Lovin' London

We left Paris yesterday evening and arrived about midnight in London. Jared wanted our last night in Paris to be romantic, but of course, we were broke so he went to a gas station and bought some cheap white wine, plastic cups, and one orange (my favorite color) candle. He packed a towel and we walked about 30 minutes out to the river to sit on the bank. There was a slight breeze, and it was a bit chilly, but we thought it would be an all together romantic night and a great way to end our stay in Paris. It turned out to be quite the opposite of romantic. We had been walking along the river to pick out a spot that was not crowded with drunks and that didn’t reek like urine. After we finally found one, we laid out the towel and sat down. Jared got out the plastic cups and I poured the wine. The candle was one of the long skinny types, so he cut a hole in one of the plastic cups and turned it upside down and then put the candle in with the cup as a type of candle holder. We tried multiple times to light our candle, but the wind kept picking up and blowing it out. About this time a man across the river pulls down his pants and pees right in front of us. Imagine, here we are: young couple, candle (unlit, but still a candle), and drinking wine (out of plastic cups, but still drinking wine)and the guy directly across the river decides to pull down his pants and face us and pee into the river that we are looking at and trying to make a romantic evening out of. Jared and I just laughed about it and then tried to get back to the romance. Jared had a good idea to empty the rest of the wine into individual cups and use the bottle as a holder so we cut the candle down so that it would fit into the opening of the bottle and then we tried to light it that way. It worked, but the wind still kept blowing it out. Jared (genius) then put the cup right-side up over the top of the candle (picture below) to block the wind, and keep the candle lit. It worked for about a minute (till the wind blew it out), but it definitely looked pretty dumb. About this time the first beggar came around asking us for money, cigarettes, anything really. Could people not see that we were on a date? A few seconds later another guy came by selling things, and then another, and another… At this point we decided to just play monopoly deal since the romance was definitely killed, but the wind was too strong and was blowing the cards away. We were going to go back to drinking our wine, but hair and bugs from the wind/dirty walkway beside the river had blown into the cups and ruined it all. It was actually really comical. If there is one thing that I learned about Paris on our last evening, it is that whoever called Paris the “city of love” must have been rich and spent all of his/her time on a yacht floating down the river at sunset or something because we saw more graffiti, smelled more urine, and touched more germs and dirt on railings than in any other city we have been to EVER. After our hilarious evening, we walked home and ate our final crepes on the way which kind of made up for the dirt and things that Paris threw in our wine. At least they offer crepes too.

We braved the metro yesterday to get to the airport. We were very successful, but my arms and legs are both aching today from the massive size of my suitcase and the unbelievable amount of stairs we went up and down yesterday. Jared did help me with my suitcase, which was really sweet because he has one of his own, but I didn’t expect him to carry it the whole way, so I had to do my part and my biceps are really suffering today. We had a really enjoyable time in the airport, actually. We enjoyed Pizza Hut (!) and M&M McFlurrys. We talked and played monopoly deal (of course) while we waited for our plane. After arriving in London we had the task of finding our apartment, which is always the most miserable part of every city. We decided to take the bus to the train station and then the train to King’s Cross. We got off there and took a taxi the rest of the way to the house. I think we did it about the cheapest way possible without getting lost, and it cost us 50 pounds just to get from the airport to our flat. London is expensive too! Who would’ve guessed? We arrived after the stress of spending so much money so quickly on pretty much nothing to find that our landlady read our booking incorrectly and thought we weren’t supposed to arrive until the next night. She was remodeling our room and there was literally no furniture in it, there was dust all over everything and no decorations. The walls didn’t even look painted. Luckily her roommate was sleeping elsewhere, so we slept in her room for the night. I was in a bit of a panic when I saw the state of our room though, if I must be honest. I thought to myself “there is no way that room will be ready tomorrow”. Turns out that our landlady is an artist, a sculptor to be exact, and she has a knack for decorating and working on deadlines. It also turns out that the room was painted. It has a kind of old look to it. She used lime (did I spell that right?) to paint the walls a whitish color, but left chips of the sage green showing from underneath. Today she reupholstered a wall with really elegant striped fabric (red and black on a beige background) and made it feel like a pillow. The bed is really comfy and the room is gorgeous. I totally underestimated her!

Let me tell you about Antonia. She is so scatter-brained but anal and obsessive all at once. She cleans everything all the time and her house is completely spotless except for the dust from the construction of the storage closets in our room. Nothing in her house really matches, but everything matches all at once. She is very eclectic and definitely fits the artist stereotype. When she answered the door her hair was a mess and she was in tights and a tunic with a confused look on her face about why we were there a day early. She was immediately friendly making us tea and talking with on the balcony for about an hour before bed. She apologized probably 15 times in the hour. When she was showing us to our room she said “If you want to have sex you can make as much noise as you'd like to.” That should give you a good idea of her personality. Of course, you have to remember that she says everything with an English accent as well. We have only been here around 24 hours, but already I feel like I kind of know her. Tonight she showed me her collection of vintage dresses and this afternoon when I was making lunch she came in and added cinnamon to my ground beef and water and salt to my rice without asking. Turns out she used to be a chef before she started sculpting and painting. If I leave a dish for a few minutes later she will always get to it before I can. I washed all of the dishes and stacked them in the dryrack and about a half hour later I went into the kitchen and she had put all of the already clean dishes into the dishwasher. That is how anal she is… I never thought I would know someone more anal than myself. That day has come. I really like Antonia.

Jared and I haven’t left the house yet except to get a few things at the pharmacy. I wish I could tell you more about the culture of London, but we don’t really know much about it. I know that they call the bathroom the “loo” which is awesome. I also really liked arriving at King’s Cross due to the great connection to the wizarding world. Antonia did get us oyster cards so we plan on doing a lot of traveling around the city this week for sure. We just had to spend today resting and catching up on work.

Now I am going to take one picture of the room (excuse Jared rudely sleeping during my photo. ha!) to give you an idea of how well it is decorated and then attach it to the blog and go to sleep! More to come on London…

The pictures don't do it justice. Can't really capture the panoramic view. Trust me, it is a nice room. :)