Ice Ice baby

 This weekend saw the annual ice sculpture festival descend on Canary wharf, where against a back drop of glass sky scrapers and frosted offices aspiring teams competed to chisel a 2m lump of ice into a frozen masterpiece.

  Last years winners Portugal (Cool Runnings eat your heart out) opted for delicate snowboarding creature while Sweden carved an impressive though abstract stacked square number.

The lovely Anna Heale and Jessica Rosheen standing in front of this years London Ice Sculpting Festival's doubles entry.

The Brunel Tunnels

The Thames tunnel, sunken brainchild of architectural father and son mega-team the Brunels, was not only the worlds first underwater tunnel, but following delays in construction and an interrupted revenue stream, its first subterranean market place and finally circus. Victorian London was a far cry from the capital we see today, as horse-drawn carriages tore up the cobbled streets either side of the thames - the swirling cesspit which flowed through the city centre and out to sea - was manned by a series of small boats. But when it came to the titans of trade and industry, these small boats and the neighbouring Tower Bridge simply couldn't cope with the sheer amount of goods which needed to be transported from one side of the river to the other. 

Enter the Brunels- Marc Isambard and Isambard Kingdom (yup  thats Isambard Kingdom...) who worked tirelessly using their newly invented tunneling shield to construct a shaft 396m in length, 23m below the river Thames' busy surface. Now construction wasn't without its problems; floods, gas leaks and inevitable delays blighted the project and saw it commuted down from a trade route, to a footpath and eventually a circus. No doubt to the relief of the tunnel's investors, it was purchased in 1865 by the East London Railway Company. The tunnel's generous headroom, resulting from the architects' original intention of accommodating horse-drawn carriages, provided a sufficient loading guage for trains as well. 

The conversion is not to take away from the project's magnitude- the construction of the Thames Tunnel showed that it was indeed possible to build underwater tunnels which was in itself a revolutionary concept. These days the tunnels can be viewed from Rotherithe and Wapping tube or as part of a walking tour offered by the Brunel museum, which incidentally I couldn't recommend more highly.  

David Arnold in front of a picture of what the entrance at Rotherithe would have looked like.

An Illustrated Post About Birds

Bee eaters

The lesser spotted leopard.

Blue stee-agle

A teenage eagle merrily chows down on some sort of smaller bird.

A black headed Ibis spreading its wings.

The fairly commonly spotted peacock. 

On a leopard safari in Yala, Sri Lanka the incessant and unfortunate Monsoon rain ensured the leopards, though beautiful, were a little thin on a ground. There were however some spectacular birds. Turns out ornithology, long the pass time of the beardy and bespectacled is in fact quite fun.

Sovereign Debt Made Cheesy

Sovereign Debt Made Cheesy 

For a complex global matter, to be understood with ease, 
Simply turn the offending articles, into lumps of cheese,

With EU summit talks, now in the 11th hour,  Its clear the Euros buzz, has turned lactose-n-sour, 
A sovereign debt disaster, caused chiefly by the banks,
There’s even talk in Paris of a return to the old Francs,
And while Sarkozy’s brie,Could probably take the strain,
Of Berlusconi’s Lira, it could not be said the same,
A mozzarella currency,that’s what Italy have got,
Like Spanish Manchego, they both melt when things get hot,
And what of Greece's Drachma, troublesome as Feta,
Of Papandreou’s performance, The results could have been better,
Not to mention Cameron’s cheddar, Patriotic and proud, But the hardcore euro states don’t really want the pound around, 

So let us hope that beefy Merkel, can keep it all together, Sobering absorbing bread to in disastrous joint venture 

But in so many waysThis Euro drama is irrelevant,
Since the Chinese Renminbi, is quite lactose intolerant. 

Shockingly it didn't win, but was highly commended by The Spectator  

 

Penny for your thoughts

I think it's time to take a cold hard look at what I let pass for a productive afternoon these days...

The Masks of Prince Charles

26 March Picadilly and Trafalgar square

 

While a peaceful march through Hyde park may be a more legitimate form political statement but kids playing thug is central London makes a much better picture.

 

NHS not for sale

Buzz Buzz bees

 So there are a few bees based bands buzing around but these are my favorite. On Saturday night i had the privilege of going to their highly acclaimed gig in Westminster library- cakes were served. The Allotment hosted 3 sold out London show filmed by Tuckshop. This was my absolute favorite. (never mind that i thought the words were happy as a pie- i prefer it that way.)

Sea of Bees - The Woods from Tuckshop Community on Vimeo.

Send in the Clowns

This annual memorial service in Dalston in honour of the king of clowns, Joseph Grimaldi (1778-1837) is a colourful event. About 60 clowns in full harlequin get up including props of musical bubble machines and deceptive flowers descend upon the Holy Trinty church. Much of the usual Sunday morning congregation are also present leading to a strange mixture of the farcical and the faithful including a preaching magician who having folded the sunday papers into the shape of a cross- promptly re-assembled them.

Ever Young

Ali in Accra

Meet James Barnor- the subject of my final year dissertation on the history of Photography in West Africa. He's 82 in June and lives here in London. Barnor was a studio and press photographer for the a Ghanaian branch of the Daily Mail in the decade prior to Independence. In 1959 he left Accra for London where he continued to shoot for amongst others- Drum magazine. In November, Rivington place held an exhibition of his work (mostly from london) and ran a series of workshops, with the BBC making a documentary of his life at some point this year. Certainly at 82 this recognition comes rather late, and Barnor is acutely aware of the coverage that his French West African contemporaries such as Malik Sidbe and Seydou Keita received, but remains grateful that it puts him in a position to support his family in Ghana.

Barnor in Hounslo