Finally got my phone working as an alarm clock. Got up at 6.30. Blood Pressure 115/60 Pulse 64 Worked on emails and facebook for 45 minutes. My tattslotto card has run out and I cannot renew it because I cannot recall my password. We walked to the top of Whycam Hill. A fair walk. Good view of Wembley Stadium. It a bit of a jungle up there. Signs saying No Camping and No Fires although it would be easy to camp and no one know you were inside the jungle. Says its part of the 78 mile walk around London. Wet ground. Muddy surface. We took longer than we meant as we had to come home and clean our shoes. Consequently we were late for our appointment at India House. Because I used to have lunch every day at the Indian High Commission I wanted to do it again when we came here this time. 45 years ago it suited me very well. The food was fantastic. It was all very basic. You picked up a plate and got in the line to get your food. There were two choices - rice and curried fish or rice and curried meat. The food always tasted wonderful and was one of the big things I missed about London. The atmosphere was terrific also. The other people eating were pretty well all workers in the Building and were probably just like me - base grade clerks. This was the workers canteen. There was another larger room which had a waitress service and an ala carte menu with tables with table clothes where the higher ups ate but I never went there. I liked the staff canteen. I felt at home amongst the many types of Indians. Sometimes they would engage me in conversation. Sometimes I would impress other people and bring them with me to eat at India House. So I wrote asking if I could once again eat at the Staff Canteen. And if I could show my wife how wonderful it was. The High Commission wrote back saying yes. Our host was Mr MP Singh. He is the First Secretary and seems to be involved with Protocol and organising tours of Foreign Dignitaries. He had a special phone that was something of a hot line. It had a kind of a siren ring and he picked it up immediately. I presume it was The High Commissioner. He had to change some arrangements for something that was going to happen. He has photo's on his wall of many people who he has arranged tours for through India and elsewhere. The Queen, Three Presidents. The Dali Lama. Etc. He also has award plaques from places where he has worked previously indicating the work he has done for the Indian Community. He particularly likes Canada. He says Indians feel more at home in Canada than anywhere else except India of course. Altogether he must have an enjoyable job. He thinks he might become First Secretary in Canberra in a few years time. As it is here he lives close in and has a diplomatic car that is not subject to either parking charges or the daily tax. His life in London must be fairly comfortable. But even with a diplomatic car he takes the tube on weekends as it is impossible to park. What can I say. It was fantastic. He was a very generous and accommodating man. Couldn't have been more sociable. Made us feel very much at ease. Obviously very good at his job. We had a conversation in his office for about half an hour about the world - Australia and India etc. I don't think Australia rates as high on India's scale as our leaders lead us to believe we do. Its the same in Britain. I think that Australia now rates pretty well down the scale of priorities with all of the rest of the world. Not only with Britain and India. Sad and sobering. But understandable. But what is Australia about? Do we really want to make a difference in the world? Do we even want to have a place in the world? It seems not to me. We are so concerned with other things. Trivial but seemingly important to the right side of politics. The only real leader we ever had that had any impact on the rest of the world was Gough Whitlam and Australians hated him for it. I think Tony Abbott sums us up pretty well. He led the way with what our priorities should be. Plebiscites on same sex marriages. Knighthoods for Royalty. And what would have happened if Tony had actually shirt-fronted Vladimir? Big men make big threats do they not? That would have made the rest of the world sit up and take notice of us. In reality Australia is a small country to the south of Asia. They have moved the Staff Canteen from the ground floor to the 7th floor. Security at the front door. Same set up as Canada House last week. Mr Singh said that they have had 2 bad incidents where people got inside the Embassy and once a Policeman was killed. They have to have security because India is such a large country and has so many different types of people. Some only show their grievances in London. The High Commission building itself was built in about 1910. It was where the British governed India from before independence. The Secretaries of State for India and Ceylon and Burma all had their offices in the building. The size of the building reflects the importance that India was to the Empire. The building was granted to India on independence. Mr Singh introduced us to an old English lady that has worked at the embassy for as long as it has been in existence - since 1948. She has been the Librarian. The Embassy has an extensive library in Sanskrit texts among other things. She is retired now but works voluntarily. She is quite old and not too steady on her feet and has trouble hearing. Nevertheless quite interesting to talk to and I wish we could have spoken more. She doesn't like Indian Food. Cant eat it. Had trouble when she was young with her stomach. This was spoken in true British fashion. She lives near Vauxhall Bridge. Her father was in real estate and bought the flat for her. She is the salt of the earth English that I remember. Very frugally dressed. Would also live very frugally. Jenny noticed that she had repaired her overcoat herself. Mr Singh admitted that he had never eaten in the workers staff canteen that I wanted to eat at. They still have the two canteens and he doesn't normally have lunch but when he does he eats in the more comfortable one. He didn't say it in those words though. He was more diplomatic. This was a first for him also. He was curious to see what I liked about it. It was something of the same. Much smaller room. Ambiance much the same. The staff numbers have fallen from 800 to 200 so they don't need such a big room. I felt that all the others dining were a little more up the ladder than 45 years ago. But the food was much the same if a little blander. The same limited range. Mr Singh explained that for this particular fortnight Indians only eat vegetarian and that this means the meals are not as hot. Wonderful tasting rice though. Authentic samosas. Indian yogurt. Absolutely first rate naan bread. Naan to make your mouth water. Soft and fluffy. After lunch Mr Singh made us cardomon tea. This is exactly the tea that used to be served 45 years ago. It finishes off the nice taste you have in your mouth from the curry. We took photo's which Jenny has posted on her blog. When we left he gave us a present to remember the occasion. A paper bag with the High Commission seal on it and some tea and a book about India inside. After that we walked to Benjamin Franklin's House in Charing Cross but it was closed. so then we walked to Handels House. Quite a long walk. There are a multitude of people walking around in the central areas. Only a small proportion are English. Most are from Europe. Are they all here making money? They are not all tourists. Because they talk business into their phones as they walk and they hurry. They move with purpose - and quickly. You rarely hear English spoken. They have made one big difference to London. Everybody now walks on the right side of the sidewalk. No one keeps to the left on the footpath. We had trouble finding Handel's House and Jenny's satnav gave wrong instructions. I asked a man standing where the house was supposed to be if he knew if Handel's House was in this street. He said he didn't know - I then asked if he knew where Jimmi Hendrix's House was. He was quite impressed that I thought he might have known where Jimmi Hemdrix lived. He certainly knew who Jimmi Hendrix was even if he wasn't sure of Handel. He explained he came from Sanfrancisco. He was quite good about it and we chatted for a few seconds. He was obviously impressed that I had actually asked him if he knew where Jimmi Hendrix lived. He was a very conservative looking American. Jimmi Hendrix lived in the house next door to Handel's house. The charity that controls Handel's House has also purchased Jimmi Hendrix's House and turned them both into exhibitions. Both have been restored to their original state. In Handel's case they had to strip away 17 layers of wallpaper. There was no notice anywhere outside the building indicating that this was Handel's/Jimmi Hendrix's. There was a little notice on one doorway saying to go to the next doorway. There are shops on the ground floor. When Hendrix was there there was restaurant on the ground floor. His flat was above the restaurant. It apparently was a fairly seedy area. Not now. Very upmarket shops all over then place. Very gentrified. Hendrix was a very personable man who gave his phone number to anyone and everyone and he invited anyone and everyone back to his flat after gigs. The neighbors did not like this and he always had complaints from the council to deal with. He wanted to live in the area because it was central to all the clubs he played at and he was not familiar with London. The notices on the wall inside the house hint that he was asked to leave. He found it hard to get a flat in London. Landlords did not like rock stars as tenants. For a while he stayed in Ringo Star's flat but neighbors were always taking out restraining orders on noise and disruption and he had to leave there. Even Ringo was asked to leave the area. When John and Yoko lived in Ringo's flat the injunctions came in droves specifically referring to their unwanted presence. Ringo had to promise that only his family (inferring someone like his mother) would live there in order to settle the matter. Handels House is interesting in that it is where it is. His house then was not in the centre of town. London was much smaller then yet he was able to have a very good living from music. His house has been restored faithfully, Colours, furniture, instruments. No kitchen or servants quarters though. The volunteers sitting in each room are all elderly super keen Handel fans who know their stuff. Very helpful. Glad to talk. Jimmi Hendrix's flat has been restored to what it was. There were so many film recordings made in the flat it was easy to make it authentic. Everything has been put in place. Including all his albums. Guitars. Coats. He had more Bob Dylan albums than anyone else. No Beatles or Rolling Stones funnily enough. When he was told Handel lived next door he went out and bought 3 Handel albums. And apparently played them. The volunteer in the bedroom was not up to the standard of the Handel volunteers. He was a young bloke. Not very talkative. Jimmi Hendrix was left handed yet he played a right handed guitar. His father forbade him to play left handed as he considered left handedness to be the work of the devil. So Jimmi had to learn how to play a right handed guitar. He was a genius guitar player. He had a total sense of melody - one note leading into another - all in a line. He could produce melodies to suit any occasion. Yet he always kept the chord structure intact over which the song was constructed. He could always keep the chord structure in the background. He pushed the guitar into playing notes. All with a wrong handed guitar. All self taught. Pity he overindulged when he didn't have the capacity for it. Still we all do this. By this time we had done a lot of walking. All the way from Charing Cross up to Oxford Street and then to Bond Street. I was in pain. Home at about 6.30.
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