Alright, I'm not done with my London trip yet, but I feel like I am gonna have a lot of shit to write, so I'm doing a two part entry about this. I've been jotting down reminders about topics to write about while not paying attention in boring business meetings at various bank headquarters, so this oughta be a pretty detailed summary of my trip.
Let me start out by saying London is a gigantic city. It's overwhelmingly large. It's crowded, loud, and everyone is always in a hurry. I can feel myself becoming more of an impatient asshole every day. It's not good for me. That being said, it is beautiful and quite fun. There is just so much history. This town is 2000 years old (holy smokes!). The London Eye is incredible, especially at night. I got pictures, so you can check Facebook if you care at all.
The first night we were here was low key. We had to spend 2 hours in customs, so we were late to dinner. Everyone was shot so we just hit the hay pretty early. The next day we had some boring business obligations in the morning before going to the British Museum. That museum is so cool. I could have spent a week in there. In fact, if I ever come back I might bring a tent and a sleeping bag and just camp inside. After the museum, a nap was definitely in order, so I took a mini coma for a few hours. We reconvened after nap time to start hanging out as a group. As we were leaving to go out, and I saw this girl running back up the stairs. I asked her what she was doing and she told me she was going to grab something from her room quick and check on some other girls. Obviously, being the chivalrous stallion that I am (I got jokes), I offered to wait for her. Apparently when girls say two minutes it often means that they aren't actually coming out at all and are going to bed. So after 10 minutes of waiting I just said screw it, I'm catching up with the group. So I needed to jog to find my group. Oh, quick disclaimer, I'm not 100% sober. So I jog to the tube station, but obviously I took a wrong turn. One wrong turn leads to another wrong turn which leads to another wrong turn which leads to "holy shit, I am completely and utterly lost in London alone with no map". I decide to try and figure this out myself to avoid a costly cab fare or expensive international phone rates. This gets me even more lost, and I find myself in some sketchy neighborhood. A car driving by was rare, and a passerby even harder to come by. This propels me to decided to suck it up and give some girls a call to help me out, which is a big step for me. They grabbed a map and told me to find my cross streets. When telling someone where you are, "how the hell did you get that far away?" isn't a very reassuring thing to hear as a first reaction. So they pinpointed my location and we started walking towards each other, or at least trying. After I hang up, I hear some British guys behind me.
"Hey American!"
I turn around and just respond with a "Yo, what's up?"
"Hey come here and talk to us!"
"Nah, I'm good, what's up?"
"No, come here and talk to us!"
"Nah, what's up?"
"Just come here!"
So I keep walking, but a bit more briskly. They start walking with a bit more pace as well. I get to a corner and just turn around the corner. Once out of there sight, I just run. I get to the next corner, get around it and peak back. They legitimately ran after me. They looked around the corner trying to find me. So at this point I am frantic, I just book it. I dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge around a few more corners and then wait to see if they are still following, phone in hand ready to call the cops. After a few minutes, there was no sign of them, so I figured I would be OK. I'm real rattled at this point, because not only am I afraid, alone, and map-less, but I just presumably almost got mugged. I don't even want to go out anymore, I just want to be back in my hotel, plugged into Miles Davis, and doing some real slumberin'. After wandering around for another hour or so, I am finally able to meet up with my search & rescue party. It took about 20 more minutes to get back to the hotel. I pass out immediately. The worst thing is that not only did I get lost in London and have an absolutely terrible night, but I still didn't get any sleep because I was out in the London wilderness so late. I had a 3 hour bike tour that started at 9am. Then I had to sit in a bank meeting, and as much as I love scumbag investment bankers preaching me basics about the global economy (/sarcasm), it was really not what I was trying be doing at this particular point in time. So that is my story of my first night out in London. I have lots more to come, but I have to run to dinner right now and go to the Lion King musical. And then I'm going out, with a group this time. I've had a my fill of flying solo. Adios, friends, I will write more on Saturday.
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