A comfortable 13 hour flight on a Malaysian Airlines 747 (no Indian TV shows on the movie screen at the front of the compartment this time) and Anita and John find themselves in beautiful London, England. This cosmopolitan hub is a highlight on the tour, mainly because of the chance to visit with their friends Kathy and Dave. Let's see if Anita and John can stay on budget in this wildly expensive city...
HE SAID:
more to come...
SHE SAID:
We loved London. It was my second time there (the first time was only for a day), and I had not seen a lot of it like this. And, we hung out with our friends. It was like home.
COMING TO THE WEST...AND JOINING FRIENDS
One reaction I remember was, not only were we excited to stay in this sparkling clean apartment with our friend, but we were overly excited when Kathy handed us plush, white, amazing smelling towels! We almost got a high off of the detergent smell when we stuck our noses in the towels and took it all in. Sigh... it seemed our non-fluffy quick dry travel towels didn't always cut it, and handwashing them also didn't do as much for us.
Oh yeah, and Dave wanted to kiss John, a lot.
LONDON STYLES
We went to check out the city with our friends...just seeing people who looked like us, and were also dressed quite well (with what was familiar), was very refreshing and exciting for me. It was funny that the weekend outdoor market we went to sold, I would say, 80% goods from Thailand that we had seen on sale there for a fraction of the cost. Even in Thailand I wasn't impressed with the quality or styles I saw, and although I'm happy Thailand is doing well with exporting goods, was disappointed that these are our options in Europe as well (I noticed in other countries as well).
BYE BYE COCKROACHES
Luckily, one of the biggest factors that made me uncomfortable in Asia was essentially gone...you could place your bare feet on the pavement all night in London, just like most of Europe (I think?) and Canada, and not fear that a big cockroach will be passing through from his/her sewer and go after the dark shadows around your feet. Though I know we have these 'critters' too, I think I can say this with certainty!
OVERALL
After we took over the laundry machine and washed essentially everything, we had a chance to do lots of walking, sightseeing, and great Art Gallery visits despite the cold and rainy weather in London! Also, we went to some wonderful restaurants, one being "Maroush", a Lebanese restaurant chain in London....with AMAZING food. Considering that my mom is Lebanese Armenian, everything I ate was like home...mmmmmm, so tasty! Plus, my mom at this time was in Lebanon, so I had a chance to ask the owners about what they know of the situation over there since some fighting had just begun there, again.
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