h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Bonfire night is one of my favourite festivals. It's secular and there's not the huge pressure to have fun that you get with Christmas. Also there are lots of things that go bang.
When I was a very small child we used to go to the bonfire party that was held in the village my aunt lived it. They always had a big bonfire party with a bonfire the size of a house, and a huge Guy, that seemed nearly 10 foot tall. I remember spending the whole evening enthralled by the scale of it all. And the fireworks! The fireworks were amazing.

When I was 7 we moved away from the South of England and a few years later my Aunt moved away from that village. I've just googled and the Brockham Bonfire is still going strong. http://www.brockhambonfire.com/

Once we were up north we went to the school fireworks display, which despite the headmasters best efforts weren't as good. My main memories are of sulking because my mother didn't have 50p for me to have a baked potato from the stall. When we got home she made me one in the microwave but it wasn't the same. I was a horrible child. I used to think that because my parents couldn't afford to buy me things it meant that they didn't love me.

Once I got a bit older, and my mother left, my father thought that it was 'natural' for boys to want to play with fireworks, so would let us do dangerous things on Bonfire night. We found that it was great fun to selotape them to petrol cans. There was one occasion when we made a 9 foot mushroom cloud and our neighbour called the police. My dad said that it was performance art, and showed them the rest of his art and they believed him and didn't do anything. (One of my sadder confessions is that I was bitterly disappointed when my parents decided to give their marriage another go, life was so much more fun with my Dad).

I remember one year we went to the firework display at Blackpool, which coincided with the end of the illuminations. I was so impressed that the fireworks matched up exactly with the live brass band.

And now I'm lucky enough to live close to a very big display, and it's very exciting! I was very excited last year, but it rained so much we all went home. The forecast looks better tomorrow.





We soo need a smiley

Bonfire night sounds like fun. Can anybody have one or is there a certain place you have to go? Sounds like you were lucky no-one was injured experimenting with explosives!

I was a horrible child in that way also. Always felt deprived of things.

No, you don't have to go to a specific place, anyone can have a bonfire party. You need the space to have a safe bonfire and you can't buy the bigger fireworks for home displays. Every year people get injured and they think of banning it.