What I did at half-term, part one

A first for me: a pagan wedding. It wasn’t actual pagans getting married, of course. It was a couple of artist-craftsman (and woman) friends of mine, in their garden on a sunny day in the hills of west Penwith. Still, I thought you might like to know what you’re letting yourself in for if you get invited along to a pagan marriage bash.

First, there was no sacrifice, either human or animal — even though there was something of a three-legged altar made out of large granite stones. (It usually earns its keep as a garden table.) I can’t pretend I wasn’t disappointed. Where is the spirit of Edward Woodward when you need it?

Second, there wasn’t actually a pagan priest running the thing from behind a hooded cowl, with a staff of correction in her hand. Rather, it was a part-timer whose day job is storyteller. It did help, though, that he looked (and dressed) like Steve Martin in The Jerk — or a more benign version of Brad Dourif’s pentacostal preacher in Flannery O’Connor/John Huston’s Wise Blood.

Three, there was an ancient (well, probably) saying something like ‘What once was, shall ever be’. (Something like that anyway.) It was engraved on a glass goblet, hand-blown by a friend.

Four, a toast was drunk by all from this goblet — which contained white wine and a bit of dry toast (rapidly getting soggy). The story-teller then got us to pass this round and all have a sip. He told us this was an ancient ritual*.

Five, there was no Whitney Houston I Shall Always Love You or anything similar. (Nor was there any Yvonne Fair It Should Have Been Me.)

Six, there was a ‘hand-fasting’ thing where their teenage son (this was a modern marriage) wrapped a strand of three coloured ribbons (white for cloud, green for earth, blue for sky — the pagan bits kept coming). Thus bound, they left the ceremony for a bit — with their best man and maid of honour so I don’t think it was a sex thing, though who knows? Then they came back, said some stuff to each other about how wonderful the other one was and how lucky they were to get married. Then the storyteller (kind of) pronounced them married. (The real legal thing was a couple of days before in a registry office.)

Seven, there was a gorse kissing sprig. (See picture.) It was a reference to a song with a line about kissing only being in fashion when the gorse is in flower. (Gorse is always in flower.)

Eight, we all had our picture taken inside a frame hung from a tree. See picture.
Nine, there was a vicar there. He was a good friend of the bride’s late mother. He began one of his bits with the phrase ‘If there is a god . . .’ Who can not love the Church of England, a religion which, where others have ritual, has jumble sales? For the record and census purposes, I’m a North London Jewish-ish (through marriage) Catholic atheist - and, to steal an old Nik Cohn line, not untypical of the sort.

Ten, it was all excellent.

* Knowingly or unknowingly, he wasn’t telling the truth. In the next posting, I’ll give his version. And the OED’s. You can take your choice.

What I did on my (Easter) holidays, part six

I went to the city that took my name . . .

What I did on my (Easter) holidays part five

This is a picture of a Druze village street in northern Israel. Why did I take it?

What would you think of it if I said a bomb had gone off there five years ago? And that it was the bomber's home town?

And what would you say (or think) if I told you I was playing at being either a new topographicist or a Becher, messing around with imbuing neutral landscape with existential dread?

What would you think if I invoked the hoary old paradox that I always lie?

What I did on my (Easter) holidays, part four

Two pictures of two walls, no more than a hundred metres apart.

One of an impressive but uncomfortably triumphalistic image on the walls of Jerusalem's Old City.

One of an impressive piece of what Ruskin called 'honest repair' - from a shopping mall wall. An old building was taken to pieces for reconstruction. Each brick and stone were numbered. Then, when it was put back together, the numbering was deliberately left in view. (I used the basic Photo Fix on my Sony Ericsson phone to sharpen up the colours a little.) The building was by Moshe Safdie. It's the smartest shopping mall I've ever seen.

What I did on my (Easter) holidays, part three

On Saturday night, I was invited to what I was told (by a non-Christian) was an Ethiopian music event. I found myself on the roof of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, deep in Jerusalem's Old City, right in the middle of the Ethiopian Holy Fire ceremony.

Every Christian lot has a bit of the Holy Sepulchre. Catholics, Copts, Orthodox, Armenians etc etc: they've all got their little bit of the place to themselves. (There's no Lutherans or Wee Frees of Scotland, of course. It's a Protestant-free gaff.) The Ethiopians got the roof. There were thousands of them crushed in there, parading and dancing. All dressed in white robes, all holding candles. The last time I was in a crowd that packed was at the old Boothen End at Stoke City. They were far, far, far calmer. Far less boozed up, too. And way less smelly.

I have never been anywhere which felt so like I was in instant danger of being trampled to death. But nothing happened. As one of the Ethiopian Christians said: 'This happens all round the world every Easter. And no-one has ever been injured.' It's enough to turn you into a believer. Not that there's any chance of that with me. Thank God.

What I did on my (Easter) holidays, part two

Then . . .

I followed the parade up the hill till we reached the last of Christ's stations — outside the old church on the hill top. There, I took a second picture. Again, it reminded me of other Good Friday parades — a time when all young women in possession of their youth and hope get dressed up in hope of attracting a man of their dreams.Things never change. I'm sure it's a mid-Spring ritual that far precedes the arrival of Christianity, whether Maronite, Catholic or Other.Notice the carefully tended long hair and the modesty rules — bare legs or arms would have been unacceptable but tight, tight jeans (and high heels) are fine. One religion's dress codes are so often another's moral outrage.

What I did on my (Easter) holidays, part one

As someone who once found themselves, unknowingly, in Bethlehem on Christmas Day, it should have been no surprise to me that I chanced across a Maronite Christian Good Friday parade in a village near the Lebanon border. I took this picture of the parade — very similar to the ones in long-ago Ireland and my memory.Then . . .