London What A Time (Part 1)

So we end up going to London. What a trip, a crazy town, and a crazy bunch of students we are indeed. On Friday we get down into the city around twelve in the afternoon, only to discover that we weren't allowed to put our bags in the Grand National Hotel until 2PM. So our busdriver decides that since he used to work on public transportation that he would tour us around the city in the bus. This huge coach bus goes around Buckingham Palace, Picidily Circus, Houses of Parliment, the Tower Bridge, and every other touristy stop for the next two hours. All of us students just wanted to get off the bus and explore ourselves, though we all got some great pictures of the river and the tower of London.

Eventually, we are finally let off the bus and make our way to our rooms. I end up rooming with two guys from UE named Josh and Sid. They're good guys, more on the theatre side of things though than myself. After things were settled at the hotel it was time to go exploring. Our latin american student David ended up seeing one of his friends who lived in the Dominican Republic for awhile in London named Philip. So Jessica, Lissa and myself tagged along as Philip guided us along the city as the resident Londoner. We saw almost everyone you would want to see on our walk, The British Mueseum, Buckingham Palace, Picidily Circus, and Hyde Park. It was amazing, getting this Swiss's perspective on London and American culture as well as discovering a few underground places in Chinatown.

We end up getting back to our hotel around 6PM and proceed to go out to dinner with some other students in our group because they were going to go see Phantom of the Opera around 7PM. I ended up just getting a drink with the girls, who were all dressed up to go see the show. We took the "tube" the Underground back to our hotel and waited for most of them to get back, while I frequented another pub in order to grab myself some authentic fish n' chips for dinner. Delicious they were, and I'm starting to realize that the "peas" that come with the dish is a standard procedure in all of England. Though the meal cost me around 12 pounds plus the cost of my pint. Expensive city I was thinking, but I would realize that this city is the number 2 most expensive city in the world for a reason.

Later that night when the "drama" students got back from their show a bunch of us decided to go to SO HO the famous night club destination in London for some good times. We ended up a club called ANANON, which got us in with a five pound cover. Drinks were expensive, we were spotted as Americans from far away and really no European's came within voices reach of us. It was perculiar, but these sort of things are common I guess in London. After about four hours of hanging out with our group and paying way to much money for horribly small quanties of drinks, we ended up taking a taxi back to the hotel. No one bothered to explain to us that "The Tube" closed at 12:30AM in the city.