Yesterday I got my fill of the Greenwich area and then let myself get really down about not having a job, even though I can't have a job here anyway at this point. Then I let myself get stressed out about whatever I am going to do with myself without a job...and then I came to my senses and made some plans for myself to go frolick around in Notting Hill for the afternoon.
Frolicking in Notting Hill is definitely not as fun by myself as it would be with Jim, which is why we will go again this weekend. Also, by the time I actually got there, after a hellish battle with the crowds on Oxford Street (I HAD to go to T-Mobile...life without a phone when you are prone to getting lost is not a good one. Now I am able to text message Jim whenever I get lost!) it was starting to get dark...at about 4:00.
To back up, Oxford Street is a long street of mostly clothing, shoe, and electronics stores (and T-Mobile). It is very touristy and, to me, seems like a mix between Canal Street in New Orleans, Times Square in NYC, and Downtown Crossing in Boston. There are, to my delight, at least 4 H&Ms, each catering to a different style. There are also lots of department stores, a Swatch store, many, many shoe stores (two Aldos!)...I think the department stores probably had some designer stuff in them. We will have to explore them someday with shopping and fashion minded friends. For now, shopping and fashion are not really options for us.
When I reached the end of Oxford Street, the crowds drastically thinned and suddenly I found myself at the entrance to Hyde Park, marked by a huge Marble Arch (I believe that is actually its name). The park is sprawling--green with lots of trails and trees and fountains and people walking with their dogs and with their loved ones. The contrast, within a few blocks, between Oxford Street and Bayswater Road (same road, different name a few blocks down and across from Hyde Park) was unbelievable. To my right were enormous, sprawling homes and flats, cobblestone, lush bushes and trees. To the left was the park.
Eventually, after about two miles, I made it to Notting Hill, and returned to the land of the common man...but only for a few blocks. I was trying to find a book store called Books for Cooks, which is supposed to be floor to ceiling cookbooks from all over the world, but I ended up walking down the wrong road for about a mile, finally managed to get to the area the bookstore is reputed to be in, and never could find the place. Despite that, I really enjoyed my walk--more beautiful homes and, lots of young mothers all around, pushing prams and walking dogs. They were all very thin and stylish of course (most were wearing tight jeans with boots over them...which is, by far, the most popular trend around here. These women, though, were also wearing fur-lined vests and dripping with diamonds.)
Portabello Road, I think, is a big tourist attraction (there is a market there, which gets very crowded on the weekends, supposedly), but by the time I got there, it was dark, cold, and not too much was going on. We'll go back to try to find the Books for Cooks shop again this weekend. I was really disappointed that I couldn't find it on my own, but I'm sure that my skilled navigator (Jim) will be able to figure out where it's elusive side street is.
Tomorrow I am meeting a friend of Andrea's at the Cafe at Sotheby's and this weekend Jim and I will go to the Tate Modern, where we are excited about their slide exhibit--as in sliding down a slide type slides, not PowerPoint slides and we will also climb to the top of St. Paul.
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Monday, November 06, 2006
My first day alone...sniff
Since I have a notoriously bad sense of direction and I forgot my map (not that it would have helped), I decided to stick around Greenwich and Blackheath today instead of forging a new trail into unexplored parts of London. I woke up late and on the wrong side of the bed this morning, stumbled into Greenwich, managed to pull on a push door for about five minutes before figuring out that I needed to push, couldn't find what I was looking for, but I did find a realtor and I am going to look at some flats tomorrow. Yippee, skippy. Hopefully Jim can come, too. For some reason I feel sheepish and clumsy in the presence of British people. I think I just feel like I don't belong...which I don't. So that makes sense.
Anyway, here are some pictures from my walk today. This is the Queen's House in Greenwich. I believe it also houses the Maritime Museum, but I wasn't motivated enough to go to a museum today, so I didn't explore. The nice thing, though, is that most of the museums here are free, so we definitely plan to check them out. Especially the Tate Modern.
The Queen's House borders Greenwich Park. When I took this picture, I was contemplating walking up the big, huge hill below (the building on the top is the Royal Observatory). You can't see it in this shot, but there were little kids in their school uniforms screaming and running full speed down the hill. That seems to be the thing to do when you are a little kid in Greenwich Park. I decided I was too lazy to walk up THAT huge hill and veered off to the right, where I walked up another huge hill. Greenwich Park has great running potential, if I can ever get myself to actually go running. It rivals Boston with it's hills, which are hard to walk up, so I imagine they will be hard to run up, too. 
I thought this door, at the top of the hill I did choose to walk up, looked like The Secret Garden. Everything is so historic and old here--a big change after Texas!
Past the Secret Garden gate there were rose gardens, more historic buildings, more winding paths, gnarled, old trees. It's a beautiful park. If I had walked around the whole thing, I would have also been able to see the largest herd of enclosed deer in England...but I decided to go into Blackheath instead, where I had lunch, window shopped, and then got lost trying to come back to Greenwich the way that Jim took me yesterday. I ended up in London's version of "the hood" (which probably really wasn't very far away from where we are staying, as we are on the border of "the hood") and found myself in Lewisham, which I remembered Jim had marked "Bad! Bad! Bad!" on my map...so I turned around and eventually found familiar territory again and made it back to the flat where I am staying until tomorrow (I think). 
Anyway, here are some pictures from my walk today. This is the Queen's House in Greenwich. I believe it also houses the Maritime Museum, but I wasn't motivated enough to go to a museum today, so I didn't explore. The nice thing, though, is that most of the museums here are free, so we definitely plan to check them out. Especially the Tate Modern.
The Queen's House borders Greenwich Park. When I took this picture, I was contemplating walking up the big, huge hill below (the building on the top is the Royal Observatory). You can't see it in this shot, but there were little kids in their school uniforms screaming and running full speed down the hill. That seems to be the thing to do when you are a little kid in Greenwich Park. I decided I was too lazy to walk up THAT huge hill and veered off to the right, where I walked up another huge hill. Greenwich Park has great running potential, if I can ever get myself to actually go running. It rivals Boston with it's hills, which are hard to walk up, so I imagine they will be hard to run up, too. 
I thought this door, at the top of the hill I did choose to walk up, looked like The Secret Garden. Everything is so historic and old here--a big change after Texas! 
Past the Secret Garden gate there were rose gardens, more historic buildings, more winding paths, gnarled, old trees. It's a beautiful park. If I had walked around the whole thing, I would have also been able to see the largest herd of enclosed deer in England...but I decided to go into Blackheath instead, where I had lunch, window shopped, and then got lost trying to come back to Greenwich the way that Jim took me yesterday. I ended up in London's version of "the hood" (which probably really wasn't very far away from where we are staying, as we are on the border of "the hood") and found myself in Lewisham, which I remembered Jim had marked "Bad! Bad! Bad!" on my map...so I turned around and eventually found familiar territory again and made it back to the flat where I am staying until tomorrow (I think).
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Some flat pictures
Here are a few pictures of our temporary flat. We probably won't be staying in such luxury once we are in a long-term place, so we're enjoying this one for as long as we can. Here is Jim on our front stoop:
And a chilly lunch on the patio--veggies, cheese, bread, hummus from the farmer's market...and leftover spaghetti from the other night. As well as wine and tea, of course.
This is our temporary kitchen (great shot of me doing the dishes). You can't see the evil washer/dryer because it is hidden behind the island. It's smaller than a dishwasher:
And the room on the basement floor of the flat that looks out onto the patio. We haven't taken pictures of the rest of the house yet....so stay tuned.
And a chilly lunch on the patio--veggies, cheese, bread, hummus from the farmer's market...and leftover spaghetti from the other night. As well as wine and tea, of course.
This is our temporary kitchen (great shot of me doing the dishes). You can't see the evil washer/dryer because it is hidden behind the island. It's smaller than a dishwasher: 
And the room on the basement floor of the flat that looks out onto the patio. We haven't taken pictures of the rest of the house yet....so stay tuned.
British TV
The most annoying and evil gameshow ever: "Come on, dolls! Call me and tell me what THIS phrase is to win 20,000 pounds!! Don't forget to turn your telly down, so we can hear you loud and clear, loveys! Awwright! Come on, call me, call me ,call me...only a pound fifty per call!"
The market and the first culture shock experience
We headed out this morning for the Blackheath Farmer's Market--a brisk, 25 minute, uphill walk which started out cold, but got warm fast. If we come back skinny, it's because we're walking a lot more than we used to. If we come back fattened up, it's because we have been going to a lot of pubs, eating cheese and bread for almost every meal, and adding milk to our tea and porridge...and it's not low-fat milk either.
The Farmer's Market was really neat--much smaller than the one in Dallas and stocked with local farmers' produce: farm raised and produced cheese and milk, fish, beef, chicken, eggs, bread, flowers, pies, jams. We purchased broccoli, salad veggies, some delicious herbed goat cheese (lunch), two loaves of bread, garlic and onions and trekked a few feet to a deli/cafe, where we crammed into a corner and had porridge (Claire) and pesto muffin with mushrooms and eggs (Jim). We are definitely not starving in London and thought it was funny that the "American Breakfast" at this cafe consisted of pancakes with scrambled eggs in between them, bacon as a side, and smothered in maple syrup--a combination of ALL American breakfasts!
Upon returning to our flat, we decided to do some laundry, which, apparently takes a rocket scientist (or at least a Brit) to figure out. Washers and driers in London seem to be typically very small and located in the kitchen. The one in this flat is a combo washer/dryer. You can fit about 2 pairs of underwear and a sweater into it and we have yet to discover how to get the soap to go from the drawer you put it in, to the actual load of laundry that you are doing. Also, once it gets started, the door seals shut and there seems to be no way to stop it, soap or no soap. And the wash cycle goes on for HOURS...doing laundry must be a day long process. Of course, if we can ever get our clothes out of the washer again, there is no way that they will dry in that thing, so we'll hang them on the drying rack in the bathroom. I suspect that our jeans won't be dry for a few days. If anyone in the US ever complains to me about their washing machine again, I will have no sympathy.
Jim goes back to work tomorrow and I will have to get around the neighborhood and the city for the first time by myself. With my incredible sense of direction and map reading abilities, I'm sure that I will end up someplace unplanned.
parks and parks and parks
Well, after rest and illness yesterday, we moved into high speed tourist mode today. We took the tube to Westminster where there were SCADS (good British word) of people. Jim forced me to have my picture taken in front of Big Ben (For some reasons, I'm not able to add pictures to the blog right now) and then we got out of there as soon as possible and took a less crowded walk around St. James Park, where we saw ducks, Canada Geese, Black Swans, and also some seagulls. Even England has seagulls and even people in England feed them. Sigh.
We headed through St. James park and marveled at the number of people who thought it was a good idea to stop in the middle of narrow footbridge, blocking all people coming and going, for a picture. Eventually we ended up in front of Buckingham Palace (more huge groups of people taking pictures not with the guards, but with the policemen, who were cheerful about it) and cut across to Hyde Park. The parks in London are plentiful and beautiful. There were people running and biking and playing soccer...and also an obese child selling hotdogs, which gave me hope that I will get a job here in London (sad, but true).
After Hyde Park we hit Oxford Street, which was the most crowded place of all. There are lots of department stores and shops (H&M!) There are so many different kinds of people here. The women wear tight jeans with boots over them or very short mini skirts with boots--always boots. Most of the men have some sort of spiked up hairdo and pointy shoes. We got off of Oxford Street and met up with....Dan and Meg!!!!
Sadly, we were so excited to see Dan and Meg that we forgot to take pictures, but we did have some pints, rode in a black London taxi to Hampstead, where they live, met their cat Jack and then headed out for the most expensive Indian (Curry, they call it here) dinner that we have ever had. It was delicious, though, and it was great to see our good friends, although we were unable to rally enough to go out again after dinner.
Now we are back at our temporary flat, where Jim is trying to convince me that it is a good idea to call the hostess of this incredibly annoying game show, Make Your Play. The goal of the game is to call in and guess a phrase, part of which they give you. Every time you call in, you get charged a pound. If you guess a correct phrase, you win 20,000 pounds, 50,000 pounds, etc. They play suspensful music and hardly anyone wins, but this woman chats you up on the TV, and tries to seduce poor, defenseless people ( I suspect that most of them are old) into calling over and over again until they get through and can guess. It's completely moronic, but somehow Jim is drawn to it. British TV is a hoot!
Still haven't taken pictures of the flat, but we'll do that soon. Tomorrow we head out to the Blackheath Farmer's Market, where we'll by farm fresh local produce.
We headed through St. James park and marveled at the number of people who thought it was a good idea to stop in the middle of narrow footbridge, blocking all people coming and going, for a picture. Eventually we ended up in front of Buckingham Palace (more huge groups of people taking pictures not with the guards, but with the policemen, who were cheerful about it) and cut across to Hyde Park. The parks in London are plentiful and beautiful. There were people running and biking and playing soccer...and also an obese child selling hotdogs, which gave me hope that I will get a job here in London (sad, but true).
After Hyde Park we hit Oxford Street, which was the most crowded place of all. There are lots of department stores and shops (H&M!) There are so many different kinds of people here. The women wear tight jeans with boots over them or very short mini skirts with boots--always boots. Most of the men have some sort of spiked up hairdo and pointy shoes. We got off of Oxford Street and met up with....Dan and Meg!!!!
Sadly, we were so excited to see Dan and Meg that we forgot to take pictures, but we did have some pints, rode in a black London taxi to Hampstead, where they live, met their cat Jack and then headed out for the most expensive Indian (Curry, they call it here) dinner that we have ever had. It was delicious, though, and it was great to see our good friends, although we were unable to rally enough to go out again after dinner.
Now we are back at our temporary flat, where Jim is trying to convince me that it is a good idea to call the hostess of this incredibly annoying game show, Make Your Play. The goal of the game is to call in and guess a phrase, part of which they give you. Every time you call in, you get charged a pound. If you guess a correct phrase, you win 20,000 pounds, 50,000 pounds, etc. They play suspensful music and hardly anyone wins, but this woman chats you up on the TV, and tries to seduce poor, defenseless people ( I suspect that most of them are old) into calling over and over again until they get through and can guess. It's completely moronic, but somehow Jim is drawn to it. British TV is a hoot!
Still haven't taken pictures of the flat, but we'll do that soon. Tomorrow we head out to the Blackheath Farmer's Market, where we'll by farm fresh local produce.
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