Day 11: Moving man and The Machine

The Machine

London moves and if you don’t move with it, you’re bound to get run over. 

If you had asked me a week ago how my commute was, I would have told you “I took the red pill.” The complex matrix of trains, tunnels, platforms and elevators that create the London Underground, is like taking a breathless free-fall down the rabbit hole.

Moving man

But eleven days into it now, I can safely say the red pill wasn't that bad. Being a lifelong Californian, I’m about as used to public transportation as I am to not seeing the sun every day. Not the best of combinations for this Angeleno, but when in London, you do as the Londoners do, you disregard the weather and you ride the tube.

The daily grind

The Underground is a circuitous system of arteries and veins that feed the heart of the city. It is remarkable to see. But what you don’t see is equally as remarkable. There is a certain politesse that Londoners afford each other on this ritualistic and communal ride that is quite touching. Those who can help those who cannot lift everything from bags to suitcases to baby carriages without prompting. There is no pushing or shoving. There is no grabbing of seats or hogging of hand rails. There is no leftover trash or unwelcomed graffiti. You stand on the right, walk on the left and you go with the flow, cordially.

The daily Metro

Even the overhead messages are polite. The engineer makes announcements with the most apologetic of tones when the train is delayed, the Station Master preempts your confusion with updates on lines that are down or closed, and the pleasantest of accents ever reminds you to “Mind the Gap.” It’s so close to an urban utopia, I keep expecting H.G Wells to show up!

But blitheness aside, this is a system that works and works well. Every morning, I now freely take ‘The Metro’ newspaper handed to me by the newspaper man at the front entrance of the station and catch up on the news (and gossip) on my way to class. I then fall into pace with the rest of the crowd. 

Man and machine meet

People are hooked-up, plugged-in, wired-on and totally connected. Familiar,white ear- buds, intently climb out of long, black coats. Novels, papers and iphones stay clutched for convenient entertainment on the AM ride. Regardless of stop or start endpoints, travelers effortlessly slide into line with each other, moving in sync with equal rhythm and measure. Up the escalators, down the stairs, through the tunnels, out the doors. . .the dance of the underground has begun and the choreography needs no rehearsal. This is a second nature waltz.  

Plugged in

The “dancers” move in tempo to a cadence that conducts itself and those unfamiliar with the steps, don't take long to learn. The orchestrated movement of the well-timed masses mimics the precision of the machine they move toward. Man and machine collide together in exact time. One ending where the other begins. Two colossal forces merging on a single platform, gingerly mindful of the gap that divides them. 

This is London and this is how it moves.

Today Colin Firth is the New King of England

Day 10: English Preserves

English Preserves

Jam-Jelly-Marmalade-Conserve = Museum-Gallery-Collection-Reserve

English Preserves

The English like to preserve things. Lots of things. Whether it’s their history, their heritage, their way of life or their fruit, this country has a way of ensuring their most endeared traditions stay well taken care of. Why is that? It’s not to say other countries don’t have similar tendencies towards historical archiving and preservation of their goods, but the Brits seem to be especially good at this.

When I arrived in my apartment last week I found three things already in my pantry. “Bonne Maman” strawberry conserve, “Morrison’s” orange marmalade (the kind with bits of orange peel still in it) and Earl Grey tea. Now, if I didn’t know any better I would have thought this was an over-done, clichéd “Welcome to London” gift basket left to me by the best intending of landlords.  But I knew better.

This wasn’t some puka shelled-pineapple-coconut-orchid-lei extravaganza left in the center of the bed day one of a Hawaiian holiday package. You know, those convivial and corny arrangements tourists expect and hospitality concierges pander to, those trite offerings that say, “this is what you think the natives here are doing so we’ll support your misconceptions.” No, this was a genuine offering. The “natives” here really did have tea every day and they really did serve their favorite fruit preserves with it!

But their preservation is not limited to fruit and tea time alone. I have not walked down a street in London yet without running into a museum, a library, a gallery, or a collection that wasn’t preserving a part of this country’s legacy to some degree or another. From the theatrically large British Museum with room after room after room of highly treasured antiquity on reserve, to the more sedate, but equally robust, Wallace Collection of Master painters housed in a once-privately owned mansion, the breadth and scope of where and how this country preserves its treasures is vast.

But I suppose like any traveler who returns home with souvenirs, we like to find prime places and spaces to display our goods not just because we really like to look at them, but because we also really like our guests to look at them.   

...and let thy feel millenniums hence be set in midst of knowledge.

To look at them and think how cool we were for going to all those places. And for a country like England whose historical legacy is fraught with centuries of conquest and colonialization the world over, it’s consistent the appeal of wanting to show off the goods. And yet today, as I passed along the Egyptian mummies, the Rosetta Stone and the Elgin Marbles, with the droves of other tourists who came from buses lining the streets alongside the British Museum, I couldn’t help but think these displays of “English Preserves” were a lot like English marmalade, neatly packaged, nicely labeled and served up daily for mass consumption.

The Elgin Marbles

And as mesmerizing as it was to walk through the long hall of disarticulated Parthenon carvings stripped from the frieze and pediment of their original temple structure, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would look like to see these “fruits” on the actual tree they came from.

The Wallace Collection

The Wallace Collection is a National Museum in London that was created from the private collection of the Marquess of Hertford. He left the house and the entire collection to his son Richard Wallace when he died, who later donated the collection to the nation. The entire collection is still contained in the original Hertford house. 

Walls of Paintings!

The caveat for donation was that the entire collection stay together and no object ever leave the house, even for loan exhibitions. 

It was overwhelming to see Rembrandt, Velazquez, Titian, Gainsborough and Rubens all in one place. All these Master Artists under one private roof! The collection was immense! And it didn’t stop at paintings.

How could the horse even move!

There were rooms of armory, porcelain, jewelry and furniture. 

Every room looked like this!

The opulence was dizzying and a little exhausting, but so far, it has been my favorite museum yet.

The British Museum

This place is HUGE!

The British Museum is just a stone’s throw from campus. I have been going there in between classes and on lighter days to take in as much of it as I can. 

Walking through the halls is like going back in time (minus all the digital cameras and the kids on field trip running around). 

The Rosetta Stone

Fortunately, it is close enough to pop in whenever I’d like because I can’t imagine trying to see it all in a single visit! It is EPIC. When you stop to think of the all the riches contained in even one of these rooms it makes your head spin. Pottery, Buddhas, temple doors, mummies, jewelry, weapons, textiles, carvings, carpets, porcelain, glass, gold. . . .on and on and on. How did they get all this stuff?? And are they ever going to give any of it back? 

The Elgin Marbles

On the one hand it is reassuring to see the level of archival preservation and deference given these objects. After all one can only imagine what would have befallen them had they been left to destabilized or war torn countries. 

But on the other hand, there is a certain sadness I feel that they are kept so far away from where they were intended to be.

Day 9: Dr. Sircar, I presume?

The Mystery of the Red and White Scarves

The sun shone briefly this morning as I made my way to the Highbury and Islington station. Foot traffic being lighter on Sundays, made it easier for me to get a seat on the train. As I settled in for my four-stop ride towards North West London, I noticed a young man in his mid-20s casually adjusting a red and white horizontal striped scarf around his neck. How very Dr. Seuss of him I thought laughingly as the train made way for Euston Station. I paid little attention to him after that until we reached the next stop.

There, three more men, wearing the exact same red and white scarf entered the train! Curious. I wondered what all these scarves meant. Perhaps it was National Dr. Seuss day or something. But that couldn’t be right, Dr. Seuss was American, why would they have a national holiday for him here? Hmmm…curiouser. At the next stop two of the red and white scarves descended the train and four more got on! Amongst them a young boy was not only wearing a red and white scarf, but he was wearing a red and white striped hat as well! What was going on? I needed to find out and fast, and I knew just the person to ask. Why, Sherlock Holmes of course.

Sherlock Holmes' Office

221B Baker Street is the fabled address of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. It is here where the famed Holmes and Dr. Watson lived and worked. It is here where they solved many mysteries including The Sign of Four and The Hounds of the Baskervilles. It is here where I would go to get all my questions answered about the Red and White Scarves. The house was a narrow, creaky, three floor museum recreated from various scenes in the Sherlock Holmes stories. The sun had all but faded away by the time I reached the front door and the rain began to fall, and fall hard. I swiftly shook the water clinging to my umbrella with a quick flick and made way to Holmes' upstairs office.

Prepared with a list of questions, and a bag of coins to enlist his services, I was sure I would have the answers to this growing mystery by day’s end. But alas neither Holmes nor Watson were anywhere to be found! I searched all three floors from top to bottom, nothing. Hmm, they must be out on another case. Left to my own devices with coins and questions still in hand, I looked around a little more and then left disheartened in my pursuit. Feeling helpless that I would ever get this mystery solved, I wearily made my way back to the tube.  

On my walk there I heard singing. Yes singing. Loud singing. Loud men singing. At a nearby pub, standing outside in the rain, were a group of men singing and cheering with pints of beer in their hands. Some of them were wearing the same red and white striped scarves I had seen earlier! I couldn’t make out what they were singing, or why they were singing, but I felt I was getting closer to the answer. 

Maybe I wouldn’t need Holmes after all. I walked on a bit more. More and more red and white scarves began to hurry past me. 

Across the street another loud-pub-of-men-with-pints-in-their-hands-wearing-red-and-white-scarves was  singing. There was something going on in this City and I was going to get to the bottom of it. Using my powers of deductive reasoning (modeled after Sherlock Holmes' methodology of course) I concluded: It could not be National Dr. Seuss Day because Dr. Seuss was American and therefore would not be celebrated to this magnitude in the UK, nor would any national Dr. Seuss day include pints of beer (I think). 

The Hound

Nor could it be National Where’s Waldo Day because although Where’s Waldo wore red and white horizontal striped sweaters and hats, he never wore scarves! A, ha! This could only mean one thing! It must be National Birmingham City vs. Arsenal for the Carling Cup Football Final Day! And the red and white scarves were in support of team Arsenal! Of course! How stupid of me not to have known. I mean after all, when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth!

I left Holmes a note

How could I have missed it before! I'm, after all, such a huge football fan! (ahem)

It wasn’t until I reached home and turned on the TV to discover the 2-1 victory of Birmingham City over Arsenal for the football cup final and the hordes of disappointed faces in red-and-white scarves being interviewed about it, did I realize I really didn’t need Sherlock Holmes to solve this case for me after all. I had solved the Mystery of the Red and White Scarves all on my own. Pleased with myself, I lit my pipe, sat by the fire and settled in with a hot cup of tea. Perhaps Sherlock Holmes would be enlisting my services soon instead of Dr. Watson's. Dr. Sircar, I presume sounded so much better anyway.

The Red and White Arsenal Scarves

As usual

Whole lotta nothin' goin' on

After all, it was elementary, my dear reader, elementary.

A lotta rain

A Little Sun

Day 8: Dreaming up the Rain Dial

Wanting to go out and play

The uninvited cold edged its way through the cracks of my door, tippy-toed across the wooden floors to the foot of my bed, snuck in under the covers, despite my vehement shooing and stayed there. Silver chains of rain beads made links across my window glass and fancifully displayed themselves as if awaiting my selection. Deep sigh. Plans for a walk through Hyde Park thwarted again by thoughts of soggy pant legs, damp hair and an unprotected camera lens. Best to find an indoor plan instead, I thought. As I lay in bed dreaming up four-walled adventures for the day, I realized this wasn’t really bad rain so much as it was cozy rain. This was the kind of rain that made you want to stay in bed a little longer, curl up with a good Netflix stream, sip hot, sugary, libations in oversized coffee mugs and wear fuzzy slippers kind of rain. This was built-in-excuse for complacency kind of rain. I liked this rain.

The Backyard

Doesn't it ever stop?

You wouldn’t think it, but there are many different kinds of rain in London. Sure, it’s all the same water falling from the sky, but it’s how it falls that makes the difference. I think the great British novelist knew this and classified the rain to their advantage. They used the rain to “set the stage” for some of the greatest literary scenes ever written. I further think that some of the greatest literature ever written came from here precisely because of the rain. I mean afterall, what else was there to do but write. Decent North Face jackets were hard to come by in those days, so rather than weather the cold in wardrobe that looked like it came off the set of Les Miserables, you stayed at home and you wrote. And you wrote about the rain.
Take Jane Austen. She dialed the rain to “passionate release” when Darcy finally professes his love to Elizabeth Benet in Pride and Prejudice. Emily Bronte turned it to “heart-wrenching downpour” when Catherine seeks Heathcliff on the moors of Wuthering Heights, Shakespeare to “ominous thunder” the night Macbeth kills Banquo, Dickens to “steady sinister ” when Ebenezer Scrooge enters scene and Conan Doyle to “mysterious-drizzle” when the Hounds of the Baskervilles are heard. These writers knew how to order up the rain just the way they wanted it whenever they wanted it. I wish I could do that. Though if I had to choose the rain today I think I’d dial the one right now: “cozy-comfort.” And the scene would be: “Then she goes back to bed for a few more hours.” And that’s exactly what I did.

Day 7: Top-offs and Takeaways

Modern London

Londoners don’t get things “to-go," nor do they get “refills” or “reloads.” When you’re ordering out, you’re getting it to “take away.” If your Oyster cards needs more mileage or your cell phone needs more minutes you get them “topped-off.”  Although I’ve been tempted once or twice now to say,”Whaddya mean you don’t understand what I’m saying?? I’m not the one with the accent buddy!” I’ve refrained. Instead I am learning to “speak the language.” And the language here isn’t limited to the enunciation, pronunciation or the vernacular of speech, it is an entire cultural language onto itself.  London is a modern city living alongside its historical past. 

The Crypt at St. Pancras

The steam-punk vibe of the industrial underground quickly evaporates to old gothic cathedrals when exited above. Updated London ‘black cabs” or hackney carriages, give the streets a classic feel of the early 1900’s, while traditional double decker buses freshen up with ads of the latest Nick Cage movie. Contemporary storefronts such as Dwell and Paperchase face old English churches and "castles" across the street.For every steel and glass modern feat of architecture erected on one side, there is a revered, historical landmark of mortar and brick on the other.

An "old castle" peers above the modern library

The mixture of old and new is a juxtaposition that is classically England. It's hard to imagine what this city would look like without its history. I suppose the streets here are a lot like the language the people speak. The city doesn't “takeaway” the old when the new comes in, it merely “tops-off” what it already has.

Day 6: A Little Sun and a Lot of Sleep Make a World of Difference

Spring peeps through

California Dreaming on Warren St.

As I peeped through the padded night mask stolen from the first class section of my Virgin Atlantic flight out through the curtains, I noticed something I hadn’t seen yet in London, THE SUN!! Yes! The SUN! Could it be that this country was indeed touched by rays of the radiant sphere? Could it be that Seasonal Affective Disorder and Vitamin D deficiency were not the inevitable fate of every one of this country's inhabitants? Could it be that sunglass displays were not in fact someone’s idea of a sick joke? Could it be? As I bounded out of bed, rapidly dismantling the research thesis I began crafting in my head on: “English Plantlife and their Alternative Pathways to Photosynthesis,” I realized just how much I took the sun for granted. I swore in that moment that never again would I curse the sun or the rain as I fiddled with the A/C or windshield wipers while stuck in traffic on the 405. Finally over jet lag with 12 hours of sleep the night before (I hadn't gotten that much sleep since I started med school!), I prepared myself for a full day of sightseeing and city walking. With my London A-Z in hand I took off in search of all city wonders. As I am first and foremostly a nerd, despite country of birth or origin I headed straight for the "medicine museum" first.

Ayahuasca Oddities and The Wonderwall

Free entry for the incurably curious

Henry Wellcome was a pharmacist and a philanthropist whose love for medicine and its eclectic history founded the ‘Wellcome Collection:  A Free Destination for the Incurably Curious.” Sounded like just my thing. Founded on Euston Road not too far from campus, its most current exhibit was called “High Society: Mind-altering drugs in history and culture.” Sounded just like my thing. This was sure to give “high tea” a WHOLE new meaning. The exhibit was an immense display of historic drug paraphernalia ranging from ancient hookah pipes and betel nut cutters, to 1960's makeshift beer bongs. 
There were laudanum inspired photographs, crack house dioramas, absinthe induced literary pieces and psychedelic walls of revolving colors. But for as much as I searched, I could not find a room that gave "free samples" or had "how to" workshops. Major letdown. Alas, I pressed on. The top floor of The Collection, was an enormous and beautiful reference library that housed every historic book known to the ancient and modern world of medicine. Lister, Darwin, Mendel, Semelweiss, Grey, Nightingale, Curie....you name them, they were there. 
After thoroughly romping through pre-historic JAMA and BMJ articles and combing through medieval manuals on consumption and bloodletting, I remembered that I wasn't on call anymore, nor was I anywhere near a hospital and perhaps I needed to get out of the medical library. 

Early pharmaceuticals made from heroin and cocaine

So, with fervent determination I went back onto the street ready for my next adventure. That's right, to another library. The nerd in me would not go quietly. Out of the Wellcome Library and into the British one.

Newton

Gutenberg, Alice and the Magna Carta  The British Library is overwhelming. It is a giant, bustling city with acres and acres and floors and floors of books. Old books, new books, out of print books, e-books…on and on. In the middle of the Library is a glass walled column that houses the King’s Library. From all around you can see large, ancient, leather bound tomes from every language, dead or alive, ever written in. I was exhausted just thinking about the pages of texts and stories and history that were written in those pages! But this is not a stuffy library by any means and it's even a bit noisy! It is a vibrant, fully functioning, operational, social spot with laptops, backpacks and study groups everywhere you look. On the piazza entrance there is a giant statue of Newton and beneath it there are cafes and restaurants where people come to eat lunch and do some reading. The moment I walked into the library, I knew it was going to take more than one day to grasp it all, so I headed straight for the rare documents gallery first just in case I ran out of time. In this one, dimly lit, purpled-walled room lived Shakespeare’s first folio, Handel’s original Messiah, The Canterbury Tales, The Gutenberg Bible, The Magna Carta, and ALICE IN WONDERLAND!! all beautifully conserved and displayed. People take on an immediate silence and reverence when they enter this room, an almost quiet-holiness washes over them. All the original works of great Masters in a single four walled space can be a little overwhelming.

The library piazza

But by far, the display that most seduced me was Lewis Carroll’s diary and his first draft of Alice in Wonderland. I spent more time with the Mad Hatter than I did with Gutenberg, Chaucer and the Magna Carta combined! I was really glad the Queen built a place for all of the great works to live in. And I was even more glad that she invited all the people of the world to come and see them for free.