Getting to London on Friday
I had my first experience with Ryanair, the cheap low-budget airline that flies all over Europe. It does not however, fly to Luxembourg, so we had to get to the nearest airport where they fly: Frankfurt-Hahn. To get there, one must take a two-hour bus ride from the Luxembourg train station. This service, provided by Flibco buses, is not bad. It was like 17 euros one way and the buses themselves are really comfortable. So we arrived at Frankfurt Hahn at about 5:45, for our 7:30 flight. Check in went really fast, but I had some issues at security. You are only allowed to bring a Quart-sized ziploc bag for your liquids. So if you have your liquids in a gallon size bag, you're screwed, and they'll make you get out of line and go buy a smaller bag at the store. Luckily, Pat had an extra bag for me, so it wasn't a big issue.
The boarding system is most aptly described as a giant cluster - there are no assigned seats on these Ryanair flights, so everyone jockeys for position to get in line. Then you run out to the plane and board via the tarmac. The seats are pretty cramped, as are the overhead bins, since pretty much everyone is just rolling with carry-ons. Anyways, it was pretty easy getting to London-Stansted, the airport Ryanair flies into. But from there, we still had to get to the actual city of London.
So we took Easybus, a service that runs from London-Stansted to the city of London. It was a quick hour and ten minute bus ride to Baker Street, where our bus dropped us off. Then, we made it our mission to try to get to Chipotle. We arrived at Baker Street at about 10:15 pm or so, local time (Luxembourg is an hour ahead of London). We then went to the tube (subway) station, to try to figure out how to get there. At the tube station, we bought our Oyster Cards. The Oyster card is a budget traveler's bargain deal for use on London's public transportation. Basically, they require a deposit of 3 pounds (oh, the UK uses pounds, not euros, so the exchange rate for dollars is even worse), and then a deposit for a daypass or however much you wanna put on the card. But when you're done with your Oyster Card, you just take it back to the station, and they give you your 3 pounds PLUS whatever money you didn't use. It's awesome, and ended up only costing us like 10 pounds for all the tube and bus travel we did all weekend.
So we got off at the stop near Chipotle, got lost, went in the wrong direction three times, but eventually found our way to the promise land, and what's more - they were still open: Chipotle London stays open until 11:00 pm on weekdays and Saturday, thank goodness. So we rolled in, exhausted, starving, and I was actually crying a little bit because I was so happy that it was still open. Went up to order the food, and they were out of steak - said it would be a couple of minutes. I had waited over 80 days for my perfect burrito, I could wait another ten minutes while they made fresh steak. So I ordered my chips and guac, got my burrito all together, went up to the counter and asked if they had tap water - the girl at the register said, "Yeah, it's one pound," and as I started to ask if it was cheaper to just buy bottled water, she interrupted me, "I'm just kidding! It's free." Amazing. You do not know how rare it is to just find free tap water in Europe. Then, as I went to get my wallet out, she stopped me again, and said, "Because you were so patient with us, tonight, your meal is on us." WHAAAAAAAT?!? Not only did I get Chipotle, I got FREE CHIPOTLE. I didn't know what to say, so I just said, "God I love this country."
Here is a picture of the carnage:
Easily one of the most beautiful sights I've seen in Europe.
So after that, we headed to our hotel to meet Pat's grandma. It was a really nice hotel, and we sat down in the bar and had a drink with Pat's grandma. She's really cool, and was in London on business, as she is a corporate lawyer handling some international trademark cases. She is also a MUDEC alum who studied in Luxembourg for a full year. We went to sleep, in our wonderfully comfortable beds. It was majestic.
Doing London the Right Way
Saturday, we got up. We had a huge breakfast provided for us at the hotel, including real toast, jams, coffee, muffins, and juice. Then, we headed out, and our first stop was the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. We stood in like the center, around the statue of Victoria, to watch the changing of the guard. It was a huge demonstration of British pomp - lots of fancy clothes and such. There were british guys with their big bearskin hats, horse guys, and a band. All in all, pretty much exactly as I expected it would be. The band started playing a little extra concert though, and at that point we rolled out.
Then, we walked over to Westminster Abbey (we didn't go in because the line was too long). But, we did walk over to look at Big Ben and the Parliament building. All of these sights were really neat. We walked through the gardens by Westminster Abbey, and they were celebrating Remembrance Day (something like our Veteran's Day). There were tiny crosses all around the garden with the names of fallen soldiers on them. After that, we went to our first legit English Pub - The Albert. It was superb, we had some awesome ale called London Pride and some excellent fish and chips.
After that, we went to the sight of Winston Churchill's War Room and bunker, where he lived during the bombing raids on London. It was an awesome museum. There was a whole system of tunnels and room underground where Churchill pretty much ran the war for Great Britain. I loved a couple of things about the museum that really showed Churchill's badass-ness (pardon my french). First, there was a quote - "I am prepared to meet my maker. Whether my maker is prepared to meet me is an entirely different matter," said by Churchill on his 75th birthday. Secondly, he had 8-10 cigars every single day. Third, near the end of the war, he limited rations in his bunker to two large gins and two large whiskeys every day. That was just how he rolled. Total B.A. I was so much inspired by Churchill's personality that I bought a book on Churchill's wit at the gift shop. Oh, here's a picture of Churchill's actual "War Room" (I'm gonna have my own someday):
Next, we went out to dinner at Sherlock Holmes' restaurant. It had a ton of memorabilia and was decorated in the style of old school England. It was a disaster in terms of service though. Apparently, it was the new chef's first day, and the waitresses were understaffed and panicky. But once we ordered and got food it was delicious. But we had to eat fast, because our show started at 7:30!
That's right, we went and saw a musical, Oliver!, based on Charles Dickens' work Oliver Twist. It was in a really cool theatre, and the entire theatre culture itself was cool. We had really legit seats, and you were allowed to like bring in food or drink into the theatre, so there were people with cups of beer and whatnot in the theatre. Anyhow, the musical itself was amazing - it was both hilarious (including several bouts of rather raunchy humor) and had excellent singers (including some famous and really popular singer who was like the UK's winner of whatever their equivalent of American Idol in 2008, but whose name I do not know).
After that, we headed back to our hotel, which was not an easy task. We had decided to take a double-decker bus, because that's pretty much what you do in London. But, we got stuck in really bad traffic, and our ten minute bus ride turned into an hour long bus ride. Also, I was stuck sitting next to the couple who were drunk and just going at it in the seat next to me (why does this keep happening to me?). But after we got home, we said goodnight to Pat's grandma, and then decided to rally and go to the Goat Tavern, near our hotel.
Unfortunately, the Goat Tavern was closed, but the club next to it was open. So we headed in, grabbed some beers, and went to the back of the bar. Turns out we walked into some private party area, which had been reserved for some girl named Kristin. Anyways, we may or may not have been the odd people out, but there was nowhere else to chill, so we just sat down on a couch and hung out at Kristin's party. After a few hours and a few drinks, we walked back to our hotel and crashed for the night.
Rainy Day in London
When we got up on Sunday, we had breakfast and headed out. Unfortunately, it was already raining. We had decided to walk to the infamous "Speaker's Corner," a small section of Hyde Park where the city lets people just speak freely and rant about whatever they want. Apparently, it used to be the only place in London where one could speak out against the government, but now it's just a gathering point for crazy people on Sunday.
So, at Speaker's Corner, we listened to a Muslim guy rant about how he could prove God exists, a 53 year old man talk about his sex life, a really loud Protestant talk about how non-believers were doomed, and a Jewish guy who was just singing, in what I presume to be Hebrew, to himself. All in all, it was awesome. It was more fun to hear people from the crowds heckling these guys, because they were all somewhat...how do I put this - crazy? That sounds about right. But yeah, I would recommend checking it out if you're in London on a weekend.
Next, we walked to Harrod's, the giant department store in London. This place was insane. It had 7 floors and about a million shops. Too many shops. I mean, there was pretty much anything you could ever want in a store - they had tea, chocolate, perfumes, watches, jeans, clothes of all kinds, wine, cigars, and every other manner of purchasable item known to man. And, that was only on the first two floors! Most expensive things we found - a bathrobe for 1,659 pounds (about $2,700), and a bottle of some whiskey for 13,000 pounds (almost $21,000). Madness!
We got on a tube, went to Westminster, tried to get on a boat, didn't, got back on the tube, went to Tower Hill, and got off. From there, we took a short stroll on the Tower Bridge, and then decided to go and visit the Tower of London. The Tower of London is not actually a tower, but more of a prison slash "city." It's been used as a prison, armoury, and most importantly - a holding place for the crown jewels. Though we had to rush through it (they close at 16:30 on Sundays), it was awesome. We got to see the actual crown jewels (which are amazing). I mean, some of the diamonds and emeralds and sapphires and rubies are huge. I'm pretty sure if you had just one of the sceptres or something, you could pay off the entire US budget deficit. We also saw a bunch of really cool suits of armor, and some guns decorated with diamonds (how American is that?). Oh, here's a picture of Tower Bridge as seen from the Tower of London:
From there, we headed back to Leicester Square, where we found a cool pub, The Cambridge, and had some pints. I had a Dark Island ale, which tasted a lot like Guinness, with a little hint of chocolate and a rich flavor. It was quite refreshing. Then, since we are true American college students, we went to Chipotle. Again. What's more, the guy recognized us from Friday night. I did have to pay for my food this time, but it was still totally worth it.
After dinner, we packed it in, since we knew we'd have an early morning the next day.
Disaster Strikes?
So, our flight from London Stansted to Frankfurt-Hahn left at 7:05 am. This meant we had to get to the airport around 5:00 am. This meant we had to get on the Easybus at 4:00 am. This meant we had to get a cab from our hotel to the bus station at 3:30 am. This meant Jimmy had to get up at 2:30 am to pack and get ready to roll.
So we get to the airport, get through security without any problems, get some legit breakfast, and get on the plane without any trouble. Then, it hits the fan (if you know what I mean). Our plane needed to be de-iced again, so we sat on the tarmac for an hour. So we were late rolling into Frankfurt-Hahn. Then, coming back into the Schengen area from outside (the UK is a member of the EU but has not signed the Schengen Agreement, so you have to get your passport and stuff checked again), we had to wait in a really long line to get our passports checked out. Unfortunately, our Flibco bus back to Luxembourg was leaving at 10:15 am. Our plane landed at 10:03 am. We got through passport check at 10:14 am. And here is what then transpired:
So while we were in the passport line, I had been saying quite loudly how we needed to get on this bus (in hopes that somebody would maybe have the decency to let us go in front of them in the interest of time). This was to no avail, but apparently people were listening. I say this because as we were sprinting from the passport checkpoint to the bus stop (a few minutes walk from the airport terminal), this lady who was in front of us in line stops me (I was in front), and says, "Forget it - you just missed it. I tried to get on and the driver shut the door on me." I was devastated. To think that we had done all that and were going to miss our bus by a few seconds just crushed me. I fell to my knees out of a combination of exhaustion and bereavement. I rolled over, and let my body fall to the ground completely. Pat and Greg caught up, heard the tragic news, and paused. About 15 seconds passed, and then Greg walked on further towards the bus stop. He then noticed that a bus marked, "Flibco" was still there. He watched as the door closed. We realized that the lady who stopped us thought we were on a different bus with her, so she told us that our bus left when really it was right there! We ran out in front of the bus and waved violently at the bus driver. He had no sympathy for us. As we moved to the side, I looked up and saw the other MUDEC students who had been in front of us at the passport line, on the bus. I waved, and they could do naught but shrug their shoulders and give a sympathetic expression.
Devastation, wrought upon us a second time in mere minutes. I had no method of handling such pain, so I shouted several profane words into the air, and smacked the bus sign repeatedly. Greg, Pat, and I were silent for a minute or two after that. Then, Greg got real angry, and blamed me for stopping when we could have gotten on the bus if we just kept running. I understood his anger, since I pretty much was the only person who could have been held responsible, if anyone could. But it was short-lived, because we realized that there was another Flibco bus going to Luxembourg 50 minutes later, and that we would still make it to Econ class on time (which was critical, since Pat and I had to give a presentation in class).
Rest of the story can be summed up in 10 words: Rode bus. Made train. Rocked Econ presentation. No big deal.
And that's the story of London - a couple of cultural things I noticed - first, when everyone is speaking your language (English), you notice a lot more when people are speaking foreign languages. I felt like I was not so much of a tourist anymore, and that these people were. But, I also felt that innate desire to help them, since I had often found myself in similar situations elsewhere in Europe. Also, London was a very happening and cool city. It was definitely among my favorites, and somewhere I for sure plan on going back and visiting again. So that's that.
Epilogue
I have three more days of class this week, and then we travel to Prague, Auschwitz, and Krakow for our study tour for my history class. After that, I plan on heading to Budapest, Vienna and Salzburg for the second half of next week. I don't know if we'll have internet access or not, but I don't plan on bringing my laptop. I'll be sure to take lots of notes though - so look forward to hearing about yet another full week off school for me! So now, as they say in London - CHEERS MATES!
No comments:
Post a Comment