I'll stick with you baby for a thousand years. Nothing's gonna touch you in these golden years.

By this time in our trip, our group has already seen Shakespeare's All's Well That Ends Well at the Globe . . . which was superb. Today, we got to take a tour of the theatre itself. Might be one of my favorite sight seeing things I have done. It's just that I have spent so many school years learning about this theatre and the time of Shakespeare. I feel like all I had learned didn't really stick until today. I was there. I was in the space where it all happened. It's true what my English professors say, that if you really want to major in English, your life wouldn't be fulfilled to you come to England. Everything I have learned just gels together all of a sudden. It's beautiful. A wonderful event in earth's history. A stunning creation wrought by humankind.

For instance, I learned that the people who watch from the ground are called "groundlings." Makes sense. They were also called "penny stinkers" because they paid one penny to get into the play. In a modern day performance, they can fit 700 people max. Back then, they didn't have any sitting restrictions and just shoved as many people as they could. They were able to fit 1,000 people in the ground then. Since they were packed in so tight, they literally couldn't get out during the play if they wanted to. These plays would last for hours on end depending on the play. If they had to do important business, like relieving themselves, they had no choice but to go on the spot where they stood. Hence the name "penny stinkers." Isn't that wonderful!?!

After our enlightening tour, we went to the remains of the Rose theatre, where Shakespeare actually performed a lot of his plays, along with Christopher Marlowe. I won't go into that very much because, honestly, there wasn't much to see. Although there was a video with Sir Ian McKellen. That was cool.

Following this, we were able to go to the Globe Exhibition, which was awesome!!!
This is a picture of Preston, a guy in our group. He was participating in an interactive activity where he can read lines from a play as the computer says the other lines, while recording your own voice. When you are finished, it plays it back to you with your voice and the computer's voice doing the other part. We convinced Preston to read Juliet's lines in Romeo and Juliet, seeing how it would be accurate of Shakespeare's time (men played all the parts in plays, including the roles of women. Preston was sensational, and we all enjoyed his performance :)

My favorite part was they had little booths with the names of famous British actors and various Shakespeare monologues next to the actors. You could press a button in one of the booths and actually hear a particular actor delivering the monologue over the speakers. Maybe it doesn't sound nearly as cool as I thought it was . . . but I loved it!!!! I got to hear Marlon Brando (I am aware he isn't British) be Henry V, and Ian Holm (Bilbo!) be Richard III. That was really awesome and wonderfully creepy, and the highlight of my day.


I apologize for the lack of pictures. Don't worry. They are coming! Next we went to Borough Market, just down the way from the Globe and Rose theatre. Holy Food-ness!!!! I mean, just look at it. LOOK AT IT!!!!!!


Yes. That is all cheese. Little chunks of dairy heaven.


Blueberry cheesecake . . . . . . . . . . I can hear the harps.

This my friends is an almond croissant. I bought one for two pounds, ate it, and bought another one shortly after. The girl selling them was like "So . . . you liked them?" And I could barely answer I was so intoxicated by the thought of enjoying another one, but did manage to blutter out, "Uh-huh." I thought I could save the other one for later, but I just ate it for dinner. These are devils, smothered in butter and sugar. Seriously, you bight it and butter just oozes out in the most seductive way.

Speaking of something more healthy. This is literally orange juice. Like, the juice from the orange itself. I couldn't believe it, neither could I resist.


Just a few images from our walk around:




And then, we decided to go to Clink's Debtor's Prison Museum. It was the exact location where Charles Dickens's parents were for awhile as he worked as a lad putting labels on bottles to work off their debt and provide for himself. The museum is a bit indulgent and a tad bit tacky, but was still fun.




This isn't what it really looked like. It was so dark in there that I was forced to use the flash. This corner is actually very dark and you can barely see anything. You can only see him because there is one candle lit there in front of him. They would have lightning come in flashes every now and again and you could see him better. I think that was my favorite part of the museum. They had a plaque about the religious prisoners they held there.

And then there was torture. What is a historic museum in London without talking about torture? Nay, it does not exist.


This was used when the prisoners were irritating the guards with their complaining. If the prisoners complained about their situation too much, they could put this bridle around their head, holding their mouth shut. Some were morbid enough as to put a spike just about the tongue so that if they did try to talk . . . yeah you get the idea.

We are all familiar with the rack. Is it bad that the only thing I think about when the rack is mentioned is Muppet Treasure Island, when the pirates are trying to torture Gonzo, but he thinks it feels quite good :)

They also had a torture device that would compound the person as tightly as they could, opposite of the rack. There was one man who endured through both torture methods. I'm sure it was for posterity.


This one just made me laugh :) I want a bejeweled chastity belt!


I've now been beheaded by a simple stub and axe and a guillotine. Guillotine is still the coolest death I've experienced.



And really big mushrooms!

Not in any way, shape, or form meant for torture. This was just the last picture I took of the day of some ridiculously huge mushrooms.