At least the rain didn't extinguish the flame

Friday 5/7/12... we made our way into Colchester with Aunt Thelma for the historic occasion of cousin Julie singing in front of the Colchester Castle.  Oh, and the small matter of the Olympic flame making its way past.

The weather was in fine English form...

Julie, the star with the Funky Voices choir - an inclusive, community singing group

but the singers kept singing,

we climbed railings, and waved paper flags that fell to bits when they got wet,

 

Thelma on the railings

and the traditional sights of England passed by,

and the not-so-traditional sights too (we think that's a kangaroo.  What do you reckon?)

 There was an Olympic torch borne aloft by a proud runner too, but we didn't get any photos of it.  We got a video, but it's not that exciting if you've seen one before...

Surprise Show Day

 According to our guide on the Doctor Who locations tour, we associate London with the colour red thanks to these kinds of phone boxes (tho' they don't usually have giraffes in 'em), the old postal boxes, double decker buses and Tube signs. They use a lot of red props when they shoot 'London' scenes in Cardiff. 


On Saturday 7/7/12, we went into real London for a couple of surprises for Ayesha.  First there was this... 

The Barmy Britain Stage Show

Two fantastic actors performed songs and skits, changed costumes on stage and even got us joining in - pantomime style.  The next surprise was another show, but quite different...
 

Ssshhh, we took a naughty photo of the stage

Matilda the Musical

 Sets were amazing, actors were amazing, everything was amazing.  Tim Minchin is a genius songwriter - the perfect person to adapt Roald Dahl's work.  Any musical that includes 'front bottom' in a song has got to be good!


We also spent some time exploring family history in Soho...

Shop with a name common in Dad's (Howie's) family- they were tailors too

Place where census records show Dad's (Howie's) family - the Bierman side living in 1881 

In Which We Did Not Blink

WARNING, THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE CRASH OF THE ELYSIUM, INTERACTIVE DOCTOR WHO STAGE SHOW...

 Join 16, 17 and 18, Patrol Group, Alpha Squad Team for the adventure of a lifetime...

AYESHA... On the 5/7/12 we went to the Crash of the Elysium. 

First we went into a boring museum room about a boat (called the Elysium.) All of a sudden, sirens went off and army officers came bursting into the room. They said that we were all in serious danger and they needed our help. So, we went into another room and got changed into weird white full body suits with hoods and masks, all the while being shouted at by army officers. We were assigned numbers 16, 17 & 18 (Hazel & Bradley were 14 & 15) of the patrol unit in Alpha Squad on a special emergency mission.

 And so it was that our adventure really began, as we were taken to the wreckage of the real Elysium (a space ship) and shown a video of ...guess who?.. none other than the Doctor asking us to find the TARDIS and destroy it (her). Oh, and, of course, to beware of escaped art exhibits. We kept seeing strange spacesuits crumpled on the ground everywhere.

Before we knew it, we were searching rooms and running down corridors and then, there they were... WEEPING ANGELS...DON'T BLINK!!! Everyone, except poor number 3, made it through to the control room of the ship where we got another video message from the Doctor. He told us which section to find the TARDIS in and warned us about the ship's auto-defence mechanism... but the tape cut out before he could say more.

We turned around and a suit which had been crumpled on the ground had come to life and was standing large and still... Suddenly, it lurched toward us and there was more, faster, running down dark corridors... Then more Weeping Angels, even faster, blind running down pitch black corridors with locked doors barring our way until we found ourselves in a circus?!?! in the 1800s!?!?

We were met by Dolly, a lady who had had many adventures with the Doctor (including accidentally being the first woman on the Moon, oops!).  She told us we must not destroy the TARDIS as we were the last hope for the Doctor's survival.  We used the artron energy  obtained from our jump through the time rift to charge the TARDIS key and find the TARDIS  to send it/her back to the Doctor.  

But Angels were still on hot on our heels.  Now we ran through a hall of mirrors until we finally made our escape and used artron energy to time lock the Angels.

Some of you might like to read the letter of thanks I received from the Doctor... I'll have to post a scan when I get back to Australia.  

PS Thanks to cousins Hazel & Bradley for organising the tickets and coming along xx

Kath's Reflections on Family & Framily

A wordy entry written 1^st July 2012

A cold and wet Welsh summer's day... a view of the headlands, the cliffs, wild seas, white water smashing against black rock, hovering and circling sea birds crying out hauntingly, foxgloves and grasses in various hues of green and gold bent in the wind that whistles and howls... a hot cup of tea, Howie napping under a doona on the couch, Ayesha with her nose in her Kindle, washing tumbling in the dryer. We are in the barely pronounceable Pwll Deri YHA, perched alone on a coastal hill top in Pembrokeshire. What a place to stop, to breathe, to collect our thoughts, to domesticate with some washing & cooking.

I'm thinking of the people we've seen so far on our way, of connections and re-connections with people we love- our family and our framily (friends who become like family – phrase courtesy of Libby, my framilial sister-woman).

There's Ali, my aunt... not so much older than me that we can be called a generation apart, yet our experiences growing up seem so different that I learn from her that our Australian and English childhoods were truly worlds apart. She helps me tease out stories from my Grandma. That's my Nanny, Irene, who at 93 years old never ceases to amaze. I've learnt much of her life from her but wish I had days and weeks more to hear her stories, and piece them together and understand the way the people, places and times fit, or not! She's experienced, endured and survived incredible things and changes. A childhood bout of pleurisy left her deeply scarred and the treatment seems so barbaric to us now. She hid under a cake oven with a cat while pregnant with my Dad during bombing raids on London in 1940. Then there are the myriad of jobs she took, people she knew, places she lived. Listening to her brings the past to life, but she's living now. Just imagine outliving so many people you know and love...

Gabi, Roger, Michael and Peter welcomed us with the embraces and cheer and warmth that I've always known from them from the moment we first met. Living so far from extended family gives you the awkwardness of meeting people you 'know' but have never seen. This mob have never felt like strangers to me. We eat, drink, chat, laugh. Ayesha & Peter dance. We forget to take photos … maybe it's a sign of being so completely in the moment with them. The moments are too few and too short. I want to bring them home with me. If only... Maybe Lapland one day.

We visit my dear old friend, T, in beautiful Dorset countryside. It's joyful to just grab some food, throw it together and get down deep to talking about what matters – painful, political, psychological, philosophical. T has always kept me on my toes and her great expectations push me to want myself to do more with her percipience, persistence, resilience, bolshiness (yep- I swallowed a dictionary... well, she makes me want to be impressive!)  And I want her to see it all in herself – she is so much more than she believes.

And we visit our beloved Lib, Gra & Bee who give us health for body, soul & spirit with good food, gorgeous surrounds, fun game playing and inspirational ideas – always! We're building a pictionary card list, folks, and will work on the artwork soon. Aya's happy to find she & Bee still have much in common – vegetablists/arians, animal advocates, netballers and Whovians both.

DOH! a DEER and how a National Trust medal was won

Sorry this has been a BIT delayed ... (from Monday 25^th June)

We are now in Bournemouth, England. Aunt Alison came down with us and we are staying with Nanny Irene who is my great grandmother (Mum's grandma). She is 93 but still lives on her own, which is impressive. Mum's going to write a post about her and our family after this.

We went into Bournemouth town this morning where there are big public gardens that lead down to the beach. The beach has yellow/brown sand, very cold water, and a lot of little huts in different colours of the rainbow which line the foreshore. We looked inside a hut and it's basically just a beach cupboard that you can rent to keep your stuff for the day in. And make a cup of tea. 

Unknown guy sunbathing next to his cupboard :)

 In the gardens we found MINI GOLF!!! Of course, we played. My favourite hole was called the 'ant nest' and the hole was at the top of a mound which was hard to get the ball up. Dad liked the one which went up through a tunnel. None of us got a hole in one, but there were very near misses.

Later, we went to Corfe Castle; it was AMAZING!!!

First of all, on the way there, there was a deer on the side of the road. It thought about crossing and only saw us when it already had one clippety-cloppity hoof on the road. Luckily, it got out of the way.

Corfe Castle is an old ruin... lots of royalty lived there. One of the royals was called 'Ethelred the Unready'!  The last royal owner was Queen Elizabeth I. It's dungeon, or keep, was GIGANTIC and once held 22 rival knights from France who were starved to death. King John also held his wife prisoner there! I guess they didn't get along. 

(For more on the interesting and gory history of Corfe, try this page http://www.accesslanguages.co.uk/pb2k/corfe_hist.html)

 

 

I won a National trust medal... it isn't as amazing as it sounds. I did a quiz at Corfe Castle. While we explored the remains, we found shields, on them they had a bit of informative text and one question on each to answer. After we had finished all of the questions and been all around the ruins, we exchanged the quiz for a plastic medal. 

 Also, this happened. 

GRACING THE QUEEN with our fascinating presence

A treatise on Ascot, cherries, fascinators, Queen E & sleep deprivation. by Kath

Early morn arrival at Heathrow after an overnight flight found us bleary eyed, but quickly processed through and into the car, navigating our way to my Aunt Alison & Uncle Ramzi's place near Ascot. Noticed a lot of Union Jack bunting* around the town & soon learnt that the Royal Ascot racing carnival was drawing to a close with the grand finale race starring Black Cavier and with the Queen & Prince Phillip on hand to cheer everything along.

*strings of decorative flags

 

So, after a delicious breakfast courtesy of my hospitable family and a wee rest, we strolled into Ascot, stopping to pick and eat cherries from the trees in the square on the way. It's not scrumping* when it's in a public place. 

Soon we were amidst the crowds of the well-heeled and the high-heeled, the stuck up, the wobbly and the drunk -all in their finery or their slappery, all in their hats and fascinators, slurping down their champers**, wearing patchy fake tans. I loved the touts*** & gypsies with their cockney 'come-buys' most of all - “Need tickets?”, “A rose for your lapel, lovely?”. Then we found a couple of fascinators for ourselves... fate seemed to have left them lying about for us.

*stealing fruit

**champagne

***people selling stuff in a dodgy kind of way (Dodgy - Kira!)

 

 

It occurred to us that the Queen and Prince Phillip might want to have a look at us, so Ramzi led us to where they would pass in their carriages on the way to the Royal enclosure. We donned our fascinators, took our spots on the fence and watched the joy on the royals' faces when they spotted us.