Photograph Life's Lessons -- London, England

Speak for yourself and from yourself, or be silent. 

~George Henry Lewes

 I'm starting this post from the spotless dining room of Francesco's London apartment. I am pleased to note that the walls are every bit as white as they were when I arrived, so my dear, mildly obsessive new friend will have no fingerprints to point out when he returns from his dinner party. His cousin (who is a spy from his mother) is flying in from Italy tonight, so the place has to be super duper squeaky clean.

Francesco is in his fifties. Francesco is still afraid of his mother.

Italian mothers would hate me so much. I must never fall in love with an Italian boy. No matter how charming and playful and seductive Italian men are, their mothers would definitively be the death of me. I would be found drowned in a bucket of soapy mop water.

Because of the spy's arrival this evening, Francesco asked his maid to come half an hour early to thoroughly clean up after his German couchsurfers (he called them his messy teenagers).

"Why are you leaving trash in the room? I texted you three times this morning -- why didn't you respond to my texts? Where did you go today? What is your plan for tomorrow? Did Aimee put the blinds up like I asked? Why hasn't Aimee emailed me yet? She promised to email me first thing."

Francesco is like an overprotective mama bear... except as a middle aged Italian man with crumpled crepe paper eyes from laughing too much. I think he's wonderful. He's so stressed out about the fact that I don't have a working phone (British SIM cards don't work with my unlocked samsung, apparently) that he's purchasing a cheap phone and SIM card for me to use while I'm here.

"It will make it much better for me to be able to contact you. And it will be good for other couchsurfers in the future who have the same problem."

I shrugged. I've grown so accustomed to the freedom of being inaccessible that having to carry a phone is oddly uncomfortable.

But to each his own. He opened the door to his home, I have to fit through. 

"Okay."

The gregarious Bulgarian maid arrived at 7:30.

"Where are you from?"

"Colorado."

"Oooh! America!"

"Yup. The mountainous part." 

"I have never been to America... but Francesco... he has lived in New York. What are you doing in London?"

"I'm attending a yoga training program."

"Yoga! mmm... yoga is so good for the body. And the mind. And the breath. Breath is important, yes?"

"Yeah, yoga's really good for that. I actually get to practice yoga for six hours a day for the next five days. I'm really ex --"

"SIX HOURS A DAY?" Nadia leaned against the counter and caught my eyes.

"Ermm... yes."

"SIX HOURS A DAY?" she repeated. "No..." she tsked disapprovingly. "Six hours is too much. How can you do six hours?"

"A lot of it will be massage. Yoga... massage... yoga... massage... I'm not too worried."

"You will be too tired," Nadia wasn't at all convinced. "Six hours," she muttered darkly.

Six hours of play. Six hours to blissfully indulge in an activity that draws out my inner child.

I left Francesco's apartment (rapidly becoming spy proof) at a quarter to nine and walked through gardens and parks, past ducks and dogs (and coots) until I arrived at Covent Gardens Piazza in time for the free Sandeman Walking Tour.

I took no pictures as I walked -- I wanted to try one of Michael's ideas on for size.

"I stopped taking pictures because I realized that everything I photograph is a lesson -- which is the reason I'm so drawn to capture that moment. Instead of taking the picture, I tried to think about the lesson life was teaching me. By the time I understood, the moment had passed. So I sold my camera in Italy and now just look for life's lessons."

Why do I want to capture the sinister crow stalking the squirrel with the cracker? Why do I want to photograph the morning mist drifting between the trees, dulling the vibrant daffodils and blanketing the grass? What attracts me to -- 

This Sandeman tour was my eighth (Berlin, Madrid, Dublin, Copenhagen, Paris, Versailles and Munich are already under my belt) and the most disappointing one thus far by far. The guide spent more time talking about her hometown in New Zealand and the other tours offered by her organization that explaining London history. The only remotely interesting thing I learned during the two and a half hours of wandering through Westminster was that at one point, the garden's pelicans had become so inbred that they started eating the pigeons.

Nothing else is really worth mentioning.

Our guide was from a town that sounded like "Cowcoppacoppa". Which was funny the first five times she had us say it.

Our very large group.

The National Gallery

Baha! I might finally make it into a film! My dreams of becoming a film actress might inadvertently come true.

Trafalgar square (in front of the National Gallery) was originally built to commemorate the defeat of the French (I can't remember when. I think Cowcoppacoppa got in the way of this bit of history). The English ran out of money during the final phase of construction, so this pillar was left without a statue. Eventually, they decided to turn it into a sort of rotating art display. This year's piece is by a feminist who wanted to objectify men the way men objectify women. So she erected a massive blue cock on top of the pillar. She didn't quite realize that the national color of France is blue and the national bird of France is... the cock. France was quite delighted with this turn of events. 

Changing of the guard.

Buckingham Palace.

The most lucrative Ferris Wheel in the world. This big guy makes 50,000 pounds an hour.

 After the tour culminated (thankfully), I sat down in one of London's many gardens and ate a picnic lunch of Camembert and chorizo and chocolate.

If only Harriet could see me now... No! No, Bourget. You are not getting bitter over this. Eat your chorizo because you like chorizo and not because Harriet would not like you eating chorizo. 

So I enjoyed the chorizo because chorizo is delicious and then went to explore the National Gallery. Because the National Gallery has works by my favorite artists and not because every guide book says I ought to visit.

Parks, Parks, Parks -- London, England

I have resolved to seek my happiness by limiting my desires rather than attempting to satisfy them. 

~John Stuart Mill 

I'm starting this post from the living room of my couchsurfing Italian host in London A large, expensive looking orange, blue and cream carpet covers the majority of the glossy wooden floor. Three windows line the wall and a modern hanging lamp hovers in the up left corner. The walls are cream, the ceiling is cream, the couch is cream, the coffee table is glass and sparkly clean.

It's so... spotless. I feel like I'm in Turkey again. What is life trying to teach me by constantly throwing me under the vacuum cleaner and dust bin of super clean people?

 Francesco picked me up from Costa Coffee at about six pm last night, after making me promise to buy a SIM card for my phone so that we could communicate better the next day.

"If strangers are going to stay in my home, I like to be able to check in on them," he wrote over Skype.

Logical enough, I suppose. No other hosts have been this concerned... but everybody's different. This is a situation where it's my job to adapt. He opens the door to his home and I have to do whatever it takes to squeeze inside. Or just stay outside. 

"You can put your bag in here," he opened a coat closet and motioned my osprey inside. "Just not against the wall."

Not against the wall... that's strange. Okay. 

I leaned the bag against the cabinet filled with summer shoes.

"Do you drink tea or coffee in the morning?" Francesco asked as we moseyed into the kitchen. 

"Coffee! I love coffee."

"Here is the coffee and here is the French press. Here are some eggs and nutella and an interesting orange whiskey jam for breakfast... Now, let me show you the shower -- "

And my huffing, puffing host proceeded to introduce me to his entire apartment. As he made my acquaintance to the shower head,  I told him a little bit about the crazy land from which I'd just escaped.

"I needed to always make sure the toilet lids were down so that positive energy didn't escape through the pipes," I shook my head with bewildered, "did that really happen?" laughter.

"Yeah, I put the toilet lids down, too," my host nodded back at me. "I am afraid that snakes will come up out of the bowl. I lived in New York City for too long."

"I like your reason better."

Just as the grand tour was about to culminate, the doorbell rang.

"That is the German couchsurfers," my host explained. "They promised to make us a German dinner tonight, so I will go let them in."

"Hello," the two slender, stylish young Germans greeted me. "Where are you from?"

"Wait!" Francesco interrupted. "We have not told her the most important rule here."

"Yes," the willowy girl with long blonde hair took the baton. "Don't touch the walls."

"Don't touch anysing zat is white," the laugh-lined boy finished.

"Exactly!" Francesco surveyed his young Germans with nearly fatherly affection. "Now, where is this German dinner?"

"We didn't have time to buy the ingredients."

"But you promised!" Francesco looked stricken.

"We cooked last night!"

"Okay, okay. I will treat us all to Indian food. We leave in half an hour, yes?"

I love it when this happens. 

Francesco took us out to a nearby Indian restaurant (there's always a nearby Indian restaurant in London) and ordered beers for himself and the Germans and a saffron lassi for me.

I must go to India. 

My spicy lamb dish came out of the kitchen a few minutes later.

I really, really must go to India. 

 I spent the next morning slowly, softly, appreciatively ambling through Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Green Park and Saint James  Park.

Seeing out of Michael's eyes for a month helped me to find beauty in places I would have overlooked and hurried past. 

Google maps told me it would take an hour and a half to walk to the Tate Museum.

I took three.

Must... itch... face.

When I finally reached the Tate Museum, it was 12:15. I only had 45 minutes to wander about before I needed to walk back to Hyde park to meet with Robyn -- a volunteer from Colorado who is about to head to Istanbul for a three month volunteer stint with Umit and Seher.

I hope she's good with babies. I hope she's really, really good with babies. 
 

I scampered to Albert Gate at Hyde Park to meet Robyn and noticed the enormous difference between hurrying back and meandering there.

I dislike this ever so much. Why do people walk so quickly? Why do people organize their lives so they have to be somewhere at certain times all the time? It sucks all the joy out of movement. 

Albert Gate loomed in front of me. I wandered inside, found a block of cement that kind of looked like a bench and sat down to wait.

And waited.

And waited.

And...

I don't regret planning my day around meeting this person, I thought to  myself as the cold from the cement seeped into my skin. I just wish I hadn't hurried back. 

Half an hour later, I decided to find some internet to contact my fellow volunteer. When I turned to go, I was immediately accosted by two friendly looking girls with an impressive looking video camera and microphone.

"Hello, do you mind if we ask you a few questions?"

"Umm... " I stalled. Last time I'd been asked for an interview, it was about some political business regarding George Bush about which I'd had NO idea and felt remarkably silly about the whole thing. "I'm not from around here," I hoped my lack of Britishness would get me off the interview hook.

"It doesn't matter," the outspoken girl with the microphone invalidated my excuse. "We're involved in an independent film festival in Bristol and we want to ask you a few questions about what freedom means to you."

"Oh. Okay, I can do that."

"So, what does the word freedom mean to you personally?" camera girl switched on the camera and mic girl thrust the mic under my chin.

"To me, freedom means non-attachment," just pretend that's a real word, Bourget. Commit to it. "I'm a long term traveler, so I don't have a house or job to be attached to, but I have my bag. I have my plans. I have my absurdly heavy electronics. If I can find a way to not care whether or not my bag makes it onto the luggage belt at the end of a flight or whether or not my plans work out the way I'd envisioned them, then I am free. I am able to live spontaneously and fully in the moment because I have no anxiety about the future. I am free to allow life to unfold itself to me instead of scrapping about wildly for what I think ought to happen."

"Is there a time you didn't feel free?"

"Yes. It was when I was saving up for my first trip. I worked 70-80 hours a week at jobs that didn't fulfill me. I was compromising my present for my future and that made me feel like my freedom had been lost. This trip is funded by my passions. By the things I love. I didn't compromise my present for my future so I kept my freedom in a place I'd felt so trapped before."

"And what do you love to do?"

"I love to teach yoga. I love to garden. I love doing the things that really make me embrace the present."

"Can you sum up freedom in one word?"

"Non-attachment. The ability to let things come and to let things go." 

After some all caps "WHERE ARE YOU?" facebook messages, I met with Robyn in Kensington Gardens. We chatted over coffee and got good and lost while I debriefed her on my experience in Istanbul.

She brought me a package from my family. Smartwool socks, my favorite tea, a beautiful card and buffalo jerky.

These are the bits of home I miss. Thank-you, mom. I will wear these socks to threads on the Camino de Santiago this August. But this jerky... is not waiting until the Camino. This jerky is getting eaten right now.

Oh, yes. I'm doing that. Walking five hundred miles and stuff. More on Camino business later.

Good luck, Robyn! Enjoy the tulips, the baklava and the coffee!

I had German dinner (which looked startlingly similar to gluten-free pasta with tomato sauce and bacon) with my fellow couchsurfers, edited my photos and called it a night.

First day in London. I saw hardly anything, but I loved everything I saw.