Thousands of people swarmed Manchester city-centre yesterday to protest Prime Minister Tony Blair's foreign policy and to urge him to bring troops back from Iraq. I was covering the event all day for Student Direct, the university newspaper--so excuse the "newsy" tone this might have. I do think it's worth writing about though, regardless of your interest in current or political events, no one wants to read about the Pav every day.

It was the first time I had to find my way into the city without any navigational help. Considering I've been on auto-pilot every other time I made the journey to the city thanks to Shaun, my captain up until yesterday, just getting to my destination was the first task of the day. Armed with my fold-out pocket map of the city centre and a little extra time, I did just fine.

I even had enough extra time to find myself a bag. Now this is a far cry from what I imagined my first Mancurian shopping experience to be like, but I was left with little choice: I would be working all day and I had to take advantage of the extra ten minutes at my disposal.

Mission 1 completed. Mission 2: get into the first store I see and purchase the first thing that would hold the odds and ends I insist on carrying around. This is like a shopping-lover/ perfectionist's worst nightmare.

Unfortunately, the first store I came across was the big-box department store, Marks & Spencers. "Everyone" shops at Marks & Spencers, but in case the use of that shameful, all inclusive pronoun everyone wasn't enough to tip you off: Marks & Spencers is not trendy. You can almost guarantee it isn't trendy if it is referred to en masse.

I emerged with something brown and corduroy--apparently I'm still holding on to the idea that if it's the colour of chocolate it will at least appear to be rich. It is a terrible misconception of mine. Or maybe it's my sub-conscious desire for chocolate...

Regardless, the bag isn't that bad. I just resent that I had to buy it and that it has such generic origins. I know I'm not the only one to hold personal feelings against objects, particularly fashion-related ones. But I bet I am certainly the only person that will admit it.

I also hold a grudge against a pair of Puma sweatpants of mine for being irresistably comfortable and yet so hopelessly frumpy looking. But, that's another story.

Back to current events:

The city centre was alive with people. It is a major city centre and I've yet to see it quiet, let alone deserted, but I doubt even the most oblivious passerby would miss feeling the pulse of Manchester this particular Saturday. I'm not good with numbers or estimating them, but even on the safe side there were at least ten thousand people within a couple of blocks of Manchester yesterday.

The protest took place in front of the town hall in Albert's Square. A town hall sounds deceivingly undignified for a city like Manchester, and the town hall is anything but that. It is a massive stone building dating back to the late 1800s. For imagination's sake, it rises 286 feet above the square it overlooks. This square was filled yesterday with protesters from all different backgrounds; however, everyone's message was the same.

In Britain there has developed a strong anti-war sentiment and the Prime Minister is not in good favour. He has already announced his retirement and won't be running for re-election in a year. But a strong majority of the British population is calling for him to step down earlier than his scheduled departure. Similar to Canada, a lot of people are concerned about Blair's foreign policy being too closely aligned with that of the United States and the Bush administration. As well, there is a strong Muslim representation in Britain and the occupation of Iraq is a unfavourable cause that is being strongly opposed within Muslim organizations within the United Kingdom, as it is throughout the rest of the world.

Manchester was a particularly good place to have a protest on Saturday because the Labour Party was holding its conference a couple of blocks away, which included the participation of PM Blair. The preperation for this conference included bomb-detection exercises, like sealing off man-holes in the vicinity of the conference once they were detected to be bomb-free. Security was evident throughout the city what with certain streets being barricaded from public access and the noticeable police presence. It was a definite presence. There were hundreds of police officers: lining the streets, sitting in police vans, on horse, in bomb squad units, with k-9s and probably where I couldn't see them as well.

Despite the preperation on the part of the police, the protest was successful without much incidence. There was a planned "mass dying" that called for participants in the march to lie down in the street as a symbolic protest against the lives being lost in Iraq. It was supposed to work like a "wave of "dying," but it wasn't as successful as planners had hoped it to be--believe it or not, a lot of marchers weren't willing to lie down in the dirty Manchester streets.

But for the most part, the protest was impressive. The number of people alone was impactful enough, not to mention the degree to which they were organized. That being said, I don't know how effective protesting is. I doubt Tony Blair so much as glanced out the window of whichever plush boardroom he was residing in yesterday.

But as one bystander put it: "It's a great expression of freedom of speech."
And then: "...I bet they will all go home feeling better having had a good shout at Tony Blair."