Railing Against the Machine

Bye Bike, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Bicycles are the lifeblood of Cambridge. 48% of journeys in town are done on a bike - the highest percentage in the country. That's got to be a good thing in a world where Exxonmobil are making $1 billion a day. But beware: stay too long in the pub and the town may quietly claim yours...

Static Rapids

Falls, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

I've been all over the place today so haven't had time to go out and take a shot; instead I'm posting one I took a few weeks ago and really liked. It's part of the weir down by The Mill pub. It's a peaceful area where people gather and have picnics and drinks on Sheep's Green. You can just sit, chill and watch the people go by of a summer's evening.

It's Life, Jim

Helix, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Cambridge is full of open-air art and no doubt I'll be showing you more than you'd ever want to see in the coming months but this one's great. It's in the grounds of Clare College's Memorial Court on the other side of the river to the main college. You can miss it if you're not looking out for it but once in you're faced with quite a beautiful building and a few decent examples of modern art of which this is a detail of my favourite. It's an aluminium sculpture, here in full, of the the double helix structure of DNA. A tribute to the discovery of said by Watson and Crick at the University's Cavendish Labs. It was created by Charles Jencks. Excitingly there's a recipe, using kiwi fruit and washing up liquid, for extracting some DNA of your own here. Not "your own" DNA of course - that would be pretty difficult and really gross, but yours to keep and chuck around...

Face Off

Face Off, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

The building today's detail is taken from, Cintra House (early 1800s), is just down the road my new apartment. I was walking back from there the other day and noticed that the building directly opposite, Terrington House, had been refurbished with reference to its classical lines (especially when you see it used to look like this). It may be in my imagination but they seem to work well together - the youngster paying respect to its elder... Well - it makes a change to me complaining about progress in the city. Apparently the romantic-style design of the facade (added 1860-65) could be influenced by Sintra in Portugal which has many romantic-style buildings. Anyway, I just liked it because this image reminds me of a joke involving two statues given life for a day, and a pigeon...

Greencroft's Day?

N+I, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Today's slice of Cambridge is from a local shop window. The shop, Nobby & I, has been around for ages and does what it says on the tin - custom framing of anything you want hoisted on a wall. It's on a small quiet street that has mews running off it and it leads from New Square down to Midsummer Common - ostensibly named after the annual fair that has gathered there around Midsummer's Day (a certain DPBlogger's birthday...) since 1211. However, researching this I find that apparently it's also called Greencroft. Who knew? Anyway, liked the curious symmetry of this picture despite being unable to lose the reflection of a door behind me which leaves the hazy whiteness in the middle. And yes, sadly I did position my feet there deliberately. Why don't they tan..?

Ten-Hut!

Triset, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

I'm sure it's my fault but Picasa deleted all my shots from yesterday so today we have a library shot. Well, actually, a museum piece. An unofficial exhibit in the Fitzwilliam's new coffee shop. I really like the space here, open and bright with clean lines that remind me of the 'new' atrium in the British Museum. Something about these chairs, their precision, placement and polish - as if they're on parade, made me want to keep the image. Also, finding something that piques your interest or takes your eye when surrounded by 'establishment-actual' works of art makes me think of Banksy - and if you go there, make sure you check out the films page, it's hilarious.

1944

Broken, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us
and we see nothing but sand;
the angels come to visit us and we only know them
when they are gone.
George Eliot

Queens' Rhapsody

Mathematical Bridge, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Still at Queens' (as you can tell from the title which is the same as yesterday's because for some weird reason I can't change it...). This, the unofficially named Mathematical Bridge (1749), is definitely the most photographed bridge in town. There's a story that it was designed by Newton and that it needed no bolts to hold it together but that when it needed refurbishing (1866, 1905) the college took it down and then couldn't put it back together again. Which is why it is held together by nuts and bolts today. Very entertaining and utter poppycock. There's a slightly indignant tone to the bridge's history page and a distinct lack of humour on the subject... The two salient points to note are that Newton died in 1727 and that the original bridge was held together by coach screws and spikes . Mind you, the college authorities DID decide to build this the other side of the bridge, directly opposite the oldest building on the river in Cambridge. Anyway, you can enjoy the view of both from a punt as you take a peaceful trip along this delightfully deserted part of the river...

Queens' Rhapsody

Old Hall, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Queens' College today. Probably tomorrow too. The picture is a detail of the the Old Dining Hall (1449) although the design of the ceiling and walls is actually from 1875. 885 stars were gilded for the roof decoration. I know it's a bit 'in your face' but I think it's kinda perfect. The Hall forms the east side of Cloister Court, the north of which is bounded by the Long Gallery of the President's Lodge; dating from1595 apparently it's the only substantial half-timbered college building in Cambridge and the Cloister Walk on which it sits is actually one hundred years older. There are loads of sundials in Cambridge but this is one of the best. The college website gives instructions on how to read it here. I admit I stood there for a while trying to work out why it said 12.10 when it was actually ten past one - maybe it was the heat of the British Summer Time sun...

The Right to Bear Arms

Arms, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

was granted in 1575. The heraldic description can be found here but isn't really worth reading. MInd you, it's going to be better than any description of this which is the Coat of Arms of Heidelberg with which Cambridge is twinned. They also have a very old prestigious university - founded in 1386. My favourite drug, nicotine, was discovered to be the cause of my (ex-)love of tobacco there in 1828. This picture shows the city's coat of arms as placed on the Guildhall in the marketplace in the city centre. The building sits just on the boring side of hideous and was constructed in 1936. That page notes "The only reason most people would go inside is to visit the planning application department" which is ironic considering that's where they should have gone to object to it being built. More interesting though is that the bricks from the old guildhall were bought and used to build "Mount Blow" (latterly South Hill House - recently sold for £2,000,000 no picture available sadly but it was great) by TC Lethbridge, keeper of Anglo-Saxon antiquities at the University who later become a controversial psychic researcher. Excellent.

Follow the rabbit Neo

Westcott, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Ok, so it's a misquote. And it's not a rabbit. But i still couldn't resist. Boring pics today today but of one of my favourite places. When you visit you have to come and find this hare. He stands guard outside the doors of Westcott House theological college in Jesus Lane. Again, a doorway you'd normally walk past but you'd be the poorer for doing so. Step inside and you find an oasis of serenity filled with resplendant borders, effervescent flora and age-wizened trees. Birds sing, insects buzz - all that malarkey - and within a stone's throw of the city centre. I love it; I always drag unsuspecting visitors round here. Scenes like this, seemingly robbed from history, are the norm. I want to see Miss Haversham waiting here - but without the cobwebs...

Summer Evening

Mill Road Cemetery I, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

And if you should leave me
I would say that the ghost
Of Cassandra
Has passed through
My eyes
I would say that the stars
In their malice
Merely light up the sky
To stretch my torment
And that the waves crash
On the shore
To bring salt-stings on
My face:
For you re-connect me with
All the lights of the sky
And the salt of the waves
And the myths in the air.
And with your passing
The evening would become too dark
To dream in
And the morning
Too bright.

Ben Okri

Mill Road Cemetery II

Honoured, I'm sure

Honoured, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Still at Caius. This is the Gate of Honour (1573-74), one of three (see Humility and Virtue). It's a bit fussy but appealing nonetheless and the six sundials (shot here) around the top are, to me, the epitome of elegant form and function. Just because I like them I've included another chapel window detail (there's a danger this could become a series). Stephen Hawking is a fellow of the college and Francis Crick of DNA fame studied here as well as Olympian gold medal winner (Chariots of Fire again) Harold Abrahams. Another notable alumnus was Stephen Perse who founded the school school that a certain DailyPhoto blogger attended. I suspect I'm keener to claim them than they would be me...

Gonville Court

Gonville Court, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

Gonville and Caius (pronounced ‘keys’) College (founded 1348) sits at one end of King’s Parade and the Tower of its Tree Court (1868-70) stands proud on the corner of Trinity Street and Market Hill. Possibly the most notorious moment in its history was on June 7, 1958 when 13 Cambridge students hauled an Austin Seven van on to the roof of the Senate House, the central university building. The authorities considered it such an audacious feat that they sent the ringleader a case of champagne! Read the full account. It’s stunning inside (tourists just standing around, mouths open!) with many photo opportunities (a couple tomorrow) but I decided to present one of the oldest bits today. This is the north-east corner of Gonville Court and dates from 1490. Virtually unchanged for half a millennium… Older still is the west range but the picture was (a depressingly regular occurrence) disappointing so I sidelined it.

Today in 1925 Mein Kampf was published. Whilst in the college I visited the chapel, which is beautiful, but was drawn specifically to the lists of those members lost in the two wars.

Solo

Solo, originally uploaded by Neorelix.

"They took all the trees
Put em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see em"
Big Yellow Taxi

Ok, so the picture's poor but the voice on this girl at the Big Weekend was unbelievably rich and reminded me of Joni Mitchell. She was singing in the amateur tent and people were literally thronging the place. She was very nervous and didn't smile once until the end. The crowd loved her of course; I guess it didn't hurt that she's easy on the eyes...

Shiny Happy PeopleOk, so I don't normally enjoy being near children. Or having fun. There's far too much of both around these days. However, yesterday I ventured forth with a friend to the Big Weekend and I found myself surrounded by kids having fun. Loads of both. There was little I could do about it so grudgingly I decided that, if I couldn't beat them, I'd shoot them. As it were. Anyway, took about 150 pictures, of which I slightly liked a couple and only really liked this one.

Walk on by.But don't; this lays bare the life blood of the university and the country's future (a stretch I know): a typical student house - this one near Jesus. For some reason I'm fascinated by entryphones and doorbells like this. (This is a detail of this, part of this set. Sad, I know.). A small collection of buttons leads you into myriad lives, families, networks and paths - historic and future. It makes me think of the whole six degrees of separation scenario. Who knows where pressing just one of them could lead..? But for now let me introduce:

Nik - Final year, spends all his time revising, no-nonsense, politics.
Mark - Arts degree, too cool to use scissors, smokes 40 a day, media luvvie dahhling.
Adom - Thinks he's hip (didn't tell his mum he changed the spelling of his name, will quietly revert after finals), probably underlines his signature, civil service.
Josh - Scientist. Quiet but actually very cool. Linear with no sense of humour but supplies the best drugs. Will accidentally solve the fossil fuel crisis and be knighted.
Kate - Came to university by mistake. Very bright but unhappy childhood hidden behind party-vixen front. Alcoholic caffeine-addict - loves Cazimir and The Maypole pub (for cocktails) equally. Will become her heroine Dorothy Parker.
Vikas - IT professional and web-millionaire just at university adding gravitas to his hacker rep. Caffeine addict also but loves the - corporate teat.
Lily - Social sciences. Earnest and cause-minded. All free time spent at AI meetings or in Indigo coffee house discussing AI meetings. Will probably be kidnapped in Colombia.
Rich - Business Studies. Printed his name card on his PC. Far too busy d/loading and selling dvds off BitTorrent for coffee. Will be a major contributor to Labour...

Let's hope the occupants don't see this post. And apologies to them if they do...

You are: HERE.Frequently spotted around Cambridge: a gaggle of camera-toting tourists huddled over these kinda-cool relief maps of the city centre trying to work out how to get from where they are (in this case under Great St Mary's tower in the centre) to their favourite coffee shop. Astonishingly (the epidemically-omnipresent) Starbucks has not been ringed in dayglo-orange by the council on this map despite their best efforts in cookie-cutter-corporate-branding of the city centre. These relief maps are great reproductions though and very realistic - the most recognisable bits being King's College chapel top right and Trinity College Great Court (a la the race in Chariots of Fire, although the film actually used Eton College school) in the foreground. The only innacuracy as far as I can tell is that, unlike the actual city centre buildings, this isn't covered in pigeon s***.

Of course, the true beauty of this map is that, whilst any photoblogger can snap their city's best bits, only a really lazy one can give you the whole city centre, to scale, in one shot. Voila!

Bowling along...A lovely summer evening and we're on our way to revisit the past by dining at Eraina Taverna, a fixture on the Cambridge cheap-eats circuit since Peterhouse college (the oldest) students decided they needed discount kleftiko or pizza and chips as revision aids back in 1284. ...ish; it's been there at least 40 years though. Eating there last night was just like the last time I was there - 1986. I mean, exactly the same; the table, the cutlery, the c.200 items on the menu... Even the waitress looked the same - although she is now, of course, Polish. Amazing. I thoroughly recommend it and will feature it exclusively in a post of the future. However, today's snap pays homage to another tradition - that of the genteel pastime of bowls (although I know of some who'd dispute it was a pastime and would scorn the idea of it being genteel!). We passed these smartly-attired folk on our way across Christ's Pieces, one of the many parks and public green spaces in the city. Here, the members of the City of Cambridge Bowls Club hone their skills and passers-by tend to stop, sit and watch awhile. Quintessentially English I guess; except that it's originally Egyptian.

Clare: A Beauty.
With gorgeous weather lightening our step in Cambridge at the moment, it is a joy to just walk around the colleges of an afternoon. Stopped by Clare College yesterday. It's not as famous as some of the others but is delightfully pretty with wonderful gardens (the Fellows' Garden especially) and picturesque river frontage. Of course, I'm not showing you any of that. Instead I thought I'd offer a detail of the stained glass window in the south side of the college chapel. See the whole window in here. The chapel itself (1763-69, designed by James Burroughs) is tiny and slightly plain - almost austere, just right for the serious business of scholarly worship I guess. Not a lot of fancy ornamentation here but with Cipriani's Annunciation over the altar and with the two windows, none seems needed. To me, it just has an ageless ambience that discards the world when you enter.

26We are slap-bang in the middle of the single most exciting event in the Cambridge diary - the Cambridge Film Festival - this year from the 6th to the 16th July. I love it. Although I will say that I wasn't exactly entranced by my choice yesterday - The Brittany Job; literally, to me - a luddite, an exercise in watching paint dry with faux-ad lib cursing. BUT - saw the legendary auteur Luc Besson (Nikita, Leon and loads more) introduce his latest film Angel-A on Saturday. He was great; his flik... simple but pleasing. I'm watching loads more this week, starting with Paperclips today.. The Festival is held at the Arts Picturehouse (a slice of the bar is shown above) which in turn is housed in the old ABC Cinema building on Hills Road.

Optional Rant Below:

Unfortunately the floor below is occupied by The Regal, a Wetherspoons pub which, holding some 1600 people, is the largest in the UK. This was fine while it continued with its famous 'no music' policy. It recently applied to have live music permitted. Situated below an Art House cinema? Well, faced with 'an unprecedented level of objections', the large amount of live music venues in the city and the fact that there is only one foreign-language, non-blockbuster, independent cinema in the surrounding 100 square miles, you'll know which way the council went.

Local Haunts. "...but now im just a tear in the shape of a girl.
all i can ever do is cry about everything. about being happy.
about being sad. being confused. being mad. crycrycry."
Anon

I had a pleasant wander through the city centre the other day and gradually became aware of a siren call of melancholia from somewhere ahead. It was at once beautiful yet plaintive and people were clearly responding to it, being drawn along with me towards the source. Found this chap outside Holy Trinity in Market Street. he didn't exactly fit the image his music conjured but nevertheless he had people transfixed. It was whilst being pulled to him like a Pied Piper acolyte across the Market Square that his sad air struck a chord within and I remembered a piece I'd come across on the web years ago, from whence the lines above are taken. I know it's teen-emo-angst but I still find it ingenuous and affecting and return to it every now and then. See the full text over here. Her grammar and spelling are as troubled as she is but I think that adds to its strength. Anyway, if you're cheerful it may give you pause and if you're blue then take succour from solidarity...

Madonna in the MeadowAfter another excellent lunch recently at Dojo (you have to go. Seriously.) I dragged a friend along on a photo-scavenge around the western edge of the city and as we were coming back through the meadow behind the Fitzwilliam Museum (another must-visit venue ((the museum, not the meadow)), this time for the culture-vulture in you - if only to see my favourite Venus and Cupid) and we were taken by an awesome piece of stencil graffiti by Maya, of which this is a slightly-swivelled detail. Go here and see the whole thing and to Maya's place to see an inspirational wealth of her stuff. Some of it's sublime, seriously. Anyway, came across a devil in the detail of Tennis Court Road which scared us. Ok, kidding about the fear.

Sky King and the World of Tomorrow!

Remember 1936? No? Well now you can - with this fantabulously lush, phat and most-wicked tricycle ever recreated. Walking past King Street Cycles (a great independent store) yesterday I had to stop and stare. Iconic design cues down to the last detail. Even I know we've had a retro-bike fad for a couple of years now - exemplified by such uber-rad machines such as the Schwinn Sting-Ray - but I had no idea trendy toddlers could live the cool-cat dream on a rockin' repro '36 Sky King. It's almost worth begging/borrowing/stealing a child just to have a reason to buy it... Almost.

Windows of (Absent) Opportunity"She used to drag her mattress besider her low window and lie awake for a long while, vibrating with excitement, as a machine vibrates from speed. Life rushed in upon her through that window - or so it seemed. In reality, of course, life rushes from within, not from without. There is no work of art so big or so beautiful that it was not once all contained in some youthful body, like this one which lay on the floor in the moonlight, pulsing with ardor and anticipation."
Willa Cather (1873 - 1947), The Song of the Lark

I hate to see boarded up windows; symptoms of dereliction. The ground floor of this building near the city centre is a furniture showroom but the rest is like this. What a waste - I'd live up there like a shot. You can just imagine the vibrant thrill of having the view of this resplendent city framed by these. Sadly this body isn't exactly youthful and hasn't vibrated for a while...

Great Gate!I just love this gate! It's a recent addition to the Sydney Sussex College entrance in Malcolm Street. Modern, art-deco style in brushed steel with a delightful gilt treatment to the crest - a detail of which can be seen here. It's a shame that such a gorgeous design should be hidden down a tiny back street. But then, maybe that's why such an exciting piece was permitted by the notoriously aesthetically-inspired college heads...

Orchard StreetOne of my favourite streets in the city, Orchard Street is one of several in the my area that have either botanical or biblical names such as Elm Street, Adam and Eve Street, Eden Street and Paradise Street. This is because they are all in an area that used to be the Garden of Eden allotments - small vegetable gardens and orchards grown by locals. This particular street is one of the prettiest in Cambridge in my opinion. The cottages here originally housed the servants of a very large house - the garden wall of which was directly opposite their front doors. You'll notice they have no upstairs windows at the front (there are two tiny rooms in each roof!) this was so the occupants could not look into the garden and see the gentlemen and ladies taking tea or enjoying an arboreal ambulation... Given that the last of these houses to be sold went for £335k in December you'd have to be a chambermaid of means to live here now...

Summer Jam
Got back late and haven't had time to go into town and grab a shot yet so I thought I'd post a fun one from the other day. Corner of Sydney Street and Market Street. These guys were really going at it and having a great time playing some good ol' bluesy rock. An excellent excuse to waste a lunchtime! Or so the crowd thought at least.