What a shame. The Queen, the very picture of stoicism, standing for 3 hours during the Thames River Pageant in driving rain - and not even a sit-down or a cup of tea to break the monotony or warm up. Would you make your 86 year old granny stand, freezing in the rain for 3 hours? No. And what of her 90 year old husband? Is it possible to keep a smile on your face for that long? Put simply, it's not - but the queen did her level best. In fact it seems that everybody did heroically under the circumstances (except the BBC who have been slammed for their inane, dreadful commentary during live televised proceedings - and Kate who looked very nice, but has been accused by the Daily Mail of dressing to upstage the Queen) -
I didn't watch the whole thing, but by the time we got to the rain soaked operatic singers at the finale on Sky news - it was hard to watch. Let's hope the Queen endures the next couple of days of yet more public appearances and official functions without falling sick or needing a day in bed. Hot toddy anyone? Best of British with the rest of the celebrations! (Getting remarkably cold and grey here in Nairobi too - perhaps in sympathy?!)
A stoic looking queen - keen not to let anyone down
and the UK street parties
Meanwhile, whilst thinking of England, I took the kids to the Nairobi national park to meet friends (who have one of those great gas burner thingies) for Sunday brunch. Unbelievably (and late as usual) we got stuck behind a lion! It took us by surprise. I thought it was a large dog or donkey at first - but then I was a little distracted by the discovery that my daughter had spilled hair oil all over the inside of my handbag. Anyway, we pulled ourselves together and videoed it on my old phone (had forgotten both camera and binoculars - the old phone I'm using just isn't a patch on the iphone that got wet in Lake Naivasha a couple of weeks ago). I tried to download the video clip here, but it's not working. Will keep trying.
Also killing time - on Saturday I took the girls to the cinema (in a big city mall) to watch 'The Avengers'. I was enjoying the film very much - happily munching popcorn, right up until the point that the multiple explosions on screen caused me to wonder whether we might get suddenly bombed by Al Shabaab - and whether I'd ever be able to locate and extract all three children in the dark. The film passed uneventfully and fortuately by the end of the weekend, even my husband returned from his Rhino Charge 'are you tough enough?' alpha male bush-challenge, unscathed and annoyingly looking pleased with himself.
