Danger: un-unexploded mythsComments Off
m posted in General moans on April 18th, 2006
Went to Imber Village on Monday. The local news broadcasts made a bit of a fuss about the village, because it’s only open to the public for a few days a year. The rest of the time, the army is hiding in its buildings and firing paint-balls at their privates - in both most obvious senses. The BBC talked as if this was some spooky ghost town, and conjured up images of a Salisbury Plain Sarajevo, where plates of dinner were left half-eaten on tables, enormous Bakelite wirelesses crackled in the corner of abandoned lounges, and the local pub’s jukebox was playing Neville Chamberlain speeches on repeat. So, I was fairly excited on the drive through the plain, as we passed numerous items of military paraphernalia. There were plenty of these signs;
How exciting.
But the village was a bit of a let-down, having been almost totally destroyed by the army since 1943. The church is still there, cordoned off and emptied of pews. The local pub still stands, though an unauthorised poke around its interior yielded no souvenirs or photos of bullet holes. It was just a disused pub, with no windows or plaster on the walls. After destroying most of the village’s existing buildings, the army has built some of its own. They’re all empty shells, which they presumably use for a form of hide and seek, involving counting to a hundred and then hurling canisters of tear gas through the windows. But there’s nothing particularly striking or poignant about the village.
While there, we were approached by some enthusiasts who have some ancestral relationship to the place, and who had their marriage blessed in the barbed-wire-encircled church some years ago. We were eventually allowed to leave their company when one or more of us fell asleep. It felt as if they’d been roaming the tattered village all weekend, pouncing on tourists. Nice enough, but I think I found the people a bit creepier than the village. Here are a few pictures of (firstly/secondly) the pub and (thirdly) my favourite sign of the day;
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