Afterward, we board the tube and ride through the country, the back yards of peoples' homes, London looming ahead. There is a kind of green in England that does not exist in Michigan. Richer, more wet.
Emergency service on the train line means waiting, means waiting. A congested voice reiterates the reason but is impossible to untangle. 'I think he said we don't stop at those stops.' 'I think he said we need to get off now.' The two of us so beat and not trying to look like tourists with our bags stuffed up to the ceiling. At some point, all cleeer to hamursmeeeth! all cleer to hammursmeeth! and we lurch forward.
Enter London and exit from the tube. Drag bags through busy streets toward hotel. The skies are gray but no rain. We check in to the Presidential Hotel. Find our room. Rearrange ourselves into something less like pack mules. By the sink there are crumpled packets of instant coffee and an electric water heater. Katie says, 'This is their coffee and you'll have to get used to it' then hands me some kleenex to clean up my nose bleed. When finished we walk to the river and spend the rest of the day in the Tate Modern.
[ statue outside the Tate ]
[ Robert Therrien - No Title (table and four chairs) ]
[ Turbine Hall in the Tate ]
[ Outside the Tate ]
[ Katie ]
Emergency service on the train line means waiting, means waiting. A congested voice reiterates the reason but is impossible to untangle. 'I think he said we don't stop at those stops.' 'I think he said we need to get off now.' The two of us so beat and not trying to look like tourists with our bags stuffed up to the ceiling. At some point, all cleeer to hamursmeeeth! all cleer to hammursmeeth! and we lurch forward.
Enter London and exit from the tube. Drag bags through busy streets toward hotel. The skies are gray but no rain. We check in to the Presidential Hotel. Find our room. Rearrange ourselves into something less like pack mules. By the sink there are crumpled packets of instant coffee and an electric water heater. Katie says, 'This is their coffee and you'll have to get used to it' then hands me some kleenex to clean up my nose bleed. When finished we walk to the river and spend the rest of the day in the Tate Modern.
[ statue outside the Tate ]
[ Robert Therrien - No Title (table and four chairs) ]
[ Turbine Hall in the Tate ]
[ Outside the Tate ]
[ Katie ]A sprawling mess of a museum. Dark and disorienting. Old power station ironwork still crawling up the walls. Special exhibition on Rodchenko with rooms full of enormous tables and paintings like this:
The Tate wins, the Tate wins.
The Tate wins, the Tate wins.
