Masters of the Underground

Our London hotel faces the backside of Buckingham Palace. One block up is the subway, which seemed terribly convenient until we followed the throngs of people down the broad granite stairs to find no turnstiles or rumbling trains. Instead, dazed and confused, we followed them back up the opposing flight of stairs to find ourselves deposited back on the other side of the street. Over here when they say “subway” what they mean is an underpass. If you actually want to find a subway you have to ask directions to the “tube.” When the trains in the tube stop, a lovely, disembodied female voice speaking Masterpiece Theatre English cautions you to “mind the gap” which means “Watch your step.”

Once again I’m struggling with a language problem. Shar and I stopped at an Italian version of Starbucks called Fratelli and ordered lattes. They asked what size. She ordered a large; I ordered a small. Here’s what we got:

Okay, I didn’t actually order a latte; I ordered an espresso, but still… 

Then there’s our hotel room, if you think about a normal hotel room as the size of Sharon’s cup our hotel room is the size of my cup. It’s just large enough to contain a queen size bed, and about seven molecules of oxygen. To make up for the lack of physical space the hotel folks have added lots of interesting amenities. For example, our bathroom comes with a black light instead of the usual nightlight, which, when you are half asleep, staggering in to pee at three in the morning, creates the eerie illusion that your have somehow stumbled into your college dorm. 

Then, last night, while I’m brushing my teeth I notice that the shadows of everything sitting on the bathroom sink counter are cast in neon yellow. We’ve got both the black light and the regular halogen lights on, and yellow is the opposite of purple, but I can’t really explain why this is happening. It looks really cool though, and I decide I’ve got to get a picture. When I try to take the picture my hand winds up casting a shadow as well, but this one is even weirder. The shadow of my hand is dark blue, and next to that is a second shadow in neon yellow. Here’s the pic: 

Sometimes I wonder about myself. I mean, here we are in London. The other night we saw a laugh-out-loud performance of The Taming of the Shrew at the Globe Theatre. Then we spent a fabulous day steeped in the recreated 16^th century world of Henry VIII at Hampton Court. I didn’t take a single picture of any of that stuff. (I guess I figure if you want to know about the usual tourist highlights you can read Rick Steves.) Instead I fly half way around the world to take pictures of our lattes, toilet, and bathroom sink. Even I think I’m a bit strange at times, and wonder how I got like this.

Then I remember. At family gatherings, my dad would often tell the story about taking me to the Ringling Bros. circus at Madison Square Garden when I was four or five years old. All the acts had just finished parading around the arena perimeter, and had now begun their performances in the three rings. In ring number one were lithe young women doing dazzling acrobatics while standing on the backs of galloping horses. In ring number two clowns were tumbling out of a burning building and doing pratfalls in the sawdust. In ring number three elephants were doing synchronized pirouettes on their hind legs. Trapeze artists flew through the air overhead.

“Wow! Look at that!” I am reported to have shouted as I pointed at the source of my delight and amazement. A small tractor was driving around the perimeter cleaning up the elephant poop. I guess we all work with what we’ve got.

Since I started off by talking about the subway I feel I should end on an up note. Through clever reading of maps, and shameless requests for guidance from the ubiquitous (and always helpful) subway staff Shar and I have become masters of getting to anywhere we want to go in the city of London. Here’s the perfect example. The other day we wanted to go see the Benjamin Franklin House where the face of our hundred-dollar bill lived for sixteen years until the Revolution made it uncomfortable. We walked to Victoria station, just a few blocks from our hotel, made our way through winding tunnels and down extremely long escalators to the Victoria trains northbound, rode two stops, got off at Oxford Circus, transferred to the Central Line, caught a train to Charing Cross, walked back through the winding tunnels, climbed the endless escalators, and emerged on Villers Street. 

Charing Cross tube station is at the end of the block in this picture. Notice the sidewalk table and chairs outside the Pret a Manger. This is a critical landmark for the rest of our story. It’s located about midway down the length of this quaint little street, and directly at the intersection with Craven Street where the Benjamin Franklin House is located. It also happens to be across from a side entrance to the Charing Cross Railway station. After dipping our toe into the early days of American history we stopped at this Pret, and grabbed a bite to eat before heading off to our next destination: the Thames ferry taking us to the London Tower Bridge.

To get there we checked our map and saw that, from Charing Cross we need only go one stop to the Embankment Station. So we walked back up the block the way we came, found our way back through the tunnels, down the endless escalators to the southern platform for the Central Line, but when we got there a station agent told us that, because of technical difficulties the train would be delayed, however if we walked back up the stairs and turned right down the hall we could get on the Picadilly Line which would be arriving any moment. We followed his instructions, and sure enough, as we descended the stairs the train pulled in, which caused us to descend the stairs at an accelerated pace so that we just managed to hop on before the doors closed behind us. After a brisk trip of only several minutes we arrived at the Embankment Station pictured below:

As we emerged from the tube, Sharon saw a sign that said, “this way to Charing Cross Railway Station. The block in front of us looked very familiar.

“Isn’t this the street we were just on?” she asked me.

Of course it looked familiar as all these charming London streets do, but obviously it couldn’t be the same street we were just on because we had just spent almost fifteen minutes on the tube. But a very short walk up the block took us to the Pret we had just eaten lunch at. Apparently the Charing Cross station sits at the north end of this block, the Embankment station is at the south end of the block about fifty yards away. As you can see we are brilliantly effective at navigating on the tube to get to any destination we desire, we are just not very efficient. Cheerio!