Rambling: A Week in London

Well, after spending a week in London, the easiest way to summarize is that I could definitely live here.  I was too busy to write during the week so now, waiting at the insanely crowded airport at 5:30am, I’ll try to recap:

First pic on the new cam!  At the top of St. Paul's Cathedral, which is unbelievable.

 The craziest thing happened on the flight from Chicago – it turned out that the girl sitting next to me not only was going to the same hostel as I was, but invited me to join her in the cab she had arranged – for free!  She is a PhD student at Northwestern on her way to do research at the British Library archives so the university is paying for her trip, including her cabs (and mine!).  It seemed like the best luck I could have and instantly assured me that things always work out (for any readers of The Alchemist, I’d call it ‘beginners’ luck’).

My hostel, thankfully, seemed exactly like I expected from the website – edgy and brightly painted, full of hundreds of people my age from all over the world, and crowded but secure (I’m so mad I forgot the take a photo!).  We didn’t arrive until around midnight and my dark dorm room looked like a girl’s closet had exploded – dresses hanging from the windowsills, suitcases strewn around, and toiletries lining the one shelf.  Clearly these people trusted their fellow hostel community and felt no need for suitcase locks – also reassuring.

The next few days were a whirlwind of site-seeing.  I didn’t want to get too overwhelmed by trying to see everything but also didn’t want to regret missing out on something just because I was too lazy to get up early. I was able to see St. Paul’s cathedral, the Tower of London, the London eye and the southbank, Shakespear’s Globe Theater, the Ragged School Museum, the British Library, the National Gallery, the British Museum, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and the House of Parliament with Big Ben.  Whew! The sheer amount of history this place has can kind of boggle your mind – it can make Chicago feel like a toddler, age-wise. It is home, afterall, to (in no particular order... well, maybe some order) Shakespear, the Beatles, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Chaucer, Samuel Johnson, Harry Potter, Oliver Twist, the Little Princess, the children of Narnia, James Bond, the Spice Girls, and centuries of royalty.  Highlights included the amazing architecture of St. Paul’s (also, getting picked by 4 grown men on a photo scavenger hunt on the steps of St. Paul's), discovering a new favorite artist, William Turner, in the National Gallery (also, getting lost after the National Gallery), and the medieval history of the Tower of London (also, walking in the men’s bathroom at the Tower of London).  The whole city is buzzing with special events for the queen’s Diamond Jubilee (60^th anniversary to her coronation) along with post-Olympics topics (one newspaper had at least five articled dedicated to the conclusion and question of what to do with the Olympic park now – they closed it before the public was invited for viewing, which surprised many people, including me!) 

Crowns on display for the Jubilee at the Tower of London.

Big Ben!  And the House of Parliament.

Just matching the decor of the City Year London office :-)  (which is, obviously, way nicer than Chicago)

A close up of the Rosetta Stone, which has the code that allowed us to read hieroglyphics for the first time. The artifacts in the British Museum are insane (...because it's things they've stolen over the course of history).

Walking across the Tower Bridge

Indian take-away food, enjoyed at the park next to Buckingham Palace. Yes.

One of my favorite days was when I took a daytrip to the Cotswolds, the English countryside.  Let me start by saying that I’m pretty proud of my trip planning and execution – I ended up taking 9 separate buses/trains, using 4 different providers, and made it without much hassle!  I explored Cheltenham in the morning, Winchcombe and Sudeley castle in the afternoon, then stopped by Glaucester in the evening.  Even just riding the trains around the Cotswolds was awesome, especially during sunrise (I left super early!).  I jotted this down while on the train:

The train passes though curving tunnels of green, revealing perfect towns of limestone and chimneys between the folds, offering themselves up to be discovered again and again.  The sun casts light to boast the richness of the emerald grass and foliage, and they seem to glow from within.  As purple tree-topped hills guard the horizon, a senseless rainbow appears, suspended without clouds, as if confirming that this place is indeed magical.  A quick glance in the other direction is met with tiny sheep, dotting a field like fuzzy white dandelions.

Cheltenham was a nice town but more commercial that I was expecting – the most popular activity seemed to be shopping at the posh stores.  I decided to head to Winchcombe earlier than planned and found the most charming town you’ve ever imagined, straight from a storybook.  I got a macaroon from the bakery, walked around, and had tea and a grape-and-brie sandwich in the garden of a teashop, overlooking the sheep in the fields.  I met a sweet German woman who’s lived here for 60-something years yet kept forgetting certain words and slipping into German (weirdly, I also met separately two other old women on this day – one who used to be an art teacher in Cheltenham and one who moved here from Singapore 30-something years ago.  I haven’t met really anyone my age yet but old ladies seem no problem!).  Sudeley castle, which is what brought me to Winchcombe, is just as enchanted as the town. It felt magical from the front gate – images from Alice and Wonderland, Harry Potter, and the Secret Garden ran through my head. I learned on the tour that it has a long history, with it’s most well-known owner being Katherine Parr, the 6^th and final wife of King Henry VIII (all of his previous wives died, were dismissed, or were killed, like Anne Boleyn).  The photos really speak for themselves: 

Good morning!

English countryside from the train - there's a faint rainbow!

Winchcombe - is this not the cutest town you've ever seen?

Why yes, I will sit in the tea garden.

Just hanging out

Amazing gardens at the castle.  This one had Dr. Seuss-shaped bushes.

Winchcombe from the castle.

I sat on a bus with some local middle school girls, with their blazer/micro-miniskirt school uniforms, iphones, and gossip.  I couldn’t help but wonder/worry about the population trend here in recent years – no doubt many girls like them will want to escape to some place more exciting as soon as they can.  The last stop of the day was Glousester, a larger city in the Cotswolds, which I found to have not much charm (or weirdly even people walking around…) but IS home to Glousester cathedral, which was used to film several scenes of Hogwarts in Harry Potter.  It wasn’t exactly peak visiting hours when I visited, making it kind of awkward that I was creeping around with a camera while a service was starting.  Oh well.

HARRY POTTER LIVES HERE.

Besides the sightseeing, I did some normal things too.  I stayed the last half of the week with my cousin, Karl Erik, and his girlfriend, and got to experience some delicious meals and London’s pubs.  The regular routine here is that after work, people go straight to the pub to have a drink, often standing outside, followed by a few more drinks at a few more pubs, then dinner, then home – the pubs traditionally close around 11 or 12!  Some of them had groups of men in suits standing around outside with beers in hand by 3 or 4pm.  I like the earlier schedule because it’s more conducive to weekday socializing, versus meeting for dinner at 9pm and staying out til 1am.  Meals included a Vietnamese noodle dish WITH MINI SPRINGROLLS IN PLACE OF MEAT, Turkish sarma and veggies at an ocakbasi restaurant, and appetizers and burgers at a cookout Karl Erik and Michelle hosted. Yum.  

SO MANY SUITS standing around the pubs.

Turkish bakery :-) My cousin just happens to live in a neighborhood with a large Turkish population

Dinner on the last night!

I really feel like I could slip into a life here.  Everyone seems well-traveled, likely because they are, the country feels healthier in many ways, and I enjoy being called “dear” or “love” by clerks everywhere. More photos to come on facebook.  All it all, it was simply a brilliant holiday.  Cheers!