thursday 7th july

wanna know how messed up yr head can get after getting nicked at a protest?

there we are in the cell, me, the polish guy and the israeli guy, ready to be packed off in a van to go to court. we sit there and there is this vibe of what are we going to talk about?

certainly not politics. we’ve had a bloody skinful of that.

so what else can possibly unite four blokes from completely different cultures sitting in a police cell awaiting judgement? and then it happens. we start singing pink floyd songs. one after the other, all the old classics from the wall. mother, comfortably numb etc etc….

that’s it. i know now for sure i have lost it. and yet…..

all of us in the holding cells are being herded off to have a wash and scrub to make us presentable for court. ha fucking ha. most of us are wearing clothes we were wearing for days on end at the eco-village in stirling, and consequently we all stink like a savory collection of bogs.

we are given disposable soaps and toothbrushes which we have to chuck into a big black bin liner when we finish.

that’s it, more animal treatment for us, please. all part of the service.

then we are herded out to several group four security vans. they each have individual cells for us to sit in. it is a hot, sunny day and this is a good thing to see under the circumstances.

as we drive off to stirling sherriff’s court, one of the group four security men in my van, a young guy, puts on the radio and starts smoking and chatting to the driver. they seem to be laughing about something.

“that’s a messge to the leaders of the seven richest nations on earth – up yz!” he says in a thick scottish accent.

and then as we head through the centre of stirling in the traffic, i hear on the radio exactly what they are talking about. reports are coming through from london about several possible suicide bomb attacks there.

my head is going something like this:

oh my god my mum and my brother and his girlfriend and my girlfriend are all in london please god let them be safe…….

i have no way of knowing. i have no way of contacting them. this is a fucking nightmare. then what happens?

that feeling takes over that u hear so often about from people in a crisis. it’s like, this is so bad, and it may get better or it may get worse but either way some strength inside you comes out and u tell yourself u will get through it and it will be ok and u submit to whatever is happening.

and that’s it. i’m fine. i don’t think about anything except the immediate moment.

at the court, the group four people are hilarious. they are cracking on as they put us in the cells and i crack on with them.

“how come yr not miserable bastards like those coppers?” i ask.

“oh, it’s the uniform, makes u a bit funny.” one of them says laughing.

there are a bunch of us in a cell at the court, waiting to find out what the hell is going on. the nutty french guy is there from the night before at falkirk, as is the austrailian, who turns out to know the girls i was nicked with, and a few others.

after what seems ages, with different protesters coming in and out the cell, i am up before the beak solicitors babble in legalese, suited and booted, while i sit there in my minging clothes.

finally i free to go. it is about one o’clock in the afternoon. i am told to leave stirling and get back to cardiff to report to the police station there at midday the next day. only thing is, i can’t go via glasgow or edinburgh.

so how the hell am i supposed to do that?

i ask a copper, can i go via edinburgh cos otherwise i won’t get back in time. he says that will be fine. then i ring my family and friends in london and see if they’re ok.

everyone’s fine, thank god.

i make a short journey with an australian girl to the cop shop because we both found out our cameras were nicked by the police. so it’s a good job mine didn’t work then!!!! (see blog entry ‘photos and destiny’). we bump into the english girl from the queer block who we i was nicked with. she’s there for the same reason, i.e. camera stolen by cops. she gets invited in a room and suddenly we find out she has been nicked again.

“she’s breaking her bail conditions by being here, and so are we,” the australian girl says.

headfuck. i head off to stirling train station and book a flight out of edinburgh. i just want to get outta this nuthouse!

i ring some mates at the eco village. the cops have surrounded it and things are getting heavy. i tell them i’ll see them in cardiff. and yet somewhere inside i have the feeling this aint over yet.

at edinburgh station, i have to change trains. i get out and there are a load of coppers searching everyone who looks like they’ve been living in an eco village for days. and i mean everyone.

so i do something really stupid. i go up to one of them and hand him my passport and bail conditions and explain to him that i have a ticket out of the city. the cop says, ok, and talks to his boss.

his boss is a big, fat fuck of an englishman. big mason. big in the community. big rotary club tosser.

“you have blatantly breached your bail conditions,” he says. “you’re nicked.”

eh?

i start to argue the toss with him and his scottish side kick. the scottish side kick is a mean bastard, and he accuses me of lying and being a violent idiot.

at this point, i smack him in the face and pull out his revolver. i shoot him at point blank range in the head before anyone knows what’s going on. blood and brains (shock!) splattered all over the station concourse. then i turn on the other five or six coppers and blow their heads off one by one, singing a full three choruses of the harry roberts song. in fact, i’ve beaten harry roberts’ record of killing cops! i walk on down the platform, with all the coppers dead in pools of blood, the general public screaming and running in all directions and i get to the ticket barrier before anyone can re-arrest me.

actually, that last bit only happens when i replay these events in my head.

in actual fact, i get arrested, walked down the station concourse, handcuffed and in full view of the public, and bundled into a van. a zen-like calm comes over me as i realise things have just got a whole lot worse.