Time Difference: -9 hours (from Brisbane)
Soundtrack: Les Miserables Cast Recording, Labyrinth soundtrack, general David Bowie
Currently Inspired by: Palace intrigue! Secret maze hookups and calves in silk stockings
Words written: 60,105
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| A very English pub |
It is difficult to know what to say in a blog when you are
in a city that makes you feel less like a tourist than it does like you are
just coming home after a long time away.
It is also difficult to have your heart living in two places at once, particularly
when those places really couldn’t get too much further apart geographically, something
I have just had to deal with over the last seven years since I returned from
the UK. In many ways (most assuredly NOT
the weather), London is so much more “me” than Brisbane is. I have been throwing myself with gusto into a
myriad of activities and its general Londonness while wavering between feeling
incredibly lucky to have the opportunities I do here and pants wettingly
excited about whatever is coming up next.
I have also greatly enjoyed being a greedy and insatiable hug monster
with all of my wonderful friends, the kindest and best of folks, who have
allowed me to crash on their couches, air mattresses and spare beds and leave
my long dark hair in hidey places all over their houses, no doubt to be pulled
off a pair of jeans in about six months with a bewildered “whose frigging hair
is this??” Saving me the hideous chore
of paying for non-hostel accommodation in any part of London is really the best
gift anyone could give me at this point.
Packed to the ceiling with activity, the time has flown, and of the six
weeks I initially faintly begrudged spending in a place I had already lived in,
only two and half precious weeks remain, something on which I am trying very
hard not to focus.
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| Dinner at Won Kei |
I am very conscious of the fact that saying “went for eggs
benedict with such and such” and “hung out on a couch playing a game on my
iProduct with someone sitting two feet away” is not the quality of content that
my patient and faithful readers have come to expect, so I will stick to the major
stuff since my last blog, beginning with... Labyrinth! Now, in Brisbane we have (had) the good old
Globe but still have a couple of hard working personalities out there, most
notably Kristian Fletcher, who still plug away at putting on these movie
nights. But... well... this was in the
Prince Charles Cinema in Leicester Square!
Please stop me anytime I start to sound like Eurotrash. I decided to stay in a hotel next to the
square on this particular night just to make life easier and as I was early for
check in and my room wasn’t ready, got upgraded to an executive suite. It was a stunning hotel, the deal I had got
just for the regular room was already excellent, so it was a huge bonus on top
and really set my mood for the night. It
kicked off with dinner at Won Kei in Chinatown, my favourite chinese restaurant
here and home of the juiciest, tastiest, crispiest, duckiest crispy duck in the
whole of London Town. When we got into
the cinema they handed us little baggies containing bubbles for blowing during
the masquerade ball scene, a little sweet and a popper to blow at the end when
she remembers the line! It was so much
fun. The Jareth impersonator did an
excellent David Bowie voice and the huge pair socks down the front of the skin
tight pants didn’t hurt the impression at all.
Needless to say the girls in the cinema all screamed and carried on
whenever “those” scenes happened. None
louder than I. So much for a kid’s
movie, huh? Top night, and so much fun.
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| Excited! At dinner before the show |
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| Ramin Karimloo, our incredible JVJ |
The other major event has been Les Miserables. Since I saw it on Wednesday I have bought the
album and been listening to it essentially on repeat on iTunes. Anyone who has seen it obviously knows how it
can get its claws into you, although I much preferred the first act to the
second. The actor who played Javert
managed to bring empathy and understanding to an otherwise horrible antagonist
and the actor who played Jean Valjean really blew me away. He wasn’t just an incredible stage presence,
but also an extraordinarily talented vocalist and vocal actor. The depth of emotion he could convey in two
breathy syllables was truly astounding, and his deep set hooded eyes glinted
out at us from under his shadowed brow with a kind of dark and feverish
intensity that sent chills down my spine on more than one occasion. I was glued, riveted, utterly
captivated. I sniggered and blushed,
gasped and clapped, sniffled and bawled like a baby. During the first act the entire dozen or so
people next to me could have started an orgy and I wouldn’t have noticed or
even cared. Head full of music, I went
to bed that night and dreamed of people lurching towards me out of fog on
cobblestone streets and I marched, marched, marched what felt like all night
long. I woke up humming and wondering if
my legs had moved through the night!
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| The Tudor Palace |
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| One of the many incredible gardens |
I spent a couple of days south of London this week in the Hampton
Court area, where King Henry’s palace is.
It really has the most jaw droppingly beautiful gardens I have ever seen,
and I was glad to get some photos of them to replace the ones I lost last year. As it is the beginning of spring, all the
bulbs were in first bloom and the scent of the area ranged from zesty to heady
and everything in between. It was both
an olfactory and visual sensory assault.
A most pleasant one. I didn’t go
back inside the palace itself because I still remember it so clearly from my
first visit. For the second time,
however, I did take on the maze, and for the second time got lost for ages and
just a little panicky. At first it is
fun. I defy anyone to walk into a full
sized maze and not begin to make up stories.
For me it was about good fairies and bad fairies. The bad fairies were trying to lead me into
the centre to do unspeakable things to me, and the good fairies were trying to
lead me back out to safety. So I would
notice leaves and patches of sunlight, and interpret it as either a good sign
or a bad sign, and go left or right.
Frequently I would round the corner into a bunch of giggling children,
and rather than let them ruin my fantasy I turned them into Maze Goblins,
harmless pranksters who live in the maze and like to fiddle with the signs to
play with poor travellers such as I. I
warded them off with my traveler’s talisman (a garnet) in my pocket and carried
on. Finally I popped out, puffed, disheveled and
just a little relieved. The good fairies
won... this time.
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| Diana (goddess) monument |
Just opposite the palace grounds is a ridiculously huge park
called Bushy Park through which I trekked for a couple of hours, petting and
babytalking at people’s dogs and listening to music next to the glistening
lakes in the welcome sunshine. Only half
an hour’s train ride from one of the most densely built cities sits this
spacious and wondrous piece of nature, clean and verdant, full of the most
beautiful natural wildlife, squirrels, swans and deers. Animals in England are so cute. None of this crocodiles, funnelwebs,
stonefish crap. Just tiny fluffy things,
white birds, and Bambi. Enid Blyton didn’t
make this stuff up you know, she probably just looked out into her
backyard. Gotta love it. Another interesting animal tidbit, following on from last fortnight's blog, is that all swans in the UK belong to the Queen. To harm one is a very very serious offence.
Click here to see all my general London photos so far
The weather here has just started to get “nice” and by that
I mean it is still cold almost all of the time but the sun is out and for a
couple of hours a day you should be able to find a patch to sit in, in which a
jacket is not required. As happens every
year when this very first touch of Spring begins to flower in the city,
virtually the entire population begins to move its activities out of doors and
parks, commons and greens overflow with happy Londoners kicking footballs,
playing cricket (badly, of course) and just sitting on blankets with bottles of
cider, laughing and chatting and smiling at everyone. What a
difference a season makes! It’s a lovely
time to be here and I am looking forward to more of the same over the next
couple of weeks. It is also making me
excited for my Europe trip which is going to be during spring and the beginning
of summer. I am planning to train it
through about seven or eight countries before settling in Italy for six weeks
or so. I suppose I had better start
looking at booking accommodation and train tickets, considering it is all less
than three weeks away! This week I am
hoping to do some substantial writing, not just the tiny token amount I did to
get over 60,000 about a week ago, the only writing I have done in my 3.5 weeks
here. I am visiting three barbershop
choruses at their rehearsals this week, which I am incredibly excited
about. Next weekend is more club fun and
then the following week is Shakespeare in Stratford, THE wedding, a few more
catch ups and then off again. If I can,
I am going to try and squeeze in Phantom of the Opera this week. So hopefully I should have a lot more to talk
about in the next blog!
Til Next We Speak
*LOVE*
N
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