What Constitutes an Advance? by Lena, Gabriel & Sid.

Lena (33), Gabriel (5) and Sid (1) wentto Sefton Park for their Advance. Theydecided to move from a non-affluentperiphery of the city (Everton) toanother more affluent (Aigburth). Theytravelled by public transport. Theywondered what impact LiverpoolBiennial’s opening had on their own day,a Saturday walk in the park. During theday Lena realized that she was aconnecting point between the young andthe old. A mother with two kids alwaysattracts attention from the elderly, oftenpositive attention. Two old ladies made asignificant impact on their day: one onthe bus and one in the park. Thefollowing conversation has beentranscribed by Lena, but all the wordsare either Gabriel’s or one of the twoolder ladies.

‘First we saw a lady on the bus, andyou were talking to her. Then yousaw other lady, who was trying tofind a festival, and it wasn’t on today.First lady said Sid’s name.’

‘Those two ladies, they might havebeen the same. They both had whitehair.’

‘I know it wasn’t on already.’ [thefood festival]

‘We are sitting on a different bench,because a man, with a mobile phone,sat on our bench. That’s ok. Thismight be our bench for now on.’

‘She was talking about when she was little. She hasn’t been to thispark in thirty year, but she knows it well.’

‘It’s all changed now. Nobody knows anything.’

‘They’ve got lots of money to fix this park now, but I am not sure theywill spend it well. Bus stop is so far away. It’s such a long walk and Iget scared and lonely. There’s nobody around.’

‘Good thing I didn’t tell my sister. She wouldn’t have been able to walkthis far.’

‘Why don’t you write 2008 on the top?’

‘There used to be Aviary here. It wasn’t because of rats only that theyclosed it. Some children., when they grew up, shot some of the birds.It’s a pity. And Peter Pan was here and Jolly Rodger. We used to allplay round Peter Pan, Jolly Rodger was in the stream. And no onescratched anything. Now it got vandalized. They put Eros up againonly last week.’

‘Park is good for the little ones. It’s good education for them. They getto learn what it was like fifty-sixty years ago.’

‘I remember we went to the bus stop. And we went on a bus. And wewalked from Mr Smith’s Smithdown all the way to Sefton Park. Andthen what happened is that we met a lady. Then we tried to getexplain to her but she just kept on talking till we finally lost her.Where is she now? In a café?’