England Through My Eyes #11

September 2, 1999

York was quite a rude shock after a few days in the countryside. Well, to be fair, York is a very nice city but my introduction was near the railway station, where traffic is never known to be pleasant.

York’s railway station is extraordinarily long. According to Paul, the station was an important logistics centre during WW2 and a hit target. We heard that the Time Team was in town and the room situation was expected to be tight, so decided to book through the tourist office. Time Team, which is part of the BBC, produce archaeological excavation documentaries. We saw them digging and filming at the Museum Garden the next day. Didn’t see much though, as most of the places were fenced off.

We were famished and went into the walled city to hunt for food. It was amazing that much of the city is still surrounded by medieval wall and its entrance guarded by towers. We entered through Micklegate Bar. York’s street names reflected the Viking’s influence, where ‘gate’ is street and ‘bar’ is gate (well, and ‘bar’ is pub, but that applies to everywhere in UK).

I joined a free tour given by volunteers the next day and learnt that once, a mayor decided to demolish the wall to accommodate the traffic conditions. That started a public outcry, thus the wall was preserved, except those parts that had already been torn down. The same guy who led this protest also petitioned for the wall to be widened, to create a public path to walk around the city. That led to a private outcry. You see, people walking on the walls can see everything in the gardens of those mansions. Majority won and now part of the fun when you walk around the wall is to peep into the gardens.

Along the way, Paul shared anecdotes about the sights and corners of York. York’s shortest street (a few meters only) has the longest name: Whip Ma Whop Ma Gate. And the uni students were particularly fond of ‘collecting’ the signage of this street and hanging it in their rooms – just for fun!

After dinner, he practically gave me a walking tour of all the major sights (he would leave for Cambridge the next morning and it struck me later that he was giving me an orientation). The old, narrow streets with little lopsided houses look real pretty at night – I would say it was quite romantic actually.

There is a plain looking fountain at Parliament Street. Paul said that he

seldom saw the fountain looking so ‘decent’. Well, it was the uni students’ ‘playground’. In the middle of the night, they would throw paints, detergents etc. into it. Try to imagine the fountain overflowing with suds! And he was one of those ‘masterminds’.

Every night on the 5th of November, the Clifford Tower is transformed into a launch pad for fireworks. Why? Thanks to Guy Fawkes, who was from York, who tried to blow up the House of Parliament (while the parliament was in process) in 1605 with 36 barrels of gunpowder so as to return the country to Catholic faith. The Gunpowder Plot was discovered in the nick of time and the poor guy suffered a terrible ending. Still don’t quite comprehend why

every year throughout England, people ‘commemorate’ their most notorious extremist through bonfires and fireworks.

River Ouse, which runs through York, floods almost every year. There’s a very popular pub by the river bank, which marks on its wall the flood level throughout the years. Wow, there are quite a few markings that are over

my height!

Did you like this article?

    

 

Share it

 

Place a comment