The Lazy Cherub Enigma: London Calling

Ah jolly olde England. London calling and we answered. Here we are! So let’s begin at the beginning - with a flight. Until someone of immense intellect perfects teleportation, the only way to get anywhere significant is by plane – or as I like to call it – flying cattle cars. We have yet to accumulate enough wealth or airline point to fly first class so like the other 99% of humanity, we travel “economy.” Ken likes to rationalize that the money we save means we can stay in better accommodations. I suppose one step up from a 6 to a room hostel is worth giving up a seat that can recline to a comfortable sleeping position. We flew Air Transat. It started out good. The plane was new – even had “new airplane smell” and the seat back entertainment unit actually worked. We also had the seat between us empty although I must admit; I have no idea how a person could fit there unless they were the size of a small child. Things got a lot different once we were in the air. There was a fair amount of turbulence so drink and food service was constantly interrupted. On Ken’s side, the attendants made it up and down twice in the first hour hurling drinks left and right. Meanwhile on my side the other flight attendants never made it past row 12. Eventually, a woman 2 rows behind me went up to ask what was going on and the 100-year-old flight attendant marched down the aisle and screamed “I’VE BEEN DOWN HERE! WHAT IS THE HELL IS THE PROBLEM?” To which we all said, “No you haven’t! You’ve never made it past the first 6 rows which we’ve watched you serve 3 times in the last 3 hours.” She argued for another 5 minutes and then went and got the cart. Started serving the family beside me and realized she was out of apple juice. Reaches up above my seat to press the “call button” and proceeds to press it over and over and over again until finally, the purser from first class runs down the aisle in a panic thinking someone had just gone into cardiac arrest. Turns out, there was plenty of apple juice in her cart if she actually opened any of the drawers. When it came time to serve dinner, she kept forgetting where she left off which meant some people were served twice while others not at all (I got 3 breakfasts). Meanwhile, her 150-year-old counterpart spent the bulk of the flight aimlessly wandering the aisles and falling into anyone sitting in an aisle seat (not due to turbulence btw). Quite a few people ended up wearing their beverages and meal for the duration of the flight. Now before you get offended and call me out on ageism – let me be clear: I don’t care how old you are if you want to be a flight attendant! But I draw the line at being able to walk a straight line without falling every 10 feet and it helps if you are not suffering from dementia.

(Now is the time where I provide my in 140 characters or less in-fight movie reviews)

“Exodus: Gods and Kings” – Christian Bale goes 6 years without a bath, has deep meaningful conversations with a rock and essentially becomes the Jewish version of the Taliban all because he met Ben Kingsley at a pyramid building site.

“The Hobbit” Battle of Five Armies” – WTF Peter Jackson. All that build up in the last movie about Smaug and finally getting some dragon Benedict Cumberbatch only to have it all crash and burn within the first 5 minutes of the movie. PS. Total overkill on Bilbo’s hobbit feet.

“Night at the Museum 3” – Ben Stiller has a primal cave man thing for Rebel Wilson. Ben Kingsley shows up, there is a reference to pyramids, and Sir Lancelot tries to dance a lot with Hugh Jackman. Everyone get’s peed on by a monkey.

Arrived in London around 9 am local. We figured we would get to our hotel, sleep for 3 or 4 hrs. and then hit the streets. Lay down for a nap and the next thing we knew it was 7:30 at night. Jet lag – it will do that to you. We needed food so Ken found a Sainsbury’s a few blocks up that had sandwiches marked down to 99p. Ate. Showered. Passed out again. Didn’t wake up until 7 am Monday morning.

After a breakfast of cheap sandwiches and instant Starbucks coffee we were off to the Imperial War Museum. Even as a peace-loving beatnik I found the museum to be a great way to “kill a day.” It has been seriously overhauled since my last visit but the big guns where everyone poses showing off their “big guns” still remain, as do all the planes and tanks in the main foyer. Sadly, one can no longer climb on them and recreate famous scenes from Inglorious Basterds or Patton. One of the more interesting pieces on display was what we thought was a rather interesting sculpture of scrap metal neatly folded like origami and stained a lovely hue of burnt umber. Turns out it was a van that was at ground zero for a massive car bombing in Afghanistan). Never had something look so beautiful and painfully barbaric all at the same time.

The big draw for the museum is the World War I exhibit. This is a definite must see unless you have PTSD in which case you are going to want to avoid it at all costs. You spend around 2 hours wandering through amazing displays of the war while being bombarded with the sounds of machine gun fire, artillery explosions and the screams of dying men. It’s about as immersive as you can get without actually fighting the war itself. Add to that the throngs of screaming school children and you will need therapy and a stiff drink before you head up to the next level for the “Ration Fashions of World War II” exhibit. Ken kind of poo-poo’d the idea of checking out a “fashion” exhibit (he has never let me live it down about the V & A and how “All it had was a bunch of clothes and tea sets”) but we both enjoyed this display very much. It is amazing what people could make when they had to recycle material due to rationing. Because so many of the images we see of the Second World War are black and white you never get to appreciate how much colour there really was. I would fit right in! Not sure I would want to knit my own panties. It just seems wrong to have raw wool “down there.” We also got a kick out of all the morale posters about how as a woman, no matter how ratty your clothes were you should ALWAYS wear lip stick and do your hair. You know – do your bit to remind the boys what they are fighting for. One poster said, “Just because a war is on doesn’t mean a lady leaves home without lipstick! Don’t be the reason our boy’s won’t fight! Keep your face pretty and your hair tidy!” Right next to that poster was one about “Secrets lose wars. Don’t tell her anything other than you love her.”

After a $400 museum latte the size of a thimble we made the afternoon trek to the Tate Modern. We were both super pumped to see one of our favourite museums only to arrive and find it in the throws of deconstruction. There is a new Tate Modern slated for opening in the next year so the current one looks like someone ransacked it and no one bothered to clean up afterwards. God what a disappointment. I love modern art and the more obscure the better. But the crap that was in the Tate Modern wasn’t even decent enough to be called crap. It was beyond insulting. We actually wondered if the entire museum was set up as a giant installation piece where gullible humans wander through filthy rooms looking at pieces of news paper with paint splotches and photos of a man’s uncircumcised penis pressed between glass slides murmuring to each other “This is ART!?!?” while someone in a back room films and giggles maniacally. The Rothko meditation gallery is still there although it was hard to get meditative with the Lucien Freud massive scrotum and dong painting blinding you just before you went in. Ken is scarred for life.

London Tourist Tip: Do not eat at a museum. Museums are free to get in and there are “picnic” areas to eat your own packed lunch, which you want to do. Museum food will cost you your first-born child’s college fund for a burger. As a matter of fact, just don’t even bother to eat out in London. It is beyond expensive. As in, plan to mortgage your house for a sit down dinner. On the plus side, lots of super markets sell cheap take away. I already mentioned to sandwiches. You can also get cheap 3 dish Indian food with naan bread for 5 pounds or less. I have not given up my Starbucks Lattes but I may switch to crack cocaine because it will save us a ton of money in this city.

Day Two had us walking through Hyde Park to find the ranting podium (aka Speaker's Corner) and Princess Diana’s memorial. We found neither although we did find the ostentatious memorial to Prince Albert (who looks kind of like a drag queen in this one) and I got attacked by pigeons while trying to feed the wild parakeets and red squirrels. Hyde Park is a birder’s paradise with a plethora of songbirds tame enough to eat out of your hand. A welcome sight after the Natural History Museum with its cases of songbirds stuffed and pinned into ghoulish Victorian dioramas. (The hummingbird display case screams “Serial Killer in the Making.”)

We then took the bus to North London/Camden. Wow – you are so not in Kansas once you get to Camden. Five minutes off the bus and some homeless guy cycles past two women and yells “FUCKING BITCHES” for no apparent reason and then tries to run them over. Every second shop is tattoo parlour. Every first shop is a bar of questionable repute. There is a famous street market in what was once the old stables and blacksmith shops of old London. Now it is rows and rows of Goth clothing, incense sellers and palm readers. The whole place smells like weed. There is Amy Winehouse graffiti everywhere. My kind of place! We walked along the canal and chatted with the junkies. Wandered through the market stalls and bought some creepy Star Wars t-shirts. Amidst all the squalor you begin to see the seeds of gentrification sprout – an old warehouse district being remodelled into luxury lofts, a Whole Foods market wedged between the curry shop and a piercing and branding studio. And then – holy of holies – STARBUCKS! Time for my ridiculously expensive caffeine fix.