The Mayor's Thames Festival

The Mayor's Thames Festival is an annual event hosted by the City of London to celebrate the City and it's River and maybe to boost old Boris' popularity a bit (the colourful Boris Johnson is of course the current Mayor of London).

During the two days of the festival the area along the river between Westminster and Tower Bridge (a big chuck of city!) is transformed into a free party and entertainment zone, so whatever the real purpose of the festival, it's great fun.

Unfortunately I missed most of the big events like the Banquet on the Bridge, the Night Carnival and the Fireworks, but I did manage to see some great street performers and musicians. Here's a short compilation of the acts I did see:



The main show of the afternoon at The Scoop amphitheatre was this guy and his mechanical horse. The “horse” is actually a remote controlled robot, but you soon forget this little fact as his skillful controller brings him to life and he becomes a wild, fire spewing, neighing, galloping character in the show. The performers have amazing interaction with the people in the audience, making them a part of the surreal show. They even manage to make a few children cry and surely violate a number of Health and Safety regulations, but this just makes it all the more entertaining!



These little segments do not come close to doing justice to the entire festival (not that I know how you're supposed to be able to experience everything on offer), but should at least be able to keep you amused for a few minutes.

What I Bought from The Hobgoblin

On my way back from the St. Pancras Crypt I was lured into a side-street by the sounds of a harp floating on the wind. I followed the music and it led me down Rathbone Place straight through the doors of The Hobgoblin. The cosy little shop specialises in acoustic, folk, Celtic and world instruments and it wasn't long before I found myself lost amongst the mandolins, violins and guitars.

To tell the truth, ever since an unfortunate incident a few years ago involving a guitar getting it's neck crushed by a VW bus door, I've been missing a proper guitar to play on. Buying one has been in the back of my mind since I arrived in London, but I was looking for something very specific and wasn't expecting to find anything matching my needs as well as my budget soon, so I was just browsing and dreaming. After looking at a few steel string acoustic guitars I was about to leave when I mentioned to the shop assistant that I didn't see any classical nylon string guitars on the floor. He nodded his head to the side, indicating the stairs to the basement which I have somehow not noticed up to that point and for the second time that day I found myself going underground.

The basement is both a showroom and workshop with classical guitars lining the walls. A bit more interested now, but still not seriously considering buying anything, I started to casually go through the instruments. My monthly budget had already reached it's limit, so I was just smiling at the tags with mostly three and four digit handwritten prices on them, but then a surprising figure caught my eye. £20? Could this be right? I took the instrument from the wall. The 3/4 guitar was noticably smaller than the rest and it was definately second hand. I didn't mind the odd scratch here and there, but the obvious work done to the neck did concern me. The brand was a name I have never heard of and the design around the sound hole reminded me of Space Invaders. I asked the man with the gray ponytail behind the counter if the price on the tag was correct. He agreed that it sounded very cheap, but after showing him where the neck was rejoined to the body he remembered doing the repair work himself and confirmed the price. He assured me that the damage had been properly repaired and gave me a guarantee on his workmanship, but I was still sceptical. I had to hear for myself.

I sat down on the stool and tuned the strings with a few quick harmonics. Playing the first few chords I knew it would be difficult to put down this guitar and after a few fingerpicking sequences (mainly to check the fret positions, but also to show off a little) I was convinced. The sound is surprisingly rich and clear with a nice deep, mysterious resonance on the lower notes. The strings are at a perfect height above the fingerboard for a firm yet comfortable action. The 3/4 size makes it light and easy to handle and this combined with the character that comes with a secondhand instrument, makes it a perfect travel guitar. I knew that I had found exactly what I was looking for and the price meant I couln't say no.

On my way to the bus stop I was counting the days to payday and with my new second hand guitar under my arm and three-day-stubble on my face I was feeling kind of like a busker. By the way the bums on the street were smiling at me they must have gotten the same idea, but I have learned not to judge anything on outer appearances alone.

And this is what she sounds like:

Illumini

The first thing you notice as you go down the steps is the stuffy, mouldy, yet strangely inviting smell. An old, damp, decaying, woodiness mixing with the smoke of burning incense.

Your eyes have to adjust to the darkness as you move into the depths, following the deep, hollow "doof-doof, doof-doof" of a heartbeat booming through a sound system with a lot of bass somewhere further down.

This is the crypt under St. Pancras, one of London's famous old churches. Once a burial place, the past few days it has been the striking venue for a free art exhibition. Illumini is a collection of sculptures, paintings, photographs, installations and other creations by 15 artist with one thing in common: they all use light in their work, either as subject or as medium. With themes like man's relationship with technology, perception of space and reality and the properties of light itself represented with neon, laser and projected and glowing light, the contrasting dark crypt is the perfect backdrop for this fascinating display of light. For more info go to www.illuminievent.co.uk/


































My new computer, combined with the uninspiring weather, kept me indoors for most of last week. Even as I left for the exhibition on Saturday morning it was cool and cloudy and it took some self-persuasion to leave the house, but by the time I came out of the crypt it had changed into a cheerful autumn day and I was eager to get to the Thames Festival. Before heading back south of the river however, I wanted to explore the area a bit more. This is when I came across the Hobgoblin and - once again - couldn't leave without parting with money I didn't really have (no, The Hobgoblin is not a pub...). More about my latest purchase in my next post, which should be up soon.

I cracked

I just couldn't take it anymore. Who was I trying to fool? I can never live isolated from all that is familiar and comfortable to me, cut off from the world I know. I can't go on like this. How am I supposed to survive without... a Laptop!

So on Saturday morning after a visit to the old Battersea Power Station building (which might be featured in a later post) I did not go home as planned, but semi-impulsively paid a visit to Tottenham Court Road "just to look" at what's on offer at the amazing number of electronics and computing stores, all next to each other on the High Street. An hour or two later, after some bargaining, haggling and poker-faced negotiation, I got on the tube shivering with excitement, a silly grin on my face, a new computer on my back and almost no savings left in my bank account...

Sure, I might have to live from bread and water for the next month, but I'm too happy to care. With an unlimited broadband connection, a decent machine and enough time, the only limit to what you are capable of is your own imagination. Sunday was a blur of technological indulgence, I jumped right in by installing Skype, what a wonderful invention. If anybody would like to keep in touch with me FREE OF CHARGE (except for data costs if you still have those...) email me for my Skype details. Then I had to do a bit of SARS e-filing to get the business affairs in order (yawn...), before I could get lost in Youtube. Youtube, who needs TV! Here's a few of the gems I came across:







An old one, but still hilarious:





If you have a bit of bandwith to spare, a little bitter-sweet one:



By the way, I found quite a few ways to save Youtube videos to your hard disk, if anybody is interested...

Then I became a resident of Second Life. I've never seen anything like it! It's like Facebook meets 3D adventure meets online shopping. A huge, real-time, online, 3D environment where people (or more accurately, their avatars) interact, chat, buy and sell, explore, "live" and even create anything from buildings (on land you can buy) to clothing. Brands like Adidas have "real" shops in there and you can even attend a live concert with "real world" artists on stage! Take a look at www.secondlife.com, but be warned, it's addictive.



And when is the last time you checked out Google Earth? Did you know you can now go right down to street level to see 3D buildings? Or fly over your home town in a flight simulator? And when you get tired of earth, you can just leave it and explore the rest of the galaxy!



Honestly, I've been using the Internet for more than a decade now, but for the first time I'm beginning to feel the magic. I am really excited (and a bit scared) by where all this is going.

Needless to say, I think the "Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone" line at the end of my posts will not show up as often as it used to.