London.
Day 1 (3/22):
I put £8 in the internet at the airport to use it for a little over an hour. The pound coins here just look so much like quarters.I wasn´t thinking.
I spent £6.5 getting a one day travel pass to get to the hostel. As we pass all the little neighborhoods, I realize I´m in London and I realize I am excited.
I get off at my stop and think I am at a deserted brick subway stop, until I turn around and see hundreds of people on the other side. All in their outfits, waiting to go home, it would make a great picture but I´m not ready to whip out my camera just yet. I buy a map from a vending machine and make my way up top in search of my hostel. Crap people drive really fast here. Little residendial streets and cars are zipping down them. The sidewalks aren´t much safter, they are narrow and everyone rushes up and down them, I feel like I´m breaking up the seemless flow so I veer off to a sidestreet.
In "Neither here nor there" Bill Bryson talks about how when he first went to europe, he walked around in amazement. That person was a luxemburger. so was that person. And I think it´s a usual, natural, noncopycat reaction because I have it to as I walk around getting more excited. that bird is a london bird. There´s a london mom yelling at her london child. That´s a london garden. And a london street. And a london shop. I´m in london!
I find my hostel and settle in. And then explore a little. I eat non discript carrabien food with a sullen waitress at a chain resturant (I didn´t know it was a chain when I walked in and ordered, I though I was supporting a family establishment) and I study my map and decide what I´ll do the next few days, and if I´ll stay here longer or not.
My roommates are two very nice american boys who are from Boston and a british guy. The bostonians talk about the huge boston road project. I go downstairs and wait for an hour with a few other poor souls for the free internet. You are only supposed to use it for a half hour. but two girls who I saw there an hour or more earlier are having to much fun chatting and checking their my space accounts. I will never have a my space account. but I think I vowed never to have a blog. When I finally get a computer and I see more poor souls waiting and waiting and I nicely remind the girls that you really are only supposed to be on it for a half hour if people are waiting "and you guys..." I let them finish the sentence in your minds. One of them gives me a sassy who the heck are you look " Yeah. Ok." She goes back to the computer looking at pictures and commenting that soandso is so ugly and such a flirt. I´m too tired to want to smack her. Her quieter blond friend announces she´s going to bed and the other girl protests. but blond girl leaves and her friend glares at me. Hah. but my half hour is also up so I go upstairs and go to bed.
Day 2 (3/23): I woke up at 8. I go to the bathroom to change. I have breakfast- toast, apricot jam, several cups of tea and orange juice, a little milk , bread of my own (rosemary bread that I bought in the mall, it´s not the greatest, but it´s better than sliced bread). I sit across from a german girl and her mom. It is fun to see people from germany, a lot of them look like me. The rest of the table is infested with italian kids who are shouting and gesturing to their freinds at the end of the table. Apparently the germans and I are preventing a happy breakfast gathering for them. The second I get up my chair is taken and my cup and plate are pushed aside as they swoop in to be one unit. I put my food at another table and look at the wartime photographs (lttle london kids being reunited with their parents after the war).
I go back upstairs and take advantage of the inroom sink by washing my clothes. I know the american boys have checked out so I use their towels to dry my clothes. Some things become much less gross when you travel. Normally I would never touch anyones used towel. But it´s perfect today. I feel very tired and I write down an inventory of my backpack till 2, and then use the free internet till 3. I get a cheap flight (£40 or 90) bookedto biarritz. On the ryanair website they only have passport or identification instructions for uk and european citizens. What if I get there (after spending £15 on the train ticket there) and find out I can´t fly because i´m from the us. Of course I´m not going to call, I´ll just vaugely worry about it.
I walk down the street and find an organic store with a deli. £5 for a little bin of tofu, lentils, beets, and pasta. I buy postcards and then walk past several shops selling scarves. oh I want them. I want them all. Everyone in london is wearing a stripped fringed scarf that they have neatly looped around their neck. and since it is a good travel rule to try fit in with the locals, I buy two for £5. The first thing I find in kensington gardens is a gated playground. It looks fabulous. It has an actual pirate ship, teepees and I want to see it. Only it has a heavy security gate, lots of cameras and a large sign that reads
"No adults without children are allowed" I glance around to see if there is a spare child to borrow, but don´t see any, so I resign myself to never see the fun playground. But then I see that london doesn´t like to descriminate against the childless, so there is a small sign that reads:adults without children under the age of 12 may view the garden at 9:30 before the playground opens at 10:00. Excellent.
I walk through Kensington gardens and it´s lovely, but there is on thing I really want to see in Hyde park. I was looking through a travel magazine a couple years ago, and there was an announcement that the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain had opened. It could be the Melba Sue May Memorial fountain and I wouldn´t have cared. All I cared about is by this was a sunny picture of 2 girls with their shoes off, wearing stylish sundressed, wading through a looping concrete fountain. And I wanted to be there. In a sundress, with my shoes off, walking in the concrete ring. The picture only was of a small part of it, since it said it was a ring, I hadcompleted the picture in my mind. An enourmous, mile long celtic ring of a fountain covered the park full of sunshine and joy. So, of course, I was a little disapointed when I came upon a single boring circle of gray concrete in the wet ground, about 30 feet or so in diameter. And there was a serious sign telling you that you couldn´t play in the fountain, only sit on the side and dip your toes in (to cold for that). I reserved dissapointment and walked around it. After awhile it won me over. If you were right by it and just concentrated on the fontain, you saw that no part of the fountain was like the other part. The sides twisted around- narrow on the right and fat on the left until they looped and were the same size, but then switched, the right got larger and the left shrunk. And it was really many fountains contained in one circular river. Steps bet bubbles, which met a narrow steam of water, leading to a little waterfall, shooting spickets, and then an irregular surface which produced an almost musical sound.This fountain could even be fun for people who can´t see. I test this by closing my eyes and listening to each fountains sound. Yep. fun.
After 20 minutes I keep walking and stumbled unto a photo shoo. The photographer was cursing and barking orders to his assistants. The models are typically tall and skinny, one is in a yellow 50´s dress and the other is in a white coat. So if you´re a magazine addict and see two girls in such outfits standing on either side of a stone bench- I was there. Noone else seemed to care about the photo shoot. Bicycles buzzed by, women hurridly clipclopped with their high heels down the long path. My leg started to hurt after all the walking in sandels, so I readjusted it by doing my tai chi walk. I got a few stares, but it worked. pain free.
There had been a question in my mind that had been nagging me and I finally figured it out. WHERE were all the homeless people? the pan handelers? The scary men up to no good who stand in doorways and street corners? Not once have I been asked for money. Not once have I seen anyone asking for money. This is London. London is a huge city and I´ve been around it and nothing. Do they lock them up? Actually take care of them? I braved my way across the busy square. I still can´t believe how fast everyone drives here. Even the enormous buses just barrel down the street. I walked past the fancy buildings and found the best window display I´ve ever seen. Maybe not the best, but it made me laugh and laugh. It had all these male manniquens, who were dressed quite stylishly, with scarves as their key assesory. Tied around their waist just so, looped around the neck, tied in their hair. They were all very pretty and I don´t think I´ll ever see a guy dressed like that is des moines. A girl, sure. A guy, no. During daylight anyways. It´s gotten pretty dark. The policemen are driving through hyde park and locking it up. I get lost in a pedestrian walkway and realize I could meet one of the absent scary men who hide in doorways if I don´t get home quickly so I stick to main streets.
I get a £4 kebab (which is not on a stick but like a gyro. I feel slightly uncivilized, eating my kebab on the sidewalks, but it´s tasty, so I don´t really care. the londoners can deal with it.
And on a sidenote: toilets in london do not like to flush.
Day 3: (3/24):I am a little tired of being in a room with all guys. Not that I really planned it. To ensure I´m not sleeping in a train station, I always tell any hostel I´m alright with a mixed room (if they don´t offer an all female one, or I havn´t booked it). I usually get put in one, only I don´t notice because it´s always been all girls.I think most of the hostels I stayed at in the us try their hardest to keep the sexs´seperate. Just calling it a mixed room gives the hostel possible flexibility. Most HI hostels however, don´t mess with that. No girls with boys! no boys with girls! a lot of people don´t like HI hostels. I don´t really care as long as rats aren´t crawling over me and I have access to a shower and a toilet. That So of all my 30 different mixed room experiences' this is the first actual mixed room.
It got very tiring last night. My friendly american boys were replaced by a cell phone using, keyboard clicking german, an alcholic english guy, and the one from the night before. All of them did the following: sniffed rather than blowing their noses, commented how hot it was and opened the window the second they came in (it really wasn´t hot), and ignored eacthoer and talked to me. They all went to bed late. They were all gone when I woke up. I ate breakfast: toast, jam, orange juice, tea, and the rest of my hunk of bread. I took a showere and check out at 1030. I dropped my luggage off at my new hostel, which was 2 blocks away. Without asking for my ID, they gave me a key to a closet full of bags. I couldn´t for the life of me get the door open. I love the look of bone keys (herringbone?). I secured my bags and managed to lock the door. Crap. Forgot my map. Labourously try to open the door again, and 5 minutes later I open it. Walk out of the hostel and feel like I´ve forgotten something else. Where´s my rain jacket? My pink, expensive, not mine rainjacket that I´m borrowing from turtle. I walk back to the closet, look in the window and there it is. Laying on the bags, all pink and stealable. My gosh michelle. I start to question how I´ve been able to survive for 25 years, then remember I don´t need to insult myself. But my gosh. My 3rd battle with the key proves to be a loosing one. I am crouched on the floor, trying to squint and get the stupid key right where it needs to be. A hostel guy walks by me and laughs. I can see I´m going to be making a lot of friends here After 5 minutes, a hostel maid takes pity on me and opens the door for me. I grab the rainjacket and double check everything. I´m good. I jump on the notting hill bus which terminates after a mile. So I just decide to grab a random bus-268. The busses alarm me. The way they zoom down the streets along wit the car. I eep expecting to hear a splatbut on´t.
People watching on a double decker bus is fabulous. I could do it everyday, all day, for a week and still not be tired of it. There´s a women in a green sweater talking to a shop keeper. And there´s a little kid riding a bike. And there´s a women who is completly cordinated (I´m going to spell check these things when there is more time, for now you´ll have to forgive me). Black shoes, silver buckle, red tights, silver and black dress, red scarf, silver glasses. I love how cordinated and matched the london women are. After being on bus 268 for 40 minutes we pass a large, hilltop cemetary and my heart leaps. I want to get off here. >So I do.
It was the haringbord cemetary I think. I wander around and see the greatest sign ever. A little boy is standing dumbfounded as another kid pushes a large angle statue on him. The angel glares at the boy it´s about to smash and in large block letters above this frightening scene is
CEMETARIES ARE NOT PLAYGROUNDS. Hah. What a great poster. It´s almost as great as the
DON´T SHAKE YOUR BABY billboard I saw once. Now. Don´t get me wrong. I sincerly concure that you
should not push angel statues on your friends in cemetaries and really should never ever shake your baby, or any baby for that matter. But because I would never consider doing it or think about doing it, seeing it in bold serious letters on a huge poster or billboard just gives me a small fit of giggles. The cemetary was deserted but really nice. There were huge monuments and statues everywhere. There was noone else around, so I didn´t get to treat it as a playground. The peacefulness of it with the mist and little paths covered in brush and ivy started to creep me out after an hour, so I caught a bus to trafalger square. I love riding buses around, you just observe and if you see something that captures you, you jump off. The next thing that captured me was a sign for £5.99 all you can eat pizza buffet. I ate all I could. Any chance I get to eat vegetables I do. And since lettuce is crap for nutrients, I ate a lot of lima beans, corn and beets (and pizza). I took the metro to the london tower, and when I got out of the station, there it was, the tower castle. Then I saw something more beautiful. Toffee apples, £1. Ah! all i have is a 20 or 95p.
Michelle. you are at the tower castle and just ate all you could. Go explore. Toffee. apple. I´ll just break my 20.
You´re at a castle! Castles aren´t sweet.
They can be, in a tasting life sense.Fine. Lets go see the dumb castle.
I think you´ll be ok.Now. this little exchange might concern some. but really, I just really like toffee apples. or anything tasty from a stand for £1. I´m very passionant about it. I walk all around the public wall that surrounds the tower castle and then watch a free 20 minute video at the visitor center that shows everything in the tower castle that any visitor that pays is about to see. I´m fully satisfyed by the video. I just had a fufilling and free tour. I walk happily to the tower bridge and walk across. After barely using my camera, I´m starting to get into taking a picture of everything I like or see. Which is everything. When I start to walk back over the bridge I realize I can´t. there is an enormous cruise ship that is slowly making it´s way under the bridge. Everyone seems pretty excited about this. All the tourists on the bridge wave or take pictures of the people shouting and waving on the cruise ship. I give in and take pictures as well. When the bridge reconnects a lot of londoners, who I don´t think were as thrilled to be waiting 25 minutes for a cruise ship to cross, hurry across the bridge. I walk back around the tower hill, appreciating the castle at night and then hop the metro back home.
