Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

RUMBELOW AND THE RIPPER

I’ve always been fascinated by Jack the Ripper.  It’s probably not possible to be captivated by British culture and not also be curious about the dark deeds of their most infamous citizen.  And so of course a walking tour through Jack’s stalking grounds was high on my list of things to do.

There are a number of these tours, but make no mistake, the London Walks tour is the best.  Our guide was Mr. Donald Rumbelow, considered to be the world expert on the Ripper.  A former London police sergeant, now a crime historian, Mr. Rumbelow’s written a number of books on the Ripper, and he owns what is believed to be Jack’s knife!

The tour begins outside the Tower Hill tube station, across from the Tower of London.  When I first arrive, there are only a few people, but before long there’s a large crowd and I get worried that it will be hard to see.  Then Mr. Rumbelow appears, wearing khakis, a button-down, and a rumpled jacket, wheeling a little cart filled with copies of his latest book.  He’s very kindly, chats with everyone.

And then the tour begins, and I soon forget my worries.  Because Mr. Rumbelow is a master storyteller.  As he leads us to each site, he weaves the tale of the Ripper murders in a straightforward fashion – gruesome details and all – but with respect for the victims.  No sensationalism.  Just the cold hard facts told in an engaging way, with a dash of humor.  Mr. Rumbelow is very diligent about making sure everyone can hear him and gets to see each site.  He shares details that I’ve never heard or read before.  For instance, I didn’t know that the first victim, Polly Nichols, had been married, with five children, before taking to the streets.  I didn’t know that Catherine Eddowes met up with Jack outside a church – St. Botolph’s – and that this church was used by many prostitutes as a kind of pick-up spot because it was situated on a busy roundabout.  If a prostitute stood in one place for too long, she could be arrested for soliciting.  But if she kept moving, the cops would leave her alone.  So the women would walk around and around St. Botolph’s until they found a customer.  Crazy.

But it’s when we cross over the boundary separating the City of London and the East End that I really become captivated.  It’s in the East End that I feel transported back in time, as if I could be a woman in 1888, walking the same cobble-stoned streets.  The same streets Jack must surely have stalked.  Many of the buildings in the East End have survived from the Ripper’s time, which is why it has such an aura about it.  But the feeling goes beyond that – a nameless sense of the many hundreds of people who lived there in such poverty, struggling every day to raise a few pence for a bed and a bite to eat.

Mr. Rumbelow guides the Ripper tour only a few times a month, but he’s well worth the wait.  Go online here to see which dates he’s walking.

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Dear Anglophiles: The amazing writer Mr. Douglas Watkinson provides today's guest post.  Mr. Watkinson has written for television (including the Midsomer Murders series, beloved by Anglophiles everwhere!) and for stage.  He is also a novelist, having created the detective Nathan Hawk series. 

I’ve written for television all my life. When I started out, it was the brave new artistic medium of the seventies and eighties and we had an absolute ball!

I was lucky. Most writers didn’t earn enough money to keep body and soul together, let alone feed, clothe, and educate four children as I did. Not that it was plain sailing all the way, and one year, 1997 to be precise, it required some very nifty improvisation. My wife decided that we would ‘do bed and breakfast’, assuring me that it would get us out of our financial difficulty of the moment. She was right. Within months, two small barns had been converted into guest units and were up and running and an incredible mix of people were coming from all over the world, for all manner of reasons.

Then, of course, I was offered more television work, this time in the shape of helping to set up Midsomer Murders and then writing for it. I was all for slimming down the B & B, perhaps even shelving it, but my wife, being a canny Northerner, wasn’t so keen. The guest units stayed, the business prospered, and these days we could fill the place every night of the year if we chose to.

As far as Midsomer Murders goes, I’ll cut to the chase. Fifteen years, 230 countries, and 208 bodies later, none of us who worked on those early stories can quite believe that they've been seen by one billion people worldwide. I have to repeat it to make sure I’m not dreaming. A billion people have watched it, and they all have one thing in common. They believe that the fictional county of Midsomer represents the true England, with the murder and mayhem being nothing more than a touch of colour. How do I know this? Because 15 years after we opened our B & B, 15 years after those first Midsomer stories, dramatised from Caroline Graham’s novels, people come to see the locations, and it just so happens that most of the series was made within a stone’s throw from where I live. Which means that many of them stay with us.

In general, people can’t believe that me writing for the series and helping to run a B & B in the thick of the locations is a happy coincidence. If anything, they imagine that British television works by a producer picking a location and then knocking on local doors to see if anyone would care to try their hand at a script. If only it were that simple!

And when I said earlier that we get visitors from all over the world, I wasn’t kidding. We get Midsomer fans from as far away as Estonia, Latvia, Australia, Canada, America, and Japan, to say nothing of our regulars from Europe. One couple from Sweden has been three times! We consider them to be friends. A couple of weeks ago, I gave a talk to members of The Midsomer Murders Society, which meets yearly for a four day event, and they too represent all nations. Attending the evening feast, in a gathering of some 80 people, there were Germans, Belgians, Australians, Americans, Canadians ... as well as the English hardcore.

I have, as you might guess, come to know my audience over the past 15 years of the two businesses, writing and hospitality, running side by side, and I’ve discovered something which never ceases to surprise and delight me. There is a thirst out there in the world for all things essentially English - from the landscape and the people who live in it, to the history and architecture certainly, to the murderers, their victims, and the people who solve the crimes. One billion people testify to this fact. Their belief that what they see in a drama like Midsomer is quintessentially English and their desire for it to remain so, both baffles and enthrals me and, I must confess, chimes with my own wishes.

That’s one of the reasons why I created the detective Nathan Hawk book series, because as I looked round our one-billion audience, I saw that they didn’t have a huge variety of fundamentally English detectives to move on to. Plenty of Americans, yes, plenty of female sleuths, far too many professional policemen who seem to become very samish in their work! What I grandly thought the world was lacking was a rogue, English detective, with attitude and wit, who would open up for those of the one billion who want to read him, a place which already delights them - England.

It’s been a tough learning curve for me, however, because whereas when I wrote a script for The Onedin Line, say, or Poirot, or Howards Way, I needed to persuade only one person to like it, and then millions would watch the result whether they wanted to or not, now I have to persuade one reader at a time. And it’s taken me to the far out world of Facebook, Twitter, and running my own website. All highly enjoyable stuff, but I little thought, as I submitted my first script to the BBC that one day, I’d be able to reach everyone in the world in theory and the things I’d written would be seen by a billion people. All I ask now is that one percent of them buy a copy of Haggard Hawk, Easy Prey, or Scattered Remains. If nothing else, they are just about as English as it’s possible to be.

If you want to know anything more about me, Douglas Watkinson, or the Nathan Hawk series of detective books, or other things I’ve written, let me point you to this link:
www.douglaswatkinson.com

If you’re looking for a B & B within easy reach of London, Oxford, and the murderous, fictional county of Midsomer, let me point you to this link:
www.dintoncottage.co.uk

Zella's comment:  Dear Anglophiles, if you would like to sample Mr. Watkinson's books, here are links  to Amazon, where you can check them out.  (Perfect gifts for the Anglophile with an insatiable appetite for British detective stories, right?!)

• UK readers, go HERE

• USA readers, go HERE

• To pre-order the new book in the series, Scattered Remains, go HERE  (USA readers only)

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Dear Anglophiles: If you're a history buff as I am, you'll find the following BBC-produced videos about British history keenly interesting.  With autumn around the corner, and long, rainy days in sight, what better way to spend a little indoor time than learning even more about that land we all love. . . Great Britain. 

Most of the 29 episodes in this series are 9.5 minutes long, and one can, of course, pick and choose topics.  So make that cup of Earl Grey, cozy up in  your easy chair, and enjoy! 

First video of series: A HISTORY OF BRITAIN, Part 1, Beginnings 1

To see the listing of all episodes in the series, click this link:

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

JEREMY BENTHAM'S BODY

So I read about this guy who founded the first progressive college in London in 1826, whose seated corpse is on display in the college's main building.  Well, I just had to meet him.  Turns out he didn’t found the college at all, but is considered to have inspired its founding and was a supporter.  Turns out his head is not on display, but only his skeleton, dressed in clothes that he wore, with a wax head.  

And it turns out, he’s one of my new heroes.

His name was Jeremy Bentham, and I can’t believe I never heard of him before today.   Born in 1748, Jeremy was a very progressive thinker for his time.  He was a British philosopher, jurist, and social reformer who advocated the separation of church and state, equal rights for women, freedom of expression, the abolition of slavery, and the decriminalizing of homosexual acts.  Let me repeat that last – he advocated the decriminalizing of homosexual acts!  That’s the one that really got me.  A man who stands up for that in the 18th century must be very bold and brave, indeed.  Bentham is the father of a philosophy called Utilitarianism, what he later preferred to call The Greatest Happiness Principle.  Its fundamental axiom:  “It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong."  I really like that.  Sounds a lot like the philosophy of socialism, doesn’t it?  Bentham also believed that the great disparity in income between the rich and the poor would lead to political corruption – the rich using their wealth to influence the governing laws of the country.  Sounds a lot like our lobbying system in Washington.  He stated that if all it took was £500 a year to live comfortably, and one person had an additional £500 a year, their sense of fulfillment would likely be increased a good degree.  But if you gave them £500 more on top of that, their sense of fulfillment would actually begin to decrease.  £500 more, decrease more - and so on, and so on.  Basically the law of diminishing returns.  Also makes a lot of sense to me.

Bentham has also been hailed as the first patron saint of animal rights and he was highly active in law and prison reform, among many other things.  If you want to know more about him, check out his page at the University College of London.  He’s considered the college’s spiritual founder because in his time, membership in the Church of England was required of students entering Oxford and Cambridge.  The University College of London was the first in England to admit all, regardless of race, creed, or political beliefs.

So why is Jeremy Bentham’s body on display at the college?  He requested it.  On his death, he wanted to be dissected for the education of medical students, and then mummified, dressed, and displayed as if he were sitting at his desk writing.  They tried to mummify his head using the practices of the Maori of New Zealand, but this left it looking too gruesome to display (although you can view it at the college).  Bentham’s body was therefore given a wax head fitted with some of his own hair, and the real head is locked away separately somewhere in the college.  There are some disturbing myths to read about this strange display, such as one about students using Bentham’s head to play football.  But there are other true stories to check out if you wish.  Oh, and you can see a revolving 360° image of Bentham’s body online.  You know you can’t resist.  Go ahead, check it out.

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

 CHANGING OF THE GUARD

I can say two equally true things about my experience this morning – I enjoyed it, and I never want to do it again.

At one point, standing pressed up to the railing with dozens and dozens of others crowded around me – all of us staring through the bars at a big empty courtyard – I thought, “This is utterly ridiculous.”

I learned from my last attempt to see the Changing of the Guard, and this time I arrived early.  It was 8:30 a.m. on a Sunday morning, and when I crossed the street from Hyde Park onto the palace grounds, I saw that today I would have my pick of places at the gate.  I chose a spot near, but not right next to, the big central gates.  Sat on the little ledge and took out my book and ate my breakfast.  Enjoyed a leisurely hour reading, eating, and taking the occasional picture – watching the guards on duty in their sentry boxes, wondering what kind of lives they lead when they “clock out” at the end of their work shifts.  At about 9:30, more people started to trickle in, and by 10 a.m. the place was packed.  As the time for the changing drew near, I noticed the people themselves changing from politely giving each other space - apologizing when they bumped into each other – to treating each other as objects obstructing their view.  And I noticed my own patience beginning to wear very thin, indeed.  It’s very uncomfortable to be packed in with that many people for an hour and a half.  There’s nothing like a spectacle to make people suddenly transform into sardines!  But I was committed to seeing my mission through to its end.

At 11:15, the blessed sound of a marching band approached.  No horse guard this time – I guess they don’t participate in every ceremony.  The band led the regiments of guards into the courtyard, and the ceremony began.  I noticed that there were different-colored plumes on the sides of the guards' hats and wondered what that meant.  Here’s what I discovered!  The hats are actually called bearskins, and they’re 18 inches tall.  They’re made of real bearskin from Canadian brown bears and weigh 1.5 pounds!  Poor guys – both the bears and the boys.  The hats were first worn by British soldiers in 1815, following the defeat of Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo.  Napoleon’s French grenadiers wore bearskins to appear taller and more intimidating, and Britain adopted the towering hats as a symbol of its victory.  The different plumes represent the different branches of the guard: Grenadier, Coldstream, Scots, Irish, and Welsh.

The ceremony lasted about an hour – mostly songs played by the band.  I think I heard the theme songs from STAR TREK and STAR WARS too!  Very strange.  And ironically, the ultimate purpose of the entire ceremony – the actual changing of the guard – happened in such an offhand way that I nearly missed it!  I was watching the band play and happened to look over to the side of the courtyard.  It was then that I noticed a small group of guards standing in front of one of the sentries at his box.  Some kind of a small ritual seemed to be going on.  Then, the sentry on duty traded places with one of the guards.  The changing was complete.  But the band played on.  The very thing we all came to see seems to be the least important part of the ceremony – strange.

I snapped far too many photos of the palace and then headed off in search of something to eat.  On my way out of the park, I noticed a section of fence covered in political posters – all of them extremely inflammatory and blatantly anti-Thatcher.  I’ve always been curious what the British people think of Thatcher since I’ve read such differing views of her (and the movie with Meryl was pretty sympathetic, I think).  My curiosity was satisfied when I met the man responsible for this display.  I had just snapped a photo of one of the posters when Ray introduced himself by stepping up next to me and saying, “You know you can be arrested for doing something like that.”  At first I thought he was upset that I was photographing his stuff, but it turned out to be just a conversation starter.  :)  Ray told me he’s an anarchist, and he made it clear that an anarchist is NOT synonymous with a Communist.  Seems most of us Americans harbor that misconception.  When I asked him what he thought of Thatcher, he explained very “delicately” that if you were one of the working class, all you really wanted to do was rip her face off and eat it.  Wow.  I chatted with Ray for about 20 minutes, felt incredibly ignorant at times when he proved he knows more about my own government than I do, but he also confessed that he doesn’t know enough about his either.  Ray says this is not due to lack of information, but rather lack of free access to it.  That surprised me.  Is there a propaganda machine at work in Britain?  I welcome views from other Brits on this.

I also learned more about Guy Fawkes Day from Ray.  I’ve read a bit about it, but could never figure out if it’s a celebration or some kind of an anti-celebration.  Some things I’ve read describe it as a remembrance of Britain’s crushing of Fawkes’ attempted terrorism.  Again, Ray said it depends on your perspective.  The working class celebrates Guy, but the government views the day in exactly the opposite way.  I’ve never heard of a country proclaiming a holiday especially designed to denigrate someone before!  So strange.  And nowadays, supporters of Julian Assange don Guy Fawkes masks and gather outside the Ecuadorian Embassy  where he’s been given diplomatic immunity from the British government.  Only half a mile from where Ray and I stood chatting.

My conversation with Ray made me think again of Pomp & Circumstance, of the ceremony I’d just witnessed at Buckingham Palace.  Differing views on government.  Is it wrong to express pride in our country even when our country is so imperfect?  I don’t think so.  So long as we not do so blindly.  So long as we act as responsible citizens and stay involved in what our government is doing – protest when we believe it is doing wrong, support our leaders when we believe they are doing right.  It’s when it becomes un-pc to criticize an unjust war because doing so might also criticize the soldiers who fight it, that pomp & circumstance becomes dangerous – even idolatrous.  And I fear that’s where the U.S. is right now.

The most important thing about citizenship can be boiled down to one word – information.  It’s not enough to get out and vote.  We must stay informed about what our leaders are doing, what bills are being presented.  These bills become laws, and then they affect all of us.  If you're American, you can keep tabs on Congress and the bills up for vote there by checking the House Floor site.  And write to your congressperson and senators – tell them how you want them to vote.  Look up your reps’ contact info here.  Let them know you’re watching them.  Let them know how you want them to represent you!  This information is freely available to us.  We should appreciate and take advantage of it.

In the meantime, if you want a fix of pomp & circumstance for yourself, you can watch a video of The Changing of the Guard here.

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

MUSINGS ON THE METRO

The past three days have been gloomy and rainy.  Guess we’re finally getting the real London weather I’ve always heard about.  I stayed in Monday and Tuesday, fully intending to write, but instead ended up spending all of that time organizing little trips.  It always surprises me how much time it takes to plan a trip, even the smallest ones!  And most of that time is taken up with directions.  Getting the right directions.  How far is the hotel from the station?  Can I walk or will I need a taxi?  How far from the hotel to the places I want to see?  What are the bus routes, how much fare?  Do they take cash or do I need to buy a ticket?  Especially if you’re traveling sans car, directions become the holy grail of the journey, and finding the right ones can be just as hard.  I spend a lot of time peering at train timetables, plotting my every step through Google maps.  But the upside to all this planning is, once I finally arrive at my destination, I can relax and enjoy it, knowing that I’ve covered all my bases.  I still end up getting lost sometimes, but then I can always rely on the kindness of a stranger for guidance.  It’s a lot like producing a film – it’s all about the PRE-production.  The more of that you do, the smoother the production will be.

Anyway, I’ve planned a lovely journey to the tiny village of Haworth, out on the English moors, to see the home of the Bronte sisters.  And a smaller jaunt to Oxford to see the university and the home of Mr. C.S. Lewis, my very favorite author.  I just cannot tell you how much joy his writing brings me.  Not just his more famous works, like the Narnia tales, but some lesser known stories and especially his writings on Christianity.  No one else has ever been able to put into words so clearly and beautifully, what faith is, who God is, for me.  And you should check out his science fiction trilogy, starting with OUT OF THE SILENT PLANET.  So good!

So today, finally, I am able to dedicate to writing.  Lovely, isn’t it, to have the blessing of a day doing nothing but putting words to paper – break for a yummy lunch – and then write some more?  All day….  Sigh…  :)

Since I’m not out and about today, I thought I’d give you a glimpse of my room, the view from my window, and talk a little about the METRO – the subway, the tube, the underground – that wonderful thing that gets so many people all over the world around.

The amazing thing about the New York City subway is that you can pay just $2.50 and ride it all day, all over the city, from the heights of Harlem to the borough of Brooklyn, and all over Manhattan, wherever your heart desires.  As long as you never leave the subway system itself, that is.  Now, I know not many people would want to be stuck on the subway all day, but it’s just the principle of the thing, you know?  That you could if you wanted to!  Not so in the London Underground.  You can buy an Oyster card here, just put a bunch of money on it if you know you’re going to be traveling around a lot.  Every time you enter the tube, you have to swipe your card over these yellow readers to get in.  And THEN - here’s the sly genius of the system - you swipe AGAIN as you’re leaving the tube, and big brother figures out how far you traveled and deducts the amount from your Oyster card accordingly.  Oh, ho ho.  This I thought was just so mean when I first got here!  Now I’m used to it and it seems perfectly reasonable.  But I really, really hope New York City never gets wind of it.

In Paris, Callie and I could never figure out the logic behind their Metro.  There you can purchase a batch of tickets, tiny little cards, easily lost if you’re not careful.  You insert them into a slot at the gate to the train, and they pop back out at you through another slot at the top.  Then the gates either open or they don’t.  If they don’t open, your ticket is no longer valid and you have to buy another to get in.  Callie and I just started keeping every ticket and trying them until they didn’t work anymore!  But we never did figure out the logic of it all.  There were times when one ticket would get me into the Metro up to four times, and others when I got through only once.  And it didn’t seem to be based on any kind of a zone system.  Sometimes I’d enter the same station twice in the day, within hours, and still have to buy two tickets.

But the beauty of the Paris Metro for me was the announcements.  Just hearing those lovely Parisian voices announce the stations was like having a seductive Frenchwoman purr in your ear.  Oo…  And the station names!  Wonderful!  Rome (pronounced HOM with a purr at the beginning).  Chateau Rouge.  Cité.  Maison Blanche.  Ópera.  Madeleine.  Names that let you know you really are in Paris.  In New York, the announcements squawk through the train in nervous bursts of static that make you jump and are completely incomprehensible, like the teacher in Charlie Brown.  And it’s the same in London!  Everyone looks around at each other in complete confusion – “What did they just say?”  lol…  What’s strange is that the stations in London are air-conditioned, not the cars, whereas in New York, it’s just the opposite.

I think if I had to choose, Paris’s Metro would be my favorite.  Stations and cars that are still nostalgic, very easy to get around the city, and not once was there a line down.  In New York there is always track work going on somewhere, disrupting your journey, which is reasonable to expect, I suppose.  In London it’s the same – you have to check before you leave to make sure the line you need is operating on that day.  But the London Underground wins the prize for cheerfulness - its stations and cars are so bright and clean.

There’s just one wonderful thing that connects each of these cities for me.  When I entered Paris and London, and even New York back in the day, I felt like a foreigner – awkward and unsure - an imposter among the many who lived there.  But as soon as I stepped down into the subway – the metro, the underground – all my uncertainty melted away, and I finally felt like I belonged.  Just another someone trying to get somewhere.

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Dear Anglophiles: I recently received word of a captivating, new book.  If you were enthralled by Downton Abbey (and who of us wasn't?), then I can only imagine that you'll want to read Servants: A Downstairs History of Britain from the Nineteenth Century to Modern Times.  The book's release date is November 18, which will put it in our Anglophile hands just in time for Downton's Season Four premier on February 23, 2014.  Perfect timing! 

SERVANTS: A Downstairs History of Britain from the Nineteenth Century to Modern Times
by Lucy Lethbridge

Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company
Release date: November 18, 2013
Price: $27.95 hardcover
Summary: An account of the vividly told lives of British servants and the upper crust they served.

From the vast staff running a lavish Edwardian estate to the lonely maid-of-all-work cooking in a cramped middle class house, domestics were an essential part of the British hierarchy for much of the past century. Servants were hired not only for their skills but also to demonstrate the social standing of their employers, even as they were required to tread softly and blend into the background. But how did these countless men and women live? How did they view their employers and one another? And how did they experience the rapid social change of the twentieth century? In this “best type of history” (Literary Review), Lucy Lethbridge brings to life the butlers and lady’s maids, the nannies and cleaners whose voices have been largely ignored by history. Drawing fascinating observations from a kaleidoscope of research, she delivers a discerning portrait of life in service from the Edwardian period to the 1970s and a new view of English society.

Author's bio:
Lucy Lethbridge has written for the Observer, the Sunday Telegraph, the Independent on Sunday, the Times Literary Supplement, Art News, and Art+Auction. She has also been theTablet’s literary editor. She lives in London.

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

OLD OPERATING THEATRE

My Mom used to say I was born in the wrong times.  Since I was a kid, I’ve been fascinated by all things Victorian.

So today I visited the Old Operating Theatre, the oldest in Europe, built in the garret of St. Thomas Church in 1822.  It was built there because the women’s ward of St. Thomas Hospital was built around the church, and they used to operate on the women in the ward itself, which as you can imagine, would be highly disturbing if you were a patient there - listening to some poor woman scream as she’s having her leg sawn off.  So they built this operating theatre in the attic, and next to it they prepared various herbs that they used in their medicines for the patients.  In the 1860s, the hospital was moved to Lambeth to make way for a rail station, and the operating theatre was boarded up and forgotten for nearly 100 years until it was rediscovered in the 1950s.

Florence Nightingale started her nursing school here.  Patients were operated on without anesthesia or antiseptic of any kind.  This was before physicians discovered that bacteria causes infection, not bad air.  Before they learned the importance of operating in a sterile environment.  So they’d use and reuse bandages, wear the same bloody frock coat to operate in.  Ugh.

One of the curators of the museum gave us a spontaneous lecture on surgery in the 1800s, and I learned a lot of very useful things, such as, when you are unsuccessful at cutting through a bone with a bone saw, use a bone chipper to finish the job.  And do you know where the term “mad as a hatter” comes from?  Many of the hatters like Christys had their factories in the Southwark area of London, where St. Thomas Hospital resided.  In the 18th century, mercury was used to make the felt for fancy hats.  We now know that mercury is a poison, but that wasn't known back then.  Workers handling the mercury day after day would develop tics and twitches because mercury affects the nervous system, among other things.  Hence the term “mad as a hatter”!

Speaking of mad, tonight I’m off to see a movie in Henry VIII’s backyard!  Hampton Court Palace screens movies in the gardens, and tonight they’re showing SOME LIKE IT HOT.  Can’t wait.  But I’m glad Henry and Marilyn never met.  He’d probably convince her to marry him and then chop her head off.

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL

Did you know Sir Christopher Wren was a scientist and mathematician as well as an architect?  He designed St. Paul’s Cathedral to be 365 feet tall, equal to the number of days in a year.

As I walked toward the cathedral, the bells were pealing!  And there was a wedding going on.  The bride and groom were having their picture taken on the steps.

Inside you can attend a service, or light a candle - pray privately.  I lit a candle for Mom, said a prayer for all those grieving the loss of a loved one.  St. Paul’s is also a working church.  They still hold services every day.  I really wanted to attend evensong, when the entire service is sung.  Maybe I’ll go back before my journey is done.

I walked down the nave toward the altar, stood there and looked up at the soaring dome.  No words can describe it.  Then I walked up the 257 steps to what’s called the Whispering Gallery, which overlooks the cathedral floor.  This is about 90 feet above the floor.  Then I decided to go ahead and walk up a further 119 steps to the Stone Gallery.  The steps are smaller and steeper now.  Yikes.  And when I come out onto the gallery, I’m outside!  Lovely, cool breeze.  Beautiful view of London and the Thames.  Now I’m 175 feet above the ground!  If you look at the picture of St. Paul’s that I posted, the Stone Gallery is just below the dome.

NOW I decide I might as well go ahead and climb the remaining 152 steps to the Golden Gallery.  Very narrow steps, very tight and close.  I was definitely nervous climbing these stairs.  They reminded me of the spiral metal stairs in the Statue of Liberty, up to the crown.  The problem is, you can see DOWN.  So I concentrated on each step right in front of me, one at a time.  Just before you step outside there’s a square of glass cut into the floor and you can look through it, see all the way down to the cathedral floor!  I got a picture of my feet standing over this strange looking-glass.  Then I stepped outside onto the Golden Gallery, and now I'm 280 feet above the ground!  If you look at that picture again, the Golden Gallery is that little band circling the spire just above the dome.  From up there I could see the dome below me – very surreal.  Had to keep away from the railing.  And there’s only room for one person at a time around the Golden Gallery, single file around the railing.  Scary, but exhilarating.  I’m posting a picture of the view from there.

So I climbed a total of 528 steps, up and down.  My legs were a bit wobbly when I got to the floor, and I was glad to be on the ground again.  Down to the crypt for lunch.  Mozzarella and tomato on a baguette, and chocolate cake.  And this really great Victorian lemonade.  Had ginger in it.  Never would’ve paired those two, but it works!  Sat with a lady named Bridget and we had a lovely conversation.  She’s from Tipperary in Ireland, but she's lived in London for quite a while now, since her husband died.  She loves London, told me she'd always wanted to come and visit, bring her kids, but her husband worked in London and never wanted to come back in on the weekends.  Turns out her favorite place to walk is in Hampton Court gardens, which so far has been my favorite place in England!

Then in the middle of our conversation the fire alarm goes off!  Lol…  Had to stuff my chocolate cake (always save the cake!) into a napkin and haul it out of St. Paul’s.  Everything was okay and they let us back in about 15 minutes later.  I finished my visit by walking through the crypt.  Saw Florence Nightingale’s tomb and learned more about the history of St. Paul’s.  There’s been a church on this site since 604!  Can you believe that?  The first two cathedrals burned down, the 2nd in the Great Fire of 1666 that decimated London.  Then Christopher Wren designed the cathedral we see today.  It was struck twice by bombs during the blitz in World War II, and badly damaged, but still standing.  There’s a wonderful picture of the cathedral after the bombing.  I can only imagine how it must have made the people of London feel – their city being attacked day after day after day – to look up and see, soaring into the sky, the dome of St. Paul’s – still there.  How comforting.

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Dear Anglophiles: As many of you are aware, I am taking a sabbatical from blogging due to my mother being critically ill.  I expect to resume blogging in September.  Until then, I am very excited to announce that guest writer Vicki Speegle will be sharing her travel journal with us!   Vicki traveled by ship to England and is now in London for the first time and will be touring the U.K.  Warning: Her posts will make you want to drop everything and fly across the pond straightaway!  Feel free to make comments or ask her questions. --Zella

THE FOUNDLING MUSEUM (& MURDER AT THE MOVIES!)

So this morning, I walked to the Foundling Museum.  It's an exhibit of tokens, clothing, and other items from the Foundling Hospital, Britain's first home for abandoned children.  The hospital, really a children's home, was founded in 1741 by sea captain Thomas Coram, and Handel was a loyal patron!  He performed THE MESSIAH in the hospital's chapel to raise money, and performed there many more times over the years before he died.  William Hogarth, the famous painter and satirist, was also a patron.  Some of his illustrations are exhibited at the museum, along with a true copy of THE MESSIAH that Handel bequeathed to the hospital!

But the most moving items are the tokens that some of the mothers left for their babies.  The hospital had limited space, so they instituted a lottery process whereby the mothers would go to the hospital on a certain Saturday to petition to have their children taken in, and they would draw a ball from a box.  White meant your child was accepted.  Red - maybe, pending further inquiries.  And black - your child was refused admittance, either because there was no more space or because your child had some kind of disease.  Many mothers left little tokens with their babies before they walked away forever.  And these are heartbreaking to look at - buttons, handmade trinkets cut from pieces of cloth, little bracelets.  Hard to imagine looking on your child for the last time before you hand them over to strangers.  What's more heartbreaking, though, is that the hospital never did give these tokens to the children.  They wanted to preserve the parents' anonymity.  So they sit now in this little glass case, with only strangers to look on them.

You can also sit and listen to the testimonies of people who grew up in the Foundling system.  Such varied experiences!  You can hear them online too!  Just click here.  And there's another wonderful thing the museum does.  They randomly pick 10 visitors each day, and at 2:30, those 10 people are given a cup made by artist Clare Twomey.  At the bottom of the mug is a good deed that you are requested to fulfill.  You can choose not to do the good deed, but you have to give the mug back.  If you do the good deed, you keep the mug.  I had to leave the museum before 2:30, so I wasn't able to participate, but I think it's an amazing idea!  And it turns out you can actually participate online!  Anyone from anywhere can do it, and you can also suggest a good deed.  They'll put your deed on a little cup and post it online.  So check it out!

After the museum, I walked to the Curzon Mayfair Theater and saw DIAL M FOR MURDER.  In 3-D!  Hitchcock was once again ahead of his time and filmed the credits and a few shots of the movie in 3-D.  Such fun!  To see a classic on the big screen in a beautiful theater.  So far I've only been to these Curzon theaters - there's a chain of them here.  And they remind me of our Angelika in Manhattan.  Big, plush lobbies to sit in, and a snack bar.  The only thing that's been different so far is the POPCORN!  My friend Andre will appreciate this.  He can't live without a big bag when he goes to the movies.  :)  You can get your popcorn here salty or sweet, or MIXED!  Oh - my - gosh.  What we're missing in the states.  I got the mixed and it is deeeelicious.  I always get a small bag because I'm never able to finish my popcorn, but I gobbled this whole thing down.  What a treat!  And Sunday, I'm going to see SOME LIKE IT HOT in Henry VIII's big backyard!  :)  They have movie screenings in the Hampton Court gardens.  I'm quite sure that will be a different experience!

No pics today, but tomorrow I'm off to see St. Paul's Cathedral.

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