Welcome to Diagon Alley

On Monday, Ming and I decided that rather than exploring a building a la the British Museum, we would walk around doing touristy things (though we never did make it to the Notting Hill Festival -- given that the news this morning was reporting that it ended in violence, that's probably not a bad thing).



We decided that one of the most touristy things we could do was eschew the tube for a double-decker bus. Unfortunately, the ones you see in movies are very rare thus far, having been replaced with new, modern, closed-topped ones (equipped with station announcements and CCTV).



First stop on our tour was Hyde Park. We didn't explore anything but the corner of it, but I fell head over heels in love with the Queen Mother gates. Seriously, I totally want these gates.



Leaving Hyde Park, we made our way to:



Buckingham Palace. The Queen was in residence, but not much was going on other than the guards out front changing positions every so often. They were also busy taking down the Visa 2011 festival (whatever that was). So we left and headed to St. James park.



There are a lot of waterfowl in St. James's park, and the areas around the pond are set aside exclusively for their use. The neat thing about them is how many of them are different species than we have in Canada. My favourite are the coots -- the black ones with the white faces and the ridiculously oversized flattened white feet. They make a fantastic noise, too.



The gardens are also lovely, but one of the things that struck me most was the hillside full of crocuses we found, which were apparently common enough that people were trampling all over them. Crocuses. In August.



From the bridge at St. James's park, we could see the London Eye. I fully intend of riding it at some point, but you have to call in advance for tickets, so I'm waiting for a day when I know I'll have a lot of time.



My favourite thing about this picture is that it shows a building that doesn't exist. It's an effect created by the overlapping of several different buildings, which combine in just such a way to create some kind of fairytale castle. There's a story in there somewhere.



At the end of St. James's park is the Horse Guard, and yes, they do have people stationed around the grounds whose job it is to look stoic and not move as tourist take embarrassing photos with them. Every single one of them stationed around the grounds looked like a baby -- they couldn't have been any older than 18. I was particularly amused by the two above, stationed on either side of the gate -- the guy was doing a good job being stoic despite his horses' clear impatience with standing still all day. The girl, on the other hand, couldn't keep this smug "yeah, you're touching my horse" look off her face.

From there, we had no idea where we wanted to go, and decided it would be fun to get lost.



We popped in to the National Gallery (you can do that because, like other museums, it's free), where I had another one of those "Oh, I get it" moments looking at a DaVinci painting. You can see them in photos and prints. Does nothing to convey the magic inherent in his work, especially when comparing it to other artists hung around the painting. There's something about the light, the form, and the expressions that honestly does transcend the ordinary to become truly spectacular, and you can only see it when you're looking at the real thing.



From the steps of the National Gallery, we took a photo of Trafalgar Square, when I noticed something peeking between the buildings and the monument.



Yup, really starting to feel like I'm in England now.



From there, we started our serious wandering. It's really hard to convey just how different the streets are in London, because in addition to having no straight lines and intersecting at various bizarre angles, the buildings are high, crammed, close together, and speaking of an age that we just don't have. They're also damned near impossible to navigate, which led to our very scientific system of "okay, let's go that way now" ambulation.



So of course, we managed to find a Timmies. Only not quite a Timmies -- you serve your own coffee out of a machine, and check out the maple dip doughnuts. The doughnut is more cakey than a regular honey dip, the glaze is actual maple glaze instead of that hard icing, and they put pecans on it. And did you know that Tim Hortons is Canada's favourite restaurant?



The conversation around this street went "wait, are we in Chinatown?" *turn corner and see this street* "Oh, I guess we are."



We found Picadilly Circus.



We also found the West End.



My favourite street hands-down was Neal's Yard. You got to it by passing through this painted tunnel, down an alleyway, and ended up in this courtyard of shops and restaurants. It was passing though all these streets, and this one in particular, that gave us another OIC ("oh, I see") moments -- Diagon Alley makes SO much more sense when you've been to Neal's Yard.
posted by Sarah E. at 6:27 PM

The British Museum

Ming and I decided that we should go do touristy things, and made our first stop the British Museum (because I had mistakenly believed someone at the ROM who mentioned there was a Tutankhamun exhibit there).



We got to the tube and bought our Oyster cards. These are hard to describe, even when you have all the literature telling you what they are. Basically, they're like a cash card you can top up, to which you can also add things like a daily pass or a monthly pass. You swipe them as you get on and off the tube, and the according amount is taken off your card (this happens with weekly and monthly passess too if you go outside the zones for which you bought your pass).

These are the escalators leading from the tube station to the street. You pass by a couple of old blast doors before you reach these escalators. One of the many subtle reminders that London is a city with a history that Toronto simply doesn't have.



Of course, we got lost on the way there and ended up walking in a circle around the museum. It's easy enough to do when none of the streets are straight. We're very spoiled by Toronto's grid system -- if you look up a map of London, you'll see just how easy it is to go down one street and have no idea where you are. But then, you end up discovering cool things like the street above, which struck us as another one of those "history" moments. Also, some of the streets are really frelling narrow.



The neat thing about museums in Britain is that they are all free, and simply have a donation box asking you to help keep them "free to the world since 1753". They are also FULL of people. ROM, take note.



This is the courtyard at the centre of the British Museum, which they recently covered with that impressive skylight. The round part at the centre houses the shop, a temporary exhibition room, a gourmet restaurant, and the reading room. Perhaps most importantly, this modern editionworks with the existing architecture instead of trying to overwhelm it, and is nearly invisible from the street, so comes as a surprise when you walk into the bright, open space.

The sense of scale here is something the ROM just doesn't have. For all its size, it's welcoming (the use of colour and the warmth of the stone floors add a lot to that, I think), and the galleries do have some cohesion and story to them. I just find it odd that the ROM professes to want to be a "world class" museum, yet does the opposite of what this one does.




The Parthenon Galleries were pretty spectacular. The pictures don't really do justice to how much detail, and how lifelike, these things are. Plus, it's just cool that there are pieces of the Parthenon.



It was actually kind of sad how many of this series of blocks (all depicting this fight) were labelled something like "his head can be found in Copenhagen." I wish it could all just be together in one place.



There were other bits of Greek antiquity in addition to the Parthenon. All were equally impressive. Most lacked heads. And, in the cases of the male figures, penises. Given the sheer volume of "his head was taken by so-and-so in 1852" texts on the statues, I find myself doubting that every instance of statue castration was accidental.

I bet there's a Master's Thesis on the topic floating around out there somewhere.



This is one of my favourite pieces from the Egyptian Afterrlife collection. It's a page from the Book of the Dead, and this part of it shows the deceased being led to his judging by Anubis. I just find something very touching about it. Anubis isn't holding the soul by the wrist or shoulder or any way that could be taken as harsh or commanding. If anything, I find that it would be very reassuring to know that when you reach the other side, there would be someone there to hold your hand. Even if he does feed your heart to The Devourer of Souls if you've been bad.



Having so recently been to the dentist, this collection of Egyptian skulls showing how big of a problem tooth decay was in Ancient Egypt made me feel a bit better about having my cavities filled. Note the abscesses on many of the teeth.



It was also interesting to see how many of the Egyptian customs the Romans adopted for their own. I already knew about the coopting of the Greek pantheon to become Jupiter, Juno, and the others, but this Roman-era mummy mask was a reminder that they did it with other cultures as well.



On leaving the museum, we were bemused to discover that London has pay phones, pay internet, and also pay toilets. It was occupied, or we would have used it.



Okay, you know how in Torchwood they're always discovering things through the CCTV that just happened to capture whatever it was they're looking for? I get it now. The sign above was for our hostel, but signs like it are everywhere, and the big boomy voice-of-God announcement came on the PA and yelled at me for taking that picture of the camera. Apparently flash photography is not permitted in the Underground. It's actually a little Orwellian.

There have been a number of moments of "oh, I GET it now" since I've been here. More to follow...
posted by Sarah E. at 6:25 PM

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