Belgrade to London [June 5th]

From Belgrade airport to Jubilee-full London (and a terrible hotel - don't ever stay at the Hotel Ibis, at Heathrow, unless you're desperate.   Though most of the team went bowling after they returned from dinner in Covent Garden, and that might have made things better.  But the Internet didn't work, despite swallowing 9.99 GBP.  So no post last night).

I found myself playing tour guide on our way into London - tour guide to a city full of red white and blue bunting, and metal barriers resting between the flotilla down the Thames and Tuesday's Royal Procession.  It's certainly easier to be enthusiastic, in some kind of isn't it quaint/nostalgic kind of way, about the Jubilee when one is flying in for less than a day - with such exposure, the sheer density of tat still remains at the level of novelty (the plastic shopping bags like Union Jacks; the bizarre anti-litter notice outside Pret a Manger [sorry about lack of accents]).

And even my parents had a red white and blue flower arrangement from their garden ...