Four milestones

This week sees the anniversary of four major cultural milestones. The fall of a wall, finding all kinds of people in your neighbourhood, the morning agenda and a trip to the moon.

First off, the wall. The falling of the Iron Curtain, and the Berlin Wall. The wall’s coming down on 1989 led to a major cultural change across the world. Mostly the end of the Soviet Empire had effects across the world. Firstly the reunification of Germany meant a bunch of economic changes across Europe, and the start of an expansion of the EU indirectly leading to Polish becoming the second largest language group in Ireland.

More to the cultural point, the end of the Cold War meant a huge change in political thrillers. The generic Russian bad guy couldn’t be used. Bond has only recently recovered from the required plot changes. It also meant that the Soviet era iconography quickly lost its political edge and became nostalgia. Bgnr wrote about this already so I won’t write more.

The second anniversary is the 40th year for Sesame Street. Yes folks Big Bird is 40 and Ernie & Bert have been room-mates for a very long lease. Its early programs look quite different, a mix of late 60’s American inner city thinking and Muppet sensibility. Back then internationalisation wasn’t a requirement. But Sesame Street has appealed to generations now. Kermit is an icon, as are Big Bird, Snuffy, Elmo, Oscar, Count Von Count, Ernie & Bert, Cookie Monster and Grover.

Sesame Street tackles more that learning to count to 12. When in real life the actor who played Mr. Hooper died, instead of writing around the fact, the writers decided to have the Muppets ask questions about the death of Mr. Hooper and explain death to the small child that the Muppets are stand-ins for. PBS have educated and entertained for quite a while. The proper date is November 10. The Berlin Wall was November 9. Needless to say the 20th anniversary was somewhat upstaged.

Celebrating 25 years yesterday is Morning Ireland. Yes the show changed a huge amount since its launch, but the show has set the agenda for the day’s news for most of that time. (Major breaks not withstanding but sometimes they get the scoop.) At the start they planned “very few live interviews because no one got up that early” while now its a political, and on occasion, an Irish blogger requirement.

And finally a 22 minute stop-motion animated cartoon aired on this day 20 years ago. An inventor makes a spaceship for himself and his dog to have a picnic on the moon (which is made of a cheese not unlike Wensleydale). Yes folks Wallace and Gromit are 20. They became a Google doodle too on google.co.uk and it looks like the doodle is actually a screenshot.

Now if you excuse me, I simply must find my techno-trousers.