DAY X REMEMBERED

Kids: If George Galloway tells you to stop the country when war starts he won't help you. If Ken Livingstone stands up and says "We support the kids" he will be lying to you. I stopped him when he came off stage after saying that and told him you were there, he ran from me. He was lying to you.

..

AVERSION THERAPY

The other day I was speaking to a ten year old I last met when he was two or three. He said he wanted to be a soldier and fight the Taliban. This made me remember being ten. One of our teachers asked us to please stop writing war stories, as we all wrote war stories all the time and he wanted to read something different. Todays classrooms here and in Muslim countries. What effect is this media focus on our limited wars having on children and the ambitions they have? Are we breeding enemies? I may have been a bit gonzo some times, but if there was ever any reason I started filming it was the question- How do we avert this?

..

LEGACY OF IRAQ

The legacy of Iraq

I'm not sure how I feel about the Iraq war. I was talking to Mr Camel and we both agreed that we were pretty much against huge amounts of missiles being fired on a country from a great distance. Calling it "Shock and Awe" was ridiculously stupid.

I was on the big march the other day, but not fully behind it. I don't see Iraq and Afghanistan as black and white issues. I also don't see those who think they lead moves for change in this country as credible. I heard George Galloway saying that the "movement" had "Maybe been a bit too law abiding and a bit too peaceful". OK George where were you when children tried to stop the country? Why did you leave them to be picked up by the throat like kittens? YOU SAID we were going to try and stop the country.



You're full of shit George. Don't worry, I didn't try and stop the country either. As I said, it's not a black and white issue. In 2003, as lots of bombs were being dropped, it was for school kids.

thanks to Flee

see also Where did the anti-war protest go?
and Gungho media

MORE HISTORY

This is Katya Nisim's film which is a bit less violent than my version of events.

BATTLE FOR HADITHA

I had a bit of a strange turn mentally over the last few days which has driven me to get incredibly pissed and wander round bars on my own to see what happens. I've been ranting at people. Yesterday I saw the Respect party screening of Nick Broomfields Battle for Haditha in the Curzon, Soho. There is a behind the scenes article in Timeout, also the Times is interesting.

The guardian says

Where Broomfield's film stumbles slightly is in its recourse to set speeches in which characters outline their inner thoughts; perhaps a hangover of the documentary habit of getting people to explain themselves.

I thought this a few times watching it but the characters involved were great.

Afterwards Broomfield took questions, along with an Iraqi journalist who didn't seem to be part of the project. Lindsey German chaired. It was quite funny as it beame obvious the Iraqi guy didn't seem to like Broomfield or his film. First he questioned the veracity of the story, where Broomfields film claims a guy who filmed the famous scene where the Iraqi girl talks about Americans killing her family- was actually one of the guys who planted the roadside bomb.

Broomfield says he got that from the family. He said he had also done extensive interviews with kilo company, all of whom were quite fucked up. The Iraqi journalist also went on to niggle about accents, saying some of the Iraqi actors were Jordanian. This was all very amusing.

I thought the film was great, and I can see how tempting it must be to piece together such a story from so many peoples perspective. I just worry a bit about how the film will be used by people who want to believe all US soldiers are like this, and I worry that Republicans won't watch it. I didn't think it was anti the soldiers involved. Broomfield said he believed they were victims.

Afterwards I went round the corner with some Respect party workers and talked about revolution. I was wanting to buy another drink before I had finished the one I had. I'm not sure why these phases are occurring. I just feel an incredible darkness in my head which is lifted into blissful euphoria by alcohol.

RAGEH INSIDE IRAN - 7pm, THURS 14 JUNE, LONDON IRISH CENTRE, 52 CAMDEN
SQ

Renowned BBC journalist Rageh Omaar has agreed to come and speak at a
meeting of Camden Stop the War Coalition. He has recently filmed a
documentary in Iran where he tries to show the country through the eyes
of
the ordinary people who live there. We will have an edited copy of the
documentary, and Rageh will lead a discussion. We will also have other
who
were involved in the making of the film at the meeting, including the
director, Paul Sapin, and Ziba Mir Hosseini from the London Middle East
Institute who made a lot of it possible.

This will be a fantastic opportunity to hear about Iranian society
beyond
the images we see on the tv.

Thursday 14 June, 7pm
London Irish Centre
52 Camden Square
off Camden Rd

Yeah yeah yeah

I had a dream the other day that I put a bet on the favourite in a horse race at 7 to 1. I woke up to find it was Grand National day. I cycled off to the bookies to find the favourite was about 16 to 2. It didn't feel right so I didn't put the bet on. Later I cycled into town and went into another bookies. Again it didn't feel right. I came out of the bookies and totally by chance bumped into an ex-attendee of Finsbury park mosque.

I went into another bookies and found an earlier race with a favourite at 7 to 1. I put a fiver on it to win and, sure enough, as usual on the rare occasion when I put a bet on a horse, the race was run, the commentator got really excited shouting the names of the horses in contention never once mentioning the name of my horse. I suppose I dreamt that I put the bet on, I didn't dream whether the bloody thing won or not.

----

Filming the NF the other day, and a post I found on "the Nation of Duncan" have made me reexamine my motivations in an interesting way. I obviously look for the human characteristics in people that others would describe as inhuman. Why? I suppose I must still be idealistic in some sort of way. Fuck knows why.

I would enjoy doing a character study, for example, on the guy at the end of the film who talks about Combat 18. He is interesting. A smart arse film maker might be able to gain his confidence and do a hatchet job on him. Whats the fucking point though? Its been done and solved nothing. Surely its more of a challenge to address the points they make full on, with accurate representation of what they are saying.

Why does everything on TV need to be spun to shit? What is wrong with filming what people say? Humanity really isn't hard to find. It depends how you go about it.

When I look at anti-fascist groups, and how important it is for them to label their enemy I feel sad. I think to define yourself by your enemy, which is what you are doing, is a mistake. Maybe that is Zippy Buddhist post-rave shit philosophy. I just don't feel any need to get myself into a group of people who are similar to me and shout "BAAA". Whatever the "BAAA" is about it still sounds like "BAAA" to me.

----

I was discussing with a friend who is part of the Stop the War Coalition how much I hate Tony Benn et-al the back-slapping glitterati elite of "the left". I just don't believe in the power of politics to change shit. The days of "vote for me" are over. Burn your fucking rosettes. A friend bought the Mail on Sunday yesterday (cos it came with a free Tubbular Bells CD- he says). This is a Tory womens paper. In it came their own "Green Issue" supplement which included articles about Bio-fuel sports cars, Daryl Hannah's eco-hippie lifestyle and the plight of Palestinian children captives in Israel. A revolution is happening. Who needs Politicians?

DAY-X REMEMBERED

This is a short "promo" if you will for my first ever attempt at film making, where we covered the kids who came out to "stop the country" on the day the war started as requested by the Stop the War Coalition, only to be totally left to the mercy of the Police by the adults who INCITED THEM. There was a word for that sort of behaviour in my playground.

Over the weekend I was worried that they would keep going and that things would get ugly. I saw Ken Livingstone's speech in Hyde park where he said "We support the kids."

I waited for him back stage

"Ken, I'm really worried that these kids are going to carry on after the weekend and they are on their own, facing the Police.. I was wondering if you could go down and speak to them or something?"

He ran away from me. Strange guy.

Thanks to Flee and Jubal for the footage and Paula for the music.

Mark Thomas

I got heartily sick of the back slapping glitterati of "the movement" shouting and went for a coffee on Saturday so I missed Mark Thomas. Here he is proving he's still got it in the comedy department.

DONT FOLLOW LEADERS WATCH YOUR PARKING METERS

Two friends of mine managed to turn up in the background of a TV program called Born Sloppy out of their heads on ketamine. I thought about making this pursuit a competition for a website called "On drugs on TV", getting people to send in clips of themselves out of their heads infiltrating TV programs. In truth I had given up all drugs by that point for about 2 months. Giving up dope was a hell of a struggle. All my painting, computer artwork and music seemed to come from the herb. Being straight made reality quake all over the place. I went to the doctor and he prescribed me an anti depressant called cipralex, A Serotonin Reuptake inhibitor or SSRI.

I watched the BAFTA awards. At the end Saul Gantz got up and made a mind-blowing speech. America had been temporarily taken over. We shall overcome - and we will. All the audience, including people like Martin Scorsese, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones rose to applaud. For a week or so I became obsessed with the idea that there was going to be a celebrity led peaceful revolution. I remember I was feverishly waiting for it but it never happened. I watched news of how the British Soldiers were campaigning for hearts and minds in Iraq. British politeness seemed to be exporting well. I hoped they were there to return Iraq to the Iraqi's, but with the corporate Bechtell in the middle things looked dubious.

The Stop the War campaign was having a national meeting in Hammersmith. The Stonehenge festival was on the same day. Someone suggested that I bring my film down to show in the interval. I phoned up and this was confirmed. I brought a copy of my film down to the Stop the War HQ in Britannia st. One of the volunteers loaded it on a computer and a few other volunteers came over to watch. A woman came over who I had seen making speeches. I remembered she had a foghorn of a voice and could see how she had become a leader. My dislike of speechmakers made my back go up. She started complaining

" This is an office you know, not a cinema. "

Whatever, I thought.

I left the CD with the volunteer. I was about to leave when they all congregated round a video. George Galloway had prerecorded an interview for channel 4 news denying Saddam Hussein had rewarded him financially. They all watched adoringly and came away pleased with their hero's efforts.

" So why did he say to Saddam Hussein " I salute your indefatigability? " " I asked. No one answered.

" And why is he using a word like in-de-fat-ig-a-ble (I counted the syllables on my fingers) with someone who doesn't speak English? "

John Rees, Andrew Murray, Mrs. Fog horn, the glittering courageous wafflers of the biggest dissident movement this century, and associated volunteers all stood there with nothing to say. I had to ask. The question had been burning in me since I had seen Galloway’s meeting with Saddam Hussein on TV.

" And what does indefatigable mean? "

One of the volunteers actually chimed in with the same question. No one knew the answer.

" I think I'm going to ask him. On camera." I said. I genuinely wanted to know the answer. They drifted away.

Needless to say when I turned up at the meeting my film had been pulled and everyone ignored me. 600 people from all over the UK missed the chance to see what kids had actually done, on their own in Parliament Square. I had missed Stonehenge for this. In one of the side meetings I got a chance to speak.

" 2 million people marching to listen to speeches in Hyde Park, yet when war breaks out, who in London tries to stop it? Just children. It seems to me that if any of us are serious about stopping wars rather than just talking about it you actually have to do it. " (I was holding up a still from my film of a kid being lifted from the street by the neck by a policeman.)

" Unfortunately this is how you do it. This kid is Gandhi."

I told them my Ken Livingstone story during which I was told off for swearing and showed them all my roached Mayor of London card. No one took any notice. Worse still I felt like one of those fucking speechmakers I despised. Galloway was top of the bill. It was like a fucking Galloway fan club meeting. One old guy was actually stamping his feet and clapping at the same time. " Good old George! " he shouted. I didn't have my camera and didn't really care. The room seemed full of people who like to talk and go to meetings. I stood at the back, arms folded. Furious.

BRING THE WAR TO THE FLOOR (DAY-X-)

After a year filming the bizarre battles between Abu Hamza and the Fundamental Islamists and the world’s media in Finsbury Park I feel it’s about time to give up. I don't even know what I think any more. The whole thing is going nowhere, I've got media, terrorism and Islam spinning round and round in my head with no respite and no focus. At first I thought I was doing something really important, then it was just fun but now its got obsessive. Considering the subject matter it’s interesting that at no point has it been scary. At all.

Sometimes it’s been comical, I've been trying to find the funny side, but then something like the Madrid bombing happens which makes me question everything I am doing. Now alleged terrorists have been arrested in Britain. Maybe I shouldn't have given up smoking dope. How did I get here? In a life coloured with demonstrations, international trance parties and the London squat scene I was not the likeliest candidate to end up spending so many Fridays with Fundamental Islamists. Some of this story is in the wrong order, some names have been told me and forgotten but as far as I know this is a true story, most of which I have on film.

If George Bush hadn't declared war on Iraq I probably wouldn't have started filmmaking. In the long build up to the war I was stoned most of the time. As the war was looking more and more inevitable I knew I was likely to be laid out stoned glued to the TV as the media went into hyper drive. I decided to combat this by documenting as much as possible what I thought was important where I live, in London, and making sure I enjoyed it instead of being sucked under by powerlessness. A video activist friend of mine had texted me about a bunch of school kids trying to storm Downing Street on their own.

Vaguely in the back of my mind I thought to myself, Yeah, that'd be right. I bet when this eventually kicks off the only people who will seriously have a go at stopping it will be kids. A few days later there was a knock on my girlfriends door. Two researchers from the channel 5 breakfast T.V. show RI:SE TV told me that the program had just moved into the area and they were going round inviting their neighbors to the pub for a drink. That ended up with me on television, stoned out of my head at 6 am out in the cold on Queensway W2 with a big picture of Osama Bin Laden with flowers round him saying

" Bring the War to the floor use biodiesel!"

I think the irony of casting Bin Laden as an eco protester disappeared into most people’s cereal bowls. RI:SE at the time was most famous for having pitiful ratings, but I had a good time and got my first irrational taste for telly. " He's got tusks in his ears! " said Edith, the presenter as they transferred back to the studio. I had wanted to be a spin-doctor ever since I saw how Peter Mandelson had successfully spun the concept of New Labour through the media tool into the public consciousness. Could this be done the same way spinning a spiritually edifying solution for social change?

I marvelled how much money people like Sattchi and Sattchi made presenting a media image of a political ideal and wanted to commandeer some of that airtime to spin stuff into public consciousness for free. Was it all totally controlled by the powers that be? I was a bit bored with the " it's all a police state " attitude of underground media makers in the UK. Maybe their stuff didn't get on TV because it was crap. I intended to find out for myself, keep a totally open mind, and above all, to enjoy the process.


Vicky, A hippie friend of mine who lived in a bender a spit away from Glastonbury festival's stone circle had come up with the idea of a campaign called

Bio diesel Not Bombs!

We wanted to convince the world to turn away from petrol addiction and use vegetable oil to power their transport. Could you bankrupt George Bush like this if it caught on? I still don't have a clue but it sounded good at the time and apparently burning vegetable oil for fuel was CO2 efficient. (The plant absorbs the same amount of carbon dioxide as it grows that you release when you burn it) We went to a Socialist Alliance meeting and posed the question to the panel of distinguished speakers.

The panel of distinguished speakers not knowing the answer completely ignored the question until Seth, a good friend of mine stood up (I think he's 6 foot 4) and reminded them in quite heated terms that a question had been asked. Someone acting as security told Seth to sit down. Seth asked him if he wanted to see some direct action. The guy moved away. I was prepared to leave it but it was quite funny seeing Seth take the whole room on.

" The time for sitting around talking is well past! " he shouted.

" Sit down!" they all shouted back.

The speakers sat and fidgeted nervously then carried on as if nothing had happened. This was my first experience of leftist political meetings. I agreed with everything being said but found sitting in a room listening to endless things I agreed with unfulfilling. Nothing changed. No bolt of lightning hit me. It surprised me how self-important and politician like these people were considering that they had no power whatsoever. I thought that without the drug of actual power these guys would at least be able to say

" I don't know. "

But it seemed they couldn't. It wasn't as if we were trying to hijack their little meeting, I genuinely wanted to know what they thought. At the huge rally in Hyde Park the picture turned into a placard. Out of two million I think I was the only one holding up a picture of Bin Laden. It was quite a head turner. I think the biodeisel reference was beyond most people a lot of who were offended by the picture. I remember trying to storm the stage to try and convince everyone that it was no good opposing war if you were going to continue putting George Bush's petrol in your car.

"Sell your petrol engined car buy a Diesel and use biodeisel!"

I thought I was a visionary who would convince the freethinking world to bankrupt George Bush from the petrol pump. All the stewards behind the stage thought I was crazy. They thought that what they were doing was very important. I've always been alive to the psychology of demonstrations but I'm not sure why I've always felt such intense hatred of stages and speechmakers.

I remember feeling that the only thing worse than George Bush and Tony Blair dragging us all to war was the fact that I probably could not avoid at some stage having to listen to the other George and Tony show. (Galloway and Benn) At least Blair and Bush were funny. I was worried that two million people listening to things they agreed with wasn't going to stop a war unless it turned into some sort of action.

There was a run-stop battle with riot police on Oxford st. and someone was arrested for trying to burn an American flag even though the thing wouldn't light. Vicky had come up from Glastonbury for the demo. Before she left, she whispered the password of the biodeiselnotbombs web address she had set up for our campaign. I promptly forgot it. I wasn't to know that would be the last time I would see Vicky alive. She died suddenly that summer of liver failure.

She was an archetypal British protester of the old school, living in a bender, more love and poetry than money, allied to no group or political party, taking on the system with hastily prepared art and flowers. When I first met her she was a tough lesbian who would make you feel guilty about being male over coffee at breakfast time. God knows what she would think of my now regular meetings with Fundamental Islamists.

Maybe the tactic of boring people into a war worked. Television and parliament quite successfully talked it all to death. I watched most of it. When War finally was agreed on the most notable thing to happen outside Parliament was a group of kids getting themselves on TV hitting Peter Mandelson with protest signs. I thought it pretty funny that although the stop the war movement put out a leaflet

"IF WAR BREAKS OUT"

encouraging everyone to stop the country the day the war started, no one over the age of 16 actually bothered to do this in London. Certainly not those who printed the leaflet anyway. I don't think the kids noticed though. They just got on with it. I arrived in Parliament square the next morning to find a small group of kids half my height in blazers lying in the street.

" Come on " said a policeman " Your not going to stop a war like this "

" Oh yes we are " came the answer.

I got the feeling London kids would be hardcore but I never imagined that they would have the resolve to fight for and hold parliament square two days running. On their own. It was classic non-violent direct action, so perfectly disorganized and self organized at the same time. The result of different groups of kids making separate plans in playgrounds and communicating through the Internet exploded in all directions onto the street. Without a camera myself, I looked for video activists to try and work with. Groups of friends headed off in all directions managing to split up the police. Swelled by numbers the kids shut down the square to traffic section by section. I bumped into some of those who I had seen the day before hitting Peter Mandelson. They were in the frontline again, sitting down on the north side of the square.

I tried to interview them about the Mandelson stunt but they were steam rollered by police. I couldn't believe how determined they were, Police eventually resorting to lifting them off the road using pressure points in the throat. As usual in post Thatcher Britain most of the police were O.K. I wouldn't blame those who weren't for the violence some kids reported as much as the jokers who had incited them to be there, only to let them down when it came to it. There was a word for that sort of behavior in my playground. There were no reclaim the streets style crusties there; there were no socialist workers there, no anarchists, hardly anyone over the age of 16.

I had been pretty cynical and jaded by protest over the years. I had become bored rigid by the violence and was glad it had more or less died out, at least in London. I was pleased London was not Genoa or Seattle or Prague. Suddenly I found myself in the middle of the most inspiring protest I have ever been on in my life, organized and executed without drugs, or political organization by London children.

With the ridiculously unseasonable sun shinning down on them, the exuberant action of kids washed away the empty words I had heard from the stage the previous weekend. It was as if the spirit of Gandhi mixed with the personality of Johnny Rotten had possessed every school kid in London. I felt sorry for the police and tried to keep everything good humored. I remember calling the RI:SE researchers begging them to get these kids on the show. Surely kids with something to say would be more interesting than endless bland celebrity wannabees, and who knows? Controversy might turn around their piss poor ratings!

Again I got the feeling that these people thought I was crazy. Luckily I met up with a few people there with cameras so we got a chance to film and interview the kids. I didn't sit down with the kids myself. I didn't think I would achieve anything by being arrested and it felt like it was their protest. Police were O.K. with me, and I understood it wasn't their war.
I was fascinated to find out what the kids, all of who must have been first time demonstrators could achieve and learn for themselves.

Most protests I have been on in the past I took acid or at least was drunk. It was great to be sober, with reality in the sunshine. Two million in Hyde Park listening to speeches did nothing to stop war. I wondered what two million sitting next to the kids in Parliament Square would have done? Maybe Blair was right and it was more complicated than being pro or anti war. For the kids it wasn't complicated. As bombs dropped on Baghdad, they woke up in the morning and set out to stop the country.

I found out later that kids from the small suburban village in which I grew up in Dorset did the same. This happened nationwide and worldwide and became for me the most important phenomena of this unfolding War. I asked a lot of them if they wanted the voting age lowered. As parliament debates lowering the voting age to 16, could this make a difference? or could MacDonald’s buy up all the votes in the playground with free happy meals?

LIES AND MORE LIES

A few days later David Blunkett obviously conscious of media pressure issued a timely law designed to get rid of Abu Hamza. As war fever gripped us all we got a timely reminder of the enemy within. I had been following the story the same way as everyone else. From the front page of The Sun and the scuffles on the early evening news. With hooks as hand and a glass eye Hamza made a great bad guy. I typed his name into google and saw the infamous " Looting and shooting " speech he had made from inside the mosque on www.johnathangaltfilms.com He was also saying something like

" If a kaffir (godless person) is caught in a Moslem land and you can’t sell him as a slave in the market place then you kill him."

I had been called a kafir in Pakistan. I had been called " kaffir, infidel, heretic " but mostly a word I had never heard before " Malung. " Everywhere I went it was " malung, malung, malung. " Sometimes with hatred, mostly with surprise,

" You are malung? "

" Err. Yes. What’s a malung?"

A few people even shook my hand. In Pakistan if you dress the way everyone else does you are greeted really warmly. The guest is god. I met westerners with beards dressed in the native shalwar kamieze who literally paid for nothing and went from house to house as warmly invited guests. If you have 3 inch bones through your ears and a ring through your nose you are called a "malung " which was variously described to me as someone who was dirty, laughs and smoked dope all day and had no god. Muslims everywhere hated me. After having to resist being forcibly dragged off with the mullah by an angry crowd on my first day in Peshawar I realized that if I conformed it would all be different. I tried on a shalwar kamieze. I hadn't worn a smart collar since my schooldays and I just couldn't get the hang of it.

It certainly gave me a sense of identity going round Pakistan as a malung. It was worth it just for the expressions on people’s faces. I thought I was doing my moral duty fazing their heads. Eventually I took refuge with a pagan tribe right up on the Afghan border that as luck would have it were just starting their annual fertility festival. I got the idea that in the UK things would be different, as I had lived in a Muslim community in Birmingham with no problem. I knew there would be a whole load of Muslims totally used to British culture and expressing themselves within it and looked forward to trying to engage with them, and whatever reaction the way I looked provoked.

Abu Hamza and Finsbury Park were quite close so I thought I would go down without a camera to check out the story for myself. Sure enough there were lots of serious TV cameras, and eventually some Muslims, a few whom were masked gathered. A big, angry looking guy, started preaching. He had been one of the first to arrive and stood out from the others because of his size and beard. He seemed like a classic image of what you would think Fundamental Islam to be. An angry man with a beard preaching against the west. But he wasn't Abu Hamza. He was younger, white and had a London accent.

While he was preaching Abu Hamza arrived photographers swarming around him like he is a rock star. A microphone was pinned on him, the sun shinned on him. He was totally confident and seemed to relish being badass No. 1. He started to preach. He spoke first in Arabic, making media people and I fidget. Then he spoke in English. All his words are against Bush, Blair and Saddam.He angrily accused them of hypocrisy in their dealings with Palestine and Israel and attributed the invasion of Iraq to the business as usual attitude of a tiny minority of American Oil men. He believes that most Arab nations are ruled by apostates who sell their countries wealth to the west whilst the poor starve. I wondered how many British citizens would actually agree with this.

He said that he did not fear deportation because the whole planet belongs to Allah and Allah does not recognise borders. He praises the work of peacemakers who are not Islamic. As he finished preaching every Muslim faced east to pray whilst the gathered media bunched up at the front of the barriers ready to pounce. Muslims surrounded Hamza; the biggest guy who was preaching earlier stuck right beside him. He seemed like a bouncer. I wondered if Abu Hamza had known him from his reported days as a bouncer. T.V. cameras, pundits and journalists swooped and the Muslims literally pushed their way through, pulling leads from cameras and blocking lenses. The police wisely stood back and let them all get on with it. Very little was said. Someone asked a question, I overheard Hamza's answer " Lies and more lies " scary looking Islamists with masks entangled themselves with camera people. Eventually Hamza and the bouncer character were able to walk away freely down the road. No police, no secret looking MI-5 people hiding in trees, just the two guys walking off into the sunshine.

I wondered to myself what on earth I would do the next week, what questions I might try to ask Hamza and how I would get an opportunity to do so. I had really enjoyed interviewing the kids in Parliament Square and was well up for my first media scrum. Being anti war certainly didn't make me pro-Hamza. He had not caught the sympathy of the protest movement and few Muslims seemed to have a good word to say about him. When I called the Muslim Association of Great Britain they wouldn't speak to me about Hamza. They called me a sensationalist, and seemed convinced I was working for the Sun. I was fascinated by the theatrical nature of the interplay between Muslims and media and there was something laughably British about the way the police refereed.

I had no idea what was going on really but thought if I was really intending to have fun during this war, joining in the game these strangers chose to play with each other seemed like the best course of action. The Government and the press vs. the mosque in the street seemed like a unique opportunity. I decided straight away that I didn't want to bust in on these guys place of worship any more than I would bust in with a camera and a pile of questions to any mosque or church. I would only disturb their gathering if big cameras were already doing so or if I was invited. Yet this was not only a mosque. Theatrically it was tense, spontaneous high drama every bit as fascinating as the kids protest at the start of the war for totally different reasons. The staring character was a cartoon character cartooned beyond cartoonism. And he was real. God and everybody’s concept of God was involved.

The last time I had got involved in any religious ceremony was in India where I experimented with desert Hinduism in Rhajistan. I was also experimenting with a drug called ketamine which Indian chemists do good business selling to British malungs. For me this seemed to amplify the god consciousness of it all. There are strains of conservative Hinduism amongst middle class families in India and the west, but in the desert celebration is much more frantic. No one minded my sniffing of powders or my staggering dancing, a few babas (holy men) joined in with both. In the UK in the mid nineties like most people my age I had got turned on to dance music and the drugs which went with it like it was a religion. There was no doubt about it, being out of my face made me feel closer to god and my fellow man. Crossing the border into Pakistan sobered me up abruptly. Everywhere I went people asked the same questions. It became like a ritual.

" What is this? " they would ask pointing at my nose ring.

" Gold! " I would answer.

" But what is this?" they would say worriedly, their hand going to their ear.

" Bone! " I would say triumphantly.

" But what is this? " they would say pointing at my neck.

" Seeds!"- I had a necklace made out of rodrugs (Shiva seeds)

" And what is this?" their hands going to their wrists.

" Copper!" I had heavy copper bracelets on.

" But what does it all mean? " they would say.

" Jewelry!" I would answer.

The question of religion always came up. People would ask if I was a Muslim, then if I was a Christian. If I answered in the negative to both they would invariably get angry. Not having a god made me the enemy of god and to be the enemy of god was a very big deal. Yet deep in the smugglers bazaar of Peshawar I found Muslims smoking the best hashish I have ever found, and using it as an aid to worship. I got high with them and was warmly welcome to sit while they prayed facing a wall covered with beautiful Islamic writing. A withered old guy turned to me

" So what do you think of these poor unfortunate souls who have no god?" he asked me in perfect Queens English.

" Terrible.." I said as the blood rushed to my head and my ears started to zing.

At the only protest mosque in British history I wondered if I would get the same reaction I got in Pakistan? How would a malung be treated at Finsbury Park mosque? I didn't think it a good idea to turn up with any ketamine as this form of worship required you to sit still in one place and there was definitely no dancing. The first time I ever noticed Finsbury Park mosque was 10 years ago. I was stuck in traffic on a motorbike, I heard the call to prayer looked up and saw the now infamous building. I looked round to see a fat English guy in a string vest lean out of his window and shout

" Shaaad aaap!!"

I laughed at this wonderful picture of Britain. I bet this guy did this every Friday and loved doing it. I would never have dreamt of going into the mosque whilst it was opened, but with its occupants taking to the street in protest I was fascinated to at least have a go at documenting what these people really believed about the world we live in. Knowing it would be coloured so much by the way I looked made me feel like I was bound to a chaos element which would provoke a reflection of a totally different type of Britain for whatever shaky camera I could find to record on. I wanted to go into the news business.

That weekend there was another big London protest, ending in another round of speeches in Hyde Park. This time I managed to slip through backstage and watched Ken Livingstone telling everyone how much he supported the kid’s action. I stopped him as he came off backstage and told him how worried I was for the kids as they were completely on their own, taking on the police. Would he be able to go down there, as he supported them? He sort of took huge steps away from me. He didn't actually run, just moved quickly, leaving me with someone who gave me a card with Mayor of London written on it. I roached it for a spliff later.

The unseasonable sun continued as war fever gripped us all through the T.V. The next Friday, I managed to convince a veteran protest journalist in his fifties called J. to join me at Finsbury Park. Even though he had been close filming in riots for 30 years he was terrified and thought he was surrounded by terrorists. I thought we were surrounded by local Finsbury Park Muslims wearing masks as a fashion statement. I thought to myself that if I managed to talk to the big guy and make clear that I was separate to the gathered journalists and camera people, I might get a chance to talk to Abu Hamza, although I still had no idea what to ask him. If I was going to approach the big guy with a camera I thought I had better do so very, very carefully.

Pretty soon he arrived and we approached him camera rolling before I could loose my nerve. I told him how we had previously filmed the kid’s protest in Parliament Square. Considering how I had seen him preach the week before I was surprised to find the guy, whose name was Abu Abdullah very approachable. He told me of his belief that Freemasons and Zionists run the world. He also told me that he believed George Bush, Ronald Regan and Donald Runsfeld sacrificed children to a 40 foot owl god in a place called Bohemian Grove in the U.S.A. He said he believed that the people who run the world would have to eradicate Islam because Islamists would not submit to man made laws.

" Many people are ignorant about what’s happening in Chechnya right now, pregnant women’s stomachs are being opened up by Russian soldiers and the contents is being thrown across the floor. Young children are being raped by gangs of Russian soldiers. "

He believed the September 11th attacks to be the work of the C.I.A and Mossad. It was a small price to pay to take over the world. He denied that Muslims were a threat to the British people and said that the killing of innocents was totally against Islamic law. I felt that we had quite a polite British conversation. I was surprised that he had a lot of faith in the theories of David Ike. My activist friend was pleased with my efforts.


" Excellent you've got us right in the middle of everything, the trouble is you've got me in the middle of all this as well. There's BBC and ITV and everyone down here and I haven't got my mask..."

" Yeah you know The Sun and all that try to portray these people.... " I tried to answer.

" Yeah, but I haven't got my mask...you don't understand...I'm serious, If I'm going to be on national T.V. I've got to have my mask on "

" Don't worry about your mask. "

" You don't understand I'm a super-hero..."

As Mr. Abdullah preached, still sounding scary as anything, I looked at him in a different light. As a British fundamental Islamist he was a bit of an enigma. I was really glad we spoke; it was worth it to get my stereotyping faculties blown for a bit. He was deadly serious, but didn't seem dangerous or hateful and this was apparently supposed to be an international terrorists second in command. He preached against Homosexuality, Bart Simpson and people walking around naked. He raged against George Bush and those Freemasons who sacrifice to an owl god in Bohemian Grove. As the war was on, and war fever gripped me it felt great to be there hearing this Blair and Bush slamming from the streets.

" Cow-lin Powell? It’s Colin Powell! He can't even read his own name. " He ranted.

I suppose I could have confronted him with the things I disagreed with Islam about and had a much shorter conversation. With war on, I thought it really important to try and reach across the divide between our cultures and strangely enough British politeness seemed to be the bridge. While I fully accepted that most British people probably thought Abu Hamza had overstepped the mark of freedom of speech, it dawned on me that outside Finsbury Park mosque had actually become the border of free speech in this country. I had no idea who was right or wrong, but for the first time in years, all this was giving me the feeling that I was bemusedly proud of being British. I looked around me at this strange scene. I wondered which other country in the world this would be allowed to happen in.

As a person more used to talking to people over loud trance music, talking to Mr. Abdullah, Abu Hamza's apparent second in command in his mosque was one of the strangest things I have ever done in my life. He seemed like an eccentric Londoner, not someone who would be involved in terrorist outrages or someone who would associate with anyone who was. Again, Hamza arrived while he was preaching, looking quite cool for a Fundamental Islamist in his sunglasses. He looked like he thought he was a rock star. As he preached, he gave his run down on the war so far, paying special attention to how the media people in Iraq had been shelled, he believed, to control the story.

He said ordinary people were fighting for the benefit of multinationals whist the rich elite hid in bunkers. He said it was the duty of Muslims to sacrifice, and that they would be called to account for this by God. He said that being anti Zionist was not anti Jewish and that Zionists were just a rich elite who’s only concern was money. As he preached I bit my fingernails wondering what question to ask in the inevitable scrum that would follow. With war on, the atmosphere was really tense. Muslims prayed, media surged forward this time with J. and I, worriedly discussing tactics.

" Don't forget. Be polite.." J. Said nervously. Masked Muslims surrounded Hamza.

" Shall we hang back? " I asked.

" But I got to stick with you, his bouncer is your friend..remember that.."

The media pounced like the beast with many heads from the revelations. I was in the middle of it feeling like a rebellious head. The BBC asked if he was appealing against Blunketts decision. His Muslim friends fought them all off. A short angry guy seemed to be in charge of media relations and was manoeuvring them all onward as cameramen tried to get a clear shot. I pushed in and asked whether he had a message for the mass of British kids who had protested the war.

“ They are great - they should be ruling the country.”

I'd lost J. and swore because I didn't think he had it on camera. I made a fuss as if having a go at J. but I was just trying to locate him. The masked Muslims had heard my question and the same guy who tried to push J. out made way for us. Hamza continued...

" Everybody… even Bin Laden is encouraged. They became the source of security in this country, rather than this billions of pounds spent on MI5 and Scotland Yard because once Muslims and Islamists see the children… the people of this country opposing the war, trying to save their blood, this is what we want. We want to live together. I think they should be ruling the country."

I asked if he thought poor Muslim children of the east would become more militant as a result of this war. He said

“ I think everyone, even women will become militant, can you see women who have lost their children see the aggressors who killed their child? Even women will become martyrdom.”

There was loads of jostling and professional media questions. Then I asked him if he was a threat to Britain. I think he said

“ I’ve been here 25 years and I’ve never threatened anyone. “

The Muslims went beyond a barrier and told the media people to stay back. I spoke a bit longer to Mr Abdullah who told me of a website, www.infowars.com where he said it was reported that 8 million Christians recognised that the American government belonged to the occult. I felt pretty good about what we had on camera. In the back of my mind I was worried that maybe I might be just giving easy questions to a terrorist. The kids certainly didn't need his support, yet at the time with war raging I couldn't agree more with his answer. Seeing the ineffectualness of the British protest movement in stopping wars, and the way the British government chose to run them I felt like I wouldn't trust anyone over the age of 16 to run anything. Hamza seemed very arrogant and I remembered his kaffir killing comments from the Internet. If I hadn't got such an honest vibe from Mr. Abdullah I wouldn't have gone back. Overall I had no idea what was going on but I had fun.

I went to a Stop the War meeting In Belsize Park the day Saddam's statue came down. Someone got up and said that everyone should be celebrating. I pretty much agreed but was the only one to clap. One of the school protests organizers was there; I asked her if she thought Tony Blair’s citizenship lessons had backfired on him and whether their action was a campaign for a lowering of the voting age. She thought Tony Blair should be doing a humanities G.C.S.E.

The next Friday Hamza was preaching about Jesus in the temple turning over the tables of the money lenders. I asked him about usury and whether his message was anti-capitalist.

" Its not anti-capitalist its anti wrong. You shouldn't earn your money from immoral means. "

Gillian Joseph from BBC London was there; looking even more gorgeous than she does on T.V. she asked him if he was appealing his conviction. The short guy shouted

" No Comment..." he was good at this and deflected further questions as they all did a runner.