This Past Weekend

My dad has been in Denmark since October, on business. We had asked him to come visit us sometime before he flew back to Florida. He'd been so busy in Denmark that he wasn't able to leave until this past week. So he booked a ticket through London with a 48 hour stop-over. Originally, the plan was for him to come up to Norwich, but it proved to be too complicated so I decided to go down to London to meet him.

Actually, I was going to go to London anyway because I had been planning for about a month to go to the Digital Futures seminar at the National Film Theatre (a seminar focusing on the digital future of cinema with comparisons of 16mm, 35mm, and digital projection, then a panel discussion). I'm going to write my MA dissertation about this subject area, so this was to be part of my research. I had a couple of questions prepared that I wanted to ask the panel. Anyway, as fate would have it, my dad was flying in on the same day as this seminar. I booked two tickets so I could take him along.

The plan was to pick him up from the airport (Gatwick), go to the seminar, then check in at a hotel in London. His flight (Maersk DM205 from Billund, Denmark) was due in at 12:55. That would give us about two hours to get to the National Film Theatre. It takes about two and a half hours to drive to Gatwick from Norwich, so I left at 10:00am, too early to check the flight information since it hadn't even left Denmark yet. I arrived at Gatwick at 12:40. When he hadn't appeared by 13:30, I was starting to get concerned so I ran in to the terminal and checked the monitors: flight delayed, arrival at 13:51 (an hour delay!). Things were starting to look pretty grim, but if he made it out by about 14:00, then we might still make it. Mapquest quoted the drive time from Gatwick to be 47 minutes. The seminar was scheduled to start promptly at 15:00.

He didn't come out until 14:20. We quickly hugged "Hello", tossed his bags in the trunk, and took off. It was smooth sailing until we got inside the London Orbital (M25). I still had a glimmer of hope that we would make it, perhaps a bit late, but make it nonetheless.

When we were idling in traffic, nearly an hour later, I had lost all hope. Driving in London is NOT an option (see earlier post from today). We arrived at the NFT at 16:45. By then, I had given up on the seminar, but I wanted to see if there were any pamphlets handed out, so I went inside while my dad waited in the car, parked in a loading zone. The security guard told us we weren't allowed to stay there long and then went back into the warmth of his booth.

I asked the NFT box office if there were any pamphlets handed out for the seminar. They told me to ask one of the ushers when it ended (which was supposed to be 15 minutes later). I tried to go in just to stand in the back for the last bit, but the ushers stonewalled me. So, I went to pick up my tickets. OK, fine... you can sit over here in the back of the theatre. I watched about 5 minutes of a digital projection of The Wizard of Oz and then they brought up the panel of experts for questions. I stuck around for about 20 minutes, but I was concerned that my dad was getting hassled by the security guards (and he also had mentioned at the airport that he really needed to pee), so I left before it ended. It had already run over by about 30 minutes, so it was due to end any minute anyway.

I went back out to the car and we followed out Mapquest directions to the hotel near Hyde Park (a scheduled drive-time of 6 minutes). An hour later, we arrived and checked in. Oh, I forgot to mention that we were running dangerously low on gas by this point. Petrol stations are not abundant in London. Two strokes of good fortune, though: since it was a weekend, we could park on the residential street through Sunday (instead of paying 30 lbs. per day to park in a lot). Plus, we didn't have to pay the congestion fee for driving in central London because they only charge that Monday thru Friday.

After dumping our stuff in the hotel room, we went out to have dinner. We tried to go to a pub that I had been recommended but it was jam-packed, so we went to Cafe Rouge (a French restaurant chain). Pretty good food! Then we walked around a bit before heading back to the hotel. We stopped in the lobby bar to have a beer and I caught the last 20 minutes of the X-Factor results show (Steve/Simon Cowell won).

On Sunday we ambled around central London for the day: had full English Breakfasts for brunch; walked around Oxford, Bond, and Carnaby street; salivated over all the amazing new computers at the gigantic Apple store; bought chocolate from Charbonnel et Walker (my dad bought a massive amount of chocolate for Kristen and I); rode the Tube; took a breeze-through tour of the National Gallery (unfortunately, my favorite Caravaggio painting "The Supper at Emmaus" was at an exhibition in Naples); and stopped back at that pub from the night before (Churchill Arms) to have a pint. Then we went back to the hotel to pick up our bags, which we had checked in with the concierge. Then it was time to head to the petrol station and out of London.

We tanked up just fine. Then we tried to get out of London. It took us nearly two hours to get to Gatwick (a total of 36 miles)... again, I refer you to the earlier post about driving in London. I had planned to get on the road by 18:00 to go back to Norwich, so I wouldn't get home too late. I missed that deadline by an hour and a half. My dad checked in at the Gatwick Hilton and we headed over to McDonald's for a quick dinner. I didn't really have time for anything else.

Arrived in Norwich at 22:15... knackered beyond belief! But then I loaded Kristen up with all of the goodies my dad had brought from the US and Denmark, and the chocolates from London. Early Christmas! I'm looking forward to going through all of my grandfather's 8mm films (I asked my dad to bring them from Denmark). There were more than I realized (a prolific filmmaker, I guess)!

Despite the spirit-dampeningly large amount of fiascos over these past two days, I had a nice time with my dad. It was good to see him, even though it was just a quick trip. Now I just need to get my mom and sister over here for a visit. Well, 2005 is just around the corner.

Tomorrow, Kristen and I leave for Oregon. We'll be there until the 29th. One of my classmates offered to give us a ride to Gatwick (yep, back there again)... very generous of him, especially since we have to leave by 7am at the latest! We owe him big time!

-RP-