Looking @London: Day Three
With each amazing day so thoroughly eclipsing the day before, I'm
quickly running out of superlatives to describe what a phenomenal
time we're having here. Today was yet another such day, in which a bunch
of irritating little frustrations were forgotten in the wake of major
events so spectacular.
(View over Kensington Park from Holland Park Ave.)
The day started out overly-ambitious and quite over-scheduled, with a
double-decker bus ride to Oxford Street for food and shopping. Then a
quick Tube ride to Russell Square, and we were soon at the British Museum,
to see the one thing we both absolutely had to see before leaving: The
Rosetta Stone. From my earliest memories of elementary school history
books, this one artifact always stood out as the single most interesting
discovery of modern archaelogy, unlocking thousands of years of historical
records in one fell swoop. Were it not for that whole
hostile-takeover-of-Europe fiasco, this discovery could have been
Napoleon's shining legacy.
(The Rosetta Stone, one of the few items behind glass .)
(A closer look at the top portion of the Stone.)
Instead, the French were trounced by the British, and the Stone was given
to the British Museum where it remains on display as the crown jewel in a
grand Egyptian antiquities wing. Words completely fail to describe how
awe-inspiring this place is, especially when you consider that the only
thing standing between you and a 5,000-year-old pharoah's sarcophagus is a
polite little sign saying "Please don't touch. Even clean hands can damage
the antiquities." Mind-blowing, especially to someone like me, so
entranced by Egyptian mythology that it bleeds over into software product
names (the Scalara Ra, Osiris, Abydos, Hathor products) and tv viewing
(Stargate SG-1). So walking
through the Egypt wing in almost a daze, as the very remants of this
mythology stood all around us.... Wow... I still haven't quite wrapped
my head around such an amazing realization.
(The Egyptian antiquities at the British Museum.)
We could have spent days there, in just that one section, but instead, had
to rush off to experience yet another English treasure: The London
Symphony Orchestra's Christmas Concert. Sure, it took us
thirty-seven-and-a-half frustrating Underground transfers (or so it
seemed), but all irritation melted away at Barbican Hall just moments into
the most fantastic musical bliss I've ever experienced. The LSO, with the
London Symphony Chorus accompanying them, flew through the most brilliant
collection of Christmas pieces ever, from heavenly renditions of classics
like Silent Night (led by the talented German soprano Anne
Schwanewilms), to the two best known pieces of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker
suite, to English classics ("I saw three ships come sailing in..."),
to even the popular standards of the modern commercial Christmas
extravaganza. At one point, an adorable little girl, about four years old, in a
beautiful red velvety dress with patterned flowers, sat bouncing happily
in her mothers's lap and laughing in delight at the most flawless
and impressive and wonderful and perfect version of that old "sleigh-ride
together with you" classic that normally drones painfully through
department stores this time of year. And hey, when they got to the
section where the trombones kicked in the greatest bass line and timing
ever, even Brian and I were diggin' the groove and finding it hard to
keep still in our seats. ;-)
(The London Symphony Orchestra at Barbican Hall.)
The best part here -- and probably the reason why today dwarfed every LA
Philharmonic performance I've seen -- was the really fun audience
involvement... a cozy, seemingly-informal interaction still powered by
world-class musicians and vocalists. During one song (the "I saw three
ships..." song, I think), the men in the audience were taught to whistle one
piece while the women learned to "la-la" another. The end result was not
only a great musical result, but also pretty entertaining as conductor
Richard Hickox chided the audience affably for our imprecision. :-) Then
towards the end, brought back to encore by loud rounds of applause, Hickox
painstakingly taught us all the perfectly-timed lower five lines before
embarking on the most entertaining-and-yet-flawless Twelve Days of
Christmas I've ever heard.
(A close-up of the strings and chorus sections.)
Something else struck me as curious today, while joining with the entire
audience and choir in a stirring verse of Hark the Herald Angels
Sing... If someone had suggested even a few days ago that I'd be
singing Christmas carols (and even the "Jesus, Lord at they birth" lines
of Silent Night), I'd have thought them insane. Hence, for all my
sarcastic criticisms of religion and especially "singing in heaven for
eternity," I have to admit, I might be underestimating God Himself if even
the mere mortals of the London Symphony Orchestra could have me so
whole-heartedly involved this afternoon. :-)
Obviously such a great experience would have been the perfect ending to
any sight-seeing day, but as driven as we've been this week, it's probably
not surprising that we had yet another big event planned for the day. As
most of you know, Brian and I flew to London this week largely to see
Eddie Izzard play at Wembley, and those of you who know how paranoid I am know
I'm not likely to fly 10,000+ miles, and with tickets bought on eBay
no less, without a pretty good backup plan. In this case, though, the
backup plan surprised even me, as a second pair of tickets I got was even
better (fourth row!!) than the first. So of course, we did what any
reasonable Izzard fan would do... and saw both shows! ;-)
(Eddie Izzard at Wembley, from about 30 feet away.)
Of course, with this kind of a lead-in, I'm going to sound like even more
of a bastard than normal when I start whining about the mix-up with the
tickets and how the eBay seller sent me tickets for seats #42 and #43
instead of the aisle seats (#40 and #41) that I agreed to buy. Brian
pointed out a few times how ridiculous this was, and believe me, I knew I
was being an ass. Still, there's a pretty big difference between knowing
something in your head and feeling it in your heart, and two decades of
knowing better obviously didn't stop me from whining this week.
So we went to Wembley with an "Oh well, this should be cool, I guess" sort of
nonchalance, especially since we'd seen the show the night before. I
certainly was surprised when the evening became the best time I've had in
London all week! First off, Eddie Izzard really is a genius, just as
we've been saying all along. Seeing two shows back-to-back was the best
way to see just how much material he creates on-the-fly with his
stream-of-consciousness style. Sure, the major jokes were the same, but
there were lots of parts we hadn't heard the night before, and many things
left out from the night before, to where we were really happy afterward
that we'd gone.
(You never realize how much Eddie moves around until you're trying to get a clean photo!)
But -- hard to believe -- even better than the performance was meeting the
young couple who ended up in those coveted #40 and #41 seats I was whining
about. Didn't even talk much until the intermission (I was earlier
talking to the woman in front of us, whose brother works for the tour and
who herself works for an ISP here in the UK, right up my alley). But at
the intermission, when most people were getting up to take a break or get
more drinks, I started randomly talking to the only person left around,
the girl sitting next to me named Annie. It was random idle chit-chat,
about how hilarious Eddie Izzard was that evening, about where we were
each from, about how many groups disliked the English (she's Irish), those
sorts of things. We eventually drifted on to the
deeper point of how most people can't see past Eddie's striking
transvestite gloss to the real wit and genius of his take on life. I
asked about how popular he was in the UK, whether he was a household name
as we in the US sort of assumed him to be, and instead found out that he's
largely got the same loyal following from a small group of people here,
much the same dynamic as his US following. (This is the same guy,
after all, who most Americans don't know but who also caused a 6.5 hour
line at his dvd signing in Los Angeles last year!)
But the coolest part of all was Annie's sheer wonder of the evening, that
sense that she couldn't believe she was sitting there, in a packed arena
of about 10,000 people, with fantastic seats less than 30 feet away from
the man himself. She told me about how Rob had surprised her with these
tickets as his Christmas gift for her, and told me about the gift she had
planned for him. It was all just so sweet! :-) And given that they're
both students (she wants to be a teacher), and since I know where he
got those tickets, I was especially impressed that he'd put together such
a great gift.
And even more than just being impressed, it hit me like a ton of bricks to
see her sense of wonder juxtaposed with my whining about sitting two seats
over. Talk about missing the big picture! There were a million
reasons I could have been grateful for the amazing opportunity, and the
fantastic week, and all of those other things, but it's all too easy to get
caught up in the trivial at the expense of the significant. And if I
needed further proof that the universe somehow works itself out for the
best, tonight was yet another excellent example. After hearing such a
great story and seeing their joy at being there, I was actually really glad
it worked out the way it did, because they would undoubtedly appreciate
the evening far more than we ever could have. Not to mention, it seems
entirely surreal to think how easily I might have gotten the seats I
wanted, been sitting just a few feet to the right, and in so doing, likely
missed what turned out to be the best part of the evening. In other words,
an awful lot of independent events had to work out just right for this
evening to turn out the way it did.
After months of careful
planning and expensive travel plans and precisely-crafted schedules for
event after event, the best time I've had so far this week was totally
unplanned, as the universe put me where I needed to be (over 5,000 miles
from home), for a lesson I didn't know I needed, from a teacher who never
even knew she was teaching.
It really doesn't get much better than that.
// 12.22.2003 4:37am //
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