London is Full of Nutters!

Let's see, the last time I posted was Tuesday afternoon, right? Tuesday evening we went as a class to South Bank for a backstage tour of The National Theater. It was really neat to see, especially since we will be seeing a play there as a class. At The National every evening thy have live music in the lobby for about an hour before the evening shows start. When we finished our tour the band was on so I sat and listened for a bit. When I turned around everyone in my class had vanished so I decided to wander around South Bank for a while by myself.

When the sun started to set, I made my way back home. I didn't really want to be wandering around London by myself at night. I decided to take a bus back rather than the tube. You get to see more that way. It took a while to find the proper bus stop, but when I did, did I ever get a treat. I was entertained until my bus came by the most amusing crazy man I've ever seen.

First thing he did was set down the 3 grocery bags he was carrying and then lay down on his back on the sidewalk. A few minutes later he rolled over on his stomach and yelled at a man standing a ways off "Why are you standing over there?" then, as some people walked around him he half mumbled "I'm about to be trod on there." So far he didn't seem too crazy. Next he walked out into the middle of the road, spread his arms and addressed God, I presume, and said "I'm accepted you gift!" then mumbled as he came back to the sidewalk, "but I don't know why you've given it to me."

He continued to mutter to himself for a while in a very amusing manner until a bus came by. He tried to get on and wasn't allowed for some reason. That set him off! "I don't want to ride your bus! Why would I want to get on your bus. London is full of Nutters! That's why I keep going back there." It was all I could do to keep from laughing at him. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture. I didn't dare; not sure what reaction I would have spurned.

Taking the bus back rather than the tube was really neat. The bus I was on went through Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus and Hyde Park Corner. It was really neat to see a big chunk of London, albeit briefly, without walking for ages.

Wednesday

Wednesday after class we all took the tube to Kilburn to see a play at The Tricycle Theater:



The play was Twelfth Night. The theater is quite small and intimate. There was a lot of interplay between the audience and the actors. At one point they actually passed a couple pizzas around to the crowd. It was a spectacular performance!

After the play a handful of us decided to just jump on a bus and see where we ended up. The bus we chose happened to go by Abbey Road, so when I saw the cross walk we all decided to disembark and do the Beatles thing.



Unfortunately it was basically rush hour and we had no plan of action so the picture isn't great. I think we'll try to go back sometime early in the morning and get better pictures.

When we were done with Abbey Road we got back on the bus and headed more into town. We ended up at Trafalgar Square. From there we wandered back to The National Theater to see if we could get tickets to Habit of Art, a play for which we saw the set during our tour. They were sold out, but Cameron and I decided to go see Women Beware Women there instead. We sat around drinking wine and listening to the band until our show started.

Women Beware Women was another really well done play. I didn't love it as much as Twelfth Night, but it was still quite good. We were in the Olivier theater, which is the biggest theater at the National. As such there was not really any way to have the audience interplay like at the Tricycle. Plus Women Beware Women is a really dark tragedy so... it was basically the opposite of the play we saw in the afternoon.

Thursday

Which was yesterday, I forgot my camera. Much sadness. I went with a few people to The Tate Modern. That was spectacular. They have a really cool looking exhibition starting in June, so I will be going back. I can take all the pictures that I missed yesterday then. Some of the highlights: They had a full size marble statue of Rodin's The Kiss, several Picassos, a few Pollocks. I love modern art.

After the museum, we went across the river to St Paul's, but didn't want to pay to go in. They run tours and we missed the last one. We wanted to take the tour and didn't really want to pay 10£ twice. After that we walked down Fleet Street (I wanted to stop somewhere and get meat pies, but no one I was with got it). Finally we came back to the college around 5, quite exhausted from walking around all day.

Last night I went out with a group of people to a pub (or maybe I should call it a club, or a bar, I don't know. It looked like a pub to me, so I'm calling it a pub). There was a live band that covered a bunch of good rock songs. We danced and drank and had a generally great time. At about 1:30 we stumbled back to the dorms.

Today I'm really not doing anything. This afternoon I'm going to go out into the park and find a nice place to read. I am here for class, after all, so homework stuff must be done.

Even though I didn't have my camera yesterday, I still have a quite a few more pictures you can see. Go here to see them