FRIDAY January 23rd:
Last Friday we pretty much just took it easy. After the monumental breakdown that was Wednesday and Thursday for both of us, we decided that a lazy day was a great idea. So we just sat around and hung out until we had to get ready to go out Friday night. Bridget and I had looked in our SEVEN (Thank you Erin, love you!!!) guidebooks and decided to go to a club called “The Social.” After looking at the website, I decided to call and check on cover. It was free! We were sold! So we rushed over, told Hannah, Anitra and Lanette and made plans to get ready to go. Lanette was a bit tired and decided to stay in but Anitra and Hannah came over and we got ready to go. In this preparation, I learned an important skill: how to drink myself a jacket. Now I know this does not sound like a good idea, but I assure you – it comes in VERY handy! For one, coat check is £2 (a waste of money which can be spent on other things!) and if you are too stubborn to coat check (no idea who that could be…) then you have to either carry or keep track of your jacket all night…just not a good idea. The other thing I learned that night was that me wearing heels and going out is NOT a good idea…you can all form your own opinions on what happened haha...but I WILL say that I ended up walking through some of the London streets barefoot. Yes, I know that sounds gross, but the sticky club/bar floors are SO MUCH more gross than the streets (imagine that!)! So anyway, The Social was okay, it was a bit of an older crowd, mostly late 20s-early 30s but there was great dancing to some great American music and it was free cover, so it worked. We left after about an hour to roam the streets looking for a pub, but we ended up heading back to school (the Tubes close at midnight and we were too lazy (unable to…) figure out how to take the bus home that night) and ordering pizza.
SATURDAY January 24th:
Bridget and I had tickets to go see Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” So we made our way to Covent Garden tube station where we climbed 193 stairs to street-level!!! Covent Garden is six stories underground and since most of the tube stations have escalators, we thought nothing of it. There was a HUGE crowd waiting for the elevator, we had to make it to the theatre by a certain time, and Bridget is afraid of elevators….so I said “let’s take the stairs, they are over here!” As soon as we started climbing we saw the sign that said “this staircase has 193 stairs! No stopping or turning back!” So we climbed, and climbed. And on we climbed…
By about stair 115 I was strapped for breath. This asthmatic was having a HARD time breathing and was wheezing A LOT!! By stair 193 it was a full blown asthma attack, I could NOT breathe. As Bridget looked at a map trying to figure out where the theatre was, I fumbled through my purse to find my inhaler. “Thank God I brought it this time,” I thought, since I don’t usually because I am too stubborn to use it normally. However, my inhaler was new and this one is special and needs to be “primed.” I did not remember how to do this and there was NO time to try and pull out the instructions and read them. So I did it how I thought I should, and then just used it anyway. To make a longer story short…I did it wrong and it was not as effective as it should have and needed to be.
So still wheezing a bit and huffing and puffing a lot, we made our way through Covent Garden (a really cute little area with lots of shops and public performances in the middle) to the Theatre District and the Novello Theatre in anticipation of getting our tickets and seeing the play. The performance was FABULOUS and very well-done!
By the time it was over, Bridget and I were starving so we headed to Pizza Express. OMG! The pizza was AMAZING! After a slight mishap/misunderstanding about British restaurant culture Bridget and I headed back to campus for a quiet night.
TUESDAY January 27th:
Bridget and I went on a walking tour for her Literary London class. We saw The Tower of London, the Roman Wall, All Hallows Church, Tower Bridge, The London Bridge, Southwark Cathedral, The Millennium Bridge, The Waterloo Bridge, The Tate Modern, the National Theatre, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre and more! It was so pretty and my pictures (yes, even the ones that I was NOT supposed to take inside the cathedral that I took anyway…) certainly do not do the sites any justice at all. It was a gorgeous, sunny day and it was all just absolutely beautiful! I had Bridget pinch me a couple times (though she took it too far!) to make sure that I was really here seeing these things right in front of my eyes!
THURSDAY January 29th:
We decided to head out and see some more sites of London. We made our way to Trafalgar Square first (so that we could get daytime pictures since we only had nighttime ones!) and then headed over to Big Ben, Parliament and Westminster Abbey (once again, I took pictures that I was not supposed to but I sincerely did not know this time…I am so going to get myself arrested one of these days…lol)
After this, we headed in the direction that we thought Buckingham was in. See, I had suggested that we grab a map before we left, but Bridget quite adamantly decided that it would pinpoint us as tourists and that she did not want to have to stop and pull out a map to figure out where to go. I did not make a fuss (initially) since I had seemed to assume the role of stopping and asking people for directions to places since we got here (some of the people I asked turned out to be FABULOUS choices, btw!). So we walked and walked and walked and decided to duck into Starbucks for a bit to recharge (the raspberry peach muffin = AMAZING, btw and I TOTALLY need them to make them in the US!).
After Starbucks, we walked on a bit more and had pretty much almost made up our minds to just head back to campus and call it a day. I was greatly disappointed by this but knew that realistically it would not have been the worst decision to retackle this a day we had a map and/or had planned it out better. But then I saw a sign: “Buckingham Palace left!” “NO WAY!” I groaned, there had been no signs and NOW as we are ready to head home there was a sign. My whining was supposed to suppress the disappointment I felt, but much to my pleasure Bridget stopped and said, “Alright, let’s go!” “REALLY?!” I inquired. “Yea, we have come this close and walked this far, let’s go!” I was soooo freakin’ excited! So we walked on a bit more and finally made our way to Buckingham Palace! It was absolutely GORGEOUS!!!! I could not believe that I was really here, seeing this! So after lots of obligatory picture taking we walked through Green Park to make our way to the Tube and headed back to school to grab dinner and get ready to go out.
We decided to go (as did 85% of our school) to O’Neills Irish Pub in Piccadilly Circus near Chinatown. As I am sure you are all aware Chinese New Year is coming up and so the entire area was decorated! It was soo exciting! So we made our way to the pub, waited patiently as they carded, and then headed inside to the three floors of chaos! We hung out for about an hour just talking and dancing a bit and then headed upstairs to the dance floor right before the live band went on. The band was FANTASTIC and it was a lot of fun just letting go and dancing to some of my favorite songs. A little after 12 Bridget and I decided that we were gonna head back. It was hot – (we brought real jackets this time…never again…) and we were hoping to catch the tube before it closed (hahah I love that our laziness dictates what time we go home…lol). Luckily, we just made the last tube!
FRIDAY January 30th:
40 years ago today (January 30, 1969) The Beatles gave their last public performance on the roof 3 Savile Row, London. As you all know, I LOVE The Beatles and was so excited to go and see the building, even if it was completely different than it was. So Bridget and I headed out with the intention of going to Piccadilly Circus and then Abbey Road. We got to Piccadilly Circus, found the street and building quite quickly and easily, I took pictures (DUH!) and then we headed towards Bond Street. We walked down it looking at all of the shops that we could not afford (Louis Vuitton, Chanel...etc.) and then headed to Regent’s Street and just walked around.
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