Tag Archive | France

Sight-Seeing in Sussex: Chichester, Arundel and Petworth

Feb22

Sunday, February 22, 2009
Chichester

Up again at 5. 50 am, I found the time to check and respond to email, make an Easybus booking to get to Stanstead airport and back for my trip this week to Oslo, Norway, and began drafting a new research grant application–all this while the rest of the world had a long Sunday late lie-in! As time galloped forth, I realized that it was almost 7. 30 and without further ado, I jumped into the shower, gulped down my toast and tea while Alternate Soaking and was out of the house at 8. 10 am in time to arrive in Wimbledon for my appointment with Stephanie at 9 .00 am. En route, in the Tube, I began reading Harry Potter #4 (The Goblet of Fire) and was making good progress on it when the train drew into Wimbledon.

Neither Steph nor I knew what the weather gurus had predicted but we hoped it wouldn’t be rain. We had decided to drive to Chichester in West Sussex, close to the Coast and not too far from Portsmouth which I had visited on Friday. As always, we chatted nineteen to the dozen in the car as we caught up with the goings-on of the past week–mainly Steph’s joy at finding a rental flat in Richmond.

Chichester:
By 10. 30 am, Steph was parking her ink-blue Lexus in Chichester’s quiet Priory Lane, so-called because it ran parallel to an ancient stone Priory that is now abandoned–or so it seemed. We found free parking (always a thrill!) and began walking down one of the town’s old lanes towards the medieval Market Cross that formed Chichester’s crossroad in the old days. Spring was decidedly in the air though the sun was playing peek-a-boo for most of the day. When it did make an appearance, it gilded the glorious Sussex Downs in the warmest shades and lifted our spirits no end.

Steph picked up a muffin and orange juice and munched as we walked towards the round monument that denotes the town center. At this point, we received our first glimpse of Chichester’s medieval Cathedral. We skirted its periphery and arrived at the gates where a modern sculpture of Saint Richard greeted us. At the main doors of the Cathedral that loomed above us (its spire creating an impressive landmark on the skyline, visible for miles out at sea), we discovered that service had just begun and visitors were unable to enter for a whioe hour. Since neither Steph nor I had heard Mass, we decided to join the service and spent the next one inside one of England’s oldest cathedrals.

Construction on Chichester Cathedral was begun in 1075 and it was largely rebuilt in the 13th century. It is a vision in clean-cut sophistication, its three storeys rising on rather stark plain walls. The highlight of the service for us was the excellence of the choir whom we passed in their wooden choir stalls en route to Communion–they gave the two of us goosebumps! Right after the service, we encircled the interior to take in the Marc Chagall stained glass window that is a burst of vivid color and contains his signature flourishes–his goat’s heads, for instance. At the back of the Shrine to Saint Richard, there was a beautiful woven carpet, also modern in design. We joined the congregation for coffee at the end of the service in a chapel at the side, then walked out into the town, glad to have attended Sunday service in so revered a place.

Lunch was on our minds by this point and since I have never eaten at Pizza Express but had been interested to try out the “Pizzas by Theo Randall” that Pizza Express has been advertizing for weeks, I jumped at Steph’s suggestion that we get a pizza. I ordered ‘Theo’s Tonnera’ which contained tuna and capers and black olives while Steph got a Guardina with artichokes, asparagus, red peppers and tomatoes. We split our pizzas and had a diet Coke each and then we were making our way back to our car as we had decided to move on to the other interesting venue right outside the town of Chichester, the Fishbourne Roman Palace.

Fishbourne Roman Palace:
This incredible space, right in the midst of nowhere, is one of the most important Roman remains in the United Kingdom. It was while a trench was being dug in the mid-1960s, that a perfect black and white mosaic was discovered embedded in the soil. Archeological excavations then extensively carried out in the area with the help of hundreds of amateur diggers, revealed the remains of a grand Roman Palace built around AD 74. A huge fire in AD 250 destroyed most of the building and the stone was used to build the Roman walls of the city that still stand.

The highlight of the exhibit is an almost intact mosaic floor whose center roundel depicts Cupid riding a dolphin while surrounded by more rondels of sea panthers, wine decanters, etc. This was the floor of what was almost certainly the dining room of the grand home that once housed dozens of people of various generations and a multitude of slaves. A 12 minute film recreated the era for us with the the kind of documentary vividness that these films always do so superbly and when we walked through the remains, we were completely in awe of the elegance with which these people lived and their expertise as gardeners–for the Palace was built around extensive formal gardens that were filled with box borders, espaliered trees and a variety of herbs. For me, it was like revisiting a tiny piece of Pompeii for it was in AD 69 that Pompeii had been destroyed. This Palace was, therefore, contemporaneous with all the marvels I had seen there with my friend Amy Tobin last March.

When we had spent more than an hour in this location, we decided to move on. Stephanie, who works for Twinnings Tea, had told me that her colleague Stephen Twinning, had mentioned to her very casually yesterday that if she intended to go to Chichester, then she ought to go to Arundel for a meal. Having taken a look at our map, I realized that it was not too far from Chichester and, on an impulse, we decided to take a detour there. And, boy, were we glad we did!

Arundel:
Arundel came upon us like a shock! Since neither one of us had read up anything on it, we did not know what to expect. Imagine our reaction, then, when we rounded a corner and came upon the turrets of a fairy-tale castle perched high up on a hill, staring down at us as we drove along a curving street through the center of a medieval town whose beamed shop fronts hid antiques stores, charming eateries and warm tea rooms. Llew had chosen just that time to call me and with Stephanie exclaiming besides me in undisguised delight, I told Llew I would call him later. Indeed, the castle reminded me so very much of the grandeur of the structure known as the Palais des Papes (Papal Palace) in Avignon in the South of France. It certainly had the same dimensions and color and some architectural features such as the crosses cut deep into the steep sides. We parked our car and hurried to see what we could of the castle before we lost all light for it was almost 4.00 pm by this time.

Wondering how to get inside, we asked a little old lady seated on a bench where we could find the entrance when we received the bad news that the castle is open only after April. As we climbed the steep hillside lined with antiques shops, I disappeared into one of them leaving Steph to find her way to the top. I poked around a bit and left with a lovely Hammersley porcelain cup and saucer for my collection which cost me almost nothing. It is steals like these that make my browsing in antiques shops so worthwhile.

Climbing further up the hillside, we arrived at the ancient stone Church of St. Nicholas that dates from the 13th century. I almost had an accident here as the glass and wooden doors of the church were difficult to open. “Turn the knob and push hard” instructed a little sticker on the door. Well I did and I almost tumbled over four steps that lay just beyond the door! Relieved that I had done myself no harm, we roamed about the interior of the church.

Next, we tackled the imposing interior of yet another Cathedral–this one belonging to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Arundel. Of course,we had to go inside and inspect it and how thrilling it was to read the history of Saint Philip Howard, once Earl of Arundel, a courtier in the time of Elizabeth I. He was persecuted for converting to Catholicsm and sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered after being convicted over cooked-up charges of treason (he is reported to have prayed for a Spanish victory over the Armada!). He died of malnutrition (some might say mercifully) when imprisoned in the Tower of London and was canonized a few years later. It is always these little nuggets of history–whether ecclesisastical or secular–that catch my fancy and keep me rivetted to the spot as I circle the monuments that signify their occurence.

On our way downhill, we browsed in another antiques store–this one carrying pricey country furniture as Steph looked for a mirror and a dresser for her flat. Everything was atrociously overpriced, however, and so we beat a hasty retreat. Arundel came upon us like an unexpected gift and we were so thrilled we took the advise of an Englishman to explore a part of the country of which neither of us had heard.

Petworth:
Then, realizing that another picturesque town–this time, one I had heard of before–was on our return route to London, I suggested we drive through Petworth. Petworth House, run by the National Trust, is another great country estate but like all National Trust properties, it remains closed until Easter (I do wish I had been warned about this because an English Heritage membership seems to offer much better value for money. Not only do their properties remain open all year round but they have tie up agreements with several sites that allow their members discounted entry as Stephanie is finding out, much to her joy, while National Trust members get no discounts at all).

Our drive through Petworth did reveal a tiny town that time forgot, complete with narrow winding lanes (also full of antiques stores, enticing shops and cute restaurants–all, unfortunately, closed by the time we arrived there).

We did get a good flavor, however, of the quaint charm of these Sussex coastal towns that come suddenly upon the motorist along country lanes that are sprinkled with villages, dotted with stone-clad churches and fields full of cud-chewing black cows. This kind of rural English landscape that I sometimes believe to be its most spectacular element, followed us all the way into Surrey by which time we had lost light completely as the sun set over the third salmon and aquamarine evening sky I have seen over the past three days.

On the way back on the Tube from Wimbledon, I couldn’t help thinking how progressively better the weather had gotten since we first began these Sunday excurisons together. In Rochester, we had rain. In Battle, we had snow. In Canterbury, we had clouds. And in Chichester, we finally had little spurts of sunshine that had lit up the entire country with a burnished glow.

With a little bit of luck, we will see the rest of the United Kingdom at its best.

And so on we go… towards yet another week–as Lent begins, Shrove Tuesday brings its customary pancakes, Ash Wednesday brings its, well, ashes and we slowly inch towards the spring-time joys of Easter!

A Very Busy Day!

Feb18

Wednesday, February 18, 2009
London

I was up again at the crack of dawn–at 6. 30 am–but did not have the time to do any reading in bed as I had to head out within an hour for my Physiotherapy session at UCL with Claire Curtin. I was early for my 8. 30 am appointment but was pleased to discover that I have improved a great deal since last I saw her. It seems that with the stretching exercises I have been doing, the shape of the arch of my feet has changed (hopefully, for the better!) and if I continue these stretches, I can hope to see more improvement. Claire showed me some new and more challenging exercises. I told her about my success with Alternate Bathing–while she did not nix it, she was not unduly enthusiastic either. She basically told me to do whatever it is that makes me feel better! She now wants to see me again after three weeks and has asked me to follow up with a call to the podiatrist to find out where I stand in the queue and if possible to see if they can fix up an appointment for me on the phone for my orthotics.

I took the bus straight from UCL Hospital to the SOAS Library so I could do some reference work with Frank Anthony’s Book Britain’s Betrayal in India. The library was almost empty when I got there at about 10 am–college students stir themselves slowly–and on consulting the online catalogue, I discovered that the book I wanted was in the Special Collections and for reference only. When I asked an assistant there to show me where the Special Collection was located, she informed me , to my huge disappointment, that Special Collections is closed on Wednesday because the library is short-staffed! I was so stunned! Imagine keeping a reference section in a university library closed because there is no one to work there! Such a thing would be unimaginable in the States!

I then decided to go into the stacks to get a book by Herbert Stark. When I tried to find that on the shelves, it was nowhere to be seen even though I had learned online that it was “Available”. I thought that I was probably looking in the wrong section or that the book had been misshelved. I was almost tearing my hair out in frustration by this point but, just then, I saw a passing librarian and asked for assistance. She apologized and told me that many of the books had not yet been shelved as “there is a huge backlog”. I was still trying to figure out what she meant when she led me to the Reshelving Section. To my horror, I saw several bookcases filled with books that had been returned days ago but which had not yet been returned to their respective shelves as they did not have the man power! This is completely insane, I thought. How is it possible for anyone to find books if they are not shelved correctly? I realized by this point that doing any kind of research in these libraries is going to take me much longer than it would take were I attempting to glean the same information in the US–so I better get cracking and bargain to spend a lot more time than I expected.

Since I was only two blocks away, I went next to the British Museum and decided to finish seeing the Highlights that I had begun yesterday. To my amazement, I found the Museum mobbed by every school-going kid in the country. Just as the area around Buckingham Palace was stormed by school-kids yesterday, so too the British Museum was buzzing today–a result of half-term break. The most popular galleries were the Egyptian Gallery where the Mummies are kept and the African and Native America Galleries where the giant totem poles and carved wooden eagles can be seen.

I had a bit of a fright when I entered an elevator to get from the Ground floor to the third. The elevator took off and then within ten seconds, kept bouncing up and down with a fearsome sound. The voice inside then said, “This lift is not in service”. I was terrified for a few seconds as I was alone in the lift and have never experienced anything like this. I started to look around frantically inside the elevator for a button I could press to communicate with someone for help when the doors swung open and I was back where I started. I fled and decided that I was better off climbing the stairs!

Eventually, I did get to the relevant floors and spent a fascinating hour seeing the following items:

1. The Lewis Chessman (These exquisite carved ivory chess man are in the Sutton Hoo section). Each one is different and they are beautifully crafted.

2. The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial. (These treasures found in a mound in Dorset were buried with a Saxon warrior who is presumed to be a king. In addition to arms and armour, there are gold and silver objects, jewelery, and a whole horde of really amazing objects that were excavated at the time of the discovery).

3. Mosaic of Christ. (This Roman mosaic, found in a Roman mansion, is the earliest image of Christ in Britain. It is remarkably well-preserved).

4. Basse Yutz Flacons. (These large urn-like metals vessels are the finest survivals of early Celtic Art. They were used for the storage and mixing of wine in keeping with similar techniques that existed in France at the time).

5. Oxus Treasure. (This is a collection of gold ornaments that hails from Archaemenid Persia. The detailed metalwork is amazing).

6. The Flood Tablet. (This is a small stone tablet whose cuneiform script has been deciphered as hailing from the Babylonian civilization. It has been interpreted as describing a great floor that led to the building of a great ark that was filled with animals and birds–an incident that bears an uncanny resemblance to the account of Noah’s Ark in the Bible. I was spellbound as I read about this on the explanation plaque near by).

7. The Royal Game of Ur. (This is a board game that was popular in the Middle East three thousand years ago. It was played with dice on a portable game board. Interestingly, a game called Asha, played in Cochin in Kerala, is said to have originated in this game–brought to India by the earliest Syrian Christians who hailed from this region–talk about cross-cultural global influences in the Ancient World…my God, this is stunning).

8. The Mummy of Katebet (This is one of the most popular items in the museum as kids seem to be bizarrely attracted to them).

9. Sphinx of Taharqo. (This is a smallish sphinx that has rather detailed features).

10. Samurai Armor. (This was found in the Japanese section but it was the least impressive of all the items I saw).

11. King of Ife (This is a small bronze head from the Yoruba tribe in Nigeria in Africa that shows the most delicate casting.)

I have to say that I was deeply touched by the images I saw everywhere of kids in the company of their parents. It took me back to my own childhood days in Bombay where I grew up. On Saturday evening outings, my parents took my brothers and myself to the Prince of Wales Museum in Colaba and it was probably there that my great passion for museums was first developed. I remember the excitement with which I looked upon the stuffed animals and birds in the Natural History section and the marvelous carved Gandhara art in other parts of the building. Bombay was such a different place in those days–the early 1960s. I remember the bus ride on a red double decker bus, so similar to the ones I have grown to love so dearly here in London. I recall the quietness of the Ballard Pier area on weekend evenings when the feverish commercial activity of the region ceased–so similar to my neighborhood of Holborn on weekend evenings. I can see so clearly the manicured lawns of the Museum and the sailors strolling around the dockyards having just disembarked from their voyages around the world.
How nice it is of these parents to spare the time to spend with their kids and to help create in their minds the kind of memories that I cherish today and am so grateful to my own parents for nurturing in me.

It was close to lunch time when I reached home to check and respond to email. Then, I shut my eyes for just a little while to take a cat nap as I had to step out again later in the evening to make my way to Charing Cross where I had scheduled a meeting with Geraldine Charles, the first Anglo-Indian academic I have met here in London. I arrived at our appointed spot rather early but whiled away the time at a local W.H. Smith store browsing through magazines. Geraldine arrived right on schedule and after we had settled ourselves in a Starbucks over coffee for her and a hot chocolate for me, we began our conversation.

Geraldine is different from most of the Anglo-Indians I have met so far in that she has made the study of her community as much an academic interest as it is a matter of familial curiosity. Her own probings into her family genealogy has led to her being invited all over the world to talk about Anglo-Indian families in British India. She gave me a ton of useful information and a number of photocopies of portraits from her family albums–all of which are priceless. Her clarity on the subject, her rather controversial views and her personal contact with eminent Anglo-Indians made for absorbing conversation and I was delighted, when at the end of our talk, she suggested we get together another time “for a curry at the Strand Continental Club”. I told her I would love to do that and on that optimistic note, we parted company as she left to catch a long-distance commuter train.

Back home, I settled in front of the telly to watch Under the Greenwood Tree based on Thomas Hardy’s novel of the same name, sent to me again by Love Films.com as the one they sent me a few weeks ago was defective. Thankfully, unlike most of Hardy’s writing, this one had a happy ending.

London’s Seedier Side: Two Walking Tours of the East End

Feb13

Friday, February 13, 2009
London

The Prisoner of Azkaban is marching along nicely. One hour long reading sessions at dawn and at bedtime will, I think, get me through the tomes (which grow in size with each volume) before I am gone from here.

Alternate Soaks, phone calls to Bombay, email correspondence, proofreading blog entries–all of that kept me busy through the morning. But the thing that ate most of my time and got me most frustrated was trying to find reasonably priced airfares for our proposed flight from Rome to Istanbul just before Easter. After trying every possibility, I came to the crazy conclusion that it might be best to use the budget airlines to return to London from Rome, then take another flight from London to Istanbul! Llew green lighted the scheme as most financially feasible and tomorrow, I shall try to make our bookings.

In the midst of all the internet research I did to try to find some fun things that Llew and I can do on Easter Sunday (as we will be spending it together here–yyesss!!!), I finally did something I had been meaning to do for weeks–book a ticket to the Royal Horticultural Society’s Chelsea Flower Show, In fact, this was on my list of things to do before I leave London! I have been reading about this legendary flower show–perhaps the world’s best–for so many years in the Home and Garden magazines to which I subscribe in the States. So, I was determined to buy myself a ticket.

When I finally got down to it this morning, I discovered that it is scheduled the very week (May 19-23) I will be in Lyon, France, with my French pen pal of 37 years, Genevieve Tougne-Ducote. Genevieve and I have not seen each other since 1989 and I was so looking forward to meeting her and her family–husband and two sons. Fortunately, the day I return from France is also the last day of the show and since my flight arrives at Stanstead at 10.30 am, I will certainly be able to catch the last three to four hours of the show–which will be ample, I think.

Then, for technical reasons (they need my credit card registered to a UK address)my online purchase would not go through and in desperation, I called my friend Rosemary and asked her to make the purchase for me with her credit card. She readily obliged and I will reimburse her in cash. Delighted, just delighted, that I did get tickets to the show and will actually be able to make it, despite my travel plans, I decided to go outdoors and enjoy what had shaped into a lovely day with robin’s egg blue skies and a cheerful winter sun. I showered, decided to do the Jack the Ripper Walk from my book–24 Great Walks in London–and left my flat.

The reason I chose this macabre walk was because I had scheduled a walking tour of Spitalfields with a Blue Badge Guide for my students of Global Cultures at 5pm. I knew that Brick Lane is located in this general area and since my students are studying Monica Ali’s Brick Lane for my South Asian Studies class, I thought it would make sense to take them there to explore the area and see it for themselves. We were scheduled to meet at Liverpool Street Station at 5 pm, so it made sense to do another walking tour of the same area in the afternoon with a good long break in-between in a coffee shop to rest my legs.

The Jack the Ripper Tour began at Aldgate Underground Station and took me past such interesting sights as the following:

1. The Church of “St. Botolph Without Aldgate” (so-called because it lay beyond, outside, or without, the gates of Aldgate). Also known as the Prostitutes’ Church as most of the street walkers of the area worshipped here.

2. Various locations in which the six women that Jack the Ripper killed were found or were last seen. These included a few pubs in the area around Whitechapel.

3. Petticoat Lane (so-called because 18th century under-jackets called petticoats, worn by men, were sold on this street). Today, it is a thriving street market, mostly frequented on Sundays by tourists. I found it very disappointing and totally lacking in atmosphere.

4. Old Spitalfields Market: A Victorian indoor market (similar to Old Covent Garden Market or Smithfield Market). Both this place and Petticoat Lane were on my list of places to see before I left London–so I guess I can say, Been There, Done That.

5. The Jame Masjid at Fournier Street, just off Brick Lane. Interesting because it was once a Huguenot Chapel, then a synagogue and is now a mosque.

6. Rows and rows of row houses (attached houses), many of which were destroyed during World War II (remember all the TV footage we have seen so often of the late Queen Mother touring the ravaged East End after the London Blitz?). These once housed the Huguenot silk weavers and giant wooden bobbins are now hung outside these homes. This is especially true of Wilkes Street and Puma Court. This was the most atmospheric part of the walk and appealed to me the most.

7. Christ Church, Spitalfields, built by Nicholas Hawksmoor (pupil of Sir Christopher Wren) in the early 1700s. An imposing Baroque structure, its spire rises tall into the sky and its four columns in the front flank a semi-circular pediment that gives it a very distinctive look. Inside, after restoration, it exudes peace and serenity and has fine stained glass windows.

This walk took me to some of the seediest parts of London I have seen so far. There was garbage in the gutters, houses and neighborhoods that looked badly in need of refurbishment or at least a lick of paint, rather ratty looking shops and Mom and Pop businesses. Now I understand why they say the East End is one of the most neglected parts of the city and why they hope the coming Olympics in 2012 will rejuvenate the area.

However, it is also one of the most diverse parts of the city and I saw a variety of races living in harmony together and a number of global cultures coalescesing quite effortlessly. Amazingly, just a few blocks past the rather run down streets were the towering glass and concrete structures around Liverpool Street Station where the large corporations have set up shop–RBS, for instance. Just a few yards ahead is Bank, so-called because the Bank of England (aka the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street) is located here and one day, when the weather gets better, I shall explore these old solid 18th station buildings and the warren of streets that unite them, on foot.

I arrived at Liverpool Street Station at the end of this walk and found myself a quiet spot in a Burger King where I rested for over an hour and read the free local eveninger–“the london paper”! At 5 pm, I made my way to the Upper Concourse to the meeting point outside McDonald’s where my students and I were supposed to meet Rachel Kolsky, our guide. We were all very punctual indeed and our walk began with Rachel pointing out many interesting features of the area, such as:

1. Kindertransport Sculpture: This sculpture by Frederick Meissler depicts the Kindertransport children. She told us the moving story of the 10,000 European children who were brought to England in 1939 just before the outbreak of World War I and were placed in English homes. I had never heard of this aspect of War history before and was fascinated and moved to tears by Rachel’s retelling of the scheme and the impact it had on the children who are scattered, today, all over the world.

2. Dennis Severs House: Built by an American expatriate in the East End who took an old Huguenot house and converted it into a ‘museum’ of sorts to recreate the era of the old silk weavers. It is a must-see, I think, and I will definitely carve out some time to see it though visiting hours are rather erratic.

3. Homes on Hansbury Street, deliberately kept in a decrepit state, because they are used today as movie sets for period films and TV series. The insides were also true to those bygone eras and were fascinating to peer into.

4. The synagogue on Hansbury Street and the many stories associated with it. This taught me about the arrival of the Jews into the East End (they lived on the outskirts of the City as they were not permitted within the City reaches), their persecution and expulsion under Edward I, their return to England under the more hospitable Oliver Cromwell, their persecution again in the Victorian Age and their move out of the East End to the Western suburbs such as Golders Green, Hendon and Edgeware in the 1970s to be replaced by Bangaldeshi immigrants.

5. Brick Lane: This stop told us about the arrival of the Bangla or Bengali immigrants into the UK from the time of the lascars (Muslim ship hands) who, in the late 1800s, jumped ship in England and made their home in the East End to those who arrived at the end of World War II to provide labor during the era of acute labor shortage in England and then the most recent ones who came during the Civil War in 1971. We touched on Monica Ali’s novel as we surveyed the endless chain of Bangladeshi restaurants, sweetmeat shops, sari emporiums, video stores, etc.

The appetizing aromas of spices assailed our nostrils and made me long for a curry stop except that it was freezing by the time we finished our walk about two hours later and all that my students and I could think of was getting back home to our warm dwellings and hunkering down for the evening.

The walk taught me why you can find really excellent bagels in Brick Lane (the Jewish run bakeries still stay open 24 hours of the day and make really authentic, delicious, boiled bagels on the premises). I can’t wait to try one with lox (smoked salmon) and cream cheese, capers, lenon juice and chopped onion. It is one of my favorite things to eat and I frequently fix myself this treat for breakfast at home in the States.

It is true that having done two walks in one day, I was very tired when I got home. I made myself comfortable on the couch while eating my dinner (I picked up canneloni stuffed with spinach and ricotta cheese from M&S, what my neighbor Tim refers to as his “larder”) while doing my Alternate Soaks (if ever I needed them, it was this evening!) then checked my email and got ready for bed.

Culture-Vulture Me! Twelfth Night with Derek Jacobi.

Feb3

Tuesday, February 3, 2009
London

After the worst snowstorm in two decades, London limped slowly back to normal today. Red buses were plying again and the ice on the sidewalks had started to melt. There actually were signs of life on the streets as I had my breakfast and finished captioning our Scotland album. Actually, it was rather an odd sort of day because Carol, the weather forecaster on BBC’s Breakfast show, kept saying that temperatures were be below the minus mark (which is a big deal here in London) but that the sun would shine all day!

I spent a while doing some preliminary research on my proposed Spring Trip with Llew and since Easyjet has a sale that ends at midnight tonight, I figured I would look at some possibilities. We have finally decided to go to Italy and Turkey for 9 days–essentially Rome (where Llew has never been) and Istanbul which so many of my friends have raved about and which I did want to see before I returned to the States. I also wanted to go to Egypt; but I find that airfares are really high right now and it might be best to go to Egypt and Jordan at the same time that Llew and I go to the Holy Land as that trip is very definitely on the cards for us sometime.

After I found us good fares, I dashed off an email to Llew telling him to get back to me and let me know if the dates I had in mind would work. Given the time difference between New York and London, I knew it would be a few hours before I heard from him, so I showered and set off to get myself a bunch of theater and opera tickets for the next few months as some marvelous shows have opened up in London for the winter season and I did not want to miss them.

It WAS a beautiful day–it is so rare to see the sun in these parts in winter that though it was very cold indeed, I did not feel the bleakness of winter surrounding me. I took the bus first to Shaftestury Avenue to the Apollo Theater where I got myself a single ticket to see Three Days of Rain starring James McEvoy (who played Robert in Ian McEwan’s Atonement). The show is filling up fast (McEvoy’s name is a huge draw) and I only managed to get a seat in my price range in April. Next, I took a bus to Trafalgar Square to the Trafalgar Studios to book a ticket to see Imelda Staunton (who played Vera Drake in the film Vera Drake) in Entertaining Mr. Sloan. This show has a very limited four week run and since I think Staunton is one of the finest female actresses working in the UK today, I simply did not want to miss it. How thrilled I was when I found a ticket for next Monday evening. Then, I simply walked across Trafalgar Square to the Coliseum where the English National Opera has two superb shows on in the next few months. I got myself a single ticket to see Puccini’s La Boheme in March and then bought two tickets for this Saturday evening’s show to see Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Stephanie will be spending the weekend with me in my flat and we decided to go to the opera and dinner on Saturday evening. Finally, I crossed the street (St. Martin’s Lane) and entered The Duke of York Theater to buy a ticket for Arthur Miller’s View from the Bridge which counts in its cast Hayley Atwell (I saw her recently in The Duchess and she also played the major role of Julia Flythe in the new version of Brideshead Revisited–which I have yet to see). She is one of the UK’s most up-and-coming actresses and I am delighted to be able to see her in person. So, with all these tickets in the bag, Culture-vulture Me then hopped next door into the National Gallery to complete the last six galleries I needed to study as part of my project to become closely acquainted with its collection.

I sat on a bench in the lobby and ate my quiche Lorraine and then began my perusal of galleries 41 to 46 which are the most popular rooms at the National since they contain works by the Impressionists. They were, therefore, far more crowded than the the other galleries I’ve studied. All the big names were here and all the most famous canvases in this genre (Monet’s Water Lilies, Van Gogh’s Armchair and Sunflowers, Degas’ Ballet Dancers, Renoir’s Umbrellas —I loved that work–Cezanne’s still lives, Seurat’s Bathers at Asnieres, etc. etc.) but for me, as always, the works that caught my attention were the least known–I particularly warmed to a view of Badminton by Corot and a wintry scene in Norwood by Camille Pissarro. So many of these Impressionists ‘escaped’ to London to avoid the (Crimean?) War that they ended up painting English landscapes in styles that pre-empted the Impressionist rage that would shortly sweep over France. And it was these works that I found most intriguing. I also loved the scenes of the Siene at Argenteuille and Pointoise that Monet, Manet and even Morissot painted. Somehow, it is these rural river scapes that are most charm my eye and take me into imaginary realms that make me feel me serene and contented.

Then, I took the bus back home, glad that Llew had contacted me via cell phone while I was in the gallery and had greenlighted the dates I had picked for our travels. This meant that I could go ahead and book our Easyjet tickets online which I did immediately. So, Italy and Turkey…here we come! I now have to find us good fares from Rome to Istanbul but I do know that Swissair is doing some good offers at the moment. I organized all my theater tickets at home, changed a few plans to fit in with an invitation to drinks tomorrow that my friend Rosemary Massouras left me by email and tried to take a short nap before I left the house again.
You see, yesterday, just by chance, when we were standing outside NYU waiting for the campus doors to be opened, Ruth Smith Tucker, one of our administrative aides, had offered me a free ticket to see Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night at the Donmar Wyndham Theater on Charing Cross Road. I had jumped at the opportunity, of course, as I was aware that the role of Malvolio is being played by none other than Derek Jacobi, veteran Shakespearean actor (also star of Cadfael and I, Claudius). So, I pulled on warm clothes, took the bus to Charing Cross at 6. 30 pm, (after a small bite of more quiche Lorraine) and arrived at the theater to find David Hillel-Reuben, Director of NYU-London, in the lobby awaiting the arrival of his family. A little later, his wife and son joined us and still later, James Weygood arrived with my ticket.

Upstairs, in the Grand Circle, in one of the most beautiful theater interiors I have been so far, we settled down to watch a show that I have seen several times before and in several versions (the very first time being at the Royal Shakespeare Theater at Stratford-on-Avon twenty-two years ago when I was at Oxford). Yet, it never ever palls, this lovely amusing confusing heartwarming comedy that Shakespeare wrote so many centuries ago. I have seen so many Malvolios over the years and each of them has brought his own brand of humor and individuality to the interpretation of the role–but I know I will never forget Jacobi, who was simply masterful.

I was also thrilled to discover that Olivia was played by an Indian actress (Indira Varma who was in Bride and Prejudice among other shows). She is tall, slim, statuesque and very elegant indeed and when I saw her olive skin, so beautifully set off in the grand black mourning outfit she wore in the first scene, I knew she was an ‘ethnic’ actress. Yet another actor whose origin is undoubtedly the Indian sub-continent was Zubin Varla who played Feste, the Fool–he is not only from South Asia but a Parsi as well, as I can tell from his name. All of the cast were just superb and at the end of the show when I ran into Mick Hattaway who teaches Shakespeare at NYU and is considered one of the UK’s finest Shakespearean scholars, he said to me, “This is as good as it can get”. Indeed, it was brilliant, and I realized as I left the theater that I can see Twelfth Night again and again and never ever tire of it.

The show ended at 10 pm, I changed three buses to reach home and yet I was in the lobby of my building at 10. 25–this is the beauty of living in the Heart of London and of London’s buses–when they do run, they are reliable and convenient and, best of all, so cheap!!!

Back on my couch, I helped myself to some Carrot and Ginger Soup and the Strawberry Compote Trifle (courtesy of Marks and Spenser) and went straight to bed. It had been a day of art museums and quality theater and I was a happy camper as I fell asleep.

Spring Classes Begin and Seeing an NHS Physiotherapist

Jan20

Monday, January 19, 2009
London

Rain poured down at dawn on the first day of classes as I showered and breakfasted and left my flat early to take the bus to get to Bedford Square. The idea was to beat every other faculty member to the basement copy machines. I needn’t have worried. No one else had surfaced for a first class on a Monday and I had the premises entirely to myself. In fact, I had only 7 students in my Writing II class in the lovely ornate Room 12 with its brass chandeliers and its ornamental ceiling plasterwork and moulding.

Class One is devoted to going over the syllabus and explaining course requirements and getting to know new students. The way I did this was through an assignment entitled ‘Primary Sources’ in which I ask students to pick any 6 words or short phrases that best describe their journey through life. They then expand on these phrases by writing an accompanying paragraph that fleshes out the essentialist idea and helps create a mosaic that informs the reader about the writer’s past. They set to work cheerfully as sunlight flooded the room. I am looking forward to this course which includes field trips with accompanying assignments to Cornwall as well as Portsmouth and Winchester when the weather turns warmer.

During my hour long lunch break, I caught up on email, did some more photocopying and noticed that life had returned to the campus’ academic building, former home of Lord Eldon, Chancellor of London. Other professors started to descend down to the copy machine. I had a chat with Llew who was headed to Manhattan to meet Chrissie to pick up the stuff my parents and I’d sent through her for him from India. We decided to speak again later in the day.

At 2pm, I left for my second class which is located in the University of London’s Birkbeck College. This Writing II class had a larger enrollment–16 to be precise. Several were returning students who’d taken my Writing I class last semester but several were new faces, three of whom are from Turkey. It is like a mini-United Nations in this classroom with students from India, China, Korea, France and the United States and, no doubt, they will bring a great deal of their own background and heritage to bear upon our study of London’s multi-cultural and multi-racial quarters as well as the ethnographic profile that I have asked them to create based on individual research and personal interviews. It promises to be an exciting semester and I am looking forward to it.

I left this class early at 3. 30 pm (instead of 5 pm) as I had an appointment with the specialist physiotherapist that the NHS has finally allotted me. Imagine… I had to wait for three whole months to be granted an interview with a specialist physiotherapist. This, I guess, is the down side of socialized health care. In the United States, I’d be able to see any specialist of my choice within 24 hours. Here, I had to wait for three whole months! On the other hand, in the United States, the visit would have cost no less than $400–of which I’d have to pay a co-pay of $30 per visit, my medical insurance covering the rest. In this country, I was not required to spend a penny but imagine if I hadnt seen a private physiotherapist as I did in October itself since my Aetna Global Insurance covered it, I’d have been writing in agony for 3 months before I could find relief from pain! It is truly hard to imagine such a situation and it explains why the United States is so reluctant to go the socialized medicine route. The wealthy would never tolerate this sort of time lag even while the poor would finally have access to quality health care. It is an impossible dilemma to resolve and today, the day on which the first African-American President of the United States is sworn in as the leader of the First World, I have to wonder whether we Americans will ever be able to settle this impasse.

Paul was very professional indeed as he started from scratch. I had to go through the plethora of questions–where, when, how did the affliction (Plantar Fascittis) assault me. What have I done so far to relieve my condition? What sort of exercises have I been prescribed? etc. etc. He started from Square One, asking me to walk across the room so he could assess my gait. I was pronounced to have a right foot that is flatter than the left (hence the persistent pain in its arch), a right foot that flares out slightly when I walk, weak hip and knee muscles (that are probably responsible for the pain in my knee every time I have done a bit too much walking). Paul recommended a series of exercises (I will be retaining two of the old ones and adding two newer ones) as well as an exercise that involves the use of an elastic rubber band to strengthen the muscles on my right ankle. He too (like my homeopath Alpana Nabar of Bombay) has suggested that I avoid all unnecessary walking for the next two months at least to allow the muscles and tendons to relax completely. This means that I will have to scrap all self-guided walks though I can still do the museum visits in short spurts. I have to admit that I was rather “naughty” (as my friend Cynthia Colclough puts it) and as soon as the pain in the knee disappeared over the two weeks that I stayed in Bombay (where the warmer weather also helped), I was out and about again…hey, you can’t keep a good gal down! Now I know better and shall follow doctor’s orders walking no more than for 20 minutes at a stretch and carrying as light a load as possible. The very thoughtful gift that Chriselle gave me for Christmas (a pedometer) will prove very useful as it measures the number of steps I’ve taken, the number of miles covered as well as the number of calories that have been expended with each step that I take.

On the way home, I felt the beginnings of a cold. My throat felt raspy and dry and I became aware of a strange weakness descend upon me. I took a Crocin immediately and had an early dinner and got into bed with the idea of turning in early. Then the phone began ringing off the hook–first it was Cynthia catching up with me after my return to London, then Stephanie Provost called. She is a close friend of my close friend Amy Tobin and has also been posted in the UK for a year from the States. She is a marketing whiz and works for Twinning Tea Company and will be launching this product line in Europe. Her work involves a great deal of international travel but she is certainly up for doing anything cultural or artsy as well as taking daytrips with me on the weekends. The good news is that the company has given her a spiffy car–a Lexus–and pays her gas bills! This will allow us to take daytrips at the weekend once the spring thaw arrives. The bad news is that she doesn’t work in London but in Andover and, therefore, lives right now in Wimbledon (on the outskirts of London) and will likely be moving shortly to Richmond. We have made plans to meet on Sunday, January 25, to take a day trip to Oxfordshire to see Blenheim Plaace and Klemscott Manor (home of William Morris) and will synchronize our respective calendars at that point and try to find weekend slots during which we can take in a few new plays and go to the opera. So many wonderful plays have recently opened in the city starring some really big names (James McEvoy, Imelda Staunton, Hayley Atwell, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Edward Fox, Christopher Timothy, Steven Tomkinson, etc.) and I am keen to see them all.

Just then Llew called and we had a long chat and caught up with everything that had happened that day. He had the day off (Martin Luther King Day) and with the USA gearing up for Obama’s big inauguration tomorrow, it promises to be an exciting and very historic day in the country.

I was asleep by 9. 30 and awoke at 5. 30 am (which I guess is better than awaking at 3.30am!) but I still keep hoping that I will sleep until at least 6 am each morning. I guess I am slowly getting there.

A Black and White Weekend

Nov29

Saturday, November 29, 2008
London

It is shaping into a Black and White Weekend with a steady drizzle continuing to drench the city. I broke from routine today, waking up quite unexpectedly at 3. 30 am and thinking it was 6 am. I tried futilely to return to sleep but when it eluded me, I said, what the heck, I might as well get up and do some writing. When I did feel sleepy again, it was 7am and I succumbed to the temptation to slide back in to bed, waking only at 9 am. This threw my routine out of balance completely. But then that’s one of the joys of living on your own. I am mistress of my day and I choose to live exactly as the whim takes me.

Everything was subsequently delayed. I ate breakfast at about 10am, called my Dad and Mum in India to get another update on the situation in Bombay which, thankfully, is finally under control, though the death toll, at almost 200 people, is horrendous. The dullness of the day and the complete lack of sunshine did nothing to alleviate the gloom I felt all day. Rather despondently, I sat down to transcribe three of the interviews I carried out at Greenford the other day and went in for my shower only about noon. That, and a quick lunch later, I was finally ready to leave my flat for a bit of sight seeing.

I chose to return to the Tate Britain to finish seeing the rest of the permanent collection. This portion of it went rather quickly. But for a few Henry Moores and Barbara Hepworths and some Victor Pasmores, I was left quite untouched by British Modern Art. There was a special exhibit on Francis Bacon and I caught a glimpse of a few of his large canvasses as well as a video on his life and work. I don’t believe that I found anything I saw today compelling.

Deciding not to spend any more time in the Tate, I caught the bus back to Covent Garden as I found the Christmas lights there rather enticing and believed that there might be a Christmas market on. Well, when I got there, I found that I was rather mistaken. It is the regular market that is on, but the place is festive as several holiday lights do festoon the area. I heard a busker provide a good rendition of Nessun Dorma before I peeked at the Arts and Crafts in the Jubilee Market. Those too did not engage me in any way and deciding not to waste any more time, I walked towards Tesco to buy a few groceries.

After a very long time, I bought a pizza which I popped into my oven and ate on my couch while watching TV. I also bought a bottle of cider which I found wonderfully sweet and refreshing and when I spied Mrs. Beeton’s Rum and Raisin Ice-Cream, I could not resist picking up a tub for dessert.

Just when I finished eating my dinner, my doorbell rang and Tim Freeman, my next door neighbor, inquired about whether I had already eaten my supper. He had come in to invite me to join him and Barbara at a kedgeree dinner which I am sure I would have found scrumptious. I had to take a rain check, however, as I had finished my ice-cream too, by that stage, and felt quite stuffed indeed. I know it would have been a rare treat to taste kedgeree as the English make it as I have heard about this dish that combines rice and fish for years (but have never eaten it). It was an invention of the English in India during the British Raj and is based loosely on the Indian dish called Kichdee which contains rice and dal. Oh well, I hope there will be another time. On Thanksgiving evening, Tim had invited me over for Liver and Bacon, another traditional English dish of which I have heard so much (most recently in All Creatures Great and Small, the TV series, when Seigried feels miserable because he had plans to be away from home on the evening that his housekeeper intended to serve Liver and Bacon). Unfortunately, I could not accept that invitation either as I had plans for dinner that evening with Karen and Douglas.

I saw three really good programs on BBC TV before falling off to sleep. Steven Fry’s Tour Across America took him to California, Oregon, Alaska and Hawaii today and it was wonderful to relive the drama of watching the live volcanoes on the Big Island by which Llew and I had been bowled over a few summers ago. Chriselle called in the middle of my program and I spent a few pleasant moments speaking to her. This was followed by Boris Johnson talking about the clash of civilizations–Islam and Christianity. Yes, this is the same Boris Johnson that they call BoJo–today’s Mayor of London. I had no idea that he was an expert in Medieval History and I realize that I should read his biography and get to know a little bit about this flamboyant blondie! And then there was a feature called France on a Plate–an attempt to understand why, for the French, food is not just something that sustains them physically but a cultural, political and ideological aspect of their lives.

And on that salivating note, I called it a day as I was exhausted,
for some reason, and ready to drop.

A Word About Poppies

Nov12

November 11, 2008
Athens-London

At the stupendous, breathtaking Olympic Stadium in Athens, as so often happens on vacation, a young man came up and requested us to take his picture against the five world rings that dominate the spectator stands. He happened to be Bolivian, on holiday in Athens from Paris where he is posted for a year on work–talk about globalization! There I was in Athens, originally from India, now based in the USA, on holiday in Athens from London where I am posted for a year on work. The similarities were striking!

He told us he was out and about on a long weekend in France where the nation is celebrating Armistice Day–November 11, 1918 was when the First World War ended. And I am reminded of the ceremonies in London that I have seen year after year on TV during the BBC World News in commemoration of Remembrance Day (as it is in known in the UK). For years I wondered why the BBC reporters and its guests wore a brilliant red favor in their lapels for a couple of weeks in November. Then, at the Cenotaph, a monument in London that I have yet to seek out and find, Tony Blair would lay a red poppy wreath as war veterans hobbled forward or were wheeled in their chairs to the front, all decked out in their military regalia. We have no such ceremonies in the States to mark this date–probably because we were not involved in the intrigues of World War I.

However, a few years ago, when my mother Edith was visiting the USA, I had taken her to the traditional parade to mark Memorial Day (last weekend in May). There, on the cheering streets of our local home town, Southport, Connecticut, she watched fascinated as people waved the star-spangled banner and floats laden with vivid red poppies passed by to the enthusiastic waves of elderly men and women whose clothing was covered with poppies fashioned out of red construction paper. My mother was enthralled, indeed almost teary-eyed, as she watched. “Look at all those poppies”, she said. “That takes me back to my childhood. When we were children in school, we celebrated the end of the War with these poppies that were sold as favors in Bombay. In fact, we used to make these poppies ourselves, out of red crepe paper! Everyone bought a poppy and wore them in their lapels. I haven’t seen anything like this in so many years”, she marvelled.

So it was in my mother’s honor that I bought a poppy, two weeks ago, while I was with Dorothy Dady in Richmond. It was with pride that I wore it in my lapel for a couple of days before Llew arrived and we left for our Greek Odyssey. Karen, my colleague at NYU, saw me walk into our office with the poppy on my coat pocket and asked me, “What’s with this thing? I see so many people wearing it here.” I explained the significance of the Poppy Appeal about which I had heard on BBC TV only two days previously. Every single BBC reporter and guest had worn the poppy and I was so delighted to be a part of this tradition during my year in London.

So many thoughts coalesced as we crossed Western Europe last night–albeit at thirty thousand feet above sea level–en route to the UK. It was Armistice Day in Europe–Poppy Day in London–and my mother Edith, in whose honor I purchased and wore a poppy, turns 77 tomorrow in Bombay. I cannot wait to call her and tell her about my small tribute to the many nameless brave and courageous men and women whose contribution to the War Effort continues to be recalled here in the UK on Remembrance Day. I was only sorry that I missed the ceremonies in London as I would dearly have loved to be a part of the rituals of the day in person on English soil.

Understanding the NHS and Discovering Persephone Books

Oct17

Friday, October 17, 2008
London

Boo Hoo, Boo Hoo…that’s me weeping. I am still here in London as I had to cancel my weekend travel plans to Berlin. And for very good reason too. My maniacal walking all over London has finally done me in. The excruciating pain I woke with two days ago reached unbearable levels yesterday. After teaching my two classes, I consulted with my colleagues and was told to head straight for the A&E (Accidents & Emergency) Department at the University of London Hospital at Euston.

Dusk was already falling gently on the city when I reached there feeling unusually nervous about having to find my way through the medical system of a foreign country. I expected to have to wait for at least an hour–after all, an ache in the foot doesn’t compare quite as urgently with a heart attack or someone with a burn accident. Registration done, I was asked to sit for a bit. Waiting time, the receptionist informed me, was running at an hour. Not too bad, I thought, as I settled down to read the evening’s edition of The London Paper–full of the news about the Madonna-Ritchi divorce.

I was only quite getting into the dirt when someone with a strange accent barked my name. I had barely sat down for ten minutes! The doctor who saw me was rakish–a Dr. Manolo Gavalas. From his name, I would guess he was Greek. He gave me a welcoming smile and asked to see my foot. He took one look at it, encased in my ankle brace, and said, “I’m sorry, but you’ve come to the wrong place. There’s not much I can do for you here. There are no bones broken. No fractures. You need to see your G.P. Who’s your G.P?”

“I don’t have one”, I said, miserably.

“Well, you need to register and get a G.P. He’ll then decide what to do–whether to send you for a X-Ray or to see a physiotherapist. I think you have Plantar Fasciitis. It’s a painful condition and will be troublesome for a few days. But I can’t do anything for you”.

That was it. At the reception, I received a print out giving me instructions on how to register with the NHS–that’s Britain’s notorious National Health Service for you. If you are legally present in the UK, you are entitled to NHS facilities which, basically, means you can see a doctor and get a prescription. However, you do have to pay for your medicines (7 pounds is the average cost for one set of medications) unless you are a child or a pensioner (British for senior citizen) in which case medication is also free.

Well, I hobbled back home, seriously concerned about my leg, and went straight to my laptop. I googled ‘Plantar Fasciitis’ and learned everything about it. It is clearly all the walking I have done that has caused my condition. The arches under my foot, which are very weak to begin with, have stretched and become inflamed and need a great deal of TLC to coax them back to health.

I then rang my neighbor’s doorbell and asked Tim if he could suggest a GP in our area since I’d rather go to a doctor they could recommend than to a stranger. Within a half hour, I had the telephone number and location of the Holborn Medical Center on Lamb’s Conduit Street just behind High Holborn and I resolved to get there and find a G.P. first thing today.

Well, I then went on to the NHS website, registered (they needed a lot of personal information) and awaited the Registration confirmation. NHS GPs (that is General Practitioners, what in the States we call Internists) are the first port of call. They diagnose conditions and refer patients to specialists who suggest treatment and dispense medication.

When I awoke this morning, the pain was still present, not severe, but there, a nagging ache in the sole of my foot that caused me to hobble about my flat. I didn’t waste too much time contacting the Holborn Medical Center. A lovely chap called Steven told me to come in with my “documentation”–by which he meant my passport (he needs to determine that I am legally in the UK, so I guess he would need to examine my work permit), my rental agreement (which makes me a bonafide resident of Holborn–I took my Camden Council tax papers) and one utility bill (I took my Virgin Media bill for last month). Then, I set out on a particularly lovely autumn day to find the “surgery” as they call the doctor’s office.

A short ten minute away, there it was. Steven met me, had me fill out the paper work, and told me to stay tuned for a call from the doctor that would come within the hour–thank God for my new cell phone. I decided to find a coffee in a cafe nearby as I did not want to walk too much on my strained foot. My research on the Internet had informed me that they only real treatment was footrest and a few exercises to strengthen the Achilles tendon and the plantar. Then, just across the street, I spied a shop called Persephone Books and, of course, I cannot pass a bookshop without browsing through its shelves. So in I went.

And thus, I discovered one of the cutest bookshops in the world. Inside were shelves with books covered in a uniform grey. The end papers were wonderfully funky prints. Where on earth had I stumbled? The lovely salesgirl then came forward and asked if I needed help. “What an interesting book shop!” I exclaimed.

“Yes, we are one of a kind, aren’t we?” she said. “Persephone was started by Nicola Beauman in the most interesting way.”

She went on to inform me that the company’s founder, Nicola Beauman, had just watched a movie called Brief Encounter, directed by David Lean (yes, he of Lawrence of Arabia and A Passage to India and Beckett) and was enchanted by the heroine of the film which is set in the 1930s who enjoyed her weekly excursion to town to do some shopping, have a coffee in the cafe, see a movie, then go to the local library to change her book. In her shopping bag, was a book by Edna O’Brien. The cover of this book fascinated Nicola Beauman who decided that she too would read the book. This got her involved in the world of female writers between the two great Wars and she found that so many of the books were out of print.

So, there it was–a business opportunity staring her in the face. One that would allow her to reprint these classic books written mostly between 1900 and 1940 only by women. She chose fabrics that were contemporary to the period of the book and used those as end papers. Each book has a plain grey cover though, in some cases, ‘Classics’ have been reissued with a picture on the cover–usually a contemporary painting by a female artist.

Thus, Persephone Books was born, an outfit that has two London storefronts–one at Kensington Church Street, the other at Lamb’s Conduit Street. Their market is very specific. Almost all their customers are women. Because they have, to date, no more than 60 odd titles, the books are ready wrapped in fuchsia or grey wrapping paper, tied with a ribbon and finished off with a book mark in the same print as the end paper to be found in the book. Now how clever is that? And how charming? As I flipped through the pages, I became aware of the trills of a Chopin Etude playing softly in the background and I envied the salesgirl her little spot of heaven.

I was so taken by the store and the collection that I asked for prices and was informed that every single books costs a flat 10 pounds, though you can buy three for 27. They do ship all over the world (in fact, the Lamb’s Conduit Street shop handles mail orders) and they run events all year round. Not surprisingly, the events take the form of “cream teas” and lectures (one of them on November 13 is to be given by Prof. Elaine Showalter, my colleague at NYU’s English Department).

As if that were not enough for the Edwardian in me, guess, what? They also run a book club! YYYEEESS!!! Groups of women get together over Madeira, bread and cheese and discuss one of their titles. The cost to attend this is 10 pounds and because I will be missing their November meeting (I will, fingers crossed, be with Llew in Greece at that time, when the group will be discussing
The Making of a Marchioness by Frances Hodgson Burnett”), I hope to attend their early December meeting where the book to be discussed is A House in the Country by Jocelyn Playfair. I cannot believe that I have actually stumbled upon a Book Club in London and one that I can enjoy. Naturally, I did get enrolled and will pay my 10 pounds when I get to the meeting in December at their Notting Hill Shop.

To read more about Persephone Books, please visit their website:
http://www.persephonebooks.co.uk//

So, here I was, feeling unhappy that I was forced to call off my trip to Berlin as I was so afraid about my foot and as a compensation , I found a darling book shop in London and will soon be a member of a Book Club! How fortunate can one reader be? Well, just as I was browsing through the shop, my cell phone rang–withing 20 minutes of my arrival there. The doctor could see me in ten minutes. What a good thing I hadn’t strayed too far away.

In ten minutes, I was sitting with a GP named Steven Yaxley who didn’t seem older than 18! He went through the formalities with me and came up with an identical diagnosis–plantar fasciitis. He also gave me a print out of the exact same thing I had read on the Net yesterday and suggested foot rest, foot exercises, a local ibuprofen gel and the use of sneakers with good supportive arches. He actually showed me the exercises and told me to stay off my feet for at least one to two weeks. I was so crestfallen. Imagine wasting two weeks in the autumn staying cooped up indoors, unable to do any of the exploring I had intended. But then, I realized that perhaps it is best I do this because I do want to be, as my Dad would say, “fighting fit” by the time Llew arrives here at the end of the month and we leave on our travels in Greece.

Dr. Yaxley told me that I could see a physiotherapist if I wished but I would probably not get an appointment for at least a month. It seems that the UK is short of physiotherapists and there are too many patients to see them. In any case, he assured me, my condition does not require any urgent treatment. If I am good and stay off my feet and do the exercises while watching TV or working at my desk, I should be much better in a couple of weeks, he assured me.

So I returned to my flat and have started making plans to spend the next few days cozily at home with lots of good stuff to eat and drink, a lot of reading and good TV (with my feet raised for comfort) and a lot of writing accomplished on my laptop.

Really not too bad a deal, if you come to think of it. And if I stay optimistic, I will get rid of the foot pain and be all set to start exploring again!

I only hope I am not going to pile on the pounds in two weeks!!!

So, there you have it. The NHS. It works.

My Writing Class at the National Gallery

Oct10

Thursday, October 9, 2008
London

My Anglo-Indian course at NYU is going, as they would say in London, “brilliantly”. My students have actually finished reading all 500 pages of William Dalrymple’s White Moghuls and we have a very productive discussion. Oral presentations on The Way We Were are also engaging, my students using Powerpoint very effectively to present visuals, maps, and the like. I am impressed by their creativity,their industry, the manner in which they have “gotten into” my course. Two of my students leave class early because they’ve been invited to a lunch at Norwood by a South London Anglo-Indian group that meets each Thursday to play bingo and eat Anglo-Indian food. The rest of the students envy them and want to be invited as well. “Can’t we all go?” they ask. Then I inform them that another Anglo-Indian group based in Berkshire has invited all of us to a do on November 9 to meet their members and partake of more Anglo-Indian grub. We are all devastated that the date falls in the midst of our Fall Break when most of us will be traveling. But I am deeply touched by the warmth and the hospitality and the welcome we are receiving from every quarter.

An hour later, I am at the National Gallery getting ready to meet my Writing Class. I am taking them on a tour and I proudly wear a Group Leader badge given me by the National Gallery Education Department to wear during the tour. I am nervous because I do not know the layout of the museum well enough and have to consult my floor plan each time I wish to move from one item to the next. Still, we have a lovely afternoon (at least I did and I hope my students did too) as we viewed and studied 12 works. Here are the choices I made:

Piero della Francesca–The Baptism
Paolo Uccello–The Battle of San Romano
Bronzino–An Allegory
Tintoretto–The Origin of the Milky Way
Meynhert Hobbema–The Avenue, Middleharnis
Pieter de Hooch–Courtyard of a House in Delft
Thomas Gainsborough–Mr. and Mrs. Robert Andrews
George Stubbs–The Millbank and Melbourne Families
J.M.W.Turner–The Fighting Temeraire
John Constable–The Hay Wain
Georges Seurat–The Bathers at Asnieres

I wanted to show them The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein and The Arnolfini Marriage by Jan Van Eych only to be informed that those two masterpieces have been removed from their usual places to be included in a special exhibit opening on October 15.

I am fatigued, deeply fatigued, by the time I leave the museum, but I do want to finish two more rooms in the Sainsbury Wing (that I have been studying closely piece-meal) before I get home. A close analysis of the work of Sasseta, Duccio and Cosimo da Tura finishes my day. I cannot resist sitting outside in Trafalgar Square for a few minutes on what is a particularly gorgeous autumn day. Then, I begin the half hour trek to my flat, amazed at the confidence with which I can now find my way home using the shortest cuts without consulting a map. In six weeks, I have learned so much about my surroundings.

Them, I lollop around on my couch while finishing the last bits of The Mayor of Casterbridge on DVD starring Ciarin Hinds in the title role. I think I prefer the version I saw years ago with Alan Bates playing Henchard.

I am looking forward to my first full weekend in London and I have so many ideas on how to spend it. Mercifully, the weather promises to be blissful.

My Kind of Day

Sep22

Monday, September 22, 2008
London

I had the kind of day that can only be described as perfect. Did a batch of laundry and cleaned my flat–still can’t believe how quickly I can finish that. Have finally mastered the brain behind the washer-cum-dryer concept and now my smalls are no longer getting fried and my clothes are emerging bone dry and do not need to get to an ironing board before they can be placed back in the closet.Yyeess!

Spent a few hours of the morning networking with my Anglo-Indian contacts and organizing the many names and addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses that are now pouring into my possession from all over the UK as people are helping me make connections. I will be spending at least one morning at my office this week sitting on the phone and making follow-up calls to set up interview appointments. I’m so glad that I had a breakthrough with Marina Stubbs in Brighton yesterday as that seems to have set the ball rolling.

Then, I made myself a sandwich lunch with everything that was in my fridge–multi-grain bread, hummus, olives, tomatoes, Stilton Cheese and Gorgonzola Cheese–and walked out into a very sunny afternoon. I headed straight for one of my favorite places in London, the National Gallery. Of course, I decided to take the scenic path there, past Covent Garden which had attracted only a few visitors until I arrived at the Jubilee Market which I discovered to be a covered antiques market. Of course, I could not resist spending a half hour browsing among the vintage jewelry and china bric-a-brac before I pressed on towards the Museum.

Part of my museum musing was also work as I need to identify the ten or fifteen paintings I will place on my own tour when I teach my Writing class at the Gallery on October 9. So heading straight for the research computers down in the basement, I spent the next half hour identifying the exact locations of a bunch of them based on the book I am using to study the works–The Guide to the National Gallery by Homan Potterton. It is my aim to go over every single one of the paintings in the Gallery in the next one year and I intended to study two or three rooms at a time. Well, I started at the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries and finished five of them, feasting my eyes upon the fabulous Piero della Francescas, the Giovanni Bellinis and the Andrea Mategnas in the Gallery’s collection while also studying some of the Albrect Durers.

Then, I sat on a bench and watched a few fat pigeons forage for food among the tourists as I munched my sandwich and took the shortest route I could to Green Park Tube station to embark upon one of the guided walks entitled “Spies and Spooks in Mayfair” from my book entitled 24 Great Walks in London. I discovered a place called Shepherd Market, the heart of the ‘village’ of Mayfair, Crewe House, one of Mayfair’s last existing mansions (today the Embassy of Saudi Arabia), two beautiful churches (Grosvenor Chapel where “coffee and cakes are served in the garden on the first Tuesday of each month”) and the Jesuit-run Church of the Immaculate Conception with its ornate Gothic interior and magnificent statuary, a wonderfully tucked-away park called the Mount Street Gardens where, during the Cold War, KGB spies are said to have congregated and left notes for each other on the park benches, the Claremont Club in Berkeley Square which sits cheek by jowl to the homes once occupied by writer Somerset Maugham, soldier and administrator Clive of India and Prime Minister Anthony Eden.

The terraced house occupied today by Maggs Bros Antiquarian Booksellers at Berkeley Square is reputed to be the most haunted house in London. There are many stories about the many apparitions that have been sighted here and the awful fate that has befallen those who did sight them. I also passed the Red Lion at 1 Waverton Mews, which, the book says, is singer Tom Jones’ favorite pub. At South Audley Raod, I passed by my very favorite shop in all of London–Thomas Goode and Co. that stocks the most fabulous china, porcelain and silverware that I have ever seen. The store is like a museum and every time I am in London, I love to spend an afternoon just feasting my eyes on the works of art represented by the painted porcelain on display for those with heavy wallets to purchase. I feel so indebted to this book for taking me into the secret niches of London that I would never have encountered on my own and, as always, these walks leave me with renewed appreciation and affection for this city.

Then, I hopped onto the Tube at Green Park and headed for the School of Oriental and African Studies where, in the Brunei Gallery, public intellectual, critic and journalist Clive Bloom who teaches Political Science and Culture at New York University was giving a public lecture on “The Idea of Britishness”. The auditorium was packed with NYU students taking the seminar on contemporary British culture and I was pleased to join them as part of the audience. Bloom’s lecture was jocular and serious in turn as he spelled out the uncertainties of identity that have plagued Britons in recent years as the influx of immigrants have increased and cultural polarities have grown. He did make jokes about the British penchant of pin-up girls in their tabloids, their obsession with Victoria ‘Posh Spice’ Beckham, their new vocabulary (chavs –a working class person with Burberry togs and bling, gingas–red-heads), and their idiosyncrasies–the English see the wearing of baseballs caps indoors as terribly disrespectful and consider curry their national dish. He was intensely proud of the fact that Chicken Tikka Masala was created in the British Isles and is unheard of in India.

So as I walked home briskly at 7. 15, I told myself that this was the kind of day I visualized when I was first told that I would be spending a year in London. It had all the ingredients that for me, at least, spell bliss–antiquing, studying Masterpieces in oil, discovering the hidden corners of a city on foot, and feeling intellectually stimulated at a public lecture given by an extraordinary speaker.