Bermuda Beauty Treatments

Rain for Beauty!

What am I posting about today? Well hopefully you got your beauty sleep this weekend? No? Oh right it was Bermuda’s annual Rugby Classic.

I’m sure most people are feeling a little less than light on their feet today. Maybe there are a few bags under the eyes that were not there before?

Need something to pick you up? Perhaps you’re having a better day than Oleg Mavromati (read my previous post for understanding) who appears to be alive!

Have no fear the Bermudians are on it and have been “on it” since our creation. As you can see in the pic I have chosen for you today, the Brits thought they were ahead.

What am I talking about?

Today’s Robyn’s Wanderings draws from my next column for The Royal Gazette (in on Wednesday now!) I was meandering around the house of John Keats in Hampstead Heath, London and noticed this sign.

“Rain Water in Beauty Treatments”

Now who would have thought? Well the Bermudians certainly have! We catch the rain off our roofs, store it in our tanks and use it for everything from washing our faces (hello beauty!) to washing our vegetables (beautiful tummies?).

Apparently this was  new trend in the time of George IV i.e. late 1700’s and early 1800’s. Kinda an odd concept, really. Not washing?

But then again who would have thought about catching water on our roofs to use it for every day affairs? A small island nation in the middle of the Atlantic is who!

It’s always a fun fact to share with people, even people who work for eco-lodges in Berlin. He couldn’t quite get his head around it!

“You mean you catch water on your roofs? To flush toilets, right?”

“No. Well yes. But we also drink it and shower, etc.. It’s why we have roofs shaped like stairs and painted white!”

White, water-catching Bermuda roof

“That’s crazy! Why don’t you write about that for your blog.”

Ha. Well here I am writing about it. Trendsetters that we try to be, Bermuda was way-ahead in the beauty treatments that the British then “came-upon.”

So remember your beauty treatment today. In Bermuda it’s no further than your tap and stay tuned for my next Rock Fever Column on Wednesday!

Happy Monday.

Escalator Etiquette

 

Descending into the the dungeons of London's Tube

 

Wandering rage. Walking rage. Whatever you want to call it….. just make sure you’re on the right of the escalator when I want to walk on the left.

I’ve got it. I’ve been in London now a week (after returning from my Stockholm and Berlin escapades) and I’ve become incensed at walking around this city.

The worst place for this kind of walking rage? The Underground. The Tube. London’s trains. If you are taking the escalator up or down to the Tube there is etiquette.

If you want to stand and let the escalator do the work, stand on the right. If you want to get run down, tsked tsked or told to move then stand on the left.

Got the memo? People who are in a rush are walking-up the left. And I am always in a rush on London’s Tube. Why? Because being from a small island where it takes ten minutes to meet someone for a coffee I’m not used to taking fifteen minutes to get to my transportation and another 45 minutes to get to the coffee.

Plus I haven’t had my coffee at this point so…..for your safety: STAY TO THE RIGHT ON THE TUBE ESCALATORS.

And don’t even get my started about Tower Bridge…..ok you did. If I want to run this is my route. Only it takes half the run to dodge the tourists entranced by their cameras or the tourists who decide the top of the stairs is the right place to meet to discuss their next plan of attack.

MOVE AWAY from the stairs. STEP AWAY from the middle of the bridge and PLEASE PLEASE when you’re looking in your camera also have some idea of the people running around you.

I might not live in London, but I’ve now spent enough time here to no longer be amazed by the Tower or entranced by my camera.

And more importantly I like to think of myself as an aware tourist. SO when I take pictures I also know what is going on around me.

Like I said. I have rage. I’m going for a walk.

A hurricane in London….England?

 

A Hurricane in England?

 

I didn’t believe it either. Nope. I scoffed at my friend’s boyfriend a couple of weeks ago when he raised the subject.

We were discussing the impending Hurricane Igor attack on Bermuda. I was pretty sure the Brit had no idea what a hurricane was about. He claimed to have suffered one in England!

Ha. Right. Sure…. You sure it wasn’t just some strong winds?

Ok now I’m eating my words. Why? I’m wandering around London looking for cheap trips from this capital city. One of them had to be to Hampstead Heath – an area where writers such as John Keats and Louis Stevenson haunted. Maybe they would inspire me?

As I wandered through the Heath here, yesterday I noticed a sign. It sat innocently enough near the path, but it destroyed any of my belief in these storms.

It claimed to represent all the trees that had been wiped-out in the hurricane on 1987 (you can try and read it yourself in my poor attempt at photography above!)

Ugh. Aghhhhh he was right! Now I’m going to have to concede. Who knew? Well I had no idea which is why I made this photo my photo of the week. A little Bermuda (hurricanes) with a little of London (Hampstead Heath).

On another note….I have now found my favourite place in London. This Heath is truly…..calming. Nah you can’t block-out the city sounds completely but the green of Parliament hill where people fly kites, read or sleep is definitely a start! With lakes and massive mansions there is a little of everything here and I loved it. What an escape.

Perhaps too much of one, however. I spent so much time in the Heath I didn’t have time to see anything else. So it’s back to Hampstead today to discover the historic figures it hides. No wonder so many literary figures haunted these hills!