Having blogged about my grief the other day, and recovered
from yesterday’s (totally unrelated) hangover—that story will come later—it’s
time to play some catch-up.
I decided that I wanted to devote Saturday to getting some more
touristy photos around central London while there was still some snow on the
ground. Unfortunately, the snow was pretty much gone by then, but I got some
fun photos nonetheless. I also was able to spend the day hanging out with EN,
the other (non-Cultural Studies) student Columbia sent to UEL this semester,
which was—as always—quite fun.
EN and I had agreed the night before to meet at Buckingham Palace so
that we could witness the legendary Changing of the Guard (a.k.a. Guard
Mounting) ceremony. But more on that in a moment…
Making my way toward the palace, and the spot where I was
supposed to meet with EN, I crossed through St. James’s Park, which sits along
the eastern(?) side of Buckingham Palace. It is the oldest Royal Park in
London, dating back to King Henry VIII’s time. Over the years, it’s undergone
numerous changes: under King James I (England) / VI (Scotland), it was used to
house everything from camels to elephants to crocodiles—surely they couldn’t
have been comfortable in the London climate!; King Charles II had it redesigned
and opened to the public, and—eventually—the exotic animals of years past were
phased out in favor of cows, which provided milk for Londoners in the early 18th
Century; finally, under King George IV (who was Prince Regent at the time), it
was transformed into what we know today.
Unfortunately, in mid-Winter, it isn’t as beautiful as I
found it to be in the early Spring of 2008, when I was here with Nic. But that
is only because the trees were mostly bare, the ground was frozen, and the
flowers not in bloom. Nonetheless, the ice-covered (man-made) lake afforded me
some beautiful photos of the Ministry of Defence building, and fun shots of the
palace.
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| Buckingham Palace, as seen from St James's Park |
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| The Ministry of Defense, as seen from St James's Park |
The other thing I liked about St. James’s Park was the
animal life. The squirrels were more than happy to come up and eat out of
people’s hands (probably less than safe), and there were all sorts of
birds around that were equally happy to come right up to the people.
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| Nut Nibbler |
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| Honk! |
Now, as EN pointed out to me later, apparently I have a
‘thing’ for photographing birds—but, more to the point, I like birds that look
like they have character, or appear somewhat curmudgeonly. (How does a bird
look curmudgeonly? Ya got me, but it happens, I swear!)
At any rate, the trip through St. James’s Park enabled me to
snap the following bird-related photos, which I just thought were plain ol’
fun:
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| 'Don't mess with me--I'm in a "fowl" mood!' |
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| I thought Big Bird was yellow! |
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| Is this a sleepy pelican, or a hat for Aki? Could be either... |
Moving on…
At approximately 11:30 AM, the official Guard Mounting ceremony started. I was pinned against the gate by a crush of people, so I
couldn’t see too much. But, as I had seen it once before with Nic, I didn’t
mind too much. Basically, what happens is that a troupe of ‘new’ Guards
replaces the ‘old,’ accompanied as they do so by a Guards band. All-in-all, it
takes about 30-45 minutes.
Here's a brief snippet of the ceremony I caught on film:
Now, you may also notice that there aren’t as many Guards on
display as one might think would be guarding the palace—well, such is the case
when the Queen is not in-residence (as denoted by the flag atop the palace: if
it’s the Royal Standard (the Royal Flag) then she’s at home, but if it’s just
the ‘Union Jack’ she’s not.
TO BE CONTINUED...
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