Day Two... er Not Counting Arrival...
Trip Start
Jun 27, 2008
1
3
11
Trip End
Jul 11, 2008
London,
United Kingdom
Monday, June 30, 2008
Now, I knew Harrods was supposed to be expensive; and I was prepared for that. But, it was still super depressing. I did the "OH! That's a cute coat! Oh, that's a 2000 dollar coat..." thing many times while browsing the designer fashions sections. And let me tell you: the designer fashions section is basically the ENTIRE STORE. I have to say, though, that a lot of designer clothing is ugly as hell; and I really don't know why people would pay massive amounts of money for them. However, some stuff was pretty sweet and I promised that when I become extremely rich, I will come back and buy stuff just because I can. Also, I enjoyed playing the "lets guess how much that shirt is" game.
Before I even went in the expensive section, I spent a lot of time in the Harrods shop, which is like a gift shop. They sell all sorts of things at reasonable prices, most of them saying Harrods somewhere on them. We bought a few all purpose bags for people who were watching our house and dogs for us. They were really cheap because- OH MY GOD. I forgot! Harrods just started their only sale of the year; though it doesn't help much because that 2000 dollar coat just becomes a 1000 dollar coat- Anyway, the sale made the bags cheap. I even decided to get one for myself, though it turned out to be one of the ones not on sale. They were the prettiest bags, too. All black (my favourite color) and awesome. Now, I am an indecisive person when it comes to unimportant things, so I ended up agonizing over the shiny version or the not shiny version of this one bag for like 45 minutes. Meanwhile, my mother had gone into hungry mode and had gone off to find something to eat. Though, it might have been that she was tired of waiting for me to pick out a bag after she told me that one reminded her of Las Vegas and that the other one was classier. The Las Vegas one was much prettier on the inside tough...
My indecisiveness led to me searching out my mom. I found her eating a sandwich, which I had some of and learned that Harrods food was ridiculously good. I also got a diet coke - a SEVEN DOLLAR DIET COKE! Preposterous. It was then that I finally chose a bag, and it turned out not to be the Las Vegas one or the supposedly more classy one.
After Harrods my mom and I walked to Knightsbridge station to take the Piccadilly line to Charring Cross. This involved me getting unceremoniously pulled out of an H & M and my mom exchanging some money. Luckily, we eventually got on the train and arrived at Charring Cross a few minutes later.
The plan was to meet Jeffrey at the National Gallery, because it and Charring Cross are in (or under in Charring Cross's case) Trafalgar Square. It took us a while to find him, but we did eventually. By that time my mother was hungry again, which resulted in us going to a "tearoom" recommended by the guide book. It ended up being more of a deli for the National Portrait Gallery. Liars! The book was Knopf Mapguides, if you care. They are really great because they have compact labeled maps of each area of the city, making them easy and convenient. You can get them for many major cities around the world, but unfortunately sometimes the places are played up a bit. Now that I am done advertising for them, I will continue with my story. We got some food and drinks then split up again. Jeff suggested what we should see in the National Gallery and went into the National Portrait Gallery.
I'm not a big fan of museums. Actually, I hate most of them, so I zoomed through half of it in under half an hour. I only bothered to stop at things I liked, and then only for ten seconds or so. After that I followed my mom around and gave what I thought was genius commentary on a few chosen paintings I had learned about in my AP European History class. In fact, I was able to give more info and background on the Marriage a La Mode by Hogarth than the plaques did. It's a fairly interesting set of paintings that tell the story of a couple's marriage arranged by their greedy parents in 18th or 19th century France. It shows the ugly side of unwanted marriages in a group of exquisite paintings. You should look them up! Sadly, the second painting of the set was missing.
After the all the museuming (just add ing and it becomes a verb) I could take, we met up with Jeff again. Just so you know, he said the National Portrait Gallery is very interesting, but the repetitiveness of seeing faces gets dull after a while. Anyway, we walked up Haymarket Street to Piccadilly Circus and went in some of those very touristy shops where everything says either London or England on it (or both!). We also stopped in a pub and got some fish and chips, but they weren't very good. We cruised down Shaftesbury Avenue for a while, until... BEHOLD! CHINA TOWN! I was stocked. I had found Chinatown. That had made me very happy because I love Asia.
First thing my mom did wass go into some little gambling place and proceed to win money. That woman is so lucky it's disgusting. After that, I went into a grocery store because Asian grocery stores are just about the coolest things ever. I bought a bottle of Ramune and a box of Pocky. I was very happy, though I couldn't figure out how to open the Ramune. Somehow, during this time, my mother and Jeff had scheduled themselves massages for 7pm. Thus, I was left alone to shop for half an hour. I came back with hairclips and shoelaces, cause those are totally Chinese, right? I even managed to find myself a meat bun, which as far as I am concerned is the best culinary creation in existence. Sometime during this I figured out how to open the Ramune.
Once the massages were done, we went to Pizza Hut. But not any ordinary Pizza Hut. This was the nicest Pizza Hut I had ever seen. There were waiters and real food! It was amazing. The eating completed, we walked to Tottenham Court Road station and took the tube back to the apartment.
I then proceeded to make my friends mad by reminding them that I was in England and they weren't. Oh, the wonders of instant messaging
Something I Learned Today: British people don't understand the concept of lanes while driving, or the lines that divide the street into two directions of traffic.
