Sunday 5 November 2006

Guy Fawkes and Bonfire Night

It is very noisy around London tonight (5th Nov). There are fireworks all around the place. It's the bonfire night!

What is it all about, you may ask? well, the firework is to mark the failure of Guy Fawkes' Gunpowder plot. You can read more about it here: http://www.bonefire.org/guy/gunpowder.php

Anyway, a long story short: In 1605, a group, led by a person called Guy Fawkers, has gathered barrels of gunpowder under the House of Lords in an attempt to blow up the House of Parliament and kill the king. Their plot failed and the conspirators were caught, tortured and executed. Subsequently, bonfires were set alight to celebrate the safety of the King and the tradition has continued until today, although for a completely different reason.

These days, the bonfire night is held around Britain on several nights around 5th Nov. Each council/regions tends to run their own version, so the theme would be somewhat different. However, since most of the bonfire night are planned by individual councils/suburbs, there are a number of firework display inside London. However, the scale of these firework display is relatively small.

SP and I are living alongside the river so we can see the fireworks in a few places. There are at least four  six nine seperate firework displays at this very moment. Rather noisy, if you ask me.

 

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