School is having a ‘themaweek’ next week and the subject is Great Britain. Apart from hooligans, vandals and arsonists and, at the other extreme, over-thanking and over-pleasing, and maybe at the interface of the two, vandals who say and hooligans who say sorry, I am stumped when asked to come up with British things.
They want to decorate the classrooms . ‘You’ve probably got lots of British things at home,’ someone said. A scan of the house gave us a pound coin, a 1977 Silver Jubilee coin, a small Union Jack flag, some fossils from the Jurassic Coast (although it’s questionable as to whether they count as British because Britain didn’t even exist in the Jurassic Period) and stacks of books in English.
I didn’t find any London buses, Beefeaters, busby-wearing Buckingham Palace Guards, Stonehenges or Morris dancers lurking in the cupboards either.
The week is going to be kicked off by hoisting the Union Jack and singing the British national anthem, which I’m looking forward in terms of surreal moments that brighten an otherwise dull existence.
However, the whole idea of hoisting the flag and singing the Union Jack doesn’t feel British either. I do know the words of the British national anthem, it’s true, but the most I have ever sung it is this last week as I have waved the flag and marched round the kitchen irritating the children by singing it in my most patriotic voice followed by ’Rule Britannia’ and ‘Land of Hope and Glory’.
I feel like Margaret Thatcher. I’m probably starting to resemble her too. And that’s the point about waving flags and singing patriotic songs it’s been hijacked by the Right, or has always belonged to the Right, and fits an 18th century view of the world that I can’t take seriously.
To fly the Dutch flag more normal, so for the teachers it seemed reasonable to ask if I had a Union Jack flag they could borrow. Maybe it’s just the people I associate with but I think that flag flying isn’t something the general public goes in for in Britain. Yes, you might get children out with little Union Jack flags if a member of the Royal Family is in town, certain pockets of tory-voting society will want a village flagpole and village flag, and the Union Jack seems to be popular as a cushion cover at the moment but proper flags that you hang in your own front garden? I’m not so sure.
Our house here has a flagpole on the front drive that is as tall as the house. We certainly didn’t put in. I can’t imagine ever thinking, hmm I have some money saved. What shall I buy? I know! A flag and flagpole! The biggest one in the street! I’ve always coveted my own flagpole and now I shall have one.
We also have a Dutch flag to fly on our flagpole. The previous owners left it behind.
Our house isn’t the only one with flag-flying accoutrements either: the apartments next door have a flagpole that is even higher than ours, and their flag is the size of an olympic swimming pool. Most of the street have some kind of equipment. It’s a flag-flyers paradise.
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