Portraits & Pondering, Rocks with no Roll, Wandering with Water

Tuesday I went to the National Portrait Gallery with Amy. We saw paintings, sketches and marble busts of the great English monarchs and their peers from the Tudor dynasty, to William Shakespeare and many in between all the way to Judi Dench’s fulllength portrait that hangs in the contemporary exhibit. I went back by myself on Wednesday and spent a couple of hours in the two rooms devoted to the Tudors. I should preface this by saying I am obsessed with King Henry VIII, his wives and especially his two daughters, Mary I and Elizabeth I. My favorite portrait of King Henry VIII is more of a sketch of him with his father, Henry VII in the background. The sketch was a preliminary drawing of what would have been a great portrait of himself, his parents, his third wife Jane Seymour who was the mother of his male heir, Edward VI to celebrate the Tudor line. I sat there looking at his body language, facial expressions and strategically chosen clothing, wandering what kind of man were you alone? How did you justify your choice of spouses and the treatment of your daughters?  I find him so intriguing. There were three painting of Elizabeth I that I loved. The first is of her coronation as a young woman where she is holding an orb and scepter as symbols of her authority. The second is from later in her reign where her face still looks ageless as she cast herself as the virgin queen ruling my divine right. The last is Elizabeth in a gigantic, puffy white dress standing on a map of the globe. I feel like they show an evolution of her as a person and a monarch.

MoMo's Lanterns

Outside of MoMo's

Wednesday I went to dinner at a North African restaurant called MoMo. The atmosphere was wonderful with lanterns hanging from the ceiling, candles burning, and Maghrebian music bumping. We sipped on sweet teas and feasted on hummus and lamb. It has reinforced my belief that someday I must go to Morocco. After dinner, we went to the Comedy Store for improv night. The players did hilarious skits partnered with suggestions from the audiences.

Yesterday I went with the University of Westminster social program to Stonehenge and Bath. We first stopped at Stonehenge. The stones are really impressive based on how they were brought from the coastal mountains of Wales to inland England and built in a rock formation that marks the summer solstice and tracks the movement and the moon and sun. In truth, we were only there for about forty minutes. That is how long it takes to walk around the exterior, take pictures and listen to the audio guide.



The afternoon was spent in Bath, where I wish we had more time. We started at the Roman Baths that were built around the city’s natural hot springs during ancient times. You cannot actually touch or drink the springs though because they are contaminated with meningitis. We went to lunch where I tried clotted cream and scones. Yummy! After lunch my girlfriends decided they wanted to do some shopping, but I felt that was not ideally how I wanted to spend my time in Bath since it was so limited. I wandered off by myself and strolled along the River Avon, meandered through the Guildhall Market and moseyed into some thrift shops. I spent the last hour sitting in a pretty park people watching and thinking. I have decided I am happy with me now and the me I am growing into. In this park, I was laughing at my own jokes and observations, consequently it is safe to conclude I enjoy my own company.

The park where I did my pondering

The River Avon