On Holiday in London: Part 3

Getting tired of this yet? No worries, there's just a bit more. Well, a few more days any way. Long weekends do end eventually, which is sad, but their end means I'm ever closer to coming home.

In any case, on Saturday morning at 9:30 I met up with Melissa and we headed over to the Imperial War Museum, which is a giant (and free) collection of all things war concerning Great Britain. In the main room, they've got tanks, submarines, and planes, and the surrounding halls and floors have various exhibits on war-- mostly WWI and WWII. Over the summer, I'd noticed that Brits and Europeans in general have a very intense fixation with WWII. I never knew why since the war ended over sixty years ago, most of them weren't alive then. But then I found out. The War pervaded so much of their life and left them reeling for years and years afterward. It's effects are still very readily felt today. The Museum was extremely well put-together, and I really enjoyed walking through the 'Children's War' exhibit that showcased how the War affected children in Great Britain.

Finished there, we took the Tube to London Bridge and found the Bramah Tea & Coffee Museum, one that I had tried to see earlier this summer. Unfortunately, it was still undergoing renovation. But, since it was lunch time we grabbed kebabs and took them over to Southwark Cathedral, a church I had toured back in early June. There was a market going on behind us, so after finishing eating, we wandered around and split a giant, delicious £2 brownie. Yum! Melissa headed back while I called Emily to meet up with her for our next grand adventure.

And where was that adventure to take us? Well, back up near Highgate Cemetery is a giant park called Hampstead Heath which contains a large hill called Parliament Hill overlooking London. After getting off the Tube, we hiked around for a while trying to find the Hill and finally did after much path guessing. We even saw some crazy loons and ducks and what we thought was a gypsy camp of trailers. We walked down Parliament Hill and even though our view was obscured by leafy trees, it was still very neat. At the bottom, we had to figure out how to get back to the station, though, because we had just walked across half the 720 acre park, so we hopped on a bus-- my first public transit bus in London!-- to get to the station. Back at the flat, we just sat around after walking all afternoon.

That night, we took Lacey, a gal we all met during Session I, out to eat at the Chinese place Katie Beth and I had gone to in the last week of June because she was set to leave with the other non-interns on Tuesday the 29th. I got in some more chopstick practice, but I'm afraid my skills are still pretty abysmal. I really like the food there.

The next morning, I met up with Melissa and we headed out for church, her last time at Bethesda. Before the sermon, Pastor Jared was talking about a few people getting ready to leave-- one of them being Melissa, leaving Laura Beth 'the regular.' Did you hear that?! He called me a regular!! I do come whenever I can and that's been going on since late May. I'm so thankful for the people there.

After church, we came back and Emily asked if I'd like to go to Henley, a giant, multi-floor, iconic toy store in London. Me, being not terribly intelligent, said yes and proceeded to spend the next hour traveling for a total of three minutes in the store. Why, you ask? I had to be back for afternoon tea at 3:30 with Melissa and company. Silly Tube, never seems to be on time when you need it.

Anyways, I got back huffing and puffing after a brief sprint down Hogarth Road over to the Knaresborough residence to find Melissa, Erika, and Emily waiting to head out. Seven minutes late, that's not too bad, right? We hiked it over to Hyde Park and then past Kensington Palace to The Orangery, a fancy tea room. The line was pretty long, so while Erika and Melissa held our spots Emily and I went to find some water. On returning we waited just a few minutes and were seated under an umbrella on the front patio. And it was perfect weather for tea! We all ordered Orangery Tea for £12.50 which included tea, cucumber sandwiches, scones with clotted cream and jam, and Orangery cake. We each got our own teapot, and the waiter brought out our food items in courses! Oh man, it was so amazing! I've decided Katie Beth and I are going to have real tea back in Kirksville, like with sandwiches and cakes and things. Now I just need a real teapot...(maybe find one at the antiques market I'm going to tomorrow?)

We got back to the flats, and I met up with Emily because we were heading out to the London Eye in the evening. The London Eye is a giant, slow-moving (i.e. 1 revolution takes 30 minutes) Ferris wheel that was erected in 2001 (I believe). We chose to go at night to see London from above with all its lights ablaze- plus, we'd seen London from above during the day from St. Paul's Cathedral. About thirty people are in each pod and during our 'flight' (yes, it's called a flight) we all scrambled around to get pictures and look at everything. The neatest part was seeing Parliament from above. At 9 PM, the Parliament/Big Ben lights turned on-- very, very cool.

And that was that; we went back to the flat to get ready for work on Monday. Wow, what an amazing four-day weekend! I thoroughly enjoyed each and every day- it was so much fun to explore this grand city. Seeing so many amazing sights, experiencing so many amazing things. Sometimes I can't believe it all, and after I get back I hope I'll look on these times with absolute amazement. It is so incredibly amazing to be here, no matter how many rough spots have come along.

I would also like to put into writing a very historic fact: I wore a skirt all of Sunday. Literally, all Sunday from church to London Eye. I don't think I've done that in the past decade, at least! It really wasn't too bad besides the blisters from my flats...ah well.