Whistling Gypsy

Today has been rather quietly spent by comparison- mostly as I contemplate how little money I have left, and how much I blew on the opera last night, and how these facts may somehow be mysteriously related... in a way upon which I haven't yet been able to put my finger.

Today, I lay in bed until 8am, hoping that someone else would stir, but no! And most of them were in by 11pm, too... I don't understand it. Why lie in bed when there is all of London to explore... LONDON! The greatest city of earth!

Today, I wandered around Hendon in a different direction from yeserday. There's a war memorial in the middle of the road up the way a little bit- Watford Way, it's called- and to get to it you have to use a concrete underground walkway called a "subway"- which refers then neither to the Tube service NOR to the sandwich-stores which are ubiquitous (there are more around the McDo's). It's an excellent idea, but I'm nor sure that I would have felt particularly safe using it had I not been surrounded by friendly street crew... I was about to say "street workers," but this is Hendon, not Piccardilly Circus!

The memorial was really quite moving- so many men died from just this little district- and I liked that it was displayed so prominently in the centre island, surrounded by a little fenced, lawn area... London shoves history in your face everywhere you go. Back in Christchurch, we do have that very big, rather ostentatious memorial at the top end of Cashel St... primarily to be viewed by drunken ravers stumbling down the Strip, I suppose. This small memorial seemed to bring home more the fact that it was ordinary people from ordinary places who were slaughtered. A few of the weatherproof poppy wreaths had fallen face downwards, and I righted them, which earned a cheery "God bless you, love!" and a big smile from two passing old ladies. I like Londoners.

There was nothing much to photograph, apart from a gorgeous lady in a red jacket.

After that, I then spent a happy couple of hours wandering around the threatre district (Covent Garden and Leicester Square) in town again. There's lots to see- street performers, markets, people everywhere. I haven't taken many photos at all- I'm too busy taking it all in. I'll try to take some soon. There are a couple of plays that I am keen to see- one in particular that stars Jeremy Irons, which has had rave reviews from everywhere- it runs for another five weeks though so there's no particular hurry. Later that evening, after eating back at the hostel, I went out to Waterloo Station, and spent 45 minutes strolling around. It was amazing to think that I could have jumped on a train to Paris then and there, as I had my credit card and passport with me... the hostel here was paid up until the following Wednesday however so I resisted that temptation. Londoners are always in a hurry! it's fun to watch them race from platform to platform.

Waterloo Station must have had over 100 shops in it- there were even two outlets of WH Smith's, the bookseller's! It was instructive to look at book prices- even with the exchange rate being as punishing as it is, it's still cheaper to buy brand new paperbacks over here than in, say, Whitcoull's at home.

One of the things I love about London is the stack of free magazines and papers available everywhere- you are never short of reading material. From the previous night's Evening Standard to the wonderful TNT magazine ("for the independent traveller"- geared towards Aussies, NZders and South Africans) to Loot (for jobs) and NZ News (which rehashes old NZ news with a definite anti-Government slant, it seems to me)- it's all free! Thank god, because they're not kidding when they say London is a drain on the funds... I need to hurry up and get me a job if I want to stay here!

Tschus!

Well, this is my first day in London, but I know this much already: I adore this twon. The buildings- the shop fronts which look unchanged from 200 years ago (even the computer stores manage this... don't ask me how) - the people, who don't mind chatting interminably with crazy kiwis- even the dreary grey sky, which is comforting homelike to a Christchurch girl like me!

I got in from Heathrow yesterday, but after battling queues there and figuring out how to use the Tube (which I also love), and finally finding my hostel (London Backpackers) along from Hendon Central, I was too exhausted to do anything much but sleep! The journey over was happily uneventful. I rather let myself down by crying at Christchurch International Airport, setting off Mum... at Auckland, I bought the London Guide by Lonely Planet (which earned its pricetag this morning in helping me to find Convent Garden and the Royal Opera house from leicester Square on the Northern line from Hendon... I was just in time to join the crowd queuing for day tickets before a whole deluge of tourists arrived at 8:30am... by the time 10 o'clock rolled around and the box office opened, the queue seemed to stretch to far more people than would fill the mere 67 seats available... but I'm getting ahead of myself.

From Auckland to London, I sat beside a very nice sailor called Alasdair, bron in Ipswich, who recommended to me Port Ellen, Islay, where his mother is from. He says it's like Picton, only less tree-ish.

We were held up for some time at Los Angeles Airport (or LAX as they call themselves, though why, I don't know. "Lax" is not a very positive adjective, not does it apply in any way to their ruthlessly efficient, unsmiling, Gestapo-like staff). They DID have free soft drinks in the waiting area, however, and I wasn't so churlish as to complain about the fact that it was the Pepsi range and not Coke that they offered (well, not much). Flying in and out, you have to marvel at the grid pattern the the city is build on. The perfect, parallel lines stretch endlessly into the horizon. There's just so much of it, too- so many houses, so many cars around the airport - miles of parking lots, as packed as car sales yards. I'm beginning to appreciate how very, very many people live in this world.

Flying over America, I noticed an awful lot of those circular fields that Mum wa saying are being implemented down south by wealthy North island famers. Maybe I've seen too many conspiracy theory-type programmes about alien crop circles, but they did seem too perfect and too clear-cut - rather as if done by a laser from space! We flew by the tip of Greenland... not that we could see anyhting as it was too dark and I was over the wrong side of the plane anyway, but still! Good to know! :D I can't wait to go dog-sledding there with the huskie puppies!

I landed in London yesterday afternoon, and eventually made it through Customs and Immigration. The former was funny; the man had been rather sternly interrogating the people in front, but after asking me where I came from, a huge smile broke over his face. it appeared "New" and "Zealand" were the magic words! He hurried me through in a very friendly way, and when he asked about dairy products and I mentioned the cheese and butter samples I'd brought with me from the AirNZ flight, he winked and said, "We'll never mind about those!" Darling man. I'd never had preferential treatment before, and I must say that I really liked it! :)

After that I bought a weekly bus pass, zones 1-3, on my shiny new Oyster Card (£27, ouch) and braved the Tube. I LOVE it - from the electronic "Mind the gap" reminders to the way that everyone studiously avoids eye contact, but covertly stares when no one is looking. As for conversation, that is RIGHT OUT. It's really, really funny.

Once I got to Hendon Central I dashed to an internet café to let Mum know that I was alright, then checked into the hostel, about which I am ambivalent at the moment. The kitchen's a mess, and there's nothing to dry your hands on in the bathroom. I took a quick walk up the road to Hendon Park, which is rather pretty. Greeeeeeen! I'm glad I came to London and not to Tokyo.

After that I got back into the hostel, my lovely new pyjamas (courtesy of Mum) and bed. I slept the sleep of the just, and rose at 4am, had a shower and read a camping guide in the kitchen until about 6am, when a nice English-born Indian chap named Suresh got up and made his breakfast. He told me where to get cheap phones... at the "Mall" (which English people pronounce to rhyme with "pal") in a place called Carphone Warehouse. Sounds good. He works in construction, doing something with pipes.

I headed out for a beautiful walk along Hendon Park until I got to the T-junction up the road, and wandered around. The streets are really uneven, and you get quite a good workout going uphill and downhill... it's not all flat like Chch, NZ. The shops are gorgeous! So tiny! Of course as it was still only 7am they were all shut except for the redundantly-named "Bakery and pâtisserie." From across the road, I figured out that a store with lots of cards in the window must be ral restate agent's (though you wouldn't know it from the store name- which I forget!). With this in mind, I looked at the shop next door which had the name "LAUND RETTES-" and how DELIGHTED I was, that this place renting out land should have such a good olde name... perhaps unchanged for 200 years- when I noticed that the "e" had fallen from the sign. Yes, as I am sure you realised straightaway, I was staring at a "LAUNDERETTES"! What in idiot I am... but in a city like this, so steeped in history, it's easy to let it all go to your head. :)

After chatting witha girl named Sara from Tucson, Arizona (which put the Beatles' Get Back into my head for the rest of the morning), I grabbed my things, took the train to Leicester Square, and queued there for several hours, while the cafés all around began to open up and the stalls in Covent Garden Market were erected for the day.

I GOT A TICKET TO TONIGHT'S OPERA! Placido Domingo in Cyrano de Bergerac- full view, seated! Hurrah! In the queue, I met a nice man who works in shipping, who took the morning off work to "visit the doctor" ie. queue for the opera! Ha! He studied geography at uni, and was able to explain hurricanes to me, which is more than Mrs Jeffcott back at CGHS managed... ha! Two Swedish ladies from a choir were behind me, and also delighted to get tickets!

After that, I wandered around the Theatre Museum, which is really a beautiful place. They had a large exhibit devoted exclusively to the Redgrave Family. I knew of the most recent three generations, but had NO idea that it extended to the start of the 1800s. There was a lot of interesting stuff there, including a ballet exhibit (I spent a long time glued to a screen showing scenes from Nureyev and Fonteyn's performance of the Romeo and Juliet). God, it was gorgeous. I must see some ballet at the Opera House if I can. I also picked up a couple of postcards from the shop there showing old-time posters, once depicting the amazing Rubini in his great feat, "BEHEADING A LADY!"... too hilarious. They also had floors made up of old newspapers with ads, theatre reviews, etc., which was very interesting.

But the best part of the Museum for me was the ladies' bathroom, which was decorated THROUGHOUT with black and white tiles depicting scenes from all the major Shakespeare plays.



I MEANT it when I said "throughout."



Ha!

When I got back to the hostel, I was delighted to discover an e-mail from Mum, then talked with a Frenchman named Jeremy who praised my accent, then another frog named Alexandre (who only wanted to practise his English- the nerve!), then I put on my nicest clothes and set off for my first Opera!

Once I was up in the restaurant area, I spent about five minutes just gaping at theinterior- it's really stunning. All the columns and stairwells were festooned with real pink roses, donated by a Friend of the Opera, in memoryof someone famous whose name I didn't quite catch, as I was informed by a friendly but veeery lah-dee-dah woman from Kent, aged 83. She warmed to me because I was from NZ- she was so grateful for our contribution to protecting England during the war, you know! She also told me about a man named J---- (a pastor now the equivalent of a Bishop!) whom she is a great friend of, who was at college with Tony Blair. When Jonathan confided in Tony that he was giving the law up so that he could help people on the spiritual side, Tony said, "Oh, it's something I've grappled with too! However, I think that it's possible to help more people by going into government than into the ministry... but I admire what you're doing all the same."

Everyone here loves Princess Di. Said old lady was talking about the time Diana and Charles were at the opera, and she was getting all the attention and adulation from everyone... afterwards, Charles apparently shoved herroughly into the car, in full view of everyone, because he was so jealous of how well-loved she was. Camilla is NOT LIKED AT ALL.

Anyway, I then took the most expensive escalator in the world up to the top, and once I'd climbed a further couple of flights of stairs and entered the amphitheatre, I promptly got terrible vertigo! But what a view! I'll bring my camera next time and take a picture. So much red, gold and grandeur. It's classy.

Cyrano de Bergerac was wonderful- it's sung in French!- and the final act had some really beautiful arias in it- but the cast! THE CAST! Gush! Placido Domingo was truly amazing- I've never heard such beautiful singing, anywhere before (sorry Don and Freddie)- it was so effortless, and it's true what they say about his acting- he is really amazing. Just astonishingly good. Iam seriously thinking of going again next Tuesday and queuing up... it'll ruin me either way (heartbroken if I don't see him again, stone broke if I do... augh!). The soprano was Sondra Rdavanosky, and she was absolutely exquisite too. She made me cry in the final act- just as sweet and effortless as Domingo - all the cast were excellent. And I liked how at the end of it Domingo dragged them all forward with him for all the final bows... he wanted them to share in the glory, though the crowd were yelling"BRAVO PLACIDO!" He never once came forward by himself. Someone flung him arose and on taking it he gracefully joined hands with the soprano, leavingthe rose with her when he released her-- I don't know, he just came off as avery good guy. I think I'm in love. What a VOICE.

I was up in amphitheatre at the top, right bang in the middle (seat S54), which I'm willing to bet is as good as any seat in the house- a panoramic view of the stage, easy viewing of the English subtitles (which areprojected into the area just above the stage) and the SOUND! I've never heard such great sound. It's a really beautiful house. And I had my binoculars, chiefly useful for examining the set, which was so life-like and beautifully detailed that it was quite impossible to tell whether or not the jars on the shelves in the bakery at the back in Act 2 were real or painted.

Maybe I can write more about it later- some plot details for instance, instead of this gushing use of 'beautiful' and similar adjectives which quickly become meaningless to the reader- but right now I'm too emotional. I've never seen so much concentrated, unmarred beauty. I don't care about the world's problems at this moment... poverty, hunger, pish. Tomorrow my socialist self will reassert itself, but tonight, intoxicated by this splendour, I think, YES! Money should be poured into this, and this alone!

What a first day in London. Can I ever top it?!

And, if anyone has got this far- how the hell are you all?

Currently on my iPod: nothing
Currently reading: Lonely Planet London guidebook
Currently in: an internet cafe just by the Hendon Central station, in London

I'm here! I'm here! I'm really here!

Jetlag is extreme, so about to check into my hostel, but I just wanted to let you know I've arrived safely AND that the Tube is utterly wonderful.

Love,

SJ

Currently on my iPod: Queen's Friends Will Be Friends
Currently reading: NOTHING! (a first for SJ!)
Currently in: my bed, at home, in Kiwiland... for the last time in ?? years!! (weep)

It's my last night in NZ, and I find myself watching a ridiiiiiiculous movie on TV called "Mad Cows," about a rather preposterous series of disasters which befall a young Australian woman in London. OK, this is a silly movie. A person in a yellow tellytubby suit just leapt out from behind a tree and yelled "Uh oh!" because... no, I'm not even going to try to explain the plot of this movie. That way madness lies.

Well, it's all packed up, and there's nothing much left to say. THe next time I post, it'll be from London! See you later, mes amis! :D

Hugs and kisses,
SJ

Currently on my iPod: Jim Croce's Age
Currently reading: Road to Tara (Anne Edwards)
Currently in: Christchurch, New Zealand

How daunting sitting down to write this is! Unlike any previous online journals which I can comfortably deny ever having kept (as all but one are long deleted), this blog intimidates me.

I blame Elizabeth Bennet. Well, really, I should be blaming Jane Austen, who put the following words into Lizzie's mouth, on being invited on a trip to the Lakes District by her auntie:

"What delight! what felicity! You give me fresh life and vigour. Adieu to disappointment and spleen. What are men to rocks and mountains? Oh! what hours of transport we shall spend! And when we do return, it shall not be like other travellers, without being able to give one accurate idea of any thing. We will know where we have gone -- we will recollect what we have seen. Lakes, mountains, and rivers shall not be jumbled together in our imaginations; nor, when we attempt to describe any particular scene, will we begin quarrelling about its relative situation. Let our first effusions be less insupportable than those of the generality of travellers.''

I feel all this... but am dead certain that all the wonders I shall see will only leave me spewing banalities. Christ, I'm an idiot- still, it's better than stressing out about the possibility that the plane I'll be on in two days' time will plunge into the Pacific, yes?

I went up to Picton to see my grandparents earlier this week. My Mum and I drove up the coast, and had a great time.

Regrettably, the Canterbury Plains scenery...

... was only marginally less dull than Marlborough's...

... with, thankfully, the Kaikoura coastline in between to prove some relief.

(I did actually have photos that were essentially rather better, but at each petrol station along the way, the attendants insisted on "cleaning" the windscreen with a quick few wipes that left it shining but rather streaky, which shows up in 99% of the photos taken. However, I suck at taking photos in general, let it be known.)

I cheered up once I hit Blenheim, which has my favourite bridge in the whole wide world. It's funkier than the Brooklyn Bridge, more structurally impressive than the Golden Gate, and more timeless than any Roman aqueduct! Je te présente....

The Loopy Bridge!

I have a video of the journey over the latter half of the Loopy Bridge, BUT!

• it's 3.3MB and it lasts just seven seconds, so I'm not going to put it up here. I can e-mail it to you if you're keen.
• there's no audio, so you'd have to provide your own woooOoooo sounds (Corresponding with the rise and fall of each loop on the bridge) , without which no Loopy Bridge ride is complete, yourself.

Thence the ride towards Picton, which is quite pretty at this time of the year.

Picton was fun, although my Nana gave me $50... she snuck the note into a card, knowing I'd never cash a cheque... augh, I hate people trying to force money on me all the time! No really, it was lovely of her- she also gave me a really pretty pearl ring, a beautiful waistcoat she'd knitted of white wool, a tiny framed picture of my mum when she was a little girl and a gorgeously illustrated hardcover edition of the Mowgli stories from The Jungle Book- a very thoughtful gift for a Kipling freak such as myself. I'll spend that $50 in sending her postcards and letters from the road. Ha!

I also went down to the marina with Grandad and had a look at his latest boat, the Alouette. She's quite compact, but oh so adorable; I must learn to sail, so that I can live on a boat with a dog and maybe a parrot called Polly (as opposed to Polly the Sheep, one of my earliest pets). The harbour is gorgeous, with all the yachts out at anchor. What an amazing lifestyle. It'll be mine one day.

We went and visited my Great Aunt and Uncle J & J, which was interesting (and probably ultimately expensive; the list of people to whom I've promised postcards must now have over 100 names on it), and then drove up and had a look out over Shakespeare Bay.

The bay is lovely, dark and deep, but I have blog entries to keep, and paragraphs to go before I sleep, and paragraphs to go before I sleep.

~SJ reluctantly tears her eyes away from the Marlborough sounds~

And now, it is Saturday night; two more sleeps to go! I had had all my bags packed, but it all got pulled to bits in Picton when I showing Nana what I was taking to Europe (she approved of the first aid kit and sewing kits; I feel prepared!). Now, stuff is strewn in little snaplock bags allll around my room again.

Sigh. After five years or so of sporadic planning and delighted dreaming and (over the last six months) hard saving, the long-imagined event is about to begin: my big OE! And all I feel is strangely apathetic. My hostel is booked for the first two or three nights, but I don't really know how to get from Heathrow to the place- and don't care. What happens after those few nights is anyone's guess. Christies, the agency I was going to work for, hasn't got back to me about my application yet, so presumably I'll be knocking around London with nothing to do for a few weeks. Well, nothing but the Opera and ballet and the Museum and art galleries and bookshops... okay, okay, I can probably keep the ennui at bay once I'm there.

What's more, the wonderful BillH has organised everything, and I'm off to Ireland to see Don McLean and Loudon Wainwright III (along with Van Morrison, Kenny Rogers, Emmylou Harris and other luminaries... shut up, it's my kind of music, even though I'm 21!) at the Midlands Music Festival at or near Castle Pollard, 75km from Dublin, at the end of July. It's only 2.5 months away! I hate to gush like a 14-year-old... but I've breathed the music of Don McLean since I was of that very age, and the prospect of finally seeing him at last is quite thrilling.

Equally excitingly, BillH showed me the RyanAir site, which has some rather amazing fares. Flights to Oslo and Rome are only pounds and pence! How could I ever get bored?

The apathy has melted away. Two more sleeps! Better get to bed and make it all come true sooner. :D

Night night,
SJ

Currently on my iPod: Don McLean's Slow and Easy
Currently reading: Malachi Martin's Vatican, the blog of Cello
Currently in: Christchurch, New Zealand

Am I so inept with language? I concluded my last post thus:

I'll be back, more or less the same person, hopefully with my core values (no alcohol! no drugs! no hip hop non-music!) still intact.

This gives the (utterly false) impression that I wish to remain the same person, untouched by fresh experiences, my mind determinedly shutting itself up lest it be broadened by the surprising and possibly soul-changing things - tangible and otherwise- that I encounter overseas. Not! Not! NOT! If I wanted to be the same person, I'd stay here in Christchurch (horrifyingly nicknamed "Little England" by visiting Poms), finishing off my tedious degrees as advised by all the people who never did anything particularly outside the square themselves in all their little lives (feh! at that rate I'd be doing contract law in a nice respectable firm at 23, married with children at 25, and shooting myself in the head from boredom at 27). No! Let me change! Begone, Sars of old! Aroint thee, naive girl of 21. Famme campà! (More Torna a Surriento. How I do love Neapolitan melodrama.)

Currently on my iPod: Luciano Pavarotti Torna a Surriento
Currently reading: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Currently in: Christchurch, New Zealand

My Working Holiday visa arrived today (along with my passport, thank dog. When it is only 10 days until you are due to set off for a 26-hour journey to the Antipodes, you start to get a little concerned about the fact that the British High Commission has had your passport in their clutches for weeks, with nothing but a large debit on your credit card to sho that they have even received your application! Actually, they took just over three weeks- not bad at all, especially given the fact that both Easter and Anzac Day fell within that period. Mind you, it cost $227- ouch. Talk about the hidden costs involved in travelling. I hadn't realised that it was more than a purely nominal fee. That cuts back the number of operas I'll be seeing in my first week in London- poor little arts-starved colonial struggling along on the Kiwi dollar that I am) and my dear puppy growled at the Courier man only a full five minutes after he'd left, so THAT's all right. She obviously did a good job, because it's been half an hour now, and he hasn't been back. Brave puppy girl!

10 more days, then it's Ka kite to this peaceful sod I've grown up on. Oh well, no need to get sentimental. (I'll leave that to Luciano. T'alluntane da stu core, da sta terrrrrrrra dell'ammore, tiene o core e nun turna?) I'll be back, more or less the same person, hopefully with my core values (no alcohol! no drugs! no hip hop non-music!) still intact.

Ar dee do ar dee do da day.
SJ