New Canterbury Tales

   My dear fellow researchers,  

 I am so happy you take an interest in my research on New Canterbury, the former small city of Golspie. Although I write from New Canterbury, you know as well as I do, that there is nothing left but ruins of this place. I am now residing in the remains of Dunrobin Castle which is partly inhabitable, although I seem to be the only living soul in the far surroundings, which is understandable of course. After all the turmoils in the world, I feel finally stable enough to pick up my trade as a historian and start to look into daily life during New Canterbury’s golden decade.  

 Now, in the year 2121, on this very date, it seems a good time to reconnect and tell you more about my research. But let me start by telling you something about myself. I have always been fascinated by double numbers, my grandfather was born on the 10th of October during the pandemic of 2020. My grandparents met each other in 2019, in Dessau during the celebration year of 100 years Bauhaus, which was funded, yes there we go again, in 1919. So I guess that’s where my roots are. Was the city of Golspie at its bloom in 2070 inspired by the teachings of Bauhaus? I am not sure, so much has been destroyed. As a historian, I feel very privileged to have found some original stories, some in audio fragments, of inhabitants of New Canterbury, living about 50 years ago. Stories from the year 2070. So much is forgotten already. I hope these recordings will help me reconstruct, will help us build up again. I am sure I will find other stories that will help me map out New Canterbury’s short but lively history. Thank you so much for reading my transcripts of the five stories I have so far been able to recover and for getting in touch with me. I understand you also found your way to my first notes on Golspie, which were not really meant for publication. I might have to rewrite some of that. Strange isn’t it, that with all the technological advantages of the past years, we seem to be back to writing.

  So now, for your questions, let me check if I got them all.  

 How many people lived in Golspie in 2070? How about crime? You write about human trafficking, but why this crime? Immigration of Asian people, which countries? There are a lot of differences in cultures in Asia. And why did they immigrate to Golspie? We would really like to know more about the Golspie International Institute for Brain Development Were there many cultural differences in the city, or was it more harmonic? Are there micro-communities around the city, and if so, how many and where? How big were the nomadic groups and did they live in the city, in the suburbs or outside the city? Lived the people who worked in Golspie or did they commute from outside the city? You know of course that Golspie was not named Golspie anymore in 2070 but had already renamed itself to New Canterbury. I still don’t understand why they named themselves after a British City regarding the split from the United Kingdom. Well that doesn’t really matter for now, does it? As for your questions. I will try to answer them as good as I can, based on my research so far. How many people lived in New Canterbury in 2070?

  I can not be sure, but I know Glasgow and New Canterbury have been competing for the title of biggest City ever since the end of the thirties. Glasgow had a population of 1.8 million in 2035 but populations have been dropping worldwide since then, especially in the former first world countries. So my guess is a population of around 1,3 million people for New Canterbury in 2070. Mostly living in the high rising buildings in the Newtown Area on the new lands and sea and the suburbs down south, where New Canterbury spread out on the former agricultural lands as far as Littleferry.

   How about crime? You write about human trafficking, but why this crime?  

 As you well know, the borders between Scotland and England were closed by then. England kind of isolated itself from the world with the New Hadrian’s Wall installed as a tight border. Although never proven, many people believed New Canterbury’s haven was an important port where refugees from England and other new 3rd world countries were imported for a fair price. Some of those refugees found new ways of living in the very Northern Scottish Highlands, which could be a harsh life if they didn’t have access to power stations. But there were also a lot of rumours about an illegal circuit of human trafficking related to the medical experiments, some linked them to Institute for Advanced Bionics and Healing and the Golspie International Institute for Brain Development. I found those a bit far fetched to start with. But taking into consideration New Canterbury was highly influenced by the vegetarian lobby and therefore also against vivisection, there is a hint of truth in it. I hope to find more about this in further research. Immigration of Asian people, which countries? There are a lot of differences in cultures in Asia. And why did they immigrate to Golspie? During the first part of the 21st-century medical science was practised on a high level in Japan, South Korea and China. Those countries also have a rich history in traditional medicine. In the later years of the 21st century, the field of medicine develop on one hand more and more technical but also started to integrate more of the finding from the holistic views of old medicine. In the early days of the growth of Golspie, a lot of effort and money was placed in recruiting people from these countries hoping to become one of the worlds leading cities in this field in the western countries. They quite well succeeded in this. Why did the people immigrate? Some people because the job offers in Golspie were better paid than in their own country. Some because they got more freedom because the academic world in Scotland was less bound to tradition and it gave them more freedom. We would really like to know more about the Golspie International Institute for Brain Development. So would I! I will have to dig in more to that later! I haven’t found enough source material yet to give you a good answer to that. Other than what I found in Jack’s story. I believe they were experimenting with uploading of the human brain, but that is still a bit foggy. What I do know from the days before is that it all started from a branch from the Alzheimer Scotland Foundation, originally based in Edinburgh.

   Were there many cultural differences in the city, or was it more harmonic?

   I am sure there were many cultural differences, as New Canterbury became quite a mixture of the original population of the Scottish Highlanders, the well-educated people of the Asian Countries I spoke of before and the refugees coming into the town illegal. I can imagine this gave some tension between those groups, but I have no proof of big cultural issues so far. So I guess and do hope it was more organic.

   Are there micro-communities around the city, and if so, how many and where?

   There were definitely micro-communities around the city. And also bigger communities that called themselves caretakers of large amounts of properties. I really have to dig in the way this was economically organized, as this highly fascinates me. I found a small description of this in Morvyn’s story. The place where Taran lived also hints at living in communities. I don’t know how many of those communities existed. But I think a lot of them, like maybe hundreds or even thousands. If I have to make an estimation based on the population number I gave you earlier.

   How big were the nomadic groups and did they live in the city, in the suburbs or outside the city?

   That depends on how you define nomadic groups. People like Morvyn, who live in those big communities could be regarded as nomadic people, as they did not have a fixed place to live, however, they mostly travelled between spaces in the city itself. People like Amar were single nomads, not belonging to a fixed group. And then there were groups living outside the city, more up in the highlands who were rejecting technology. Some of them had camps in fixed places, some of them travelled around. We also have proof of some bigger nomadic troops that did use technology and went from place to place depending on the seasons, using as many resources from the land as ecological wise.

   Lived the people who worked in Golspie or did they commute from outside the city?

   Most of the people who worked in New Canterbury would either live in the City Center itself or the suburbs. As New Canterbury was the only big city in the area and the Highlands are not widely inhabited. Some people might have come in from Inverness which is close enough and there was a fast train running between New Canterbury and Inverness, only 90 kilometres away. I am aware I have not answered all of your questions in the detail you might like, but I hope this may help you with your own research. If you find any interesting data, please fill me in on it. And I do promise you I will get back to you when I have more information. I will work out my former notes, which still might have some in-consequences or unreliable pieces of information.  

Yours Sincerely  

An unknown researcher in former New Canterbury