This morning, I woke up in my room...
in my flat...
in WALES!!! Good heavens! How many times in my life am I going to be able to say that?!? Oh yes, good times indeed my friends :)
Well, I woke up at about 5:30, threw on the clothes that I had remembered to set out (you know, those who know me well know that the only things I really remember are random facts, which is great for tests, but not so great for everyday living, so when I say that I remembered things, that REALLY means that the people upstairs reminded me to do it), grabbed a croissant and a few bananas for breakfast, and ran out the door with my packed hiking backpack and vest for the day.
The ride into London was three hours long, and while I fell asleep for one of those hours, the remainder of it was gorgeous! More beautiful Welsh countryside...but more descriptions will come of that, gentle reader.
Now I must warn you before I cruise through everything that we were on our feet walking through London from 9am until 11:30pm, and we stopped to sit only when we were eating dinner and when we were on the tube. I may have already mentioned that Tom moves at an absoluetly unreal speed, considering that he is in his late 50's and is only about 5 foot 7. We have a few marathoners and mountain climbers, and they struggle to keep up with him too. That being said, we FLEW through London.
So, here we go:
We parked the van in some housing area south of London, walked to the nearest tube station about half a mile away, took the tube into London, and walked over to the Museum of London.
So we were all a little sad that we were missing the usual American 4th of July celebrations, but I thought the irony of spending the entire 4th in London (of ALL places) was a tad humorous. My first funny moment of London's recognition of this day in history actually came from the 'This Day in History' projection on one of the museum walls. I thought that surely the great Museum of London would acknowledge that on this day 237 years ago would even vaguely note that they had lost a major hold on their American territory, but the only thing that they considered important enough to note was that Darwin took a ride somewhere on his bike. I honestly don't even remember the year either. :) Oh well, forgetting the birthday of once-upon-a-time conflicting countries seems like the natural thing to do, so no hard feelings.
The exhibits at the museum were amazing! They had exhibits on every major aspect of the history of Britain, from neolithic skeletons and artifacts, through the Middle Ages, the crusades, the great fire, the Black Plague, the Victorian era, all the way up to the London Olympic Games. I actually started feeling super light headed towards the end of the tour, so I did my best to try to wake myself out of it by downing a ton of sugar. Fortunately, it worked. Which is kind of lame, because I am so embarrased when that happens. More fortunately though, no one noticed what was going on, so my secret was kept safe.
As we were leaving the Museum, we had to wait outside for about twenty minutes, which was outrageous to Tom. The reason, though, was worth it. Anders and Courtney, Tom and Katie's son and daughter in law, are with us on this adventure because Anders is our official driver (Tom didn't want to try to drive and lecture at the same time). But somehow, Anders and Courtney had been spotted by some London Times pressmen, and were being photographed and interviewed because for being a cute American couple visiting on the Fourth (it's true! They are super adorable together. Plus, Courtney was wearing an american flag backpack and Anders had an American flag beanie and blue 'A' sweater on. They were perfect!)
When they were done, we were off like we were being chased by something. We walked to St. Paul's Cathedral, Temple Church (where the last of the Templar Knights are buried after they were massacred by the King on Friday the 13th, which is why Friday the 13th is considered an unlucky day), the London Supreme Courthouse (where they do still wear wigs and take votes on paper slips. I also learned that the official mascot of London is the griffin), Lester Square, Covent Gardens (where Anders was once again selected out of a crowd of 200 people by a crazy ADD gymnast lady. She was doing an upside-down sword juggling routine, but it took her a half hour of talking, prancing around, and throwing her clothing onto poor Anders before she actually started juggling. Courtney thought it was absolutely hilarious, Anders was just a very red good sport), Big Ben, Boudicca's statue (where Abby almost got hit by a taxi and grabbed the girl in front of her, thinking it was one of us, but it was actually some poor Asian lady who looked absolutely furious that she had been jostled. Seriously, if looks could kill, Abby wouldn't have made it home that day...), westminster abbey, the Thames, a falconer walking down the street (he showed us his AWESOME hawk that he had been paid to scare away the seagulls and pigeons with), buckingham palace (where we found a pair of pigeon wings just sitting on the sidewalk. they were perfectly intact, still connected to each other, and looked like they were in mid flight...they were just birdless. looks like our falconer friend had been here too) the oldest bank in london, Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Square, and the British Museum of Art.
I'll pause here for a bit because a bunch of really cool things happened here. We stopped in front of the museum to look at the statues around, one of which was actually George Washington's statue, which he had earned for his work in Virginia. Tom had mentioned that we would all meet up at Washingtons statue at 1, but not many in our group heard it. There was a break dancer getting pumped up for a routine in the square in front of us, so about a quarter of the group must not have heard. Tom shot off to the museum because he wanted to see his absolutely favorite painting in London, and most of us took off with him. It wasn't until we got inside that we realized that we were missing about eight of us. I was a bit concerned, considering the fact that the girls that were now probably freaking out had been calling ME their 'happy mum' (we each earned titles. I'm just glad I wasn't the one labeled 'the neighborhood bully'). But, as their mum, I decided I didn't want to miss seeing Toms favorite pice of art, as I knew it had to be good since he has all the greatest works of art throughout the world, so I didn't go back to find them. Tom teaches us tough love I suppose.
So we entered the art museum. And I was stopped in my tracks by the beauty of what I saw. There were many huge rooms connected to each other, each painted a dark green or dark red with intricate gold crown molding and floral designs on the walls. But they were filled with gigantic beautiful Victorian and renaissance era paintings. Now, I'm not a big fan of paintings from this era, and there were definitely a few here and there that didn't strike my fancy, but so many of these incredible pieces were more beautiful than I would have ever imagined.
Tom was already almost out of the room, still on his one-stop non-stop course to the exact room of the museum with his piece, so my immobility came to a quick end as I jogged to catch up with him.
We walked right through room after gigantic room without a single pause. I stole glimpses of as many as my awestruck brain could handle while keeping the quickly moving group always in my sights until finally, we stopped.
The room we were in looked like all the others, gigantic paintings all along the walls like the many we have passed. But Tom had stopped (an odd sight indeed) before a small glass-covered stand in the middle of the room. In it was displayed two small gold-framed pictures, gold leaf lithographs of Mary and the baby Jesus on one, and angelic messengers on the other. Honestly, to me, it wasnt the most eye catching painting of all the pictures I had seen. It was much smaller than the average, the colors were very muted, and it wasnt super flashy. But the more I looked at it, the more I really did come to see how exquisite it was.
Tom was already off again, but I didn't really care at this point. I knew when and where we were meeting up before we were to walk to an awesome and low priced Indian restaurant, so Abby and I walked around a bunch more rooms at normal people paces. The humongous paintings were absolutely gorgeous. I could have spent a few hours there, looking at many more of those fantastic paintings.
And laughed at others. There was one section of Victorian era aristocrats, and they looked absolutely grotesque. All the men looked like poor steam punk meth heads, with their dark sunken eyes, long thin hair, and lanky fingers almost sagging with the weight of their plethora of gemmed rings. One full length portrait which was the absolute worst, was actually my favorite. it seemed to be some awesome woman soldier, with gorgeous long wavy brown hair and a rather direct sultry expression...wait, but that jaw...and nose...and goatee!!! Gah! Suddenly the once beautiful brown locks morphed into nasty long man hair!! Good heavens, the man must have thought himself to be a total fox in his day, with the ridiculously tight shiny clothes and that bold expression...nasty. That's why I laughed so hard in the British museum of art. :)
About ten minutes before meeting time, Abby and I left the museum and headed out to George Washington. When we got out to Trafalgar Square again, the break dancer had left, but two still-statue men were the now. I was super impressed with one guy, who looked like he was sitting comfortably on a chair that wasnt there...until I saw a little bit of metal pipe sticking out from the bottom of his pant leg. Lame! Even I could just sit out on a hidden pipe chair! That takes like zero skill. No money for you!
We met our missing party at Washington, took a Fourth of July picture beside him, and then walked to khan, the awesome Indian place tom and Katie raved about.
Which was closed for another hour. The problem was that our play started at 7, and the restaurant didnt open until 6, so we split up and went to other places to eat. I went to an awesome Peruvian chicken place called Nandos with a few of the group members. It was nummy! Afterwards we met up with the whole group again and walked a few miles to the London Globe.
Okay, once upon a time, I was in jr. High school learning about the old Shakespearean theaters. They were like a big hollow tower, with the stage about a mans height high in the middle of the tower, and three open floors all around the sides of the tower looking down onto the stage. The best seats in the house were actually standing: if you got there soon enough you could lean right up against the stage to watch the plays.
When I walked into the Globe, I almost had to pick my jaw up off the ground from where I stood before I could move on with my group. It was everything in mrs. Oylers class and more, from the three leveled tower to the thatched roofs. It was seriously like stepping back in time. My group was super close to the front of the line, so while we were along the far left side of the stage, we all got to lean right up on the stage edge!! That was a crazy cool experience!
Now, I must be honest: I'm not a huge Shakespeare fan. Like at all. And we were here to watch Macbeth. . . . . yippee....
But I kid you not, i absolutely loved every bit of it!! The actors were funny and exciting and so interesting to follow. And the guy who played Banquot for some reason looked super familiar to me, kinda like Pippin from Lord of the Rings, but he had a heavy beard on. And he had the most BEAUTIFUL Irish accent! Oh, I have heard a few Irish accents now, but his was somehow just positively gorgeous!
So when the first act ended, I looked back at my group in disbelief. Many shared my original views on Shakespearean theatre, but they had the same awestruck look on their faces as well. I can't even tell you why, maybe it was the super legit old school effect that I appreciate, maybe it was just the fantastic acting, but DANG, it was good so far.
Then Tom asked me what I thought about Billy Boyd. "Billy who? That name sounds really familiar. Who is that again?" "PIPPIN. YOU KNOW, FROM LORD OF THE RINGS."
Gaaaa...... WHAT!?!!?! I had been standing literally four inches away from Pippin at least a dozen times for the last hour??? JOYOUS!!! Lets just say that the second act (unfortunately, his character had been killed off,though he played a few other minor roles later) was even more exciting now.
To finish the play off, when Macbeth lay dead on the stage and the final words had been said, the three witches slowly floated back onto the stage, the one closest to me with a violin. There had been a live pit playing in the hidden area above the stage, so I just assumed that she would fake it while someone above played, but I was very wrong. She locked her violin into place in the bend of her arm with a confidence that comes only with repeating a motion a thousand times before. And she began to play. It was a simple song, ornamented in the most authentic Scottish way I've ever heard live. To say that the tune was beautiful doesn't really describe it correctly. It was plain, not sad, but a song that was meant to describe an end. There were no words of course, but it spoke of finishing something long and hard, something that had hurt, but had now met heaven. Those who know me know that I almost never cry, even when I want to, but when the Celtic fiddlers peeked over the edge of their hidden room to move with her in harmony, I brimmed with tears. The harmony was haunting, and powerful, and stirring, and just...otherworldly. And then it got louder, more instruments, more drums, more bass, until everything just hummed with the life of that tune. The message of an ending was in full magnificence, and slowly, it got softer and softer until we were left with the final original voice of the witches violin. She played her farewell ballad one last time, and then it was done. I'm absolutely 100% biased, but that was the most incredible part of that already amazing production for me.
Heading out on very aching legs, we walked about a half mile to the nearest tube station, took three or four transfer trains, walked about 15 minutes to the van (where Tom stopped just long enough to plank horizontally on a light pole with just his arms for about 15 seconds!!!) and then started our three hour ride home. It was about midnight when we got in the van. I fell asleep for about an hour to Anders and Tom playing the first of many games of 20 questions.
But this days adventures were not through yet, gentle reader. When we departed that morning, we dropped the only key to my house to the company in charge of cleaning all the construction stuff up for us, for getting us a new front door, and getting everything super livable. But we found out when we got back at about 3am was that they lost our key that day.
So we were locked out. So we all camped out in the already full first house. A bunch of the girls doubled up on the twin sized beds, with three girls squeezing into one. Lydia and I stormed the stone-tiled living room, with Courtney and Anders on one, Lydia on the other, and I stole all the huge back pillow rests, puzzled them so they covered half the living room floor, spread a spare sheet out on top of them all, and slept super comfortably on my gigantic plush bed. I think I broke major records with how fast I fell asleep that night.
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