More Than A Feeling

<< Cadbury World: funner than it looks

Today we took a day trip to Cadbury World - a haven of magic and wonder deep in suburban Birmingham. OK, so it looked a bit like an evacuated POW camp from the outside, and the adventure playground and tannoyed dance music lent it the feel of a council estate fun day, but once we were inside 'twas a wonderland of chocolate, adventure and of course, learning. I learnt so much about chocolate that I may never be able to swallow an entire Boost bar* in one go ever again, but seeing as the first couple of areas stayed in my mind, before I ate my complimentary Curly Wurly and got a bit silly, I'll go with this:

The Mayan civilisation used cocoa beans as currency.

Cadbury World would tell you that there was quite a strict pricing scheme - 100 cocoa beans would buy you, for example, a slave, or a new washer/dryer. I'm personally not convinced by this, neither was I particular impressed by their interpretation of the decimation of the Aztec nation by colonialists as a mutual friendship borne of the pure love of chocolate. But then they gave us some more Dairy Milk and I felt much more liberal about the whole thing. The best bit was probably getting a cup of gooey liquified chocolate at the end of a particularly dull attraction about the history of Dairy Milk, and the factory it's made in.

You had to go sit through a short film featuring execrable acting straight out of a staff training video ("Mairy Dilk! Oh no, I got it wrong!" Oh do shut up) before getting your warm brown reward, which made it all the sweeter. You would think that this was for the kids' benefit - have a bit of tedious education, be bored until you feel weak and tearful, and then be presented with some chocolate to reward your patience. Except if you're a kid, that's pretty much what life is like all the time - doing boring stuff in order to obtain sweets. I think they're just having a laugh at our expense, to be honest.

On the car journey back I tucked into more Dairy Milk (I didn't even like it before - I think they got to me. Remember the plantations for god's sake. It's wrong) and we listened to Boston's 'More Than A Feeling' which became our anthem for the day - for visiting Cadbury World is more than a feeling - it's an experience. Although the shop was a bit rubbish...

*Don't try this at home - Boosts kill