A very Busy Couple of Days

Photos for this entry: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2261661&l=c5509&id=11832732

Sun: Attended church at St Pauls. It was a very good service; I am not Anglican but I didn't see anything 'wrong'/disagreeing with my own beliefs during the service. I think I will try Westminster next Sunday for service.

For supper today, a group of 3 people went to try out Turkish food (part of a class assignment). I had a variety of different things (lamb, chicken, etc...) in 'kebab' style cooking, as well as donor style (a big hunk of meet is spun next to a heat source and the outer layer is sliced off when it is done, letting the inside layers begin to be cooked - it was delicious). There was more food than I could eat, and delicious baklava for desert (I bought some extra for snacks in my room, it was so good)
(Photo 1)

Mon: In the morning, we toured Parliament. It was fascinating because we were allowed to walk in both the House of Lords and House of Commons - I stood where some of the important British MP's (Members of Parliament) and PM's (Prime Ministers) stood. I still don't understand everything about the British government, but I am getting there. For instance, parliament is the 'executive' branch ion the sense that the government (which is composed of the party that won the most seats in the previous election) proposes bills and parliament 'approves' or 'disapproves' them; the monarch has to sign them into law, so technically the monarch is the executive, but the monarch can't really refuse to sign a bill that has been passed, so they don't truely have executive power.

This afternoon; I did laundry for the first time. Hopefully I can avoid doing it more that one more time while in London

Tues: I was feeling very tired today. All I really did was get up, eat breakfast, go back to bed, get up, eat lunch, go to class, eat supper, and went to bed early. I guess all my excursions caught up with me.

Weds: Toured the "Tate Modern Art" museum in the morning. Let me just say again; for those of you who don't know me that well: I hate modern art. Thankfully, it wasn't as modern as the Gugenheim in NYC (no canvases full of dead flies); but I didn't love any of the paintings/drawings/sculptures there except for "Waterlillies" by Monet.

After the museam, walked over and took a few pictures of the exterior of the reconstructed Globe theater - 'Shakespeare's theater'. It figures, Shakespeare and Modern art are obviously located right next to each other because I dislike them both.

Then I had lunch at a pub in the area; had my first fish and chips (I have been in England for almost 2 weeks and I still hadn't had fish and chips yet). They were delicious, and very filling. I was glad I got the child's portion.

This afternoon, a small group of us travelled out to the Stratford area of London, which will be the site of the 2012 Olympic games. This was just so that in 2012, we can say we were there; construction is proceeding on the hotels/stadiums.

In the evening, we went to "The Comedy Store", an improv comedy club which performs shows similar to whose line is it anyways? Some notable quotes that will make no sense to you unless you were there/I explain them to you: "Show me a llama that doesn't like cold, and I'll show you a horse"; "Number 1." "Yes Captain?" "No, you made number 1; you've had a bit too much to drink"; "Cave spelunking - well that's a little redundant since spelunkling, by its very nature occurs in a cave..." All in all, it was a grest show, and if you come to London, it is not something to miss (Weds. and Sun. evenings)

(Photos 2-13)
Thurs: Had a tour of "Brick Lane", which is traditionally the poorer end of town. The name derives from the fact that a long time ago they made the bricks for the various buildings there. Since there is a great fire hazard from making bricks, it was placed far from the 'rich' part of town so that if a fire arose, the only loss would be the poor people's houses and not the rich.

After the tour, had my first Indian/Bangledeshi food - a 'sample' platter of everything. There were several dishes with curry in them, so it was very spicy. There was a great beverage though, it was like a Mango smoothie and helped relieve the spicyness of the meal (it was exceptionally delicious; I can't help but think that it owuld be very popular at home).

In the afternoon, I returned to Parliament, this time to see it in action. When I arrived, I went to the House of Commons. They were discussing a 'bailout' for an insurance company that had gone bankrupt in 2000, and had lost some peoples' entire savings. I was about to leave when the topic was changed due to the agenda/schedule - it went onto a debate about the Gaza/Israel situation. I was interested, because the process was so different from our own. A minister read a speech, but he 'gave way' in the middle of it several times to allow different MP's a chance to interupt and ask questions (but they were all polite in the interuptions). It was obvious after hearing a few questions that public opinion is split a great deal on this issue - some MP's were against Israel for a 'disproportionate amount of force in response to the rocket attacks' while some were vehomently against hamas for attacking with rockets. I left after an hour or so, when the various members began to make speeches, although there is one speech that stuck out in my mind (and apparently everyone elses' minds as well, since it was in the paper the next day). It was a Jewish MP who was against what Israel had done (the disproportionality of it). He compared how Israel is acting towards the Palestinians as the Nazi party acted towards the Jews in the holocaust/WWII.

I also visited the House of Lords, but it was fairly boring; there were only maybe 8-10 'lords' in residence, and I arrived just as one was making a statement about the same insurance company mentioned in the Commons; his statement went on and on, I left after about 20 minutes when he showed no signs of getting near an end of the statement. The Commons is definitely more interesting to watch, at least on a day to day basis.

(Photos 14-16)

Fri: I went to Greenwich today, saw the prime merridian, and stood in both the east and west hemispheres at the same time. I also synchronized my watch with GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), and was a great museam on keeping track of time.

I went to the Naval Maritime Museam, where I had lunch (a fishcake, rice, and a lemon tart; the lunch special - it was pretty good) and then toured the museam a little. I got to see Nelson's uniform that he was wearing at the battle of Trafalgar, and saw the bullet hole from the shot that killed him. For those of you who don't know, Nelson was a british admiral of the navy who defeated Napolean's fleet at Trafalgar. He also was blind in one eye, and in a previous campaign had his right hand blown off; so he was like me. I was very inspired by this, and am going to try and learn more about him. He seems like a good guy, despite the fact that he was having an affair with a married woman.

(Photos 17-end of album)

Then I rushed over to the London Eye - we rode it at 4PM. I took a lot of photos at different heights. It was nice to do this after having explored London a little - I was able to recognize places I have been. One conclusion that I reached was that St. Paul's is visible from almost everywhere in London - I saw it from Greenwich this morning (which is way outside of London), and from the top of the Eye.

Photo Album for Eye: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2261666&l=c0045&id=11832732