Current mood:

confused

Failed to see a riot
Well, yesterday was the day of the so-called 'Carnival for Full Enjoyment', the day when nervous souls were predicting violence on the streets of Edinburgh, rivers of blood, smashed glass, cats and dogs living together, all kinds of horror. There was a certain air of nervousness in the air when I arrived in town for work. This nervousness was mainly exhibited by those going to work, shopkeepers worriedly looking out of their doors, company security guards being in a heightened degree of twitchiness.



Anyway, the usual round of alerts and memoranda issued forth from our leaders in Port Hamilton, keeping us 'in touch' with the goings on and making sure us precious workers were not unduly affected by the various nasty people roaming the streets. Needless to say I wanted to see what was going on for myself and heading off downtown at lunchtime, meeting up with boxninja and coffee_lifeform somewhere on George Street. They commented that I actually looked more like a protester than some of the protesters, what with my camo jacket and backpack. But what the hey.

This is a report of only things I saw, not stuff from the news and so forth.

To be honest, there seemed to be more journalists, fishwives, rubberneckers and freelance gawpers than people actually concerned with protesting against anything. We meandered along Shandwick place, espying various indignant, protestery looking types standing in the middle of the road, 'playing' bongos and looking a little at a loss. Shit seemed to be going down in other areas, particularly up around the back of Standard Life and such. Riot vans raced back and forth, a legal observer started to hyperventilate and had to be attended to by a paramedic astride a Honda motorbike, hoots and catcalls bounced amongst the buildings. The most vocal member of the crowd was a some local jakie who, at irregular intervals, uttered the time-honoured cry of solidarity with oppressed peoples of the world: "We are the peepell!" I'm not sure exactly what he was protesting at. Perhaps being out of bed before 1.00pm on a day that didn't involve signing on?

Making our way back to Princes' Street, we say a display of police efficiency and formation lining-up that had hitherto been suspected but unseen. As the small, but now vocally drumming protestors moved off from Shandwick Place (presumably accompanied by chants of "We are the peepell!"), the black-clad enforcers of the law formed a solid line across the road, preventing the marchers from heading down Princes Street. Then the clowns arrived. The clowns. In every sense of the word. Seldom have I seen such feeble street theatre/protest activity as displayed by these people (or perhaps they were peepell?) Anyway, distinctly unimpressed by the activity so far and quite in awe of the vast police presence, we went our seperate ways.

The initial impression after lunchtime was that the police were there in such massive force as to render any substantive activity totally pointless and possibly very dangerous.

Anyway, throughout the afternoon the various news websites were reporting incidents, accidents, break-ins, not break-ins, brickings, public affray, police heavy-handedness, protester provocation, police provocation and all the gamut of garbled information, misinformation and disinformation. As Haymarket Station seemed to be the focused of an ill-defined 'something, I decided to head into town and meet up with the estimable mr_orgue for a further voyage of discovery on the seas of anarchy. As it turned out, things had turned a little bit nastier during the course of the day.

A solid line of riot police blocked Princes Street, a wall of kevlar and perspex across that famous thoroughfare. I found this all quite bizarre and odd. A street normally thronged with families, business people and tourists was now framing a scene which was more remiscent of TV images from a far off, less genteel place. So, we maneuvered ourselves round to Rose Street and found ourselves again blocked off by riot police. Whatever was happening was happening somewhere in the Hanover Street/Rose Street intersection area. Mounted officers and riot police were there in force. We wandered around, attempting to find vantage points, wandering through reserve riot cops (a strange experience all in all, sauntering between men and women done up in helmets, masks, kevlar armour and truncheons). When assuming an observatory position on the other side of the intersection, we found a similar situation. Another line of cops facing towards us, intent of preventing anyone else join whatever was happening behind them. The saddest part of the scene was not the fact that quaint little Rose Street seemed to be the site of a bitter confrontation, but that the locals neds were taking advantage of the situation to goad and abuse the police. Bakery trays and bangers were being hurled at the riot police. Not by anyone with a political agenda, but simply by idiot neds intent on causing trouble. Hey ho.

coffee_lifeform appeared on the scene on her way home from work. And we briefly toured the periphery of whatever was going on. To be honest, nobody seemed to have a clue what was going on. Civil disobedience seems so much more structured and cohesive when viewed in edited format on the nightly news. Being in the vicinity simply leads to a feeling of confusion and powerlessness, confront with the massive and highly visible presence of the law.

In summation: a highly confused and somewhat bemusing day. I saw nothing of any import, saw a lot of police, many vans whizzing back and forth, saw neds taking advantage of the situation, witnessed bad street theatre but had not actual, concrete feeling that anything was being achieved or being done. Whether it was in terms of loudly voicing a political opinion, taking direct action or even just engaging in legitimate protest, I failed to see anything cohesive or substantive. If this was the fault of the massive police presence or a lack of motivation and organisation on the part of the various protest groups, who knows?

I certainly don't.