As with many places there is a “Doors Open” event here. It encompasses buildings throughout the United Kingdom. The website lists nearly 300 sites that are opened to the public during the event. We narrowed our choice down to two. The British Library and The Institute of Cellular and Molecular Biology. A pretty obvious combination, I know.

We chose the British Library because it was somewhere we have wanted to visit and this provided the requisite prod. The second building, although it sounds like an obscure choice, you will see that it would be interesting regardless of its purpose.

The British Library is the largest publicly-funded single building project in England. I had expected an old, almost gothic, dark, musty library. What I found is a huge, modern open space that feels like it was designed for people to enjoy. It features a sunlight-filled atrium, a café, study areas and of course, a vast collection of books.

The central feature of the main public area is the King’s Library. It comprises a collection of books bequeathed to the public by King George III. They are housed in a four-storey, glass walled, climate controlled vault. The books of the King’s Library are available to be read by those in possession of a reader’s card. Most of the books are hundreds of years old.

The Library also has an impressive exhibition gallery. Currently there is a display of historically significant newspaper headlines. The display covers such events as England’s last World Cup victory, both of the wars and the introduction of decimal money among others. It is interesting to see the change in styles of the newspaper, the writing and the reporting. The improvement of photographic reproduction is also obvious.

Just an aside, looking at a headline from the last English world cup victory, I noticed the following. English football fans have waited longer for a championship than Maple Leaf fans (1966 vs 1967). And with Tie Domi bringing his cubic cranium to a TSN broadcast near you, can any sort of a Leaf victory be possible? I think not. As they say on Leaf Talk; “Put the “C” on Domi”.

But back to the civilised. We were able to take a tour conducted by one of the architectural engineers who had designed the building. He showed how the four-story deep basement had been dug into the London clay without disturbing the surrounding buildings, Tube lines or Services such as water and sewage. The guide gave a wonderful tour showing all about the design and construction of the building.

The tour also allowed us into a reading room, something not normally accessible without a reader’s card. Books are brought by request from the basement. Only employees are allowed in the basement. The reading room we entered was from Asian Studies. This encompasses the records of the British East India Company and birth records for people born in India to employees of the Company. On one wall of the reading room is the original coat of arms for the British East India Company that dates to the mid 1700’s.

The Library is another place that will join the V&A Museum and warrant repeat visits over the course of the winter.

The next choice is not, perhaps, so obvious. The Institute for Cell and Molecular Science is across from the Aldgate East Tube station. It is directly behind and affiliated with the Royal Hospital. It is a very interesting, über modern building. The photos tell the story much better than my words can.

The building is used as a medical, research and university building. The hospital demanded that the laboratories were grouped on one floor. The architect determined that they should be all on one level, underground, to encourage communication amongst researchers. This left the above ground parts for services, meeting rooms, a lecture hall, offices and the like. A key part of the design was to make the building semi-public, inviting children in so that they could experience real medical research taking place.

The exterior is two low, coloured glass blocks. The design although strikingly modern, matches the scale of the surrounding buildings. It allows an inviting open space between the two blocks The centre of the atrium has 'floating pods' that turn the place into a circus exercise. The pods, aside from being almost surreal in appearance are functional as class rooms, lecture halls and meeting areas. There is a 400-seat lecture hall that is entirely green. Everything; ceiling walls, carpet seating; everything is green. It is meant to be make you feel like you are in a forest.

By attending the Open House event, we had a great time indoors on a sunny London Sunday. And as I write this, I see from the first picture that it is time for another haircut.

I have been guilty of two things. The first one caused the second. You can guess that the second thing is the fact that the "blog has not been updated in over a week.

The first thing that I was guilty of was working two nights of overtime at work this week. Normally I would politely excuse myself, but everyone else was staying. Add to that I am still the FNG around there. I stayed a little late.

Add to that, our excursions have been a little more mundane. Last Sunday, we took the Tube to the London Bridge stop and spent most of the day walking along the south side of the Thames. We has a lovely view of the skyline of London.

One of the amazing things about London and, I would guess all European cities, is the mix of the very old and the very new. Standing on the south bank of the Thames, one can see City Hall, the Swiss Re building (also known as the gherkin and other less polite things) Tower Bridge, London Bridge and the dome of St Paul's Cathedral.

The prior week we had two outings on our High Street. One was good. The other, well, I wish I had my two pounds fifty back.

We went to the free comedy night on Wednesday. It is in a little basement bar up the street from our flat. It is interesting to watch skilled comedians try out new material. It is painful to watch wannabes flatten the crowd into cringeing silence. The hit of the night for me was a man named Ray Prestone. He was about eighty years old. In fact, his closing joke was "I've got to go now, I've got another show in December." He told every old hairy manky million-year-old joke you've ever heard. The whole audience knew every punchline. And he killed.

Last Thursday, we went to a talk at an independent book store by two local authors. Both had just released books, one about the bridges in London and the other about the old London Routemaster Double-Decker Bus. I wished to be back watching the wannabe comedians. For people who make their living with words, they couldn't think of many interesting ones for their live talks. Perhaps their books are better...

As there is not much more to tell, I leave you with a photo essay from some of our recent time spent walking about in London.







London is a classy place. The buskers sing opera. This is from Covent Garden.
















Us at the Victoria & Albert Museum. This is a part of London that we will be re-visiting. It is a spectacular museum with seemingly limitless displays.









The pedestrian walkway along the south side of the Thames. This area was at one time a docklands for ships coming along the river. The old warehouses have been converted into lofts
and shops.















This was taken on the south side of the Thames.
Tower bridge in the background you will recognize.
The glass egg on the right is London's City Hall.














Trying to outrun the police = bad idea. Their radio and their
car are both faster than you.







We happened across a fashion shoot.
The metaphysical result of the act of photographing a photographer while in the act of photographing caused a large rip in the space-time continuum. My bad...






The caption from an outdoor photo exhibition of photos taken in
Japan by Hiroji Kubota.

The Wingates of West Hampstead have had a week that took on a distinctly Spanish theme. Wednesday night, we saw the new movie “Volver” with Penelope Cruz. Our Sunday was spent at the Regent Street Festival, “A Walk Through Spain.”

The movie Volver was very good and worth a look. It is in Spanish with subtitles. It is the story of a woman whose life takes on events that re-occur in seemingly concentric circles. It also had the same added benefit for me of any subtitled film. By the end of the film, I don’t realize that I am reading subtitles and feel that I can understand the film’s original language.

The festival closed off Regent Street between Oxford Circus and Piccadilly Circus. Regent Street was a project of urban renewal in the early 1800’s. It was commissioned by the Prince Regent, later to become King George IV. It runs from the Prince’s residence at one end to Regent’s Park at the other. Regent Street has become the home of many flagship stores for the likes of Habitat and Hugo Boss. Mmmmm Hugo Boss.

At the exit from the Oxford Circus Tube station was a woman doing what can best be described as religious busking. She was standing in the middle of the pavement (here in England, the sidewalk is called the pavement) preaching through a speaker. According to her we should all forsake our pointless lives of blind consumerism and go to the Lord. She hadn’t gained any converts that I could see and would appear to be fighting a loosing battle amongst all of the fancy-shoe-and-handbag shops.

But to the festival.

The Street Festival highlighted the 14 different provinces of Spain. There were large tents showing off jewellery, artwork and artisans, local cooking and tourism for each region. There were also dancers and performers in traditional Spanish costume. I suspect that the traditional costume is more for festival performance and less for, say, running to the market for a packet of crisps (here in England, potato chips are called crisps).

There was an engaging, high energy performance by a toreador and his mariachi band. The bull fighter demonstrated to movements required to fight the bull albeit in a very comical fashion. The demonstration ended with a member of the crowd assisting by playing the toreador to the performer’s animated performance as el toro. For those concerned, only humans were harmed.

The most spectacular demonstration was of the human tower. The performers constructed a tower that was five people in height with a tower four people in height on either side. The lightest people, obviously, were on the top and in the towers we watched in the afternoon were topped by children that seemed to be no older than six years old!

All in all an enjoyable day that ended with a curry (here in England, a delicious Indian meal is referred to as a curry). For those who visit us, remember that you want to go to the Masala Zone with us, although that might count more as a sub-continent rather than Spanish theme.

Jared was so inspired by the performance,
he decided to start his own tower.