London Calling
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London,
United Kingdom
Sunday, March 23, 2008
March 17th (St. Patricks Day) I woke up at 4:30 in the morning to get on a bus from Champaign to Chicago. I arrived at Union Station in Chicago at about 8:45 and took a cab to Hedwig Dances dance studio in the Chicago Cultural Center. I was an intern for the company last summer so I visited with Jan Bartoszeck, the artistic director and dancers and took a morning class with them. I had time afterwards to watch their rehearsal and it was a lot of fun. After this I made my way to the Blue Line on the L and took it to O'hare. It took not even half the time that my parents had forced me to take, so I sat in the terminal for hours. The flight to England was delayed for an hour and I finally got on the plane at 5:30. The flight was long and cramped but that was to be expected. I arrived at Heathrow airport at 6:30 in the morning March 18th. I easily found the Picadilly line for the tube that took me to the city of London. I was tired but the tube in London is thankfully very easy to navigate, especially if you are used to the Chicago L. I had made plans with Amy Bantz (Erins great childhood friend) to meet up at her office. At this point I was having a very hard and frustrating time with my Luggage. I only had one big suitcase and one small one, but they were as heavy as bags of bricks, and there are a lot of stairs when dealing with the Tube since it is mostly all underground. I could only lift enough to go one step at a time before my bags slammed to the ground. People were very friendly though and a lot of people offered to help me. My bag was so heavy though that when a man tried to lift my large bag, the handle snapped. So after that it was even more difficult to lug around all my baggage because it didnt really have a handle on it. However somehow I MANAGED!
I finally managed to arrive at Amy's work, but it was only 8:30 and I was early. A nice man let me in the building and allowed me to sit on a couch in the conference room. I ended up falling asleep but woke up as Amy arrived. It was great to see her and helped a lot to have a place to stay and someone to see during my first moments in London. I was able to leave my horrible bags in her office. She took me down to the cafe next door called the Gallery Cafe. There she introduced me to the people that worked there and we had some coffee and a sandwich (which I desperately needed). I met Ross who is from Edinburgh who was very friendly and offered to give me some tips on great restaurants in Edinburgh.
After that Amy had to get back to work so I ventured off on my own for a few hours. I took the tube to Tower of London and Tower Bridge. It was huge and magnificent, but I unfortuntely forgot to grab my camera before I went. I walked around the exterior of the outer wall of the castle area. Even though I didnt pay to go inside it was still amazing to see such huge old architecture. I then walked across Tower Bridge which reminded me of something out of Cinderella. I walked around the area on the other side of the River in the fancy living area and looked at some shops. I was afraid of getting turned around though so I made my way back towards the tube after a while.
When I returned to Amy's work I had to say goodbye to her because she needed to leave for her other baby sitting job. I got my aweful luggage and took the tube across London to Dani's hotel. Dani was randomly in London the same time I was because she was on a trip with the Marching Illini (the University of Illinois Marching Band). Neither one of us had a phone so I had to sit in the Lobby for about an hour just hoping to luckily bump into her. Which I did, thankfully. I was able to put my luggage in her room, by that time I passionatly hated my luggage, but I did get a lot of excercise at least. It was a huge relief for both Dani and I to find eachother as we were both stressed out at that time, and finding eachother eleviated a lot of that stress.
We met up with her friends Neil, Liel, Steve, and Travis at an Italian Restaurant near by. We were served by a waitress from Barcelona that did not know English very well but was very friendly, and it became obvious to me how London is full of just as many foreigners as it is English. I also felt like although a lot of things are different about London like how old things are and driving on the other side of the street, the basic atmosphere and feeling of the city is not that different than Chicago. I kept finding myself comparing it to Chicago and contrasting it to Paris. Paris is older AND has a different feeling and atmosphere. Maybe its just the language thing. I dunno!
After dinner Dani and I showered and waited for Emily to come into the city. She goes to University in Liverpool and was able to take a bus to London. When she arrived she brought us scones and we drank some tea and caught up. It was a mellow night as we were all tired and wanted to go to bed. It was a stressful first day, but it worked out well.
19th March
I woke up at 8:30 before everyone else and headed off on my own towards the Bunac office. Bunac is the organization that I went through to get my blue card in order to legally stay and work in the UK for 6 months. They require that every participant go into the office for orientation upon their arrival in the UK. I found the office easily, but was early so I bought some kind of pastry to eat for breakfast. Orientation that day had people from the States and from Australia there. There were about 10 people with me and most of them were planning on staying in London.
After Orientation I decided to quickly run over to a cell phone store and buy a cell phone. It was pretty easy, I just got a pay as you go phone, and that way it would be easy to meet up with emily and Dani.
I took the tube then into the area of the Houses of Parliment. I had arranged to meet Dani and Emily at 2:00 by Big Ben. There was a lot to see around in that area. We walked around Westminister Abby and saw other massive buildings but im not sure of the names of most of them. This day I did remember my camera! But the battery only lasted so long, and it died about half way through the day. Since I didnt yet have a converter for the different power outlets, I couldnt charge my camera the whole time I was in London, so these are the only pictures I took with my camera.
While we were in this area we met up with Dani's group of guy friends at a pub/restaurant. There I enjoyed my first glass of warm beer, a London Pride. I am deffinately not used to warm beer and didnt care for it much. After eating, the group went to the Eye (the giant and slow ferris wheel) but I stayed back and looked around at the shops. I wasnt used to the cold yet and didnt feel like sitting outside for a long time.
After that we took the tube back to the hotel and
That night Dani went out for a night on the town with the boys, but Emily needed to get some of her luggage from her friend Tobby's place. He lives in a really nice area by Tower Bridge. We took the tube there and were able to see it at night. It is a beautiful and clean area with a mixture of both very old buildings and very modern buildings. It was close to the Tate Museum also, but I never got a chance to go there. Toby is a very friendly guy who knows emily because they both helped out the band - Unkle Bob, and are friends with the group. He is really into running and was preparing to run 155 miles in the Sahara Desert over a 6 day time period. He raised over 6000 pounds for the charity. How cool! Crazy
After we got Emily's luggage we made it back to the hotel and passed out after Dani got back.
20th March
We rose and all ate breakfast at the hotel. Then we went to Buckingham Palace to view the Changing of the Guards. Before we made it to the Palace, we stopped off at St. James Palace to see the beginning of the guards. It was interesting so see how precise they were with their movements and how they stayed perfectly together. They actually looked a lot like the gaurds of the witch in the Wizard of Oz. After a while of doing stuff in the courtyard there, they started their march down the street and round the corner to Buckingham Palace. There was a huge crowd of tourists there waiting for them to arrive so they could see it. We followed them and joined the back of the crowd. It was a pretty long process but cool because there was also a band that followed them and it was fun to hear the random music that they played. There were a lot of police officers standing around (maybe volunteer police?) and Dani fell in love with one of them. So of course we were girls and had to follow him around to get a picture with him. There was basically a line of people that wanted to get a picture with him and other officers.
After that excitement we decided we would be really touristy and pay to get into the Tower of London. So we took the tube there and bought a ticket. It was a cold and moist day but it added to the dark mysteries of the Tower of London Area. It was like a small village with a lot of castle like buildings with several large towers. It was all surrounded by a mote and a wall. The towers are known for being used as jails, places to hold prisoners, and places of torture and death. For hundreds of years Kings and Queens sentenced many people here to solitary confinment and methods of torture, many of the reasons had to do with religion and the struggle between Catholics and Protistants. However some prisoners were held in very comfortable settings and still had a good amount of freedom within the walls. It was really cool to see all of the settings that real things like that happened.
The Tower of London is also a place where the Crown Jewels are kept and an exhibit of crowns.
After viewing the towers and crowns, Emily Dani and I enjoyed some tea and scones and shared a slice of cake. It was a perfect way to warm up and rest for a bit.
When we left the Tower of London we traveled to a part of London that is known for its Pubs. We were supposed to meet up with our group of guy friends but they ended up not being able to make it. We went into the pub that we were supposed to meet them at at 6:30 but the place was packed. When people get off work they immediatly go grab some drinks at a pub. Partying starts and ends early because the pubs only stay open until midnight. So we decided to not stay there but go to a less crowded place. Well every place turned out to be very crowded so settled for the next place we went because we were starving and tired of walking. We enjoyed a nice meal, and continued afterward at the bar. We stayed out as late as the pubs closed and then took a cab back to the hotel and went to bed. It was a fun night.
21st March
This morning Dani woke up to find that she only had 1/2 hour to get ready before her group left for the airport. She hurried and we all went down to the lobby to see her off, only to find that they werent going to leave for another hour. Relieved and feeling silly, we then took our time and ate some breakfast at the hotel. Soon though we really did have to say goodbye to Dani, who started crying and it was really sad. It was really strange for me because I was staying and I started to tell people that I had just moved there, even though it only felt like I was on vacation.
After Dani left Emily and I got ready and had to run to catch our bus to Liverpool. It just so happened that the tube by the hotel was shut down for the day, so we had to quickly figure out the bus schedule to get to the train/bus station. We were worried we would miss it, but it all worked out and we got there just in time. We were able to nap and chill out on our 5 1/2 hour trip to Liverpool.
I had a great time in London, but I was also ready to check out Liverpool and have a more personal connection with a place and get to know somewhere. It is hard to do this in London because it is so big. It was fun to see all of the old stuff in London and be a tourist, but I can only stand being a tourist for so long...
