Happy Birthday !!!

Happy Birthday to me!!!!

London - Week 1 - Day 1

Now that I've somewhat settled down, I can get down to chronicling my time in the city I love. I arrived here last Saturday and the weather the past week has been amazing. Though your truly has been anything but amazing...though slowly but surely I'm getting there.

Well first things first, the early morning flight which I thought was a good idea at that time turned out to be a nightmare as the whole of India seemed to be queued up to take the flight out... the serpentine queues at the check-in and immigrations had me thinking I would be at the airport a long time. Finally the flight was announced and I guess I was so exhausted that I dozed off the minute they had finished the safety briefing. It was crick in my neck caused by my head hanging at an unnatural angle that woke me up and after that sleep eluded me. Economy class travel that is the lot of poor old me surely doesn't become of me and my Prince Charming ain't coming any time soon so I foresee cricks in the neck for a long time to come.Never mind that, so where were we, yes, sleep eluded me, it was sure a sign of things to come, but ever the optimist I let it pass,thinking of the greener pastures that were to come in the promised land. The plane landed at 7.15 am a good 45 minutes before schedule and by nine in the morning (I was at the apartment building that would be my home for the next 35 days), this inspite of the fact that I took the Heathrow Express into Paddington and then a taxi to my apartment complex at St. Paul's (yes my apartment is in the lane bang opposite St. Paul's Cathedral) .

Since I had arrived a lot earlier, they did not have the apartment ready for me to move in as the previous tenant had not yet checked out, so I was allowed to leave my luggage in the reception and asked to come back at 1ish in the afternoon as this time would allow the cleaning staff to have the rooms ready for me. I had effectively nothing to do while I waited for the room to be ready, so I decided to get some breakfast, I was starving as I don't partake of any food while travelling and my last meal has been at 8ish at night back home in India. Thankfully, London has a number of options Sandwich and Soupwise and I'm one happy girl when here. Though this time I'm sure life is going to be much more difficult as I've become a vegetarian on account of health grounds (the nature of my health problems I will pen down some other time). Having said that I found a superb vegetarian sandwich, and chips and washed it all down with some nice ginger beer.

Having replenished the calories, I still has time to kill so decided to get some sight-seeing done and decided to start with St. Pauls. I went right inside St. Paul's Cathedral and was taking in the beauty of the various murals that were adorning the walls, when I noticed that people were taking their places for the service and I decided to attend it too. The service was beautiful, accompanied by a choir who sang like angels. The singing truly moved you... I can now see why the service was jammed packed with tourists and locals alike. The service ended at 1 and I decided to go check whether my room was available, thankfully it was and I could deposit my belonging and soak in the atmosphere of the rooms that would be my home for the next few weeks. I has just about settled in when S called and was like "Get your a** out of the house, it is such a beautiful day, join me for lunch followed by some quality time lazing around at Hyde Park, Don't you dare go to bed now or you won't sleep at all at night". Little did she or your truly know that sleep from that minute on was indeed a very precious commodity. I'll let the suspense hang for a bit and let in on the reason why a little later in this post. Now if it had been the old me I would have finagled a way out of attending the appointment, but a new raring to go spirit seemed to have been instilled in me, I was like 'Carpe Diem, Baby' and agreed. We met for lunch at Marble Arch and walked to Maroush, a place that serves the best Lebanese food ( this is her husband's favorite Lebanese joint and after eating there, I agree too). Post lunch we walked about at Hyde Park and took in the atmosphere. S and I could only but wonder at the Brits, who just seemed to go gaga over the beautiful weather and could be found lying about in every patch of sunshine available, where as S and I could be found looking for shade to salvage what ever was left of our complexion, no thanks to the pollution in dear old Mumbai. After spending a couple of hours I was dead beat and decided to call it a day. Once was back at the apartment, I dived into bed only to woken up a few minutes later by the chiming of the clock at St. Paul's, the clock chimed every fifteen minutes; at quarter past, it chimed once, at half past twice, at three quarters of an hour it went three times and at the hour it rang four times followed by the Bell pealing the hour (so if it was seven, it pealed seven times), this continued through out the night, I should know, I was up all night... thanks to the incessant chiming, the traffic noise and some animal or bird that kept screaming through the night like it was being beaten to death. This was indeed not a very good start for my time here... but as always we live and hope for a better tomorrow....