A good week

The day started out with an 8 AM final in my organic chemistry class, then Josh was kind enough to skip some classes and drive me an hour and a half south to SeaTac. Then, a 50 minute flight to Vancouver where I spent an hour sipping a gin and coke with some duty-free liquor I snagged (bought) back in the states and watching the Simpsons. Best layover ever.
Anna picked me up at Heathrow and we jumped on the tube. We headed back to her flat only long enough to dump off my luggage, then we headed out to London to see the sights. We first went to Parliament so I could see Big Ben, Westminster Abby, and the building where she worked. Parliament was a very good lookin' building; it was almost a shame to see it blown up later in the week (in a movie, for those of you who haven't seen V for Vendetta). Lots of gold, lots of statues, and a very ornate outside. I have to admit that if I lived in London and was dirt poor, maybe I wouldn't mind so much if someone blew the thing up.
After that, my memory gets a little hazy, but at some point we had dinner with Ms. Elaine and Mr. Gene, then we headed back to the flat where I was kept up until 2 AM by Anna's flatmate because it was her 21st birthday. Bad times, especially since I had been up since 8 AM the previous day. 6 AM roles around, and we jump up and head to the train station to catch the Chunnel to Paris. It's not as exciting as you might think, taking a train under the ocean. There are fields, then it's dark for about 30 minutes, then there are fields again.
In Paris, we met up with a couple of Anna's friends who helped us find our hotel, which was right across the river from the Eiffel Tower. A few metro stops later and after realizing that even French streets are ostentatious, we found our hotel but our room wasn't ready yet, even though it was 3 PM. I guess that's what a 30 hour work week gets you. We left our bags there and did some sight-seeing, including a church, some French students protesting, and, of course, you have to see the red-light district of any city you happen to be in.
After being approached by a French police officer and answering his questions with blank stares while huddling outside a theatre for warmth, we made it back to the hotel at about 1 AM and collapsed. We drew the curtains and relished the thought of getting a full night's sleep. Later, we woke up. The room was still dark from the curtains. We found a clock. 3 PM. Shit. We hustled out and saw what we could with so little time left and night approaching. We saw the Louvre, but only from the outside because it closed at 5. We did make it to Notre Dame, though. I thought Parliament and parts of London were ornate and grand, but they have nothing on Paris. It was way too much to take in with just a couple of days. Hopefully I can go back someday, learn some conversational French, and see everything again.
The next morning we made it back to London via the Chunnel. Anna went to work, and the rest of the day we just took it easy. On Tuesday, we went to St. Paul's cathedral--built by, designed by, and the resting place of Christopher Wren--but they wanted way too much money to wander around inside, so we just looked around the outside. We went to the Tate Britain and saw the Gothic Nightmares exhibit, which was very interesting and creepy.
Wednesday, we went to the Tower of London, which was awesome, and we went on a tour of Highgate Cemetery. Well, a tour of the east side. The west side was where Marx was buried, but we didn't feel like paying twice to see one cemetery. Anyway, the side we saw was really cool, and had some obscure but kind of famous people, like the guy who founded the YMCA and Michael Faraday. The cemetery was founded in Victorian times, which was evident from the fact that it was very overgrown and at the oldest part, the path was strewn with volcanic glass. That's right, they paved the cemetery path in obsidian. How awesome is that? Pretty awesome, I'd say.
Thursday and Friday Anna had to work all day, so I wandered around London on my own. Thursday I went back to the Tower and had some Starbucks, then I went to the Tate Modern and saw some "art." The highlights were seeing Monet's Water Lilies and Dali's Lobster Phone, both for very different reasons. There was also a very strange exhibit in the main floor of the museum, which used to be a power station, that looked like a bunch of stacked sugar cubes. I couldn't help but be reminded of a video game level, though. I was trying to figure out how to push the boxes together so I could jump from stack to stack and make it across. *Photography was allowed on this level, obviously*
Friday, I went to the British Museum and saw lots of old and shiny things. They have the largest Egyptian collection outside of Egypt, so there were a lot of mummies and bones, which creeped me out a little. There were also a few rooms dedicated to Asian, Arabic, African, Native American, and Babylon. Pretty interesting, and you can't beat a free museum. Right at the entrance, there was a huge covered area with a large reading room in the middle, apparently where Marx penned Das Kapital. Yep, so there ya go. Museums are free, but churches charge you a fortune.
Friday night, we had one last bash at a local pub, where it happened to be karaoke night. I could tell that a few of the singers couldn't actually speak English very well by the trademark way they would interject gibberish instead of words, but keep it consistent with the melody (Dane, I imagine you've encountered this a lot). I also splurged on a £10 Cuban cigar, which was oh-so-smooth, and even got Anna to take a few puffs. I washed it down with Guinness, which does definitely get better the closer you get to Dublin.Saturday, Anna escorted me to the airport and I flew home. Air Canada was nice enough to give me a couple of beers for the flight back, too. Good times.

*For more pictures, visit the London and Paris photo sets on my Flickr*