Day #3. We meet up with Kaja, Tower of London, British Museum

I feel my creative juices starting to flow again and sorry for my 3 day absence.  A combination of jet lag and writers block.   But I am starting to think clearly now.

First, a confession.  I have done something that I regret and fear it will come back to haunt me.   I swallowed a shrimps tail.    In retrospect, I have no idea how it possible to know that a) you have a shrimps tail in the back of your mouth b) continue to swallow it.   But there I was,  eating seafood noodle dish with un-peeled shrimp in it.   Of course you grab the shrimp by the tail and you bite the shrimp out of the tail.   The mistake I made was returning the shrimps tail to the noodle bowl (no plates at this joint) and I did not want to set it on the table.  (messy, messy).

Shrimps tails are  three things in my book.  Stiff, sharp and inedible.   I have never seen nor  have I heard of bowel perforation that on examination later the pathologists ID'd as the 'caudal portion of a marine arthropod' but we shall see.   Last years trip to Europe was notable for Lawton's broken arm and need for emergency medical intervention.  Amy did have me purchase a suture set for this trip and I do have a scalpel.....

Today was very big day for us because we have met with our very special Au Pair from Norway. She lived with us for one year and returned to Norway and college over 2 years ago.

All of us took the tube to the London Tower which was fascinating.  This is home of the Beefeaters and home of most of the British Royalty until around 200 years ago when they moved to nice digs.   Essentially this is well fortified castle that has a gate that opens right onto the Thames.    This was called the Traitors gate because all people that were against the King or Queen were of course a traitor and then executed usually by beheading after torture.  

Ann Bolyn was Henry the 8th second wife.  She considered him obese, foul and malodorous and she was accused of a variety of crimes including adultery, sodomy, sex with children.   She was unable to prove the she was innocent (proving guilt was not the standard) and she chose beheading instead of hanging or stoning and was promptly executed by cutting off her head.  Henry the 8th was remarried the next day to Jane.    He executed several of his wives I think because they were unable to give him a son.  


He could not get a divorce from his first wife because it must be granted by the Pope.  So he kicked the Catholics out and made his own church called the Church of England and put himself at the head of the church so that would not be a problem.

After the tower of london, we took the 'tube' to the British Museum.   This is an incredible museum with fascinating art displayed from the Egyptions, Assyrians, the Greeks,  predominately.   At one point Lord Duveen completely removed all the art from the crumbling Parthenon in Greece and shipped it to England and gave it to the King who put it in this Museum.  Amy wants a correction here because his journey back is little more difficult than that.  Captured by the French, imprisoned for many years, returned to England, broke and had to sell the art to the King.


We learned that the French were there early as well especially Egypt.  Napoleans forces apparently blew the nose off the Sphinx.  A little later they tried to remove artifacts but were a bit more clumsy than the british explorers.   At one point the drilled a hole through a particularly large granite bust so they could pass a rope through it and help lift it.

These historical pieces are everywhere and there are so MANY of them and more incredibly, they are just parked on the floor without any sort of barrier.  It was hard to wiggle if you are 6 and Lawton backed up into a granite bust and whacked into it.   My heart skipped a beat, the art is irreplaceable and incredible sculptured bust that was just 3,000 years old perched on a little base.


Maggie kept wanting to get into the large granite baths.   These were large Sarcophaguses (4'x4'x10') carved out of one slab with amazing Heiroglyphics on the side.

Well, as you can imagine these cultures want this stuff back, especially the Greeks.   Our tour books says, see this stuff now while it is still here.   The Museum sees it a little differently.  They take the stance that we are doing these backward countries a favor by properly displaying and preserving these treasures and they are welcome to come visit anytime they like.