(Margaritte)
I realized this morning that I want to be a writer again. I want to spend my time at Evergreen writing stories and taking pictures. Sound like a good life plan at the moment.
Hear we are in the midst of northern England memories. Lets start at the beginning.
We left on the mega bus, a double-decker long distance bus with a pig like conductor painted across the back of the bus winking at us as if to say “welcome to the hellish ride of your dreams.” After an hour of combating traffic through city center the bus abruptly stops on the side of the road, another scratchy British voice comes over the intercom, sounds familiar doesn’t it? “Due to engine troubles the bus will be paused until another bus can come and take you the rest of the way.” After about 5 min. the bus starts again and keeps going with no explanation. This repeats 3 times through out the ride until another bus meets us half way there and we unload bags onto our second mega bus. As this happens it is also a “Wee” pee break. Being used to the grey hound routine and a little fuzzy in the head from a nap I walk off the bus to “take a wee” and inspect my surroundings. After finding the perfect black current juice I walk out to no mega bus. In a moment of horror I realize I don’t even have Elliat’s number because we have been joined at the hip for the past few days, and I don’t even know where I am, plus all my stuff is on the bus, oh yes and I have all the money for both of us on me. In a state of shock suddenly I see a red faced Elliat running towards me shouting, “get on the bus we are leaving.” In a state of embarrassment and relief we board our bus and laugh most of the rest of the way there.
Manchester, our sweet industrial city. “The Basement” the info. shop and queer film festival, Primark our cheap cute clothing hookup. We arrive with heavy bags and make our way to the awesome info. shop “The Basement.” Nice people with northern accents and a place to stay for the night immediately greet us. The space itself is colorfully painted and full of resource and queers. There is a vegan café with sparkling elderflower drink, yummy and cheap big meals with cake. 3.50 pounds for 2!
We watch gay cinema including a movie called “the pink mirror” a campy Bollywoodesque film about drag queens in India. We plan to distro it in the states. After the film we went back to the organizers house, Humey where we hung with Manchester queers and talked about Kafe Queeria, the collective that put on the film festival. They also put on a café for queers at the info shop with performance, knitting and socializing.
The next day we explored Manchester. We had our first official British breakfast that morning, baked beans, eggs, tomatoes, sausage, thick bacon, shhh don’t tell the vegans, tea and brown sauce, something similar to ketchup with dates that has a vinegary taste to it. It was all-good and we finally felt full. The city center contains a large green with dead grass and a fountain full of kids running around in there underwear and teenage boys filling bottles with recycled water to splash there mates and girlfriends with. We took pictures and watched the children play until it got to hot and was time for some air-conditioned shopping. Primark was the cheap clothes hookup. Polka-dot belts for 1 pound, pants that fit Elliat, skirts that come right up to your bum with big red buttons, we were quiet happy.
That night we had our first interview with Humey talking about race and the queer community, all the organizing in Manchester for ladyfest and the work between Leeds and Manchester. I could already see that I would be learning a lot from the interviews. I usually try to explain that queer identity is about having no barriers around who you love. To be open to being with anyone not just one sex or the other but gender queer folks and other identities. Humey described it as uniting all the facets of gay identity. Like not being segregated to one identity but uniting under an umbrella term that brings people together. I really liked that.
Our last night in Manchester was the Gossip show they were a fun piece of the Pacific Northwest in a far away city. We hung out with Bob and Helena from Jean Genet and all danced hard and sweaty in a crowd that looked exactly like the Northwest except for the British accents and all the smoking inside. After the show we went downstairs to hang with Beth, Hannah and Nathan the band members. Elliat made a date with Beth to hang out in Portland and eat hamburgers and get earrings. We then went home in a cab. This was our first cab in England. They are large, enough room for 7, and I am still getting used to this opposite side of the road thing.
We left Manchester that morning a fresh start to Leeds.
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