Adventures in International Education

At Stella’s suggestion, I bought a ticket for the water taxi and journeyed to Greenwich to see the Maritime Museum, the Cutty Sark, and the Royal Observatory at Greenwich

I also saw London from the river, an amazing sight.

Much of the city displays tower cranes and a vast amount of construction, including the iconic clock tower with Big Ben. Still, the cityscape is exciting and colorful.

Greenwich

The Cutty Sark became my first stop in Greenwich. This massive ship lies in dry dock, conserved and preserved over the years in a high-quality way. The tour begins in the lower hold, which contains descriptions of the tea trade and samples of the tea boxes that would have been loaded by Chinese stevedores when the ship was active. Although designed for speed and to bring tea from China to England—the first crop of tea received the highest price—she only spent seven years in the tea trade.

The tour revealed an iron-framed ship with wooded planks bolted to the outside. It was designed to carry cargo, which the iron framework allowed because it took up less space than the traditional wooden framing. The name Cutty Sark itself comes from a Robert Burns poem “Tam O’Shanter” published in 1791. A “cutty sark” is a nightdress, in the poem worn by the witch Nannie.

Steamships brought an end to the sailing ships involvement in the tea trade and Cutty Sark began transporting wool from Australia, coal, and other goods, setting speed records along the way. Under the name Ferrara, and flying the Portuguese flag, the ship transported goods between Europe and Africa before becoming a training ship and then, in 1954, ending up in drydock at Greenwich, where she became a national icon. A further refit between 2006 and 2012 further conserved the ship and preserved her in her condition similar to her years in the tea trade.

Like much of what I’ve seen in Britain, history and trade played a major role in the development of the Cutty Sark. From a 21st-Century perspective, it’s helpful to remember that before World War I, Britain controlled about one-quarter of the world’s population and one-quarter of Earth’s land area. “The empire on which the sun never sets” meant just that: For every minute of the day, from sunrise to sunset, the sun’s rays touched a British possession: Britain controlled so much of the world. The British Empire was the largest empire in history.

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Observatory

A walk up the hill brought me to the Royal Observatory. Here astronomers and scientists had developed and refined the concept of a meridian that divided the world into east and west hemispheres, the idea that zero degrees longitude marked the midpoint of the world. Britain’s seafaring role and dependance on trade made time and geography essential for growth.

Acceptance of the Prime Meridian depended on scientific development as well as political agreement. Astronomical observations mechanically set the line, which map makers used to develop sea charts in the nineteenth century. The Prime Meridian established a measuring point for every place on earth from one established point. In 1884, nations of the world agreed:

Forty-one delegates from 25 nations met in Washington DC for the International Meridian Conference. By the end of the conference, Greenwich had won the prize of Longitude 0º by a vote of 22 to 1 against (San Domingo), with 2 abstentions (France and Brazil).

Royal Observatory

Maritime Museum

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Once again, British history led me back to India. The Maritime Museum contains an exhibit about the British East India Company, and an interesting contemporary film, which includes individuals familiar with the company and its development: A woman from Bombay, a daughter of a trader, the man who now owns the East India Company, and several others.

Interestingly, the present owner of the East India Company is an Indian merchant. The sense from the interviews was of the damage that the East India Company had done to the people of India, how the policies and politics of trade affected the development of countries and wars of conquest. India, for example, had a thriving textile trade, then British traders duplicated the cloth and basically put the Indian textile out of business. The tea trade with China depended on hard currency from Britain because the West had few goods of interest to the East. Britain began importing opium from India to China, the Opium Wars resulted, and Britain gained control of all trade with China, a lucrative endeavor. Also, wars of domination persisted throughout Asia as Britain tightened its control and independent people resisted. In many cases, independence from Britain would only happen in the mid-twentieth century (and some of those struggles continue, notably the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and difficulties in the Middle East).

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