naked old men

Saturday (over a week ago, not this past one. I know, I really need to get caught up.) we started the day a little later because we were so tired. Our first stop was Portobello Road, which you should already know that I love. Actually, I basically just love all of the markets. I wish there was stuff like that out here. I'm pretty sure my parents liked it and it was cool to walk around and check out what everyone was selling. We had some lunch there made up of fruit and this freaking awesome chicken sandwich dealo. It was the bomb. For real. Too bad you'll never get to try it. We didn't  buy anything, just looked around, ate and then peaced out.


After Portobello, we headed to Hampton Court. We had to do some finagling with the tube and the train, but finally we got there. We split up again because I wanted to finish up what I hadn't seen the last time. I went into the Georgian Apartments and the kitchen area and then I still had some time to kill before meeting up with my parents so I went back to King Henry's apartments again. The Georgian part of the palace was cool, but not as cool as everyone told me it was. Maybe they just couldn't compete with all the other palaces I'd seen at that point, but it definitely wasn't my top favorite part of Hampton Court. The kitchen area was pretty sweet. And giant. It's no wonder Henry was such a fatty, I'm pretty sure it would be hard not to be a fatty with the kitchen he had. It was an entire wing of the palace. Craziness. The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra was practicing for a performance while we were there too and that was way cool. They are very talented (though that's probably pretty obvious by the title of their performing group). My parents, or at least my mom, was disappointed in Hampton Court. She was expecting it to be a lot cooler, which was unfortunate. I wish I could have taken them to Windsor Palace. I'm fairly positive they would have loved it.


After we got back from Hampton Court, we went and grabbed waffles at Waffle Palace, which is down the street from the Centre. It was delicious. Then we did a little souvenir shopping and walked home through Kensington Gardens. We also unsuccessfully tried to do laundry but it was closed so we just hung out at the hotel


On Sunday we went to church at the singles ward close by. It was the earliest church we could go to, so who cares if everyone's single except my parents. But apparently a lot of tourists were thinking the same thing because there were at least 5 other families there. It was good ward, not as exciting as some of the other churches we've been too. Mainly because everyone, shockingly enough, was normal. After church, we changed and all that good stuff and went to Tower of London. It was already latish afternoon at this point so first we stopped and had lunch at Wagamama's, this super popular Japanese place. I had been wanted to go there for quite some time and I thoroughly enjoyed it.


Tower of London was just as great the second time. We went on a guided tour with one of the yeoman (aka a beefeater) and it really added to the stuff we saw. I knew a lot of history about the Tower before but there is so much to know so it was interesting to hear about the things I didn't know anything about. The guide was way funny and kept making jokes about Americans (but in a humorous way, not an offensive way). He flat out told us that the things he would be telling us were stories and not necessarily history, which made me like him infinitely more than Tony the liar. Plus, most of his stuff sounded legit. He showed us where Jane Grey stayed before she was executed and the apartments that were built for Anne Boleyn when she married Henry VIII. The coolest part you ask? The guide took us into the chapel, which is where all of the executed people are buried so I got to see Lady Jane's and Anne Boleyn's grave. SO COOL!


After our little tour, my parents and I split up again and they went and saw the crown jewels, while I went to the prisoners tower and the Royal Fusiliers museum. The tower was freaking awesome. It has all of these carving of people who were held there and it's all labeled so you know who wrote what. There are two different places where JANE was scratching into the stone, but since Jane wasn't actually held there, they think it must have been loyal followers that scratched it into the stone. The museum was interesting. It was all about war. But I'm still not exactly sure what the Royal Fusiliers do or who they are. Some sort of military is all I got out of it.


After Tower of London, we walked across Tower Bridge and got some of the fabulous roasted peanuts they sell on many of the bridges. We walked to this Christmas store my mom wanted to go to but it was closed on Sunday's so no Christmas store for us that day. Then we walked to the Globe because we had tickets to see Dr. Faustus, which is written by Christopher Marlow, one of Shakespeare's contemporaries. I had read the play so I was really interested to see how it would be acted out. It was really good but it wasn't my favorite (nor was it my favorite when I read it). The actors were really good, I just struggle with the plot sometimes. I don't find it quite as entertaining as some of the Shakespeare plays I saw at the Globe. We had great standing spots though, right up against the stage. There was some awesome nudity as well. The old guy, who happened to be standing right in front of me at the time, pulled his pants down and I got a great view of old man butt. Pretty disgusting. I also had food spit out on me by another actor. Also disgusting.