He came all the way from darkest Peru and charmed an entire country—even its queen—after being found in Paddington Station with a label attached to his collar: “Please look after this bear. Thank you.”
But now that Queen Elizabeth has gone, Paddington Bear is no longer welcome. In fact, he’s a distinctly unwelcome bear.
British authorities published a lengthy guidance document Wednesday advising the estimated three-quarters of a million people expected to queue up to see the late queen’s closed coffin as she lies in state in London’s Westminster Hall on what they should expect, how they should behave, and what they should and shouldn’t bring.
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And there on the pictogram of banned objects, alongside the hammers and padlocks and whistles and fireworks and folding chairs, is a rather sad-looking teddy bear.
It’s not wearing a blue duffel coat or a floppy red hat, but there can be no mistaking which particular bear the parliamentary authorities are targeting.
Hard stare.
The Paddington snub is all the more hurtful for the fact that earlier this year the queen filmed a lighthearted sketch with Paddington to mark her platinum jubilee, where he visits her for tea at Buckingham Palace and they bond over their shared love of marmalade sandwiches.
And therein lies the problem. After Elizabeth’s death at the age of 96 last Thursday, royalists up and down the land decided that they would pay tribute to her by leaving Paddington Bears and pots of marmalade instead of flowers at official floral tribute sites. The organization that administers London’s Royal Park had to beg them to stop.
Clearly, the faceless bureaucrats at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, who are in charge of the regulations, are frightened the message has not got through. Perhaps they had visions of a cavernous room somewhere in the Palace of Westminster stuffed full of confiscated teddy bears by the time lying-in-state finishes Monday morning.
Not that there would be much room for even the smallest of bears if people follow the official advice and restrict themselves to a bag measuring just 40cm x 30cm x 20cm—smaller than the carry-on for a budget airline. Visitors are also warned that they will have to queue for as much as 35 hours and be ready to stand in line even overnight as the line constantly moves forward. Paddington is best out of it.
