Liverpool
I've been to Liverpool a number of times now and yet I always seem to find something new each time. Our flat was quite near the Albert Dock on the River Mersey.
No longer a warehouse, the Albert Dock has been transformed into a huge complex of restaurants, shops, tour company offices, and museums Now, however is not the optimal time to visit those museums because a massive reconstruction and reburbishment is underway. The Tate Liverpool, The Maritime Museum and The Museum of Slavery are all closed, though there is a small collection from the Tate on display at the Royal Institute of British Architects at Mann Island, adjacent to the docks. As I walked by the Albert Dock I noticed an artifact from its past, an iron brace that was once part of a pulley system for loading goods into the warehouse.
Now painted a bright orange, it serves as a colorful decorative item.
I walked down Strand Street past the beloved liver birds on the Liver building
past where the Strand turns into George's Dock Gates.
I ducked into Our Lady and St. Nicholas Church Garden to have a look around.
It's quite a peaceful spot in the middle of the busy dock area. In the garden there's a sculpture that I'm certain was put there to inspire reflection into the situation of those less fortunate.
Near the church is another statue, The Liverpool Blitz Memorial. Liverpool was an important port and command center during WWII and, as a result, was a constant target of the Luftwaffe. Local artist Tom Murphy, who designed the statue, draws our attention to the young mother holding her baby while trying to persuade her young son, playing with his airplane, to come back down the stairs to safety.
There are so many touching memorials in this church ground, memorial stones to heroes of WWI
a wonderful bronze plaque memorializing the men who volunteered for the King's Liverpool Regiment and the 2800 men of that regiment who lost their lives,
a stone memorial to those who served in the Battle of the Atlantic in WWII,
and those who served in the brutal Arctic Campaign.
In the yard just ouside the church entrance is a stone memorializing A Bell, an enslaved African and the first recorded black resident of the city.
I walked into the church which is quite a modern building, but which has a storied past.
The first church was built on this site in the 1250s, The Church of St. Mary del Quay. As the town grew in size the chapel was too small for the population so in the 1350s a new and larger church was built adjacent to St. Mary's, the Chapel of St. Nicholas. A chantry with a school was added in 1515 and it was this school which saved it from destruction during the Reformation. A spire was added to the church in 1747 but in 1810 just as the congregation was arriving, the tower collapsed killing twenty four people, most of them children from a local school. More rebuilding was done on the church in the 1850s. In the early 20th century it served an important role as a place of memorial for the fallen of WWI.
As the Battle of the Atlantic brought Liverpool to the front line of the second world war, the church was struck in December, 1940 and May, 1941 and only the tower survived. In the ruins, the rector set up a cross from the fallen, charred roof timbers. This now hangs in St. Peter's chapel.
This new church was rebuilt and consecrated in 1952.
I left the church and started walking to the restaurant where I was meeting Bruce for lunch. I passed the wall of a pub which caught my eye.
The back wall of the pub yielded more interesting signs.
Ah, those Scousers!
Oh, if the term Scousers is unfamiliar, allow
me to explain. People from Liverpool are often
called Scousers. This term is derived from the
dish which was introduced by Scandinavian
and German sailors, a stew made of cheap cuts
of meat and lots of potatoes and vegetables,
called Scouse. It was hearty and cheap and
became ubiquitous in the city, so outsiders called
the locals Scousers. Last time I was in the
National Museum of Liverpool, I bought a tea
towel with the recipe printed on it.
I had a bit of time to kill before lunch so I started walking around the Castle Street area. As in virtually every city of any size in England, there is a memorial to Queen Victoria.
The buildings in that area are enormous and imposing and many have wonderful decorative aspects in either tile or stone.
It's harder to admire them, however, when you think that the vast amounts of money needed to build them came, directly or indirectly, from the slave trade which was the foundational cornerstone of the city's 18th-century wealth and global dominance as a port.
Lunch was at one of my favorite Liverpool restaurants, Mowgli, Water Street. I've written about Mowgli many times before but this particular branch of that chain is my favorite. Reportedly it's founder Nisha Katona's favorite, too, and she pops in several times a week from her office nearby.
Today our choices were onion bhajis which were nice and spicy, sticky chicken, and Diwali cauliflower, a huge and colorful head of cauliflower with wonderful flavor and a bit of spice.
Yum!
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