Day's 3 & 4

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What a successful weekend. Saturday we had our first bus tour and I was overloaded with beautiful architecture, scenery, and information. One of the best things I've noticed while on these tours is not only do I get the touristy side of London but also the local information too! To name a few places that I passed by or stopped to visit was Parliament, West Minister Abbey, Buckingham Palace, St. Paul's Cathedral, the new 2012 Olympic building site among many other things that I have forgotten the names of but will be pursuing in greater detail and visiting at another time. Although when passing parliament she said that the courthouses are open to the public and we could walk in, sit down and listen to a trial. They even wear those funny wigs still! There aren't any cameras allowed into the courthouses and she said that the British think it's so weird that American's televise some court proceedings because theirs are so formal and wouldn't want to televise something like that .

For lunch we went to a market and it's so weird that although we aren't in Italy I have had some of the best Italian food here. Even the prepackaged pasta you can buy in stores is imported from Italy and has that homemade pasta noodle taste. Anyways me and a couple girls went to a deli for lunch and the owner and employee was clearly Italian. The sandwiches were delicious and again made with fresh mozzarella, salami, and bread. It's making my mouth water again just thinking about it. The sandwich I had was with chicken, bacon, and spinach salad which was so yummy! The market we went to had many little shops with samples to try and one was a chocolate place with many different types of chocolate including chocolate pasta! I had a sample and of course 70% of it was dark chocolate from a different country that I can't remember at this point. Normally I dislike dark chocolate because it's so bitter but this was nothing like I've had before and just melted with such flavor.

One interesting fact that I learned on the tour is that London used to be so polluted because they used coal burning fireplaces that put a lot of soot in the air and turned all of the buildings and the environment black. Then they developed the Clean Air Acts around the 1960's and stopped the burning of coal and started to clean up the buildings. I didn't realize how black the buildings were until our tour guide pointed out a few that were completely black and weren't clean yet. For the Olympic site they are currently building she said that they literally had to wash the dirt because it was so filled with soot. I couldn't imagine the entire city like that. They also had meat and glue factories that polluted the air and made such a stench. Around the Olympic site is also the sewer system in London and it reeked.

Today (Sunday) I rode my first double-decker bus! They have a huge public transport system here and you use something called an Oyster card. You put money on this card and it allows you to travel on the bus system and the tube (train system). It took us awhile to figure out which bus would allow us to get to South Kensington so we could visit the Science Museum. The Science Museum is 5 stories tall and has a lot of random things in there. There is the science of natural medicine, space, aviation, energy, and they had the first hot air balloon in there! It was cool to see all the different types of airplanes hanging from the ceiling. They also had Egyptian medicine and different practices in there and hieroglyphics. Actual walls with them carved! It was really neat. Especially with the mummy right next to it. We went to this place called Pret A Manger for lunch. This is a restaurant chain here that has really healthy food with no preservatives and prepackaged sandwiches but they're made fresh daily. They also have sushi and other healthy food. I've eaten twice here now and it's really good. I actually really like the healthier food and it isn't that much more than a meal would be at a fast food restaurant. Although it is different not to have condiments like mustard for a sandwich available or mayonnaise. But the sandwiches do have mayonnaise or some other sauce on them. Oh and they call potato chips crisps which is another thing that's different. Tomorrow we are going to see a play called "The 39 Steps". There are other various tours this week and the Thames Festival this weekend along with Proms in the Park.

Can't wait for the next adventure and a fun filled week! Oh and maybe through in 3 classes around there somewhere.

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