Wednesday 25 October 2006

Two of a Kind.


Old Knudsen gets a nice wee surprise everytime I stumble across someone that has put up a link to me, not wanting to offend someone unintentionally because that's not as much fun as intentional offending I try to find out where my links are and reciprocate, however some Blurker (I don't like the word lurker to describe the quiet readers and Blurker sounds like vomiting thus funnier) might have a link up and I'd never know, the same thing happened in the town of Bideford in Devon. In the 1980's some Yanks from Manteo North Carolina gave the Bideford council a plate proclaiming some form of friendship, it sat in council chambers until someone turned up 2006 with a gift of a clock to mark 25 years of twinning between the two towns, the Deputy mayor David Ratcliff said," there had been links between the towns but nothing official", then he went on to say,"bloody yanks think they can come over here with their chewing gum and nylons and twin with whoever they want".

The town having been slightly embarrassed by the whole thing didn't have a gift to give back, and did these Americans not hear of telephones or the interweb? it sounds like a case of town stalking to me, to make matters worse Bideford is officially twinned with Landivisiau in France, oh its all very dirty and sordid.

The picture is of Eng and Chang, born in Siam (Thailand) 1811 and were connected at the chest by a 5 inch long band of flesh. They went to America, Canada and Europe earning money by giving lectures and demonstrations who am I kidding? a freak show for anyone that would pay to take a look , they were so famous the term Siamese twins was then used to describe conjoined twins.
Strangely enough they settled down in North Carolina where they married two sisters of European ancestry who were not twins or connected, ah to be a fly on the wall in that bedroom, they did pretty well as the four of them had 21 kids in total wey hey .
In 1874 Chang died from a blood clot in his brain and Eng two and a half hours later from shock aged 63 , it is believed that they knew about their twinning .

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I went out with a twin once. She was the less attractive of the two. Lovely girl though.

Her and her sister now have 27 children between them.

Anonymous said...

I thought I'd left a comment earlier. Hmm. All I wanted to say was that I haven't seen this image in so long--it was in the Guiness Book of World Records that I had years ago, and it was the kind of photo you couldn't look away from.

Anonymous said...

One more thing, I went back to Dive's comment box and saw that I had mistyped a comment to you which then sounded very unkind, all because of one missing word. Apologies. It's been fixed.

Fat Sparrow said...

Kav -- "I went out with a twin once. She was the less attractive of the two. Lovely girl though.

Her and her sister now have 27 children between them.
"

And how much do you pay in child support now, Kav?

Old Knudsen said...

kav c'mon kav, if you're going to tell a twin story it has to involve a threesome, I look at some twins and I think, what a drag, they are twins and they are ugly, that God is a funny fellow.

robyn you would have been a freak show groupie, I hope you weren't swearing on Dive's blog again, hes a bad influence, I changed your review on the right for you.

fat sparrow now this twin comment hints at a dirty senario.

sammy.the.k said...

what about irish twins?

If my bro and I were identical we would get into lots of trouble.

But all in all that was quite the boring ass post Knudster. You can do better.

Old Knudsen said...

Yes sammy I could do better, but could you? this blog is a wank, its all about pleasing me, if others want to watch well I don't care, I'm flattered that they want to watch me tug the lad but I won't start doing tricks for them.

Taihae said...

you're a damn dirty old man - you make me think of my northern english great uncles and grandfather when they used to get sauced and pretend to sing in german. good timees. shipbuilders, the lot of them, 35 and a half fingers between the lot. love your blog

Old Knudsen said...

"Ich bin einen dirty ald manschion"
Nice to meet you dear, my new bestfriend Dive put on onto your blog recently, fun was indeed to be had.

sammy.the.k said...

hahah yes but I am lazy my dear old man. I was just yankin yer chain (dont take too much into that, no i wont yank yer knob for ye), but a pleasure as always!

Old Knudsen said...

My wrath sammy my wrath, read it and weep, I know I did.

Anonymous said...

Well, that's a very nice review change. Thank you--I'll be sure to have my mother stop by and read it.

adair said...

I think anyone would die from shock living in north carolina, with 21 kids, the equivalent of two wives...

and oh yeah, a brother's dead body attached by a 5" band of flesh.