15 September - Of art and cats

Another travel day. These are not my favorite days, I find them somewhat stressful. At any rate, up early for the usual routine of shower, eat and pack. Check out was 11:00, but they key had to be dropped at a convenience store 15 minutes’ walk away. Once the keys were dropped, we were off to the Royal Albert Dock. Our train to Manchester wasn’t due to depart until almost 4:00pm, so we took advantage of the fee time to go to the Tate. Handily, they have free lockers where you can stash your suitcases.

We saw some wonderful art and some which, I must admit, was a bit beyond my comprehension. On the fourth floor a young man working in one of the galleries struck up a conversation and enlightened us about the construction of one of the exhibits, “Untitled” by Kader Attia.

It was a model of the ancient Algerian city of Ghardaia, made out of couscous. According to him, the work is constructed anew each time it is exhibited. Only the directions are sent. Museum staff mixes the couscous with copious amounts of salt and a kind of glue to get the forms to set. He said they’d overdone the glue a bit, because over time, the edges are meant to start to deteriorate slightly, imitating the wear on buildings over time. Fascinating!

The exhibit space was closing at 2:30 for a special event, so we headed for their café for lunch, which was lovely. A quick Uber ride got us to Lime Street Station with time to spare. We headed for our train and noticed that two trains were listed as departing from the same track 4 minutes apart. Both trains were at the track, something which I’ve never seen before. There must be a lot of people getting on the wrong train, though, because conductors were walking the aisles advising people that if they were headed to Chester, they had to exit a hurry further down the track.

So there we were, headed to Manchester for a cat sit. I belong to Trusted Housesitters, a UK-based company that matches people wanting to travel with other people who will stay in their home and look after their pets. I’ve been doing this since 2019 and I think it’s wonderful. Couldn't wait to get there and meet our new charges. We struck up a conversation with a sweet young couple sitting across from us on the train. They had just come back from holiday in Rome and had already booked their next trip to Munich. I admit to feeling a bit envious. Getting to Rome from Seattle is quite an undertaking. From England it's just a short hop. Envious that they're young and getting to travel to such wonderful places. I was in my mid-thirties before I traveled internationally, except for Mexico and Canada on cruise ships I worked.

We arrived at Manchester Piccadilly station and got a cab to the house. Hannah, one of our hosts, greeted us and within about a minute we met Ronnie, one of the cats. He's a three-legged boy, but that missing leg doesn't hold him back at all. We settled in and Clare, our other host came home from work. We had a nice evening together and slowly, the other two shy kitties, Mabel and Rupert came out from their hiding places. They seem like sweet cats and we hope they'll warm to us in short order.