Museum of London

This afternoon I went to the Museum of London with two of my friends from uni. It’s nice to take time to do some sightseeing. There are still many things in London that I haven’t seen purely because I live here and I always think “I can go see that any time.” I was really tired from all my work, too, so it was nice to spend an afternoon with friends.

I was planning to take my proper camera with me & then forgot about it, so excuse these rubbish phone photos. I will try to make up for it with witty commentary! :o)

The museum of London is a not-particularly-beautiful concrete building from the 60s, but there is a nice circular garden at the entrance.

The staff at the Museum of London wear bright pink shirts! I wonder if this turns off some of their potential job applicants.

The gift shop was selling official china souvenirs for the Royal Wedding. I had seen a bunch of tacky designs on the Internet, but unsurprisingly the real thing is rather more … reserved. Now, I am a little bit puzzled by the royal pill box. What do you use a pill box for? Pills? Also, what the hell is a tankard? Why not just say mug? Or cup? Is that not posh enough? I am yet to meet a person who says, “I’m going to have a nice tankard of tea.” Clearly the people I socialize with are not posh enough. :o)

Roman gold coins. Seems boring, but my friend L. made me laugh when he asked: “What was the emperor Vespasian known for?” Apparently, this guy introduced urine tax on public toilets. From those days onwards, we have the proverb “Money doesn’t smell.” (Coins from the time of Vespasian are third from the left in the top row.)

War, Plague & Fire. This sign made me wonder why history is just full of grim things. Why don’t we learn more about the fun things? Was live no fun back in the old days? Or is fun not worth learning about? Maybe that’s why I didn’t like history in school. My friend M. asked a similar question in the Stone Age, Iron Age  & Bronze Age section. “Why is it all about weapons? Why are there no sex toys?” I told him it’s because kids come to the museum on school trips. (But then again, does that mean we think it’s more acceptable to teach our kids about violence, war and killings rather than about sex?)

“Like its men, the women of medieval London were often in trade. They could own property and run their own businesses. Rich daughters were married young to make useful family connections but poorer women often waited until their 20s, marrying when they had saved enough money to set up a home with their husband.” Not much has changed since medieval times then. I found this strangely reassuring to read.

Plague epidemics were an important part of London’s history, so there is a whole section dedicated to their history. Apparently Londoners were encouraged to drink alcohol to prevent plague! Now I know where the English love of boozing comes from.

“Goa stone”. I am always interested to learn about the old connections between England and India, having lived in both countries. Explanation below.

Pearly King. I had spotted a person dressed like this in Covent Garden about two weeks ago. So now I was surprised to learn that this is a 19th-century tradition, rather than just the eccentricity of one freak! People of the working class dress like this to collect money for London-based charities. There’s even the Original London Pearly Kings and Queens Association and a rival group known as the Pearly Guild. And a Wikipedia page, of course.

The museum is also hosting a London Street Photography exhibition. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to view it, so I’ll have to come back some time soon.

When you can’t make a big journey, take a little trip.

The weather is beautiful and all I want to do is spend more time outside and take trips to beautiful little villages around England, or hey, around the world. But as I mentioned, work is calling and there is no time for travelling. This afternoon I at least treated myself to a little trip to the park … the great thing about my park is that it changes so much with the seasons? (Remember the autumn burst of colour I posted?)

Enjoy Spring!

P.S. I have redesigned my blog a bit. Hope you like the bigger photos.

Quintessentially British

Spring term has finished, and my social life is finished with it. No more going to lectures, just staying at home and working alone on my individual project, plus revising for exams, again alone. I was productive for the first few days, but it’s getting harder and harder! I miss learning together with my course mates, I miss the long lunches, I miss our silliness and commiserating.

But I have tons of academic papers to get through, one thesis to write and eight exams to revise for. So I have this mug to remind me to just keep calm and carry on. If there is a sentence that perfectly sums up British culture to me, it’s this one. No matter what is happening, let’s not be too dramatic, let’s have a cup of tea and back to business.

There’s a nice website here which explains the history of The Keep Calm and Carry poster. It was designed by an unknown civil servant of His Majesty’s Stationery Office during World War 2. There were quite a few of these morale-boosting posters being used at the time and this particular one was prepared to be used in case Germany invaded England. That, of course, never happened and therefore most of the posters were destroyed. The website nicely summarizes how people feel about the simple and straightforward message that the Keep Calm and Carry On posters convey: “all these years later, people still find it so appealing and reassuring in our modern times”.

Kingston-upon-Thames

On Saturday, I woke up to a sunny morning and my first thought was, “let’s go for a trip!”
Funnily enough, the horoscope that appears on my Google webpage was saying, “The Moon is in your 9th House of Exotic Travel today.” I didn’t know I had a House of Exotic Travel, but it makes complete sense that I do.

Realistically, real exoticism was not on the menu, so I took a bus down to Kingston-upon-Thames for a bit of walking around, sightseeing and shopping (resulting in a new jacket, sailor-style and on sale! Apparently sailor-style is in fashion right now). Kingston is a major retail centre and a nice alternative to Westfield / High Street Kensington / Oxford Street – all the major high-street brands are there. But it’s also a nice small town to walk around, with a market and the river and cafés.

Kingston Town Hall with a market around it.

There’s a bit of a French market near the town hall, with cheeses, crepes, garlic prawns (amazing smell!), French music, French movies and even Eiffel Tower miniatures! I wonder if anyone really buys those in Kingston? How bizarre!

This cake shop is so cute. I want a table like that …

And Kingston’s most recognizable landmark, the falling telephone boxes in Old London Road.

Smooth Sailing

Last weekend I took time off from my busy schedule of work-work-work for a little trip with the yacht club. We sailed from Portsmouth Harbour to Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight and back. Yarmouth turned out to be a peaceful little town with a cosy pub, a pretty sunset and many, many boats. I’m really in love with sailing, despite all the ups and downs. (A few months back I had to pull out of a sailing trip half way through as I was puking my guts out …) It’s a bit of a dream come true, because I’ve always wanted to sail as a kid and I never had the opportunity until now.

The Czech Republic is wonderful. But it’s small and landlocked, which kind of sucks. When I was a kid, I couldn’t help thinking that we got the rough end of the deal. We didn’t have any of those seafaring Great Explorers in our history. No Marco Polo, no Ferdinand Magellan, no Vasco da Gama, no Christopher Columbus, no Sir Francis Drake … no plundering, no spices, no gold. No pirates. Not enough beach holidays. In history lessons we learnt about the land reforms of Joseph II and the grammar reforms of Josef Dobrovský. You’d be hard pressed to come up with anything less inspiring for a child’s mind.

In geography, we kept on learning about this one little country, which towns have pig farms and how many motorways there are. Unrolling the same map every week. Inside, I felt like screaming, “Just show me the WHOLE map! The whole WORLD, please! Tell me about riding camels with the Touareq in Tombouctou. Tell me what it feels like to canoe in the Amazon among piranhas. Tell me something about that funny place on the bottom side of the globe called Tierra del Fuego. Do people live there? What do they look like? Show me something I don’t know!” I wanted to go and explore and they wouldn’t let me.

But now I’m an adult and I can, and it feels awesome.