds me of the protestors in an early episode of Father Ted, holding up a placard outside the cinema, saying 'Down with That Sort of Thing'. Truly, she is not a good example of a former PA for the United Nations!

Leaving Sourpuss to her lunch, I returned home and finished the book I bought yesterday, The Road to Hornsey Rose (see extra). It's an autobiography of an apparently privileged childhood in Surrey, marred by a drunken mother and a dying father. The author dropped out of public school and went to live in a squat. The Times they Were A-Changing....

I wish I'd been born early enough to enjoy the optimism of the hippie era. All I remember is a couple of people wearing floaty scarves and bell-bottoms, talking about flower power, then it was All Change, move to from Ireland to Scotland, mother becomes depressed, British Leyland goes on Strike forever.  But Barcaldine House, in Argyll was squatted by 'hash-smoking hippies!' That was exciting! I met one of them in a pub in Stoke Newington, years later.

After supper we watched Annika, part two, and a great BBC documentary called When Tina Turner came to Britain. Highly recommended.