same old

Another weekend and, as if London didn't have much to offer, I went back to places I had already been. I started Saturday with Portobello Market, the world's largest regularly held street market. Starting near Notting Hill Gate, you can first buy tons of antiques, then old and new clothes, then fruits and vegetables, and finally assorted useless stuff. Like every weekend, thousands of people took to the streets. It was a quiet morning.

Not by any sane standards, but apparently in comparison to the Notting Hill Carnival that will take place next weekend. Carnival in August, carnival in London? Indeed. NHC is the largest of its kind outside of Rio. Initially started by immigrants asserting their rights against and splendidly getting in the face of violent racists in the late sixties, early seventies, it is now a celebration of everyone and everything. Thousands of colorful floats with beats thumping and people jumping move infinitely slowly down narrow streets clogged with dancing spectators.

Sounds like something better seen on TV? Maybe. Anyway, what the show is really famous for is the battle of the steel bands. Steel drums give the carnival its Caribbean sound, and the best steel drummers congregate for it. In an insider's guide book to London I had read that one week before the carnival a steel drum powwow takes place in a local park. We were there Saturday afternoon, but the drummers were not.

Sunday's skies looked threatening, and the forecast predicted rain. Since I had just got my Tate + Guest membership we decided to see some Dalí. We weren't the only ones, but thanks to my card we bypassed the lines - and the ticket booth. The best part of the exhibition was an animated movie Dalí had envisioned with Disney. Dalí only did the initial drawings and storyboard. Now, sixty years later, it was finished thank to some creative computer wizardry. Very distinctively Dalí. Also fantastic were a set of photographs by Philippe Halsman that are collected in the book Dalí's Mustache. Hilariously nuts. What about the paintings? The Persistence of Memory was there, as was the Metamorphosis of Narcissus, but overall the show couldn't compete with the Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Back out on the south bank of the Thames, the rain had failed to materialize. We walked towards the Golden Jubilee Bridge, just as I had done three weeks earlier. It was so different. There's always so much to do. A street festival with dancing and singing, presented by old folks. The World Press Photo Award exhibition for free. Street performers beneath the Eye. Designer shops in Oxo Tower wharf. I picked up a handful of flyers for various symphony orchestras. One event that struck me takes place on London Open House weekend. Too much for one life.