Well at long last this blog arrives, a little like myself arriving at the preparatory weekend. I finally made it there hours late, due to plane hold ups and Heathrow vanishing or something. Once I had arrived everybody seemed to know each other and I resigned myself to a lot of sitting on my own but no, they were all really welcoming and friendly. That's no good I thought. How am I supposed to be the lonely outsider now? I actually managed to develop several friends and people I could talk to. Impressive for me!
We recieved a lecture from Andy Robertshaw, which was really interesting and encouraged us to think. It raised several issues I had never thought about before. When I go to the battlefields this time it will be with a slightly different eye than last.
Then we were off into the big wide world. With one short stop at the hotel we were off towander around London. Despite our frequent attempts nobody managed to get lost. First we were brought to the Cenotaph where we filmed our first Radiowaves broadcast. I think. Of course I wasn't there at the start so they could have been doing anything then. I bet the first two hours were the chocolate, cake and Doctor Who section of the weekend!
After the Cenotaph my memory goes hazy. Did we do anything between that and the London Eye? I remember being taught some Welsh and then forgetting it but apart from that I'm not sure. Anyway at some point we ended up at the London Eye, where we waited in the longest queue since Exodus but moved surprisingly fast. Then we were on the London Eye. Needless to say it didn't move surprisingly fast. It was very impressive though. I'd never been on it in the dark before. Some of us had a discussion about all the famous people who'd been to our school. I definately played the top trump with the woman who plays Moaning Murtle. Beat that Amy Winehouse and Dido.
After the fun on the London Eye and being interrogated about Scotland (no I don't speak Gaelic or eat deep fried Mars Bars) we arrived at Pizza Express. Being the only child in my generation who hates pizza I had a surprisingly good salad. This coupled with my Diet Coke made me realise I'd accidently started a diet. I couldn't allow this to continue and quickly ordered the Toffee Fudge Caramel Chocolate Glory Bombe of Death or some such pudding.
Now, what with it being late and me having got up at 5am for my plane, we headed back to the hotel. Nothing too eventful happened there. There was the point where I woke up at half past three, read my watch upside down and paniced wildly. Idiot.
Next day we went back to the IWM and did lots of history things. First we looked at a happy painting about gas to cheer us all up just after we'd woken up. Then there was the exhibition In Memoriam where we planned our own exhibitions as well. You can find these on another part of the website with me giving some wonderful poetry renditions in my incomprehensible Scottish accent. Enjoy.
We then had a talk from a man from the Commonwealth War Graves Commision. This was very interesting and I was going to do my solo talk in English on the CWGC until I heard Zac Efron say he speaks for our generation. Now if I don't kill myslef I'm going to rant about how some of us still care about something more than Disney bubblegum entertainment!!
Later, in the afternoon, we recorded some vox pops for radiowaves. Of course I was a little nervous about approaching complete strangers. Especially after last time... but it was all fine and we got some good interviews.
After this we had a discussion about where we'd like to go. Couldn't work out what we'd decided on, myself. Big, small, commonwealth graves from different countries including France and Germany?
And then they through me out. Like the rubbish I am. And then I went on holiday. An eventful week. Especially when you se David Tennant in two different plays and get his autograph!
Presto!
One hugely large blog entry.
