Make the Most of London!

I never expected to live in London, and having the opportunity to experience British life is gravy. Every few weeks I make an adventuring to-do list. Museums, ice skating, palace visiting, gardens, shows, Parliament. We know from behavioural psychology that planning is half the fun, so I don’t lose any sleep if these trips are postponed.

Unfortunately my success rate at finding travel companions outside my own family is rather low. My friends politely decline museum invitations and suggest lunch instead. So I go alone, or take one of my daughters who is not sleeping or in school at the time. We see something interesting, learn something new, and smile all the way home, telling our stories over and over again on the tube.

When a girlfriend asked me to join her at FOCUS's seminar on Making the Most of London, I took a cue from my ladies and politely demurred, suggesting instead a visit to the Disobedient Objects exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Philosophically I could not justify the opportunity cost of two hours of exploration time for a lecture on how to explore.

Eventually I set aside my objections and headed to meet my friend at FOCUS. As luck would have it, I had the dates wrong: I was one week early. So I spent the next half hour chatting with the FOCUS

staff. I was heading to the V&A afterwards, I told them. They suggested I expand my visit to include the jewellery collection. On my way to the jewellery room (which you MUST see), I stumbled by a gallery of sculpture, stunning in scale and containing the bottom and tip of Trajan's Column, which we had just seen in Rome a few months back.

There was no longer any question that I would be at that next weeks’ seminar.

So what did I learn? Get outside your own neighbourhood. Sit in on Parliament, join the National Trust and visit palaces for free, see the Enchanted Forest at Syon Park, walk up the Wellington Arch, take a backstage tour at the Royal Opera House, see a Pantomime, visit Buckingham Palace in the summer when the Queen is on holiday. While you're at it, buy yourself an elaborate fascinator and book Ascot tickets through your home embassy. Or just buy a fascinator for the fun of it, because what woman doesn't want a loudly ostentatious headpiece?

An important and overarching theme was to plan in advance. Nearly everything in London can and

should be booked, often six or eight months beforehand. Checking out a museum this weekend? Book tickets online for popular exhibits. Visiting a garden? See if you can skip the queue with advance tickets. Often these are free and as valuable as gold when you would otherwise be queuing outside in the elements.

If you read this blog, you surely know how vast and diverse London is. Get out there. Eat something new, something delicious or gross or unusual. Take your kids to a new museum and teach them about artists and leaders of the past. See a show, plan a park walk. So much of London life is free and all of it is gloriously, uniquely and colourfully British.

Written by Susan. Susan is an adventurer, former lawyer, current 'trailing' spouse and constant mother of two daughters. She writes on her blog www.SmartlyMomming.com

For more information please visit www.focus-info.org

Should you wish to share your expat experiences in the UK, please contact us: office@focus-info.org

Sky Garden or... London Observatory?!

My family and I went to Sky Garden last Saturday and I wanted to share the experience.

It is at 20 Fenchurch Street in the City, inside the brand new ‘walkie-talkie’ building. There are three restaurants and if you book a table at any of them, your name will be at reception to enter the building (or check in counter).  But if you just want to go visit the public area, you must book in advance at http://skygarden.london/.  Once you arrive through the side entrance (off Fenchurch), you must check in, get your pass and go through security to get to the lifts, so arrive at least 20 minutes in advance. At this stage, the experience feels a bit like airport check-in. 
 
As far as the ‘garden’ part of it goes, I must say I was expecting more. The place looks rather cold and grey (continuing on the airport theme?). Yes, there are some plants and even a few benches surrounded by greenery
and some flowers, but if the experience you are after is
of an ‘indoor park’, you might want to wait until it matures
a bit.

On a more (and very) positive side, it is a great place to go for the view!  Being on the 34-36th floors, there is an incredible feeling of awe. Going up there to appreciate the beautiful view of London is worth the hassle - the outlook extends from Canary Wharf to Parliament.  I went on quite a grey day when visibility was not great, nevertheless, as I am so passionate about this city, my jaw dropped.  Seeing the Tower of London contrasting with City Hall right beneath my feet, and the Shard across the Thames directly in front of me, gave me a strong feeling of admiration and reverence for what an amazing city London is; a city that, more than any other I know, never stops evolving through the centuries.

Therefore, unlike my expectation of the Gardens of Babylon, lush and green in my imagination, the ‘Sky Garden’ of London could potentially be better named as the ultimate ‘London Observatory’. So much to see, so many buildings, sights and even details I take for granted when passing by at street level! Unfulfilled expectations aside, I can’t wait to go back on a sunny afternoon and stay till after sunset!




Written by Valeria Fleury. Valeria is FOCUS Director of Membership.

For more information about FOCUS visit:  www.focus-info.org

Should you wish to share your expat experiences in the UK, please contact us: office@focus-info.org

A World Without Oysters (cards, not molluscs)

It’s the second week of January, and let me guess, you’re already bored with your winter weekend routine. Darkness cuts off half the day, wind blows you right back to your house before your adventure has even begun, and football season is through. Pity.

This weekend, trying to jazz up our normal routine of Portobello Market gazing, Hyde Park visiting and holiday cookie baking, the girls and I headed to Covent Garden and the London Transport Museum.

LTM houses to-scale versions of early horse and buggies, cars, single and double decker busses, trams and tube cars. The entire space tells a story about something we do every day: go from one place to another in London. If you have ever taken the tube, or a bus or cab in London, your trip was shaped by the history that is explained here.
  
At the turn of the 19th century, London's profile
was small compared with its current expansive
girth. This is because people could only go so far as they could walk, or pay someone to carry them. True story: people would hire men to carry them around town as they sat in a small wooden box called a sedan chair. The museum has replicas of these, which look uncomfortable for the rider and hired carriers both.

Enter the horse-drawn carriage, a more sophisticated version of the sedan chair. Your child will immediately notice, while perusing the replicas of the horses and their carriages, that these were not the variety of show pony that your child can ride in Hyde Park. Towering and strong, these horses could pull the weight of two levels of people.

This amazes me. By the late 1800s, before electricity and running water were commonplace in London homes, the city already had double decker public busses.

At that time, London’s streets were bumpy and unpaved, and to accommodate the increasing number of people seeking out horse-drawn carriages, engineers built a series of trams set on railroad-style tracks, significantly mitigating the effects of friction.

Of course the engineers forgot the other problem with using horses. The poop. One thousand tons a day. That’s two million pounds of horse poop. If ever there were an incentive to develop engines suitable for mass transportation, this was it.

We paused to sit on some of the horse trams, which had tight, dangerous circular staircases leading to the upper level (obviously not designed by anyone familiar with American-style plaintiff’s litigators). And of course we visited the railway carriages and locomotive, the predecessor to today’s tube.


My four year-old is nudging me. “The stamps, Mommy. Write about the stamps!” How could I forget. This genius museum offers an Official Visitor Card with designated areas to collect each of 13 stamps at stations located all around the museum. Generally, I’m more of an audio guide person, but in this very tactile and visual museum, collecting stamps was better because it ensured that we visited every nook of exhibit and read each nugget of history. And what child doesn’t love stamps?

The thing about public transportation is that it constantly changes, gets more efficient and faster and cheaper. Next week is the FOCUS talk on how to make the most of living in London. Here’s your challenge until then: buy an Oyster card and hitch yourself a ride to wherever it is in this great city that you want to go. It’s cheap, it’s fast, and if you set your compass to Covent Garden you can see the museum’s predictions for public transportation in the next 100 years.

Written by Susan. Susan is an adventurer, former lawyer, current 'trailing' spouse and constant mother of two daughters. She writes on her blog www.SmartlyMomming.com

For more information please visit www.focus-info.org

Should you wish to share your expat experiences in the UK, please contact us: office@focus-info.org

It's Panto Time!

Pantomime, or Panto as it is colloquially known, is a great British tradition for the festive Christmas season, with many delightful productions of Snow White, Dick Whittington, Peter Pan, and Aladdin to name but a few. I went to see Cinderella with a group of 40 people (former colleagues, friends, acquaintances and family) last Tuesday night at the New Wimbledon Theatre.  It was a fantastic production, good entertainment value, and our annual Christmas treat!!  My friend Fatimah, as a member of the theatre, managed to get us the tickets, and we had 4 rows so that we could sit together during the show. The foyer showcased a beautiful pumpkin carriage/coach and there was also a beautiful princess setting the mood for the show, as most of the little girls were dressed as delightful princesses, but there weren’t many young princes about! 

Buttons (Tim Vine) came out first to get all of us into the mood with cheering and clapping, ensuring that both the kids and the adults too would have a great time.  Linda Gray (Dallas) was the fairy godmother and the story had Dallas-like jokes running  throughout. The two ugly stepsisters were played by Mathew Kelly and Mathew Rixon who were dressed in the most outrageous outfits (something for Fashion Week AW2015?)

  

Just before the break,  when the fairy godmother was getting Cinderella  ready for the ball, Cinderella was singing ‘Let it go’ and just whipped off her rags and was instantly transformed into a shimmering, gorgeous ball gown! Most of us were absolutely stunned but before we could recover, in came 2 white miniature ponies with the most beautiful carriage to whisk her off to the ball at the end of the song.

The second half was just as spectacular. During the break the audience was given 3D glasses and we wondered what was coming next. Of course the ball was stunning as were the stepsisters’ outfits.  Cinderella met the Prince but had to leave before midnight, losing her shoe as she ran out in an effort not to be late. The following scene was the stepsisters wandering through the spooky forest on their way home and a 3D screen appeared depicting creepy woodlands. Using our glasses, we joined in the ghostbuster movie sing-along which was absolutely out of this world ....literally as it had ghosts and spiders floating about in it! We had a few screams when one came right out and blew a raspberry at us before blowing itself up!

Of course, in the end, Prince Charming managed to get the right sister to fit the glass slipper, despite it being broken by one of the evil stepsisters! All was well and everyone had fun that night, irrespective of age! It was one of the best panto productions I have seen and I am already looking forward to next year.  So join in the fun and hope to see you there!

Written by Irene Kuan

For more information please visit www.focus-info.org