London
The trip to London between 15th and 19th March was born out of the need to get rid of 3 days of holiday before the end of March. I had several Australian friends who live in London, so why not. I stayed with Hong and Marlene, in their basement apartment in the suburb of Wimbledon. Funnily enough the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Club is not actually located there, but the next suburb down. The museum said that they moved down there many years ago.
Having never used or seen the tube / train system in London before, the train trip to Wimbledon was interesting, if rather long. I changed at Tottenham Hale, Vauxhall and then arrived at Wimbledon. As long as the trip was, I was just enjoying reading English ads, and eavesdropping on other English speakers.
It seems to me that Wimbledon, near the station, is a middle class suburb, with its fair share of shops, pubs (where we watched some six-nations rugby), Starbucks and pastie shops. A stroll up the hill towards the tennis club gave a more local appearance, where there are more small cafes and small bakeries. It looked ... English (duh!). Hong and Marlene's place was a little studio apartment which fit in two people very nicely. When a third person is added in there, then the air mattress pretty much takes up all the remaining floor space. A big thank you to them for having me over.
I did a few general tourist things. I visited the Tate Modern, a free art gallery, mainly to slide down 5 levels in the slide. They have built several slides in the turbine hall, which as the name suggests, formerly housed the turbines of the power station which was transformed into the museum. I also traveled to Royal Greenwich Observatory, the location of 0 deg longitude. Other than the line on the ground, the view from the elevated point is also excellent. Of course, I had to pay a visit to the Big Ben and the Westminster Abbey, as well as go for a ride in the London Eye, the giant ferris wheel. Rather stupidly, I lingered too long at these sites which caused me to miss my flight home to Munich. Luckily, there was a flight several hours later which I could catch instead.
While I was in London, I met Ben Yung at his Karaoke party. I was surprised that the neighbours didn't complain ... the singing was good, but we had left the windows open. After the singing was an interesting and prolonged trip home with night buses, since the tube had already stopped running. I realised that standing at a bus stop does not halt the bus - one is actually allow the put the hand out. A whole group of us missed a night bus because of that. Other than that, it was interesting to see Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circus, etc. at about 2 a.m. :)
Less touristy, but no less important, was a visit to the Chinatown. Unlike in Munich, these chefs actually know what they are doing. We also made the mandatory trip to an Indian restaurant, which had massive Naan servings.
Other than Ben, Hong and Marlene, I also met up with Ray and Alli, who were about to get married, and also Jessica. I was great to catch up with friends from back home.
As usual, see Flickr for more photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lokmanho/sets/72157600051800243/
Having never used or seen the tube / train system in London before, the train trip to Wimbledon was interesting, if rather long. I changed at Tottenham Hale, Vauxhall and then arrived at Wimbledon. As long as the trip was, I was just enjoying reading English ads, and eavesdropping on other English speakers.
It seems to me that Wimbledon, near the station, is a middle class suburb, with its fair share of shops, pubs (where we watched some six-nations rugby), Starbucks and pastie shops. A stroll up the hill towards the tennis club gave a more local appearance, where there are more small cafes and small bakeries. It looked ... English (duh!). Hong and Marlene's place was a little studio apartment which fit in two people very nicely. When a third person is added in there, then the air mattress pretty much takes up all the remaining floor space. A big thank you to them for having me over.I did a few general tourist things. I visited the Tate Modern, a free art gallery, mainly to slide down 5 levels in the slide. They have built several slides in the turbine hall, which as the name suggests, formerly housed the turbines of the power station which was transformed into the museum. I also traveled to Royal Greenwich Observatory, the location of 0 deg longitude. Other than the line on the ground, the view from the elevated point is also excellent. Of course, I had to pay a visit to the Big Ben and the Westminster Abbey, as well as go for a ride in the London Eye, the giant ferris wheel. Rather stupidly, I lingered too long at these sites which caused me to miss my flight home to Munich. Luckily, there was a flight several hours later which I could catch instead.While I was in London, I met Ben Yung at his Karaoke party. I was surprised that the neighbours didn't complain ... the singing was good, but we had left the windows open. After the singing was an interesting and prolonged trip home with night buses, since the tube had already stopped running. I realised that standing at a bus stop does not halt the bus - one is actually allow the put the hand out. A whole group of us missed a night bus because of that. Other than that, it was interesting to see Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circus, etc. at about 2 a.m. :)
Less touristy, but no less important, was a visit to the Chinatown. Unlike in Munich, these chefs actually know what they are doing. We also made the mandatory trip to an Indian restaurant, which had massive Naan servings.
Other than Ben, Hong and Marlene, I also met up with Ray and Alli, who were about to get married, and also Jessica. I was great to catch up with friends from back home.
As usual, see Flickr for more photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lokmanho/sets/72157600051800243/
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