This was the part of trip in which I was thoroughly pissed off with my group members and wanted nothing more than to come home. Now, not because I didn’t enjoy England and Scotland, because I can tell you sincerely that I loved it, rude people and all. Actually, that made it better because then I didn’t have to pretend to be nice. It’s just I couldn’t tolerate the people I was with anymore.

First problem: Riding the Tube.
My answer: It’s not that hard.

The thing about being from a smaller town in the States is that we had a number of people who had never ridden a train system in their entire lives. And for those of you who have, you know it’s incredibly easy because most of the time you are riding in a straight line, and when you aren’t there are several signs to tell you how to keep going in a straight line. Oh no, not my group. Now, there are 50 people who need to get on and off the train at once which isn’t a good idea anyway because that’s too many people for two people to be keeping track of. But that couldn’t be helped, so I digress.

Half of the kids were not listening while half of the “adults” were panicking because there were too many people on the train and we all should wait for an empty car. Really? No, really? You expect to find an empty car at 5pm on a Thursday into London? Or in any city for that matter? Give me a break.

Oh, let me backtrack. So, we arrive in Barking, London at the Etap. First of all, they didn’t have enough rooms booked for us so they had to send one of the students to the hotel next door which was sketch to say the least. Then, the room that me and these two other less than enjoyable people had came complete with a toilet that you had to fight to flush, a window that wouldn’t close and a television that was locked on a channel that showed prison films. Great.

Back to the tube.

After a lot of screaming (and we had to do the entire screaming, pushing Londoners, and people being upset several times) we were in London, where I went to see The Eye with one half of the

50 while the other went to the Tower of London. The way to The Eye though took a bit of a trek though, because someone went and committed suicide on the tracks of the Circle Line, so we had to take a different train to get there. Apparently, it’s run of the mill so nobody really cared when over the PA System we heard, “The Circle Line is closed until further notice. Someone has gone onto the track and the Circle Line is closed. Please take the … to …. into order to reach….”

The Eye is a big ferris wheel, that is hot as hell, and has a very long line. I wouldn’t recommend it because even though it wasn’t awful I can’t believe I spent money on it.
After being late to returning to the meet-place because the other 24 members of my group broke up into smaller groups, we went to Trafalgar Square and our guide went who knows where. It’s at this point that I lost my shit and screamed at this girl.

Another thing about England/Scotland. Pedestrians do not have the right of way.
I know that in the  States you can just cross the street because if they hit you with their car, their loss. No. Meaning, do not start to walk across the street and then stop because your friend is busy buying neon glasses at a kiosk at the corner and look confused when people are telling you to move. The cars will not stop. The bus will not stop. Why does it take me screaming at you (after I spoke calmly several times) to get you out of the damn road and then you catch an attitude? Anyway.

Seeing as I didn’t really have anyone to bounce ideas off of when we split up, I went to an internet cafe and realized EasyInternet is actually a chain that connects onto stores for business (This one happened to be connected to a Subway.).

I was pretty despondent at this point considering I was on the internet in a foreign country, so I went to a bookstore across the street and bought tea, then sat on a fountain the square to drink it next to George Washington until it was time to have dinner at a subpar chinese restaurant. We went and saw King Lear at Shakespeare’s Globe and it was actually really entertaining. Went back to the hotel afterwards and went straight to sleep because it was a really, really bad idea to spend a lot of the day walking around in heeled boots for 7+ hours then standing for a 3 hour play. The next night we saw The Woman in Black at Fortune Theatre on Russell Street which was good as well and wasn’t scary as much as there were loud parts that made you jump. Again, got back very late and went to sleep. Then 4:30am wake-up call for the flight back to the states. At the airport I bought a 2-disc CD set Insomnia and then bought the June issue of Mixmag (a dance magazine), which I wish was available in the States that came with a CD. I almost bought Ministry of Sound: Chilled boxset because there wasn’t any tax in the airport, and regret that I didn’t because I think the only place that I could’ve bought that here was Tower, and that’s closed.

Somewhere in there, we visited Warwick Castle because I have tons of pictures of wax figures and picture of myself in the stocks. Again, not somewhere I would visit again. Same with Anne Hathaway’s cottage. I left a lot of things out, like the sushi takeout in the square where you paid per piece of sushi and it was 10p per soy sauce packet, or the creepy tour guide with questionable teeth who told me I was attractive. But you got the idea.

I’m pretty sure that I would’ve enjoyed this trip more had I gone with a different group, visited less tourist attractions and more places where people actually went, and not eaten so much “american food”. You wouldn’t believe how many people were bitching that we didn’t go to Pizza Hut while we were over there.

Ridiculous.