Remembrance Day

If you happened to see the Queen lay a wreath of poppies at the cenotaph in Whitehall...we were not there. However, we were at a ceremony in a memorial park next to Hyde Park which we just happened on because we were late beginning our day. Here's what happened.

Right after I had made the coffee, the electricity went out. We easily found the breaker box in the hallway and saw that the main switch had turned off. We turned it back on and it immediately switched off. We did that several times...just to make sure it was really broken.  We decided to call the rental agency. Lola had to deal with all this because (a) it has to be her fault that the electricity goes out within 48 hours of our leaving anywhere--it happened in Krakow, too, so I blame her; and (b) she has a phone; I don't. The rental agency lady who was probably asleep was frantic because she didn't want to call an electrician on a Sunday because  it would be expensive and she didn't want to call the apartment owner or anyone else too early in case they were sleeping in (she waited until 9).  Finally, a handyman called and appointed Lola an official electrician and we ran around turning things on and off as he directed. Finally, for no reason anyone could understand, everything started working again. They're sending someone tomorrow anyway to see if they can reproduce the problem and fix it. Maybe the apartment is rented again the day we leave. 

After the two hour delay dealing with that, we headed off to Hyde Park because the weather was supposed to be nice today--and it was. When we got there, we noticed a ceremony taking place in a small park with memorials to different branches of the armed forces of WWI. We decided to stay there for the 11:00 two-minute silence.  

In the Underground, we had heard an announcement that said the trains would run as usual but the stations would be observing the silence and asked everyone to join in. There were services all over London, including at Westminster which we walked by later. 

Memorial to the Fusiliers

The crowd of people here were very respectful and quiet, except for the French woman and her child who talked during the silence. She helped her son, who was probably 8 or 9, climb a statue to get a view and then they had a conversation during the silence. Then, her French phone rang and the ringtone was that "Bad to the Bone" song. She left with the kid about a minute and a half into the silence.

We walked across the street to Hyde Park and walked around aimlessly. There's a biking lane throughout the park and there were lots of bikers and walkers and dogs, some dogs who seemed not to be with owners. We stopped for coffee and St. Clements cake at the cafe next to the Serpentine lake(we had had a harrowing morning which could only be eased by cake).  

Tame Swan in Hyde Park

  

Serpentine in Hyde Park

We had originally planned to take a bus to the Churchill War Rooms but so many streets were closed off, we decided to walk. Not a very long walk, just past Buckingham Palace to Whitehall where there were still hundreds of people milling about after what seemed to be the end of a very long parade. BTW, the reason we never know what's going on in London is that our tv doesn't have any news stations. We see them but can't get them. Instead, we mainly have American movie channels. We walked through James Park again but this time we saw lots of wildlife.

There's a sign that says don't touch the pelicans but you'd have to swim
to do that; there are ducks, geese, swans, and pelicans in this park

The Churchill War Rooms are worth the visit since they've left every room almost totally the same as it was in the 40s.  In fact, they said the lights had stayed on for 6 years and when they turned them off in 1946, they sealed off the rooms until the 1970s. Margaret Thatcher approved making the area into a museum which I think opened in the 80s and was renovated in 2003. There is a Churchill Museum as part of the complex; it has everything there is to know about Churchill. It's interactive so children probably like it but the lights and sounds are hard on the old people. Parts were fine but other parts were just overwhelming so fearing a seizure, we left. We couldn't find our way back to the main exhibit so Lola asked two ladies the way out. Apparently, the word "out" sounds a lot different in American English than in British English because they didn't know what she was saying. But, really, no one anywhere understands us and I thought I finally had my hillbilly accent under control. We understand them.... 

The electricity seems to be working fine this evening. I washed a small load of clothes which of course, took over 2 hours. I figure if I try every possible setting on this machine, I will some day learn what they all mean. 

We took a bus to a highly recommended Indian restaurant close to Harrods. Our bus was late and when it came, I was so excited that I forgot to mind the gap. In my defense, no one warned me as they do constantly on the trains. I just tripped a little; there are no broken bones. My laundry was done when I came home; the pants are permanently wrinkled.  
                           

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