The Big Red Bus
The Big Red Bus in the Kidz field this weekend is serving as a home, kitchen and shelter for a crew of face painters. I come across it (hardly missable) on Friday and am welcomed inside out of the rain by owner Joe Letts. His friend and colleague Peter vanDyke makes coffee and I begin my interview believing I am going to be writing a pleasant little tale of festival face painters. But no! I suddenly find myself transported on an epic cerebral journey from England to Iraq where the Big Red Bus, the very Big Red Bus I am sitting in, in the Kidz Field at Glastonbury, was part of the Human Shield who installed themselves in and around Baghdad in the hope of stopping an attack by the US and British.
Between them, Joe and Tony tell me they left England in January and arrived in Baghdad on the historic World Peace Day, Saturday 15th February when the Stop The War Campaign achieved the biggest anti-war demonstrations ever seen. It was a good day to arrive. The Iraqi Friendship Peace and Solidarity Movement welcomed them all and Joe, Tony and around 500 people from 36 nations spent a week organising themselves into working parties. They intended to protect three fundamental areas
1. power stations
2. water purification centres
3. food storage silos
They also evolved a fair decision-making processes and formed action committees to organise demonstrations, supply paramedics and provide a welfare service.
When the war started and the bombs began to drop the media showed coverage of the Human Shield fleeing the city. Well, some people left Baghdad but as usual we only see what the media wants us to see and there were many, including Joe and Peter who stayed by the power stations until they were attacked. They stayed in Iraq until the bitter end, or the bitter beginning. Sadly the Big Red Bus was looted and smashed up whilst in transit from Beirut, a lifelong collection of irreplaceable tools were stolen. It was gutted. For a while after their return to England, Peter was depressed. They had failed on their mission to stop the war. He had seen some horrendous sights and he found the memories difficult to live with. Slowly, as the sun came out and the bus was painstakingly cleaned and restored the human spirit won through and Peter is now on another mission.
It is fitting that The Big Red Bus sits cheerfully; nobly it seems, in the Kidz Field, with young people bouncing in and out of it all day long. Both Peter and Joe wholeheartedly believe that kids are the only hope for our future and they are doing all that they can to nurture the children they work with and encourage them to aim for a peaceful, brighter future.
SF
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