The Downfall of Napoleon

Trafalgar square is dedicated to Admiral Horatio Nelson and The battle of Trafalgar which was on October 21, 1805, where Horatio Nelson and the very powerful British fleet destroyed Napoleon's fleet. This wasn't the first time Nelson destroyed Napoleon's fleet though. The first time was with the battle of the Nile, where after destroying the French fleet Napoleon's army was stranded in Egypt. But later Napoleon jumped on a ship and went back to France without his army. The battle of Trafalgar was right when Napoleon was starting to lose power, this the Russian campaign and his campaign in the Iberian peninsula were the main causes of his downfall. In the battle of Trafalgar, the only good thing for Napoleon was that near the end of the battle Nelson was hit by a cannon ball and died. So after The battle of Trafalgar the British navy was unarguably the strongest in the world.

I got information about all this from Khan academy.

This is a chart about Napoleon's campaign through Russia it is arguably the best chart in the world.

it has the amount of troops Napoleon had throughout the campaign, it also shows his route and I think also the temperature. Napoleon started the campaign in 1812 with approximately 450,000 troops and ended with approximately 10,000 troops but some people say more and some people say less.

1808 The peninsular campaign started, (the Iberian peninsula) it was mainly fought with guerilla warfare all over spain. But later in the campaign a British general named Arthur Wellesley came, defeated Napoleon, and went part way into France. The peninsular campaign started because  Napoleon allied himself with Spain to attack Portugal because he wanted Portugal to join his "continental system" to pretty much blockade Great Britain. Then Napoleon got greedy and sent 100,000 troops to Madrid and dethroned Charles the II. So that's what started that campaign.

Borough Market

Cleaning up leftover blogs from 2011!
Each Friday and Saturday in London near London Bridge and Southwark Cathedral (where  Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales begins), there's the big Borough Market, which is a big food and produce market with tons of variety. We went there with my colleague Chris Tyler, as it's one of his favourite places in London and therefore good enough for us!

A big juicy London Part 2 album!

 Turkish Delight delightfulness on the left, liquorice yuckiness on the right.

 There's more than enough to keep the most exotic gourmand stuffed. Also lots of cheeses, olives, seafood, and pretty much anything you can imagine.

Walking around markets like this can't help but make you hungry. We ended up going to Chris's favourite sausage stand for a late lunch. On a side note, London Bridge has been around since the 12th century, but now is just an ugly boring concrete bridge. On the other hand, there's an unbelievable number of bridges along the Thames from Tower Bridge over to Westminster Bridge where Big Ben is. We had a great day walking along the South Bank, with views of so many of the historic sites along the way, especially St. Paul's Cathedral on the north side.

Will Lecture for Food!

As part of my sabbatical, I've been doing the EEL (Environmental Ergonomics Lab) Roadshow around the continent. In the past four weeks, I've given my general overview talk in Finland, twice in UK, and now here in Brussels, to the point where I'm sick of hearing myself talk! Just kidding - no way THAT'D ever happen! But before a big day of visiting and talks, it's important to fuel up with a proper English breakfast: sausages, beans, tomato, 2 eggs, toast, bacon, and a quality cappuccino for only 4 pounds!

Roehampton University is in the southwest side of London, right next to Richmond Park, Henry VIII's private hunting grounds (see video below). And look there on the right - a seemingly happy (or at least seemingly awake) customer of my textbook! That's Dr. Chris Tyler, who was the one who invited me to the UK to begin with. He started as a faculty in 2009 and walked into a lab and department where there was already a fully functioning climate chamber (lucky sod, it took me 11 years to build one of my own!), although everybody in the department is new enough that nobody really knows who built the chamber or why?

Big Bus Pull!

On one of our days in London we saw a band, police bikes and mounted police starting to congregate. We investigated a little and found out that there was going to be a BIG BUS PULL to raise money for the Veteran's Association. There were about 16 - 20 soldiers and police who pulled a big double decker bus full of people for 1 mile lead by the band and mounted police. It looked like very hard work!

Try dragging this massive flickr album around!

British Museum

By Jacob, Zachary and Debbie


One of the great things about London is that a lot of the museums are free. Jacob says the British Museum is one of his favorites. We went there twice and still only saw a small portion of it.


Our Second London Flickr Album!


Rosetta Stone
One of the greatest treasures of the Museum is the Rosetta Stone. The Rosetta Stone is a rock with 3 types of writing that provided the key to deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphics It was found by French soldiers in 1799 at Fort St. Julien, el Rashid (Rosetta) Egypt on the western Nile Delta. It is a grey granite rock weighing 760kg. It is incomplete and was thought to be about 50 cm taller. There are 53 lines of Greek script, 32 lines of cursive demotic Egyptian script and 14 lines of ancient hieroglyphics. By comparing the known Greek with the others, it was possible to decipher the hieroglyphics. The inscription on the Rosetta Stone is a decree written in 196 B.C. on the first anniversary of the coronation of Ptolomy V who became ruler when he was 13 years old. 


We bought a 800 piece puzzle of the Rosetta Stone and Mom thinks it is the hardest puzzle we have ever done. At least as hard as deciphering the actual Rosetta Stone itself.

Assyria
There was a large collection of Assyrian gates, carvings. There was a sculpture of the head of Sargon the Great and carved reliefs of the battles of Ashurpanipal.


Cyrus Cylinder
Another very interesting thing we saw was the Cyrus Cylinder. This is a clay cylinder with an account of the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the Great of Persia in 539 B.C. It was written in Babylonian script and was designed to be buried in the city walls of Babylon.  It has records of the kings of Babylon and then part in Cyrus' own words starting "I, Cyrus, king of the world..." Cyrus is the king talked about in Isaiah who released the Israelite people from their 70 years of captivity and allowed them to go back to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple and walls there.


Hokusai Wave
There was also an exhibit about Hokusai's print "The Great Wave", also called Under the Wave, off Kanagawa. This was a colour wood block print by Katsushika Hokusai in 1831 and is unarguably the most famous Japanese print of all. It shows Mount Fuji in the background and a great storm wave towering over 3 fishing boats in the foreground. 

The British Museum is so huge and comprehensive because the British Empire was so good at grabbing and taking things from places throughout the world - the ultimate sticky-fingered discount! And it wasn't even just little small stuff they'd sneak in their pockets. We're talking massive Egyptian statues and whole Greek temples! Imagine paying the shipping on this stuff!

It wouldn't be the British without lots and lots of mummies. No King Tut though. The mummies are the second most popular thing at the British after the Rosetta Stone. Luckily, it was a Sunday and the crowds weren't too overwhelming.

The British also had an exhibit 'from metal to medal' about the creation of the London Olympic medals, from mining the ore through to design and casting. Hey, the medals are designed by an artist named Lin CHEUNG!

The Rose Re-Discovered!

OK, so here's the cool second half of our London adventures at the Globe (see previous post). The other three main theatres of the time were the Rose, the Swan, and the Hope. The Rose was the first of these built on Bankside in 1587, and this was where Shakespeare actually performed, along with Christopher Marlowe, before going to the Globe. Well, the original Rose Theatre was re-discovered in 1989 while digging for an office tower. Now it's an archaeological site where the main portion is underwater to help in preservation, with a small portion of it covered with a stage as an actual theatre.

This album's packed like groundlings!


The Rose Theatre website

On the right is the archaeological site. The Rose was much smaller than the Globe, with the entire 14-sided theatre being able to fit into the inner open part of the 20-sided Globe. The outer wall and the inner wall are lit up by the neon lights, and the stage itself was really small. Despite the small size, 600 'groundlings' can be jammed into the pit, and about 2,500 total into the theatre. Bear-baiting also took place there, as the volunteers showed us bear bones and teeth found at the dig.

By luck, the Rose theatre company just opened a production of Shakespeare's 'Measure for Measure' on the Friday of our trip (Nov 4). So forget all the musicals going on in London's West End, there was simply no way we were going to pass up the opportunity to watch Shakespeare in his original theatre! The stage and theatre itself is tiny, with room for only about 40 audience, so the actors were right in your face and on your lap at times. Made for a really gripping experience, because it was truly 3D and unfolding right in front of you rather than on a remote stage. One of the barmaids was cozying up to me and making small talk while the scene unfolded, while later the villain Lord Angelo was doing a monologue right in my face (luckily without too much spittle flying) and then grabbing my face for full effect. The actress who played the main heroine, Isabella, is an ex-pat from Vancouver. You can see in the picture how the stage covers part of the original walls.

As is traditional in Shakespeare's time, the cast dances a jig at the end of the play to show the audience that nobody actually died and that it was all a lark. Anyway, I have to say that the chance to see Shakespeare at the Rose has probably been the highlight of the entire sabbatical adventures for me to date!

All the World's a Stage

By Debbie & Jacob

In 1599, the original Globe Theatre stood on the south Bankside of London. It was there because they wouldn't allow theatres and other amusements (such as bear-baiting) in the actual city of London. Shakespeare's company learned 30 plays or more a season! A flag flew each day to signify the type of play - black for tragedy, yellow for history and green for comedy. They were always at 1400h because there were no lights and it was after the bulk of the workday.

A Jam-packed Flickr Album!

Groundlings R Us!

There was a yard below the stage where you could stand for a penny as a "groundling," with the stage quite tall so that drunken spectators couldn't climb up. Over 1,000 groundlings may be packed into the yard, and 2 pence got you a seat in the middle, 3 up in the top, and 6 pence got you into the box seats facing the audience. Nowadays the prices are 5 and 37.50 pounds for the groundlings and the middle seats!

Ritzy 2 penny seats!

There was a special effects room above the stage, and in 1613 during Henry VIII, they wheeled out a cannon to shoot. A piece of wadding flew out and got stuck in the thatch roof and within a few hours the entire Globe burned down. It was rebuilt the next year but closed in 1642 by Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans.

400 years later, US actor Sam Wanamaker had a vision of rebuilding the Globe. The new Globe opened 14 years ago in 1997, about 2 blocks from the original site. It is an open air 20-sided building, made with untreated green oak timbers and wooden dowels. The white walls are made of a mixture of sand, white limestone, and cashmere! The thatched roof is now the only one permitted in London, but it has a sprinkler system. It went off once by accident during a matinee, resulting in a lot of wet groundlings!

One interesting fact about the Globe balusters (the posts in front of the seats) is that there are 310 of them on each of the 2nd and 3rd levels. On the second level they were all hand-turned on a lathe by a Swedish woman. However, time was running out for the big opening, so a carpenter got out his power saw and did all 310 flat balusters for the 3rd row! Both sets are painted with a fake marble pattern - can you see the difference?

In 2012 for the Olympics, all 37 Shakespeare plays are going to be performed by compaies from all over the world in their native languages - that should be a spectacle to see Shakespeare in Maori!

Our guide was Angela Bain, who did a terrific job of not just giving us the facts but getting us really into the mood of Shakespearian theatre!

Now the Globe performs only 8 plays - 4 Shakespeare - a year. Some are very traditional while others are modernized with Armani suits, acrobats, or changed settings (MacBeth was set in Hell).

Hey, but if you thought THIS was cool, wait until the next post - it gets even better!

Museum Day in London

On Friday we went to the Natural History Museum. It was pretty good. We didn't get to see the animals but we did get to see the areas about the earth's crust, volcanoes, earthquakes. There was a big area about geology and rocks.

Part 1 of our London Photos!

Then we went to the Victoria and Albert Museum which is right across the street. There was a special exhibit called the Power of Making. It had things like a Lego Dissection Frog, a gorilla made out of coat hangers, a bicycle make of mahogany wood, a special suit made for Stephen Hawking and a special kind of modelling material that can fix all sorts of things. Unfortunately we could take any pictures in that section, We had lunch in the courtyard of the V & A and walked through the sculpture gallery. I liked the one of the dipping of Achilles by his mother.

We also went through the area showing British History of the 1600 - 1760's. We saw a statue of Handel and a bust of Shakespeare. We say different types of decor like chinoiserie, rococo, palladianism and Jacobean. There was a place where you could design your own monogram and crest but the e-mail function didn't work.

There was a lock which was very intricate. The key hole was hidden behind a man's leg and you had to push his hat to "cock the lock".  There was a counter so that you knew if anyone had went in. Once it reached 100 you couldn't open the lock until you pushed a secret button on the shoulder to reset the counter to one. On the right I'm "hearing" sounds without my ears, using vibrations going through my teeth and skull!

The Science Museum was also close by. I liked watching the Rocket Show the best. She talked about Sir Isaac Newton, the Space Shuttle. The Space Shuttle is so fast you could go from London to Brighton in 15 seconds or London to Paris in less than a minute. She blew up 2 balloons filled with hydrogen and a Pringles tube rocket. There was a great hands-on LaunchPad with lots of things you could do.

At the Museum we met a group of Russian gymnasts who posed for us so we could get their picture. All these Museums were in the South Kensington area close to Hyde Park but we didn't get there because we were too tired.

Euro-star adventure

On November 3, we went to London on the Euro-star train. Daddy posted the Video of 300 km/h about. We went to London for Daddy to do some work with his friends (but he only worked 2 out of 5 days). It took about 2 hours to get from Brussels to London. When we got to the Euro-star train stop in London we caught the Tube and took the northern line to South Wimbledon and then we took a doubledecker bus to Kingston where our hotel was located. It was a very long ride to Kingston. The funny part was that when we got to Kingston we went to the wrong Travelodge because there were 2 Travelodges in Kingston. You can see how complex the tube map is but we never actually got on the wrong tube and we got pretty much everywhere we wanted to go (if not for very long at each place). Every day we got our daily exercise walking around the Tube stations! On the tube I met a really nice lady who was from Australia and I talked with her for a little while (Daddy's note: more like for the entire tube journey!).

The Lego Cheung Boys

Yesterday we went down town and went to a few museums,  and Buckingham Palace. Then we found a Lego store in a huge mall. it wash't actually that big but it did have some interesting things, like a Lego man ice cube mould that can also be used as a Jello mould! I also liked this TV and with some star wars Lego boxes you can hold them up to the scanner and it will show you what it looks like in 3D and it even shows the gadgets that are  in the set in action. and we also made our own mini figures!

Where's that paper? Lego Daddy is working on his Lego laptop under extreme pressure from Lego Guard Jacob (left) and Lego Guard Zachary (right).

There were also star wars watches for kids and adult Lego watches for the adults there were clone troopers and Darth Vader, on the Darth watch it said "you don't know the power of the dark side". We  would have gotten one for dad but they were 25 pounds. they also have Star Wars alarm clocks and there is one from the dark side and one from the good side, from the good side there is Yoda and on the dark side is his fearsome enemy Darth Vader. there was also a place where you could buy pieces but they were more regular pieces.

This Is What 300 km/h Looks Like!

Took the Eurostar from Brussels to London this Thursday Nov 3, and this is what it looks like out the window at 300 km/h! Only 2h total from start to finish! We're here for me to visit colleagues at Roehampton U and Brunel U, and of course for us to experience a bit of London.

 Debbie and the boys on the Eurostar on the left, Debbie pondering the elaborate wonders of the London Underground map on the right.

St. Pancras International train station is all decked out for the big show in July 2012.

 The boys getting their poppies at the station.