The British Museum and Wonder.Land (April 29th)

Today was an interesting day. A long day. Again I woke up earlier than I expected. It's good and bad, I have lots of time in the morning to do stuff before I need to leave but I'm getting a full night of sleep. Time will tell if this will be a reoccurring thing.

So this morning we went to the British Museum. Remember how I said that Harrod's was a hue department store? Well The British Museum put it to shame. The place is huge! There is so much stuff there from every part of the globe. We got there at 10am and I didn't leave until 3:30pm and I still hadn't been to most of it. It's mind-numbing how much stuff is there. Dozens of mummies from Egypt. What seemed like the entire known collection of greek statues and friezes. The Rosetta Stone, which was the most crowded part of the entire museum. Giant guardian statues from Assyria. Clock as big as a TV and as small your thumb dating as far back as 1500 AD and beyond. And this was only what they had on display. The store literally millions of other pieces and regularly change out their displays.

The South entrance and East side of the building

The Great Court (Inside the Museum)

Roman Statue

Assyrian Gate Guardians and Gate

We ate at one of the museums cafes called the Gallery Cafe. It was surprising well prices and high quality. I used to museum food being low quality and high prices but this wasn't too bad. For 7 pounds, I got a huge slice of pizza and a Caprese salad on the side. The pizza crust was about 1" all the way through. It had a delightful crispy layer on the outside but the all of the fluffiness of my mom's pizza crust on the inside. And the Caprese Salad was just awesome. Everything was fresh and great. I was full and satisfied.

Upon departure of the Museum, we found this lovely little park called Russell Square. It was like a breath of fresh air after the museum and being in such tight quarters everywhere I've gone for the past few day. We stopped in the middle by the fountain and just sat for a while. I read a book. Someone was writing in their journal. Other people were just sitting looking at the fountain. It was the so quiet and peaceful there. So much of the vegetation reminds me of Monterey. I wish I could have stayed longer but we had things to do.

Russell Square.

Russell Square (Fountain)

Later in the evening. We went to see a play called Wonder.Land at the National Theatre. The dot is supposed to be there in the middle of the title so don't freak-out. It was probably the most original take on the Alice in Wonderland story I've seen. It took the concept of "going the down the rabbits hole" in terms of virtual worlds and spaces. The premise is that Alice is a girl whose parents have just separated. She has moved with her mom to a new home and she is trying to fit into a new school but proceeds to be bullied by a number of fellow students. She gets sucked into this online game called www.wonder.land and tries to create a new identity for herself. It's a really interesting look into why some people go to online games and communities and the benefits/downfalls of such escaping. It also dives into themes about trying to find oneself. The production design was top notch combining traditional theater with multimedia. A very well done performance. Caution though to those of you interested in see it but are a bit sensitive to strong language. They drop some heavy words a few times. I still highly recommend it.

That was today. I'm now caught up with the days. And now I'm off to bed.