Fedeterranea and Global Warming

It's struck me lately that fedeterranean homes are very sensible when it comes to global warming. Their Mediterranean elements add a number of features that help to keep them cool, like pale paint colours and internal glazed tiling. The characteristics they retain from their Federation roots have some good anti-heat features too: verandahs, double-brick walls and high ceilings.

Lots of Marrickville people who live in fedeterranean homes cook in their yards, on barbeques and in small wood fired ovens. On my evening walks with Sailor I smell lamb marinated in oregano and garlic, being cooked over coals, and sometimes smoky wafts of fresh fish being grilled in one of these. We do have dining rooms in Marrickville, but they're rarely used, remaining preserved as pristine altars to crystal cabinets and polished wood veneer. People like to eat on their decks, in their yards, and often in their garages, roller doors open to the back lanes.

Fedeterranean gardens are often very water-wise, with dry loving trees like citrus, olives and figs.

My friend George Morgan has generously sent me a box of Marrickville Backyards. These are really lovely books, very close to Marrickvillia's heart. I intend on giving them away to anyone who pleases me, and taking a pile next time I go to Hackney. If you want one, let me know.

This very old lemon tree has its trunk painted bright white-blue every year.

A tree heavy with olives.

A fig tree, draped like a new bride to keep the birds away from the ripening fruit.

Sisterly Love

Hackney Road

Little Griff and his mums live in Hackney, London. So, I've decided to make Hackney blogs the sister-blogs of Marrickvillia.

The first thing you'll usually read about Hackney, if you look it up on Google or Wikipedia or some other reputable spot, is that it's a pretty poor place, with a lot of crime. In a reckoning undertaken by BBC4 using various statistics Hackney was deemed the worst place to live in England. Hmmmn. High crime, vile pollution, poor education, bad transport (no tube).

But when I visited I liked it a lot. About 25% of people there are black, which seemed good to me. Pete Doherty, musician boyfriend of supermodel Kate Moss, lives in Hackney (it's mentioned each time he goes to court). He's obviously hopeless but doesn't seem angst-ridden, so, whatever. Sid Vicious once lived there, too.

The Tescos was big & friendly, the teenage mothers at the station were cute, the hot chips were brilliant. We had excellent Indian home delivery (we couldn't go out because Celebrity Big Brother was on).

Like Marrickville, Hackney is very multicultural and full of wayward artistes & academics & lefties. At least that's what the blogs I've found seem to indicate.

Slaminsky is a favourite.
Baroque in Hackney is a poet who also writes about the bus, the train, the weather, whatever makes her cross, and Celebrity Big Brother.
Luke Akehurst writes stuff that may or may not be parody about being a Labour whip for Hackney council, and about Celebrity Big Brother.
Made in China '69 blogs about culture & art in East London.
Hackney Lookout hasn't written anything in a while, since his baby was born, but I like his transcriptions of overheard Hackney conversations:

"It's like summer. But it ain't cold."

"Whadja mean?"

"Well, like, it's really hot in summer. But then it gets cold at night. And now, it's, like, warm."

"Well, whadja expect? You've just been standing next to a barbeque."