Entry 3: July 5, 2008, 11 p.m.

It's funny how so much can change in 24 hours. But I've skipped some things. I need to back up.

A couple of days ago Amy, Amber, Emily, Meredith and I went to the Cabinet War Rooms and the Churchill Museum. The war rooms were the living/planning quarters for Prime Minister Winston Churchill and his main men during World War II. On our way to find the door, we walked down the Clive steps. Robert Clive was a famous colonial governor of sorts in India during the 18th century. Earlier that day, we discussed his involvement in India in the Muslims in the U.K. class. (That's important because most Muslims in the U.K. are ethnically South Asian.)  Riding around London, I see quite a few statues of people that I don't know of. So, I was incredibly excited to be able to recognize him and describe why he is important. I am learning more and more that in order to appreciate anything about culture, one must read its literature AND history. It is vital for maximum admiration and appreciation.

Now back to the museum . . .

We got an audio guide tour remote-looking device that you hold up to your ear like a phone. As you may notice from my previous journal about Kensington Palace, I thoroughly enjoyed the audio guide there. The one at the war rooms is made by The History Channel and was not as enticing. It was difficult to pay attention to what the guide was saying with his dull, monotone voice. (Why is it that people who supposedly love history, often speak with monotone voices?)  However, I made my best effort to be engaged. We didn't visit the Churchill Museum until last. It was modernized with lots of technology:  a touch-screen table of the years throughout his life, including the important documents from when he was Prime Minister, a set of motion-sensor excerpts of speeches that thundered from speakers above my head, and more that we didn't even get to see because we didn't have enough time. I didn't appreciate this experience as much because I have not read and studied Churchill in depth—which further proves my previous point.

Later I read the background book on the war rooms and found information that made the site more interesting. I haven't told you yet, but the war rooms are 10 feet underground. That makes sense because it protected them and their secrets from the Germans and their bombs. Government offices are in the building sitting on top. In the 1930s, the building was called the "New Public Offices" because they had been built recently. It was a good place to put the war rooms because it was close to Parliament and the Prime Minister's house. The construction of the war rooms began in June 1938. By 1940, Churchill and his cabinet decided to be there full time for their safety and to plan. I noticed that all of the clocks are set to almost 5 p.m. I read in the book that was the time of the cabinet meeting on October 15, 1940—the day Churchill decided to move him and his men there full time after a destructive bombing on the same street. The government left it untouched and wanted to make it into a museum in 1948, but it wasn't easily accessible to the public until Margaret Thatcher, the prime minister then took action to make it so in 1981.

Back to the day . . .

That night we (including many more from our group) went to see George Bernard Shaw's “Major Barbara” at the National Theatre. We walked enough for me to sweat about a pint of water, but we made it on time. Within a couple of minutes of finding our seats, the play began.

Here's a basic run-down of the play:

Barbara is a major in the Salvation Army, and her father is a supplier of weapons for World War II. They obviously have conflicting opinions. They make a deal that he will visit the Salvation Army if she will visit his factory. Shaw uncovers the crookedness in the Salvation Army—they want to save people who are physically hungry, people who ultimately lie about their salvation in order to be fed. Later, Barbara's sergeant takes money from the man in the community who supplies the alcohol and from Barbara's father. When Barbara visits the factory, she sees that although her father is producing elements to be used for destruction, he is also giving people jobs that help them feed their families. That is a very bare bones outline. There is also a wonderfully hilarious, ironic and obnoxious mother, a dim-witted almost brother-in-law and a Greek-studying witty lover.

The beauty of the play is it illustrates a truth that most people are not bold enough to face:  good and evil, right and wrong are not always black and white. In fact, they are often messy and gray. In the beginning, Barbara is sure that her father's work only breeds evil and her Salvation Army is holy. In the end, she finds that both are good, and both are bad. The war is still going on outside her door, and the world is still turning.

Another exciting part of the play is the words. I have not studied Shaw, but I have studied other plays. Shaw uses stichomythia throughout the play to deepen his characters, and the audience understands of them better. Stichomythia is when characters have quick, witty one-liners feeding off of each other. This company also used silence to make it funnier.

Okay. Now onto July 4th. It was supposed to be a more eventful day than it was. Meredith and I had planned to go to a museum, but we each took a nap that lasted longer than expected. We still went to Regent St. hoping to find some kind of shopping but were mostly unsuccessful. Instead, we walked around until our feet got too tired, then went to a pub called The Wellington for dinner. I had ravioli. During our dinner conversation, I was telling Meredith how I really missed my apartment, my bed, my laptop, Barnes and Noble in Cary, etc. Then she told me I was homesick. Now, I feel like a fairly bright crayon in the box so to speak, so I knew that I was homesick. However, when she said the word out loud, it became more real . . . more real than I wanted it to be. I felt like if I made any sudden movements the dams would break, and the river I had carefully secured behind my eyes would gush out onto the table. In an effort to hold it back, I went into crabby mode. I'm sure that must have been bad for Meredith, but it really was a form of self-preservation.

When we got back to the center, I went to my room and let the dams burst. I wrote fiercely in my journal about wanting fireworks, a cook-out, U.S. flags, sparklers, an N.C. beach and the heat. When I start wanting the N.C. summer heat, you know it's serious. The journaling calmed me down (as well as the crying), so I lay down to go to sleep. Now, the tube runs just outside my window, and since I sleep with the windows open, I hear it very clearly. Five minutes after I lay down, that's what I thought I heard. But I heard booming when the train wasn't outside. It was a familiar sound, one that I hear at least once a year. I got out of bed, and outside of my window I could see fireworks reflected in the windows in the building across from mine. All I could think was thank you.

Entry 2: July 1, 2008—1:11 p.m.
I am still tired.

Yesterday, Meredith, Amy, Amber, Emily and I went to Kensington Palace. The information board just inside the gate said that William III of Orange was the first monarch to live there in 1689. It was designed by Sir Christopher Wren, the same guy who designed St. Paul's Cathedral. The outside is plain, red brick with no outward extravagance of royalty in its architecture. I discovered later on the audio tour that it wasn't built to be a royal residence, but King William was allergic to something in the palace he lived in before.

I had expected to go in and see centuries old furniture and clothing, but instead I saw videos and clothing about 1958—the last year of the debutantes. The palace has this exhibit set up on the first floor that was all about that year. From the information blurbs, I gathered that the debs were from elite, upper class families and had strict rules of etiquette. Although the exhibit was a surprise, it was interesting. The debs had balls and dances they went to and wore knee-length full, flow-y dresses. By 1958, the dresses were becoming shorter and more revealing than ever before. At the end of "The Season" as they called it, the debs were presented to the queen where they would perform their well-practiced curtsies.

We finally made it to the old stuff after stopping to get audio guides. Our first room was the dressmaker's room. It is set up the way that a dressmaker's room would have been set up in the 17th and 18th centuries. The lighting was low and soft, like the lights on the wall in a movie theater that stay on all the time. Tolls of fabric about three feet wide were in a floor-to-ceiling case. On the same wall was a case that contained a lace-making station. The lace lays on a curved pad—shaped like a loaf of bread—with about 75 + sticks dangling form it. It looks like the sticks hold the thread and are differentiated by colored beads on the ends. It made me think of braiding, a very complex style of braiding. We also went through the tailor room and a room with scenes of 1920s debs and a gentleman and his valet.

Next, we saw some of Princess Diana's dresses. The audio guide talked about her sense of style and her starting her own trends. Although she lived there, the dresses were the only part of the tour concerning her. I had expected to see more because of her popularity and untimely death. Coincidentally, today is her birthday. She would have been 47 years old according to the card that admirers had taped to the gates outside.

After that, it was on the King's Apartments. We walked up the grand staircase made of black Irish marble. I touched it. To be on the same steps that so many important people had walked before made me speechless. The wall is a painting in typical 17th century style of people standing on a balcony. The audio guide said that William III had it personalized by including people that he actually knew, like the yeoman guards the guests would have passed coming in.

The audio guide said that people went into the King's apartments depending on their level of importance. The more important you were, the more thresholds you crossed. I felt rather important by the end of the tour.

The King's Gallery is the largest room in the palace. William III appointed William Kent to design it with silk, red fabric on the walls and used the same for the curtains. Kent also designed the frames that hold the art to match each other, to keep with the elegant style of the room, said the audio guide. The piece over the fireplace caught my attention. It is a map of the U.K. with a compass creating a circle around it. London is the place where the needle is held in place. Was the artist trying to say that London is the center of all direction, the center of the world?  Was it a dedication to the monarchy that lives in London?  I'm not sure, but I thought of how many artists could create a similar piece about New York City or Washington, D.C. It seems like an ethnocentric piece.

Another appealing room is Queen Victoria's bedroom. In History 103:  The World in the 20th Century, I learned about Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee of 1897 (meaning she had been ruling for 60 years, one of Britain's longest-ruling monarchs). I admire her as a strong woman in history who took a country forward when most people thought she would fall on her face when she took the throne at the age of 18. Her bedroom is not extraordinary. It is extravagantly decorated, but I had been looking at similar things all day. But to be in the same room where she had once lived is special. I thought of how privileged I am to have that opportunity—now just to be there, but to understand the importance of it.
Closer to the Queen's apartments, we entered a room with a case of a wax woman wearing an 18th century petticoat. A petticoat goes underneath a dress, and it is an arms-span wide and a waist thick. I immediately thought of Dr. English and my 18th century literature class that I took this past spring. Addison and Steele, writers in the 18th century, made fun of petticoats in an article we read for class. The petticoats looked absurd in pictures, but seeing one in real life, I realized that women actually wore them!  I can't imagine giving in to a trend like that.

It was also in this room that Meredith and I met June, a friendly palace employee. We discussed petticoats, the fast pace of American life (and how London is beginning to run at the same speed), and the importance of family and the differences between our cultures in that respect. We stood together talking for about half an hour. I will always remember the things she said about the need for families to do things together and to listen to one another.

However, today I prepared myself for the month and tried to organize my studies. It is wonderful to be in another country, and I have to work to remember that I am also taking classes. I'm excited for the things I am going to learn about British culture and Muslims in the U.K. I will definitely let you know how it goes.

I am thinking of you all back in the States.

Entry 1: June 30, 2008—1 p.m.

Disoriented. That is the best way to describe my experience so far. I will clarify exactly what I mean in a minute.

For now . . . my first day in London.

We took the Gatwick Express train from the airport into the city, then a taxi to the Maria Assumpta Centre. My state of mind during the first few hours were like looking out the window of a moving car--everything is passing fast, it's a bit hazy, and you think you might get sick. We had a minute to unpack and get our bearings, then it was on to the tube. We went down to the underground station and got our oyster card (a card you put money on to ride the tube) and a take away lunch at Marks and Spencer. M&S was surprising. The food was ready-made sandwiches, packaged fruit and veggies, and chips. Everything looked so healthy. The whole time I was thinking how it is no wonder that America is so fat . . . we don't have a Marks and Spencer.

We got on the tube to go to Green Park to picnic for lunch. My first tube experience was jumbled and difficult. I am a map person and a possible control freak. I like to know where I am, exactly where I am going, and how I am going to get there. I have never been the person who just follows the group. However, I found myself following along a lot yesterday. It never occurred to me before how much I depended on being in control of situations. Before I went to bed, I had to retrace all of our stops on a map, just so I could understand. I didn't know that I operate this way until yesterday, or rather I didn't know to the degree that I operate that way.

After our picnic we walked to Buckingham Palace to catch a hop on, hop off bus. We would have caught one at Green Park, but there was a parade for the celebration of Israel's independence. It backed up traffic a little bit. The bus tour was interesting. We rode by many things that I have seen in pictures, and some that I went to when I was here a few years ago (Tower of London, Tower Bridge, the London Eye, etc.). We hopped on and off all day, and also went on a boat tour on the Thames River. The goal was to stay awake. I only failed once.

Meredith and I went to a British Asian restaurant called Wagamama to have dinner. I was able to ration a 12 ounce Coke to last a whole meal. I think that is an accomplishment. By the time we went back to the center, I was exhausted. We had orientation and listened to the rules of residence. Afterwards, it was shower and bedtime.

So, being disoriented. Yesterday was out of my control. I went on a tour that I didn't plan. That's why I was disoriented. I don't do things or go places that I do not first plan to do most of the time. I realized how much I wanted to complain and how inflexible I am. I didn't think that either of these things applied to me before yesterday. Now that I do, I plan to work on them while I'm here.

It's time for more of day two now.
Hope you are well in the States.