London, England - Part I

London, capital of England, Great Britain and United Kingdom, most likely the only city in the world that's a capital three times over. Please don't even ask me to explain the difference. I tried once long time ago make sense of this but to no avail. Suffice to say that being a country only the size of New Zealand but once an empire that ruled over half the world, perhaps it's a hangover imperialistic behaviour of the yesteryears...who knows.

I arrived in London by the ever efficient Eurostar, a very very fast train from Paris to London's Waterloo Station, the entire journey only take about 2.5 hours. Damien, a fellow kiwi who migrated to London for the 'greener pastures' together with his now wife, Evelyn were waiting for me. It was indeed wonderful to see familiar faces again! D&E are the most atypical accountants you would come across. Damien with his jovial disposition and the bigger than life Evelyn, who easily commands your attention through her booming voice, perhaps to make up for her lack of height, or so I would tease her.

My dread in having to spend exuberent amount of money by virtue of the expensive cost of living in London and also the high value pounds was somewhat alleviated slightly by D&E's kindness in letting me stay with them. I must say in that respect I've been very lucky so far having to stay in a hostel only once in Amsterdam and since then, had friends coming to the rescue! However, I have a feeling the money I've saved up from accomodation will now be spent in this extravagant city.. The evening of 2 October was spent catching up with them both. Evelyn is also from Malaysian and so she relished being able to switch to speaking Hokkien with me, our commonly shared Chinese dialect from the state of Penang, Malaysia, where our parents derived from.

3 October

D&E, who had been entertaining other friends prior to my arrival, were helpful with providing all the typical tourist like pamphlets offering bus tours, walking tours etc but wild horses wouldn't drag them through another of those with me given that they've already done 8...EACH! So I was more than happy to excuse their lack of interest..a worry really when each of them could repeat word for word the tour guides' commentaries and they could even produce the same exact voice and monotones as the museum audio guides...so off I went on my own to explore what London has to offer.

Raphy (from France) had said that if I don't do anything in London, I should at least go and see one play/musical in West End (I knew London was where my wallet was going to get lighter). I half heartedly agreed but didn't really think I would find anything that would interest me but lo and behold! There were a few! Les Miserables was playing and so was the Lion King! I always wanted to see the Lion King and so it didn't take much to twist my arm (and open my wallet) before a ticket was purchased for the next night. I was extremely excited and would have jumped for joy (and click my heels together) if it wasn't for the fact that I was among the serious conservative English, hear, hear!

Bought one of those "BIG BUS TOUR" ticket to see London where you pay 20 pounds for 24 hours worth of bus ride across the famous tourist attractions. You can also step off and get back on again during this time. But wait! There is more! You also get to go for your choice of 1 of 5 walking tours available and if that wasn't a good deal enough, they even threw in a free ferry ride down the Thames! (What made you think they paid me to say this?!!!)

I walked from where D&E stayed to St Paul's cathedral which is a beautiful old church located in the centre of London and also the starting point of my bus tour journey. No sooner than 10 minutes from getting on the bus, I could see the tower bridge approaching and right beside it, the Tower of London, the historic castle originally built by William the Conqueror in 1066 and later expanded by the English Kings and Queens. I decided this would be a good spot to get off the bus as I could spend some time touring the castle and coincidentally, my free ferry ride takes off from the pier just beside the castle too. We Asians are well known for killing many birds with one stone (or boulder if that's required). The ticket cost 15 pounds (I tried hard to stop myself from converting that to kiwi dollars..that's freaking NZ$45!!! Arrrgh) Ok, slow yoga breathing....think of sipping tea with the Queen...

Outside St Paul's Cathederal on a gloomy English day, even that didn't put me off!

One of the many castles located within the Tower ground. This one houses the country's crown jewels. Although not able to take photos, I can confirm that I've seen the largest cut diamond in the world (The Cullinan I) *drool* gimme, gimme.....

Me standing outside by castle, with the red guard with Marge Simpson hairdo and his crown jewels..err, I mean he's guarding Her Majesty's jewels..

So, once I got my ticket (the vendor having to rip the money from my tight clutches...) I joined the rest of the Japanese tourists (could have sworn it was the same trigger happy clicking group from France) and made my way into the castle gate. Waiting for us there was a Yeoman Warder. Yeoman wha??!! Funny you should ask, a Yeoman Warder is a former serviceman to Her Majesty from any of her comonwealth countries, rewarded by the the Queen for his (yes, sexist pigs!!)service to the country and the reward allows the Yeoman to stay and live in the castle grounds with his family and to show pestering tourists around the castle. Did I say reward?!! These Warders wear an interesting bright blue and red costume (see below) which made it hard for me to imagine them as serious SAS officers or Warrant Officers in Her Majesty's army. Our particular Yeoman was a real character as he took us through the 50 minutes tour (I counted to see where my NZ45(!!!) got me). His narration of the history of the place often accompanied by quirky and witty remarks of a guide who no doubt takes his work seriously and thoroughly enjoying himself in the process.

That's our Yeoman Warder..he was once part of England's first line of defence against the enemies..

From our Yeoman I learnt that the Tower of London that were originally used as residence to the Kings and Queens of England were later abandoned and used as storage for armoury, artilery and gun powder but more imoportantly, it was also used as a prison where several infamous occupants were beheaded. Amongst them, Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard (2nd and 5th wives respectively of King Henry VIII), and Lady Jane Grey, the 17 year old would-be queen. Ooookk, mental note for women ever feeling the urge to go back to the past. Never do the following as a queen: Barren, cheat on your husband (who has 8 other mistresses anyway) and be ambitious daddy's political pawn.

I won't bore you with the rest of the historical journey that I took visiting the rest of the Tower but suffice to say that the White Tower (which was the original castle), together with the 4 other towers were truly impressive in terms of its medieval design, right up to the renovations carried out by subsequent rulers of the land. I took lots of pictures but won't clog up the disc space her with them.

Also from just outside the castle, you get an awesome view of the Tower bridge as you can see. This was the main bridge that originally separates London from the rest of the world. Many Kings in the past have used the Thames to travel to the Tower on business as opposed to using the conventional carriage in order to try and avoid paparazis, autograph hunters and of course, Oliver Cromwell (the dictator that turned England into a republic for a very short time).

The English don't do anything without style and aplomb do they?

Then after being satisfied that I've spent enough time in the Tower to justify spending NZ45!!!! on a tour ticket, I made my way to the pier to enjoy my FREE fery ride. It was rather a pleasant evening trip down the Thames, especially when due to a technology failure, one of the boat's crew, a young 15 year old boy ended up being our tour guide. He apologised profusely prior to his commentary which he feared would not be good enough for us. By the end of the tour, I think there wasn't a doubt in a single member of the tour's mind that the impromptu guide was not really that impromptu after all..very clever. I shall stop here as many of what I saw will later be described in more detail in my next and last day in London.