' Free, Free, Pallastan...'

Good day to you all, I bring you good cheer on this, a brand new shiny monday!

Firstly, apologies for not blogging in the last week or so, it has been a bit mental, work-wise, so i've not had a single chance to get on here and moan about it....thats how mental its been!

We shall gloss over most of last week, as its pretty much been covered in the 2nd paragraph, although Thursday was probably a highlight for me, as we had a good old laugh in the pub, just like the old days (god I feel old saying that!)

I came into work on saturday to get rid of some files (literally, they are currently being ripped apart all over broad street!), and had a good mornings work, which is always nice. Anyway, I left at about 1 and walked down towards Victoria Square as per normal. Now, every friday for the last few weeks, there has been a fairly vocal protest taking place about the whole sorry saga in Israel (not sure what Birmingham City Council can do about it, but they seem happy enough to protest nonetheless!). There are usually a good few hundred of flag-wavers and banner-holders, and it all goes off fairly peacefully.

So, as I walked down towards Victoria Square, headphones on, I noticed a few protesters holding peace signs from where I was walking by the Library and thought 'oh well, they're back again. Nice weather for it' (which is was, by the way!), turned the corner and realised that there were slightly more than a few hundred...more like a few thousand! As I moved past a few people standing around, I didn't quite realise what they were standing round, and ended up walking (I kid you not) right through the middle of....

.....an impromptu prayer mat with about 20 people wearing white and doing that 'om' thing where they take their shoes off and put their heads on the floor (I probably should have listened more in RE, I know its a muslim thing....or at least think it is!). I almost stood on one blokes head as I walked through their gathering!

So, recovering from that, I staggered past another few hundred people signing petitions and headed past the Council House towards Colmore Row. As I did so, I was looking at all the Palestine flags and the Peace banners (amazingly nothing anti-UK or USA. See, they can do it!), and after about 10 seconds of walking, realised that alot of the flags we being walked in the general direction that I was walking, and that the noise and the chants were getting slightly louder.......


....and then it dawned on me.....


......I'm in a protest march, aren't I!

Not just that, I was too busy trying to get past people waving flags that i had almost got to the front, where a double line of police and riot police were escorting the protesters round the streets! The worst thing was that i couldn't get out! I was wedged in, between all these people shouting about Hamas and Isreal and couldn't get out. But then I noticed we were walking towards Starbucks on colmore row, which has a lovely little side passage to it, so I made a dart for it and just about made it, to the amusement of 3 policemen who were watching events unfold!

According to the news, there were 3,000 people in that march, and I didn't even watch the local news for fear of seeing me wedged inbetween flag-bearers!

I'm not sure what the moral of the story is. I suppose I should be grateful it didn't turn nasty and I got arrested. That would be an interesting call to my mom!