The naked truth....
Hello again! I've had a busy Monday, but I want to update you on my weekend, which was quite eventful. I had heard about a demonstration which was taking place in central London so on Saturday I headed down to Hyde Park to see what was happening. The demo was a chance for cyclists to show their contempt for our car-obsessed culture and campaign for more cycle lanes and facilities for those on two wheels. The twist to this particular demo.... most of the cyclists were stark naked! Quite a novel way to get people's attention I'm sure you'll agree...The procession left from the park and headed down Piccadilly, the riders in all their glory, wearing nothing but their birthday suits.... The best thing about it wasn't the riders themselves, it was the faces of gobsmacked onlookers who had no idea what was going on, or why the streets were suddenly full of naked cyclists. There's a picture below - it's not the best photo, but it gives you an idea (some of the others were a bit too revealing...!)
Cycling down Piccadilly in the buff...
...In fact, last week, a lot more Londoners did start using bicycles, but that was only because there was a two-day tube strike. Around 3 and a half million people use the tube in London every day, so when they go on strike it causes mayhem - people crowd onto buses, get on their bikes, walk, get their rollerblades out - anything to get into work.
On Sunday, I met some friends in Bushy Park - that's a royal park in the South West of London. We were lucky to have great weather, and it was good to catch up. I promised them I'd put a picture on my blog, so here you go....
Vocabulary
If you are in your birthday suit, you're wearing what you were wearing the day you were born - nothing.
gobsmacked - gob is a slang word for mouth, but gobsmacked means shocked/astonished
Comments corner
Once again, thanks for all your comments. You had some interesting things to say about culture. Gabija from Lithuania said that culture is of huge importance and is probably everything that humans can create in order to develop their spiritual life and true worth. Jeronimo from Valencia, Spain pointed out that culture is related to the way we behave and that we should always try to be polite with other people, but that culture is very complex and much more than a word. Meanwhile, Kuldeep from Jammu made the very interesting point that culture is related to geographical conditions and weather, which helps to determine what we eat and wear for example.
Taru mentioned a Dutch writer, Geert Hofstede, who came up with a 'model of cultural dimensions' which is often used as the basis for intercultural awareness training, particularly in the field of business. Finally, Hyoshil from the UK mentioned that learning a language can help to understand different cultures. By the way, did you correctly predict the winner of The Apprentice Hyoshil??
Cheikh Vall from Mauritania asked about a lovely expression: 'like herding cats in a thunderstorm'. Herding an animal means trying to control a group of animals and make them go in one particular direction or towards one particular place. Shepherds and sheepdogs herd sheep, cowboys herd cattle. So, as we know, cats are fairly independent spirits and like to do their own thing. They also don't like to get wet and may be afraid of thunder and lightning. So, theoretically, herding cats may well be almost impossible and cause complete chaos. Any activity for which it's really difficult to get people organised can be like 'herding cats in a thunderstorm'. It's not a very common expression, but it's certainly very expressive!
Adek from Poland asks about the difference between 'at the harbour' and 'in the harbour'. In this case, both are possible but which one you choose depends on what you mean. If you are going to the harbour in order to take a boat somewhere, if it is your point of departure on land, then you would say AT - we met at the harbour. If, however, you are on a boat or arriving by boat, you can describe yourself as being IN the harbour. Remember, IN often describes a position relating to a 3-dimensional space (in this case, a body of water) whereas AT usually talks about a point (of departure) - at the airport, at the station etc.
Comments
Hello jim, I am bit late to greet you, though I keep watching this space for your entry and read all your post so far you have written there. Thanks for your notes on the preposition and other learning stuffs. I have habit of keep a notebook to make note of vocabulary, however, I never thought of jet down the preposition but now I will pinch your idea…………………………………………………………………………It is an interesting topic to discuss on culture, when you share the thought of discussion the culture the thing that struck to my mind was something which I read in the book about psychology. Here they state the psychology can be defined as the social science with focus on the individuals and communities in relation to their socio-cultural and physical environment. So the behavior of an individual closely related to the environment and the culture they have been brought up. It is interesting to note that any person behavior has not only influence of biological factor but also with the culture. Culture is an opportunity of learning by putting oneself into the variety of situation where they live. Okay , here I stop my lecture on culture and by the way I am not a student of psychological studies and I am software engineer, but for my exam I am studying psychology which is an interesting subject but I could not spend time to learn more and it is difficult to maintain a balance between studies and work. Being fed up with the computer jobs doing lots of programming and breaking head by just simply sitting before the computer make me to more vulnerable for logizomechnophobia. I must stop my comments here otherwise I will run out of space and it may be blocked to post ;-( here. Even I don’t know these much content are still acceptable in the comment column. And, I am languorous student who afraid of home works as I am not virtual student here so I can escape. Waiting for your next post.
I hope everthing's Okey with you. It sounds to me quite interesting that people were naked. However, it wouldn't surprise me , because I have seen it all before. Memory is coming back to me when I first heard and was showed naked people doing the same thing. On the other hand, as I requested you to ask you a question in my last comment, here it is.... Is it all right if I write the pronoun (I) in small letter when it's in a middle of a sentence. Actually, I already know, when it starts in a new sentence, it should be in capital, or after a full stop, just like any other word, phrase etc. Your help is very much appreciated. Cheerio, Abdisamad.
I have never heard of such demonstration. It is quite an unusual way to demonstrate. No wonder people were so shocked. Do you think this demo has any effect on people not using cars? In my opinion the majority of people were probably unaware of the real purpose of the demo. I wonder what the reason behind this demonstration was and who suggested such an idea for demonstration. However, it was a brave idea as the picture shows that quite a lot of people took part in it. Your picture with friends is fantastic. Who are the little children in the picture, they look cute. Thanks for providing explanation for difficult words. It is really helping me improve my vocabulary. Looking forward to something fascinating in your next entry. Take care Rabail UK
Hi! How words work !!! In my language the expression: "in your birthday suit" mean como tu madre te trajo al mundo": As your mother brought you to the world. Can you understand it??? By the way, Nice pictures... What a nice way to protest for something, they were vey lucky because of the nice weather... Can you image if it had been raining... See you
Hello Jim, Thanks so much for answering my question. I’m not sure whether demonstrating in your birthday suits is the best way to attract people’s attention, maybe it is, but I sure that people have to do something with that enormous number of cars in the streets of cities. Using bicycles and tricycles, which are very good for elderly people, is probably a solution. But can you show others how important you are when riding a bicycle? All the best.
Hi Jim! We had an event like this in São Paulo last year. However, people weren´t allowed to wear their birth suits because the police were there to make sure of it. So, some people painted all their bodies in order to disguise their naked figures, whereas others opt to wear bikinis or briefs. Well, it seems you and your friends had a great time in the park. The looks so blue! The temperature here is around 10°C during the day and 4°C at night... brrr... :-). See ya tomorrow, Ana Paula.
Hi Jim! We had an event like this in São Paulo last year. However, people weren´t allowed to wear their birth suits because the police were there to make sure of it. So, some people painted all their bodies in order to disguise their naked figures, whereas others opt to wear bikinis or briefs. Well, it seems you and your friends had a great time in the park. The looks so blue! The temperature here is around 10°C during the day and 4°C at night... brrr... :-). See ya tomorrow, Ana Paula.
Hello Jim! Your entry and the picture you attached on your blog recall one of my childhood’s incident. When I was in primary school the classroom teacher asked my classmates how they could or would stop a war. The children started giving their ideas away. – Such as destroying or burying weapons and talking through why a war would be terrible or unnecessary. I raised my arm up and said sending soldiers a war in their birthday suits In my theory, if the both sides of soldiers were standing in their birthday suits in a battle they would not want to fight but only laugh. My classmates were laughing their heads off, and I was waiting to hear that my idea was fantastic by my respectable teacher. But things didn’t turn in what I had hoped for. Believe it or not, I was left alone after the class, had to clean the school’s toilets and write lines 50 times. He wrote a school note to my parents that I used rude language. My parents of course were gobsmacked and furious about his stupidities.He's been in my bad books all the time since the incident. By the way, I didn’t predict the winner of The Apprentice although i had my favourite candidate. Have a good day!
JiM! WOW! Sustainable development and intending foward it needs unextraordinary weapons! GOOD LONDONERS! Hyoshil, I am really sorry about hearing of your great idea and poor manners of your teacher. When I desided to become a teacher the first thing I had to learn was memories of poorly behaving teachers and idiotic methods of learning. Suck I have to say! As Londoners do with decreasing air pollution in city you made apsolutely right to go wars with birth suits. Have you heard a saying "By mouth of children and new-borns will be heard the truth". You was right, you was right and I think there is someone in Strasbourgh who agrees with you..
HI, Jim. Thanks for your posts. I find them very informative and interesting. I've read quite a bit about the naked world bike ride in the media as well. I'd like to ask you what's the reaction from the public and government in UK? Has the campaign achieved any of its purpose? I know it's been going on for a few years. One more thing, what's your take on this campaign? Thanks a lot!!! I wish all the best!!
Hi Jim! Naked cycling is not a common event indeed but at the same time it’s not a kind of brand new invention. There is a web site (WNBR), which calls to take part in scheduled actions in many countries. Moreover, you can even schedule your own date and place to invite anyone to ride wearing a birthday suite. I’m not ready for, and what about you?
That was me who posted without name.
This sentence was not correctly writen "When I desided to become a teacher, the first thing I had to learn forget was memories of poorly behaving teachers and idiotic methods of learning." It means forget past and learn new, more human way of teaching. Hyoshil, I am still very sorry for your experiment.
Hello! I liked the word "gobmasked" very much. It can be translated into Russian "с отвисшими челюстями", that means "with jaws hung down" that is "extremely astonished" :-)
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