Little Venice

What's that? You're wondering who THAT random dude is? Be patient, my friends, all will be revealed...

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On Saturday, Anna and I went on a guided walking tour of the area known as "Little Venice". I have decided that I really enjoy this method of being a tourist. It's a neat way to explore the city, someone tells you interesting things along the way, and it's good exercise too!

When I first stepped off the bus into this little section of London, I was struck by how different it looks from the rest of the city. It doesn't have the overcrowded-touristy feel of sites such as Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square, nor the older-buildings-and-dirty-streets feel of the area I live in. This was something different. It was clean and white, with intriguing architecture lining the streets and canals littered with boats. I have to say, it bore no resemblance whatsoever to actual Venice, but it was nice nonetheless.

Our tour guide ("Shaughan" ... what a silly name! It's like his parents tried to think of the shortest name they could, then elongated it as much as possible) was pretty good. Not as good as the pamphlet made him out to be, but he was full of all sorts of random facts and there was lots of name dropping. Below are a few highlights from the trip.


Celebrities: Little Venice is home to many-a-celebrity, mostly within the music world. I definitely should have had my Mom and Alan with me, who would have appreciated these names MUCH more than I did, but we did get a look at the areas inhabited by the likes of U2's drummer, somebody from Pink Floyd, Annie Lennox, Kelly Osborne, the guy who created Paddington Bear, Joan Collins, and Michael Flatley (his house was nearly bought by Madonna, but she backed out at the last minute). Actually, we had a bit of a funny moment outside Michael Flatley's house; Anna hadn't heard of him, so I did a little "Lord of the Dance" demonstration to job her memory. I'm sure I did a wonderful imitation, because she remembered right away! The rest of our group was pretty amused as well :)

Status: The aforementioned celebrities take their little corner of town seriously. The little boats moored along the canal edges are a bit shoddy looking, but are actually functional. Lawyers (and other such ridiculously-too-rich people) actually use them to get into town. The mooring fees are upwards of £10,000/year, which leads me to believe it's a status thing to have a boat out front, rather than a practical solution to the age-old problem of having to take the tube with the "commoners". And there are signs up in the streets threatening a £500 fine for leaving dog poop on the sidewalk (are you KIDDING me? FIVE HUNDRED POUNDS??)). I guess they like their streets clean and pretty. But somehow I doubt they would appreciate me taking them up on the gesture they display prominently in their lawns: the carved pineapple, a symbol of welcome (apparently).

Trivia: Probably the most interesting viewpoint along the way was of the hospital in which Alexander Fleming worked. I remarked to Anna later how funny our brains are; when our guide started the story, he just mentioned Fleming's name. Out of nowhere, my mind associated that with one word: penicillin. I thought to myself, What? That's crazy. But, as I listened to the rest of his narrative, it turned out that Fleming was the man who invented the medicine! I must have learned this at some point in my educational journey. I'm sure I could not have answered correctly had I been tested on this knowledge, but somewhere in the recesses of my brain, the connection was still there. Random!

Politics: Partway along the tour, as we were merrily following Shaughan through a small park, we noticed we were headed towards some kind of demonstration. People were waving black flags with Arabic script written on them, and there were police surrounding the area. I have no idea what they were protesting, but a man came along and helpfully informed us that "The Arabs are taking over England!!!"  Likely not, but thanks for the info, Random Dude.

The Toilet: We had lunch in a little cafe called Toast. The food was fine, nothing to write home about. But it had the most bizarre bathroom ever!! The toilet had instructions on the wall, but they were all in Japanese. There was a scale on the floor. The light was blue and so low it seemed off even when it was on. It was dark enough that the mirror was absolutely useless. The sink (actually the coolest part) had a little fountain-type faucet that we both thought was pretty cool. Oh, and the toilet paper was sitting on top of the radiator, getting all warm and toasty. Which, not gonna lie, was nice. But also a fire hazard.

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The Man in the Picture: Okay, you've waited long enough (these posts are so long, I'm amazed any of you make it to the end). There was a small group of people on our tour who did not speak English. It was actually fairly annoying that they had someone with them who could translate, because it made it harder for the rest of us to hear Shaughan. Anna and I pretty much tried to stand as far away from them as possible for this reason. Little did we know, the guy ended up being hilarious!

Our first encounter with him was about halfway through the tour. We had gone past a couple of random statues named "Man Standing" and "Man Walking" (I told you they were random). I ran over and told Anna to take my picture "walking" beside "Man Walking". Random Italian guy rushes over to me and says, grinning from ear to ear, "Married! He's married!".

Really? THAT'S only you English you know?

So I laughed and said, "I'm the other woman!" and took a much sillier picture.

Not five minutes later, the tour stopped right at the water's edge along one of the canals. As we had done at every single stop, the entire group huddled around Shaughan, then looked back, waiting for the Italian group to catch up. Except this time, they weren't hurrying to catch up. The man was climbing aboard a boat!! His wife was taking a picture, as if this was a neat tourist attraction. Nope, sir, I'm afraid that's just trespassing.

Fast forward about ten more minutes, and we're just walking along between tour stops. The man stops us for the third time (the first was to comment on my illicit affair with the statue, the second was to label Anna "Blonde" as if that was her name). This time, the only English he could spout was "Mafia" while pointing to himself. "I'm in Mafia!" Great, sir. That's just wonderful. We've somehow managed to make friends with a trespassing Sicilian mafia member.

And friends we were. At the very last stop (the hotel Freud stayed in), I was listening intently to Shaughan when I felt an arm wrap itself around my shoulders. Confused, I turned to see Mafia Guy with his arms around Anna and I, and his wife in front of me, taking a picture! Um, what? Well, all right. You've been hilarious, Mafia Guy. So, okay, you can take a picture with us. Good thing Anna was on the ball and handed the wife her camera too.