Sink Pink

[lupestripe]

I've just dyed my hair bright pink again - it needed to be done - the faded candy floss colour just looked awful and unkempt. I was starting to turn into Boris Johnson, just without the right-wing views.

Still, what I have found out today is that Middlesbrough is not the type of town to be walking around as a guy with bright pink hair. I have been shouted at and laughed at by strangers who, under any other circumstance, would just have ignored me. This doesn't particularly bother me as it comes with the territory but WHY does it have to be this way? Surely the colour of my hair is irrelevant to anything. Sometimes I despair.

The other thing I noticed is that all these people were pillioring me from far away - either from the other side of the street or from cars that sped off rather quickly. Quite clearly these intellectually sub-normal people thought they were being witty and intelligent yet quite clearly they were cowards. They remind me of the 14 year old schoolboy who calls people a "wanker" on internet chatrooms behind the safety of his computer screen (and in my line of work, I've had enough of THOSE insults to last me a lifetime).

Still, a girl in Leeds commented on how much she liked my hair plus I have just booked tickets to see one of my favourite German bands, Oomph!, play Frankfurt in November as a special birthday treat (they are playing the evening before my birthday). Indeed it's going to be quite a week - spending my birthday in Frankfurt with Wolfie before returning to Manchester for the meet. Definitely something to look forward to *bounces*

Comments

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

It's my home town and I love it. Yes, it's rough around the edges but it gets an unfair and undeserved press. However, it is one of those places that if you don't "get" then you can see how it is a dive. What happened today doesn't surprise me with this town, but I am sure the same could be said for the vast majority of towns in this part of the world.

What happened for you to need a police escort?! Sounds very drastic.

[rustyfox.livejournal.com]

Long time ago. BF. (Before Furry, in my life time-scale). Around 1999/2000.

Stopped at Thistle Hotel with a few internet-friends at the time. Went out at night. After we split up doing different things, myself and one friend were in town, nobody around, except for one woman almost dying. She was obviously drunk but almost passed out on the cold floor.

Next time I'll know to walk on, but we stopped to make sure she wasn't actually choking on her own vomit or anything. She came around some, I checked she knew who she was and where she was, and she seemed well enough and able to get home. She thanked us, and we walked away...

...then she started shouting. "Where's my money!" "WHERE'S MY MONEY!"

Uh-oh. Then like rats out of the shadows, there were hooded chavs everywhere. She was moaning on, about us having nicked her money, someone tried to nick my phone, I wrestled him to the ground and got it back, my friend was probably pissing himself with fear. Chavs were saying call the police (to arrest us!) so I managed to call them somehow. The moment they arrived, everyone else disappeared instantly. It looked a bit worrisome for a moment but the police soon wised up when they saw we were decent people, and she was hideously drunk. Then she started going on about her monopoly money!

Police were very very apologetic, and drove us back to the hotel lest we get mugged. One of them seemed very remorseful - and urged me not to let it put me off Middlesbrough.

Well, sorry, it did. Every town has its chavs, but the police have never had to extend protection to me voluntarily. Ugh. Plus from the top of Thistle hotel the entire place seemed like one sprawling, hideous sea of concrete, far into the distance.

[alexf0x.livejournal.com]

That sounds like an entry for the Idlers "Crap towns" book. Actually I think Middlesbrough may of made it into both books.

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

The problem I have with those books is that they are often written with a southern based media conceit. Middlesbrough is NOT the worst place to live in the country - there are many hellholes in London; Nottingham has the biggest gang and knife presence in the country; Liverpool has massive social problems etc etc. The problem is Middlesbrough, Hull, Goole etc are easy targets.

Generally, I have little fear walking around this town which is more than can be said for a lot of other towns and cities across the country. It is also dependent on what you want - living in Henley would bore me to tears as there is no nightlife and no excitement. It's all based on opinion and skewed statistics (and I can prove that).

[alexf0x.livejournal.com]

It's all based on opinion and skewed statistics (and I can prove that).

How? The idler books were done by popular public vote, and...

A) It used government statistics from the stats page for each town.

B) It was based on readers experience of the towns (not just people passing though, but also those who live or used to live there).

C) The team who put the book together did visit every nominated location (to see if it was as bad as people claimed it to be).

D) There where quite a few towns from down south (actually most where from down south, oh and London and London boroughs featured heavily), oh and the winning town in book two was Luton (although Middlesbrough made #10).

E) I could agree with the reviews, Huntingdon (7 miles from where I live) got in the first book and so did Bedford (used to live around there). While nether place has a crime problem, both are frankly shit places to be, I can testify to that and I am not going to defend them.

F) As for Hull, I've met a few people from Hull, as in born and raised. None of them said anything good about the place.

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

I am more thinking about the "Best And Worst Places To Live In The UK" documentary last year as our council threatened the makers of the programme because they used inaccurate government statistics to generate their point. That may be true here too although I am unsure of that.

The thing is, it's very easy to make any town look bad. I used to live in Cambridge and could make that look bad with the right picture. I don't doubt the research, nor Middlesbrough's place in the top ten, it just seems to be a very easy scapegoat. Also, what they do is take one area of the town and not the whole town. Some of the southern outskirts of the town are amongst the most desirable places to live in the North-East so it's not an accurate or fair portrayal.

The problem with any popular public vote is that, often, the public are easily swayed. It's very easy to slag a place off on reputation with a blinkered view than look at things objectively. Assumedly, the makers of the book did this. However, the mentalities of the North and the South are different and I would argue Northerners are more likely to be denigrate their own home town. The impression I got with Boro was the views were firmly entrenched in the 1980s rather than taking into account the significant regeneration and gentrification that has happened here in the last ten years.

Luton is a town similar to Middlesbrough and indeed, it's another example of a Crap Town. I have seen both books and do feel that they are a little unfair to a lot of the towns that they say are "crap". As I say, it depends what you want - if you want the hustle and bustle then you are going to get crime, prostitution etc too. I'd rather live in Middlesbrough than Harrogate for example even though Harrogate is perceived to be most desirable. Again with Huntingdon - I would say that's a very boring town rather than particularly crap. At least there is a race course there and a direct link to London.

I believe Hull gets a bad press too and the people I have spoken to agree. It may be a bit crap but doesn't deserve the level of vilification that it gets.

I guess in many ways, most places are shit places to be and it all depends on what you are after.

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

P.S. In the "Best And Worst Places To Live In The UK", Manchester finished 9th. Surely that makes very little sense when you think about it logically - ALL of Manchester is crap to live in - the THIRD biggest city in England?

I get the impression the same is true of Crap Towns as well - there may be parts that are bad but you can't write off a whole place because of one area.

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

Middlesbrough is a Victorian city with an industrial charm. There are some nice buildings here and it certainly beats a lot of other places in the country (and in my opinion, it does beat Wakefield, whose city centre appears to be completely made out of concrete). However, there is a significant chav community here and that is the main problem with the town.

The story you describe I can quite believe happened in Boro. Things have improved over the last five years but getting involved in that sort of situation is probably not advisable. I know it's not great, but again there are many other towns across the country where similar instances occur. It's like anywhere though, some of the people here are the friendliest and most honest people you would ever wish to meet but then there are others who are the exact opposite. I guess that's the same in every town.

[rustyfox.livejournal.com]

Wakefield's live-withable but by no means scenic! It's also rather small, so at least there's not that much ming. Half the city is currently a building site as they're building an enormous new shopping precinct too, so that ought to improve the city no end.

Probably my favourite city is still Worcester. Haven't lived there since 1990 but have visited on occasion. I miss it.

Also fond of Bristol.

[lupestripe.livejournal.com]

I was in Worcester about two months ago and was very disappointed with it. It appeared to be another city destroyed by 1980s developers. Gloucester is quite nice though, it had a unique charm.

With Wakefield, I got the impression the same was happening with Boro - massive gentrification and improvement. Middlesbrough's changed a hell of a lot since you were last here and crime (and incidents you describe) have decreased significantly. It still has its problems though.

In terms of population, Middlesbrough's is 140,000 (but the Teesside conurbation is approaching 600,000). I guess Wakefield is of a similar size.