People of the World, Spice up your life! Every Boy, Every Girl, Spice up your life!
Come on now! I’m an
80’s baby who grow up in the 90’s and what girl did not love the Spice Girls. I
think the whole time I was there I secretly sang Spice Girl songs in my head.
Like the first album was bomb!
London was great! I have to say I was a bit overwhelmed.
There’s just so much to do and so many people there. It definitely deserves a second
trip. I would highly recommend if you do go to London, just makes sure you have
at least a week to venture around.
Although London is beautiful, it’s quite pricey. It
literally is so disrespectful to the US dollar, it’s about double to the dollar.
I found myself calculated in my head for the full stay. During a solo travel
make sure you plan out funds for when things don’t go as planned. At the end of
my stay, I ended up paying $100 (60 pounds) for a cab to the airport. It was planned and I
was so annoyed but I got there safely and on time so I couldn’t complain.
The first day I stayed at a really nice hostel called Wombats. It’s very chic, clean and honestly you could stay inside the hostel the whole time and have all your needs met. I
arrived at night and explored Tower Bridge. The next day I
did a double decker bus tour, it was a great way to see the city and my form of
transportation for the day. When visiting a new city, I always like to do a
tour in the beginning of my stay. It gives you a visual map of the city, you
see everything and it lets you know what you’re really interested in seeing up
close and personal.
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| The Eye of London |
Throughout the days I was able to go to Museum, where I saw
the famous Sunflower painting by Van Gogh, Regency St. where all the high end
shopping happens, and Camden market where there’s a punk rock culture. I used
the Tube to get everywhere and the train system is super easy, affordable and fast. During
the evenings I hung out with some great people at the Hostel. It was an eclectic
group of Australian, Kiwi (People from New Zealand), Canadian, Finnish, and German travelers.
We sat, enjoyed brews, talked about art, life and the hot topic about Race. A girl from Finland inquired about the issues of the confederate flag in
America and from there the issues of all different countries began to open up.
Here’s what I got from it:
Australia has racial issue with the Aborigines, which are
the natives of the continent. It seem to me that they are in some way treated
like the American Indians here. The Aborigines are being forced to not live in tribal
communities and are pushed into reservations.
Finland doesn’t understand what the big deal is about gay
marriage. Since they were one of the first countries to legalize gay marriage
years ago.
And Canadians are not happy with how their government is
being ran. To be honest I’m not quite sure why, but there seems to be many
reasons.
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| Local Artist drawing maps of the world. |
At that moment, It dawned on me what travel was all about. We
were beautiful representations of our cultures. We were able to exchange
information and be the vessels to relay what we’ve learned. It seemed our
differences were all the same. Traveling is not about finding yourself or
becoming an entirely new person. Its about exchanging information, ideas and gaining
perspective. In traveling you don’t change, your idea of the world does. Your scope
of possibilities and your mind expands and therefore you can not react to the world as you once did. London made my world
bigger yet a whole lot more intimate.
Next Stop: Switz Francs
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