Off to Tomorrow Land of the 1980's: The Towers and Trilithon Tour- Part III: London, Singapore, & Timaru

London November 12-18, 2017

The Christmas Faire at Leicester Square

Finally we arrived in London Sunday November 12th. My 3-day CME conference started Wednesday the 18th and we left early Saturday the 21st, so that gave me 2.5 full days and 3 more nights to see as much of this vast world capital as possible. I would to try to take little tourist bites and accept the fact that I would have to defer many things until some other visit. It helped that I had been here once before, 1971, when I was a bit younger and more energetic, so several key tourist spots (the Tower of London, Buckingham Palace, the original Tate Gallery, etc.) are still somewhere in my memory bank. The strategy was to first visit spots of interest in the general neighborhood of our hotel, then secondly do and see things that I couldn't on my prior visit, either due to lack of funds or because they did not exist yet.

The conference was at the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) (#1 on map) which is adjacent to Regent's Park, so we stayed one block away at the Meliá White House Hotel (#2) (BTW, a nice place, a Spanish operation with employees fluent in Spanish, not necessarily English). Perhaps the map below can orient you to the Regent's Park area of London. North is up, south down, east right, and west left.

KEY: 1-Royal College of Physicians 2. Meliá White House Hotel 3. Abbey Road 4. Lord's Cricket Ground
5. Sherlock Holmes Museum 6 Madame Tussauds

The RCP is in the 4 o'clock position, right near the little green nubbin. The park is a wonderful place to stroll or jog. There are formal gardens, playing fields, a canal and small lake, the London Zoo, and the London Central Mosque.
Within walking distance, other points interest include:
1) Abbey Road, (#3-slightly off the left of the map, above Lords) and therefore the recording studio and famous zebra crossing (the drivers are so polite to stop for the queue of fans to have their photo snapped).

2) Lord's Cricket Ground (#4-green rectangle left side middle), considered the most hallowed venue in the sport. (I have learned this since being in NZ.) Started in 1787 by Thomas Lord, this is its third site, having "only" been at the current location since 1814. The 'Home of Cricket' is owned by the world's biggest cricket brand, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which also owns the copyright to the Laws of Cricket. It is the MCC which makes changes or updates to the rules of cricket. It also houses the world's oldest sports museum (1864) but it would have cost us £36 ($48 USD) to tour the grounds and museum, and I am not a big enough fan to pay that.

3) Baker Street (#5-just off lower left-hand corner of Regent's Park); specifically 221B Baker St., the home of the "fictional" detective Sherlock Holmes. You will find the Sherlock Holmes Museum with a Bobby out front, at what they claim to be the 221B address, but that is disputed.

4) Madame Tussauds London Wax Museum (#6-a little to the right and below baker St.) has been at its current location on Marylebone Road since 1883. (Again, I was too cheap to go in, plus I generally find the wax figures creepy and/or unconvincing.)

The British Museum

A bit more of a walk but well within range is the British Museum, which I did visit before, but for museum-lovers it is worth as much time as you can spend there.

British Museum main entrance

There are so many fascinating objects, here are only a few I will share. There are artifacts from Nimrud (860 BC), an ancient Assyrian city in what is now Iraq near Mosul. (Much of the remaining ancient city was recently destroyed by ISIS.)

Assyrian carving from Nimrud

Gates from Nimrud

The most famous treasures are the Parthenon Friezes, commonly called the Elgin Marbles. Here is just one panel displaying Centaurs battling Lapiths. I am in awe of how these artists transformed the stone into such animated and vibrant creations! How they were obtained and whether they should stay in London is the subject of much debate, but you can read the British Museum's side of the story here.

Head of a horse of Selene, Greek Moon Goddess

The Mausoleum at Halikarnassos-One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World near Bodrum on the Turkish Mediterranean coast, it was ruined by a successive earthquakes in the 12th-15th centuries. The Mausoleum was a grand funeral tomb for King Maussollos and the word mausoleum comes from this memorial. He and his wife hired four of the greatest sculptors of 350 BC each to work on one of the four sides.
Like five other Wonders (excepting the Great Pyramid of Giza), I had thought that this monument was lost to history and legend, and was surprised to find major remains of the Mausoleum here. The story of their recovery is fascinating. After the destruction, bits and pieces were burned for lime to make plaster or salvaged and incorporated into other structures, like the Crusader-era castle in Bodrum and a dock in Malta. In the 1800's, some surviving carvings and fragments were sent to the British museum, and in the mid-century the clever British archaeologist Charles Thomas Newton was able to use ancient texts to rediscover the site of the tomb. Only the base and a small museum remains at the original Turkish location.

A fragment of the Mausoleum frieze showing Amazons battling Greeks

A stunning horse from the chariot team originally crowning the crypt.

Other Roman artifacts include this sculpted acrobat on the back of a crocodile and a mosaic.

In 1942 near Mildenhall, Suffolk, UK, a ploughman discovered a large hoard of masterpieces of Roman silver tableware from the 4th century AD. The trove is called the Mildenhall Treasure and consists of over thirty items and includes the Great Dish weighing over 18 lbs (8kg). The find was not declared to authorities until 1946, when the cache was legally declared a "treasure trove" and acquired by the Crown for display in the British Museum.

The Great Dish, or Great Plate of Bacchus

21" plate with neillo inlay

Another popular item is the Lewis Chess set, a group of distinctive 12th-C. pieces most of which are carved in walrus ivory. Discovered in 1831 on Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, Scotland, they constitute one of the few complete surviving medieval chess sets

The Tate Modern- Opened to universal acclaim in the year 2000 in the re-purposed Bankside Power Plant, this cavernous gallery is dedicated to international modern and contemporary art. Situated on the south bank of the Thames River, it is a centerpiece of the reborn district across the river from St. Paul's Cathedral, which includes the National Theater, the recreation of Shakespeare's Globe Theater, riverside dining, and the London Eye giant wheel.

The museum has been such a hit that in 2016 a 10-story extension called the Switch House opened behind the original. (You can see the tower behind and to the right of the classic facade above.) It is a wonderful place to roam around. There was an exhibit of works of Joseph Beuys (1921–1986) described in Wikipedia as "a performance artist as well as a sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist, and pedagogue". This caught my eye because I had never heard of him until I saw the documentary Beuys (2017) on our trip to New Plymouth in September. He had a lot of influential ideas, but I can't say I understood many of them. Perhaps you can study at the art instillation below and explain it to me?

Lightning with Stag in its Glare by Joseph Beuys

You can see the Lobster Telephone by Salvador Dalí or Jane Alexander's comment on South Africa, African Adventure 1999-2002.

Salvador Dalí-Lobster Telephone (1936)

African Adventure 1999-2002 by Jane Alexander

The view north from the Switch House observation deck

For a special treat you can go the top on the new Switch House for dramatic views north across the Thames towards St. Paul's Cathedral.
A pleasant and scenic stroll along the South Bank walkway will offer many dining options, including these plastic-domed restaurant tables.

London at Large- You may have heard that Elizabeth Tower, better known as Big Ben, has started a four year restoration project. The bells will be mostly silent for the duration, but you can still see the tower beneath the lighted scaffolding in front of the Houses of Parliament, officially called Westminster Palace.

Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square

The Underground dropped us off in Trafalgar Square, a short walk to the Banqueting House, which is the last remaining building of what was the grand palace of Whitehall. After Henry VIII seized the property from the deposed Cardinal Woolsey in 1530, it was the major residence of the monarchs until a major fire destroyed most of it in 1698. The Banqueting House was added to Whitehall in 1622 and was the scene of increasing elaborate and decadent masques, Royal cosplay combinations of theater and masquerade ball. It is also where King Charles I was beheaded in 1649 by Oliver Cromwell and his Roundheads after the English Civil Wars.
Unlike the rest of the Palace, the Banqueting Hall survived the fire of 1698, so it is said, because Sir Christopher Wren himself destroyed surrounding buildings to create a safe perimeter for it. Why did the renown architect care so much? First, because it is considered a major landmark in British architecture as the first truly Renaissance neoclassical structure in the country, designed by famed architect Inigo Jones. This style dominated British design for 250 years.

Neo-classical Banqueting House

More important was the preservation of the magnificent ceiling paintings by Peter Paul Reubens. Ordered by Charles I in 1636 as a memorial to his father James I, the nine panels heroically depict him as a godly uniter of all Britain. It took us three tries to actually get inside because the first two times it was rented out for private functions, but when we did there were few other people there, and we could really drink in the extravagant painting. The best position for this was supine in a beanbag chair.

The red throne is a reminder that this was a place where the monarch would meet the common people on Royal Maundy for a tradition that dates to the 12th C. The day before Good Friday there is a church service and the ruler will give money (Maundy Money) in a special purse, of other gifts to poor and indigent or deserving subjects, even washing their feet in days past. It is no longer held here due to security concerns, but the practice carries on in churches throughout the kingdom.

One of London's great pleasures is the abundance of live theater, something I did not have the finances to enjoy in 1971. We were able to go to the West End for two memorable evenings. First we saw Labour of Love, a clever romantic comedy by James Graham about the last 30 years of the Labour Party in the UK. I was drawn to it because of Martin Freeman, a very familiar face best known to US audiences as Bilbo Baggins of The Hobbit films, Dr. Watson to Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock , or perhaps as Tim in the original UK The Office. Easily his match was Tamsin Greig, a fantastically talented TV and stage actress known much better in British circles. She starred in the BBC/Showtime sitcom Episodes, alongside Matt LeBlanc.

The next night, it was time for murder. In 1971, Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap had been playing for a then-record 19 years. I finally caught up with it, a scant 46 years later, in its ongoing record 65th year at one of the over 26,500 performances. It was great fun, so smooth and professional, and recommended if you enjoy a good, old-fashioned whodunnit.

Royal College of Physicians- As I said up at the top, I did come to London to further my medical education. The three-day course covered Medical Complications of Pregnancy. It has been an annual conference for several years, featuring top-notch people in the field. On rare occasions I will be called to help with a medical problem for a pregnant woman, and it is always highly stressful for everyone, as you can imagine. It is important for me to be secure in the basic knowledge of how to approach the problem and not panic until I can help sort out what to do and how to safely get the patient(s) into the most capable hands. This meeting covered all the important topics.
I discovered a little late that the Royal College Building is a mini-museum itself. The College was established in 1518 by Royal Charter from Henry VIII. It has had five locations over the years, and has been at the present place since 1964. A quotation about the structure from the RCP states:

The current headquarters of the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) is a Grade I listed building designed by renowned architect Sir Denys Lasdun (1914–2001). Opened in 1964 next to Regent's Park, it is widely considered a modernist masterpiece and one of London’s most important post-war buildings.

This link to the RCP web-page has a very informative 12' video explaining why the design is so esteemed.

RCP exterior

RCP interior

The walls are covered with portraits of former members and RCP Presidents annotated with brief histories, some delightfully frank. Here are three examples.

Messenger Monsey (1693-1788)

A "country physician", he spoke plainly and was skeptical of modern sanitation. He was displeased with this portrait, complaining the artist made him look like "a hog in armour".

Sir Henry Halford (1766-1844)- President of RCP for 24 years

Halford was physician to George III and also attended George IV, William IV, and Queen Victoria. He opposed physical examination of patients and disliked innovation. Lord Grey called him "the damnest conceited fellow in the world".

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1802)

Browne was a brilliant writer, inspiring devotion from authors Viginia Woolf, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Jorge Luis Borges. He introduced 700 words to the English language. At the same time, like many of his peers, he believed in magic a gave evidence in a witch trial.

Another floor displays old medical instruments and paraphernalia.

Above- Nipple Sheilds; Below- Caul Case with Caul

Lithotomy tools

Leeches

Stethoscopes

Also featured are cases of tongue scrapers, medicine spoons, and gold "touch pieces" to cure the King's Evil (aka scrofula). (King Charles I "cured"100,000 of his subjects of TB with his god-given magic Royal Touch and the hanging a gold coin around their necks. The practice was ended by George I in the 18th C., regarding it as "superstitious".)

Singapore November 19-21, 2017

After a spectacular trip so far, it was time to head back to New Zealand, but just enough time was allotted for a 2 1/2 day stop-over in Singapore, a popular transit respite for Australasian travelers.We had had one prior brief stop on route from Perth to Cambodia on Mothers' Day 2011 which quite a bummer (as describer in prior blog here). We had heard wonderful things about Chiangi Airport, but from a key misstep it all turned to custard that time.This was going to be a much more satisfying Singapore experience.

First here is a bit of introduction to the place and its history (some of it just looked up):

Stamford Raffles founded colonial Singapore in 1819 as a trading post of the British East India Company, and in 1858 the islands were ceded to the British Raj as a crown colony. It gained independence from the UK in 1963 by federating with other former British territories to form Malaysia, but separated two years later over ideological differences, becoming a sovereign nation in 1965. One degree north of the equator and at the southernmost tip of the Malay Peninsula, consisting of one main island + 62 islets + 23% more area from landfill, Singapore is an improbable British-influenced Asian commercial and financial powerhouse.

The view from our hotel, the Marina Mandarin

One of my German colleagues loves to stay a few days to and from Europe, and he suggested our hotel on the Marina Mandarin Singapore. Across the water we had a clear view of the most iconic modern building in the country, the 55-story luxury Marina Bay Sands Hotel. Opened in 2010 with three towers capped by a three-acre horizontal deck called the SkyPark, it has an infinity swimming pool, restaurants, bars, and gardens, available for hotel guests only (not me). You can buy a ticket to go up the restricted Observation Deck, but it was closed due to thundershowers when I stopped by.

SkyPark Image from Pinterest

The towers supporting a "lintel" reminded me of something .....

Hint

and led to the title of this blog trilogy (blilogy??).
Also echoing previous stops on this trip, it features a nightly light and fountain show and the giant Singapore Flyer Ferris wheel. You can see a glimpse of the wheel at an angle partially peeking out behind a building on the left side of the Marina panoramas above or better further down.)

The Marina Sands complex includes a casino, upscale shopping mall, a convention center, showrooms, and the lotus-shaped Artscience Museum.

Artscience Museum

Like Dubai and England, there were universal signs of Christmas everywhere, especially in the malls and hotels. Without Thanksgiving to restrain them, other parts of the globe outside the US go into full Christmas mode early November. I especially enjoyed how the Olde Tyme Dickensian Christmasy England put me in the holiday spirit.

Inside the Marina Bay Sands

Marina Square Mall Christmas Decorations/kiddie event

A word about the malls: they are ubiquitous, and being in a hot and humid climate prone to sudden thundershowers, they are designed so shoppers will spend a minimum time outside. Multi-leveled, labyrinthine, and connected via hotels and covered walkways, you can wander for miles inside from mall to mall.
There is more to see around town, so for efficiency as in Dubai we opted for the Hop-On-Hop-Off Bus tour (HOHOB if you will). Highlights include the 158 year-old Singapore Botanic Gardens. The gardens played a role in some 19th C. British Imperial intrigue after some rubber tree saplings were smuggled out of the Amazon to Kew Gardens in London where they were secretly germinated. Saplings were first successfully grown here and then the trees were widely disseminated throughout the Empire to break South America's rubber monopoly. (BTW, none of the Garden attendants could point out a rubber tree to me.)
One must visit the National Orchid Garden sub-section. I cannot imagine a more glorious exhibition of these stunning flowers.

Orchid Garden collage

A monitor lizard enjoying the garden

You must have a meal at one of the many street food bazaars, this one in Chinatown.

After initial racial and ethnic turbulence in the 1960's, Singapore is proud of its multicultural and multiracial society. The people are 75% Chinese, 14% Malay, and 10% Indian; 31% Buddhist, 20% Christian, and 14% Muslim. Different sections of town reflect the different heritages.

A mosque in the Islamic neighborhood

In the 1960's the Singapore Tourism Board came up with the symbol of Singapore, the half lion/half fish Merlion. The Singaporeans seem to take it very seriously if you read the Wikipedia entry carefully, but it also contains this less than flattering quote:

Together with the Little Mermaid of Denmark and Manneken Pis of Belgium, the Merlion is ranked in Japan as the 'Three Major Disappointments of the World'

My photo.....

but this Flickr photo is way better than mine.

Photo By fad3away. - Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/76425142@N07/12948445504/., CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31652394

Time finally to board the plane Timaru-bound, and a second chance for Changi Airport to impress us. This time, it was a pleasure to spend a few hours walking around and experience the visitor amenities, like the Butterfly Garden and authentic Street Food Court.

In the end, it seems to me Singapore and Dubai (and Las Vegas) have much in common: recently invented cities in the middle of a hostile environment (tropics/desert), fancy hotels and malls, lots of shopping and money and business but no clear industry, a big wheel and a fountain/light/music show.

In Timaru, before and after UK trip

There are just a few Timaru odds and ends I wanted to mention for completeness sake, with brief explanations.

A major part of our weekly routine is Wednesday pub quiz night at the Sail and Anchor, and a major draw for Kiwis to quiz night is the raffle. Usually the prizes are chocolate, baked goods, tea towels and the like, but sometimes something more unusual is offered. Cushla, a nurse from the ICU and frequent quizzer, was delighted to take home this giant sack of onions one night.
WWI centennial remembrances continue. At the cenotaph in the Timaru Botanic Garden there was a recent plaque dedication to those Kiwis who fell at The Battle of Passchendaele, a particularly bloody and nightmarish episode of that tragic conflict.
The 1931 brick Timaru Public Hospital Administration Building (and my former office) was demolished almost overnight due to earthquake concerns.

Photo from stuff.co.nz website
The America's Cup was won by New Zealand, and came to visit Timaru.

The Auld Mug,World's Oldest International Sports Trophy, visits us and Colleague Genie

Post-trip, we needed to return in time to prepare to host a potluck Thanksgiving weekend for local Yanks and friends. It was a lot of work but worth it for the fellowship and conviviality. The weather and food were spectacular, but once again I didn't remember to photograph the food until it is mostly eaten (I guess that reveals my true priorities). FYI: The Thanksgiving tradition that intrigues many non-Americans most is pumpkin pie. They find it very strange that we make sweet, not savory pies, and that we would use a gourd more suited for livestock than human consumption. The skeptics are slowly being won over, one slice at a time.

My improvised version of γιαγιά Wallace’s Rice stuffing, with black rice and cashews replacing chestnuts

The current exhibit at our local art gallery, the Aigantighe, features Moari-themed painting, carving, and music. Here is the Maori god Kahokuru Uenuku carved from niho paraoa (the tooth of a sperm whale) by Brian Flintoff.

As we quickly wrap up things here and prepare for our six week holiday and New Years trip home, here are a few images from preparation for Christmas in the Southern Hemisphere.