Just outside the National Trust visitor centre at Wicken Fen there stands an old cottage. It was once part of a small hamlet of dwellings occupied by those who made a living from the sedge fen. It's been renovated by the Trust and made to look as it might have done in the early twentieth century. Duck your head if you're over five feet six tall and come inside.
The first thing you notice is how small the cottage is - then you learn that this was once two separate dwellings! The front garden full of flowers is about right, though there should perhaps be more hollyhocks and roses from what I remember of growing up in a country area in the 1950s (and I don't think things would have been a lot different a few decades beforehand; things tend not to evolve very much when folks have little money).
A fairly typical living area. A large photograph like the one on the wall would be unusual, though wedding photos were often prominently displayed, being the only photo that many people possessed. There's one thing that such re-constructions always overlook though; there were always ashtrays in every home, even if no one in the house smoked they'd be there for visitors.
A good big mangle for washdays, though I didn't notice a washing line in the garden. Everyone needed one, usually with the line being raised up with a roughly made prop. I wasn't very impressed with the back garden; it was far too pretty - no chickens, not enough vegetables being grown, no rhubarb growing under old buckets, no muck-heap for the garden, no swing tied to an overhanging branch for the children, no dog kennel.....
Ah, baths in front of the fire, I remember that well, and very embarrassing it was for little boys when unexpected visitors called! But the bath wouldn't be there unless baths were taking place, it'd be stored out in the garden or in a shed.
A wind-up gramophone. It always surprises me how much people were willing to pay just to have a bit of music in the house. A radio, more often referred to as "a wireless set", powered by an accumulator battery, soon found its way into many homes. We even had a broken-down fiddle stored in the loft which someone must have once scraped away on. Needless to say it was even more broken soon after I got my hands on it!
I love the way the shelves have been beautified by being covered with artfully cut brown paper, I remember my mother doing the same.
Look at that workbench! That's just so typical of what men constructed in their sheds out of odd bits of re-used timber, not fussy but absolutely solid. The improvised shelves and hooks, the home-made tool-rack, the wood off-cuts carefully stored away for the day that "they might come in handy", they're all so familiar to me. If you look on the chair you'll see some duck-decoys under construction - these would be floated on the water to entice other birds to land nearby so they could be trapped or shot.
These curious bits of basketry are eel-traps which would be baited and submerged in the stream, the eel would swim in and then find that there were sharp inward-pointing spikes preventing it from turning around and escaping.
A few historical photos had been pinned on the wall showing the old ways of the fen.
A couple of boats in their shed. The top one has an enormous punt-gun mounted on it; the whole boat would be manoeuvred into position and the gun fired into a flock of wildfowl. The lower boat seems to have been used for harvesting reeds.
A home-made barrow and a selection of peat-cutting tools, all essential for those making a living from the fen.
And not forgetting the smallest and most necessary room in the house - or more often "out in the garden" - complete with torn squares of newspaper hanging on the wall.
Just down the lane there's an old Nissen hut. These pre-fabricated huts were used by the military as barracks or for storage and many were recycled after WWII as farm buildings or as workshops. At one time they littered the countryside, though nowadays you don't see so many.
Also nearby there's a pair of slightly more modern fenland cottages of the type that are still found all over the area. There's not a lot of room in them either! Take care.
Most people have seen Clare College in Cambridge without even realising. It stands cheek by jowl with King's and if you've seen that classic view of King's College Chapel from the river then you've at least had a glimpse of Clare standing right alongside.
Last Sunday The Fellows' Garden at Clare College was open to the public as part of the National Gardens Scheme. These gardens are usually off-limits to visitors, only the senior staff of the college being able to wander here on a regular basis.
During the 1930s the garden had become very neglected, but after the war it was decided to renovate the whole area, redesigning the garden though incorporating some elements of the old plan. The man put in charge of the scheme was Prof E N Wilmer.
When I was growing up in Grantchester just outside Cambridge, Nevill Willmer could often be seen about the village. He was a keen sketcher and painter who published a couple of thin volumes of his drawings, entitled Old Grantchester and The River Cam, each illustration being accompanied by notes on the history and associations of each scene. Other than that most villagers simply knew that he was "some sort of perfesser at the colleges".
In fact he was at that time Emeritus Professor of Histology which, in case you don't know, is the microscopic study of cells and tissues. He also had a great interest in how the human eye and brain perceive colour.
As you may have perceived for yourself from the pictures so far, Nevill Willmer designed the garden to contain as many different types of garden as he could fit into the space - different "cells" one might say. He also used his skill as a painter to construct a garden which acted as a frame for different views.
His plantings often drew on the theories of colour perception: red flowers were placed in front of blue to create a feeling of depth.
He is also said to have subtly narrowed the width of paths so that distances appeared greater than they were (though it was too subtle for me to spot!)
These yellow and blue borders were one of his great delights and, after dinner in the college, he would lead people here so they could observe how, as the twilight waned, the blues became lighter and the yellows darker.
There is at present a ten-year plan to return Prof Willmer's garden to its original state, some of the trees and shrubs having grown so large as to block the views which he intended.
It's a wonderful garden to wander around, being full of nooks and crannies which make it seem much bigger than it really is.
The garden is open on just a few weekends each year to raise money for various charities.
(Still catching up from my busy weekend!) There's always something going on at Cambridge Market but on Sundays there's a little more emphasis on craft items and a little less fruit and veg. And it's all very colourful. Take a look....
"Mela" is a Sanskrit word which is now applied to any sort of "gathering" or "fair". And on Sunday people with roots in South Asia gathered to celebrate their heritage and welcome those of us who know little of their traditions.
A clear, tuneful voice came floating on the breeze as I neared the main stage on Parker's Piece in Cambridge. It turned out to be the very talented indie-pop singer-songwriter Saachi Sen, who went to the trouble of spelling her name out for us. I had a lot more trouble catching the names of some of the other performers. Apologies to those whose names I didn't get.
Three ladies from an unknown dance-troupe who were happy to pose for me.
The DJ, SonnyJi, doing his thing up on the main stage.
Some of the children had done a huge painting of which they were very proud.
This was Claudia and the Braidy Bunch on the Alliance Française stage which operates throughout the weekend and is not part of the Mela. She played a happy blend of musical styles, ideal for a sunny Sunday afternoon.
I think these ladies were from the Natyanjali Dance School as are the other photos of dancers, though the Sanskruti School Of Dance were also present.
An unknown drummer in the Bangladesh Welfare And Cultural Association Stage. He was accompanying singers throughout the afternoon.
This is NASH of the Shayal Collective. A BBC Future Sounds Artist of 2018, playing Asian-Urban music. A very energetic performer, most of my photos are slightly out of focus as he danced back and forth across the stage.
The artistry of the henna painter.
The VP Entertainers bhangra dancers had the audience up and dancing, but not as well as they did it themselves.
Another singer and musicians on the Bangladesh Stage, the guy on the keyboards still proudly wearing his Bangladesh cricket team top despite their elimination from the Cricket World Cup. The team made a lot of friends here - as did the musicians at the Mela.
I'll include as many links as I can for the various acts at the end. But before you go I recommend to you the following video of Saachi Sen, where you'll not only hear a beautiful singer of her own composition, but will simultaneously enjoy the sight of Cambridge at sunset.
http://www.sanskruti.org.uk/https://www.facebook.com/saachisen/https://www.natyanjalidance.com/https://www.facebook.com/VPBhangraUK/https://sonnyji.com/https://www.facebook.com/shayalofficial/https://en-gb.facebook.com/Bangladesh-welfare-cultural-association-Cambridge-735153373224109/
Take care.
