London - Day 2

Both yesterday and today were phenomenal. After my post yesterday, we ended up walking around downtown London, from Buckingham Palace and right along the River Thames all the way up to Tower Bridge (the bridge from the song!). We ended up taking a lunch break through Chinatown here in London. But from what I've seen, it didn't look as big as the faithful Spadina Chinatown in Toronto. After lunch, we briefly stopped at the London Eye (but never went on as the lineup was huge; then took a stroll by the famous Shakespeare Globe Theatre...restored in it's entirety, complete with a thatched roof after a fire in 1613 burned it to the ground. A short ride back on the underground completed our day. Overall we walked a fair distance...about 10km total for the day...so by the end of things my legs were done.

Upon returning back to my aunt and uncle's flat on Great Portland, my aunt wasted no time and ended up cooking a huge dinner! After dinner, my aunt, uncle, my mom and I took a drive down to Greenwich to their other flat to spend the night. I thought that the first flat was amazing...but I was amazed at the sight of their other one. It is a penthouse suite located on the edge of the River Thames with a spectacular skyline view of downtown London...need I say more?

I would have posted something last night, but I was just too tired. I went to bed around midnight and woke up around 9:30am local time...even though it felt like I didn't sleep at all...I think the jetlag is slowly wearing off though, cause I feel pretty decent right now.

Today was also another sweet day. We started off getting brunch at this Italian joint where I got my first coffee(s) since I landed. We didn't waste any time and headed about one hour north of London to the University of Cambridge. The interesting thing about both Cambridge and Oxford here in England is that everything is separated into "Colleges", including the famous King's College and Trinity College...the alma mater of Isaac Newton. Each college serves as a home for students that gets selected for the college...almost like the Harry Potter sorting thing. The college you stay at becomes their home for the next three to four years of their education. Friendly competition in sports and academics then occurs between each college here. Cambridge houses over 800 years of tradition and history within it's walls, all of which are evident in the ancient stone castles and churches present on the grounds. Needless to say, I've been considering doing graduate school at Cambridge, and being there today put a huge leap forward in my decision...but we'll see when that time comes. Both my cousins here in England; Lennard and Julian attended Cambridge (one of them went to both Oxford, then Cambridge for medicine) so as you can see, I have big shoes to fill, my dad was also educated here in England.

After the visit at Cambridge, we drove and picked up my cousin Julian, the younger of my two cousins here from his flat a few minutes north of London. He's 23 years old and is working as a chartered accountant for a huge firm in downtown London. Pretty amazing stuff. We then went to a Japanese restaurant for a huge sushi dinner, and now I'm here...in bed with some mad itis. So I will stop writing here, and let you guys have something to read without boring anyone. Tomorrow is going to be a pretty big shopping day...so I'll see what expensive things I can buy. Things are pretty expensive here...and the fact that the exchange rate isn't in our favour doesn't help out too much. Have a good night!

Simon