Bellawarde Ridge

[Max]

Ypres even wanted to change street names as "Haig lane, Plumer lane,..." to something like Peace lane and brotherhood street. I don't know if they are still planning this, but it is typical....

Is this an example of a factoid?

[Aurel Sercu]

Thanks, Andy, for asking ! I'm really glad you did.

Before your posting I intended not to react, but now I have an opportunity to reply.

For this is a typical example of ... factoid indeed.

I mean, some time ago there was an individual local politician who indeed seemed to advance a similar idea (re having the name Haiglaan substitued by 2014). One of our newspaper (not the one with the best reputation) took over using big headlines.

I can assure you : locally this "big news" produced nothing but a smile, and was forgotten immediately. But I was not suprised to hear soon afterwards that this caused some commotion in the UK. (Something like : "Will the Menin Gate Memorial be knocked down soon ?") There was even a thread with regard to this on the Forum.

Actually I am not really surprised at this UK alarm. So often when "something" is done in the Ypres area, in order to improve things, this often causes a cry of indignation and unnecessary alarm. Or I'd better say : used to cause. For the situation has improved recently. (Think of the Tyne Cot Cemetery project to improve parking facilities, toilets, etc. No need to fear that Tyne Cot will be turned into a 'fun park'.)

Aurel

[john w.]

50 years! Wow, I had no idea the park had been there that long.

That sums it up.... times move on and it seems that whilst there it isnt overbearing...

John

[salientpoints]

Kristof - Ypres even wanted to change street names as "Haig lane, Plumer lane,..." to something like Peace lane and brotherhood street

Aurel Sercu - Before your posting I intended not to react, but now I have an opportunity to reply.

For this is a typical example of ... factoid indeed.

OK Aurel so we all bit for that one including locals!!! but there is definite evidence to illustrate a change over the years now between military museums & remembrance and turning things round to 'peace parks' - have you seen anything that you don't personally like along these lines?

Ryan

[bkristof]

Ok,

maybe it is a factoid. But it is based on truth.

Even the toughts of it are giving me a chill...

It was just an example of some crazy idea's to make Ypres a peace park.

Some powerfull people think you can learn about war and the past whitout showing it.

Isn't that strange?

It is like learning to swim whitout the water...

Bellewaarde: fun park,

Ypres: peace park ?

[Guest Simon Bull]

Personally I like "In Flanders Fields". I think it is different, and tries hard to create an atmosphere of what the battlefield would have been like in the way that other museums do not. I have seen children in there being just ever so slightly frightened by the sound of shells, which is probably no bad thing, teaching them to fear the consequences of war - too often children are encouraged to regard violence as consequence-less.

I have to add that everyone I have taken there who is not particularly interested in the Great War has come out with their interest considerably increased, and I think that those of us who are already interested and knowledgeable often ignore the need to interest those who are less knowledgeable and "keen".

I also think that traditional military museums, often with an emphasis on exhibiting those devices used to kill people and less interest in the human dimension of war are often very off putting to those less interested than we are.

Simon Bull

[Aurel Sercu]

(1) there is definite evidence to illustrate a change over the years now between military museums & remembrance and turning things round to 'peace parks' -

(2) have you seen anything that you don't personally like along these lines?

Ryan

Ryan,

I'm afraid my opinion is hardly relevant, and also : disappointing I presume. Because you must be thinking that I have very sharp ideas about this.

(1) I see what's going on, and yes there is indeed a change from military + remembrance > peace.

What I think about it ? Actually, nothing, I just watch it. I don't regret this development, I'm not nostalgic, and I don't welcome it and don't support it : I just see it.

Maybe I think : what 's happening was bound to happen, something that could be expected, something that has been growing organically these past decades.

Again : it does not really affect me. It does not have a negative or positive effect on what I am doing, on the way I experience this town and area.

My attention focuses on what it likes, and sometimes this is the IFF Museum, and sometimes this is Sanctuary Wood Museum. And if school children take peace promoting initiatives, who can feel unhappy about this ?

(2) Have I seen things I don't like ? Let me say that there were times that I frowned at ... some cries of indignation from the UK with regard to this promotion of this Ypres peace concept. It sounded as if peace is a dirty word. I just wish that some people in the UK would understand that for a town that suffered so much and saw so much suffering (and this goes for any town in the world involved in a military conflict), in my eyes it is almost inevitable that this peace message grows.

But I do know that this is not the way you (I mean many or some Forum members) see it. It seems to me that your (their) idea is : "Ypres = where our lads fell, and we want to remember them. Remembrance ! That is what it is all about. And anybody who has a different idea : keep your hands off..."

And believe me : I understand this view too. But you, as visitors, come here with a different attitude. To remember in the first (and only) place. An attitude different from the attitude of many people living here, who cannot 'remember all the time', if I may say so. And that difference is normal, isn't it ?

But maybe I'm wrong.

And please, do not think that I am for or against this peace thing. I just stand by and watch this development, not choosing sides. Just feeling a bit awkward about some reactions ... That's all.

And in case there will be replies to this : I will never go in a debate about this.

Aurel

[Aurel Sercu]

maybe it is a factoid. But it is based on truth.

Even the toughts of it are giving me a chill...

Kristof,

Factoid based on truth ? I think I tend to disagree.

I don't think you can say that it was really based on truth. Basic question of course is : what is the truth ? It's not because a local politician advanced a 'silly' idea which was then magnified by some tabloid journalist but for which I think all other politicians could only smile pityingly, that one can say that it is a factoid based on truth. Okay, let's say there was a (negligible) trifle of truth at the very beginning. But not more than that.

In a previous posting you wrote "Ypres even wanted to change street names."

No, "Ypres" did not want to change street names ...Saying that it did, is a bit of an exaggeration, and squeezing the truth.

But I am not denying that in Ypres (and elsewhere) there is a tendency to promote the peace idea.

And the thought of all references to the Great War being banned from Ypres would be a chilling thought for me too. But I'm not alarmed.

Aurel

[andigger]

sixflagseurope

I was buying this whole 'living international children memorializind dead soldiers' thing until I saw sixflagseurope in the URL. Argh! That speaks commercialism gone too far.

I guess from my perspective (which is always the Virginia perspective) a few years ago Disney (speaking of commercialism) wanted to build a historically themed theme park near the Manassas battlefield. You would have thought they were digging up the Unknown Soldier to put a roller coaster in. Historic preservationist essentailly had a cow, and they stopped it. (I am glad they did for more than just the historical reasons) but there is a fine balance between perserving historic sites and allowing modernization. The balance is very hard to achieve, but it must take into consideration the desires of the people who live there as well as the obligation society has to respect those who sacraficed.

Andy

[salientpoints]

Thanks for you reply Aurel,

I was just interested to hear a bit more from a local viewpoint and someone who has lived through some of these changes in 'real time' as it were. We only see things as and when we can visit and do not have your local news & papers to understand everything that goes on.

Of course any controversial news is indeed picked up possibly by the press over here and consequently steered towards remembrance and 'old blighty' type of misty nostalgia.

Cheers

Ryan

[bkristof]

Aurel,

i will not disagree. I did not gave the example to shock people or to create trouble.

I mentioned it to give an exaple how some people in Ypres area think.

I am also not allerted, but it is sometimes hard to understand how those 'peace' people think.

I think it is also them who like to build concrete on the trenches at Boesinghe...

greets,

kristof

[petrick]

to stirr up things even more. Weren't there some plans after the war to leave ypres as it was ? hmmm wouldn't that made wipers in one big themepark today?

as time progresses people progres as well as the sentiments of the majority.

[paul guthrie]

Among others Churchill proposed leaving the town as was but Belgians did not agree.

[egbert]

Among others Churchill proposed leaving the town as was but Belgians did not agree.

...and I fully understand the Belgiums to disagree....

[Aurel Sercu]

And I just cannot resist mentioning what I once read :

When after the war the returning Ypres population asked :

"If we cannot have our town back where it was, where do we have to live then ?" that Churchill (and/or others) replied : "Build a new town somewhere else !"

"Yes, but where ?"

"Well, build it on ... the battlefields !"

Ironical, isn't it ?

Aurel

[andyspiller]

Aurel

Just like the QVR memorial after WW2

Regards

Andy

[healdav]

Speaking as a 'pen pusher in Brussels' ...................................(well, not Brussels, but near enough)

EU funding would be given to any museum project (subject to all the usual rigmarole) and assuming that it met the relevant criteria, but as the EU was, after all, founded to prevent another war in Europe (yes, it says so in the preamble to the treaties) they would expect any war museum to say something about the advantages of peace.

After all, I don't know about you, but I used to play at wars when I was small. I never played at peace. Things have changed now in my life, but many/most children need someone or something to point out the horrors of war and that there is another way which is just as exciting.

I personally don't like some of the pushy 'peace parks' - and Verdun trying to sell itself as the 'capital of peace' leaves me stone cold, but nevertheless that and others are brought in by the people themselves. The Son Et Lumiere at Verdun in July/ August ends with a, for me, embarrassing, scene of everyone holding hands in our EU, but this was not dictated byanyone in Brussels or elsewhere. It is the local people who write the script.

[Somme1916]

And I just cannot resist mentioning what I once read :

When after the war the returning Ypres population asked :

"If we cannot have our town back where it was, where do we have to live then ?" that Churchill (and/or others) replied : "Build a new town somewhere else !"

"Yes, but where ?"

"Well, build it on ... the battlefields !"

Ironical, isn't it ?

Aurel

It just goes to show that you should be careful what you ask for as you just might get it.

Jon

[Guest dinkidi]

G'day

One good thing about the Park is that you can get pretty good bearings when actually walking the salient.

There's a bonus of it being part of the Trifecta, with the Hoogue Crater & Crater Museum. The contrast between the latter two gives an indication of what this overall topic might have been aimed at.

The actual crater, of very specific historical significance, might well be passed un-noticed, even from the adjoining Menin Road footpath. The Museum is rather prominent and well patronised. Good luck to them, but I was personally amused by the sign in the Museum Cafe that, unlike Fawlty, they WOULD discuss the War, providing you had first visited the Museum.

As to whether the fallen in the nearby cemeteries would be offended by the noise of the Park's patrons, they might well have had similar thoughts to Adam Lindsay Gordon's Sick Stockrider.

"Let me slumber in the hollow where the wattle blossoms wave

With never stone or rail to mark my bed

Should the sturdy station children pull the wildflowers from my grave

I may chance to hear them romping overhead"

ooRoo

Pat

[leigh]

The Road to La Bassée

I went across to France again, and walked about the line,

The trenches have been all filled in - the country's looking fine.

The folks gave me a welcome, and lots to eat and drink,

Saying, 'Allo, Tommee, back again? 'Ow do you do? In ze pink?'

And then I walked about again, and mooched about the line;

You'd never think there'd been a war, the country's looking fine.

But the one thing that amazed me most shocked me, I should say

- There's buses running now from Bethune to La Bassée!

I sat at Shrapnel Corner and I tried to take it in,

It all seemed much too quiet, I missed the war-time din.

I felt inclined to bob down quick - Jerry sniper in that trench!

A minnie coming over! God, what a hellish stench!

Then I pulled myself together, and walked on to La Folette -

And the cows were calmly grazing on the front line parapet.

And the kids were playing marbles by the old Estaminet -

Fancy kiddies playing marbles on the road to La Bassée!

You'd never think there'd been a war, the country's looking fine -

I had a job in places picking out the old front line.

You'd never think there'd been a war - ah, yet you would, I know,

You can't forget those rows of headstones every mile or so.

But down by Tunnel Trench I saw a sight that made me start,

For there, at Tourbieres crossroads - a gaudy ice-cream cart!

It was hot, and I was dusty, but somehow I couldn't stay -

Ices didn't seem quite decent on the road to La Bassée.

Some of the sights seemed more than strange as I kept marching on.

The Somme's a blooming garden, and there are roses in Peronne.

The sight of dear old Arras almost made me give three cheers;

And there's kiddies now in Plugstreet, and mamselles in Armentiers.

But nothing that I saw out there so seemed to beat the band

As those buses running smoothly over what was No Man's Land.

You'd just as soon expect them from the Bank to Mandalay

As to see those buses running from Bethune to La Bassée.

Then I got into a bus myself, and rode for all the way,

Yes, I rode inside a bus from Bethune to La Bassée.

Through Beuvry and through Annequin, and then by Cambrin Tower -

The journey used to take four years, but now it's half an hour.

Four years to half an hour - the best speedup I've met.

Four years? Aye, longer still for some - they haven't got there yet.

Then up came the conductor chap, 'Vos billets s'il vous plait.'

Fancy asking for your tickets on the road to La Bassée.

And I wondered what they'd think of it - those mates of mine who died -

They never got to La Bassée, though God knows how they tried.

I thought back to the moments when their number came around,

And now those buses rattling over sacred, holy ground,

Yes, I wondered what they'd think of it, those mates of mine who died.

Of those buses rattling over the old pave close beside.

'Carry on! That's why we died!' I could almost hear them say,

To keep those buses always running from Bethune to La Bassée!'

Bernard Newman and Harold Arpthorp