Sunday activities

From Donna

We got a late start this morning. Really late. We finally made it out of the house just before noon. Well, at least we got a good night’s sleep!

We went first to get our ride on the London Eye, a.k.a. the British Airways Eye. This is a giant Ferris wheel although something tells me Ferris would not recognize it as a descendent of his invention. When I made the reservation I realized that they don’t call it a ride, they call it a “flight”. You “board” your pod with others and take a half hour “flight”. It’s very slow and very smooth, so as long as Lenny was not pointing out where the rivets were coming undone, I wasn’t the least bit scared. My big project was to try to get the people in the next capsule to take a photo of us, and I would take a photo of them, with the idea that we would exchange photos by email later. I felt proud that I accomplished this tricky negotiation all through pantomime. We waited for them to emerge after we “landed”, but somehow they seemed surprised to see us. They had been happy to have us take their picture, but it’s not clear they really understood my proposal. So much for non-verbal communications.

Outside the Eye was even more entertaining than inside, with bunches of out-of-work actors dressed up in a variety of strange and wonderful costumes, with a tin cup in front. For a few coins, they would do something …. pop out of a box, play the guitar, ride a bicycle, etc. It reminded me of those small broncos in the supermarket when we were kids where you put in a dime and the thing moved.

We saw a sign for an exhibit of Salvatore Dali’s works, so we mortgaged the house to be able to afford the entry. They had an amazing selection of his sculptures and drawings, although none of his oils. We ate in their small, pleasant café.

We then tried to visit Westminster Cathedral, but it is closed to tourists on Sunday. We meandered down Whitehall. We wanted to see #10 Downing, but it is protected now like a fortress. You can see the Downing Street sign, but that’s about it. Lenny pointed out that the soldier even had his hand on his gun at all times.

At Trafalgar Square, Lenny ascended Nelson’s column part way to pose for my photo, which does not do the situation justice since it’s not clear the effort he put into it. There was a demonstration going on that was, as best we could tell, pro-curry. Go figure.

We met up with Guy just before our theatre was due to start (of course he couldn’t call us because I’ve given out an incorrect phone number of our GSM phone three times). We saw Brief Encounter by Noel Coward. The basic idea was not particularly deep (i.e. a brief love affair), but the staging was marvelous. The two key actors went to and from seats in the audience. Sometimes they walked through a screen and became a movie. There were multiple special effects of trains going by. There was quite a bit of music, and it seemed like at any time any one of the actors would pick up an instrument and start playing it. They served refreshments at your seats at the intermission to give the sense of a 1930’s performance. It’s hard to describe all the clever little moments, so let’s just say that an we all enjoyed the show.

We had a nice dinner at a Lebanese restaurant in Mayfair, and resolved to get to our sightseeing a bit earlier tomorrow.


from Marina

I woke up too late in the morning. I had been woken up from my moms voice saying, “C’mon sweety! Time to get up and take your shower! You slept in until 10:00 in the mornin’, and it’s about time you got up!”
That’s not the way I was hoping to wake up, but I figured its better to get up when my mom is telling me to and not when she’s yelling at me to do it.
So I took my shower, put on some clothing, ate some food that did not have any type of carbs, brushed my teeth, put on my shoes and socks, and waited for my parents to finish getting ready. by the time we were all ready to go it was only about 11:30am. the day was half gone, but I didn’t care, because I was still half asleep.