London June 2017 Day 12 – In Little Dorrit’s Footsteps

In the late morning we met our landlady Sue in a restaurant called German Gymnasium, close to King’s Cross Station. It was in 2013 that we had stayed in her holiday flat in Walthamstow for the first time and because we liked it so much we rented it again for our stays in 2014, 2016 and 2017 (we had not been in London in 2015). However, more than the flat we liked Sue. Whenever we met her (usually just on our arrival and departure) we found so much to talk about, but had so little time, so this time we finally agreed to meet during our stay and talk some more :)

Afterwards Hermann and I went to see the remains (that is one wall) of the Marshalsea Prison which became famous with Charles Dickens’s novel “Little Dorrit”.

From there we walked towards Borough Market where most of the stalls were already closed and from there to the Thames.

Underneath the bridge for the trains to and from London Bridge Station we found this sign. Hermann tried it, but it didn’t work ;)

London June 2017 Day 10 – An afternoon in the British Museum

In the morning we went to Belmont Hall in Harrow again for the Open Door Coffee Morning to enjoy tea, homemade scones and great conversation with lovely people. On our way there by (overground) Metropolitan Line tube we could see black smoke going up from Grenfell Tower which had burnt the night before leaving 71 people dead.

In the afternoon the LCM summer school group made an excursion to the British Museum to see items which had to do with the contents of the Bible. Our guide was Clive Anderson, one of the authors of the book “Through the British Museum with the Bible”.

Clive had many impressive stories to tell, but the one which particularly stuck in my mind was that of Livia Drusilla (58 BC – 29 AD), wife of Emperor Augustus and mother, grandmother etc. of other Roman Emperors – and fashion icon of her time, even after her death.

It was interesting to hear that Livia was indirectly mentioned in the Bible, though her name never appears there. Both Apostles Peter (1 Peter 3:3) and Paul (1 Timothy 2:9) are telling Christian women to dress modestly and not to wear plaited (or “broided”) hair. The reason for this was that Livia used to wear a very elaborate hairstyle formed of many plaits, and women of the time were trying to copy this hairstyle. This in itself certainly wouldn’t have been much of an issue in the Christian community, if not Emperor Claudius, her grandson, had elevated Livia to the state of a goddess after her death, so that copying her fashion style could be seen as a form of worship. At this point it became tricky for the Christian women, of course.

To read more about that day in summer school, please visit the LCM blog.

London 2016 Day 7 - The Queens Birthday Party and Belmont Hall Harrow

This day started with rain. When it eased we went to Russell Square Station by tube, only to find that it had started to rain again - too heavy to enjoy a walk outside. So we went to Victoria Station to wait for it to end, but the only walk we were able to take without getting wet was inside the train station. We finally gave up and returned to the flat. On the internet we saw photos of the picnic on the Mall in honour of the Queen's 90th birthday, but it didn't look very cosy with all the people in their raincoats and rain dripping into the food and drinks. We didn't envy them.

In the afternoon it really seemed to get better and even the sun came out a bit, so we tried again. We travelled to Green Park Station with the intention to take a walk from there, but then discovered that in Green Park there was another picnic going on. In the station we met this young couple who obviously had no tube map and got lost, so we helped them.

We wondered where people had these paper crowns from and asked someone. A group of young people overheard the conversation and kindly offered us two spare ones they had. After our return we gave them to our neighbours' 5 and 7 year old daughters and made them very happy ;)

It would have been too good to be true if the rain had finally stopped entirely, but like many other people we had to take shelter in Green Park Station.

When it eased we resumed our walk and left the park, but it soon started again, so we had stand under a roof just outside. There we met this man who when he heard we were from Germany told us that he had worked there as a construction worker in the early 90s when there had been a recession in the UK and no work for him (just a few days before we had met another man on the tube who had told us a very similar story). So inevitably we talked about the referendum and having experienced some benefits of the EU for himself he preferred to stay in.

When the rain stopped we resumed our walk in the direction of Hyde Park and Marble Arch Station.

We took the tube to Harrow-on-the-Hill and walked to Belmont Hall where we attended their Gospel meeting. This time we were also invited to the Wayfinders group which took place afterwards (actually a youth group, but many of those who attended were adults). They worked with this book which I found very useful and ordered it after our return to Germany (nice and easy via the German Amazon website - they even had it in stock). Since then I work through it.

It was around 9 p.m. when we returned to the tube station. On our way we saw these beautiful clouds.