Swallows & Amazons

[DanTribe]

I've just watched S & A on telly again [how many times is that now? ] and it occurred to me that it would make a good training film for the people who protect us from ourselves.
How many offences can you spot ? Heres a few.

Allowing chidren to play unsupervised.
Not wearing lifejackets or any PPE.
Camping without approved sanitary facilities.
Carrying knives and other offensive weapons. [bows & arrows]
Talking to dirty old men in the woods. [Who ask if they want to play with his snake!]
Sailing at night without lights.

They should be taken into care!

 

[Ludd]

I've just watched S & A on telly again [how many times is that now? ] and it occurred to me that it would make a good training film for the people who protect us from ourselves.
How many offences can you spot ? Heres a few.

Allowing chidren to play unsupervised.
Not wearing lifejackets or any PPE.
Camping without approved sanitary facilities.
Carrying knives and other offensive weapons. [bows & arrows]
Talking to dirty old men in the woods. [Who ask if they want to play with his snake!]
Sailing at night without lights.

They should be taken into care!

Bought the DVD for the boat's library. My worldlywise granddaughters(9 and 11 going on 19 and 21) sat and watched it with only the occasional complaint about the adults disturbing their concentration!
High School Musical(their usual fare) was never mentioned!

 

[Lakesailor]

How many offences can you spot ?

The only offence to me is the prissy accents.
Yes, that may have been how they spoke in the 1920s but in a more modern remake they need to be A La Mode.

I nearly bought the DVD today. I may go back to the shop tommorrow and get it.

 

[Marmalade]

The only offence to me is the prissy accents.
Yes, that may have been how they spoke in the 1920s but in a more modern remake they need to be A La Mode.

I nearly bought the DVD today. I may go back to the shop tommorrow and get it.

perhaps

"Be'er drahned than duffaz, if not duffaz won' drahn innit"
or

John was like "let's go and explore" but Susan was like
"the first thing to do is to find the best place for our camp" and Titty was like
"not too easily seen from anywhere" and Susan was like
"and a good place for a fire"

 

[Poignard]

perhaps

"Be'er drahned than duffaz, if not duffaz won' drahn innit"
or

John was like "let's go and explore" but Susan was like
"the first thing to do is to find the best place for our camp" and Titty was like
"not too easily seen from anywhere" and Susan was like
"and a good place for a fire"

By eckythump lad, thee wunta tak'd owt like that. It wor set oop int north wont it?

 

[Mrs Sea Mist II]

Those were the days before all this PC and H & S rubbish got in the way of children being children.

I remember when I was a kid, many moons ago. I would disappear in the school holidays with a packet of jam sandwiches and a bottle of pop, and be gone all day. My mother had no idea what I was up to or where I was. I was actually quite safe climbing trees, making a tree house, trying to find buried treasure. Kids these days are so over protected, what a shame.

 

[reginaldon]

Those were the days before all this PC and H & S rubbish got in the way of children being children.

I remember when I was a kid, many moons ago. I would disappear in the school holidays with a packet of jam sandwiches and a bottle of pop, and be gone all day. My mother had no idea what I was up to or where I was. I was actually quite safe climbing trees, making a tree house, trying to find buried treasure. Kids these days are so over protected, what a shame.

With you, we had such freedom then no mobiles, very few homes with a phone, yet being away all day or even a few days camping was not considered to be foolhardy on behalf of the parents. My pal and I took off camping , when I was 12 - I had done almost all my growing by then - self on Dad's Roadster with camping gear - blankets! - first night spent on a farm near Northwich, a German POW farmhand came to ask us whether we needed milk in the morning, carried on to Prestatyn, rained all night we used my pal's new Blacks lightweight tent, rained all night - bedding soaked - next day back to Stockport in one -109 miles with a broken 3 speed. Still wouldn't swap with today's kids - we lived the adventures, not seeing them on Play station or DVD.
Looking back we were quite poor, but neither status nor accent signified much to us then.
Imagine that journey by bike today A56 & N Wales coast road!

 

[cliffordpope]

Nothing's changed. Children still go off all day and do unsafe things, meet strangers, without their parents having a clue where they are or mostly caring. They think they are safely upstairs doing their homework on the computer.

 

[Mrs Sea Mist II]

Nothing's changed. Children still go off all day and do unsafe things, meet strangers, without their parents having a clue where they are or mostly caring. They think they are safely upstairs doing their homework on the computer.

Fair point, but oh how much better it was when we were young. Outside in the fresh air, exploring, playing coming home shattered, and sleeping like babies. "Progress" is not always a good thing is it?

 

[oldharry]

... safely upstairs doing their homework on the computer.

Whats safe about being on a computer? Exposed to everything the Internet can produce. Much rather mine were safely out camping somewhere, or messing about in their dinghy. Before they grew up, that is. Now they are still messing about on computers - and being paid half my annual pension each month for doing it.

 

[explores]

Those were the days before all this PC and H & S rubbish got in the way of children being children.

I remember when I was a kid, many moons ago. I would disappear in the school holidays with a packet of jam sandwiches and a bottle of pop, and be gone all day. My mother had no idea what I was up to or where I was. I was actually quite safe climbing trees, making a tree house, trying to find buried treasure. Kids these days are so over protected, what a shame.

i did the same thing as you.Played all day int The Jungle (a small wood), swum in the river Lea ,hunge on the barges being drawn by horses.Catching newts at the newt pond.Making dams in the local steam. Making rafts on the Blue Lakes (gravel winning pit) that just about floated. Happy days

 

[Mrs Sea Mist II]

Whats safe about being on a computer? Exposed to everything the Internet can produce. Much rather mine were safely out camping somewhere, or messing about in their dinghy. Before they grew up, that is. Now they are still messing about on computers - and being paid half my annual pension each month for doing it.

Did you miss the irony in Clifford's post?

 

[sighmoon]

... a German POW farmhand came to ask us whether we needed milk in the morning, ...

In true Swallows and Amazons style. In all the books, never an adventure took place without milk in their stomachs, and AR always went out of his way to explain how they came by it.

 

[JonA]

Unpasteurised milk, very dangerous full of TB and brucellosis, although I was brought up on it.
At the age of 11-13 I would work all the Easter holidays harrowing barley in on a fergy 20 to earn an Arthur Ransome book. Father must have been tight.
Jonathan

 

[Poignard]

Examples of weird parents

1. On an LBC Radio phone-in a couple of days ago a father was whining because his kid had come home from school with his sleeves wet, after he had been playing with some water. The father (who seemed about as wet as they come) went to the school and complained to the headmaster on the grounds that the school was at fault for allowing his little precious to get wet. Not satisfed with that he then goes on the air to seek sympathy from other people!

2. A few years ago my boat was laid up in a yard in Gosport. One day a father brought his young son down to his boat nearby. Suddenly this man started raving at his son because his shoelaces were undone. I have never heard anything like it. He went on and on about it, embarassing the kid and everyone within earshot.

It makes you wonder what sort of adults these kids will grow up to be with a paranoid parents like that.