Volunteers participated in cutting out red paper poppies for a “Remembrance wall” from 23rd Wednesday and Tuesday 29th September in Royal Armouries Museum, Leeds.
During October to November, visitors coming to the Royal Armouries will be able to write on the poppies to “note down what [Remembrance Day] means to them,” including writing down “family connections” to the First world war.
Molly Fielding, event officer at Royal Armouries, wanted to “make a bit of a fuss” for Remembrance Day. However, she realised that she needed “6,000 to 8,000 poppies” to complete the wall. To her, this was “just too much” to handle alone.
On the aims of the project, she said: “We wanted people to remember the people before them… You can’t have remembrance without people.”
Source: Om Kumar | All Rights Reserved“I have been a big fan of history. I have a history degree specialised in the first and second [world] wars.”
“Studying more recent conflicts makes you see the impact conflicts has on the individual, it makes you see the importance of honoring and remembering the sacrifice those people have made.”
Karen Peters, a volunteer at the event, whose brother is in the army, said: “The sentiment of Remembrance Day [has] been lost and forgotten” and that people are “going through the motions” when it occurs.
Source: Om Kumar | All Rights ReservedWhen asked why, Ms Peters said that due to “state of the world,” citing the wars across the globe , people are starting to “forget” the sentimentality of Remembrance Day and why it was created.
“They [do] not see the irony of it all… we are at war at every corner of the world and it makes me really upset.
“What a waste of thousands, millions [of lives] for our freedom.”