Iran homecoming

Two weeks in Iran. It felt like months - renewing old friendships, seeing family we'd not seen for 4 years, and being bombarded with the sights and sounds of a city of 20 million people. A long way from Cambridge!

What's new? Motorways through the city centre, air conditioned buses, bus lanes, metro from north to south Tehran, electronic number queuing system in banks, supermarket deliveries to your door, top of the range safe playgrounds in every park, paintings and tiles on kilometers of motorway walls, and tight mini roopoushes (Islamic coats)on young women .

What's the same? Taxi drivers complaining about the government; family warm and welcoming; people unwillingly observing Ramadan; zoolbia and bamieh; every market trader and acquaintance remembers you. This is a city that doesn't need surveillance cameras: there is always someone watching you.

What's surprising? Water fountains working during Ramadan; women actors performing and reciting poetry in a public park; the price of bread and virtually everything else, has more than tripled in 3 years.

It was a wonderful, intense, 12 days.

Now back to the slugs and weeds on the allotment.

Protest march with Stephen Hawking

How cool is it to go on a protest march with Stephen Hawking?

About 30 of us (average age 70+) marched along the river bank, rather embarrassed to be chanting "Save our river!" for the benefit of the Anglia news cameraman who turned up for 10 minutes with a large video camera and a plastic mac. Someone made sure that Professor Hawking was in front. The rain let up long enough for umbrellas to be put away and placards held up rather apologetically in their place. Two young policemen stood by the river watching, with an air of making sure that their elderly charges didn't come to any harm.

This is the Cambridge Evening News version of the event.

And today we heard that the planning application for a large extension to the riverside hotel has been turned down. So 30 years after the LSE marches against higher fees for overseas students, I've now been involved in a march that wasn't futile. The Planning Committee, though, didn't give us the credit. They cited breach of "...policies 3/4, 3/7, 3/14, 4/1, and 4/11 of the Cambridge Local Plan 2006 and guidance provided by PPG2 Greent Belts and PPS5 Planning and the Historic Environment." and more along those lines. But I'd rather think it was Hawking and me that did it.

Cambridge to London

Just got back from London - it was a good day with an old friend but it is always good to be back in the quiet of Cambridge.

We saw the Henry Moore exhibition at the Tate. I liked the innocence and exploration of the early sculptures best - especially two called 'Girl'. At the Photographer's gallery, Sally Mann was showing some of her photos of her children, beautiful but also vaguely unsettling in their rather self-conscious innocence. One room had photos called 'What Remains' - pictures of decomposing human bodies.

Also had dim sum in Soho, rode the bus, explored fabric shops in Berwick St and ate Thai durian from a chinese supermarket.

London was very crowded - especially Picadilly Circus when we were going home. I was caught in a heavy downpour at Kings Cross.

By the time we got to Cambridge the sky had cleared and the air felt fresh and earthy. There was a rainbow over the Addenbrooke's building site for the LMB. On my bike it felt good to be free of the traffic. I headed straight for the allotment - the sky above the cricket field was streaked with red and pink cirrus clouds. It was quiet there. Just the distant sound of traffic from the M11 - the wind is in the west, so it should be good weather tomorrow.

Allotment

I've got an allotment. It's not an official one - so there are few rules, and no water supply at all. The rules are things like 'Always ask T. before you start a bonfine'; 'Don't lock your shed, it will only get broken in to'; 'Just mark the land you want with posts and string - that means it's yours'.

There is some amazing recycling going on. Plastic water bottles and pallets are used everywhere in various forms. Tennis nets are used to protect courgettes and squash from insatiable muntjac deer; green beans grow up goal netting; broken ladders are cucumber frames; old metal sport lockers are ivy-covered tool stores; cast iron baths store precious rain water; and blue plastic lime-juice barrels now serve as water butts.

My ambition is to have a few vegetables surrounded by a picnic area, a barbequeue pit, a hammock, and a beach-hut/shed worthy of Southwold with tea facilities, wicker chairs, and a front porch. I'm thinking of painting it blue and white. Hopefully I'll get the paint from Freecycle, where I got the corrugated iron sheets for the roof.

Fellow gardeners in neighbouring plots have been helpful with good advice. My favourite so far is: "You can never have enough chicken wire."