The second weekend of the Nato festival was even more eventful than the first. This was the live art and activism day, with various actions, a critical mass and a march for capitalism. I arrived at around 1pm and headed straight off to the Agitate show to hook up and find out what was going on. Not having a bike or skateboard with me I realised that the critical mass was going to be a bit of a spectator event as far as I was concerned. I walked into town with the pirate radio case and went to see what was going on.

Shortly after arriving in the city center I bumped into Philip from Fan Club. He had been chasing after the critical mass and was standing on the roadside with a couple of girls after having lost them. We all walked back onto the rough route they had taken, and around ten minutes later a mob of skaters and cyclists came around the corner with a police motorcycle escort.

Zigzagging around the road and causing all manner of traffic chaos, they soon lost us again. I decided that my involvement was pretty pointless, so I headed off to cause some pirate radio trouble. Manchester was in Commonwealth Games fever. The police budget must have gone through the roof, as there were police and Commonwealth officials absolutely everywhere. Great if you are a councilor or corporate sponsor, not so great if you are trying to find a CCTV free spot to tune in a radio station.

Eventually I found a spot right next to the Arndale shopping center carpark. Arndale is Manchester’s largest shopping center and the carpark is a multistory beast to match. Switching the CD player to a track with an official announcement, asking car drivers to rethink their polluting ways, I strolled up to the entrance.

I walked up to the 4th floor and into the center of the carpark. This was Saturday afternoon in a multistory shopping center carpark and it was rammed. Cars were driving around and around looking for spaces and I had a captive audience.After playing the message on loop for around 10 mins, l left the carpark glad not to have come across any attendants. I switched the CD player to a different track and walked off by some of the main roads.

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