24
DAY 1 - A Slow Start

If I could have got my hands on one, a tank of a more offensive kind would have been a handy and appropriate vehicle with which to have completed my daily commute to Sizewell B. Indeed though my own 'Tank' tried it's very best, that first days commute was far from smooth.

Indeed, Day 1 at Sizewell started badly all round.

First of all, despite turning in at around 9pm the previous night to ensure a good and long sleep, I mis-set my alarm and got awoken at 23 minutes past midnight. Somehow, I then fucked it up again and was awoken once more at 37 minutes past midnight in the kind of bad fug that usually spells trouble the next day.

As it happened I felt OK when I finally did get up correctly, and after a shower, I jumped on The Tank only to find that tackling a cross country bike ride before 8am was much harder work than I'd anticipated.

Starting on a dirt track through woods, my route then joined the single-track, hedgerow lined, tarmac of the Minsmere Road, until a mile or so later, the greenery petered out, to be replaced by a broad expanse of purple heath, stretching to the far right horizon and to the sea, on the left.

So far so good….

However, a mile or so further on, the tarmac itself ran out, and the cliff dropped away to beach level, and for the next 3 miles I had to follow the sandy path in between RSPB Minsmere and the sea all the way to my new employer.

This duneside sector was, without question the most challenging part of the journey. Not only do sand and push bikes antagonise one another in almost every way, but I realised that everyday, I would have to ignore the possible vagrant warblers, scarce herons and lost wading birds that were sure to be lurking at RSPB Minsmere and instead ride straight towards the James Bondesque facade of Sizewell with a firm duty and a strong moral purpose.

It was going to be tough. Indeed, it was basically like willingly cycling past my boyhood heaven in order to do a 12 hour day in some kind of perverse and nasty adult hell.

25
The Black Pen of the Nuclear Family

So, once their, I found my way to the portacabin at the rear of the training building car park, at the bottom of the main site, outside the two-skinned perimeter fence on time, and got ready for work.

After rearranging the chairs into a semi circle, the 6 of us that appeared to constitute the kitchen staff, were introduced to Jill Culrose and nuclear day 1 began in earnest.

Attired in a neat cream blouse, tan leather jacket, 2 gold necklaces and a 75% Happy job smile, Jill grinned at us like a child, and turned her attention to the overhead projector on the floor.
She flicked the switch on and off.
"WHO'S GOING TO GET THIS THING WORKING THEN?" she yelled, as if we were sat on the beach a half mile away.
Tony, dressed in a blue Chariman Mao outfit that suggested he was some kind of a security guard - perhaps even our own specific security guard - left his seat and approached the renegade piece of equipment
"Well, it helps if it's turned on!" He exclaimed contemptuously after examining the fundamentals of the projector.
"Well done Tony!!" Ruth mocked.
"Where would be without him??" A shorter plump woman, with a flat top of curls and mid brown freckles added.
"Better off!" Ruth finished, chuckling a deep and hearty laugh.

Tony flicked the switch on the wall.

NOTHING

He flicked it off and on again, then stared determinedly at the projector. "It should work - Everything's as it should be!" He exclaimed officiously, as if his saying so, should make it work forever without the slightest complaint.
"NEVERMIND" Jill yelled "I'LL USE THE WHITEBOARD"

The whiteboard worked.

"OK" Jill beamed "I'M TERRIBLE WITH NAMES, SO IF WE COULD ALL WRITE THEM DOWN, I MIGHT BE ABLE TO GET THEM RIGHT!"
Jill handed me the paper. I wrote my name in black and the pen ran out. Jill handed the next person a blue one and the paper made its way around the room. "OK, SO WHILST WERE DOING THAT, SHALL WE GO AROUND THE ROOM AND SAY A LITTLE ABOUT OURSELVES SO WE KNOW WHOS WHO?"

We all did as were told.

"OK! EXCELLENT," Jill said, when we were done "SHALL WE START THEN BY DEFINING WHAT WE MEAN BY THE WORD HYGIENE?"


26
The Freakshow


Like all modern work training talk, what we learnt that morning was mostly obvious, basic common sense or complete fucking rubbish. Indeed, I spent a large portion of those first two nuclear hours internally critiquing the whole notion of modern hygiene and modern training, almost forgetting where I was and that I was supposed to be a shit hot investigator concentrating on far more serious matters.

My frail concentration wasn't helped either, by the shower who looked set to be my new workmates. Frankly, on first viewing, I found them a very disappointing looking bunch indeed. You see, perhaps unrealistically, I was expecting Sizewell B employees to be exhibiting all kinds of nasty mutations - People with 3 heads, no arms, nastily twisted faces, bent hands - that sort of thing.

But that morning, they simply looked like the usual common or garden selection of losers, posers, depressives and misfits that end up in end of the line jobs like working 12 hours a day as a dishwasher.

As well as Ruth from the interview and Jackie (the woman with the curled flat top) both of whom worked in the kitchens year round, there was Amy; around 20, wearing a nose stud, a 12 year old boys body and jet black hair, Margaret; middle aged, grey permed and school dinner ladyesque, Ralph; clad in a dangerously vacant smile, pressed white shirt and pin stripes, and Stan; who was neatly blonde dread locked and tattooed into his twenties.

Despite this general lack of promise, it was however at first break - before I'd even got a security pass - that I first spoke to Ralph Singleton, and the chain of events which led to the fun and games that marked the end of my time at Sizewell started to develop.


27
THE AMAZING RALPH 01


"Thought so," Ralph said, nodding to himself as if he'd solved a minor crime "You were in the fruit shop - Kneuw I recognised you."

As I was to discover was normal, Ralph Singleton wasn't a very prepossessing site as he stood starring at me like he was a store detective, and I was a shoplifter. Indeed that very first impression correctly suggested that Ralph had the whiff of someone who could be unpredictable, difficult and random - Exactly NOT the sort of person to befriend when on a delicate and covert mission into Britains fading nuclear dream.
"Leistun fruit an veg. I was workin behind the counter" Ralph added. "Thought you were going to have the fuckin till!! New face in town an that." Ralph continued, letting off a stray and hysterical cackle "Sorry 'bout that. He's gone bankrupt you kneuw. Didn't pay me fuck'n stamps!!"
Ralph inhaled quickly, his eyes darting with an unhealthy intensity.
"'Where you live then?"
"Dunwich" I replied vaguely
"Wheresat???"
"On the cliffs that way 5 or 6 miles" I said, pointing in the wrong direction
Ralph nodded "'Live in Leistun, Sellwood Avenue. Kneuw it?"
I shook my head
"Been here 18 months and dunt kneuw no-one. so fuckn quiet down here! Can't fuck'n believe it!..Usta live in Lustoft smuch busier there!" Ralph said his eyes checking all around the shrunken bus stop smoking shelter for danger as if it frequently struck. "Got burgled 6 times, lived opposite drug dealers we did. Usta carry fuckn plants in and out like they're normal! Police never did nuthink! Copper lived right next door, never said a fuck'n thing!"
Ralph inhaled quickly and peered at a gaggle of men in front of the Training Building.
"'See them men,"
I checked where his finger was pointed and nodded.
"They'll get one if fuck'n security sees 'em smoking there! This is the smoking hut. Only place you can smoke is these huts. Nowhere else! Gotta obey the fuckn rules in this place or you're out!!!"

28
Further down the road to Terror

The prospect of being 'OUT!' would have been music to my ears 10 years previously - More to the point, as a young man I wouldn't have even gotten anywhere near Sizewell B to start with, unless I intended to either occupy or infiltrate the place in order to protest against it's unquestionable evility.

You see it wasn't long into the rekindling of my love affair with nature, sparked by Gerald Durrells idyllic childhood, that I started to get pissed off at what was going on in the natural world and decided to try and do something about it.

Though that particular road ultimately ended in trouble, to start with, this return to nature was however all sweetness and light. I diligently joining conservation and wildlife organizations and by locating all the areas within a 30 mile radius of my home that had potential for wildlife study. I then spent all my spare time out and about at these sites collecting specimens (live and dead) and building lists, plans and diaries of what lived where, when and why.

I recorded everything: Where the Kestrels nested, which fungi were edible and which weren't, what orchids grew where and how rare they were, which dead trees held Nuthatches, Woodpeckers and Treecreepers, and how many gulls wintered at Lakeside. My spare time became a neverending search for new wildlife, new knowledge and new experience.

Sure, I brought home the odd road kill dead bird and insisted on boiling it in the kitchen in order to get the flesh off it's skull, so I could add the skull to my collection. But I never got into trouble….Indeed I'm sure that despite my fondness for dead nature, my mother was delighted I'd lost my growing interest in sport and replaced it with something wholesome and organic like nature study.

Over time though, I became increasingly upset at what I was learning and seeing.

You see, whichever of the many nature magazines I read, programs I saw, or talks I attended, there always seemed to be more bad news than good news. It was all destruction and loss: Lost species, pollution, acid rain, CFCs, Dolphin Unfriendly Tuna, Dead Whales, diggers, bulldozers, new roads, quarries, oil spills, new housing developments on heathland and grassland and woodland.

IT WASN'T RIGHT!!!

So, I started to get proactive and after writing hundreds of letters and attending meetings that appeared to achieve nothing big enough, I changed my focus from trying to get a good little private zoo and wildlife records office going, to looking into affirmative and practical ways to redress natures balance.

Bit by bit, I became a full time direct action protestor and with it, my young and naive life changed beyond all recognition.

29
Back on the job

One thing that certainly hadn't changed at all since Marj's first mentioned the Sizewell job was my view of the SECURITY situation at Sizewell B.

Indeed, it was as early as lunchtime on that first day of work, that I became convinced beyond any doubt that rather than being a well defended and safe key strategic facility, the complex at Sizewell wasn't so much a sitting duck for terrorism, protest or whatever anyone half capable sought to do to it, so much as a sleeping flock of around 10,000 plump geese with a plumage marking that spelt WHY NOT KNOCK ME OUT AND COOK ME WITH ORANGE!

I mean first there were no armed thugs guarding the perimeter, and then I'd acquired a job without any apparent effort to check my ID or criminal record.

All that so, it was when I entered the perimeter fence for the first time, in order to eat lunch, that I knew for sure that if the hardcore Islamists had Sizewell B on their target list, Sizewell's A & B, London and most of East Anglia was most certainly fucked.

You see, once again, I'd rather naively expected the Main Security Lodge to be populated by a gang of the mercenaries with machine guns - You know - The sort of boys that populate Andy McNab books: Former problem children with cold eyes, black combat outfits, drooping cigarettes, mean grins and tempers forever a split second from eruption: Guys with loyalty to the NPG or NPA - a quasi governmental organisation comprised of rookie soldiers and ex-cops dedicated to protecting our nuclear heritage AT ALL COSTS!!!!! -

But, no - The Security Lodge, as it was rather falsely named was divided into two parts by a thick glass partition. The side that was IN enclosed a group of local middle-aged dads dressed in lazy blue uniforms easing back in swivel chairs and talking about their dogs love lives and last years holiday as if they were caretakers at a secondary school rather than frontline combat troops - The lazy, half arsed, fucks barely looked capable of defending their lunches from attack, or their wives honour at 11.20pm, let alone a £3bn nuclear reactor!

As I shuffled around, feeling nervous, trying to keep Ralph randomness at arms length and wondering whether there really was a man called Osama Bin Laden, or whether he was in fact, some photo fit montage constructed by the CIA to scare us into order, obedience and good behavior, Ruth handed each of us a form and instructed us to read the rules. These rules stated that recording devices and cameras were banned without prior consent and that all entrants were liable to be searched at any time. I signed, feeling glad I'd not brought any such equipment on the first day. Ruth signed hers as the responsible person, and I was issued with a swipe card bearing the letter V and a number.

On the 4th swipe, the red light turned to green, and without being searched or producing a single piece of ID, I found myself wandering about inside the perimeter fence of Britains newest Nuclear reactor like a lost tourist.

30
IN!!!

Now, though I felt some level of achievement at this daring and successful entrance into the beast that should have been impenetrable, getting inside the fence was almost anti-climactic because it had been so easy. Indeed, though one part of me felt accomplished, another couldn't help but notice that not only was I one of many - some of whom looked even more suspicious and stupid than I did - but also, to all the other kitchen and cleaning staff the whole adventure was nothing special at all. Indeed for them it was just another day in the office - Another fucking Outage, another shit job they didn't want to do - Another few weeks off the dole, or a bit of extra cash for that years holiday to Magaluff….

All this so, I couldn't help but notice the atmosphere inside the fence certainly did feel very different.

Inside, everything was neat and very white, there was no litter and no weeds, no birds and no bees - It looked and felt as if the whole site had been given a solid once over with an enormous antiseptic wipe, then shrouded in invisible cotton wool and sealed up with nature proof cling film - It was like there was some kind of nature resistant force field that kept anything dirty, organic and unnatural outside, even though the whole site was surrounded by such wildness.

It was eerie and I felt dizzy.

31
REFLECTION

Later that evening, back at The Bass, I put my feet up, made some regular tea, tried to fix the computer, got angry with it, swore at it, hit it, restarted it, hit it again, then finally did a 40 minute audio diary on the spare computer.

In it, I considered how Day 1 had fitted my expectations and what it meant for my investigative strategy. I also discovered that talking to oneself and a computer is really rather flattering...

Anyway, as I said earlier, despite knowing I perhaps should, in the two weeks in between getting the job and starting work, I hadn't contacted any newspapers, publishers or publicity men at all. Frankly, I'd had no idea where to start with that, or who to trust. Indeed my experience with The Standard suggested I could be in for all sorts of trouble or an aborted mission if I messed it up or told the wrong person the wrong thing at the wrong time. I'd therefore figured it best to get in first, take a good look, get something juicy to go on and then decide how to play it...

So, now that I'd got in, wandered about and tasted Sizewells dangerously clean and perverse atmosphere, was it time to make some calls? Or should I wait a few more days?

To be completely honest, at that point, I had no real idea what exactly I intended to do next apart from continue to explore this new and strange part of my local environment. I wasn't even sure if I might just lunch the whole investigation out at some point and pretend I'd never thought about it the job way to start with.

I was however sure that whatever was to happen, I had no desire for my adventure to end there. Despite it's strange, clean normality, I'd really rather enjoyed that first day. For the first time in a while, I felt a little less useless and cut off and a bit more like I was involved with the world.

What's more, I felt certain that if I stayed a bit longer, I'd soon have full security clearance and my own pass to work at Sizewell B! And if I played my cards right - in a week or twos time - I'd have a far better and more valuable story than any of the ones from my days as a full time protestor.