A Trip to London Part 2: Scary Horse Statues, Men with Guns and the Artful Dodger.

In my last post I told you all about the seemingly endless process of applying for my J-1 Visa. The paperwork, the bizarre questions, the ordeal of finding the US Embassy for my interview and, of course, the queues, queues as far as the eye could see!

But, once my interview was over and done with and I'd bravely made my way back through the gates of the Embassy, past the guards with giant guns ("you'd better get used to guns if you're going to America. I've seen the ID channel. Guns everywhere!" as my mother helpfully added), my mother and I had the rest of the day to spend wandering around London. And here's how that panned out...

I wanted to go to the Dickens Museum. I mean, they have costumed tours and a gift shop. What's not to love? But my mother isn't a big fan of Dickens...or museums. She wanted to have a wander around Debenhams instead. In the end we compromised ended up in the Disney Store.

Needless to say I got in Cinderella's carriage

From there we went and had a quick nose around Selfridges. I'm not entirely sure my mother understood just how very out of place we were. She kept looking at me and asking if I'd seen anything I wanted to try on. When I told her I definitely couldn't afford anything in the shop she seemed to think that I was just being a bit of a miser until she spotted a dress she fancied and took a look at the price tag.
"I don't have my glasses on. What does that say? £19.50?"
"No...that's £1950."
We quickly vacated Selfridges after that.

At the start of the day it was a struggle to get my mother on the tube. Yes, it’s dank and scary and squashed full of people who shoulder you out of the way and push past you on the station. Yes, it smells and yes it is totally unnatural for human beings to be propelled from one end of the city to the other underneath the ground at hurtling speeds. But, for all its unhygienic and terrifying qualities, the tube really is the best way to get around.

And, once my mother got over her initial fear that we were all certainly going to die and saw how quickly we could hop on at one station and pop up somewhere entirely new, she really began to enjoy it. In fact, when we got home that night, she and my dad discussed the wonders of the tube in depth for half an hour or more. As if it was some kind of miraculous new invention.

Next ventured over to Camden Market on a whim. It was awesome! You could spend days wandering through the little stalls, peering at all the weird and wonderful curiosities on display. There were clothes, jewellery, ornaments, books, food, artwork…pretty much everything you can imagine, only quirkier and more bizarre. There were little winding alleyways, cobbled tunnels and shops that were tucked up and hidden out of the way, a barrage of different sights and sounds and a new smell every time we turned a corner (some good and some…not so good).

The Stables Market was my favourite (despite the fact that the horse statues made me very uneasy) because its nineteenth century stonework, worn floorboards and general hustle and bustle made it feel almost as though the Artful Dodger could pop up at any moment. I guess it was the next best thing to the Dickens museum.
  

Next we headed to Covent Garden. Yes, I know it’s one of the most famous places in London and yes I know it has a Chanel and a Burberry and it’s very fancy and all that, but I preferred the randomness and weirdly endearing griminess of Camden Market. Besides, I am in no way posh enough to go wandering around Dior so it’s just as well that I stick with the little stalls in Camden where a pair of earrings is £4. 

When the time came for us to get our train, neither of us were ready to head home, partly because we were having such a lovely time nosing around London and partly because we had foolishly left it until rush hour to catch the tube. Commuters are hostile at the best of times, but in the city centre at 5:30pm a tourist could potentially lose a limb.

Spending the day in London made us realise that we really don’t take advantage of the interesting places we have on our doorstep. Here I am jetting off to explore America and I still haven’t even begun to explore to UK. So I’m going to make an effort to travel more within the country. Top of the list? The Dickens Museum!