Portobello Road, Portobello Road

"Street where the riches of ages are stowed."*

I am super behind on blogging, I know, and I'll post more later tonight, if I can, but I wanted to do this post up right away while I was thinking of it.

I'm back in London, and staying in a new hostel (it's in a park!! A park full of puppies!!). I've been doing all the free sightseeing that I can this week, as I've gotten out of the application groove because of the holidays, and haven't much felt like getting back into it 100%. So, I've been taking my days until about 3 or 4 to wander the city and see what I can see for free before I head back to my hostel for a night of job applications and avoiding old men. I have been successful at neither.

My sisters and I have this sign on our foreheads that only bored or lonely or crazy people can see. It says "What I am currently doing is not as important as listening to whatever you want to tell me!!" Between conversations with my 75-year-old transgender friend Peta and my 85-year-old hard of hearing friend Graham, my nights were pretty slow on the job application front. Peta did tell me, however, that if she were 50 years younger she'd be "chatting me up proper like" and Graham did ask me out for dinner and then offered to let me stay at his place if I'm ever in Hartlepool. Yup. I've still got it. Anyone know how to get rid of it?

Anyway, that was neither here nor there, but did catch you up a bit. See how good I am at blogging?

Gate to Holland Park and my hostel

On Wednesday, I wandered through Kensington Gardens to Kensington Palace (which is currently under construction) and through Hyde Park. I saw the Albert Memorial, the Royal Albert Hall and the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain. On the way there, I got stopped by this fellow, who was recruiting people to fundraise for various charities. Once he told me he was a filmmaker, though, I pretty much stopped caring about the charities. And let's be honest here, I only stopped because of his beard anyway. And his accent. It was awesome. Check out the trailer for his movie, but only if you're into being COMPLETELY TERRIFIED.

Kensington Palace Gate. Apparently I like gates.

When I was wandering through Hyde Park, I thought to myself, "This really feels a lot like Wascana Park." And then I saw this:

I hate you in Canada, I LOATHE you in England.

 And this:

IMPENDING DISASTER

How many times have I seen parents in Wascana leading their children INTO DANGER because they don't know that birds are the creation of the devil? Seriously. You wanna know what's not good for someone that hates birds? Living in London. They are everywhere. And they have no fear. It is horrible. Thank goodness there are puppies, too.

On Thursday, I went to Baker Street and saw (the outside of) the Sherlock Holmes museum, and went into the greatest store ever, The London Beatles Store. Love!!! I went there on my first trip to London with my buddy Alissa, who is also a Beatles nut. This time I didn't spend any money, but only because they didn't carry the key chain I bought there 10 years ago that finally broke this summer.

The address isn't even actually 221B. It's, like, 237. 

Hurray!!! The Beatles!!!!

I also saw (the outside of) the Tower of London, walked across Tower Bridge, and saw (the outside of) the Parliament Buildings and Westminster Abbey. Westminster Abbey costs 16 GBP to get in. Can you believe it? There can be nothing in there that I would be willing to spend that kind of money to see.

Today I wandered Portobello Road and Notting Hill Gate. If you LOVE being surrounded by people that are walking so slowly you want to stab them, this is the place for you! There were a few shops that were actually pretty cool, and a lot of old things (and I do love old things...not as much as they love me, apparently), but the best part of the entire day was listening to the Ryan O'Reilly Band and Robbie Boyd. I have a feeling they're there a lot on Saturdays, so I might go back next week to see if I can hear them both again. They were awesome. I spent today's food money on the Ryan O'Reilly Band CD. Worth it. My favourite song that they sang was called Gypsy Tree. SO good. The video just has Ryan O'Reilly doing it, but listening to five guys sing it was fantastic.

The Ryan O-Reilly Band. Awesome, awesome band. Awesome. 

Robbie Boyd's shoe is in the corner.
I took an actual picture of him too, but I liked this one better.

On the way back down Portobello Road towards my hostel, I also saw the greatest thing I have ever seen in my life:

This man is carrying a puppy on his shoulder! Can you imagine? 

So that's been me since coming back to London. I still have some Ukraine stuff to get out of the way (like chocolate and food and more chocolate), but this will have to do for now.



* Wow. I'd forgotten how long and vaguely racist that song is. Oh, Bedknobs and Broomsticks. What a great movie. Despite the racism.

Vika!

I am not a morning person. Like, at all. I like to get up around 1 or 2 pm. And when I say "like," I don't actually like it, I just do it because people are supposed to get up eventually.

This morning I was woken up at 9:30. IN THE MORNING. And the only reason I didn't snap is because this little face is what greeted me when I opened my eyes.

Cutest EVER. She's like a little elf.

This is Victoria, known as Vika (pronounced Vee-ka) and she is the daughter of Tanya's Avon Lady, who is the daughter of Dad and Tanya's mail carrier. It's a small village.

I wish you could have heard the laugh that went along with this face.

Neither of us understood the other at all, but Vika and I played with the doll (pictured above) and the stuffed animals (pictured below) for ages and ages. It was pretty much the cutest thing ever. Also, stacking pillows and then falling into them is HILARIOUS for the under 3 crowd. And the under 30 crowd. Let's be honest, here.

Look at my awesome toys!
(I assume that's what she was saying. It was in Russian)

When Dad went to drive them home, Vika's mom Katya told her to say goodbye to me, so she blew me a little kiss. Couldn't you just die?

CLOSE UP

By the time she left to go home, she was a super sleepy little thing. Her mom called later to tell us that after her nap, Vika had put her boots on and asked to take the "Beep beep" back to Dedushka's. Seems like Dad's adopting all the neighbourhood children as his grandkids. I for one don't mind at all.

Shopping With Tanya

There is really nothing harder than being a picky, plus-sized girl, shopping in a foreign country where you don’t speak the language. My stepmom, Tanya, is really good at picking clothes for herself. She looks nice all the time (“Is Ukrainian tradition,” she tells me) and thinks that I should dress fancier. Which is fair. Maybe I should.

We went into Zhovti Vody the other day to go shopping and I have to tell you that there is little in this world more terrifying than standing in your underwear behind a curtain while three women are speaking in Russian and throwing clothes at you to try on. Ok, fine, there’s plenty more terrifying than that, but I couldn’t have told you what at the time.

Women here tend to come in two types: skinny young women and babushkas. I’m a young(ish) woman who happens to be shaped like a babushka, so there’s not much by way of clothes for me to choose from. I’m also a good 6-8 inches taller than most of the women here. I tend to dress in solid colours, and basic styles. Most of my wardrobe is black. And cotton. Women in the Ukraine like colours and texture and patterns and buckles and lycra.

Blurry Babushkas

I’m happy to try things on if it’ll make Tanya happy (mostly because she tends not to take ‘no’ for an answer. "You try," is her standard response). Tanya had me trying on all kinds of stuff. After I was unhappy with everything in the first store, she says to me, “You look beautiful. You have MUCH complex” and points at my head. Maybe I do, and maybe I do.

Anyway, we had a really great time shopping. We went to a dozen stores, I tried on a million things and made Tanya try on a bunch of stuff too. Mostly things she wanted me to buy but that I didn’t like on me. I ended up with a sweater, and Tanya ended up with a new blazer-type shirt thing and a bunch of dishes.

Side note: dishes here are SOOOO cheap. You can get a super nice tea pot or a huge glass bowl for $3 each. I can’t remember what she paid for the four serving platters she ended up buying, but it honestly couldn’t have been more than $40 for the lot. SO cheap.

Here’s the sweater I ended up buying. I’m pretty sure Tanya hates it, but I love it. Also, I’m pretty sure it’s meant to be a dress, but when you’re 6 feet tall you sometimes wear dresses as shirts.

New Sweater!

Cemetery Walking

I know this is likely a weird topic to start the new year off with, but I come from a morbid family. This is how we roll.


My family has a weird thing for cemeteries. We like to walk in them and take pictures of them and speculate as to how the people in them died. Dad takes his two puppies out for walks through the graveyard on the other side of the field behind their house. We’ve gone that way the last couple of days for puppy walks, and I think it’s just the most interesting place.

In the Ukraine, people take care of their families’ graves. Fresh flowers get put on them fairly often, the grass gets tended, and food and vodka sometimes gets left for the dead. The puppies apparently LOVE when that happens. Each grave, or sometimes the family plot, is surrounded by a fence, and the gate is always left open. Dad’s not sure why, and neither am I. There are benches and little picnic tables all over the graveyard, for family to come sit at and visit their loved ones.

A typical grave with an open gate and a bench out front

There aren’t many graves for people that are over 70 or 80, and if there are it’s usually women. Most of the graves seem to be for people who died in their 50s and 60s. There are also a lot of graves for people in their 20s and 30s.

Grave for a set of twins that died. Age 28, I think.

A very Ukrainian thing is to have a picture of the dead person on their gravestone. Sometimes it’s an actual photograph behind glass and sometimes the picture is cut into the gravestone like below. I assume that’s some sort of laser work, but I’m not sure.

Yesterday while Dad and I were walking, we came across two ladies who were visiting a grave. They stopped us and gave us candy, which is a tradition in the Ukraine. You give candy to people walking by in remembrance of the person you’re there to mourn. I wish I could have understood the poor woman better, because she was crying so hard. It just broke our hearts. Dad thinks she was there to visit her 17-year-old grandson. There are words that you’re supposed to say to someone when they give you candy in honour of their loved one, but Dad didn’t know them, so he told them to me in English. He figures she understood just the same.

Dad beside the graveyard.