Flags flew at half-staff in Honolulu. The Eiffel Tower turned off its lights. The sails of the Sydney Opera House will be illuminated. And above Buckingham Palace, two rainbows emerged. The impressively broad sweep of Queen Elizabeth II’s life ran from the great to the infamous, Churchill to Ceausescu, Mandela to Mugabe. But much of her lasting legacy will lie in the tens of thousands of quieter lives she touched during her reign. As news of her death spread, personal tributes poured in around the world. In London’s shopping centre, a phalanx of black taxis formed an impromptu honor guard. “Liz is a girl from London,” said Michael Ackerman, a 26-year-old taxi driver, “she’s one of yours, she’s one of ours.” Black London cabs line the mall in front of Buckingham Palace. Photo: Samir Hussein/WireImage The late monarch was born 96 years earlier less than a mile away, at her grandparents’ home in Mayfair. In the late afternoon in London, as crowds gathered outside the gates of Buckingham Palace, a double rainbow flashed briefly above the crowds. The news also spread to the farthest corners of the monarch’s kingdom. Eleven thousand miles away, Aotearoa-New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern awoke to the light of a police officer’s flashlight in her bedroom just before five in the morning. Having gone to bed reading about the Queen’s ill health, “when that lens came into my room, I immediately knew what it meant,” Ardern said. “I am deeply saddened.” In the country’s official condolence book, Ardern thanked the Queen for her “life of service”. He followed the words with the Maori proverb ‘he kotuku refenaga tahi’, which translates to ‘the flight of a white heron is seen only once’. It refers to a rare event and the comparison is honorable. New Zealand radio presenter Mike Hossing broke down in tears on air discussing the Queen’s death. He had earlier declared his love for the Queen: “She may be the greatest representative of most of our lives in terms of devotion, consistency and loyalty.” In Sydney, the sails of the city’s harborside Opera House will be lit up for two nights in honor of the Queen. Paying tribute at Government House in Sydney, Ross Harris said his first memory of the Queen was when she and Prince Philip visited his primary school in Tasmania in 1977. “When they visited, Prince Philip remarked: ‘What a delightfully cold place you live in.’ “Whether you like the monarchy or loathe the monarchy, you cannot take away the fact that these are all people born into this situation. They make the most of this situation. they set an example for others in terms of work and service to others.” Members of the public leave messages of condolence for the Queen at St Andrews Cathedral in Sydney, Australia. Photo: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images In India, MP and former diplomat Shashi Tharoor – who wrote the anti-Imperial polemic Inglorious Empire: What the British Did to India – paid tribute to the Queen’s personal devotion to duty. “An era in history ended today. It had to happen one day, but it’s still hard to shake a sense of disbelief. RIP Queen Elizabeth.” In Hong Kong, some took to social media on Friday to mourn the woman affectionately nicknamed “Madam Boss” among elderly residents of a city that was one of Britain’s last colonies. Elizabeth II visited Hong Kong twice during her reign, while her son – now King Charles III – was present for his handover to China in 1997. “My grandmother who raised me always talked about the ‘boss lady’, I heard about her so much that she felt like family… today it’s like a family member died,” Vincent Lam wrote. When the Queen first set foot in the Solomon Islands, she was given the name Fau Ni Qweraasi, meaning ‘protector of the people’, by a former chief. Flags in the Solomon Islands, where the queen is head of state, flew at half-staff on Friday and many on Facebook changed their profile picture to pictures of the queen. But the queen’s death was mourned beyond the borders of the former empire she represented. Outside Ye Olde King’s Head Pub in Santa Monica, California, Gregg Donovan set up a small shrine to the monarch, complete with candles, roses and an official framed portrait. Donovan, who met the Queen, told the Press Association: “She was so kind and gracious and it’s a sad day around the world.” “America loves the Queen … and where I work in Hollywood people were shocked, British tourists were crying in the streets.” At the Rose Tree Cottage English Tea Room in Pasadena, Calif., Bracken Armstrong was moved to tears amid mementos of her majesty. Armstrong and her husband Martin said they admired the Queen’s strong, positive female role. “The world has become more masculine,” Martin said. On the other side of the American continent, New York’s Times Square projected an image of a smiling Queen, while the Empire State Building was lit up after sunset in purple and silver to honor her life and legacy. Tel Aviv’s municipal building was lit up with a union flag as a tribute. The Tel Aviv Municipality building was illuminated with a tribute to the Union flag. Photo: Jack Guez/AFP/Getty Images In Berlin, flowers and candles were laid outside the British embassy, while in Venice God Save the Queen was played outside the Italian city’s Festival buildings. The statue of Christ the Redeemer is illuminated in Rio de Janeiro. Photo: Pilar Olivares/Reuters The Christ the Redeemer statue, overlooking Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, was lit up in red, white and blue. But beyond formal and official recognitions, in many parts of the former British empire – India, the Pacific, the Caribbean – public outpourings have declined. In Jamaica, Leslie Henriques said the Queen’s death “really means nothing to me”. “Let’s hope he [King Charles III] it is done with the monarchy. We don’t need kings and queens anymore.” The Queen was the most widely traveled of any world head of state. He has visited every Commonwealth country except Cameroon, which only joined in 1995, and Rwanda, in 2009. He visited Canada 22 times, Australia 16, New Zealand 10 and Jamaica six. With AFP, PA. Additional reporting by Natasha May, Stephanie Convery, Georgina Maka’a and Charlotte Graham-McLay
