Day One: The Arrival

Day 1

Today I arrived in London!! I met up with 4 other people who'd been on the same flight as me, and with all of our many bags in tow, we proceeded to make our way through the Heathrow airport, stopping frequently to try and figure out where the heck we were, and obstructing traffic every time we did, because we invariably stopped right where we were, which was generally in the middle of a walkway or right in front of a ramp or staircase, with all of our enormous bags. I wondered what all the other nice European travelers walking past us with their single, immaculate personal items must think of us. (They weren't all like that, some of them had several grundgy bags). Anyway, with the help of a friendly old lady and many tube workers, we managed to get out of the airport, board the tube, and get on our way. I was glad it was a Saturday and there weren't too many people getting on and off at most of the stations because we took up a lot of space!

The thing that immediately struck me about London was the humidity. Even before we got out of the airport, just in the underground tunnels below, it was markedly humid. And then All the roads smell like gas and smoke, because of all the cars and all the people smoking (apparently, the British smoke a lot). One thing that I did think was funny was that time I was on the tube I felt like I was at Disneyland. The car would go clacking along in the dark like Space Mountain, and then it'd come out on theses quaint little picturesque houses and fairs, which looked like something you'd see in Disneyland sets.

I was a bit surprised by the fact that the "underground" isn't actually underground for large stretches of time. At one point, we actually went over a highway. It was pretty much smooth sailing up until we had to climb staircases. Most of us had 1 or 2 big bags each weighing around 50 lbs, and it's hard to carry two of those up the stairs, especially after an abnormally long day with very little sleep. But it turns out there are plenty of helpful people in London, and several times people around us offered to help carry our bags.

There are also some not so pleasant Londoners. While we were waiting at Earls Court to switch from the Picadilly to the District line, we saw a foreign guy not 20 feet from us start shouting at a black man, and I'm mean really shouting. He was swearing and making threats and obviously very, very upset for some reason that I'm not even sure the black guy knew. And this guy just keeps working himself up, until suddenly he takes off his coat and trying to be more threatening. And then he unbuttoned his shirt and took that off too, and started trying to show of his muscle (difficult, since he wasn't a particularly slim man). A well intentioned, but very small Indian man (who'd previously been very helpful in directing us on what train to take) went over to try and calm it down, and soon had backup and there wasn't a problem. But I thought people only acted like that in movies.

But there are lots of interesting people in the tube, and most of them are nice people. There was a little family standing next to us for a couple of stops with the cutest little boy, who thought the pipes and graffiti on the wall were skeletons! And he had an adorable British accent too. You don't really think of little kids having accents. And while I was waiting for a train, I saw a little old lady across the tracks with a skirt and a blue shawl carrying a bright, multi-colored umbrella, who I'm pretty sure had to be somebody's grandmother. [Oh, and as a sidenote, my umbrella theory was completely disproven--lots of Londoner's carry and use umbrellas. Also hats and raincoats]

Anyway, we made it to the BYU London Centre, which is two old Victorian townhouses near Nottinghill Gate and next to Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park. They're really very nice inside, and also very tall. I'm up I don't know how many flights of stairs, but it felt like an eternity dragging those bags up those stairs one at a time. After we got sorted out, we went for a walk down the street to get acquainted with the neighborhood and buy a few necessities (soap, shampoo, toothpaste, that stuff) The British employees got a kick out of our jetlagged disorientation and comments like mine, where I was looking for change in my pocket, so I handed him a coin and said, "I don't actually know what that is" and he laughed, told me it was a pound, and in giving my change said, here, "I'll give you a few more of those things" and gave me about six different kinds of pence. We also got Oyster cards for traveling on the tube and buses.

It was kind of a long and confusing afternoon, because my body couldn't figure out what time it was. It felt like 10:00 in the morning for hours, and then at some point it switched to several hours of 4:00, and sometimes I was so tired I couldn't physically keep my eyes open, even though at home it wasn't even noon. They say it's easiest to jet lag if you just make yourself stay awake that whole first day without taking any naps. Well, I sure hope that works out well for me, because I'm very tired. But I've made it to London!