Awoke 8am (new time). Read and dozed off. Dreams of Mom, and me saying I couldn’t get out of bed without a reason, and seeing Saj briefly who then disappeared with his crew. Awoke for real about 10am (11am old time). Susan in bed deciding which biscotti recipe to pursue. Prepared some granola + yoghurt + berries, and was deciding to go to St Paul’s when Susan said she’d been thinking of going to Westminster at 3pm, so said I’d do that with her instead. Leafed through the Lonely Planet West Africa ahead of returning it (along with the Chris Scott Sahara Overland guides). The ‘itineraries’ LP suggests include flying from Dakar to Accra, skipping Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast..hmm. Benin sounds quite nice. Togo was nice until it fell apart (when was Huub there, again? Before 1972, I expect…). Burkina Fasso has great people. Ghana would be worth a visit. Wren wants to drive to Benin. I don’t ‘see’ her buying a car (5x the price of a car in the UK) and driving there, personally…but that doesn’t mean she won’t manage to get there overland in some way…but my ‘not seeing’ HOW means I’m not so keen to ‘chance’ it. I can’t evaluate the odds. And my ‘gut’ is skeptical. I’m admittedly still ‘reeling’ from her backing out of driving from here to Mali. I’m keeping the LP book on Volunteering and the one about Teaching ESL Abroad. Maybe I’ll pick up a book on East Africa – I’d somehow rather go and explore Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi than go to Mali again…even if Burkino Fasso and Benin were tacked on. Ama is in Addis, and Susan is keen to visit her as well. Dumi may still be in Malawi. I must email him to see how and what he’s doing. / Walked across Waterloo Bridge at gray noon, and stopped in at Malpin Electronics to see about a splitter for Susan’s Ethernet. Costs 20 quid for a 5-slot box, plus 5 each for two more cables; not worth it. / Continued up past the Lion King and through Covent Garden. Stopped in at the Outlet Store and Birdie’s (?) shoe store. Would like a ‘stoere’ mini skirt and some nice high boots; the fashion this year is all me, too bad I don’t want to be spending any money on clothes these days. / Stanford’s to return the West Africa books, and browse – East Africa, Ethiopia, Malawi (the latter two Bradt guides)…and some cycling stuff in the England section. A guy (b 1983) biked around the world and wrote a book about it. Grew up on a farm and was home schooled (seems to be the way to go, to produce adventurous spirits), and first did cross-Scotland, then End to End, and in Uni decided that he wanted to go ‘round the world, spending about a year planning it and only getting sponsorship right at the last minute. His Mum was his logistics manager while he was on the road. Made me determine I want to have a multi-day bike ride in my life this coming year (Oct to Oct). Maybe Italy or France. Who’d be up for doing that with me? Or maybe Malawi. Dumi is big into his biking. How about a ride for charity around Lake Malawi, to raise money for people affected by AIDS? / Byron called and I reeled off the books I’ve been reading – Great Gatsby, Catcher in the Rye, To Kill a Mocking Bird… and now Crime & Punishment. He’d read GG thoroughly with Nelson, and said Daryl had gotten into emulating Holden and Byron had had to hide the book. Byron is going to be in London at the end of November to launch the McKinsey Education Report (?). It was going to be launched at the OECD in Paris, but the head honcho there can’t make it, so it’s likely to move to London. Sat on the steps by the Pret and stared absently at the screen mounted above the Diwali celebration in Trafalgar Square until I’d finished my mozzarella & tomato croissant (to which I’m oddly addicted). / Walked down Whitehall to Parliament Square talking to Byron. Hung up in front of the Abbey, where I was meeting Susan for the 3pm service. Men in red keep tourists at bay at the gate. We ushered up the left aisle and took our seats on the left side of the transept. It’s a cramped space, for such a large cathedral; you walk a mile down the nave only to be squashed into the transept. You need to arrive early to get a seat in the three rows from which you can see anything . St Paul’s is open and airy and spacious by comparison. Wren’s 17C structure decorated with gold mosaics of men in flowing robes, vs the linear Gothicism of Westminster – built when? In the 1200s, over a couple of centuries? The sermon was in aid of combating leprosy – we have bad memories but good forget-ories, the speaker noted. Leprosy (and lepers) are forgotten, but have by no means disappeared. Someone is newly infected with leprosy every two minutes. I’ll have to steal that angle for my next ALC appeal. What music was not completely traditional was almost atonally 20th century. Still ethereal, but you hesitate about when to sit down, not knowing whether that was the final note of the piece. / Caught the 211 across Westminster and back to Waterloo, stopping in at the Sainsbury’s for ingredients for the biscotti baking spree, and a steak dinner. At home Susan wanted to do some admin before getting going in the kitchen, so read another chapter of Dostoevsky and wrote here.
Later addition: ...I believe we made biscotti later on...
No comments:
Post a Comment