Today was, without a doubt, an interesting day. I started my day right; I ate two croissants and some fig rolls for breakfast and finished off my orange juice. I then went to the streets first thing this morning and went to the Knightsbridge Station and walked, almost literally, a mile down to Royal Albert Hall. Guess what? Royal Albert Hall was closed today due to a private function. But that's okay--I was able to walk another mile to Kensington Palace. The Kensington Palace tour was quick, and frankly, not that interesting. It is a tour directed more at those interested in the fashion and court during Victorian period as well as people who are big fans of Princess Diana, though their Princess Diana exhibit is rather small.
After that, I made my way towards the Royal Mews, although something interesting happened while I was en route. I was passing by the Israeli Embassy and noticed a police line. Here, the police were also carrying automatic weapons. Well, when I saw the Star of David flying in front of the house, I pulled out my camera to take a photo. Immediately I heard "Hey! No photographs!" I was a bit startled, because just as I began to take a photo I saw the "No Photograph" signs. I immediately turned my camera off, put it in my pocket, and apologized. They nodded and said it was all right. As I made my way to the end of the police line, one of the armed officers approached me and asked if I had a camera. I figured I was going to be searched or something, but instead he was very polite and helpful. He said they've had to up the security at the Israeli Embassy and that it is a necessary precaution. He was very friendly and gave me directions to the High Street/Kensington Station.
From there I went on to the Royal Mews. Guess what? The Royal Mews is closed on Fridays. I found this out as it started to rain. So, I just made my way up the street and went to a place called Noodle Noodle. It was an oriental restaurant that was quite delicious and well-priced. I got a dish of rice, fried chicken fillets, and yellow curry (I think that's what it was) all for about 5 pounds. Once I was done there I made my way back to the dorms to check out my London Pass book and find something I could do, since obviously the things I had planned were canceled. I'm not too disappointed by this though, because I actually chose Royal Albert Hall and the Royal Mews mostly for filler anyways. Tomorrow though are the zoo, aquarium, Globe, and hopefully the Sherlock Holmes Museum. If those are not open I'll be a bit ticked off.
Either way, I was around the corner from the dorms when I saw Ashley, Brandy, and Anjelica heading to the train station to see Ashley off--she was on her way to an area just outside of Cambridge for the weekend. I rode with them and after left Ashley on the train at Victoria Station, we got off and headed for Green Park. Specifically, Anjelica wanted to go to a jewelry store that is owned by the parents of one of the actors in the Harry Potter films (Bonnie Wright, who plays Ginnie Weasley). So, we stopped in there and Anjelica had a look around while Brandy and I stayed outside.
The three of us then headed to Green Park, which is absolutely lovely. Once you get through Green Park, you arrive at Buckingham Palace, which was majestic and awesome. We took plenty of photos and looked around. There were no red royal guards in sight, which was a bit disappointing, but I'm sure there were some around there somewhere. After we had seen Buckingham Palace from the outside, we went and walked over to St. James' Park, which is simply spectacular. There were a huge amount of geese, ducks, pigeons, and even the largest pelicans I've ever seen (they are about three to four times the size of the pelicans in Florida and have beaks that are at least a foot and a half long, they're actually quite scary looking). The small waterway running through St. James' Park is crossed by a bridge called Blue Bridge which looks out towards the Cavalry Museum on one end and Buckingham Palace on the other. It's quite a site to see.
We each got some delicious soft serve vanilla ice cream (with a chocolate stick in it) and ate that as we made our way through the park. We then worked our way back around to Parliament Square and took a few more photos of the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. We then crossed over Westminster Bridge and took some photos of Parliament from South Bank. The view there was spectacular. We then made our way towards Hungerford Footbridge and saw some of the street performers. Today there were a group of six guys break dancing and while I'm not very fond of hip-hop music: these guys were impressive. They danced for at least five minutes and really put on an excellent show of skill. After we viewed that, we crossed back over the footbridge, got on a train at Embankment Station and headed towards Leicester Square.
At Leicester Square we checked for theater tickets and tried to find our way to Tottenham Court Road to head back to the dorms. On the way I stopped at Waterstornes book store to check out the price on the British editions of the Harry Potter books. They had them at 3 for the price of 2 (being 6 pounds each), which was quite tempting. I still need to put a few dollars down on the British edition of the book, even though I'll also have the American edition of the book. I figured since I'm not much of a souvenir person, perhaps I'll just buy myself a set of the British edition as well as have the full American edition, just for the sake of having it. Who knows though.
Of course, we met our only delay of the day near Leicester Square, due to the bombs discovered today. Honestly I can't even believe I'm really writing this, because it seems so unreal. The thought that I'd be in a city where the actual potential for a bomb going off just seems so--strange. Nonetheless, they had a few streets blocked off, so we had to walk around. I completely ignored the news signs I had been seeing about a bomb being located, and it wasn't until I got back to the dorm and read an e-mail from my grandmother about them that I actually went online and read all I could. I did call my dad and let him know that everything was okay and that all is well here. I would ask that anyone reading this please continue to pray, not just for myself and the people here in London, but for all of the people around the world as we fight against this horrible menace. The idea that there are people out there who want to kill us for no other reason than their own personal hatred is a rather awful though. May God have mercy on their evil souls. I really pray though that they would realize the error in their ways and turn away from their false beliefs and accept Christ as the Son of God and realize that God does not desire violence from His people.
After hanging out around the dorms for a while though, Donald, Amanda, Katie, and myself all went out to the nearby pizza place and picked up a pizza. Just prior to that Donald and I stopped in the Tesco to buy groceries. It was my second time in there today, as Brandy and Anjelica had wanted to stop in there on the way home to get groceries as well. We brought the pizzas back here and sat around eating and talking. Some of the other folks (Gabe, Gideon, Ryan, Jen, Molly, Ashley, and Tanya) all went out to the pub(s). The other four of us stayed at the dorms and goofed off. We discovered a new little area of the building that I'm not entirely sure is open to us, but it was pretty cool nonetheless. It looks like Amanda, Katie, and Donald as well as the rest of the group except for Molly and Ashley will be going to Scotland tomorrow morning. I hope they have a good time and I look forward to seeing them when they get back.
Here are some pictures of today's wanderings around London:
http://flickr.com/photos/8494714@N03/
P.S. We seemed to have discovered where some "screaming" outside our windows has been coming from. There are some people at night sword fighting down in the basketball gym in our building. By that I mean they are using bamboo swords and full kendo/kenpo (is that the name?) dress regalia. Britain is an interesting place.
