Helping a friend help her neice to win the Flat Stanley competition, I spent a day sightseeing in London. If you’ve never met Flat Stanley, and wonder what I’m talking about, Flat Stanley is the homework assignment of grade school children across the country. They mail a small paper cutout of Stanley to a distant relative, who dresses Flat Stanely in ‘local’ clothes and takes him sightseeing.
Lori dressed her niece’s Flat Stanley in a Beefeater costumer (which is apparently a ‘local’ customer) and we took him sightseeing. Here we are at the Tower of London. Flat Stanley makes an appearance in the lower right of the frame.
But the oddest thing about that day was not the looks I got from people as we held up a tiny cutout of a man and took pictures of it, but of the ridiculous signs that help tourists orient themselves at the Tower of London. Do you need to go to the toilets or make a phone call? No problem – they are this way.
Do you need the gift shop? Over there.
Did you come for the beheading? Yes, right this way, folks, and if you can’t read English, just follow the handy picture of the beheading. Top of the morning, and good day.
I swear. Who gets these jobs? Really, whose job was it do draw a stylized beheading?
More pictures of me and Flat Stanley touring London can be found here.
Thanks for writing about Flat Stanley. So educational! I looove to know the little stories from different countries.