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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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The world is not flat, the world is indeed spherical. But it is somewhat larger than you think it to be. But if you were to get yourselves a Map, and a Globe of the same scale, and you then try and fold your map around the globe I bet you a guinea piece that you cannot do it convincingly.
There will be a good deal of paper crumpling and no shortage of advice. In no time most of you would become noisily and argumentatively engaged in the project. Some might suggest that success could be achieved by simply chopping off the north and south poles where most of the surplus paper seemed to be, on the principle of ‘who would miss them?’ Others may become convinced that the world was quite probably the shape of a doughnut.
In short, you would fail. It is an evil business, and a conspiracy of epic proportion. Neither the globe, nor the map, offer a true representation of the world’s geography or its true size. The flat map will not fit the globe, because there is, quite simply, too much map. In order to make the map fit you must increase the size of the globe by at least one third again. I contend that the world is a good deal larger than we are being told. And that there are portions of it which are not printed upon the map. Portions that are hidden from us.
Next let us examine the A-Z Street Directory. I am sure that each of you has at some time attempted to navigate across the metropolis with the aid of one of these. Ponder this. You take a cab from home. The cab takes a certain route. Covers a certain distance in a certain time, you are charged a certain fare. Later the same night you engage another cab to take you home. This time you find yourself travelling by a route which is utterly strange to you. The journey takes half the time, yet the fare is almost double. What you have here is a conspiracy. It exists in every great city. It is a conspiracy of cab drivers to keep their customers always confused about their exact whereabouts. So that they can never get their bearings. They do this to conceal the huge areas of uncharted metropolis from the public. These areas are disguised by intricate one-way systems, pedestrian precincts, no-through roads and diversions. These are the areas which never appear on any map.
Let me reveal to you a closely guarded secret. Before a London black cab driver can officially don his sacred blue cap and receive his mystical number, he must first take something which is called THE KNOWLEDGE. This is a rigorous test of his courage, stamina, endurance and dedication. He must debase himself by riding around London for months on end, mounted upon a moped with a wooden board fastened before his eyes, memorizing the name of every London street. Few survive. Those who do then sit before a Secret Council of Elders. If they are deemed worthy, they receive THE KNOWLEDGE and are formally initiated into the Black Order. London’s Legion Of Cab Knights. BOLLOCKS for short. THE KNOWLEDGE is a secret so terrible that they are sworn upon pain of terrible death never to reveal it. They are told what lurks within the concealed areas and why no man must ever enter them. And they learn the true meaning of the A-Z.
A-Z, gentlemen, means Allocated Zones. The zones allocated for mortal man to inhabit. And what lies within them? Some dark and brooding force, perhaps some ancient intelligence which is not of man. The old maps labelled such areas with the words ‘and here be dragons’. I believe the Forbidden Zones contain strange beasts and stranger people, who sometimes spill across the borders and enter our world. Who has not heard reports of curious flying machines, out-of-place animals, abominable snowmen, ghosts, fairies and bogey men? And what of all those people who vanish without trace every year? Could they have wandered unawares into a Forbidden Zone? |
