I had a bite in the Albert cafe, to warm up, and to look around in the gift shop.
The walkway leads to Prince Consort street, past the Jamaican embassy and on to exhibition row.
Remember getting Rick Rolled several years ago? A meme, a fad, a way to insult, bait and switch, in a humorous, but annoying way?
He has a gig at the Albert Hall? I am amazed -I was certain that he had already experienced his fifteen minutes of fame.
Carry on , Rick, I am sure your music is more worthy than the 1987“ never gonna let you down or desert you”.
The first museum on the right across from the V&A is the museum of science, thought I would just pop in , check around for a bit and move on to the others…four and a half hours later, still absorbed in the medical section of the science museum- the sun going down and I had not even made it to the third floor. Decided I had better get back, unsure of which bus to catch, temperature unfriendly especially dressed in an ice bag.
I found a bus that would get me to Vauxhall central , in a round about way, crossing the river on the charming little Chelsea bridge, through Battersea and round the back of the station, to catch the usual bus back to Goose Green. If you can make it to theVauxhall bus station ,you can connect to everywhere.
I took so many photos in the science museum that I overwhelmed my device. It is the best museum on the planet, I reckon…though I admit to not having been to every museum on the planet, Goals? Not enough life in front of me, time is not my friend.
I’ve had a pretty good run, unlike many of my generation.
Sad face , Iron lung in the background. The fright of everyone in our neighborhood, I was still too young to charge around independently , getting infected, but I do remember going around with my mother, collecting for the March of Dimes. Posters everywhere of warnings ,children in iron lungs, braces, using crutches and wheel chairs.
Folks gave their dimes generously. Of course they did!
Below is the inside taken from the head area, from where one might clean the iron lung. The bed is rippley like a slosh of lake moving to and fro.
I knew a man who spent something like the first three years of his life in an iron lung. Can you imagine? The polio left him unable to walk unaided but he lived a fairly normal life and had four children.
ReplyDeleteI am in awe of the way you find your way around the city using buses. I would die alone and abandoned on a sidewalk somewhere if I tried to do that.
Polio nightmares!
DeleteYou would get by just fine , the bus system is brilliant. Seems like there is always a solution even if it takes two hours to get across town.
I was terrified as a kid of the iron lung. So many newspaper pictures of kids my age in them, seeing the world through a mirror.
ReplyDeleteI love the Kanneh-Mason family of gifted musicians, and thank you for the reminder.
Yes it was the threat of the worst boogie man when we were kids-polio ! I have always been Pro-vaccines ever since, without hesitation.
DeleteI was going to buy the music family book but , I don’t need more to carry when I leave, but will probably order it when I get home. What an amazing lovely family.
my father had polio as a child but no iron lung, just one leg shorter and smaller than the other. iron lungs...scariest of them all. what a horrid life living in one of those. my father took us all down to the elementary school as soon as those sugar cubes were available.
ReplyDeleteI am also a fan of sugar cubes! They did their work.
DeleteI remember lining up for the sugar cubes at the local high school, and the general feeling of relief at the time. People who won't vax need a trip in the time machine. Beautiful pictures of a beautiful city, wish we were there.
ReplyDeleteThis city is a work of art at nearly every turn. Four and a half months is not long enough ,but there is the money thing, pesky..
DeleteI remember being terrified of polio and the iron lung when I was a kid. Like Allison I can't help but wonder if people today were more familiar with the consequences of not vaccinating they might make better decisions. We're loving your pictures of London, bringing back lots of good memories.
ReplyDeleteI saw a faith healer one time when I was little, on our neighbors tv. I made my mother promise to take me to him if I got polio, she said “ ok”, and then laughed and laughed but not in a mean way…polio scared us silly!
DeleteHow I'm enjoying living vicariously through you while you traipse around London! That museum looks amazing. Terrifying memories of the iron lung days.
ReplyDeleteOf all the museums I love this one best. History of medicine going through the ages is remarkable and that women have been pioneers in development of modern medicine… they may have been burned at the stake, as women were, but their wisdom/ knowledge was taken over By lesser witches, menfolk.of course, giving medicine more authority and validity.
DeleteI remember the sight of an iron lung on my aunt/uncle's television (we did not have one yet) drove me from the room to hide in the kitchen. I was in grade school.
ReplyDeleteYou will soon know London well enough to apply for citizenship.
The visual of a child living in an iron lung is terrifying at best. We all remember those days, lost on the youth or anti vac movement, humans get stupider .
DeleteI remember the polio times and a girl in school who lost three years of education before learning to walk again with braces and crutches.
ReplyDeleteYes please, buy a warm coat! you are going to need it.
It would be luxury indeed to have enough $$$ to stay there for a couple of years.
Not for me though, I couldn't take the cold weather.
I think that it is easier to adapt to the cold…it’s more difficult to adapt to heat.
DeleteRaised in Christian Science so I missed finding out about the polio epidemic, iron lungs, and even vaccinations against it. Now I believe in medicine, and when my babies got their vaccines I was told to be careful handling their diapers.
ReplyDeleteThat iron lung looks positively medieval. I think they were no longer in use by the time I was a kid -- we had the vaccine, knock on wood! That area behind Royal Albert Hall is very familiar. I've walked through there many times! The Science Museum occasionally has interesting photo exhibits.
ReplyDeletemy aunt told me about the fear she and my aunts and my mother had every time summer rolled around in the early 50's. most of us cousins were born during those years so they were afraid of us getting it. at that time the alternative of being in an iron lung was very scary. even as late as the 70's one would hear of children being in one as they had never had the vaccine. a biology graduate assistant i worked for was one of the early recipients and ended up with a mild case of it.
ReplyDeletekirsten
Karen Frances here, LS. I, too, was in line with my family to receive the polio vaccine sugar cube. However, in discussing anti-vaxxers and withholding judgement, I remind myself, one, that there have always been anti-vaxxers since the very first vaccination available in this country (small pox in 1796), and, two, that 200,000 children in the U.S. were vaccinated with the live polio virus when the company that made the vaccine used a defective process to inactivate the virus in the vaccine. The problem is that humans are at the center of science and we only know what we know (remember when science thought that the 1920 flu was caused by a bacteria and created a vaccine for that? that was before my time, so I don't remember, either), and part of what we know is that human beings make mistakes. So I understand vaccine hesitancy. In addition, there are so many more today than in my childhood. We have to wonder about giving all of them, and at the same time. So I don't judge. All that said, that museum is super cool!
ReplyDeletewhat a great day! The Albert is such a beautiful building -- I'd love to see inside but the outside is wonderful! And what a neighborhood. You could easily spends weeks going through the museums. The science museum looks fascinating. I remember when my next door neighbor girl had polio -- my parents were frightened indeed. I was just sad when Chrissy died.
ReplyDeleteMany years ago we lived near the museums and I am glad to say that the Albert Memorial area isn't much changed. We had identical twin Belgian dentists who lived and worked in one of those red brick houses. Their surgery looked as if it dated from the same time as the houses, but despite this it was very clean and they were great dentists.
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