i have nearly perfected the british english “sorry.”
it is surprisingly different from the american english “sorry” in that you have to use it a lot more and mean it a good bit less.
for example: if someone bumps into you, you say sorry. if you are trying to get someone’s attention, you say sorry. if you are at a museum and looking at the same placard as someone, you say sorry.
it’s pretty simple stuff.
what is apparently not simple is ordering food. never have i felt more the stupid american than every time i’ve entered a café or restaurant or anything that isn’t a sainsbury’s, frankly, because i always manage to do something a bit wrong.
when i went for pancakes the other day, i spent a fair bit of time confused because, as i’m sure you’re aware, the typical american wait staff does this lovely thing wherein they circle around the restaurant and check in at regular intervals, in a sort of low pressure, “while-i’m-here-what-can-i-get-started-for-you” kind of way. this is apparently not universal. in fact what i’ve done is i’ve discovered the reason they are called wait staff. they seem to be paid to stand waiting for you to signal them over, in my case with a bit of fearful and confused eye contact. it also meant i was terrified to look in their general direction in case they thought i might be particularly fussy or snobby, particularly challenging as i was eating alone and seated directly in front of (and facing) them.
then yesterday at harrod’s (a not entirely pleasant experience–but more on that in a bit) i again experienced the sinking feeling of knowing i had done something wrong and not understood exactly what. i was seated at the bar at the pizzeria, noticing how particularly legitimate this pizzeria looked. i had heard that harrod’s had good food at reasonable prices, so was a little bit shocked to see the £20~ per pop prices, though this made more sense later. i ordered a lemonade and a calzone, which i figured i could handle–they’re not terribly large, usually. see, the thing i had forgotten was that i was at a pizzeria, like where families or groups of friends might gather, and this calzone was a more traditional calzone in that it was the size of a full pizza, folded in half. you know, like what a calzone is. i resigned to my fate, imagining that, in such a ritzy place as this, i would either eat as much as i could and they’d throw the rest away because they could afford to, or i would die on that stool in a matilda-esque show of power by the pizzeria, who would force me to eat it all because that’s what i had ordered, wasn’t it? i had eaten about 60% of this full-size folded pizza before i gave in, setting my utensils in the centre of the plate and preparing to beg for forgiveness. the waitress asked me if i would like a takeaway box.
i had at least done the important bits of paying for my food, such as the giving and receiving of my card, and had signed the receipt when it just seemed like the waitress was not planning on coming back around to verify my signature, as everyone has done when i pay with card. after a minute or two, i figured that maybe she didn’t need to, and began to walk out of the restaurant. as i was passing the threshold between luxury pizzeria and luxury department store, i think i heard a man call out “sir” after me, but i was too ashamed and too far away by then to go back and make sure. the payment went through, at least, so…
sorry?
…
the last couple of days have been full of thought.
so monday i spent primarily at the national gallery, and a learned a few things about myself and my relationship to art. i love old stuff, i really do. when it comes to artifacts or architecture or rocks or anything like that, i’m entranced. but paintings done before the 1750s or so, before art was a creative outlet instead of just an attempt at representation of a religious image or wealthy patron? not feeling it so much. i spent roughly two hours surrounded by paintings of saints and smitings and jesus’ circumcision (a shockingly popular subject to paint). there were michaelangelos and raphaels and possibly the other ninja turtles as well but i cannot remember because they were all of the same group of people and they have all smushed together a bit in the days since, with the exception of vermeer, whom i love.
by the time i worked my way toward the modern (read: 1850s and later) i could have cried i was so pleased to see works that were evocative because of their composition, not just their subject.
and then i walked through the doors, and i saw this, and i did cry.
excuse the finger in the shot, i was a mess. flanking it were two other works by vincent van gogh, and i stood there too long weeping before i decided to compose myself and stepped into the next room, and saw a klimt through the window:
which was opposite a couple of monets:
and picassos:
and cezanne was there too:
and i had to go after that because it was all too much on an empty stomach.
oh, and somewhere in there i also saw westminster abbey and the houses of parliament and elizabeth tower (housing big ben), which were all charmingly under construction because of course they were.
…
yesterday began with a long, leisurely, and much more (though still not entirely) comprehensive walk through hyde park. while it was still a comfortable temperature, it was a couple of degrees cooler than the weekend had been, and the cloud cover was more substantial. after feeling so much pressure to rush to catch everything, it felt nice to make myself sit still and look inward.
after the park came harrod’s department store, which was beautiful but a bit depressing. i am not opposed to a level of comfort, but luxury to that extent feels unnecessary and almost cruel; it feels like it’s putting itself so far above the workers who made the clothing, above those who can’t afford to spare £1,600 for a designer casual jacket. and when there are so many people living in need, or barely living at all? each individual designer having personal attendants who run and fetch you whichever garment in just your size feels classist and demeaning.
not to rant, or anything.
it was very pretty though.
after that came the victoria and albert museum, which was full of history and culture in a much more comforting and inspiring way.
i’ve never seen so much old stuff as i have here. the victoria and albert is very much an artifact museum, all very well kept. i’ve honestly seen so much i don’t have much to say, other than “wow.”
after that i was home with the other 40% of a calzone to eat for dinner (not nearly as good cold as pizza, strangely) and off to bed.
…
this morning began with a trip nextdoor to the v&a, the natural history museum. this one was a much more family-oriented museum, with plenty of interactive exhibits and simpler concepts, though no less fascinating. the museum itself is a work of art, with sculptures of various animals worked in subtly with the structure. the entrance hall is rather famous:
there were exhibits on dinosaurs and mammals and human evolution and plate tectonics and the rock cycle and the time scale of earth’s development and also this room FULL of very expensive and usually beautiful rocks:
i relearned quite a bit that i had forgotten about natural history, and learned much more for the first time.
had some time to spare before coming back in and calling it a day, so i wandered around kensington before hopping on the tube toward baker street, home not only of fictional sleuth sherlock holmes and the museum about him, which i did not enter:
but also at one point to real-life science fiction pioneer h.g. wells.
then it was back into southwark for ramen (the bowls were disposable plastic but i think they might have wanted them back, also i walked up and gave my order to the wrong person at the counter) and a night off the ankle, which still seems to be causing me a bit of trouble if i walk so much in one day.
from there, i think we’re caught up! more soon.
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