6 o'clock buzzed in much too soon, but we had to shower, pack, check out, and get to Westminster Abbey by 8. On our bus ride home the night before, Meagan had declared her resolve to attend Holy Communion--a resolve that met with cranky protestations on my part. Nevertheless, we boarded the very empty Docklands Light Railway early that morning, backpacks in tow, ready enough to commence our last half-day in London. LeeAnn departed mid-route for Westminster Cathedral's morning mass, while Meagan and I continued on. Perhaps it was my tiredness--afterall, an introvert who has been enjoying new experiences in a bustling city will get socially, emotionally, and physically tired--but the day was beginning to take on a surreal cast, my present activities dislimned by my anticipation of the coming night when the three of us would embark upon our first Wwoofing adventure. I'd never worked on a farm--rarely even in a garden, never concerned myself with organic practices nor the environment, never stayed with a host-family. Would this be the beginning of something new, the time I could point to later on and say "there the course of my life changed"?

Holy Communion was the best way to experience the Abbey, far better than the cattle-prodded shuffle of paid admission. The greeters did not even seem to mind the backpacks we stuffed dutifully beneath our seats. The service soon over, Meagan and I trekked to Westminster Cathedral, reunited with LeeAnn, and made our circuitous way to Victoria Station. In between settling the finer points of our evening's journey to Kent, I took the opportunity to nab a cup of coffee that provided little of the wanted effect.

The details in order, our departure time duly noted, we set out for Portobello Market for a few hours of browsing. The alarming cost to check our bags at the station dissuaded us from doing the sensible thing and from then on every few steps nagged me with regrets as I hoisted my bag to a less aching position. We finally found Portobello Market (are you sensing a theme with all these "finally found"s?) and, after bumping through crowds and stalls stocked with tea cups and antique watches and faded books, we discovered a stall selling scarves at a reasonable price. Each of us bought a beautiful pashmina and correctly predicted that "we'll be loving them all summer."

The train was a blessed respite from the bustle of London and of the past few days. It was our moment to sit for an hour or so in the relative quiet of the car while anticipating our next adventure. What would our host be like? Would we acclimate? Would we realize that this whole trip was terribly misguided and so dread our remaining weeks on other farms?

Excitement, curiosity, and anxiety mingled in my thoughts as we pulled in to the station.

By that morning, our third day in England, I could feel myself adjusting to the time change and even to life as a tourist. We had much to do in this our last full day in London--tour the British Museum and the British Library, search out our midday meal of fish and chips, breeze through Regent's Park, and arrive at the Globe Theatre in time for our much anticipated production of King Lear*. LeeAnn was also itching to return to the theatre set exhibit at the V&A, having stumbled upon it only five minutes before it closed the previous day. She lives and breathes theatre. With all that, we also rather hoped to take a jaunt through an open-air market before the show.

Such are the unrelenting plans of the optimist.

Although the Museum proved surprisingly difficult to find, we selected the exhibits we wished to see with relative ease by confining ourselves to the 100 Objects tour on the first and second floors. As an English major, however, I made sure to visit the Brownings' wedding rings again, and we all paused before the Elgin Marbles with Keats's famous poem, "On Seeing the Elgin Marbles for the First Time."

As I wrote during my last visit, it was amazing to set eyes upon things--statues, tools, jewelry, pottery, &c--that have existed before the momentous events that we have defined as history, touched by the hands of those completely different from our own. So many of these things were created before the incarnation of Christ himself, the Lord and Savior of the world. Shadow of a magnitude indeed.

taking a breather at the British Museum

But time waits for no one, particularly the traveler, and we found a small restaurant serving the next item on our agenda. The three of us disappointed the waitress by ordering only one (albeit large) plate of fish and chips and mushy peas to split among us, relying on its full fat content to hold us through to a light supper before the play. After our grocery-store meals of bread and cheese and fruit, it felt good to sit down in an classy establishment and eat a hearty meal. We even ordered a dish of hazelnut ice cream (to split of course) in a moment of delighted spontaneity.

Thus refreshed, we wandered further through London in search of the Library which we found only after a good deal more twists and turns past boiled-peanut vendors and souvenir tea shops. We ended up forgoing Regent's Park, in spite of my stubborn remonstrations, wisely concluding that it would be foolish to hurry across London in order to rest at the Park. Part of traveling is figuring out what you have time both to do and savor; capability is only half the equation. Nevertheless we did speed through the unimaginable riches of the British Library--Queen Elisabeth I's signature, Shakespeare's handwriting, Jane Austen's desk--in order to return to our favorite haunt at the V & A. In our rush I neglected, once again, to take my picture on the incredible book bench. We breezed through the theatre exhibit buoyed by LeeAnn's pure delight before snatching bread and cheese from a convenience store by the station (not knowing what kind of gory interpretation of King Lear was in store for us, we wanted to keep our fare light). Then, situated just across the Thames from the Globe, we found a bench and pulled out my tiny Complete Works of Shakespeare to review the play.

My only concern as a groundling was my [lack of] height, and I feared being squashed behind some tall broad man for the two or three hours of the play only catching the occasional "Wherefore..." or "Bethink..." As it was I needn't have worried, for we wedged ourselves in right next to the stage--within spitting distance of the actors, as they say--sufficiently drawing us into the play so that we even forgot our tired feet. At one point, characters from the play processed up to the stage and passed right by us.

Unfortunately, the Birds' Nest is a ways away from London proper, and by the time we left the Globe that evening the few Underground lines linking us and Deptford were closed, some right as we entered the station. One staff member took pity on us, however, and directed us to a bus stop serving the last bus to Deptford. I write "directed" kindly, for minutes of circuitous wandering failed to reveal what he had glibly waved us toward. Spurred on by terrible visions of taxi fares (which I admittedly supplemented with the idea of walking to Deptford in spite of the rather rough area in which our hostel was situated), we at last found the bus stop where I discovered I had lost my Oyster card**. Now, I am the sort who obsessively checks for my keys before shutting my car door and checks for my library or credit card before getting in line; all through London I kept my Oyster card easily accessible, only reassured with the occasional pat to verify that it was still in its proper place; this, therefore, was especially frustrating. Frenzied rifling, desperate coin-counting, tears, the odd "damn it," &c, however, and I finally found it just as the bus pulled up. We arrived at the Nest an hour later.

*Never actually been a fan of King Lear--in fact, for the longest time this play represented everything that repulsed me by Shakespeare; but such was the 2008 summer schedule at the Globe
**Underground and bus fare

My mom and sister's return from England has reminded me of my own most recent trip in the summer of 2008. I originally started this blog to document the adventures of my two college roommates and me as we Wwoofed our way through the UK. Internet access was too sparse during our trip, and since then other events and nonevents have crowded out my original intention. I did, however, make a start at blogging it, and that is the narrative I would like to resume over the next few months. In deference to the blogger's predilection for alliterative posts, I have scheduled my Wwoofing accounts for Wednesdays, tentatively.

Catch up on my Wwoofing adventures with my introduction, narrative #1, #2, #3, and #4, and look for the next installment in a week!

London Tour, cont.

Our fresh new day brought fresh new energy and attitudes to the three of us, and we set out early the next morning to finish our London walking tour and browse the many galleries and museums around the city. Leicester and Trafalgar Squares were among the first stops, the National Gallery our next. I obligingly studied my favorite periods of paintings as I wandered from room to room, but soon sleepiness overcame me and I had to sit down. Perhaps I just wasn’t cultured enough to appreciate the work of such great artists as Caravaggio and Van Gogh and Seurat and Giovanni with alertness, but really I tend to find the layout of museums and galleries a bit tedious—if I’m to study anything in great depth, I don’t do so standing up. I kept dreaming of a museum in which the paintings were displayed on individual tables with benches beside them, allowing the viewer to sit and peer down at the art, that visual direction so much more conducive to actual study. But I enjoyed listening to the folks drifting in and out as they discussed their impending lunches and, occasionally, a painting.

St. James Park was our next stop, for I remembered it as a haven of green and quiet and ducks in the middle of the bustling city. We broke bread on the lawn while some rowdy boys displayed their Frisbee skills further on. It was wise of them to keep moving, for the day was brisk and after my quick nap under my jacket I was thoroughly chilled and ready to spend several pounds on a hot drink. We walked up to Buckingham Palace, stared at it dutifully for a moment, and then continued on our way to the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The V&A

The three of us wandered through the museum’s provocative exhibit about book-designing, fascinated by the layouts and themes and handwritten pages of each piece. One artist even blew his carefully executed book up with dynamite. Then the fashion exhibit kept me entertained for at least two hours with displays of designer ensembles from the modern era, namely eighteenth-century through present. Oh, the construction of the garments and the carefully-wrought details! It was as though I were walking through the back covers of Threads in fact. I soaked in as much as I could and vowed to incorporate similar techniques into future sewing projects.

“Did you see that welt pocket, Meagan? Meagan?” Come to think of it, I vaguely remembered her telling me she was going to some other exhibit. After traipsing through several rooms and floors, I managed to locate LeeAnn wandering the metalsmithing hallway, and the two of us recommenced our search for Meagan.

Our Discovery

We were passing through the second or third floor when something arrested us—and suddenly LeeAnn and I were staring dumbfounded at Trajan’s Column, assembled right there a few feet from us, the scenes of war spiraling up the absolutely massive cylinder. We had read about that very piece in our CivArts texts and here it was, commanding attention as if it were an ancient Roman himself. The detail of the myriad faces was incredible and seemed to suggest that the abstract concept of war-and-conquer was propelled by individual persons. I briefly scanned the rest of the room which was scattered with Romanesque doorways, Elizabethan sculptures, a whole church front, altars, effigies, and crosses, but inevitably my gaze would again alight upon the Column.
…plaster…
“eh?” I thought, “what was that?” In its rhapsodic flight, my gaze had swept over a nearby placard. I ventured closer to read: …despite the large proportions of the gallery, the height of 83 feet is not large enough to accommodate the column in one piece, as it may be seen in Rome … The cast is displayed in two … opening of the Architectural Courts in 1873 … The sections of plaster reliefs are each individually numbered to make up a giant jigsaw…
Suddenly recommitted to finding Meagan, we made our sheepish exit, and I hoped that the couple over yonder had not overheard my naïve amazement at finding the priceless Roman art in Great Britain. Once reunited, the three of us had just enough time to scout out a sushi place before returning to the V&A for their Regency festivities which we were delighted to discover for the evening.

Reliving Regency

First that evening we watched the recreation of one of the duels between Sheridan and Matthews. LeeAnn, a fencer herself, pressed close to analyze the fencers’ techniques as we watched the two re-enactors brandishing their swords and bandying insults at one another. Next was the dance.

The Regency dancing was to be held in the room displaying the tapestries of the Acts of the Apostles. The tapestries were on loan from Her Majesty’s collection—and my mind immediately shot back through history and imagined Raphael’s hand painting those very scenes, those very eyes, those very shadows in the draping cloth. As we looked on each cartoon, LeeAnn read the pertinent biblical passages so that our ears were washed in truth as our eyes were treated to its visual representation. I had made sure to read each placard carefully lest these, too, should prove to be imposters, but each attested firmly to the 16th-century origin of the paintings.

A man and a woman in regency dress demonstrated two dances in a rather ungraceful series of hops and twirls and dips, but after watching the onlookers half-heartedly copying them, we soon took our leave. And, I must say, I was proud of our full day and late night—synchronizing our internal clocks with that of Great Britain’s was going well.

12 June 2008

As I pray in St. Paul's Cathedral, a choir begins to sing...softly. The sopranos are light and the basses are gentle. I see the offering pouch I noted last summer, still beneath the candle stand and proclaiming in squeaky magic marker letters that I HAVE BEEN STOLEN FROM ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. I also hear the thud click and ratchet of commercial tourism layering its tinny sound over their holy melody. Is it a fitting illustration of the old fight between God and mammon or am I overdramatic with sleep deprivation? The information booths and stands advertising guided tours for four pounds do seem to suck the marrow out of the cathedral as the stamps authorizing our right to enter thud and click, thud and click.

Setting out from the Bird's Nest after breakfast, we had returned to central London for our self-guided walking tour along the Thames. I loosely plotted a route from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey where we would also pass by the Wibbly Wobbly Bridge (officially known as the Millenium Pedestrian Bridge), St. Paul's, Leicester Square (for the half-price ticket booths Meagan and LeeAnn were anxious to peruse), and Covent Garden. Having been awake for a day and a half by then, plodding through London forced our bodies to keep up with the new time zone and provided us with a mental map of the area which we would visit for the next few days. It was gratifying to walk through my memories of London which had lain dormant since I returned from last summer's two literature classes, and whenever I spied something familiar I rejoiced in the clarity that comes from recognizing what you have not seen in awhile.

It was overcast and every-so-often it sprinkled, but I don't think we minded much; we were still amazed to be in England actually beginning our long-anticipated wwoofing adventure. "Can you believe we're here walking around?" we breathed, words which would be repeated and rearranged as our staple phrase for the next two months. It would crop up at all places in our conversations accompanied by never-flagging head shakes and exclamations: "Oh I know!" "No, no I really can't." All the nebulous dreaming and paper-laden planning now took on real textures and experience: the slippery slick stone of the pavement and the spitting precipitation of the London sky reminded us that we were indeed here at last.

Our elatement dipped at times throughout the day such as when LeeAnn could not find a working phone card and, bordering on hysteria, finally resorted to purchasing a rip off at a small shop, or I, teetering even closer to hysteria, couldn't find a bathroom and cursed myself at every step for drinking coffee and lots of water that morning. Yes, my elation dipped as my search for a toilet took me several blocks up and down the street until I finally gave in and entered Starbuck's, traitor to the British experience. I knew they had restrooms, however, so I bought some exorbitantly-priced fruit bread to justify my use of their facilities and returned to St. Paul's where we trudged up the hundreds of steps to the outer dome and my skirt caught the wind and flew up to my chin.

--Note to self: a light and airy skirt is inappropriate for windy days and climbing openwork metal staircases with fellow tourists climbing directly beneath you.

We trudged up Fleet Street and walked right past Dr. Johnson’s house; the rainy pavement sent our cold, flip-flopped feet skating; the bridge on the way to Covent Garden turned out not to be the bridge on the way to Covent Garden. Our enthusiasm and vigor waned as the afternoon wore on until we finally sought shelter beneath the columns of the Lyceum Theatre, chilled, wet, hungry, and tired.

We decided to head back to the Bird’s Nest and finish the route tomorrow.

12 June 2008

Our hostel in Deptford Bridge was just beyond Lewisham College’s gated car park as a tower of darkly-shadowed brick and peeling sills. It had four stories, the first of which was a pub painted in traditional white and British green. A red-striped awning housed a few weathered tables and benches and a chalkboard sign advertised last night’s menu. Frankly it looked like it could have been or still could be the target of vandals and I thought vaguely of graffiti and broken glass as we approached.

Clinton was the host on duty, a Canadian bass player who was spending his gap year in the UK. He was settling down to his chocolate cereal and offered us some breakfast, too, which we accepted as the midnight yoghurt was fast failing us. We chatted about our plans for the upcoming weeks as we learned of his time there in Deptford--since September--and the ins and outs of the Bird's Nest. Despite the rather rundown exterior, the inside held a casual charm with its heavy wood tables and creaky benches, the warm rusts and hunter greens of the cushions, the brass handled taps at the bar, and the signs pointing out the WC, drawn by a quirky hand on bright pink cardstock cut out with pinking shears. Clinton periodically scanned the digital jukebox mounted on the wall, asking for song suggestions, and I wished I had paid more attention to the Bob Dylan and Eagles' songs Kristen had been forced to learn on guitar; after furiously upending every file in every crevice of my memory I only came up with "Wild World." He said it was a good song.

Our only other breakfast companion was Ed, a tubby sixty year old man who hailed from the great state of Arkansas with tee-shirt, accent, and easy affability to prove it. It seemed he had come to the UK for the sole purpose of wandering, for when we prodded him for his day's plans he vaguely mentioned downtown Greenwich and some Hard Rock Cafe he hadn't seen yet, and I got the impression that his London expedition was as much a mystery to his friends back home as it was to us sitting now at the Bird's Nest, just a head-shakin' clumsy unspoken mystery. Relieved, therefore, of the mental acrobatics required to picture Ed shuffling among a tour group at Westminster rather than popping his can of beer in front of the t.v., I chuckled to myself at the mix of people a cheap hostel attracts.

The room was very cheap at only 10 pounds ($20) a night, but the drawback was in its being a six-bunk co-ed room. That did not appeal to my conservative nature but really, how bad could it be? Then horror flicked across my mind--What if he were staying in our room? Ha, no; that would be too funny. Besides, the only other bunk occupied in our room had a small pink beach towel draped over the head and a sleeping mask, definitely not the accoutrement of an Ed.

Our snickering was cut short when we spied soft bare shoulders peeking out from the blue striped sheets the next morning, gently rising and falling to the beat of his unabashed snores. And he did wear that sleeping mask.

This is the first of many posts detailing the adventures my two roommates and I had in the UK under an organization called WWOOF--Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms. Having never really farmed nor concerned ourselves particularly with environmental issues, the three of us nevertheless hopped on a plane June 11th and set out for two months of farm labor and learning, accented with weekend tours of historical UK sites. Posted sporadically will be my account of our experience.

June 12, 2008

There’s nothing like waking—or was I even sleeping?—and ladling strawberry yoghurt between my teeth at 2 am trying to convince myself that the last three hours of tossing and turning served as the necessary punctuation between night and day. How much time has passed between now and the flight’s beginning? What time is it in the U.S.?

But we’re not supposed to remind ourselves of the old time; we’re in Britain now. I will obediently set my watch to our new time zone.

We arrived slightly before our due time of 6:55 and disembarked to a bustling Heathrow International Airport. The yellow signs marked INTERNATIONAL ARRIVALS and CUSTOMS became our guides and we went from one to the other as a preschooler swings from rung to rung on the monkey bars. As we proceeded to baggage claim, my imagination kept foisting upon me the scene of the three of us staring at the emptying carousel, watching as bags were reunited with their owners one after the other while our humble rucksacks never appeared. Those bags contained our entire trip, all the work and touring clothes we would need, all the sunscreen and Advil, all the shampoo and wellies and cameras and socks and host gifts and rain ponchos we had so carefully packed—and what would be the compensation? My whole bag was probably worth around $50 and I certainly would not be able to replace everything in it for nearly that amount here.

Our bags appeared promptly on the carousel, however, and we were soon free to buy our Oyster cards and take the Picadilly line into central London where we changed to the Jubilee and then the DLR, finally arriving at the outskirts of Greenwich in a little corner of town called Deptford Bridge.

Deptford. A mottled stretch of brick shops outlined the streets with its little grocery stores, laundromats, a two-story Noodle King, and dim-windowed salons displaying posters of sultry-haired models. One shop had a handwritten advertisement for a nail technician. I had noticed en route the gradual evolution of passengers as we came closer into Deptford as the designer shoed,
suit-clad men of the world’s financial capital were swapped for the sweatshirt hooded, baggy-dropped jeans of…well I could envision them on street corners or in alleyways conducting business of a whole other sort. These were those streets. And here was our hostel.

Everytime I walk by my hiking backpack, I get really excited and cannot wait to pack it for England. It has 2800 cubic inches of space plus three external pockets for those little items that get so easily lost in the bottom of the main compartment. Its straps are comfortable, and it has waist and sternum straps to help carry the load. What a piece of excitement! I think of where it will go and what sort of floors it will be tossed upon in just two months--let's see, a family home in East Sussex an hour south of London and west of Kent (Canterbury Cathedral) and the white cliffs of Dover; a loft in the Lake District, which Edward describes as a sort of stone tent with an outdoor loo and primitive shower; and an English castle near the Welsh border which, I hear, has a resident ghost of a dog, some ancestor's faithful hunting partner several centuries ago. I'm not sure where the ancestor resides.


My backpack will also see several hostels--two stays in the Bird's Nest in Greenwich and a stay in my beloved Oxford. It may also travel to Scotland near St. Andrews, which is a new development in our UK trip plans. Linda, a former GCC student, is completing her doctorate on the influence of Medieval literature on the work of Charles Williams (what a dream study!) at St. Andrews and, although she has a one-room cottage, eagerly has offered my roommates and me her floor for a few days. We originally planned the WWOOF trip around a Scottish mansion, but it turned out that the couple had no room for us (in terms of jobs, not space, I'm quite sure) and our Scotland plans fell through. We are so excited to resurrect this part of our UK journey with the generous hospitality of Linda.


WWOOF stands for WorldWide Opportunities on Organic Farms, an organization which offers people of all ages the chance to work on farms in return for lodging and food. I joined with Meagan and LeeAnn just because I love to travel and this was the cheapest way to do so, but now I am actually quite interested in learning about sustainable living, especially after having read the Agrarians' book, I'll Take My Stand. There is something to be said for living amid the cycles of life and death which help to foster a concrete vision rather than an abstract vision, which comes with the danger of losing sight of or fragmenting the really real into something which may turn out not to be an accurate reflection of the True.


So yes, I get excited whenever I pass by my backpack, because on its new and innocent nylon exterior I can imagine the smudges and tears of the experiences I'll gain in the UK as I meet people from different cultures who are established in the time-honored way of farming. They are among those of us who do not embrace Progress wholeheartedly but who insist that concrete tradition must not sacrifice itself to some vague vision of the future. And a summer spent roaming? How lovely!