The Present Under an Antique Guise

Kensington Palace has become my new favorite palace, and Queen Victoria and Prince Albert have become my new favorite monarchs. If you want to know about their story but don't want to read much, I recommend the movie "Young Victoria" which stars Emily Blunt as Queen Victoria. When I compared the movie to how she is recorded in Kensington Palace, it was pretty accurate because Queen Victoria kept a journal about her meeting, falling in love, and life with Prince Albert that has become available to the public. It really is a sweet story :) The main reason why I love Queen Victoria, though, is because she was a courageous, bold young woman who sought after what she wanted and did not allow anyone to manipulate her. Here, I also learned about my second favorite queen: Queen Caroline. She was a woman of science and learning, and even though she couldn't practice in her day, her heros are some of the greatest scientists and philosophers of all times. Basically, these two women helped me realize that even though they were royalty, in a different time period, and of a different nationality, the outline of their lives and society is still the same as it is today. This is why history is so important- because it repeats itself under new guises, and we just have to keep our eyes open.

Kensington Palace started as the private residence of William and Mary who bought it from the Earl of Nottingham. The house was then used as a secluded get away for the succesive monarchs who also wanted to avoid the public and polution near the Thames river. This is also where Kings would hold court, which to the girls, meant that their matchmaking would be done here. The fashion of the day was ridiculous to our standards, but it was important because that was how a woman and her husband could move up the stairwell and into rooms that got closer and closer to where the King was.

Honestly, I don't even know how these women fit through the door in these outfits, but it shows off the fabrics very nicely! The woman's outfit was a demonstration of her husband's wealth, and the footmen would judge the quality of it to allow the couples into the next highest room. Sound familiar? Think about going to a club: The people dressed in average clothes wait in line outside, the hot men and women get let in by the bouncers, and then the rich and famous sit in the VIP sections. It's the same hierarchy and separation, but with new costumes and different people!

Here's another example of how we are a lot like the monarchs in England. The weathly people could have busts made out of their heroes to put in their estates. They would place them in areas that could be seen as often as they wanted. What is this equivalent? It's pretty much like those pop idol posters that teenagers hang in their rooms. AC/DC and Avril Lavine may not have existed around the 1700s, but other heroes did.

My favorite room in the house was a demonstration of where Queen Victoria and Albert used to meet to socialize. While they did not live in Kensington for very long, they courted here. Both were apparently good singers and musicians, so they would sit and play duets on the piano together, and Albert would compose songs for Victoria. I don't know why that is so romantic to me, but I could almost cry just listening to Handel's music playing in the background and shadows of the two dancing on the walls (this is a very interactive castle!)

The palace becomes quite somber for a couple of rooms as it takes you through the time of Queen Victoria's reign after Prince Albert died. You can really feel the pain of her loss, but also the bravery of being a mother to her own children and a ruler to her people. However, the mood lightened in the rooms where beautiful gowns worn by various members of the royalty are on display. The exhibit starts around the 1850s and continues into Princess Diana's time. For me, these dresses and the royal courts got me very excited about Mardi Gras. I know that it is only one isolated event, but that is another demonstration about how the etiquite and customs have been carried into today.

Finally, on my way out through The Orangery (the beautiful garden shown above), I met Ted. His real name is Polish, but I could pronounce it and I just called him Ted. The situation in which I saw him was initially very strange: He was sitting on a bench holding a cracker through a plastic bag as if it were a glove and his trousers were hanging on a hanger from the cieling of the walk way. Luckily, he had a sort of under- garmet pants on so he wasn't without pants while the outer layer was drying. He initiated the conversation by talking about my camera and its lense, but then he invited me to sit down for a little chat. This is one of the things that I have been most excited about in Europe (meeting others from all over the world- so I can check off Poland), so of course I sat down! We chated about World War II and

how both Britatin and France betrayed Poland (he was defending his own country), and I thought it was really cool to hear the story from another country's perspective. No story is just one sided, so his rendition was unlike any that I've ever heard. He also struck me as a very active member of society. We talked about the events of September 11 for a while, and he told me how he tried to rally the firefighters in Poland to come help us in America. Sadly, he couldn't even get the government to let him go, but this stood out to me so that he became a more globably minded person. It has never really occured to me how much the attack on the World Trade Center has affected the rest of the world, but there are memorials for it here in London and even this stranger from Poland was affected by it. It was a tragic event, but this has showed me how much it also served to unite many nations.