"London calling"

Well I haven't been able to blog because of the lack of wifi in our hotel.. but overall London was fantastic!
I expected the city to resemble what I had seen in Dublin.. so it was quite a shock seeing HOW big the city really was! Our first night we arrived around 5, settled in to the hotel (first one to have normal looking hallways, defimiteoy more like what I'm use to back home)..we went to SOHO and grabbd some Chinese before a group of us went out to a club! The first thing I realized is that Lomdin has many many different cultures and ethnicities mix throughout... second thing I noticed, their bartenders have no concept of a mixed drink haha ( they seriously give you the craziest look when asking for Bacardi, Cranberry, with a splash of sprite, Bartenders are also paid hourly and do nit work for tips so you can imagine how much time it takes for one drink to be prepared! Draggin ass!)

I wore my orange pants, a button up, tank, and Irish tweed I bought.. I DO NOT exaggerate - I was asked out, hit on, ask to be married, told I was the not beautiful person in the whole wide world atleast 15 times by foreign men. The entire group was getting quite a kick out of it. I have no idea what was in the water. It was like a breeding ground. The funniest one was a man from Siciliy who wouldn't let me leave his side because he could make passionattteee loooove ... imagine the accent. Thank God I was amongst friends to save me. It wasmt just me, don't get wrong.. but I was creeped on the most lol. After the club we all tried to get home. I say tried because it failed miserably.. the underground closes at midnight so we had to take a Night Bus (imagine the one from Harry Potter) except the drivers thick accent, our exhaustion, and the fact that it felt like we had rode around for an hour in a circle led us to get off at the wrong stop.. mind there was atleast 12 of us. So 1/3 wanted to just grab a taxi, 1/3 thought we should cach another night bus, and the other 1/3 was bound and determined to walk home... going "north"... yeah I left my compass at home. So I sat back and decided that being navigationly challenged pretty much told me not pipe in and choose whoever seemed most reliable. In the end we all started walking (not my choice.) We walked for THREE miles. Can you see me .. seriously. Three miles. The entire time I walked next to a girl and plotted that if someone tried to attack the group how I would survive. Each plan imvolbed throwing everyone else in the street as bait and hiding in bushes. It was a rough walk.,.  I don't expect anyone to understand lol. My feet still hurt!
The next morning I went to Portobello Market!  Very very cool antiques,food, clothes, nic nacks.. everything! I bought a pad lodk and key from the 1820s , two shipwrecked coins from the 1800s, an old Franc, letters from a printing press in different shapes that spelled out my name! (Not going to lie, it looks pretty crafty), I bartered with a guy for a dagger like tooth from Indonesia (for a bracelet) , and this marble hand. Its like a hook thing, but I have already started planning an art piece around it!

I ended up drifting away from the group, because there was such cool stuff -like old old clothes and footballs and pilot masks .. crazy stuff - so I actually had to navigate home on the underground by myself.. which I did SUCCESSFULLY. Crazy right!!!! Who knew!  Truthfully the underground is a really simple system.. we had day passes so I went all over the city!

Later that day we had a bus tour of London, the guide was really good. He showed us the normal sights but included this little park (from the the 1800s that created a memorial for the commoners.) Its an entire wall of plaques commemorating those who gave their lives to be everyday heros. Like an eight year old boy who drowned saving his friend.. it really made us take a step back. The city actually is bringing the idea back and has posted a new plaque for a man in 2007. I have photos of some of them.. we drove past the London Eye, and the church where the prince just got married, Big Ben, the bridge from the Harry Potter movie that collapses -called the millennium bridge I believe..I cant remember all of the stops but I have millions of photos haha.. Parker, Tim, and I left the tour early for the Wireless Festival.. it was AWESOME!! I'm not sure if it was the genre of music or that I am in London but people were alot more friendly at the concert.. like there was not a hostile group of people in the crowds not letting people by and elbowing everyone.. it was really nice.. I met a few different people from the States there! Hahahha it started raining and this boy got the bright idea to strip down to his tidy whitey-s and slide face first in the mud. I swear he got more photos taken of him than the Djs lol. I got a deadmau5 t shirt too!
July 7th-
Sooo I was exhausted from the concert and the night before, and the cold is passing thru the entire tour group..needless to say it was a struggle to move. We stole a hot breakfast from the hotel because they tried forcing me to eating crappy bran cereal when there is Dippy eggs and "bacon" (thick ham) right infront of me! Then a gang of us tried to take photos with the guards at Buckingham Palace.. it was ropped off tho, my comedic talents just went to waste! Hah! THEN we walked thru a gorgeous park and I fed a baby squirrel (theyve never had rabies or other diseases here)  and he WRAPPED his little baby squirrel paw around my index finger!!!!!!I about squeeled from excitement !! I have pictures to prove it! We hit up the Gay Pride Parade after.. it was a great time! Soooo many different countries came to support-there was a Polish Pride tent lol. I got two free pairs of shades and a buttload of stickers..anddddddd this guy from a singing group rested his arm on me. It was pretty cool lol.there are SO many people that attended. Utterly amazing! After we tried to go to the Sherlock Homes bar but ended up on the other side of the city.. so there are people called Street Reps who promote clubs and he took us to a club called Rumba (the guy was from Bulgaria, cool huh!) , they played a bunch of R&B and pop (side note, most clubs play a lot of old school American songs we would never normally hear at the clubs its funny)
I was dancing with some friends and this boy came up and said I like your ass, well I thought he said I like your hat because he had a thick accent, so I'm like thanks! lol. He was a bit thrown off hahahaha..

July 8th
Andrew gave us a little walking tour of London and it was SUPER interesting because he explained how social housing works, like our section 8. (Now I remember only 1/3 of what he said so I may not explain it well enough) so Londoners don't pay taxes towards social housing. Out of every 10 houses built 2 have to be for social housing- now people arent all put in one area so it becomes like the slums. They are mixed in with the upper class as well. So their kids are going to the same top schools, and could have property next to someone who pays a quarter of a mill for their waterfront access. That way low paying jobs are not all clustered in the same area too! people can rent for cheap and after so many years you can buy your house - each year it is 10% off the market value. Once you buy you must live their for 5 years or so before you sell. If u do u get to sell for the market price.. the money you originally bought it for goes back into the system and is used to build more social housing.  I think this is SO SO ingenious.  They use to have very scary areas and this completely enhillated a lot of the crime areas!
We went to King's cross, platform 9 3/4 and took photos next to the Hogwarts cart stuck halfway in the wall!! It took soooo much for me to restrain from buying a wand! I stopped at this VERY fancy store where the Queen shops, it had her specific tea that she drinks too.. classy clsssy.  Then we made our way back to the hotel to board the bus to get to our Cruise ship
London to be continued - I'm pooped