jolly ole england!

It's just life...

So remember in my last post how I talked about creepy men from the hostel? Well, I found this one man to be particularly creepy. He's probably in his late 20s or early 30s, and he smells like a combination of Old Spice, alcohol, and body odor. He speaks very broken English, but he ALWAYS has this huge grin on his face, like he has no idea what's going on in the world. He also listens to his ipod as loud as it'll go, and there's horrible music playing constantly. As he listens to the said ipod, he bobs his head obnoxiously. Every time I used the common room to get Wifi at the hostel, he would come and sit ridiculously close to me while listening to the music and bobbing his head. It was awkward, and I was happy to leave th hostel because I thought I'd never see him again. Oh, I was wrong! We were waiting at the bus stop to catch our bus to the airport, and he randomly appears behind us. I have no idea where he came from, but Emily was laughing uncontrollably, and I didn't know why until I turned around, and he was standing directly behind me. He was grinning and bobbing his head. I just turned back around and pretended like I didn't see him until he said, "Bus at 7 and 9 tomorrow. No 8?". I said no, and he said, "You go to airport?" We nodded. He bobbed his head and walked down the sidewalk. AWKWARD! I hope I don't see him again!

We made it to the airport just fine, boarded our plane, and took off. Our Ryanair Jet actually ended up arriving in London 30 minutes early, which was amazing! I am impressed with Ryanair's ability to be on time. We caught the early bus to the Victoria bus station, and that was a good thing because it ended up taking us 70 minutes to get there due to construction. We still arrived ahead of schedule, though, but lucky for us, Gen and Lisa were early! We only had a few minutes before the tube closed down, though, so we sprinted down the sidewalks and underground. The tube people let us on for free because we only had 2 minutes before departure, and Emily and I didn't have pounds to pay with, and it wasn't taking our credit cards. We made it to Earl's Court, and Gen and Lisa escorted us to their flat. A Scholars House first floor reunion then took place:


It was definitely nice to see familiar faces and catch up on things. Plus, we're VERY thankful for a free place to crash. We fell asleep fairly early last night (around 1:30AM), and the London girls (plus JT) left early in the morning for a field trip. Emily and I took the tube to Westminster. We were greeted by Big Ben when we stepped off! After lots of picture taking, we opted to ride the London Eye during the day time. Here's a daytime photo from the top of the Eye:


There's Parliament, Big Ben, the cathedral, the Thames River, etc.


Here's a closer pic of Parliament (Right), Big Ben, and the Eye.

We tried to go to the cathedral and walk around, but we found out we had to pay a lot of money, and since we didn't have much time, we opted not to. Plus, it was pretty crowded due to Ash Wednesday. Instead, we opted for cheap lunch at Tesco, and we took the tube to Wicked.


When we got to Wicked, we were surprised to find that we actually had really decent seats. We had bought the cheapest ones possible, and although they were up high, they were in the dead center and provided excellent views of the stage. Wicked was AMAZING, despite the HUGE group of obnoxious junior high kids that surrounded us!! I still like the Lion King on Broadway better due to the amazing costumes and sets in it, but the music of Wicked was incredible. I am so glad we went! Wicked was wicked awesome, for sure. In case you don't know the plot, it's basically the prequel of The Wizard of Oz, and it explains why the Good Witch is called good and why the Wicked Witch is called wicked. It also explains how the tin man, lion, and scarecrow came to be. There is also a goat character in it that baaaahs a lot, and when he did so, it sounded a lot like the little Irish man who kept saying "Blaaaaackrock!" the other day.

We went to McDonald's afterwards (I think I'll make it a point to eat at one in every country since we do anyway. I'm sure Dad won't object to this when he comes in March!), and we had awkward encounter number two with strange man. We were taking a picture, and this grey-haired man offered to come up and do it for us. That seemed normal enough, so we said okay and he snapped the photo. Then, he asked us where we were from and when we said the USA, he said, "Me too. Kind of." He then proceeded to explain how he moved to the Czech Republic 3 years ago, and he hates returning to the US. I'm not sure he was all there in the head because he asked where we were from 3 times, and he confused Missouri with Minnesota, and he seems to think that Hillary Clinton and Obama are best friends. Eventually he ended up pulling up a chair next to us and urging us to visit the Czech Republic and telling us about how we need to convert our money to crowns because the exchange rate is so good. He was a little random and a lot creepy. We were happy when he finally decided to leave us alone. Oh, by the way, his name is Paul, and he designs websites for cameras with face recognition software, and apparently the Czech Republic is the best place to have a website company. Oh, and although he had a huge dinner to go to that night, he was eating at McDonald's. Strange? Yes. I hope the creepy men lay off for a while.

We went back to Westminster after dinner to take night shots. Here's Big Ben at night:


We took full advantage of our full day tube passes and took it to King's Cross. If you read Harry Potter, you know that this is where Platform 9 3/4 is. We took pictures with it, although it really wasn't anything great. I was reminded that I am, in fact, a Muggle (disappointing!!), as I did not make it through the wall. We then proceeded to Piccidilly, which turned out to be a lot like Times Square in NYC:


There was a slight difference in the fact that this lacked a Starbucks on every corner. We actually had to search for one! Like NYC, they have their own version of Chinatown and Little Italy. We didn't see Italy, but London's Chinatown is much cuter than NYC's, and it looked WAAAAY safer! That's always a good thing. We constantly see people who resemble people we know from MSU. We're going to start taking pictures of them soon so you all can see what we're talking about. We also tried to use the phone booth to call people, but we're not smart enough to figure out the calling card, so sorry to all of those who were desperately hoping to hear our voices from London... :)

Later today (it's 4AM here!) we're heading to Buckingham Palace to watch the changing of the guard. I'm not sure what else we'll do, but I'm coming back to London with Aaron, Mom, and Dad in March so I'll be able to see everything else then!

Today is February 7th, which probably doesn't mean a lot to most of you, but it holds a special little place in my heart. Today would have been my Mama's 75th birthday if she were still alive. I wear her wedding band on my finger, and I always think of her when I looked at it. However, I'll be thinking about her even more than normal today. As I gain these new experiences and view all of these beautiful places, I find myself wishing that she could be with me because I know that she loved traveling, and I also know that she, too, would sincerely love and appreciate all of God's amazing creations that I am seeing! However, I have to smile as I am reminded of the fact that she is daily experiencing the wonder and splendor of Heaven, and that is millions of times more beautiful than anything on this earth! So, today as I finish up in London and hop back on a plane to Spain, I'll think of my sweet little grandma and smile, knowing that I'll see her again one day, and until then, we're both being surrounded by beauty, and I'll take a little piece of her with me wherever I go. :)

...so keep dancing through!