This weekend I've been in Birmingham visiting friends, mainly Siu Yen (the one who gave me the selection of Japanese sweets in the entry 14th July 2012) for her early birthday celebrations. I came bearing gifts of funky makeup and these cakes I'd made:
(Luckily they survived the journey on the train with me).
We began the evening with a group of Siu Yen's friends and her boyfriend Cam at a nice restaurant, and later on progressed to a couple of cocktail bars, pretty much having the sort of laid-back letting-hair-down fun out in town that nice people in their twenties have in the city centre on a Saturday night.
At some point in the evening, somebody mentioned that there was supposed to be a meteor shower going on later. Me being a bit geeky and knowing about certain celestial events, I immediately knew which shower it was.
"The Perseids," I said.
"What?"
"Every year around this time there's a meteor shower that looks like the shooting stars are originating from the constellation Perseus, which is why they're called the Perseids."
There was a pause. I felt like I had to continue.
"I used follow an online celestial calender thing to track these astrological events but since it's been so cloudy for the last few meteor showers I've been too disheartened to follow the events properly."
Pause.
"There are also pretty good showers in November called the Leonids, and the Geminids in December are supposed to be the best ones', I added, helpfully.
"Alright... " Somebody said, "But it'd be too bright to see them in the city centre, wouldn't it? All the lights and everything..."
"I think if we went to Cannon Hill Park and got away from the roads it'd be okay- plus it's a relatively clear night for once, so I think it'd be worth it," I said.
Most weren't too bothered, but Cam and Siu Yen were quite excited about the idea, so after cocktails and when it hit 1am, we went back to Siu Yen's flat to get changed out of party dresses and into sensible star-gazing clothing (excluding Cam of course, who was not in a dress to begin with), grabbed a blanket, and went to a petrol station to get some picnic-like snacks.
On the way to the petrol station we passed Broad Street, Birmingham's (in)famous watering hole and clubbing scene for students and young people in general. An ambulance bluelighted its way past, and I bet Siu Yen and Cam that it was for an alcohol poisoning. Sure enough a bit further down the road, the ambulance had pulled up and the paramedics were frog-marching a very bedraggled-looking girl dressed up as a Grecian Goddess with vomit all down her front. I vaguely wondered how long it'd take her to be back in the bar and drinking again after this experience.
Broad Street was littered with short skirts, cleavage, bare chests and glitter, also featuring people on stilts, someone dressed up as Sonic the Hedgehog and another as Pikachu (the image of Sonic the Hedgehog miming spanking has ruined my childhood), and a girl carrying the biggest inflatable penis I've ever seen. Siu Yen commented on how young everyone looked- I noted that perhaps it wasn't that the crowd was getting younger: rather we were getting older.
I've never been to a club, and I've never been out boozing. Sure I go out for cocktails with friends every so often, but I've never once drunk myself sick (maybe because I can have enough fun without alcohol already and I have a pretty hardy liver thanks to my Russian-Polish blood, but that's just speculaton). I'd also rather be in an environment where I can hear other people talking, or at very least shouting. However I have a very broad sense of fun even as a geeky girl, which is why this evening was perfect- good food, funky colourful cocktails and stargazing. Once we had managed to break free of the Bedlam that is Broad Street on a Saturday night, we made our way down to Cannon Hill Park and sort of broke into it.
I said 'sort of' broke into- it's not really 'forbidden' per se to enter the park past opening hours, it's just that the gates to the main entrances and parking are closed. If you know where the park begins and ends, however, you can just go around and sidle your way between and past the bushes to get in- which is what we did.
Feeling ever so daring (and just a bit wary of disturbing and angering the odd passing badger), we picked a nice open spot not too far from the road but far enough from the street lights, spread out the blanket, located Perseus in the sky with the help of a star chart and my pre-existing knowledge of where Cassiopeia and Ursa Minor is in relation to everything (I know, I know...), lay down and gazed out into our galaxy.
We didn't exactly see a multitude of meteorites, and we only stayed out until the clouds finally and inevitably came to shroud the night sky from our view (it was about 2:30am by this time), but any shooting star we did catch was met with loud cheers and exclamations of 'WOW!' and 'Did you see that one??' We chatted about the stars and interesting Science-y things, and I silently reflected to myself, as I always do when I stargaze, how small we really are, and how strangely serene it feels to have everything put into perspective (and, in this instance, what a shame it was for all those students on Broad Street to surely be staring down a toilet later on in their evenings rather than up at the stars). Our excited chatter and laughter gradually died down to a thoughtful quiet, and we watched the stars twinkle and the eerie glow of a satellite lazily tracing its path up in orbit.
"Tash, do you believe in God?"
~Fin~
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