Tea with the Queen

London is the single best descriptor for what London’s like—a world all its own without any other place like it in the world. It’s interesting, because when I first ventured through London at the beginning of the program, I didn’t get nearly the glimpse that I got the second time around.

The first afternoon, a wet one, took me from the Cambridge train station to London King’s Cross, where I routinely took pictures of the legendary “Platform 9 ¾” like it wasn’t actually famous. I felt like such a tourist, but instead of trying to hide it under a fake British accent this time, I felt somewhat proud to be an American, and spoke with confidence.

After catching a train to Russell Square station, I walked with my friends Ben, Christina and Kyle to The Generator Hostel, where we would spend the night. It was eight in the evening and we were starving, so after putting down our bags, we walked to a fish and chips shop on the corner and ate the most delicious food I had eaten in a while. The fish and chips just keeps getting better and better each time I eat it.

We caught a train into town—Piccadilly Circus, the most Times Square-esque thing I’ve seen since I was last in New York City. It was beautiful. After getting hassled by club advertisers that would “only charge us a measly £10 quid”, we decided that a pub without a cover would be a better option. So we each drank a pint of beer and headed back to the hostels before the trains shut down for the night.

Upon returning, we spent some good time in the room together: new friends in a new place, and got late night sandwiches that were accompanied by late night laughs. And then we slept like babies.

Saturday was equally incredible in many different ways. Instead of meeting up with the PKP group that was coming that morning to take a walking tour of London (which we had already done twice), Ben, Christina, Kyle and I shelled out the £9 and spent a few hours exploring Westminster Abbey. It was incredible seeing a thousand years of history in one building, from the coronation chair of English monarchs to the graves of King Henry VI, Queens Elizabeth I and Mary. Even Charles Darwin and Isaac Newton are buried here. I think the highlight of the Abbey was seeing the grave of Oliver Cromwell, who was buried, excavated, decapitated for his atrocities, and then buried right back. It was brilliant.

At about a quarter till one in the afternoon, we finally met up with a portion of the group and took a boat to the Tower of London. We passed the London Bridge (quite plain actually), and the Tower Bridge (which is commonly mistaken as the London Bridge), which was beautiful. I fell asleep on the boat, which was sort of embarrassing, but it was nevertheless an incredible ride.



The Tower of London was okay, but there were more tourists in the way than there were things to see. Other than the crown jewels and a few sweet suits of armor in the White Tower (as well as a column with all sorts of guns, pictured), the attractions were standard at best, and scarcely worth the £15 we had to pay to get in. The soft cream at the tower did give a bit of a boost, however, and I ate it with such deliberation that my back actually stopped hurting for a moment whilst the cold memory of childhood touched my tongue and dripped down my hand.

After a few hours, we left the bloody tower and headed to the Globe Theatre (the home of Shakespeare) to watch King Lear. We got dinner on the way at Pizza Express, which was surprisingly delicious. The play was terrible for about the first hour. We were groundlings and had to stand the entire time, so although the acting was absolutely brilliant, my back and feet ached so bad that I couldn’t hardly concentrate at all on what was going on in front of me on stage. I grabbed overpriced lemonade from the concession stand and came back refreshed. When I got lost in the action of what was going on, I forgot about my aches and thought the play was fantastic. At its conclusion, about two hours later (three hours in total), I was so overcome by emotion that I nearly cried. I never liked Shakespeare, but when it’s performed well, it is actually pretty good!

So the group loaded the buses and we headed back to Cambridge for another week of buckling down and working hard, and the trip was over.

You know what? It's actually starting to hit me for the first time how much the United States have actually given me. As much as I wanted to come here this summer, I was worried about nothing more than being an American citizen. I didn't want to have that stigma on me. This administration, this war, this newfound American fear of terrorists and of the rest of the world, has really caused us to make fools of ourselves when going to other countries. The first thing I've been asked when talking to many foreigners is: "Does anyone in your country actually like President Bush?" But none of that can take away from the fact that apart from being much cheaper than Europe, America has a sense of friendliness that Cambridge just doesn't. There is a sense of pride and purpose in our nation, regardless of how much our government has botched up over the past eight (more like fifty) years, and we still have more liberties and power than any country on the globe. And even though the British joke about how our average voter turnout is the lowest in the free world at about 17%, at least we have the right not to vote.

So yes, I may be from a country of lazy, ignorant, egocentric isolationists, jumping at any opportunity to make the world a freer place for all while we give politicians the authority to enact things like the Patriot act and the National Security/ Presidential Directive number 51, but hey... we're freer than anyone else. We've got McDonalds, Walmart and Ford to keep us alive... Exxon, Nike and Starbucks.

But it's still home, and the great thing about our country is that when the people finally realize that they have the power to do something about the corruption at bay, we will stand up and turn this country back into what we hoped it would be all along--the land of the free, the home of the brave, and of course, the Big Mac capital of the world.