My Grand Tour of England and Wales - Part 4 of X

Day 8 - Wales-Stow-on-the-Wold

Leaving Wales, we drove back into England, to Stokesay Castle, which was really a manor house - but a genuine medieval fortified manor house, no less.

After that we went to Hereford Cathedral, home of the Mappa Mundi, placed by some marketing genius at the end of a gallery containing the shop (where I bought a 'kimberly' keychain) and cafe to tempt visitors. The Mappa Mundi was remarkably well-preserved, considering that it was made in the 13th Century, and was much bigger than I thought it would be. In the Cathedral library, they also had a stunning collection of manuscripts from the 12th Century onward, all chained to the shelves.

Next we visited Gloucester Cathedral, where they had a good pamphlet offering a Harry Potter tour (since parts of both films were shot there, in the cloisters). In contrast, Alnwick, which was also used for filming, had nothing related to or about the filming except for some cardboard figures scattered throughout the castle. Among the artefacts scattered throughout the cathedral was a Norman Lead Font (c. 1140) - giving babies brain damage for 850 years!

Though the cathedral was grand, the toilets were horrible. They were smelly, one cubicle door could not close, the light in the one I chose was spoilt and when I pulled out some toilet paper, the cover of the container fell and hit my temple. And they had the cheek to ask for donations!

Outside the cathedral and a street away was what was probably the main street, and there were schoolchildren walking up and down, including 2 schoolgirls with skirts covering only 1/2 - 1/3 of their thighs, without stockings. Now, if even *I* was cold and my legs numbing, I wonder how they stood it.

For the night we stopped at Stow-on-the-Wold, near Stratford-Upon-Avon.

Day 9 - Stow-on-the-Wold-Warwick-Oxford-London

Before leaving Stow-on-the-Wold, I tried some Welsh Gold (Honey) Organic Ice Cream which was highly recommended by both Jie and Hwa and indeed it was excellent, and not that much more expensive than normal ice cream (1 pound 25 pence).

I'd expressed my desire to visit Warwick Castle, but Jie didn't want to go there, both because she balked at the price, and it was owned by the Madame Tussauds group, and she doesn't want to visit any place they run. Naturally, Hwa had to follow her lead so in the end I went in alone.

2 PRC girls were going around taking photos of each other at the Castle, and when they started approaching me, I feared for the worst. Luckily however, when they asked me to help them take a photo, it was in halting English.

There were several interesting exhibits in the castle. Among them were a torture chamber with a rack, a stand with several Civil War helmets to try on, a box with 2 swords you could lift (but not remove from the box), a machine to test your longbow draw strength (and corresponding arrow range) which was unfortunately spoilt and a dungeon. The armoury had a fine collection of armour and arms, but unfortunately, most of it dated from the Civil War and later, leaning too far into the Gunpowder Age for my liking.

One of the more interesting parts of my visit was seeing the Castle Bowman (the link is to someone who was so impressed, he set up a fan club for him) in action, replete with full battle garb. He was both knowledgeable and irrepressible, not just shooting 18 arrows in a minute (albeit only 6 hit the target) and 2 at a time (though both flew way off the mark) but also talking about the weapons of English Bowmen (apparently a buckler is used to bash people's faces in and not for defence) and showing some artefacts from daily life. Later on my way out I met the Seneschal of the Castle, but I was in a rush, so I couldn't pull a fast one on him.

If I'd gone in high summer, I'd have caught even more colourful characters and watched some funky re-enactments (being managed by Madam Tussauds *does* have advantages). But then, it'd have been deadly hot, so.

There was an intriguing sounding "Ghost Tower" in the castle, but when I went there, I found that it was so dark I couldn't see anything and had to grope my way around. The music, lighting (mostly red) and voiceovers that were supposed to sound spooky but were just so soft I couldn't make out anything contributed to a Disney-fied feel.

Since the place was managed by Madame Tussauds, they took the opportunity to put liberal amounts of wax statues throughout the compound including "A Royal Weekend Party" (Daisy, Countess of Warwick's weekend party in 1898, at which the principle guest was the Prince of Wales, later Edward VII) and "The Kingmaker", touted as recreating "the mid fifteenth century world of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, Kingmaker". The latter reeked of the generic Ye Olde World smell (a la Jorvik) and had 2 people inside pretending to be artisans, but all in all, it was just a collection of wax statues around artefacts, with an annoying soundtrack played on loop in the background - a rather big disappointment.

In the Great Hall, flash photography was disallowed, which was good for conscientious visitors like me, but after observing people's behavior, I now understand (though still do not condone) why many places ban photography altogether (though the banning of camcorders is still unacceptable). Many people are either unwilling or unable to disable the flash on their cameras, and the stewards are too few in number and so unable to restrain them. To be fair to conscientious visitors perhaps, instead of banning photography wholesale, visitors should be made to sign for a photography permit, and pay a fine if they do not disable the flash.

Much of the Castle had a theme park feel, which was both good (more immersive, vivid, hands-on, entertaining) and bad (commodified feeling, not authentic, many attractions ended at the shop). I would've seen more, but had to run off to meet Hwa and Jie.

Not far from the Castle was St Mary's Church, where I took on the 160 steps up the narrow staircase of the Tower (Hwa having declined, once again, to join me) and got to the top with a case of vertigo. After I got down, I bought 3 cheap (5 pounds 99) medium quality CDs (Royal Philharmonic).

We then went to Oxford, where Jie and Hwa dropped me off, to return on my own later. It took me at least half an hour to find the Tourist Information Centre, thanks to many street signs which had not been updated since the Centre moved in October 2002 (hmmph). My sister asked me to try to bluff my way into Christchurch College by claiming that I was a potential student, but I'm bad at such things and so got fleeced of 4 pounds. At Christchurch Cathedral, I happened to talk to the steward while looking for a rare Becket window, and coincidentally, he did his "National Service" in Singapore 50 years ago at an airbase.

I wanted to go to Merton College later, but it was closed so I decided to go deer hunting at Magdalene, and walked in when the girl wasn't looking (so saving 3 pounds). The grounds were more pleasant than Christchurch, and they even had a river of sorts, with a boat moored at the side which I was tempted to hijack. After I'd finished ogling at deer, it was about 5:30 and my feet were hurting so I decided to take the Oxford Tube bus back to London, and was charged 7 pounds by the driver who thought I was a student. Somehow, I took 2 hours to reach London (damn traffic), and when I reached it, I found to my horror that Jie and Hwa were a long while from their home (as it turned out later, they had gone to Cambridge), so I had to sit in Burger King and read.

Day 10 - Hampton Court-Bombay Dreams-Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat

The next day, I took a squeaky and rickety train which kept swaying from side to side to Hampton Court. The oldest part of the palace, Henry VII's state apartments, had unfortunately been extensively renovated by William II and Mary II, but a substantial portion still remained. After seeing the King's and Queen's Apartments of William II and Queen Caroline respectively later, I decided that, not being especially fond of house interiors, especially 18th Century ones, I would skip the Gregorian Rooms, which were probably more of the same. I don't actually dislike Baroque and Rococo design and decor, unlike my sister, though too much gold gilt is bad for health, and it would have been nice to see more splendid tapestries and historical artifacts (or pieces of furniture, at least) in their original setting, but I was short of time.

The Tudor Kitchens were especially interesting because they had people in their "researching" Tudor methods of cooking. Outside the kitchens, there was a sign advising that people who might be upset with the methods and ingredients used should go elsewhere. Again, as with the sign in the Imperial War Museum North about disturbing images, this flummoxed me - why go to kitchens if you are alarmed by cooking?

I was in a hurry, but before I left I wanted to look at "The Triumphs of Caesar" by Andrea Mantegna. Frankly, I'd never heard of these paintings even though they are "considered to be one of the most important works of the Italian Renaissance", but they sounded interesting. Unfortunately, they were hidden in a godforsaken part of the Palace which had to be reached by a torturous circuitous route, and it took some effort to find them. The paintings were hardly an accurate depiction of Roman times - as for most Renaissance paintings, what Mantegna had done was to put Classical characters and events in a contemporary setting, so the Romans looked like they were characters from Renaissance Italy. There were -some- Roman elements, but they were submerged by the Renaissance elements, though with the low level of light in the gallery, it was hard to tell. I also wanted to look at The Wolsey Rooms and the Renaissance Picture Gallery, but unfortunately they were closed for air-con renovation.

I'm not one for gardens, but the gardens in Hampton Court were rather pretty. The "Great Vine", the oldest known vine in the world, was an interesting sight to behold. And then there was The Maze.

By the time I got to the Maze, there was already a horde of English schoolboys and schoolgirls inside, and from the noise you'd have thought a massacre was ensuing in there. Gritting my teeth and steeling myself, I went in to witness pandemonium, as schoolchildren (mostly the boys) were running around screaming (in ties and coats - they should get proper outing attire) and, from time to time, forming barricades to block others (mostly girls), all the while chanting, "we shall not, we shall not be moved". Meanwhile, the girls mostly walked around in groups chatting and giving the boys condescending looks. At one point, a group of schoolboys eyed me and started to form a barrier to block me, but I just grinned at them: they got the message and dispersed. It would've been fun to break through for good measure (even more fun than running around), but I might've been arrested for child abuse, so. Later, a co-ed group formed in front of me (I think they wanted to take me on) and started chanting the "we shall not be moved" chant, so I started filming them, and one shouted, "He's got a camera!!!".

It would've been great fun walking past the hordes of schoolchildren to find the centre, but I had a train to catch to watch Bombay Dreams and was afraid I couldn't find my way out in time. It'd be even more fun with friends - maybe I shall go back some day with other people. It was the most hilarious thing I'd seen all day (maybe all week, even). The experience was priceless and incapturable, but to catch a whiff of the moment, I took 2 videos.


Misc notes:

My knees, especially the left one, were hurting throughout the trip (and still now). Thank you SAF for injuring me for no bloody reason!

The English must eat Fish and Chips extremely often for the nation to be able to sustain so many Fish and Chips shops all throughout the country.

There was this packet of tropical fruit juice that we got which had 40 cals / litre. I smelt a rat, so I looked at the ingredients and lo and behold, it contained artificial sweetener. However, I still have my doubts - isn't there lots of natural sugar in the juice?

I bought a lot of rubbish in 2001 and almost nothing in 2002. This time it was something in between. Unfortunately for someone, I couldn't find anything chic because of my abyssal fashion sense and my not patronising some types of places.

Why do people like to have their gravestones put on the floors of cathedrals and abbeys? It's cheaper than having them on the wall but won't countless numbers tread on your remains, and isn't that humiliating in the extreme?

English school uniforms are much less restrictive than Singaporean ones. Instead of having to get their apparel from a designated school tailor, all they need to do is to get generic clothes that hew more or less to the prescribed dress code (eg white long sleeved shirt, half thigh length skirt [even for the lower secondary girls, most were in those]), and wear the school tie and coat. Also, it seems the plague of Hot Socks is universal. I saw only 1 schoolgirl (aged about 8 years old) wearing normal socks, but interestingly, also no schoolboys wearing Hot Socks (from what I could see under their pants).

My sister is obsessed with Blue Bear, and likes to draw an image of him, with the acronym "BB" in misted windows.

Hwa and Jie have a tendency to ask me the same questions over and over again, which is damn irritating (and picked up from my father, it seems).

YHA kitchen staff like to wear this hideous outfit consisting of black-and-white chequered pants, shirts and caps, making them look like jesters gone wrong.

Apparently, they used olive oil to oil armour in the 15th Century.

I want a tapestry. Except that it'd be too expensive.

Instead of trying to appeal to people's sense of patriotism (hogwash) and machismo, the Army ads in the UK are humourous.

During the 2 weeks, I got zapped by metal objects quite a few times. I think I'm becoming like my sister.

Oxford had so many people on bicycles, you'd think it was China. In fact, they even have priority boxes for bicycles to wait at traffic lights, in front of all other traffic.

I saw this billboard ad for SIA where the girl had her hair down. That's a first.

The fries at UK's Burger Kings are nicer than those here as they're more crunchy.

I should've bought the "Gay Times" for a certain homophobic friend, but he'd have killed me, so.

I kept standing left when on Tube escalators depite the rule of standing on the right. Guess it's been ingrained into me in Singapore, not least in Nanyang.

It seems all floors in the UK are creaky.

TO BE CONTINUED