London calling

Same same but different

This is my first time in London and I’m really not sure what to expect. It’s somewhere I feel I should visit but I’ve never felt really drawn to. Maybe it’s because growing up in NZ there were so many connections to England – BBC news and UK TV, food, music, stories, games and nursery rhymes. It’s pretty typical for kids in their late teens/early twenties to go to London, find a job and use it as a base to travel from. My daughter was born when I was 21 so I skipped that experience, and when I did start to explore the world I headed to more exotic places like Vietnam and Peru, anywhere that felt different really. Still, I’m curious to see what London is like.

I have a few days to myself before I meet up with my friend Claire and I’ve booked an apartment in South Kensington which is close to the city centre but in more of a local neighborhood. After the bustle of Singapore and I’m ready for some aimless wandering. Landing at Heathrow is kind of exciting, and it’s easy to catch the tube into the city. My apartment is on the top floor of a building called the thin house (it’s shaped like a wedge, maybe less than a metre wide at it’s narrowest point, which happens to be the shower!). It has amazing views across the park and towards the Victoria & Albert museum, and it’s perfect for a few days.

The best way for me to get a feel for a place is just to walk, so with my Oyster card in hand and Google maps I head off for a day of tube-hopping, meandering, and getting lost. There’s so much that is familiar about London – places I’ve heard of like the Ritz, Fortnum & Mason, the Savoy, and following the monopoly board from Piccadilly to Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, Regent Street, Bond Street…then there’s the Thames, the Tower of London, London Bridge (is not falling down even though that’s the nursery rhyme playing sing-song in my head). Turn a corner and there’s something familiar. I spend hours walking the city,taking photos and trying to get a read on the vibe of the city. Everywhere has a specific vibe – and I’m finding London hard to pin down. There’s loads of history and the city is hugely multi-cultural, but people aren’t super friendly and it’s really strange to be on the tube with everyone jammed together and no one looking at each other. There’s masses of tourists around too.

My favourite moments are in the parks which are dotted everywhere and where the squirrels run around not bothered at all by the people stopping to photograph them. Super cute! I message friends to say I’ve seen squirrels and they ask @What’s your highlight so far?” Hands down it’s the squirrels (we don’t have them at home). And the food is amazing. The fruit is super fresh and so cheap to buy. And my morning at Borough markets 🙂 🙂 🙂 the cheese! the brownies! the cheese! If only my stomach was as big as my eyes. I love the street art dotted around the city too and happily spend a few hours tracking down graffiti. The British museum was also cool – if you go there look for the Parthenon marbles (the original statues that were once atop the Parthenon in Greece and have been kept largely intact….not the small glass marbles I was imagining when someone recommended I go see them 🙂

I’m not a big fan of musicals or shows but if anyone is, London is the place to be. My one fancy splurge here is at the Ritz which I spy as I’m walking down from Piccadilly Circus, and on impulse decide to go in for a drink. “Can I help you madam?” the doorman asks and when I say I want to go in for a drink he says “that’s fine madam but not in those shoes”, before guiding me to the cloakroom where another kind man finds a pair of more appropriate shoes, takes my smelly sneakers (as if they were priceless) and leads me to the bar. Totally felt like a princess, and ordered a glass of vintage champagne and a salad nicoise to celebrate the start of my travels 🙂

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