Emm in London

Friday, December 04, 2009

US Capitol Tour & Farewell to Washington DC

It was getting on in time and soon I would be catching a coach back to New York. I took one last look behind me to remind myself just how far I had travelled that day.

There was a big event happening at the Capitol that day so I was disappointed at first to not be able to get a photo of the buildings without a big, white marquee in the way! But I was son lucky enough to get a clear shot.

I began to walk up Pennsylvania Avenue North West just as the sun began to set. Washington, DC really is a beautiful city and I would love to visit again one day.

I walked past the Newseum which is quite a new attraction and somewhere I will definitely visit on my next visit to DC.

The Newseum is a news museum and I was there at a very historic time as it was the day after Michael Jackson died.

I walked past the US National Archives and the United States Navy Memorial.

I was quite excited to stumble upon the The J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building too and you’ll be pleased to know that your intrepid South African / English expat wasn’t arrested for spying as she happily snapped away at the building.

The Old Post Office Pavilion was as picturesque as I’d always imagined.

I took five minutes to look at Petersen House where Abraham Lincoln was taken after he was shot. He died there after being shot at the Ford’s Theatre which was located across the street.

My last stop before boarding the coach was the souvenir store where I bought a nice, thick FBI jersey for the ride home. The air conditioning was so high on the coach that I had frozen on the way in that morning!!

The ride home seemed to go a lot quicker than the one in but my iPod ran out of battery about 90 minutes from New York. Tragedy!! I then got speaking to two lovely people from Ohio and that passed the time. The man amused me as he had once dated an Afrikaans girl in Ohio and he repeated some things that really, really made me blush. The Afrikaans culture is generally more conservative than English culture in South Africa but what he repeated to me was absolutely outrageous! Seriously, I could repeat it here in the knowledge that none of you would know what I mean but it is that bad that I won’t!

We passed Baltimore on the way back which was exciting for me because my favourite TV show ever was based there: Homicide: Life on the Street.

Later on once the sun had set, we passed over a massive water way. It was either the Memorial Bridge at Delaware or maybe even the Susquehanna Bridge. Probably the former? I don’t know. All I remember is that the bridge seemed to go on forever over the water and I had never seen a river that wide in my life before. It was dark and eerie too and just fascinating. Reason #264 to go back to DC next time I visit New York!!! Actually, judging from this video, I think it was the Susquehanna River that I was crossing. It was amazing.

I got home that night at about midnight I think. Having left at some ungodly predawn time that morning, I have to say that I have never been that tired before and I don’t think I’ll ever be that tired again. After dutifully putting my beloved iPod on to charge, I collapsed into bed and slept through my second last night in America.

Liverpool: Bombed Out Church of St Luke

I’ve often mentioned my fascination with the Church of St Luke, the bombed out shell of a church that still stands in Liverpool. When I was in Liverpool a couple of weeks ago, I thought I owed it to my blog readers to make a turn there and take some photos for you.

After our visit to the new Quiggins Centre we continued to walk down Renshaw Street and soon the outline of the church became visible.

From a distance, it looks like any other church. It is only as you come closer that you realise that this is merely a shell; it is all that remains after the church was hit by an incendiary bomb on May 5 1941. That is my birthday, May 5.

Something about this church haunts me. I am interested in war, of course, and the devastation that occurred in Liverpool and London during the Blitz but this goes beyond that.

I think it is the idea that the sense of devastation after a war can be so absolute that there is simply no sense in rebuilding or even tearing down.

We’re simply left with painful, hurtful and permanent reminders of just how much has been lost.

And over the years, those people who could remember what it was like before all the devastation and destruction move on. Until no one alive can remember what it was like before or even what it was like during the war and all the suffering and loss.

I wonder if it is better where they are? When our war veterans and survivors move on, are the buildings and churches there complete once again?

Does the Church of St Luke still have stained glass windows in that place? Does it have shiny, brown, wooden pews and does it still smell of prayer books and polish? Does the afternoon sunshine cast rainbows of light across the floor?

What will happen when no one is left to remember that war? Or is that what has started to happen? Is that why we are so keen to rush off to war in Iraq and Afghanistan?

I’m so lucky to have my father to tell me all of the war stories that he can remember. Of course, he was only born the year the war ended in 1945 but he tells me of what a hero my grandfather was.

Of how he was in the navy and how he travelled the world and fought in the major operations. (I must remember to start taking notes!)

I guess it goes to show how little people appreciate their heritage, as the Church of St Luke is on the English Heritage Buildings at Risk Register. How sad.

Postcard update: I am the worst person on Earth for actually getting off my backside and going to the post office. So, I can confirm that I still have to post postcards for Rose, Matt and Martyn. Christina, Kathy, Ivanhoe and April still need to send me their postal addresses! Come on ladies… I’ll have to donate the postcards to the rest of the internet if you don’t reply! Email your address to missus dot emm at gmail dot com.

National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC

My dear blogging friend Kathy of Hometown Tourist and Bridges to London enquired on my last DC post about whether I managed to visit the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. The answer is a resounding yes! I would not have missed it for the world.

I think out of all my time in the United States, this was the time when I missed Stephen the most as I think he would have really liked it here. I’m not trying to gloat but it was kind of awesome.

I’m trying to piece together my memories, photographs and notes so if I make any mistakes here, don’t be shy to jump up and down and correct me. Here goes…

Click on any of the photos for enlargements

Milestones of Flight

In the corner there you can see the Ryan NYP “Spirit of St. Louis” in which Charles Lindbergh completed the first solo transatlantic flight on 21 May 1927.

SpaceShipOne is centre and was the first privately developed, piloted vehicle to reach space. The flight took place in 2004 and arced into space but didn’t actually orbit the Earth.

The gorgeous, retro plane in on the right is the Bell X-1 "Glamorous Glennis" which was the first aircraft to officially exceed the speed of sound in controlled, level flight in 1947.

Space Race

Here you can see a replica of Sputnik 1 which was the first Earth-orbiting artificial satellite back in 1957. The success of the Sputnik programme triggered the Sputnik crisis and launched the Space Race.

The sleek and magnificent plane taking up the rest of the photograph is the North American X-15 which is the world’s fastest and highest flying aircraft. Thirteen X-15 flights went higher than altitudes of 50 miles thus achieving astronaut wings for the pilots and in 1967 Pete Knight achieved a speed of 6.72 mach.

The Apollo–Soyuz Test Project was the last mission in the Apollo space programme and represented the first joint US and Soviet flight. Two manned spacecraft left from Florida and Kazakstan respectively in July 1975 and they rendezvoused in orbit.

The V2 Missile was the world’s first ballistic missile (which sort of means it was shot into the air and then subject to the laws of gravity and physics thereafter). It was also the first manmade object to achieve sub-orbital spaceflight. In the end though, it was a terrible bomb used toward the end of World War II by the Germans and many prisoners worked to their death to create them in Mittelbau-Dora. The bombs were mainly used in Antwerp and the Blitz over London.

The history of the Skylab Space Station is fascinating but I won’t bore you with the details. This is the backup Skylab orbital workshop but it wasn’t actually used because the Skylab programme was abandoned after the first mission to make way for the Shuttle programme.

America by Air

I’ll let most of these magnificent planes speak for themselves. This whole section put me in mind of films like Casablanca or tales of the war and the race to reach the skies. Oh, I can't put it into words but it was a very romantic, retro section.

The Ford 5-AT Trimotor (1928) with the glorious Douglas S DC-3 (1936) peeking out from underneath.

The wonderfully retro Boeing 247-D (1934) is at the left of the photo above with the gorgeous Northrop Alpha (1930) peaking out above the nose of the Boeing Jumbo Jet.

The Curtiss JN-4D "Jenny" biplane (1916). How beautiful is that?

The Pitcairn PA-5 Mailwing (1927).

On the way out, I decided I just had to get a decent photo of the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. It took me about ten minutes to get this photo!! It is in such an awkward position!

It is unfortunate that you can’t see what a spectacular aircraft this is. This was the first US jet fighter to fly twice the speed of sound. This particular plane was in service with NASA for 19 years and was donated to the museum after it flew its last flight in 1975.

All too quickly my time at the National Air and Space Museum came to an end and it was time to walk on up to the Capitol.

A Saturday in London

One of the aspects of being an expat is that your circle shrinks dramatically. In South Africa my life was drastically different to life in London and I was a very social person. There were the frequent dinner parties at my house, nights out with school and university friends, picnics in the sun, lunches with family and of course, the frequent braais. Now it is just Stephen and I, occasionally my mum or brother and every once in a while I see some of my old South African friends. The purpose of this little insight into how sad my social life has become is to explain how it was that Stephen and I found ourselves fighting on Friday night. It is usually just the two of us and our four animals and we do get cabin fever sometimes.

As we are both stubborn Taureans, we were naturally still fighting on Saturday morning. Eager to avoid another night on the sofa, Stephen eventually conceded defeat and decided to take me to the centre of London to see New Moon.

We arrived in London an hour before the show and decided to take a walk around Piccadilly Circus and Regent Street.

'The Three Graces' by Rudy Weller atop the Criterion Building

Naturally, we had to take a look at the famous lights at Piccadilly Circus. It was at this point that Stephen looked at me and said, “you know, you’re just like a bloody tourist!” which was met by me blinking rapidly at him. (He certainly got The Look). “What?” he said. “You do know that the tagline on my blog is ‘The Adventures of an Eternal Tourist Living and Working in London’?”, I retorted. Rather than admit that he never actually reads my blog, he uttered a small “oh” and didn’t complain about my photo taking for the rest of the day.

I was quite excited to see some Christmas lights even if they were sponsored by the Disney film A Christmas Carol.

I love the grand old buildings of regent Street and I quite liked the huge snowflakes. (You can just see it there stretched between the buildings). They must look great all lit up at night! I did have one concern about the snowflake lights though – where would the Doctor land his Tardis? I mean, realistically, he could need to land it anywhere, right? (Oh, ignore me, I’ve gone Doctor Who crazy lately).

As mentioned, Stephen was paying some serious penance for fighting with me earlier in the day so he had to take me to see New Moon (which I reviewed over at Emm Media) and the Cranes concert later that evening. Thankfully, there was a shining beacon of hope and non-torture during the middle of the day for him as we happened upon the Ferrari store on Regent Street.

In case you’re trying to find it, it is across the road from the world’s most amazing toy store, Hamleys.

Stephen bought a nice red Ferrari windbreaker but they wouldn’t let me take a photograph of it. Our sweet-as-pie sales assistant turned into a demon when I did try to take a photo and I thought we were going to get kicked out of the store!!! They did let me take a photo of the Ferrari F1 car in the entrance though and I was somewhat mollified.

And I sneaked a photo of a very happy Stephen before we hurried back to the London Trocadero to watch the film. You can tell he was trying to please me that day – he even wore the FDNY shirt I bought him in New York. I have a bit of a thing for men in uniform, especially firemen and policemen!

So that is all for my Saturday afternoon in London. What did you get up to?

Concert: Cranes + worriedaboutsatan

I usually book concert tickets months and months in advance and spend just about forever looking forward to them. To illustrate, this week I booked tickets to Muse on September 11th next year but I’ve resolved to only start counting down the sleeps after New Year.

So imagine my surprise when I visited my favourite band’s MySpace on Thursday and realised they were having a concert last night! It was all very exciting and I booked tickets immediately.

My favourite band is called Cranes and I’ve been a huge fan since 1993. Naturally, I have all of their albums including the rare and obscure ones. This is the third time I’ve gone to one of their concerts – the first time was in June 2004 and the last one was in October 2008 when they released their latest album. (Click for reviews of the Cranes concert in 2008 and the review of their latest self-titled album Cranes).

The concert was at the Luminaire in Kilburn which is an okay venue but they obviously haven’t heard of the credit crunch or current financial crisis. The cost of one lager shandy (only half a pint of lager in that plus lemonade!) and a Red Bull was £6!! There was nowhere to sit in the venue and huge pillars everywhere blocking the view of the stage so I can definitely say that the venue didn’t warrant the prices of the drinks. Or I should say drink – we decided not to buy more after the first round.

Please excuse my terrible photos! I’m often able to get great results with my little point-and-shoot camera but last night was not one of those occasions! In fact, the only usable photos of Cranes were taken by Stephen!!! :( Unfortunately, I was afflicted by terrible photography at last year’s concert too!

The support group was called worriedaboutsatan, a wonderful minimalist electronic duo from Leeds. I really enjoyed their show and bought two of their CDs. Their show was interesting as they had a full backing film to go along with the music. They were good!

Cranes’ sound can best be described as belonging to the shoegazing or dream pop genres. The lead singer Alison Shaw has a dreamy, girl-like voice and their music is moving and melancholic. I really love their music.

Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy this concert as much as I enjoyed the others. They had a couple of problems with the sound at their last concert which seemed to happen again at this concert. The mic, bass and guitars seemed too loud and the sound just wasn’t harmonious. There was also something wrong with the amplifier or something, as there were a couple of grinding, screeching noises towards the end of the concert. The set list was also disappointing. They played most of their sedate, quiet songs which is fine if it is a seated concert but not nice for a whole evening if it is a standing concert.

So in the end, it was a little disappointing which I guess is also okay. You can’t always go to absolutely brilliant concerts! Which reminds me, I still need to post about the Pixies and Shpongle concerts in October!