The next stop was a replica of the Golden Hinde, the ship Sir Francis Drake used to circumnavigate the world and loot the Spanish in the Name of the Queen. The first thing that comes to mind when looking at it is how clinically insane someone would have to be to attempt to circumnavigate the world, 500 years ago, in a boat that's put to shame by most modern-day party barges. When Drake returned to England in the original Golden Hinde, Queen Elizabeth ordered it to be set up as a monument, but 16th century curating skills combined with a wooden boat meant that didn't last more than a few decades before disintegrating.
To knock another thing off the list, I stopped at The Anchor pub for some fish and chips. I noticed on the outside an interesting plaque with the history of the place - Samuel Pepys, the diarist, sat and wrote there in 1666 when London burned to the ground (the pub itself survived only to, ironically, catch fire shortly after), and the pub claims that Shakespeare was known to drink there occasionally. Much like older buildings in the Eastern US all claim "Washington slept here", so do older London pubs all claim "Shakespeare drank here".
I passed by the Globe Theater, rebuilt in the 90s, and continued on to Tate Modern, one of the most famous modern art museums in the world; but it just seems to be an ugly building filled with mostly ugly art. Free admission is much appreciated, however.
From there it was on to some of the London heavy-hitters: Parliament and the clock tower that holds the "Big Ben" bell ("But Jo, isn't the clock tower what's called Big Ben?"... No, it's not, but not knowing that fact means you probably have a life).
While going into a Japanese photo-frenzy around the buildings of Parliament, I found out why some of the major streets had been closed that morning, as a large protest march showed up, chanting for a "Free Palestine", "end to the occupation", and so on. It was a modest group of around 1-2,000 and they came off as more than a little disorganized; I also don't think any 5 people were protesting the same thing. There were groups of Hasidim marching against the Gaza blockade in addition to people waving Palestinian, Hamas and Hezbollah flags and (confusingly) a Turkish contingent waving portraits of Ataturk (I suppose they had just had them lying around and were looking for a chance to use them). Many of the people with megaphones were yelling contradictory slogans. But it was a bank holiday, and I suppose what else are you going to do with an open morning besides protest something, right?
After the protesters passed by "Democracy Village", a ragtag collection of college students and what appeared to be the homeless who were camping out across the street from Parliament to have the UK withdrawn from Afghanistan (20 scurvy-ridden people in tents, that'll move the government into action!), I continued my walk, passing Westminster Abbey, St. James' Park, and then coming to Buckingham Palace. The Queen wasn't in but the crazy tourists were, and between the Royal Guard and the Eastern Europeans I was quite entertained. (Although the guards were kept behind the gate on the palace grounds, away from the people who want to bother them)
The Speakers' Corner in Hyde Park, were for 150+ years anyone has had the liberty to rant about anything to unfortunate passerby, was sadly unhappening on a Monday afternoon, and after watching someone talk about the control of his brain microchip, I hopped on the tube out to Queen Mary, University of London to meet a friend for a night of chicken and pubs.
'back in the day', the royal guards and their little guard houses were outside the gates, and we were some of those crazy kids getting our pictures taken next to them, and trying to make them laugh. sorry to hear the queen bee took them inside.
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